“Of course.”
“We’ve been through a lot of drama together. We need time to really get to know each other before we do anything drastic.”
“You mean you need time to find out if I’m going to bore you to tears,” he said.
“No. That’s not what I meant, not at all.”
He got to his feet, caught her by the shoulders and gently hauled her up out of the chair. “We’ve both been burned, so we’ve both got reasons to take this slowly. But for now can we just go back to the first question? My answer is yes, I would consider marrying you.”
“And I would consider marrying you.”
“Let’s stop right there for tonight.”
She put her arms around his neck. “Okay,” she said. “We can stop there. For tonight.”
“I won’t change my mind,” he said.
She smiled. “Neither will I.”
CHAPTER 70
He awoke to the gentle sound of rain on the window. It was still dark outside, but dawn was on the way. He could feel it. He turned on his side and gathered Charlotte close against him.
She stirred and stretched. “Morning yet?”
“Almost,” he said. He levered himself up on his elbow and kissed her tumbled hair. “I’ve been thinking.”
“About your new business plans?”
“No, about us. Will you marry me?”
She turned a little and opened her eyes. “I thought we were going to take our time. Get to know each other.”
“I know everything I need to know about you,” he said.
She smiled and touched the side of his face with her fingertips. “Do you?”
“I told you, one of the tenets of my work is the fact that people don’t change—not deep down at their core. You are the woman I want to marry now and you will always be that woman.”
“Is that a way of saying I’m predictable?”
“No, it’s a way of saying I love you.”
“That will work out nicely because I love you. But, then, you probably already knew that, didn’t you? What with me being so predictable and all?”
He smiled. “Sometimes it’s important to hear the words.”
“Yes, it is.”
She pulled him down to her and kissed him.
CHAPTER 71
Max stopped on the sidewalk outside the restaurant.
Charlotte looked at him. “You don’t have to do this.”
“Yes,” Max said, “I do. But you two don’t have to go in there with me.”
“Sure we do,” Anson said. “Family.”
“He’s right,” Charlotte said. She glanced down at her hand. Max’s fingers were locked around hers, covering her engagement ring. She raised her head to meet his eyes. “Family doesn’t let family do this kind of thing alone.”
“Damn straight,” Anson said.
“There’s something else to consider,” Charlotte said. “In addition to feeling very curious about the half brother they never knew they had, your brother and sister may also be feeling really, really awkward. Maybe even guilty.”
Max frowned. “Why would they feel guilty?”
“They may be afraid that you’ll resent them because they got the father you never had,” Charlotte said.
“They’d be wrong.” Max looked at Anson. “I got the father I was supposed to have.”
Charlotte smiled. “Exactly. And that’s what we’re going to show them today.”
Anson grunted, but Charlotte thought he looked quietly pleased.
“Are we going to do this?” he said. “Or are we going to stand around out here on the sidewalk until it starts raining again?”
“Let’s get it over with,” Max said.
He opened the door and led the way into the crowded restaurant. He did not release Charlotte’s hand. He gripped her fingers as though she was a talisman.
She spotted the two people they had come to meet almost at once. There was an aura of tension around the booth at the back where a dark-haired, well-dressed man in his late twenties sat across from an attractive woman who was a few years younger. There were two cups of coffee on the table but no food.
She knew that Max saw them at the same time. A kind of stillness came over him.
Anson fixed his cop eyes on the booth where the two people sat.
“Reckon that’ll be them,” he said.
Max did not say anything. He started forward.
The dark-haired man in the booth was seated facing the door. He saw the trio coming toward him first and said something to the woman, who turned her head to look over her shoulder. She was tense, Charlotte thought—anxious and nervous.
The man got to his feet. He was built a lot like Max and he had the same gold-and-brown eyes. He looked wary but determined.
“Max Cutler?” he said.
“Yes,” Max said.
“I’m Ryan Decatur. This is my sister, Brooke. Thanks for meeting us today.”
“Thanks for making the drive from Portland,” Max said.
He held out his hand.
Relief warmed Ryan’s eyes. He shook Max’s hand.
“Let me introduce a couple members of my family,” Max said. “Charlotte Sawyer, my fiancée, and Anson Salinas, my dad.”
“A pleasure,” Brooke said quickly. “Will you please join us for lunch? Or just coffee, if you prefer.”
She appeared braced for rejection.
“Lunch sounds good,” Max said.
“Yes, it does,” Charlotte put in quickly.
“About time someone mentioned food,” Anson declared. “This is a restaurant, after all.”
There was some scrambling around to rearrange the seating. When the dust settled, Brooke and Ryan were on one side of the table. Charlotte and Max sat on the opposite side of the booth. A waiter brought a chair for Anson, who was positioned at the end of the table. Anyone walking in the door would have assumed he was the patriarch of the clan, Charlotte thought, amused.
Once the food had been ordered, the floodgates opened. They talked about everything except the past—the traffic on the interstate, the weather, how Seattle had boomed in recent years. Ryan and Brooke bombarded Max with questions. He answered them patiently.
“Were you really a criminal profiler?” Brooke asked.
“What’s the investigation business like?” Ryan wanted to know.
And then Brooke looked at Max. “I owe you more than I can say. I would never have been able to forgive myself if I had allowed that con man, Simon Gatley, to worm his way into the family.”
“Forget it,” Max said. “I’m sure you and the rest of the Decaturs would have figured it out sooner or later.”
“It would have been later,” Ryan said. “A lot later. Gatley was good. I’ll give him credit for that. He even had Dad fooled.”
“At first Dad didn’t want to believe what his lawyer was telling him about Gatley,” Brooke said. “He knew the information had come from you. He said we couldn’t trust any of it. He said you probably had an agenda.”
“But Dad is too good a businessman to ignore hard data,” Ryan added. “He keeps a security firm on retainer. He asked them to look into Gatley. They confirmed everything that was in your report. Can’t believe Gatley got away with the con for so long.”
“He’s still getting away with it, as far as we know,” Brooke said. She shook her head. “He’s moved on, but I hate to think of all the people he’ll be able to scam before the authorities finally manage to nail him.”
“Brooke was afraid you wouldn’t show up today,” Ryan confided. “I was afraid that if you did show, you’d be angry.”
“No,” Max said. “Curious, but not angry.”
“I’m sorry Dad didn’t come with us,” Brooke said. “I know he’s grateful because you saved the family from
Gatley. But to be honest, he’s having trouble processing this whole situation. Mom is handling things better than he is. She told him he should come with us and meet you.”
“Probably better this way,” Max said.
“His loss,” Brooke said.
“Or not,” Ryan said quietly.
His attention was riveted on the front door of the restaurant. Charlotte and the others turned in their seats to follow his gaze.
A grim-faced man with silver-gray hair and hard-to-read eyes walked toward the table. He moved at a steady, deliberate pace, as if he wasn’t certain that things would end well when he reached his destination. At the same time it was clear to Charlotte that he was committed to the journey. One foot in front of the other, she thought. She smiled to herself.
“I didn’t think he would change his mind,” Brooke whispered. “Dad must have gotten into his car right after we left Portland.”
Anson pushed himself up out of his chair and stood back, giving Max room to get to his feet.
Davis Decatur came to a halt in front of Max and looked at him.
“I came to thank you for what you did,” Davis said. “You didn’t owe us . . . me . . . anything.”
He put out his hand.
Max took it. “It’s okay.”
The handshake was a bit stiff, but it was a handshake, Charlotte told herself.
“He did it because that’s the kind of thing he does for a living,” Anson said.
“I understand,” Davis said. He surveyed Anson. “And you are?”
“This is Anson Salinas,” Max said. His voice resonated with pride. “My dad.”
“I see.” Davis extended his hand to Anson. “I understand Max lost his mother when he was young. He was lucky to find you.”
“You’ve got it backwards,” Anson said. He shook Davis’s hand. “I was the one who got lucky. Plenty of room at the table. You hungry?”
“Yes,” Davis said. He smiled at Ryan and Brooke and then his gaze settled on Max. “I believe I am hungry. It was a very long trip.”
CHAPTER 72
Charlotte was in the Fireside Lounge, chatting with some of the residents who were waiting for happy hour, when she got a pleasant little whisper of awareness. She turned and saw Max standing in the doorway.
She smiled at him. His usually cold and unreadable eyes heated—not with passion, she thought, although that was surely part of it—but with promise; with love.
It would always be like this, she thought. The sense of connection was real. It wasn’t just the by-product of the danger they had shared together. She knew now that it had been there from the beginning and it had only grown stronger.
The residents greeted Max with enthusiasm. They were getting to know him quite well. He responded and then looked at her.
“Ready to leave?” he asked.
She glanced at her watch. “Yes. I’ll just get my things.”
Ted Hagstrom, the engineer, winked. “Got plans for the evening, eh?”
The others chuckled in a knowing way.
“As a matter of fact, we’re going to spend most of the evening looking at paint chips,” Max said. “Got a lot of work to do on the house.”
“I’ll meet you in the lobby,” Charlotte said.
“Right,” Max said.
He edged aside so that she could slip through the doorway and then he turned back to his conversation with the residents, who were all suddenly buzzing with remodeling tips and tales of DIY projects gone bad.
She hurried down the hall to her office to collect her jacket and bag.
When she arrived in the lobby, she saw a familiar face—Ethel Deeping’s son, Richard. He smiled and greeted her.
“How are you doing?” he said. Concern marked his face. “We read about the kidnapping in the press. Mom told us all the details. What a nightmarish experience.”
Charlotte smiled. “You do know that your mother helped save my life and the life of my stepsister, I hope.”
“Mom said that she took some photos of the car the kidnappers used and that your fiancé used them to help track down the bad guys.”
“All true,” Charlotte said. “Needless to say, my stepsister and I are extremely grateful to her. Ethel was a real heroine.”
Richard smiled. “She loved every minute of it, believe me. She approves of the new fiancé, by the way. Says you’re going to hold the reception here at Rainy Creek Gardens. She’s very excited.”
“So am I,” Charlotte said. She turned and saw Max coming toward them. “I’ll introduce you. This is Max Cutler. Max, this is Richard Deeping, Ethel’s son.”
The two men shook hands.
“A pleasure to meet you,” Max said. “Ethel was brilliant. She got the pics and she made the call that alerted me to the kidnapping. Can’t thank her enough. Charlotte and I took her out to dinner the other night. She wanted to hear the whole story.”
Richard chuckled. “She’ll be talking about dinner with you and her part in the adventure for a long time to come, believe me. Glad she was there for you when you needed her.”
“She was,” Charlotte said earnestly.
“It will certainly make for an exciting chapter in her memoirs,” Richard said.
Charlotte took a deep breath. She would never get a better opportunity to give Ethel’s family a gentle warning about the memoir they would soon be reading. She glanced around the lobby, checking to be certain that there was no one within hearing distance.
She turned back to Richard. “Do you have a moment to discuss Ethel’s memoirs?”
Richard’s eyes lit with enthusiasm.
“Sure. She loves that class. Great idea, by the way. Got to capture the details about the past while we still can, right? Once the older generation is gone, a lot of history is gone, as well. Luckily, Mom’s memory is still sharp.”
“Yes,” Charlotte said. She lowered her voice. “Ethel’s memory is very sharp. And so is her imagination.”
Max looked at her. “Charlotte, you may not want to go down this road. It’s Deeping family history and it might be a little more complicated than we know.”
Richard’s brows shot up. “Define ‘complicated.’”
Max winced. Charlotte ignored him.
“It’s just that your mother has decided to sprinkle a little fiction into her plot,” she said. “I mean, into her personal history. I don’t want you to be surprised by some of the more . . . imaginative parts, that’s all.”
“What is she fictionalizing?” Richard asked.
Max shook his head, but he had evidently decided that it was too late to interfere. He kept quiet.
“The part that may seem a bit . . . sensational is the chapter on her marriage,” Charlotte explained. “She writes glowingly of your father, of course. She mentions what a fine businessman he was, for example. She talks about his service to the community. She’s very clear that he was well respected and a good provider. She even says he was an excellent golfer.”
Richard nodded. “All true, as far as I know. I was quite young when he died, though. Just nine years old, so I don’t remember a lot about him. My sister was barely seven. That’s why Mom’s memoirs will be so interesting.”
Charlotte cleared her throat. “I’m afraid they may be a little more than interesting. Here’s the problem—after telling us about your father’s accomplishments and how he had the respect of the entire community, she says she, uh, killed him.”
Richard looked at her, his face expressionless. “Mom wrote that in her memoir?”
“I’m afraid so. She feels it makes for a more dramatic ending.”
“Well, I’ll be damned.” Richard started to grin. “Does she, by any chance, say how she did it?”
“I believe there is a brief reference to putting some sort of medication into his oatmeal the morning of the day he
collapsed on the golf course.”
“Ah, so that was it.” Richard nodded, satisfied. “We always wondered how she pulled it off. No one ever questioned the heart attack. But, then, Mom was a nurse. She knew how to make it look good.”
It was Charlotte’s turn to stare. “What?”
“Sounds like Mom told you the truth about Dad,” Richard said. “As far as the community was concerned, he was the perfect husband and father. But the reality was that he was an abusive monster at home.”
“I see,” Charlotte said. She couldn’t think of anything else to say, so she decided it was time to take Max’s advice and shut up.
“Mom wanted to take my sister and me and leave, but the bastard threatened to murder all of us if she did. He would have done it, too. And then, one day, he conveniently dropped dead on the golf course. My sister and I didn’t understand it at the time. Mom never talked about it. But later, when my sister and I were older, we pieced it together.”
“Your mother actually did kill your father?” Charlotte managed.
“Probably,” Richard said. “No one else could protect us—hell, no one else would have believed there was even a problem. A restraining order wouldn’t have worked. So Mom did what she had to do to protect my sister and me and herself.”
“Oh, my,” Charlotte whispered.
She noticed that Max was giving her an amused I-told-you-so look. She pretended to ignore it.
Richard looked at her. “Family secret. Got a problem with that?”
“Nope,” Charlotte said. She looked at Max. “Do you?”
“Nope,” Max said. “I hear most memoirs are part fiction, anyway.”
“Right,” Charlotte said. “Lot of fiction in the memoir genre. Everyone knows that.”
“I’ve heard that, too,” Richard said. He smiled and looked across the room. “There’s Mom now. If you’ll excuse me?”
“Yes, of course,” Charlotte said, aware that her voice was somewhat faint. “Enjoy the evening.”
“We will,” Richard assured her. “It’s a birthday party for one of her grandkids. Mom loves parties.”