The Pretender (19 page)

They parted company in the entry, J.J. heading left to the den, while Sage followed the women to the kitchen. When he joined them, Sunny was explaining about the storm coming in, and the snow, apologizing for causing them to worry and pleading for forgiveness with every other word.
Rachel was assuring her it was
okay,
they just
cared
about her, and she’d checked on Pia and made sure she had plenty of food and water, but the cat had hidden under the bed when Rachel tried to pet her and wouldn’t come out. Josie was bustling around getting out food, intermittently sniffling and wiping her nose on her apron. When Sage walked in, she threw him a tragic look worthy of a stage
drama queen.

Rachel and Sunny left to tend to their respective babies. Sage went over to his mother and put his arms around her and pressed his chin against her temple. “Hey, Ma,” he said huskily.

The only reply he got was a prolonged sniff, as she went on laying bread slices on the counter for sandwiches.

“Look, I’m sorry—we both are. It was a lousy thing to do, making you worry
like that. But it’s okay…we’re okay. You knew where I was, right? Because I called Ramon. And by the time I knew she’d followed me, I was out of cell phone range. Look, it won’t happen again, I—”

She turned suddenly in his arms, and her eyes were swimming with tears.

“Ma, what—”

“You spent the night together. Up there. In the cabin.”

He burst out laughing. “Is
that
what’s
got you so riled? Jeez, Ma.” She went on gazing at him, not angry, but more as if her heart was breaking. He heaved a sigh. “Okay, first of all, nothing happened. Okay? I wouldn’t do that—go behind Sam’s back like that. And second—”

“Nothing happened?”

“No, Ma.”

She closed her eyes, and a tear spilled over and ran down her cheek. When she opened them again, she still looked at
him as if the world was about to end. “But you want her.” He didn’t answer, and she took a step back, pushing away from him. “I know you do. By the way you look at her.” It was an accusation.

He began to feel stirrings of anger. “Yeah, Ma, so what if I do? I like her. More than like her. What’s wrong with that?”

“You
can’t.
”

His mother’s voice was like tearing cloth. He didn’t
know what to make of such grief. It didn’t make sense.

“Why? You think I’m not good enough for Sam’s granddaughter? You think Sam would think that? Why would he? He’s never—”

She lifted her hands in despair and let them fall.
“You just can’t.”

She turned, shaking her head. The ember of his anger blossomed into flame, became an inferno raging inside him, fed by all the slights,
big and small, that had plagued him throughout his life because of his ethnicity. But this—from his own mother…

“I can’t…I can’t…tell you,” she said in a rasping voice, drawing quick shallow breaths as if she couldn’t get enough air. She walked rapidly away from him, and at the door to the dining room she paused and motioned with a jerky wave of her hand.

He was so angry he could barely
see, but she was his mother. So he followed her.

Marching with head down, like someone on a mission, Josie led him through the dining room and living room and into the entry. Through the open door to the den, he could hear J.J. talking on the phone in a low voice. Josie turned and pushed open the double French doors that led to the courtyard, then resumed her headlong march, across the courtyard
to the wing opposite the one where Sunny, J.J. and Rachel had their quarters. Down the veranda she went, with Sage keeping pace a few steps behind. He knew, now, where she was going.

At the far end of the courtyard, the white stucco wall of the chapel rose a full story higher than the rest of the hacienda, broken by three narrow-arched stained-glass windows, and an arched carved wooden door.
Jutting another story higher than the red tile roof of the chapel was the bell tower. It was square, with a red tile roof and arched windows on three sides that Sam had had installed when he took the bell out of the tower and converted it to a room, and mounted the bell on the patio overlooking the valley. The tower was his hideaway, his private place, and when he came to the hacienda it was
where he stayed.

The door to the chapel wasn’t locked. Josie opened it and went through without looking to see if Sage followed. As his mother marched the length of the narrow chapel, lit only by the light from the stained-glass windows, he hung back, his footsteps slowed partly by anger, and also by nameless dread. His heart pounded now, not from anger, but from fear.

What the hell’s
going on?

Up ahead, Josie was mounting the steps to the altar. She reached up to turn the candle sconce on the right, and the altar moved slowly outward to reveal the low door behind. She opened the door and went through. After a moment’s hesitation, Sage went after her. He’d been to the tower room many times before, of course; he couldn’t explain why this time felt so different. As if he
was about trespass in a different world. A different and unfamiliar reality. One he was beginning to realize he probably wasn’t going to like.

When he reached the tower room, he found his mother searching through Sam’s desk, opening and closing drawers and muttering to herself. In one of the deep bottom drawers, she seemed to find what she was looking for. She hesitated, gazed down at it
for a moment before picking it up and placing it on the desktop.

It was a stack of paper, what appeared to be handwritten manuscript pages. She sniffed, wiped both cheeks with her hands, rubbed her hands on her thighs, drying them. Then, never once looking at Sage, she began to lift pages, turn them over and set them aside. He waited in stifling silence broken only by the whisper of those
pages as she searched through them for the one she wanted. At last, she let out a hissing breath, placed a hand palm-down on the page, and looked up at him. Her face was blotched, her eyes liquid and full of so many things—sorrow, compassion and even fear—none of which made any sense to him but somehow made the dread that weighed on him all the more oppressive.

“Read this,” she said, and
quietly left him.

Sage stared after her with burning eyes, then pulled the pages toward him. His hands felt stiff, and his movements were jerky, with anger, resentment…fear. Almost against his will, he looked down at the pages and began to read.

After a moment, he inhaled sharply and sank into the chair behind him.

From the memoirs of Sierra Sam Malone:

She was walking
down the road when I first saw her. Her hair was black as a crow’s wing, and she wore it pulled back in a ponytail, straight as string and hanging down her back. She had a pink diaper bag slung over one shoulder, and she was holding the hand of a little bitty child—a girl-child with hair as black and straight as her mother’s, tied up in two little tufts, like ears. The woman was walking slowly,
but even so, that little girl’s short chubby legs were having to work pretty hard to keep up.

I pulled up alongside in my pickup truck and rolled down the window. Told her to get in, I’d give her a ride. She threw me a look, quick and kind of scared, but it was enough for me to see the bruises on her face, the cut lip and tears in her eyes.

“Honey,” I said, “you come on now and get
in here. I’m not gonna hurt you, but if you tell me where I can find the sonuvabitch who did that to you, I’ll see to it he never hurts anybody ever again.”

Well, she sort of smiled, but that must have reminded her about her cut lip, because she touched it with her fingers as if it shamed her. She got into my truck, and I asked her what her name was. She told me it was Josephine, and her
little girl’s name was Cheyenne. I asked her where she was going, and she said she didn’t know, so I took them both home with me.

She was a good cook, Josie was, and she fixed my meals and kept house for me. I never asked more of her, but the night she came to me, I didn’t turn her away.

She was young and warm and good, and I was an old man who’d given up on finding anything good in
this world. She brought laughter and light and love into my life, and in the last years before I met her I’d known precious little of those. And in time, she bore me a son, when I’d lost all hope of having another child.

We named him Sage, his mother and I, though my name’s not on his birth certificate. And I made Josie promise me she’d never tell him who his father was, not until after
I’m gone. I did that for the same reason I never married her, and she said she understood.

The truth is, I only ever failed at two things in my life. One was being a husband.

The other was being a father.

He’s a good boy, my son. And the finest man I’ve ever known. I think he loves me. I know he respects me. And if he never learns the truth, I figure I might have a shot at keeping
it that way.

She was watching for Sage. Waiting for a glimpse of him. Wondering where he was.
This is terrible,
she thought.
When did I start needing him like I need food and water…air to breathe?

She and Rachel and Sean were in the living room. Rachel had changed Sean’s diaper and nursed him while Abby showered and changed her clothes and checked on Pia, who was still sulking, naturally,
and bit Abby’s hand when she tried to pet her. Josie was in the kitchen getting dinner, and had chased Rachel and Abby away when they’d offered to help. Now, Sean was on his tummy on a blanket on the floor being cute, while Rachel sat cross-legged on the blanket with Sean and peppered Abby with questions about the cabin and the ride up there and back, which, she said, she would have given
anything to see and do. Abby sat on the couch and tried her best to describe everything while her mind kept wandering off, wondering about Sage.

J.J. came in from the den, and Rachel’s face lit up like a child’s on Christmas morning. And Abby thought,
I wonder if my face does that now when I look at Sage.

J.J. leaned down to touch Rachel’s hair and tickle Sean’s tummy, then asked where
Sage was. Abby told him she didn’t know. J.J. shifted direction and was heading for the kitchen to ask Josie when Sage walked in.

He came in slowly, hesitantly, as if he wasn’t quite sure where he was. Abby felt her stomach drop in a sickening way—something like being on a fast-moving elevator. His face was gaunt. His skin, normally a warm brown color that seemed to glow from inside with
health and vitality, now looked like old parchment. Oh, God, Abby thought.
Something’s wrong. It must be Sam. Something’s happened to Sam.

She half rose to go to him, but he bypassed her and went directly to J.J., not even glancing at her.

J.J. pivoted awkwardly on his crutches to face him. “I was just looking for you. Couldn’t get hold of Alex Branson. Left him a message. Found the
chopper pilot’s number, but he’s not answering his phone, either.” Sage nodded, in the vague sort of way of someone who isn’t really listening. “Anyway,” J.J. went on, speaking in an undertone, “in the meantime, I called a friend of mine with the Kern County Sheriff’s department. They’re sending a forensics team up to the cabin.” Sage let out a breath. J.J. added with a shrug, “Just in case.”

Sage nodded, and a grim silence fell. Just as J.J. was clearing his throat, about to say something more, Josie appeared in the doorway to tell them dinner was ready. Her face was a softer, rounder version of Sage’s, and her eyes looked swollen and red, as if she’d been crying.

Sage turned abruptly away without looking at her, and gave a brief, awkward wave of his hand. “Uh…think I’m
gonna pass. I’m not really hungry, and anyway…got things to see to down at the ranch. So…guess I’ll see you. J.J., call me…” His voice sounded like something being ground up.

He must be sick, Abby thought. But if her son was sick, why wasn’t Josie showing any signs of motherly concern? She didn’t protest, or ask any questions—didn’t act as though her son was even in the room. As Sage made
his exit, Josie just smiled in a desperate sort of way and cooed at Sean, then directed everyone to the dining room, explaining the wind was still blowing too hard to sit on the patio.

Something’s wrong.

Hoping not to look too obvious, Abby made muttered excuses about needing to use the bathroom and went after Sage.

She caught up with him halfway down the front steps. He glanced
at her and she had only a glimpse of a face impassive as a mask before he looked away, off across the meadow to the blue-shadowed mountains. He didn’t speak. She fell into step with him and they walked together down the lane, into the shade of the tall pine and poplar trees, past beds of rose bushes heavy with blooms and fragrance.

Finally, unable to stand it any longer, she said flatly,
“Sage, what’s wrong?”

He looked at her, then, but with such anguish, she caught back a little cry and moved instinctively toward him. His face contorted as though with intense pain, and he gripped her arms and held her away from him as if her touch was poison. She felt as if he’d struck her.

“Something’s wrong.
Tell me, damn it.
” She didn’t shout. Her voice was low, and she could hear
it tremble with fear.

He couldn’t look at her, at first. When he finally brought his eyes back to her face, it was as if he had to struggle against a powerful force. The cords in his neck stood out, and she was sure his grip on her arms would leave bruises. That realization seemed to come to him, too, because he let go of her, suddenly, and put both hands to his head as if to smooth back
windblown wisps of hair. He exhaled, then spoke in a voice she could barely hear.