Davey hugged me close while I cried; even the memory of that long-ago feeling was still so poignantly painful I couldn’t hold back the tears, and so he held me while those memories rattled inside me, undimmed by time, still vivid, still gut-wrenchingly intense. Davey gently blotted my tears, then smiled at me.
“Are you OK, Angel-May?” he murmured, and I nodded, determined to get this over and out of the way; his arm around me gave me the strength and courage to go on.
“I was a mess, all churned-up inside. I didn’t know what to do, what to say, I didn’t understand what I was feeling, and I didn’t know if anyone could even help me; finally, it was you, Jose, you pointed out what was happening inside me, you showed me the truth, and it scared and sickened me, but I couldn’t get away from it; once you told me, it all fell into place, and it scared me even more. I think Mom guessed. She tried to help me, but I wouldn’t let her in, I couldn’t, not this…”
I trailed off, because the tears came again, thick and hot, and hard as bullets, my guilt that I’d pushed Mom away rising up again, brittle and hard as slate, sharp as knives, feelings of loss, of regret, that only my mom could make right, and it was too late, it was all too late…
Davey held me close, his hand brushing my hair even as he wiped my tears away.
“Shhh, don’t do this Kitten, please, calm down, it’s not good for the baby…” he murmured, but Josie heard, if the sudden sharp glance she gave me was any indication.
I shook my head; we’d come this far, it all had to come out, and let the cards fall where they will; no more hiding, no more half-truths and white lies. He tipped my chin up and looked into my eyes, and he must have seen my resolve, because he nodded in agreement, so once more I plunged on.
“None of this was Davey’s idea. It was me, all me. When daddy died, Mom asked me to call Davey home. She was so sick by then, and we needed him back with us. He came running, but it was almost over for her. I guess the strain of Daddy’s funeral was too much for her, because we lost Mom two days later, so now Davey and me, we were alone in that house. Davey had bought Mom a house in Maine, in Bar Harbor; she wanted to go back there before she… died, but she never made it. So we decided to move there; I couldn’t live in Des Moines anymore. There was nothing left there for me, and we thought a new start in a new place was what I needed.”
Davey took my hand in his, lacing his fingers between mine, encouraging me to go on, to get this all out in the open once and for all.
“You can probably guess the rest. As long as Davey was here in England, all my mooning around over him was just that; it affected me, but it didn’t rule my life, it was all just a treasured teen-dream, an impossible thing to mope about in my alone-times. But then he came home, and all that stuff just came back and hit me right where I lived. You have to understand, to me, there’s no-one like Davey, there never was; you two, of all people, should know that; he was the best big brother, my close friend, my go-to when Mom or Daddy couldn’t be there, and I loved him; when he left, that’s when I realized how much I loved him, and how badly it hurt me that he left, and it scared me that I could feel so bad over something like that.”
Josie was staring at me, obviously deeply wrapped-up in what I was saying, and even Sara had lost that hard, stony stare, and was looking interested, so once more I took a deep breath and went on.
“This is the part you probably won’t understand, but please, just hear me out, then maybe you will. When I knew Davey was coming home, all those feelings I had for him rose up and bit me on the ass; he wasn’t safely far away, thousands of miles away, just a figure in a daydream. No, he was coming home, he was going to be home with mom and me, and I just let myself go. I knew, flat-out knew, that he didn’t want me like I wanted him; why should he, he hadn’t seen me in years, and I knew that once the funeral was done he was going back home, what he called ‘home’, and I was going to be alone again, so I figured if I couldn’t have him, maybe I could have a piece of him, some part of him that would always be mine, and that would be enough, I could let him go, and call it quits.”
Josie stirred; I think she guessed what was coming next, but she held her tongue; Sara, on the other hand, seemed almost enthralled, her face expressionless, but at least that cold hostility was gone, and all she radiated was keen interest.
“There’s no other way to say this, so I’m just gonna say it; I set out to seduce him. I knew he was going to leave me, I could feel him drawing away from me, getting ready to be alone again, and if he left, he was leaving without me and never coming back; it was my last chance to have something that was part of him and all mine, so I led him on, I snared him, and I seduced him.”
I stopped and caught my breath. Both girls looked ready for more, so I squared my shoulders, and carried on.
“Now go ahead and say your piece, both of you. Tell me how wrong I was, how conniving and underhanded I’ve been. I have no excuses for what I did. All I can say in my defense is that I did what I did because I wanted to have some part of him so that when he was gone I could still have him with me, and that night that’s what happened; Davey and I, we… he made love to me. I wanted him to, more than anything in the world, and then we talked about what I’d done, how I’d tried to trick him, and I told him how, if I had caught his baby, I wasn’t going to tell him, because I wanted him to go back to England and be who he was supposed to be, and live the life he was supposed to live, far away from me and my hang-ups and fantasies. I told him that as long as I had his baby he’d always be with me, it was enough, and he could leave me and it wouldn’t be so bad. As it turned out, Davey didn’t care what I’d done, he brushed off what a bitch I’d been for plotting and planning to deceive him; he told me he loved me and wanted to make babies with me. Plural. He loves me, and I love him, and now we’re having a baby…”
Josie had that triumphant little half-smile she always got when she knew she was right about something, and Sara, she just looked thunderstruck.
“Lori… you’re pregnant…?” she breathed, and I nodded.
“Almost four months, give or take a couple weeks.”
“And his family knows…?” she prodded, “They know you and he are… you know, half-brother and sister, whatever? And they’re OK with this?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but Davey got there first.
“Yes, Sara, everyone in my family who matters knows the truth; they all know, or they suspect, and they’re all still in love with Lori, just like I am. Sophie, my aunt, she knew almost from the beginning, and she’s the lady organising this whole wedding thing; Sophie and Lori are so close now that none of this matters to her; as far as she’s concerned, Lori’s her ‘Darling Girl’ and no-one’s going to gainsay her; it would be an act of ground-breaking idiocy to try and say anything negative about Lori in Sophie’s hearing. Sophie’s husband, my uncle Richard, is giving Lori away, and as far as he’s concerned, Lori’s his girl, he’s the father of the bride, and he’s prouder of her than a cat with two gold-plated tails. Everyone who meets her loves her, but none more than me; she and I are supposed to be together, we’re all we need, we’re all we’ll ever need.”
I watched Sara’s face as Davey spoke, seeing her expression change from thunderstruck to incredulous, to perplexed, and, finally, to the mischievous smile I knew and remembered so well.
“You guys are serious, aren’t you?” she grinned, and Davey and I both nodded.
“Serious as a heart attack, Sara; Davey and I are in love, we’re pregnant, we’re getting married and having this baby in the spring, and we need you to be there for us, for me. Now you know it all. So are we good now?”
“You’re insane, Lori, both of you, you’re both fucking nuts; how the hell are you guys going to pull this off? You’re his sister, for criminy sakes!” grinned Sara, and that’s where Davey played his ace:
“Actually, Lori and I are already married, all legal and above board! Mostly, anyway. We’ve been married almost four months now, since before we ever left Maine. This wedding is for Lori, and for the family; we got married kind of quickly, so now we’re doing it right, the way we should have, with everyone we love around us. My family is already here, and as far as I know you girls are the closest thing Lori has to family, which is why you have to be here too; we need you to be here.”
Suddenly both girls were all over me, hugging me hard enough to squeeze me to death, Davey off to one side, forgotten for the moment as I tried to answer a million questions from both of them, but I did catch what Sara muttered when she hugged Davey in a neck-breaker:
“When you left, it broke my heart, Josie’s too; you were our big brother, too, even if you never realized it; losing you was the biggest hurt our hearts had ever felt, and we never really got over it. Lori did well to catch you, even if you are her brother, but paste this into your hat: you hurt her and I’ll fix you, David Keene, or Denham, or whoever the hell you really are. Never forget this one thing, Davey; I love you like a brother, you ARE my big brother, but Lori’s my girl; I’m watching you!”
*
That Denham Magic Does Its Thing, Again: