Tell Me No Lies (24 page)

He cut a glance her way. "Bonner's job corps?"

"Why not?"

He shrugged, his expression thoughtful.

By that time they were at the farmhouse. Trey was playing basketball at a hoop in the back. He stopped to watch them drive up and park.

"Hey, Trey." Hank called his nephew over. "You remember Miss Baker."

"Hello, Trey " She tried a smile on him, but he only gave her a sullen nod and went back to playing.

Hank frowned and opened his mouth to reprove him, but she stopped him. "It's all right. I don't mind. He's just being a boy."

"He's just being a brat." But there was an edge to me pronouncement. Worry, frustration. Even affection. Lucky boy to have someone care that much about him. Even if he didn' t seem to know it.

Hank escorted her into the house. They came through a mudroom with a concrete floor and a series of hooks crowded with coats, hats, and scarves. Boots were scattered against one wall, and opposite sat a long wooden bench for putting them on and taking them off. A shovel, a pile of newspapers, and a rusted pail lay about. It was a mess, but a mess made by many people living and working together, and it welcomed her.

Since it was spring and mild, neither she nor Hank were wearing boots or coat so they passed through and into the kitchen. Warm and lived-in, the room was festooned with leftovers from decades past. A countertop lined in well-worn black-and-white octagonal tiles. Long, deeply hung cabinets with plain fronts painted yellow. In one corner a round table sat snugly. Edged in chrome, it had a flecked gray surface and red leatherette chairs with matching chrome trim. In another corner, Rose's stolid form hovered over a pan on the stove.

"Look what I brought home," Hank announced, and Rose turned. Her face broke into a smile when she saw Alex.

"I'm so glad." She opened her arms and embraced Alex. "We were sorry to hear about your housekeeper. And worried about you." After a brief hug, she broke off and stepped back, examining Alex. "How are you? Really."

Alex opened her mouth to assure the woman with some meaningless phrase like "fine," but Rose gazed at her with genuine concern.

"Tired," Alex said at last. "Worn down."

Rose squeezed her hand. "That's what happens. Grief is exhausting. Let yourself get plenty of rest." She ushered Alex to the table. "Come sit down. Get her something to drink, Henry." She turned to Alex. "Coffee? Henry's got some beer in the fridge, I think. And there's always apple cider."

"Cider would be nice."

Rose found glass and bottle, which she set in front of Alex. The juice was cold and sweet and tasted like summer.

"Excuse me a minute," Hank said. "I'll go find Mandy."

When he'd gone, Alex turned to Rose. "Are you making dinner? What can I do to help?"

Rose frowned. "Not a thing. What did I say about rest?"

"I'm not an invalid. Besides, I'd rather not sit here feeling sorry for myself. I can cut and chop. And I'm good at fetching things."

"Well, I do need a couple of jars of green beans. They're in the pantry. Through the mudroom and turn right"

She followed the directions and ran into Trey, who was just coming into the house. He looked startled to see her; his face colored, and she wanted to put him at ease.

She smiled. "Your grandmother sent me for a couple of jars of beans. I think I'm lost. Can you help me out?"

He stiffened, then, "They're in the pantry. Here." He showed her the door, opened it, and stepped through. 'The beans are up there." He pointed to a top shelf filled with a bounty of home-canned fruits and vegetables in mason jars.

"How does your grandmother do all this and run the orchard, too?"

"She doesn't. Those are last year's."

Something about the way he said it caught her attention, a tensing of his shoulders, a hitch in his voice. Last year. When his mother had been alive.

"Special then," she said softly.

He shuffled his feet and looked down. "My mother did those. She grew them in the garden and canned them herself."

There was a small silence. A rush of pity went through Alex.

"You must miss her very much."

Trey shrugged.

"I hardly knew my mother. She died when I was six. Sometimes I wish I could have known her. Wish I could have had her through all the rough times."

"Doesn't do much good to wish, does it?" His voice was biting, and as though he heard the tone and didn't want to say more, pointed to the jars above him. "Want me to get those down for you?"

"All right."

He clambered up a step stool and brought down two jars of beans, handing them to her one at a time.

"I appreciate you letting me share your family fox a little while. I hope you don't mind. Your uncle is trying to help me."

He snorted. "Better watch out, then."

This wasn't the first time she'd seen him express contempt when it came to Hank. "What do you mean?"

He gave her that sullen shrug again, his gaze roaming the room, anywhere but on hers. "I don't know."

"I think you do."

He looked at her defiantly, eyes hot. "I thought he'd help, too, but it didn't exactly work out mat way."

She thought back over what Hank had told her about his sister's death. "You called him that night, didn't you?"

He peeked at her truculently. "So?"

"So I was wondering. Who are you really mad at? Him? Or yourself, for making the call?"

His face went white. Without another word, he dashed out of the room, barreling into Hank, who was coming in.

"Hey, what's the matter?"

"Nothing. Let me go!"

He wrenched himself away and ran past.

Hank swung around from the empty doorway to her, his eyes wide and astonished. "What happened? Was he rude? He can get pretty mouthy."

"No, no. He was fine." She glanced down at the mason jars she was carrying. For Trey for all the Bonners they contained memories as much as anything else. She wished she hadn't spoken. "It was my fault I shouldn't have said anything. I hit a nerve."

"He's all nerves these days, so hitting one isn't too hard." He sighed. "We used to be good friends, Trey and I." He stared out the doorway, regret all over his face.

"Why don't you go talk to him?"

"That never seems to work too well."

She hesitated. Who was she to get mixed up in this? She'd already said too much, gotten too close. Look at the mess she'd made.

But she plunged in anyway. "This time you might try telling him it wasn't his fault."

"What wasn't?" Hank unloaded the jars from her arms and led her out of the pantry.

"What happened to his parents."

They were crossing the mudroom toward the kitchen when they heard a door slam. Hank winced.

"He doesn't blame himself. He blames me."

"He made the phone call, Hank. You only answered it."

Hank slowed to a stop. "What do you mean?"

"You're the detective. Think about it."

Slowly he turned toward her as though still absorbing what she'd said.

"Stupid kid," he muttered. He piled the jars back in her arms and left her standing in the mudroom.

The door to Trey's room was shut tight when Hank got there, but he could hear the music pounding through. He knocked, and when Trey didn't answer, knocked again, louder. When there was still no answer, he opened the door.

The sound hit him like a tidal wave, raw, rhythmic, and deafening. Trey lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling. He took one look at Hank, and said, "Go away."

Hank raised his voice. "Turn off the music, I want to talk to you."

The CD player sat on a shelf above the bed. Trey reached up and turned the volume higher.

"Trey " Hank practically had to shout. With a snap of his wrist, he switched off the machine. The music cut out in midnote.

Trey jumped up. "You can't do that. This is my room."

He reached for the CD player, but Hank grabbed his arm before he got there.

In every interrogation there were times to be soft and times to be hard. Looked like this was one of the latter.

"I said, I want to talk to you." He shoved the boy back on the bed. Trey bounced a little on the mattress, and Hank saw tear tracks on his face.

And just like that, Hank's plan to use strong-arm tactics vanished. He sat on the edge of the bed. How was he ever going to make this right?

"Look, Trey "

"I don't want to talk to you."

"I get that. So don't talk. Listen." He paused. How the hell to find the words? "None of this is your fault, Trey. None of it."

His nephew stared ahead, stone-faced.

"Whatever you think you did or didn't do, or should or shouldn't have done, what happened to your parents was not your fault Blame me if you have to blame someone. Just don't blame yourself."

The stone face began to crumble into tears.

"Ah Trey..." Hank did what he would have done with anyone, what he'd done a million times for Mandy: he took the boy in his arms.

"It's not your fault, Trey."

"I'm like him." Trey's voice broke on a sob. "I'm just like him."

"God no, Trey. You're you."

"I get so mad all the time. And I hit people. Just like he did."

Oh, God. Is that what was really bothering him? Hank pulled away so he could see his nephew. "Trey, look at me. Look at me." His heart broke at the sight of Trey's thin, narrow face, so like Tom's and now flushed with tears and confusion. "Your dad made a lot of bad choices. He hurt a lot of people, including you. But that doesn't mean you'll make the same choices. You can be like him or not, Trey. It's up to you. Nothing is written in stone. You can choose."

Trey peered down, his voice snagged. "What if... what if I make the wrong choices?"

"Do you think you will? Really?" Hank hooked a finger under the boy's chin and raised his tear-stained face. "Look inside yourself, Trey. Your mom lives there, too. Do you think she'd let you do that? When you get mad, listen to her voice. When you want to hit something, remember her. She never hurt a thing in her life."

Trey sat, breath hiccuping, and Hank hoped to God he'd heard him.

"I love you, Trey," he said softly. "I know it's not the same as having your mom here. And I can never be your dad."

"Who'd want to be?" Trey looked at him glumly.

"I would. My own version, not his." He hesitated. "I... I'm sorry I took him away from you. Whatever he did, he was still your dad."

Trey picked at a piece of skin on his thumb, focusing on his hand as if it were vitally important "Grandma said you had no choice."

The memory flashed, quick and bright as summer lightning. The crazed look on Tom's face, the strength in his arm as the screwdriver plunged into Hank's chest.

"I didn't think so. Sometimes that's how it works out."

He nodded. "Life sucks."

"Sometimes. But sometimes it can be pretty damn good. If you let it."

Trey threw him a look Hank could only describe as adult. "You mean like Miss Baker?"

Hank blinked. Then he laughed. "Yeah, Miss Baker is definitely one of life's pluses. Not to mention that she's also a royal pain in the ass."

"Most women are," Trey said with grown-up forbearance, and Hank repressed another smile.

In the distance, Rose called them to dinner, and Trey scrubbed at his face with the bottom of his T-shirt.

"Don't tell Mandy, okay?"

"Don't tell her what that you think she's a pain? She already knows that."

"That I was such a crybaby."

Hank's heart hitched. In spite of everything, Trey was still a boy after all. "Not a chance, pal. Not a chance."

***

Whatever had happened between Hank and Trey, dinner was a pleasure for Alex. The food was plain but honest pot roast and mashed potatoes, a simple salad made from pale green spring lettuce.

She found herself smiling more than she'd done in a month Mandy pestered her about Russian, and before the meal was over they were all counting to ten even Trey, who'd been reluctant at first, and Rose, who couldn't always get her mouth around the exotic sounds. A whole roomful of Bonners booming,
"Odin, dva, tri, chetyre, pyat, shest, sem, vosem, devyat, desyat!"

"Eleven," Mandy yelled. "What's eleven?"

"Too much to remember," Rose said, her face stem, her eyes twinkling.

"If we learn everything tonight, she won't have a reason to come back," said Hank, winking and making Alex blush.

Everyone rose at once to take plates to the sink. The clatter and scrape of chairs and dishes, the clink of silverware and glasses all mingled with babble and laughter, sounding strange and familiar at the same time. For far too long she'd been a hungry little girl, nose pressed to the window of other people's lives, and now there she was, right in the middle of that bright, warm fantasy. It was overwhelming, overpowering, and very, very nice.

But after leftover chocolate cake and, of course, apple pie, it was time for the fairy tale to end. Alex asked to be taken home.

"I've imposed on you too much already," she said with an apologetic tone to Rose.

"No, you haven't," Mandy said. "We like you."

Trey rolled his eyes. "Uncle Hank likes her."

"Well, I do, too." Mandy's stubborn assertion made them all laugh again.

"I'm glad," Alex said, and meant it. "I like you, too, Manya."

Mandy giggled.

"And she's not going home," Hank announced.

Alex turned from the little girl to her uncle. "Oh, but I must."

"Not tonight. You're staying here. We have plenty of room."

Mandy jumped up and down, clapping her hands. "Yes, oh yes, please stay."

Trey shook his head but didn't offer an opinion, which Alex took as a good sign, and Rose only nodded.

Alex sighed. How could she let herself be persuaded so easily? How could she not?

"It's very kind of you, but "

"There's nothing at home for you, Alex." Hank's voice was low, the look he gave her deep and understanding. "There's no reason tor you to be alone."

Alone.
The word rattled inside her like wind in a cold, empty room. She looked around at the warm circle of faces gazing back at her.