Determined to make it roadworthy, she’d taken two semesters of Auto Mechanics since then, and she was a whiz at it. Carly might be moody and spoiled, but she could also rebuild a carburetor like nobody’s business.
He could only imagine how dangerous she would be in the driver’s seat. His daughter was wild and reckless, just like Olivia. Just like him.
With parents like these, who needed enemies? Taking risks was in Carly’s genes.
She looked up at him through dark, wet-lashed eyes, the picture of her mother, achingly beautiful in the lamplight. Ben almost couldn’t bear the resemblance. Most of the time, the pain of losing Olivia was like a dull throb, an ache that receded more every year. Other times, like now, when they really needed her, it was so damned sharp…
Carly must have felt the same way, because she ducked her head, hiding the fresh tears that were swimming in her eyes.
He put a finger under her chin, tipping it up. “We’ll be okay. We’ll get through this. We can get through anything.”
“Yeah,” she said, trying on a wobbly smile.
He pulled her close, all but crushing her in a fierce embrace, then just held her for a long time as she cried.
“Did you find one yet?”
His dad’s sly, cantankerous voice rang out, startling James as he shut the door behind him. When he saw the dark thing in the corner of the living room, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up.
Arlen Matthews was sitting back in his recliner, smoking. The cigarette smell and its glowing tip were the only indications of his presence.
“Maybe,” James mumbled, clenching the keys in his fist. For the millionth time, he wished he had the balls to stand up to his old man.
“What’s she look like? Big titties, I hope.”
“Nah,” he said, studying the dingy white shoelaces on his black canvas tennis shoes. “I mean, I couldn’t really tell.” Now, that was a blatant lie. His eyes had eaten up Carly Fortune’s lace-covered breasts like they were candy, and he knew their size and shape well enough to sculpt them from memory.
In fact, he’d probably be doing some inadvertent pillow-sculpting tonight, tossing and turning until he fell into a fitful sleep.
“Blond or brunette? Tall or short?”
“Blond,” he said, warming up to the idea of lying. He’d never bring Carly back here anyway, so the deception was a petty rebellion, a last-ditch form of self-preservation. The old man had a heavy hand and ready fists, but he couldn’t abuse everything. He couldn’t read James’ mind, or steal his dreams. “Not very tall. Short hair, too,” he added, thinking of the long, silky black strands hanging down Carly’s slender back. Yowza.
“Short hair?” Arlen let out a derisive laugh. “Are you sure it was a female? Hell, boy, you’re so stupid, you wouldn’t know the difference. Half-queer, as it is.”
James didn’t bother to respond to this familiar charge; his mind went carefully blank. He wanted to be alone with his thoughts, to replay his conversation with Carly, to fantasize about what might have been and what could never be. He’d keep every detail about her private. Cherish it, maybe. God knew he had precious little else to hold close to the vest: his dad controlled every shitty moment of James’ fucked-up life.
James sighed, wishing he were somewhere else. Someone else.
“Did you get me that bottle?”
“Yessir.” He pulled the pint from his jacket pocket, relieved to have moved on to topics mundane. He stepped forward in the gloom, handing it in the direction of the winking cigarette and hoping for a quick getaway.
“Not so fast.” A strong hand clamped on to his shoulder, forcing him down on the couch next to the recliner. “Take a load off.”
He heard the familiar sounds of his father un-screwing the cap, the unmistakable glug-glug of potable liquid, the hiss of hot breath after a good chug.
“Drink?”
It wasn’t really open for debate, so James took the bottle and brought it to his lips, pretending to take a healthy swig. His dad always got drunk faster, and passed out quicker, when he had a little company to help him along.
CHAPTER 5
Ben wouldn’t have forced the issue, but Carly insisted on going to school the next morning. It was the last day before Christmas vacation and she had finals. If nothing else, Carly was a conscientious student, and Ben never had to remind her to study or complete her homework.
When he was her age, he dropped out of school, much to his parents’ dismay. After he brought home more earnings the following year than his dad, a well-respected (and well-paid) judge, they’d stopped complaining.
Or he’d stopped listening. By the time he turned seventeen, he’d owned a pricey bachelor pad in Pacific Beach, a swank upper-floor condo where there were no rules, no curfews, and the party never ended.
Finances aside, Ben counted it as a mistake. In those formative years, he’d had too much money, too much success, and too many greedy people telling him he was God’s gift to surfing. He’d thought he was indestructible, and on the water, he was. It was on land, with those earthly delights, that he’d run into trouble.
In his mid-twenties, after he’d cleaned up his act, he’d gotten a GED and gone on to college. By then, he was no longer a drunk, but he was still an obnoxious ass, overdue for a rude awakening. His professors didn’t give a shit about surfing and weren’t impressed by the size of his bank account. Sure, he could make money, but did he have any idea how to calculate his quarterly interest?
As it turned out, spending all your free time partying and sleeping around didn’t make you a genius. Who’d have thought?
Ben drove Carly to school in silence, wondering if it was his faulty wiring and addictive genes that made her who she was. It was easy, but not particularly productive, to blame himself for her problems.
“I’m picking you up, too,” he said as she stepped out at La Jolla Shores High School. Ben guessed it wasn’t fashionable to wear a backpack anymore, because Carly always carried a small stack of books and a tiny, outrageously expensive designer handbag.
“Lisette’s staying over tonight,” she reminded him, tucking a wisp of hair behind her ear.
“Hell, no, she isn’t.”
“Dad. Her parents are going to Big Bear. I asked you a month ago.”
He swore sulkily, remembering that Lisette’s mom had called and made the plans herself because Lisette couldn’t be trusted home alone. She was even more of a wild child than Carly. The last time the Bruebakers had left her in charge, she’d thrown a ten-keg rager on the west lawn. “Fine,” he muttered, rubbing a hand over his tired face. “But you’re still grounded, so you two aren’t going anywhere. And no pot!”
Carly rolled her eyes as she slammed the door, a good sign she was feeling more like herself. Any other morning, Ben would have spent several hours in the ocean already. Carly was so self-reliant that she usually made breakfast, got ready, and went to school under her own steam. He thought he was being cool, letting her have her independence. Now he could see that he’d given her freedom when what she’d really needed was his attention.
He stretched his neck, trying to relieve the ache brought on by several nights of too much stress and too little sleep. On impulse, he took out his cell phone and dialed the number for Scripps Hospital as he drove away.
A crisp-voiced operator asked how she could direct his call.
“I’m trying to solve a mystery,” he said in a conspiratorial tone, trying to lay on the charm. It sounded pretty rusty. “A woman saved my daughter from drowning the other night and I’d like to thank her.”