It's a Love Thing (47 page)

“
Yes, I do.”

Drake looked out toward the water,
where the sun was nearly depleted below the horizon, only the top
edge still peeking over. Maybe she was right. If she was, it meant
he had to reconsider a lot of his ideas about life.

“
You’re something else,” he
said, reaching across the space between them and taking her hand in
his. She looked at their hands, then at Drake. In the twilight he
couldn’t read her expression, but she wrapped her fingers around
his, so he guessed it was okay.

“
And I think you’re a lot
better than even you realize,” she said. Drake wanted to argue with
her, tell her everything he’d done wrong in his life, all of the
bad thoughts he’d had, the people he’d hurt. He wanted her to know
exactly what he was. He also wanted to bury all of it, so deep
she’d never be able to find any of his past sins and that she’d
always think of him how he was right now, in this
moment.

*****

Two days later Drake picked up the
phone in the back room of Seaside Rentals. They were closed, and
Andrea had gone home. She’d given him permission to make this
particular phone call.

“
Hello.”

Drake froze at the gruff voice on the
other end of the line. Old, instinctive fear closed his
throat.

“
Hello?” the voice
repeated, demanding, irritation showing.

“
Dad?” Drake’s voice
croaked on the word.

Silence. Then, “Drake? Is that
you?”

“
Yeah, it’s me.”

He could hear his father’s heavy
breathing on the other end, as if he wrestled with some
emotion.

“
Is everything . . .
okay?”

Drake knew why he asked. When had
Drake ever called him unless he was in some kind of trouble and was
desperate enough to need to do so?

“
Everything is good, Dad.
I’m in Seaside. This is where they assigned me a PO, and it’s too
far to drive back and forth, so I’m living here now.”

Another silence stretched. His dad
cleared his throat.

“
You still have the
bike?”

“
I do. Listen, Dad, I
didn’t ever say . . . thanks. For the bike, I mean. It was . . . it
was a really cool gesture for you to bring it to me.”

“
Well, Drake, after . . .
everything . . . it was the least—”

“
No, Dad. It wasn’t the
least. It was a lot. It meant a lot. It
means
a lot. To me, I
mean.”

Silence again, then he
heard his dad swallow—actually
heard
it across the miles.

“
You’re
welcome.”

“
I was wondering, I thought
maybe, if you had the chance sometime, maybe you’d like to come
here. See . . . see the bike.” He took a deep breath. “See
me.”

There was a definite quiver in his
dad’s voice as he said, “I’d like that, Drakey.”

Drake’s heart cracked at the pet name
from when he was a very little boy, during the times he and his dad
were getting along.

“
Drake . . . I want to
apologize—”

“
Dad, you don’t need
to—”

“
Please, son, I’d like to.
I didn’t know if I’d ever have the chance to say this. I’ve been
mulling it over for the past couple of years, so please, let me say
it.” He paused, and Drake remained silent. “I’ve made a lot of
mistakes in my life, Drake. I’ve done a lot of bad things. Your mom
. . . your mom was the best thing that ever happened to me, and I
managed to screw that up as well. All the time she was sick, I
didn’t make it easier.” He laughed, but the laugh held no humor.
“Who am I kidding? I made it harder for her. I made her whole life
harder. I did the same to you. And if I could reverse time, I’d do
everything different.”

“
Why?” Drake asked. “Why
the change now?”

“
When I heard you’d been
arrested, when I came down there to the trial, and you came in,
handcuffed . . . that was so wrong, Drake. And I knew the
responsibility lay on my head.”

“
Dad, you weren’t there,
you didn’t force me to commit the crimes I did.”

“
No, I didn’t. But the
first part of your reasoning is why it lays on me. I wasn’t there.
Ever. So I determined to change my life so that if you ever gave me
another chance I could do it right.”

“
It doesn’t matter
anymore,” Drake said. A smile crossed his face. “A really smart
person told me that the past is the past, and that the only thing
that counts is what we do now, how we are now. So how are you now,
Dad?”

“
Hopefully I’m the kind of
dad you deserve, Drake. You have your mom’s heart. You’re a good
kid.”

“
I haven’t
been.”

“
But at least you recognize
that, Drake. That means you have a real chance. Don’t follow my
example. Don’t screw it up.”

*****

Drake pulled up in front of the
Martin’s bungalow. Megan had heard him and stepped out onto the
porch as he cut the engine. She smiled as she walked toward him,
wiping her hands on a kitchen towel.

“
You busy?” he
asked.

“
No. I just finished
cleaning up.”

“
Wanna go for a
ride?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “You
know my bike is in the shop.”

“
That’ll happen when you
ride a Honda,” he said.

“
Ha-ha,” she mocked. Her
bike had broken down a few days ago and even now sat in Andrea’s
shop. Drake worked on it between his paid jobs.

“
I want you to ride with
me,” he said.

“
On the back?” She sounded
like he’d suggested she swallow a worm.

“
At first,” he said. “We’ll
take turns.”

“
Okay.” She capitulated
quickly at that, as he knew she would. “Hold on while I go change.
You wanna come in?”

“
No, I’ll wait out
here.”

She hurried inside and returned
quickly, jeans and her pink leather jacket on in spite of the heat,
her hair twisted into a braid down her back. She plopped the helmet
on her head, and climbed on behind him, wrapping her arms around
his waist.

As they headed up the mountain pass,
she leaned toward him, resting her chin on his shoulder. He could
see her reflection in his side view mirror, see that she had a
smile on her face as she always did when she rode. Apparently even
riding on the back didn’t dim her pleasure.

When he came to the turnoff they’d
used several times now, he pulled over and killed the engine. He
held the bike steady while she climbed off, then put the kickstand
down and followed. She’d already pulled her helmet off and stood by
the ledge, looking down over the ocean. It was a pretty amazing
view, he had to admit. Both the ocean, and his
companion.

He stood next to her and she slid her
hand into his without looking at him. He, however, couldn’t take
his eyes off her. Finally she turned her gaze to his.

“
Is everything okay,
Drake?”

“
I’m not sure,” he
said.

She faced him. He had her full
attention now. That was one of the great things about Megan. She
was never distracted when it counted.

“
I called my dad,” he said.
She waited. He hadn’t told her much about his past, just bits and
pieces here and there, so she didn’t understand how big it had been
for him. “When I came here, I had a plan. Much of it involved doing
whatever I had to do to be able to leave California for one purpose
only.” He took a breath and told her. “I wanted revenge . . . on my
dad. For all the years of abuse, not only on me but also on my mom.
For making her suffer when she was dying. For raising me to think
that leaving home before I was even shaving and living a life of
crime was the only way to be.” He watched Megan, waited for her to
turn away from him with disgust for who he was. “I spent a lot of
years blaming him for my own actions instead of taking
responsibility. I was full of anger. I wanted to make him
pay.”

“
And now?” Megan asked, her
voice calm and curious, not accusatory or critical at
all.

“
I asked him to come here.
Not to get my revenge on him, but to try to make things right with
him.”

“
Is he coming?”

Emotion choked Drake and he looked
away from her, not wanting her to see. He nodded, unable to
speak.

“
That’s great, Drake. I
can’t wait to meet him.”

His eyes came back to her at that and
he choked out a laugh. Only Megan would think it a privilege to
meet the abusive father of a convicted criminal. She practically
beamed at him.

“
Why are you here?” he
suddenly asked.

She shrugged and pointed to the parked
Harley. “You brought me, remember?”

“
I don’t mean
here
here. I mean, why
are you here with me? Am I . . . am I just a kind of charity
project? Are you and your dad a tag team on straightening out the
lost souls who stumble upon your doorstep?”

She sighed and tugged on his hand.
“Drake, I don’t usually have much to do with those who come to my
dad. There’ve been a few that I’ve gotten to know a little bit over
the years, but none that I’ve hung out with as much as I have you.
And none of them had a Harley, so you know, you have that
advantage. And definitely none that I’ve lo—liked as much as I like
you.”

Drake’s heart lurched. Did she start
to say . . . No. No, someone like Megan would never love someone
like Drake. And she shouldn’t. She deserved so much
more.

“
Why are you here with me?”
she asked.

Startled, Drake said, “Why wouldn’t I
be?”

“
Well,” she said slowly.
“Is it just because I’m the first person you met? Or because I keep
showing up and making a pest of myself? I mean, I’ve seen the way
other girls look at you. Any of them would happily hang out with
you.”

Drake grinned. “You are a
pest,” he agreed. “But then there’s the fact that you like to ride.
You know, you have
that
advantage.” She laughed and elbowed him lightly.
He brought one hand up and lightly stroked her jaw. She leaned into
the caress. “That, and the fact that you’re the most beautiful,
kindest, sweetest, honest person I’ve ever known.”

“
More honest than someone
who confesses to jaywalking?” she teased.

Drake dropped his hand, laughing. “He
told you about that?”

She crinkled her nose
charmingly. “I overheard him on the phone when he called in his
report. I shouldn’t have been listening, I know, but I was curious
about you. There was just something,” she caught both his hands
with hers, and pressing her palms to his brought their hands up to
shoulder height, “Something about you that felt so . . .
right
.”

Drake glanced at their hands pressed
together and a shock of recognition ran through him so deeply that
he shuddered. He felt like he’d done this before, not just with
anyone, but with her. He stared into her eyes and felt a memory tug
at him, something he was supposed to do, something that had to do
with Megan. Her eyes widened in response, as if she recognized the
same thing.

With their hands pressed
together, Drake leaned forward, hesitating just before contact,
giving her the chance to say no. Instead, she closed the distance,
and as their lips touched a jolt of awareness zinged through
him.
This
was
where he belonged, with Megan, in her arms.
She
was his home. He put his arms
around her waist and pulled her closer as she threaded her fingers
through his hair. As love for her poured through him he knew that
he would spend the rest of his life doing anything and everything
he needed to, to be worthy of her.

He pulled back and she smiled at him,
a smile full of joy that lit her countenance. Looking at her like
this, he could believe in angels, for Megan surely was
one.

“
I love you, Drake. Maybe
you don’t want to hear that, but it doesn’t matter, because like it
or not, I do love you.”

“
That’s good,” he
said.

“
Oh yeah?” she
asked.

“
Yeah. Makes life a lot
easier when the woman you love loves you back.”

“
You love me?” she
teased.

“
Like you can’t
believe.”

She traced his brow, his cheek, his
lip. “I can believe it,” she said, tilting her face up for another
kiss. Drake was happy to oblige.

Afterlife

Alashon danced around impatiently as
she waited. Vindar would arrive soon, though it couldn’t be soon
enough for her. They’d spent sixty-three earth years together, but
it wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough.

He’d found her. He’d promised he
would, and he did. It would have been so much easier if they’d been
able to retain their memories from before, but she knew that wasn’t
how it worked. It would have been so easy for Vindar to miss her.
They weren’t anywhere near each other on earth. He’d made
decisions, what he called bad decisions, decisions that nearly took
him on Lucifer’s path, but they weren’t bad, not really. If he
hadn’t made those decisions, he would never have found her. And
they both would have spent their lives searching for something they
couldn’t name.