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“I never learned,” she confesses. “I always wanted to.”
“I can show you the basics,” I offer. “Sometimes Trevor and I play. Kaiden, Morgan, and Luce play, too. Occasionally, we have a kind of tournament when we all get together here.”
“I’d like that,” she whispers. She seems nervous, but I guess that’s normal, seeing someone’s home for the first time.
She peeks out the back sliders that open onto the pool deck. She gasps when I switch on the pool lights. They flicker like candlelight, illuminating the waterfall at the far end. I’d opted for a natural stone look, with plants scattered throughout making it seem like a pond in a magical forest. “This is beautiful!”
“Do you swim?”
“I couldn't when I was a kid, but I learned while I was in college. My grandmother insisted. She said everyone in Miami should know since there is water everywhere.”
“This is heated, so we can swim any time. When summer starts, we’ll throw pool parties and grill burgers and steaks. Would you like to get in?”
“Oh, I don’t have a suit.” She flushed. “I left the one I had at Nan’s.”
“Tell me about your Nan? You haven’t mentioned her, but she seems important to you. Where was she when you were growing up?”
“She didn’t know about us. My mother OD’d somewhere in Florida, they reached out to Nan since she had been listed as next of kin on old hospital records. I was 22 and waiting tables when she tracked me down. She brought me to stay with her for a little bit and paid for school. It was a difficult transition for both of us, but in the end, we grew to respect each other.”
Lorelai ventured into the dining room as she was talking. She sank onto one of the chairs, looking around the room at the art prints, the chandelier over the table, the buffet standing waiting to set the formal table with designer dishes, silver, napkins and placemats and runners tucked away in its drawers. This room wasn’t well used. There was a breakfast nook in the kitchen that sat in a bay window overlooking the small garden my landscaper had designed. Emilie and I used that table more often.
She looks down at her hands, clasped together on the edge of the table. “I know I promised we’d talk about this.”
I took a seat around the corner from her and covered her small hands with mine. “It will make it easier to help if I know what I’m dealing with.”
She took a giant breath.” Nan passed away over a year ago. She left me and my brother her estate. We were the only relatives left.
“I don’t know if you remember I’d told you my brother left when he was young. He was a drug user from an early age and got involved in some street gangs. He’d come back occasionally, but he never stayed long. It seemed his paranoia got worse with every visit, and I hadn’t seen him for about four years. Until this week.”
I give her hands a squeeze. “So the man at the B&B is your brother?” I’d suspected. The brief glimpse I’d gotten through the glass seemed to match the description and photo in Kaiden’s file. I also knew that whenever Braydon Mills showed up in the timeline, Lai had changed jobs. There were no clinic visit records in the file, but there were police reports showing property damage in almost all cases.
She nods.
“Were you hiding from him? Has he hurt you before?”
“No. He’s always been a little irrational and unpredictable. He would get angry and throw things, he only ever slapped me once, just grabbed me by my hair. I could almost always get him to settle down.”
“Why did he get angry, Chipmunk?”
“He’s always asked me for money. I’d give him what I could, but often I just didn’t have any to spare. He sometimes showed up at my job and made a scene, and I’d get fired. Then it had been so long since I’d seen him, I wasn’t sure he was even still alive.”
I can hear unshed tears in her voice, but she is holding the emotion in. I’m not sure if that is good or bad, but I know my heart aches for her. The anger at someone trying to hurt her hasn’t subsided, but I can see how affected she is.
“Nan’s attorney had PIs trying to track him down. When she made her will, she put restrictions in place so he can’t access the money without the attorney signing off, and he has to successfully complete rehab to get anything at all. He thinks we’re trying to put him away.”
“Does he also have any emotional or mental challenges that might be aggravating the situation?” I ask her softly.
Her shoulders slump even more. Her voice breaks on her words, but she pushes through. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
She looks over at me, and the tears finally spill over. “James, he took care of me when I was a toddler. A toddler. By himself. He stole to feed me and clothe me. He got me potty-trained. He taught me to read and to tie my shoes. What kind of young boy has that capacity?
“I don’t know what would have happened to a two-year-old with an abusive, alcoholic, absentee father?” She shakes her head and swipes at the tears dripping off her chin. “No, I do know. I owe him my whole life.” My chest tightens. I want to gather her in my arms like the day of the accident and hold her. But I know that has to be her move to make.
Then her voice goes firm. “But James, I can’t have him going to the preschool. If he’s this desperate, all of those children are at risk. Emilie and Becca—”
“Nothing is going to happen to them, Lorelai.” I put as much strength and reassurance as I can into my words. “Trevor’s men are looking for him. I’ll see if he can put an officer by the preschool. Or you can take some time off.”
“I have to go in and talk to Mrs. Corbyn.”
