Darcy closes the laptop. What sort of man did she invite into her home?
The shower water is cold, and Darcy remembers there’s an extra body in the house. Either she needs a new water heater, or she’ll have to schedule her showers at a different time of day. She wraps a towel around her body and pads from the bathroom into the bedroom. The sound of a motor brings her to the window as a black sedan moves slowly down the street as though searching for an address. Sunlight glares against the windshield and makes it difficult to see, but as the car passes, she spots Aaron Torres in the driver seat. The car stops in front of their house and idles. Music thumps behind closed windows, four boys cocking their heads for a good look at her house.
Throwing on her clothes, Darcy runs for the front door. As she hits the walkway, the sedan speeds around the corner, tires squealing and tracing long black claws across the macadam.
“Mom?”
Darcy spins around in the entryway and finds Jennifer watching from the kitchen.
“Stay inside, Jennifer.”
“Who was that?”
“Do as I say. And I want to know if your brother leaves the house.”
“If you say so.”
Darcy still has the letter. She pulls the note out of the bookcase and taps it against her hand, considering if she should call the police. And tell them what? That a car full of teenage boys cruised past the house in broad daylight? They turned the music up on their approach. They wanted her to see.
Her phone rings as she watches the window for their return. It’s Bronson.
“Hey, you never called about Hunter.”
“Shit, I forgot,” she says, stepping outside and closing the door. “He came home five minutes after you walked out, if you can believe it.”
“Did he explain?”
“As I told you, he needs to get away sometimes. If he was drinking himself into blackouts or tagging along with the wrong crowd, I’d worry.”
She remembers Squiggs, the kid she saw Hunter with in the school parking lot. Maybe she should worry about the crowd Hunter hangs with.
“Are you going to do anything about it?”
“About what?”
“Hunter.”
“Oh. Yes, of course. I grounded him from the car, and I’ll speak to him about it again later.”
Darcy bites her hand. Why is she justifying methods of discipline to a man she barely knows?
“I hear birds. You must be outside.”
Paranoia pulls her head around, and she searches for his pickup.
“Getting some fresh air,” she says, holding back about Aaron Torres and his friends until she speaks to Bronson and hears his side of the police brutality rumors.
“Me too. I’m finally putting in a garden.”
“Good for you. Hey, I need to run to the store in the next hour. Would it be cool if I stopped by on the way home?”
“Everything all right?”
“Absolutely. I just wanted to ask you something.”
He goes silent for a moment.
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s just a question,” she says, staring down at an indentation in the grass bordering the walkway. A shoe print.
“Let me give you my address.”
Darcy learned Bronson’s address during her research, and she suspects he knows this. She plays along, reciting the address back to him when he’s finished. Inside, she checks on Hunter, who is back in bed with his earbuds in. Heavy metal posters blanket the walls. Above his bed, a demon-like creature with glowing eyes slays a priest drowning in an ocean of crashing waves.
“Hunter. Hunter.”
He twitches and pulls the earbuds out.
“What did I do?”
“Nothing. You plan to be around for the next two hours?”
“You grounded me from the car, so I suppose so.”
“I’m running to the store and don’t want the girls left alone.” In truth, Darcy isn’t comfortable leaving any of them alone. “Do you need anything while I’m out?”
He shakes his head and rolls over with a grunt.
Darcy has no intention of going to the store. Instead, she rolls down the window and takes the coast road, following the breakers as the sea breeze carries a salty tang into the car. It’s an opportunity to organize her thoughts before she speaks to Bronson. She won’t jump to conclusions, but her experience as a federal agent requires she leaves no stone unturned. She barely knows Bronson outside of the dojo, and she doesn’t want a dangerous man around Jennifer and Hunter.
After driving through beach front neighborhoods for half an hour, she takes a deep breath and turns the Prius toward Bronson’s house. He lives on the west side of Genoa Cove in a cookie-cutter development of two-story homes. Manicured lawns stretch in fields of green, all the houses drawn from a palette of neutral tones. A woman on a lawn tractor watches Darcy as the car coasts at a slow pace. The police department pension must be generous, Darcy thinks to herself as she takes in the upscale homes. Didn’t the divorce drain his income? Bronson shouldn’t be able to afford a home in this neighborhood, a thought which fills her with guilt.
The last house on the right, Bronson’s house stands out from its neighbors. The red shingled roof is new, the red shutters and door contributing flashes of color to an otherwise conservative development. She parks in the driveway beside his truck and gives the door a cursory knock. When no reply comes, she rounds the house, following a stone path past an open kitchen window and a cherry wood deck off the back porch. Darcy finds him in the backyard where he’s connected railroad beams to form a raised bed. His back to her, he kneels beside the garden and smooths a fresh layer of compost.
She doesn’t wish to startle him, so she waits beside the deck stairs.
“Almost finished,” he says.
Somehow he knew she was there.
He grabs his shovel and walks to a shed. It’s too dark to see inside. When he comes back, he wipes his hands on a tattered flannel work shirt.
“And when spring arrives, I’ll finally have a garden.” Bronson grins, and the smile she returns feels forced and torn by doubt. “Something wrong?”
“No, no. It’s been a long couple of days.”
He scrutinizes her, a pair of work gloves clutched in his fist. At the dojo he wears loose fitting sweats. Until now she hasn’t appreciated how muscular he is.
“Come inside with me. I’ll pour you a lemonade.”
The comments about police brutality echo in her mind.
“I’ll stay outside. Why waste the nice day?”
Something flares in his eye. Anger?
“So we’ll sit out on the deck. Give me ten minutes to clean up. I’ll bring it out to you.”
“You don’t have to bring me a drink.”
She senses his glare as he opens the door. It clicks shut, and she releases a held breath. The temptation is strong to flee while he’s busy inside. Just climb into her car and drive home. What is she doing with a man who beat his wife and sent a man to the hospital?
The backyard holds a stand of apple and peach trees. All are picked clean, the leaves turning yellow and brown as if they sense winter building to the north. She flinches when the screen door bangs open, a sound like a snare drum.
Bronson wears a red Hawaiian shirt and Bermuda shorts. He grips two glasses. Ice clinks against the glass when he sets them down on the patio table.
“Wait,” he says, sighing. “You didn’t want a lemonade.”
“It’s fine.”
“Drink up.” He locks his fingers behind his head and balances an ankle on his knee. “So, what did you want to talk about?”