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“And you could end up in the pool.”
He started chasing her, and she squealed with delight as she ducked through a squat rack. He nearly had her cornered when Claudia’s voice rose up behind him.
“I bought you all this equipment and this is what you do with it?”
They froze, both looking a little guilty when they finally turned toward her.
“I went to tuck you in and you weren’t there. It’s after nine.”
“There’s no clock down here, Mom.”
Claudia looked around the expansive room, discovering that her daughter was right. “That’s no excuse. Now march. When I get up there, your teeth better be brushed and you better be under the covers.”
“Okay,” she said. As she passed Rapp, she gave him a hard jab in the leg and then darted away. He would have liked to chase her up the stairs, but it would be too obvious. He’d avoided being alone with Claudia for about as long as he could.
“She’s never going to get to sleep now.”
“Sorry. But there really isn’t a clock down here.”
“There will be tomorrow,” she assured him. “Would now be a good time to talk?”
“Well, I’m in the middle of working out,” he said, immediately regretting it.
“Is that what you two were doing? Working out?”
Checkmate.
“I guess I can cut it short.”
“Thank you.”
They just stared at each other for a few seconds. This was her pet subject. If she was waiting for him to start, they were going to be here for a long time.
“I need to do something, Mitch. After finishing your house, my life has lost its sense of direction. I love being Anna’s mother—it’s the most important thing in the world to me. But it can’t be the only thing.”
“You take care of me, too.”
“You would be fine in a tent in Afghanistan,” she said, and then waved a hand around her. “Does any of this even matter to you?”
“A few months ago I would have said no,” he said honestly. “That shithole I was living in kept the rain off my head as well as any place. But now? Yeah. It matters.”
“And us? Me and Anna?”
He thought about her question for a long time, finally realizing that he’d been wrong. He didn’t really give a shit about the house. The concrete, glass, and overpriced furniture weren’t what made it home. Claudia and Anna were.
* * *
Claudia slid back beneath the sheets, pressing her naked body against Rapp’s. The pace of her breathing increased for a moment but then returned to the gentle rhythm he’d been listening to for the last three hours.
The point of no return with her—and with Anna—had now been crossed. He thought about his wife and how much he’d loved her. About his unborn child and what that child would have meant to him. And, of course, about Claudia’s role in their deaths.
Were they looking down on him right now? And if so, what were they feeling? Betrayal? Anger at the fact that every day their memory lost a little bit of sharpness? Or relief that he’d finally moved on?
Ironically, the hours they’d just spent creating a seismic shift in their relationship had also allowed him to once again delay the conversation about her going to work for Coleman. Giving orders was no longer an option—if it really ever had been. Maybe tomorrow she’d make the observation that Scott paid better than the Agency and that maybe he should be the one to stay home with Anna.
The phone rang, and he snatched it off the nightstand in an effort not to wake the woman who was no longer sharing just his house. “Yeah. What?”
“Sorry about the hour, Mitch. Do you have a minute?”
