Somebody to Love (Gideon's Cove #3)(115)

“You were screwing my babysitter, Harry! You were dog shit!”

Her father shook his head “See, that’s your problem, Parker. Granted, I’m completely to blame for that day. But nothing I could do afterward could ever make up for that one stupid roll in the sack. You wouldn’t forgive me. Ever.”

“You never apologized,” she said tightly.

“You seem to wait for people to disappoint you, Parker,” he continued, ignoring her comment. “And guess what? They will. People make mistakes. We’re not perfect. You want to know why I like James? Because he likes me, Parker. Not many people do, in case you haven’t noticed. It was nice to be with someone who wasn’t simply kissing my ass or talking behind my back. He didn’t sit and judge and wait.”

“You paid him well.”

“Well, I haven’t paid him since May—”

“But he said—”

“—and yet he’s the only one who comes to see me, other than one visit from you. Two, counting today, which I gather is for you to vent your spleen and tell me what a shitty father I’ve been.”

“Do you have any idea how much I missed you, Dad?”

The question shocked them both. Harry’s eyes widened, but he said nothing.

“When I was a kid,” she went on, slowly, as the thoughts seemed to form only as she spoke, “you made me feel like the most important person in the world. I worshipped you, Harry. Everything I did, I did to impress you. But after that day, you could hardly look at me. It was like you hated me.”

“I didn’t hate you,” he said. “I never hated you.” His gaze dropped to the table.

Parker looked at her father, the once-powerful legend of Wall Street. For years, it seemed that Harry had a pact with the devil, barely aging, the only change the silvering of his hair. But in prison, the years had caught up. He’d missed a spot shaving, and the skin under his eyes was puffy. His hair was longer, and a lock stood up in the back, same way Nicky’s did. Maybe her son’s cowlick wasn’t courtesy of Ethan’s gene pool. Maybe her son looked a little bit like his grandfather.

“I never hated you, either, Dad,” she said gently. “I moved into Grayhurst because it was where my happiest times were. Except for that one day.”

He looked up, and his eyes were wet. “I’m sorry about your trust fund,” he said. “I hope to make it up to you and Nicky both when I get out.”

“Don’t bother,” Parker answered. “Losing it was the best thing that ever happened to us.”

There was another long silence. “I’m sorry about the babysitter,” he said, so quietly she almost didn’t hear.

She reached over and covered his hand with hers. “Thank you.”

“No touching,” said the guard. Parker squeezed her father’s hand, then obeyed.

* * *

SO THAT WAS SOMETHING, she thought as she drove home. Obviously, you didn’t repair a relationship that had been neglected for a quarter century in one conversation. But they’d said more across that little metal table than they’d said in years. Decades. It was a start.

Her father’s words echoed in her head. You wait for people to disappoint you.

No one had ever called Harry Welles dumb.

Beauty greeted her at the door, wagging vigorously, sniffing her shoes to see where she’d been. Parker bent to pet the dog’s soft head. “How was your day? Tell me you didn’t just lie on the couch and watch QVC.” The dog wagged some more, her eyes filled with love.

Funny, how Parker really hadn’t been looking for a dog and now couldn’t imagine life without her little pal.

“Come on, sweetie,” she said, heading upstairs.

Nick had left his drawing pad on her bed; they’d been coloring last night. She missed her son in the familiar rush, even though he hadn’t been gone for even twenty-four hours. Flipping through his pad, she saw the chronicle of their recent life—a girl with curly hair and blue eyes who could only be Colette, Nicky’s love. A brown-and-white dog. “It’s you,” she said, holding out the pad for Beauty to see. Lots of pictures of swords and maces. Darth Maul, his face distinguishable by the red-and-black coloring. A school bus with smiling faces in the windows. Sweet.

The next one gave her pause. Two smiling stick figures next to a house with a triangle for a roof. The smaller figure had spiky hair and held a gun and a square. The taller figure had curly brown hair.

James and Nicky and the nail gun.

He must have drawn this recently; the drawing pad was the one she’d bought him for school.

So he’d been thinking about James. Remembering him fondly, even, because the stick figures were holding hands.

She put the pad down and, on impulse, went to her closet for the box of stuff she’d taken from the house in Maine. Some rocks her son had insisted they bring. The plastic tomato with the top hat and eyelashes. The red notebook of her wretched story ideas. The manuscript of Mickey the Fire Engine. A piece of driftwood Beauty had brought her. Two pieces of blue sea glass.

She wasn’t sure what she’d been looking for. Sighing, she opened the notebook. There were the pulverized chipmunks. Swimmy the Shark, being eaten by his mommy. The Lonely Maggot. Nice. Quite a theme of distress here, most def. Oh, crikey, the Ark Angels. That one was really scraping the barrel.