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The tired beige carpet becomes his focal point. “Not really. I was gone a lot when Tyler was little.” His eyes find mine again. “A lot.”
Undercover work couldn’t have been conducive to family life.
Regret is easy to recognize for someone who’s also experienced it. Probably the exact things we’d do over are materially different, substantively the same.
Brayden picks up a red engine made of wood and hums a sound that resembles a train whistle. Smart child. He’s very young yet.
John lowers himself onto an elbow and guides the boy’s tiny hand to situate the engine on the carved track and mimics the whistle, as well.
I snap a second picture, then look around while granddad and grandson get to know each other. The room is filled with older furniture that looks little-used. Fading floral prints in brassy frames hang on the walls at opposite ends of the table, and on either side of a large window, there’s an array of frames with photos of people. The largest looks at least two decades old, judging by the hairstyles. The middle-aged couple in the center of the picture are younger versions of Judy and George. A boy and a pretty girl in their late teens are gathered around them in front of a gray-blue background. Beside the family photo is another. This one looks to be the girl, grown, probably not much older than Dani. A dark-haired toddler beams sunshine from his spot on her lap.
I glance to find John watching me, his eyes in sad slits. “Deann.” His voice is quiet.
“Tyler’s mom?”
He drops his chin in a single nod.
“Is she here today?”
Slowly, he shakes his head. “No. She was shot and killed thirteen years ago.”
Chapter 18
Hollie
Judy and George are in-laws.
Former in-laws, thanks to divorce and then punctuated by death. Their frosty reception makes a bit more sense now. “I-I’m sorry, John.”
He’s leaning on his arms again, a casual posture that feels deceptive. “We’d split a few years before. Judy and George have never been the same, though.”
I imagine not. Cancer, car wreck. Those kinds of deaths are horrible in their own right. But violence? All my flesh begins to quiver. I’ve been there, and I was not prepared to run across its coattails here today.
Was it John’s occupation that put his family in danger? I don’t know whether to ask or even if I want to know.
Here I am, at his ex’s parents’ home—so maybe their icy disdain does include me. They don’t know that John and I aren’t a couple, After all these years, could it matter?
The sliding door from the kitchen and breakfast area grates and squeals on its track. Laughter and chatter from the living room grow distant, slowly tapering to only a couple voices still inside.
Brayden, who has been squatting over the figure-eight tracks, drops onto his diapered behind, whimpering. John pats the back of his dinosaur t-shirt. “Hey, dude. You’re good.” But the whimpers turn to snuffles. Drawing his long legs in, John pops to his feet in an athletic move, and at this level, I can’t help notice how muscled his calves are.
He scoops Brayden from the carpet, patting his back as if he’s practiced the maneuver a million times. As I stand, Dani pokes her head in from the kitchen. “Food’s ready on the patio. Let me do one more thing, and I’ll get Brayden so y’all can eat.”
“Take your time.” John strolls through the archway, past the front door, and into the living room. I follow.
The whimpers stop as he talks to his grandson, bouncing him as they go. For a man who claims he was an absent father—for a hardnosed son of a gun federal agent—John handles the restless toddler like a pro.
Brayden stretches out, pointing, upsetting the balance of things and making John readjust his grip. The boy wags his tiny finger at yet more family photos at the end of a hallway. John points to the most recent. “There’s Mommy and Daddy, and…who’s that big boy? Is that Braaayden?”
Chewing his finger, Brayden moves his head up and down in an emphatic nod. The adorable pair need their picture taken. John will remember this day.
My phone cooperates for once, and as I hold for the right moment, Brayden points to another frame, one surrounding a slightly different version of the family portrait in the dining room. John hesitates. “That was your grandma. She would have loved you very much.”
I snap the picture, tears threatening.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
All three of us flip around. Leaning on a cane, George glares from the middle of the living room.
