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Luke started to fuss again, weakly, but definitely building. The corners of his mouth were pulled down into a comical frown and he rubbed at his eyes.
“It’s past his bedtime,” said Henry.
“Best be going.”
Piper and Gretchen looking like versions of each other in colors that coordinated—Piper in a navy shift dress, Gretchen in a periwinkle sweater set—were already exiting, the valet bringing the cars around. Just as Henry was buckling Luke into the car seat, his phone buzzed. He looked down to see a text that made his stomach bottom out.
Call me. We need to talk.
Cat.
Because West had encouraged Henry to keep up his connection to Cat, keep her talking, he waited until Luke was down and Piper was in the shower, then went out to the pool deck to call her.
He walked over the pavers, down to the gate that led to their dock. Their small boat sat on a lift; they hadn’t touched it since Luke had been born and were thinking about selling—which he’d been told was the way of boats. Love them, then feel guilty about not using them, then sell.
Through the sliding doors, their great room and kitchen were visible. Across the Intracoastal, similar smallish houses, and some giant ones lined up along the seawall, interior lights glowing, palm trees lit by landscape lighting. He stood a moment, listening to the water lapping against the dock, the hull of his neighbor’s much bigger boat. A halyard clanged in the breeze, and he drew the salt air into his lungs.
Before he dialed, he thought about his father-in-law and what his words had meant. More than Henry would have thought. All the time he’d spent looking for family, and now here he was, a part of one, helping to grow it. Maybe family is more than where you come from, maybe it’s also where you’re going, what you build with the choices you make.
“Henry,” she said when she picked up. “Call off your dog.”
“My dog?”
“West, the private detective you have asking questions.”
Henry hadn’t talked to West in a while. The last he heard, he hadn’t come up with much. Most of the cases were closed, deaths declared natural, accidental, or the result of suicide. The tech guy in Fort Lauderdale was deep in debt with the wrong kind of people; his murder was a presumed organized crime hit. West had been digging around, talking to investigating officers, chatting with a landlord here, a neighbor there. So far, he hadn’t come up with anything solid to connect the deaths to Cat.
You know, Henry, there are high-risk people and low-risk people.
What does that mean?
So, take your Piper for example. A nice girl from a good family. She buckles her seat belt, doesn’t drink and drive, is careful with herself and her life. Low risk.
Okay.
Then there’s someone like—
Like me.
Okay, yeah. Your mother is murdered. You don’t know your father. You get sent into the system. You manage to find your way, to turn yourself from high risk to low risk. Another person in the aftermath of such a loss develops an addiction, PTSD, or depression. High-risk behaviors could result.
So you’re saying my half siblings might be those kind of people.
It’s a loose theory. None of them were making particularly good choices.
So not genetics. Circumstances.
Or a little of both.
“He’s not my dog,” said Henry. “He’s just a friend. I didn’t hire him if that’s what you mean.”
It was interesting that she knew about West. Not interesting. Worrisome. How? What did that mean?
“Look,” she said. “Can you meet?”
From where he stood, he could see inside the house. Piper was in the kitchen making her nightly cup of peppermint tea, hair up, sweats on. She came to the glass door and peered out. He knew he couldn’t be seen from where he stood; he lifted a hand anyway. It wasn’t a secret. She knew about Cat, that he still talked to her from time to time. She didn’t interfere, but it was one of those things—like the Thursday night poker game his colleagues organized, or his buddy Tim’s yearly Cigar-B-Q which were debauched evenings of red meat, good bourbons, and fine cigars. Every once in a while was okay; but anything that veered into the unhealthy, the dangerous, and Piper would speak up. Like West said, she was a low-risk person. Likely she was the reason Henry was, too. There was no suggestion that Cat be invited for dinner. She was not on the Christmas card list.
“We’re talking now,” he said. “What’s up?”
