First Time in Forever Read online

  “What do you usually charge for babysitting services?”

  “I don’t offer babysitting services. This was an exclusive, one-off deal. Don’t ever mention it.” His eyes gleamed with humor. “I wouldn’t want word to get around.”

  “In that case I’m especially grateful for your sacrifice.”

  He gave her a long look that brought the blood rushing back to her cheeks more effectively than any medical intervention. “You finally have some color.”

  And he was responsible for the color.

  “I owe you an apology.”

  “For what?”

  “For drowning you in emotion.” Now that the sharp edge of fear had passed, she felt deeply embarrassed. First she’d had a meltdown, and then she’d spilled confidences she usually kept locked deep inside. “Most men hate emotion like they hate throw pillows and scented candles.”

  “I’m not a lover of throw pillows, but I’m not afraid of emotions. They tell you more about a person than hours of conversation.”

  “If that’s true, then by now you’re thinking I’m a hysterical neurotic.”

  “If I told you what I really thought, you’d kick me out.” Leaving her to ponder on that, he walked into the kitchen and returned a moment later carrying a bottle of wine and two glasses.

  She wanted to ask him what he really thought but wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer. “Don’t you have somewhere to be?”

  “I’m where I want to be.” He sat on the sofa next to her and put the bottle and the glasses on the floor. “Talk to me.”

  “Sorry?”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  The breath left her lungs in a rush. “I don’t talk about it.”

  “Maybe not usually, but tonight you’re going to talk about it.” He poured wine into a glass and handed it to her. “Tell me about your sister.” Another man would have tiptoed around the subject. Not him.

  “That isn’t a very sensitive question.”

  “This morning you had a full-blown panic attack. I virtually had to peel you off the ground. It would help me to know what happened, so that I can help make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

  “I was with Neil for three years and he never asked for the details.”

  Sympathy turned to incredulous disbelief. “Never?”

  “He respected boundaries.”

  “I’m starting to understand why you don’t feel the need for rebound sex. You can only rebound from something with substance. And I’m not respecting boundaries, so talk to me.”

  Her hand shook, and the wine almost sloshed over the top of the glass. “What do you want to know?”

  “Everything.” He eased the glass out of her hand and set it down on the floor. Polished floorboards gleamed in the late evening sun, and through the open window she could hear the relentless sound of the waves breaking on the shore.

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m absolutely sure you didn’t kill her.” He reached out and pulled her into the curve of his arm so that her body was pressed against the hardness of his.

  She didn’t consider herself a tactile person. She and Neil had often sat on separate sofas, facing each other, disconnected, as if occupying different worlds. In some ways they’d lived parallel lives.

  It was true that she’d never talked to Neil about her past, but it was also true that he’d never asked. And she realized now that he hadn’t wanted to know. He’d talked about respecting boundaries, but what he’d really meant was that he didn’t want to deal with emotion.

  If Neil had found himself in this position, he would have floundered, both with her emotions and with the child. Ryan had handled both without missing a beat.

  “There isn’t a happy ending to this, Ryan.”

  “Yeah, well, we both know life is full of messy endings. Tell me about your sister.”

  “I was four when she was born. My earliest memory was holding her because my mother was drunk on the sofa. I remember looking down at her and promising that I was always going to take care of her.”

  “Why weren’t the authorities involved?”

  “I don’t really know. My mother was good at doing just enough, I guess. We slipped through the cracks. By the time my sister was six months old, I was doing almost everything for her. I went from being the loneliest child on the planet to the happiest. I loved her. And she loved me back. The first word she spoke was Em, and she used to follow me everywhere and sleep in my bed.”

  “Sounds like Rachel.” His voice was low. “Drove me crazy. It was like trying to shake off a burr that had stuck to your clothes.”

  “Yes.” Her whole body ached with remembering. “I loved it. I loved holding her. Most of all I loved being outdoors with her. I hated our apartment so much. It was cramped, airless, and everything bad happened there. I was the one who begged my mother to take us to the beach. We lived close, but we never went. Spent our days cooped up in one room while she drank her way through whatever money she could scrounge from men.” She breathed. “She wasn’t a prostitute, not officially, but she’d discovered early on that men liked her body, and sleeping with them was a useful way to get what she wanted. It took me years to see that she had a low opinion of herself. That she didn’t think she had anything to offer except a pair of breasts that made men stupid.”

  “This is why you dress in black and wear your shirts buttoned up to the neck?”

  “Sometimes my curves are all men see. Or they see them first, and make judgments. I discovered it was best to take them out of the equation.”

  “Honey, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but buttoning your shirt up to the neck doesn’t hide the fact you have an incredible body—but we’ll come to that part later.” He tightened his grip on her shoulders. “Finish your story.”

  “On that particular day she agreed to take us. I don’t know why. Parenting wasn’t her thing, but it was sunny, and by then she was very pregnant with Lana. I guess she thought she could sleep on the beach as easily as she could sleep at home. I remember pulling a blanket from the bed to sit on. Katy had just started walking, and I thought the sand would be a soft landing.”

  “The moment we got there, my mother fell asleep.” She felt his arm tighten, as if he knew she was getting to the bad part. “I was pleased. She was always angry and I thought we’d have more fun together with her asleep. Katy and I played in the sand, and then Mom woke up and went for a walk.”

  “She left you?”

  “Technically she was never looking after us, but at least until that point she was there. I remember feeling anxious. We lived a short bus ride away, and I didn’t know how to get home. And then I saw her sitting in a bar with some guy I’d never seen before. She was nine months pregnant. Can you believe that?”

  “He approached her?”

  “Maybe. Or maybe she saw him sitting there and thought he looked like someone she could easily part from the contents of his wallet. I carried on playing and next time I looked I couldn’t see her anywhere.”

  His arm was still around her, and he moved his thumb up and down her arm, the gesture soothing and sympathetic. “That must have been terrifying.”

  “Not at first. You’re forgetting, that was my normal. I was used to being unsupervised.”

  “Didn’t anyone on the beach notice that you were on your own?”

  “Yes. A woman with a child about the same age as Katy came over to me and asked if we were all right and where our mother was. I’d been watching their family, copying some of the things they were doing. The dad kept lifting the child in the air and swinging her around until she was helpless with giggles. I tried to do it with Katy, but she was too heavy and I couldn’t swing her high enough to make it fun.”

  “Did you tell her you were on your own?”

  “No. My mother had told me over and over again that if I was ever asked, I was to say everything was fine. She said that if I didn’t do that, they might take Katy away.”

  His hand stilled
. “They might have taken you away, too.”

  She swallowed. “I wish they had. I’ve thought about it over and over again. I wish I’d said to that woman, ‘I don’t know where my mother is.’ I wish they’d taken Katy, even if it meant I never saw her again, because at least I’d know she was alive. That was the day I first realized my situation was unusual. I remember looking around the beach at the families and thinking that although those families all looked different, they had one thing in common. There was an adult in charge. Until that moment, I hadn’t been aware that we weren’t normal. ‘Normal’ is the life you’re living, isn’t it? This was how it was for us, so I assumed this was how it was for everyone.”

  “Your mother didn’t come back?”

  “Not right then. Katy was bored and she kept trying to eat the sand. I had to find a way of occupying her, so I carried her to the sea. I thought I’d put her toes in the water. I didn’t intend to go in deeper, but she loved it so much and she was squealing and wanting more, so I carried her in until I was up to my knees.”

  “There were other people around you?”

  “Yes. It was busy. We splashed for a while, and then we went a little deeper and—” Her heart was pumping hard. “I don’t know what happened next. Maybe the beach shelved sharply, or maybe someone had dug a deep hole. Either way I stepped and there was nothing under my feet. I felt the water rush into my nose and ears, and I tried to find the bottom but it wasn’t there, so then I tried to push Katy up so that she could breathe, but she was too heavy and my arms couldn’t hold her.” She felt it again, the rush of the water and the feeling of panic and utter helplessness. “I kicked and struggled, but I could feel the water pulling me. It was so powerful.”

  “You were caught in a rip current.”

  “I don’t remember anything else until I came around on the beach. I remember being sick, and all these adults crowded around me. I looked around for Katy, but she wasn’t there. I must have let go of her when I lost consciousness. They mounted a search and found her—”

  She felt his arms come around her, heard him murmur I’m so sorry, and you poor baby, against her hair, while he held her tightly.

  “Then my mother reappeared. She was hysterical, but looking back on it, I don’t think it was because of Katy. I think it was because she was afraid she might be charged with neglect.”

  “Was she?”

  “No. The authorities got involved, but in the end they decided it was a terrible accident. I don’t know what she said to them and I think we were followed up for a while, but nothing ever happened.”

  “Did anyone question you?”

  “They tried to, but I couldn’t speak.”

  “You were in shock.”

  Emily felt the ache deep in her chest. “Katy was the only thing in my life I’d ever loved. When I realized she’d gone, nothing mattered. I didn’t care what my mother did or didn’t do. I was catatonic. Without Katy I didn’t care about anything. Five days later my mother had Lana. She expected me to look after her the way I had for Katy, but I couldn’t.” She breathed, wondering how honest to be. How much to confess. “From the moment Lana was born, I didn’t feel anything. I didn’t want anything to do with her. My mother told me I was cold. Unfeeling.”

  “That’s horseshit.”

  “She told me this was my chance to make up for having killed my sister.”

  “Jesus, Emily, please, tell me you knew that wasn’t true.”

  “When you’re a child you believe what grown-ups tell you.”

  “At least tell me you don’t believe it now.”

  She breathed. “Part of me does, because it’s true. I did take her into the water. I did let go of her.”

  “It was an accident. As you say, you were a child. You shouldn’t have been given responsibility for her. A tragic, terrible accident, but still an accident. Did you ever talk to anyone about it?”

  “Brittany and Skylar. And Kathleen. They’re the only people who know. Talking about it doesn’t help, and anyway, it’s in the past.”

  “You sit with your back to the water and you don’t go near the sea. I assume that’s why you stayed in the cottage with Kathleen while your friends were on the beach. That sounds as if it’s in your present, not your past.”

  “I’m scared of the water, that’s true. And I’m scared of having responsibility for a child. I loved Katy with every part of me and losing her ripped my heart out from the roots. I can’t love like that again. I choose not to.”

  His thumb moved gently on her arm. “You think love is something you can switch on and off?”

  “I know it is. I don’t feel deeply. That’s why Neil ended it.”

  His thumb stopped moving. “Neil ended it because he was a dick.”

  Emily gave a shocked laugh. “You’ve never even met him.”

  “Thank God. I already have enough evidence to know he’s a dick. For a start, he was with you for three years and didn’t once take the time to explore why you were too scared to open up to him. What the hell was wrong with the guy?”

  “Not everybody wants to spill their innermost secrets.”

  “It’s called intimacy, Emily, and it’s a basic requirement for a successful, healthy relationship. What you two had sounds more like roommates or first cousins.”

  She flushed, because hadn’t she had that same thought herself? “You can’t judge a relationship from the outside. There is no right and wrong. Just what works for that couple.”

  “I agree, but that’s not the only reason I know he’s a dick.”

  Emily sighed. “What’s the other reason?”

  “He let you go.”

  Heat rushed through her. She was aware of his arm, locking her securely against him. Of the brush of his hard thigh against hers. “It wasn’t his fault. I’ve shut down that part of myself. I don’t want to feel anything.”

  “If you were mine, I would have made you feel.” He spoke with quiet emphasis, his thumb moving in a gentle rhythm over her arm. “I wouldn’t have let you hide away.”

  And that, she thought, was why being with him both excited and terrified her. “Ryan—”

  “Who cared for Lana when she was born?”

  “My mother had to. It helped that Lana was very pretty. My mother discovered it got her attention and she liked that. Used it. I’ve often wondered if her childhood contributed to the person Lana became. She was insecure. She learned early how to make her looks work for her. When Lana was about seven, my mother met someone. He was older, no kids of his own. He owned a nice house in a good neighborhood and we moved in.”

  Ryan stilled. “Is this going to end badly? Because if so, I might need to top up my wineglass.”

  “No. He was a good man. And that’s the weird part because I never understood what he saw in my mother. I think it was complicated. Something to do with having lost his own daughter to drugs and wishing he’d done more. I don’t know. At the time, I didn’t question it. For the first time in my life I had a room of my own, plenty to eat and access to all the books I could read. Those books saved me. I spent my time lost in worlds that didn’t look anything like the one I was living in. I studied hard because I didn’t want a life like my mother’s. It was because of him I went to college and met Brittany and Sky. When he died, he left me money. I think he knew if he didn’t give it directly to me, my mother would drink her way through it.”

  “And Lana?”

  “She was scouted on the subway one day. She worked a short time as a model, then turned to acting and loved it. I think because it gave her the perfect way of avoiding reality. Each film represented a new fake reality. That’s why she fell in love with her leading men. To her it was real. And when the filming ended, so did the relationship. Every time.”

  “Do you think she meant to have Lizzy?”

  “I doubt it. Lana wasn’t the sort who would be prepared to share the stage with a child. She wanted to be the center of attention. I don’t think she saw much of Lizzy.”
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  “So in that way she was like your mother.”

  “I hadn’t thought of it like that.”

  “And the two of you weren’t in touch?”

  “I hadn’t heard from her in years. That was my fault.” It was painful to admit it. “I made no effort to bond with her.”

  “Because you’d already lost one sister. She could have made an effort, too. She didn’t have your reasons for keeping her distance.” He leaned forward, picked up the bottle and filled her glass. “Drink.”

  “You’re the one who should be drinking. I can’t believe I dumped all that on you. I bet you’re just dying to run screaming through that door.”

  He didn’t budge. “Now I understand why Brittany told me you were in trouble. She was the one who suggested you come here?”

  “When we were at college, we made this pact that we’d help each other if we ever needed it. My friends gave me something my family never had. A sense of security. I know that, no matter what happens, Brit and Sky will always be there for me. And I for them. When I first heard I was Lizzy’s guardian, the priority was to find somewhere safe to stay. The press had been crawling all over the house. I was told that she needed to be kept away from everyone so that she could just process her grief and learn to live life a little. We talked about having security, but I couldn’t see how that would do anything but draw attention. No one knew I existed, so the safest thing seemed to be for me to take her and disappear. But of course the first thing a child wants to do when they see Shell Bay is dig in the sand.” She breathed. “I should have stayed in New York.”

  “But you wouldn’t have had help in New York.” He was silent for a minute. “Emily, it wouldn’t take much for the press to find out Lana had a half sister.”