Don't Let Go(71)

Yeah.
“You ready?” Seth asked, a hint of a knowing smile playing at his lips.
“Sure,” I said. “A stop or two first.”
We ducked into the bookstore for a bit so I could introduce him better to Ruthie. She cried again, hugged him whether he wanted it or not, and gave him two fresh-baked peanut butter cookies and a book to take with him.
That’s what made her Ruthie.
I called Nana Mae, but there was no answer, so I left her a message.
“I figure you’re probably out walking, so call me when you get this, or come by the house. And just so there’s so cardiac arrest involved, I have more than pictures now.” I glanced at the man in my passenger seat. “Seth is here. In person.”
“Makes me sound famous,” he said. “Like Pink. Or Usher.”
“See, I would have gone with Sting or Madonna,” I said. “Maybe Cher. But I’m old.”
“Touché.”
“And you are famous to us,” I said. “You’ve been the secret on the shelf for too long. You coming out to shine makes it the best day ever.”
Seth took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I’m glad. You never know what reactions might be.” He raised his eyebrows as we turned into a residential section. “I read so many horror stories online about meet-ups gone wrong. I nearly turned around and drove back home the second I got here.”
“Seriously?” I said, feeling the tug at my insides. “But you said Noah’s dad got in touch with you.”
“Yeah, but that was just a grandfather. It wasn’t you or Noah.” I stopped to meet his eyes at a stop sign. “He wanted to surprise his son. That could have gone twenty different ways.”
“Wow, you’re right,” I said. “I bet that was scary. Thank you for not going home.”
Seth smiled, a little crooked, and the Noah of two decades ago peeked out. “Yeah, I’m glad I didn’t.”
I faced forward and continued driving, determined not to get mushy. “So, Detective,” I began, trying to lighten the subject. “I don’t see a wedding ring on your finger. Anyone special in your life?”
And my attempt at lightening was probably the most awkward thing ever to come out of my mouth. All these years, he’d been a baby. A child at most. Here he was a man, and I was asking him if he had a woman. I might as well check his wallet for condoms while I was at it.
A sigh laced with a bit of frustration came from his side of the car. He raked his fingers through his short hair.
“There was.”
I opened my mouth and closed it again. Don’t be awkward a second time. It was a harmless question but might not be to him. Might be huge. Might be too personal to talk about with someone he just met a few hours ago.
“I was engaged, actually,” he continued, canceling out my self-flogging. “For a whole four months.”
“I take it it didn’t end well?”
“No,” he said on a sigh. “Best way to kill a good relationship is to put a ring on it,” he said, smiling at his joke. But the smile didn’t reach his eyes. “We were together for three years before that. We should have just dated for life.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I hate to hear that.” I was. I wanted to go beat up the girl that hurt my baby and made his eyes look like that.
“It’s all good,” he said. “I should have known it was too easy with her. Too good to be true.”
“There’s something to that,” I said. “Sometimes it’s the harder relationships, the complicated ones you have to fight and claw for that have staying power. May give you gray hair and bruises, but, you know.”
Seth laughed. “Probably one of the things that spurred me on to find where I came from. I needed a diversion. And a connection.” He paused and looked my way. “I’m really glad this went well.”
“Me too,” I said, rounding onto my street. Becca’s car was in the driveway. At one in the afternoon on a school day. I blew out a breath. “Hold on to that thought, babe.”
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Not sure, but my Spidey sense is all twitchy.”
I pulled next to her little blue car and got out, staring a hole in the front door as I approached it. The door wasn’t locked, and we were greeted to a dancing Harley as she viewed Seth as new love. He instantly went to one knee and got acquainted, all the while absorbing the room in seconds.
“Becca?” I called.
The thump from above didn’t give me a warm fuzzy. Then her door squeaked open at the top of the stairs.
“Yeah?”
Yeah? Seriously? “Becca!”
A sigh that had an audible eye roll with it traveled the stairs. “I’m coming.”
The door closed, and she headed down, her steps quick. Her lopsided hair swung out to the side as she came into view and opened her mouth to argue, but whatever words she had at the ready stuck there when she saw Seth petting Harley. She glanced at me in question.
“Why are you home?” I asked.
Her eyes went back to him. “Why are you?”
“Becca.”
Thank God she still had respect for “the tone.” I didn’t use it often, wanting it to be the sound of doom that would stop her in her tracks when I really needed it. This qualified. She straightened up and fiddled with the railing in front of her.
“I wasn’t feeling well,” she said.
“Are you sick?”
“Might be.”
“The school didn’t call me,” I said.