A Tender Touch
“I don’t even know the woman that well,” Clay countered, his easygoing nature being sorely tested.
“You have lots of free time to get to know her,” Eloise pointed out. “And didn’t you say you’d be working with her anyway, doing Samson’s therapy?”
“Twice a week,” Clay replied, already looking forward to that, although he would never admit it to his mother. “We’re going to do water exercises in Stone’s pool and out in the ocean. And we might drive into Savannah for some hydrotherapy in the whirlpool at this big veterinarian center Freddie suggested.”
“You mean, you and Freddie would both take Samson?”
“Maybe,” Clay replied to his mother’s question. “If she’ll go with us.”
“Ask her.”
Clay let out a long breath. “Mother!”
“Okay, okay, I’ll hush. But I was right about Ana and Tara. They’re both married to your brothers now.”
“Yes, I happen to have noticed that, since I attended both weddings.”
“Well—”
Clay sank back in his chair, rolling his eyes. Rock and Stone had warned him. “Mother.”
“Not another word,” Eloise said, her spangled earrings shimmering as she helped Neda finish the crust for the cobbler. “Dinner will be about another half hour, Clay. You could take Samson for a walk on the beach if you want.”
“Good idea,” Clay said, glad to be out from under her overbearing, well-meaning analysis of his sorry love life. “C’mon, Samson,” he called. The dog was immediately alert and jumped up. Clay noticed Samson wasn’t as fast as he once was, but he had improved since the injury. That was something to be thankful for. “We’ll be back around six.”
“Everything should be ready by then,” Eloise said. Then she came around the counter to touch Clay’s face. “It’s so good to have you home.”
Clay liked his mother’s hands. They were creative and graceful, just like her. He’d always tried so hard to please his mother, after they’d lost their father. He’d wanted to make her smile again. He’d failed miserably. But he remembered those hands, late at night, moving over his face when she thought he was asleep. He remembered her tender touch, even if he couldn’t remember her acting like a normal mother. Unlike Rock and Stone, Clay held no resentment toward his artistic mother. Maybe because he’d been too young to see the obvious, or maybe because he was so young at the time, he saw what his older brothers never had. His mother had lived for their father, and then she had lived for her work. Rock and Stone had resented her for that. They’d always thought their mother had neglected them.
But Clay knew better. He knew his mother loved her three sons, even if she didn’t go about showing it in the usual ways. He had always felt it in her touch. So tender, so loving.
He took her hand now and kissed it, noticing that it was veined and aged, but still soft and tender. “It’s good to be home.”
He turned to head up the long central hallway of the rambling Victorian beach house, Samson trotting eagerly behind him.
“Clay?”
He pivoted to see Eloise standing silhouetted at the end of the hall, her flowing skirts making her look as if she was from another time.
“Yes?”
“When are you going to tell me, Son?”
“Tell you what?”
“About that night, about how you got hurt that same night Samson was injured.”
Clay stiffened. “There’s nothing to tell. I’m over it now, Mother. I’m fine.”
“I wonder,” she said, one hand braced on the doorway into the kitchen.
“Don’t,” Clay said. Then he motioned to Samson. Together, they hurried out the front door and down the sloping yard to the dunes and the sea beyond.
As Clay followed the dog that had saved his life, he closed his eyes to the pain of his memories. He didn’t want to talk about that night. And he didn’t want to think about being a cop right now.
Chapter Four
She didn’t want to think about cops right now. Gary Hayes was dead. He’d died a violent death, a death that still haunted Freddie each time she remembered his father coming to her door to tell her that Gary wouldn’t be home that night. But then, Gary had lived a violent life, and he hadn’t come home a lot of nights. But she never would have believed it could end that way, with him dying in a shoot-out with a gang of drug dealers. Gary had always seemed so strong, so sure of himself.
I’m away from that now. Away from that life.
Freddie closed her eyes and felt the rush of the ocean’s balmy winds moving over her with a soothing touch, the sound of the waves crashing against the shore an endless reminder of why she’d come to Sunset Island. It was almost as if the waves were telling her to “be still, be still.”
Freddie took a long breath and did just that. Then she opened her eyes and watched as her beautiful son built a sand castle near the waves. Ryan looked so much like his father with his dark hair and olive skin, his big blue eyes so trusting, so loving. That was the difference though; that was where the similarities ended. Gary’s eyes had always held a kind of cynical arrogance, as if the world owed him a favor. Her son’s eyes held a mixture of hope and wonder and love. Her son loved her. She intended to live up to that love. She’d tried to live up to her husband’s expectations, and now she was terrified her son would have too many expectations, and she’d fail him, too. Not if I teach him the right way.
I loved Gary so much, Lord. But that love hadn’t been enough. Freddie had never felt as if her love was truly returned. Gary had always managed to find something wrong with her. He’d teased her about going to church, about how she was trying to raise their son to be less violent than his father and uncle and grandfather.
“You treat him like a baby, Freddie. He has to learn to be a man.”
A man like his father? she wondered now. She wouldn’t let that happen. And since Gary’s family had treated her as if she’d been the one to pull the trigger that night, Freddie had felt compelled to get her son away from the Hayes clan back in Dallas. They hadn’t liked it, had threatened her with custody battles and all sorts of dire consequences, but in the end, Ryan’s grandmother, Pearl Hayes, had calmed her husband and her son down enough to make them see that Ryan belonged with his mother. Yet Freddie couldn’t forget the open hostility in Pearl’s eyes the last time she’d seen her. Since then, she’d been waiting and wondering if they’d try to make good on their threats.
So far, so good. No news was good news wherever the Hayes bunch was concerned.
She glanced back at Ryan. She had to shield him from the kind of violence his father had thrived on. She had to teach him to stand up for the things he believed in, without sacrificing his soul to the evils of the world, the way his father had. Gary had been a bad cop, as corrupt and conniving as the thugs he put in jail every day. She was pretty sure that’s why he’d died in such a horrible way. And she was pretty sure Gary had learned it from Ned Hayes. Ned had taught his two sons to be domineering and macho. She couldn’t let Ryan become that way. In her heart, she knew Ryan could be a good man, like her father, Wade Noble, if she taught him the lessons from the Bible. The same lessons her parents had taught her.
I won’t let him be tempted, Lord. I’ll try to teach him the right way to be a man.
She’d already taken Ryan to church here. That’s how she’d met Rock and Ana. Rock had helped her so much when she’d first come to the island. Freddie intended to make sure her son had a solid foundation, a foundation built on the strength of Christ, and not the things her husband had craved and wanted.
But where is your strength? she asked herself. When are you going to be able to trust God again?
I’m trying, Lord. She’d brought her child here to this tiny island because it was about as far away from Dallas as she could get. She’d found the ad for the clinic while sending out résumés on the Internet and got an interview with Dr. Bates. Somehow with her father’s help, she had managed to swing the loan for the down payment, then she’d signed a contract to lease the clinic with an option to buy it. After that, she’d packed up a few things and she and Ryan had driven until they’d reached the ocean. But was it far enough away? Could she ever escape the memories of her failed marriage and the bitter in-laws she’d left behind?
Could she ever escape the guilt, the nagging thought that maybe Gary’s parents and brother were right? That she had somehow contributed to his death?
“I need a new life,” Freddie said into the growing dusk. The wind lifted her long braid away from her shoulder. She tossed her head, about to call Ryan in for the day when she heard a distinctive running, the sound of four paws hitting wet sand, the bark of an excited dog.
Samson.
Then she saw Clay Dempsey walking up the beach toward her, his grin full of surprise, his eyes full of hope.
Freddie didn’t have any hope to give him. She couldn’t encourage his tender attention. She couldn’t and she wouldn’t. Couldn’t. Wouldn’t. Shouldn’t.
And yet, his smile beckoned her like a warm wash of cleansing water, pure and complete and intoxicating.
Clay Dempsey was irresistible.
But Freddie refused to be tempted.
She looked mighty tempting, sitting there in her cutoff blue jean shorts and floral tank top. Freddie waved to him, but Clay could see the hesitant look in her dark eyes. Was she glad to see him? Or mad that he’d accidentally found her here on the beach?
He waved back, careful not to look too eager.
Samson, however, wasn’t so subtle. The dog raced toward Freddie, his bark one of “Hello” and “You’re the pretty lady who’s going to help me.” Then Samson looked back at Clay, as if to say “Look, dummy, it’s Freddie. Hurry up, will you?”
“Mommy, a doggie!”
Clay glanced at the little boy running toward Freddie, then called out a command to Samson. He didn’t think Samson would hurt the boy, but Samson still wasn’t back to one hundred percent, and if the boy accidentally hit on Samson’s tender spot, the dog might snap at him purely out of self-defense.
“Ryan, you know you don’t pet a dog without his owner’s permission,” Freddie cautioned as Ryan hurried toward Samson.
Both the boy and the dog stopped, obeying directions, both looking toward the man and woman with them, waiting for the sign to continue.
“Samson, easy,” Clay told the dog. Samson held back his enthusiasm, alerted to the little boy.
“Ryan, this is Samson and his human friend, Clay,” Freddie explained as her son came up to stand beside her. “Samson was hurt a few months ago, honey, so you have to be very gentle when you touch him. And you are only allowed to touch him if Clay tells you it’s okay.”
“All right, Mommy,” the little boy said, his big blue eyes practically imploring Clay to let him pet the dog.
“It’s okay,” Clay said as he came up to stand beside Samson. “Samson, sit,” Clay commanded. Samson sat down on his back legs, then tossed Clay an expectant glance over his left ear. “Ryan, you can pet him on the top of his head.”
“Be gentle,” Freddie said again, her eyes touching on Clay’s face with gratitude. “Samson is a—” she stopped, gave Clay a hard look “—he’s a K-9 dog.”
“A police dog?” Ryan said as he gingerly laid a hand on Samson’s head between the dog’s ears. “My daddy was a policeman, wasn’t he, Mommy?”
Clay’s eyes never left Freddie’s face. And he saw it all there in her reaction. Saw why she seemed so hesitant around him. “Yes, your daddy was a policeman,” she said to her son, her expression still fixed and hard, while her eyes asked Clay to understand.
Ryan looked up at Clay. “My daddy went to heaven.”
Surprised, Clay gave Freddie a sympathetic look, then bent down on one knee next to the boy. “I’m sorry to hear that, Ryan. Being a policeman is a hard job. Samson and I needed a break because we both got hurt at work. I’m sure your daddy was a real hero.”
“Yeah, that’s what Grandpa Ned used to tell me,” Ryan said, his little hand still stroking Samson. The dog sat still and watched quietly. “I miss Grandpa Ned and Grandma Pearl. And Uncle Todd.” He turned to his mother. “Do you think they could come visit us?”
Clay saw a cloud of fear moving through Freddie’s dark eyes. “I’m not sure, baby. They live a long way from here and they both work very hard.”
Ryan looked up at her through a fringe of dark bangs. “Catching bad guys?”
“Yes,” she said, that same hesitant nature causing her voice to go low. “Catching bad guys.” Then she ruffled Ryan’s hair. “But remember, we only live a couple of hours away from your other grandfather, my daddy.”
“Grandpa Wade,” Ryan said, excitement causing him to almost stumble over on the sand. “We can visit him!”
Samson watched the boy intensely, but stayed in a sitting position. Freddie Hayes held her own position, not looking to budge anytime soon from her disturbing stance.
Clay stood as her hesitancy turned to hostility while the sun turned to a rich golden globe to the west, over the bay. It was painfully obvious by the way she was looking at him now why Freddie Hayes seemed so distant at times. She didn’t want to become involved with another cop. Maybe because she was still mourning the one she’d loved and lost.
Clay sank back down in the sand next to Samson, and accepted that he didn’t stand a chance with this woman. But that didn’t stop him. Clay had always managed to take on a good challenge, just to show the world he could do it. And Freddie Hayes was definitely a challenge.
“We were just going for a quick walk before dinner,” he explained, hoping she wouldn’t think he was stalking her.
Freddie nodded, then sat on her knees to gather up their towels and Ryan’s toys. “We need to get home ourselves. Ryan goes to day care, so I have to get him up early tomorrow.”
“I start school in this many weeks,” Ryan added, holding up one pudgy finger. “I’ll be in first—a real grade.”
Freddie frowned down at her son. “Ryan, remember what I told you—kindergarten was a real grade, too. You learned a lot there, honey.”
Ryan bobbed his head. “Yeah, but Uncle Todd told me kindergarten is for babies. But I’m not a baby anymore, am I, Mommy?”
“No, sweetie, you’re growing up.” Freddie rubbed his thick hair off his forehead, a flash of mother’s love coloring her eyes a deep brown. “Too fast.”
“Not fast enough,” Ryan replied, standing up. “Look, Samson. See my muscles. One day, I’m gonna have big muscles like my daddy and Uncle Todd.”
The dog watched Ryan’s every movement, as if mesmerized by the little boy’s actions. He gave an answering low bark.
“I think he’s impressed,” Clay said, wondering why Freddie was still frowning. Probably because he was still here.
Freddie smiled then, but the smile looked forced, as if she was gritting her teeth. She finished packing up everything, but she didn’t leave. Instead, she settled back on the big beach blanket to look over at Clay. At least she wasn’t running away in a hurry.
Reaching out to rub Samson’s furry back, she said, “Ryan, why don’t you go get your sand-castle molds? And make sure you shake the sand out.”
Ryan hopped up, then turned. “Can Samson come with me?”
Clay nodded. “Sure. But don’t pet him. Just let him watch, okay?”
“Okay.” Ryan waited for the dog, one hand held out in a trusting gesture of age-old friendship. “C’mon, Samson.”
Samson looked to his master, his eager eyes making Clay smile. “Samson, go.”
Samson took off toward the ocean, barking at the incoming waves. Ryan giggled and followed, careful not to get too close to the prancing dog.
“Will they—”
“I’m watching,” Clay said in response to the worry he saw in Freddie’s eyes. “Samson knows his commands. He won’t bother Ryan. But he’ll watch over him. He’s always been especially sociable around children. We used to visit a lot of the schools around our precinct.”
That seemed to calm her. She looked away from her son, then back at Clay, her eyes the color of dark earth. “I guess I’m being silly and overly protective, but things have been difficult since his father died.”
“I’m sorry,” Clay said, meaning it. Getting killed came with the territory of being a cop, and lately, that had hit a little too close for comfort. “How are you coping?” he asked, wondering if the question was too forward. But needing to know.
“I’m hanging in there,” she said with a shrug. “One day at a time and all those other platitudes.”
He accepted the evasiveness in her eyes and voice. “But you don’t live by platitudes, do you?”
She looked surprised, but pleased. “No. In fact, I got so tired of hearing that sort of thing after…after Gary died, that I shut myself off from the rest of the world.” She shrugged again. “That was a mistake. I didn’t think about what that would do to Ryan.”
“Why did you move here?”
Again, he had to know.
She stared out at her child running in the surf, the big dog standing by, barking encouragement. “I had to get away…from the life we’d had. I needed to start over.”
Clay nodded, glanced out at Samson. “Me, too.” At her curious look, he added, “I guess that’s why I came home. I usually take a vacation at the end of the summer, but this year, I asked for more time off, because I needed it. My captain agreed. Samson needed it, too. I wanted to be here at home, for some reason.”
He watched her face, saw the play of emotions moving through her eyes like soft, rippling water, thought he saw a light opening up, as if she really wanted to get to know him. “Samson is healing. What about you?”
“You’re direct,” he responded by way of an answer.
“Well, so are you.”
“Not usually,” he admitted. “I kinda tend to dance my way around things—unless I feel it’s important.”
“I’m always direct,” she replied, her grin wry and full of regret. “That got me in a lot of trouble with my husband and his overbearing family.”
Clay took in that bit of information, telling himself he’d try not to be overbearing with her. “Is that why you had to get away?”
“Yes.” She got up, determination masking whatever else she might have said. “We have to go.”
Clay stood, brushing sand off his hands and the back of his shorts, wishing he hadn’t been so direct after all. “You don’t like me, do you?”
Her eyes lifted to his. “What makes you think that?”
“You just don’t seem to want to be around me.”
She looked down at the print of Van Gogh sunflowers on her beach bag. “It’s not that, Clay—”
“You don’t want to be around another cop right now?”
She looked back up at him, her eyes holding no secrets this time. “No, I don’t. I hope you’ll understand. I mean, I’m more than willing to help you heal Samson, but…I’m not in the market for dealing with another police officer right now. It was a tough life. I loved my husband, tried to be a good wife, but it was very hard. It’s all too fresh, too raw. I’m not ready—”
“I do understand,” he said, not really understanding at all, but then, he had a lot he had to work through, too. Before he could think about it, he added, “My mother will be so disappointed.”
“So will Ana,” she said, then she brought a hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry. Forget I said that.”
Clay put a hand on her arm. “Ana? What’s she got to do with this?”
“Nothing.” She turned toward Ryan, calling out to the boy. “C’mon, honey, time to go home.”
“Hey,” he said, pulling her back around, the soft touch of her skin making his backbone tingle. “Tell me.”
Freddie tossed her braid over her shoulder, then looked over at him. “Ana is playing matchmaker.”
He let out a sigh. “Well, so is my mother.”
She shook her head. “We have to ignore them.”
“Yeah, right. Two of the most determined women on the island think we ought to get together, and we’re just going to ignore them.”
“We have to,” she said again, a soft plea in the words.
“Why? Why do we have to ignore them?”
“Because, I told you—”
“I know, you don’t want to get involved with another cop, right?”
“Right.”
“Well, what if I told you I might not be a cop much longer?”
He had her attention now. She let out a breath. “What do you mean?”
Clay ruffled a hand through his hair, then called out to Samson to come. “It’s a long story, but I’m thinking of leaving the force. I’m thinking of giving up on being a police officer.”
“Why would you want to do that?”
He didn’t want to tell her his reasons. He hadn’t even spoken the words out loud until now. But something told Clay that Freddie Hayes would understand.
“It’s just…things can get so intense, you know. And that night when Samson got injured, I got hurt, too.”
“You did? Oh, you didn’t mention that.”
“Yes,” he said, seeing the fear and pain in her eyes. She was probably reliving her husband’s death. “I got stabbed, but…no one in my family knows much about it, except my mother, and she thinks it was only a flesh wound.”
He saw her intake of breath, saw her gaze scanning his body for signs of an injury. “I’m okay now. I’m fine. We killed the bad guy.” And I didn’t want to remember that right now, either.
“And when were you planning on telling your family the truth?”
“Never,” Clay replied. “They don’t need to know.”
“Then why did you tell me?”
He shrugged, sent a command for Samson to sit. “Maybe…because you did need to know.”
Chapter Five
“Why would I need to know that?” Freddie asked, completely confused by his blunt statement.
Clay tossed a stick for Samson to chase after, watching as the dog obediently brought it back to him. He tossed it again. “You’ve been there, Freddie. You know what a cop’s life is like—”
“More than I care to remember,” she interrupted, holding up a hand. “I know what my life was like, what my son’s life was like. I can’t put him through that again, Clay.”
“Exactly,” he said, his turquoise eyes holding hers. “So maybe you can understand that I’ve reached some sort of burnout.”
Freddie nodded, compassion filling her heart. “I can understand that, yes. Gary…never reached burnout. It was more like burn through. His rage consumed him.” She stopped, careful to keep her voice low so Ryan wouldn’t hear. “It made him turn ugly, very ugly.”
Clay’s head shot up. “Was he abusive?”
“No, no.” She didn’t want to speak ill of her dead husband, and she certainly didn’t want Clay to get the wrong impression. “He wasn’t that way toward us. But he was all man, all the time. He could never let his guard down, not even with me. He didn’t trust anybody, blamed the world for all his own flaws and shortcomings. Gary could never accept blame, even when it was his fault, so he’d turn the tables and take it out on everyone around him.”
“Including you?”
“Especially me.” She crossed her arms, glanced out at her son. “I never could break through to him, to help him. I regret that, but Gary was a hard man. He’d seen a lot of things out there, things he didn’t understand or agree with. So he gave up and gave in.”
Clay’s eyes widened, but he nodded his understanding. “He turned bad. It happens a lot.” Then he grabbed her arm again. “I don’t want to give up, Freddie. So maybe you can understand why I’m so bitter and discouraged right now, why I need some time to think about my future.”
“You don’t want to become that way?”
“No, I don’t. I can’t. One of the reasons I trained to be a K-9 officer was so I could distance myself from what I’d seen on the detectives’ faces. That hardness, that resolve. Working with animals allowed me to keep my head on straight.” He nodded toward Samson. “He doesn’t have it in his heart to become hardened or corrupt. He only knows what he’s been trained to do—search and find. I tried to keep the same perspective. But that night…something happened inside me. Not because I came close to dying, but because I killed another human being.”