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  Frank eased down onto his right side. "Why didn’t you tell me about this before?"

  I laid down facing him. "It didn’t seem important."

  "No wonder you’ve been so sad this week."

  "I’m not sad … not really. I’m happy for him. Johnny wanted children. I would never be able to give them to him."

  Frank pulled the sheet over my shoulders. "The doctors weren’t positive you couldn’t have children. They said it might be hard for you—"

  "If I could have a baby, I’d had one by now." I rolled over, giving Frank my back. That damn dentist messed up my insides so much that the chances of my being able to get pregnant were almost nonexistent. When the doctors first gave me the prognosis, I held out some hope. But after the visits from the Pickers-in-white and months of sharing Frank’s bed, I knew I’d never have a child.

  I convinced myself everything had worked out for the best. I might’ve been as bad a mother as Helen. No child deserved that. Yes, everything happened for the best. That was my new truth. What I told myself whenever I saw a pregnant woman or a new baby.

  Frank put his arm over me. His breath warmed my neck. We lay in silence, watching shadows skip across the ceiling and walls. Shadows formed by the dim glow of a table lamp, the fluttering of curtains pushed around by an oscillating fan, and memories too powerful to be exorcised by weary minds.

  "How can I take away the pain, Becky?"

  "Tell me you love me."

  "I love you."

  "Tell me you’ll always love me."

  "I’ll always love you."

  I turned on my back and looked at Frank. "Promise me you’ll never leave me."

  "I’m not going anywhere, Becky."

  I smiled. That’s all I ever wanted. To know someone loved me and would always be there. That’s not too much to ask for, is it?

  Frank pulled me closer and kissed my cheek.

  A late afternoon shower had left the air muggy, but the little fan made the night’s heat tolerable. An unexpected breeze caught the sheer curtains and took them for a ride halfway to the ceiling. My mind jumped back to the night I seduced Frank.

  Like tonight, our first night together had been filled with recollections of painful memories, debates over what was best for me, and the acknowledgement of emotional and physical needs. Frank had faced the hard truth that his son had raped me.

  Now, I had to admit an unwelcome truth. I’d been saving my kisses for a man who was never coming back to me. In Texas, another woman slept in Johnny’s arms and carried his child. My dream of being his wife and the mother of his children would never come true.

  Frank began stroking my brow, pushing beads of sweat off my forehead and into my damp hair.

  Something else had happened the night I seduced Frank. After the tears had been shed, old secrets revealed, and passions sated, we’d made plans for a new beginning. Tomorrow would mark another new start for me. Becky Leigh Cooper was going to be a college student. I felt scared, but excited, and I wanted Frank to have something new too. For a long time, he’d desired something I couldn’t give him until now.

  "Kiss me, Frank."

  Without hesitation, he kissed my forehead, my cheeks, my chin, and even the bridge of my nose. Frank kissed every inch of my face except my lips. I’d trained my Pick well, but now I no longer cared about Picks and Pickers for I was content, not happy necessarily, but content.

  "You can kiss me on my mouth, Frank."

  He pushed up on his elbow. "Are you sure? What about germs? I thought you were afraid."

  I slid my hand around his neck, pulled his mouth close to mine. "I’m tired of being afraid. Kiss me."

  Frank did as he was told. He kissed me until our lips ached.

  *****

  The Thanksgiving table looked beautiful. Grandma Cooper’s lace tablecloth provided the perfect backdrop for the shimmering china, crystal goblets, and polished silverware. In an antique copper pot, miniature English ivy served as a bed for a centerpiece created from Indian corn, miniature gourds, and chrysanthemums in cream, gold, and burgundy. I’d done a great job. While the guests droned on about their plans for the waning days of 1970, I sat wondering why I’d agreed to host this farce.

  Charlotte, Donald’s default wife, had insisted we have a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I call her his default wife because Donald never intended on marrying the girl.

  While I was at Havenwood, Donald injured his leg in a car wreck. The resulting surgery ended his football career and his dream of playing pro ball. Frank paid for his son’s last year of college, but the boy didn’t appreciate it. By Christmas of ’67, Donald had flunked out of school and had gotten Charlotte pregnant.

  Instead of getting an abortion, Charlotte Welch told her parents, who insisted Donald marry their daughter. Frank agreed, but good-time Donnie didn’t care much for the notion of being a husband and a father. Charlotte’s reputation and an illegitimate baby meant little to him.

  Mr. Welch, however, was concerned about both his daughter’s reputation and his own. A man of considerable wealth and influence, Ben Welch owned the biggest Chevrolet dealership in North Georgia. He sat on advisory panels to the governor, several charity committees, and the local draft board. The irate father told Donald that, while his injured leg might keep him out of pro football, it wouldn’t keep him out of Vietnam.

  Mr. Welch’s vow to get Donald drafted, along with the nightly television pictures of boys his age slogging through the bug-infested jungles of Vietnam, convinced Frank’s no-good son to walk down the aisle. Little Amy was born on May 4, 1968, three days after I came home from Havenwood. In December of ’69, Kim was born. After his marriage, Donald went to work selling used cars at his father-in-law’s dealership.

  When Frank told me about Donald becoming a father, it made me sick. Everything I’d ever wanted Donald got instead. I dreamed of seeing France, but he went. I longed to have a child, while my stepbrother got to become a parent against his wishes. Frank would’ve laid down his life for his son. And Momma? I’m alive in spite of her best efforts to kill me. Life is so unfair. It never brought me anything good except Frank.

  I’d agreed to host this dinner because it meant so much to him. Since learning about my rape, Frank had struggled to find a balance between his love for his granddaughters and his disgust with Donald for what he’d done to me.

  The morning had gone smoother than I’d expected. Helen and Charlotte talked about fashion and the girls. The men watched TV and I stayed in the kitchen, happy to do all the cooking. Stuffing a dead turkey held more appeal to me than watching Donald cram my special crab-stuffed mushroom caps into his big mouth.

  I’d cleaned the house, cooked the food, and now I had to listen to my stepbrother brag about what a terrific salesman he was. To prove his point, Donald pulled out his key chain and showed us a medallion he’d received from Ben Welch Chevrolet for selling the most used cars in October.

  I glanced around the room to see if the others were as bored with Donald’s boasting as I was. Momma sat at one end. To her right was Charlotte, the default wife. Seated next to her and across from me was Donald, the rapist. Henry Nash had parked himself on my right. Momma had insisted her lover be included in our family gathering. She’d introduced him to Charlotte as an old family friend. The children lay sleeping on a pallet in front of the sofa.

  Frank sat to my left at the head of the table. He wore many hats this day. Patriarch. Grandfather. Father of my rapist. Momma’s legal husband and friend to her paramour. And finally, he was my protector and the keeper of my heart.

  We were an odd lot. Yet to any stranger walking through the door, we looked like the typical, loving family. Momma had said this would be an interesting day. I think perverted would’ve been a more apt description.

  Eleven-month-old Kim woke up and started crying.

  "Can’t you make that brat shut up?" Donald asked. "I’m trying to talk."

  Charlotte tapped her fork against her plate. "And I’
m trying to finish my pie. She’ll get tired of crying soon and fall asleep."

  I pushed back my chair. "I’ll get her."

  Amy stirred. I tucked her blanket around her, rubbed her back, and she quieted. Kim wrapped her chubby arms around my neck. I sat down in the rocker and proceeded to rock her, humming a lullaby Anna had sung to me when I was a child. Frank smiled. I could read the love in his face as clearly as I could see the hate in Donald’s scowl.

  The baby snuggled her cheek next to mine. I closed my eyes and slipped my hand up the back of her shirt. The scent of talcum powder, the warmth of smooth skin, and her whispered breaths in my ear delighted my senses. This was my idea of Heaven—a rocking chair, a baby in my arms, and Frank watching over us.

  CHAPTER 20

  The moment I stepped out of the van, I realized what I’d missed. I took a deep breath, letting the salty air fill my lungs. Slipping off my shoes, I ran toward the surf. Warm sand scrunched beneath my feet and pushed up between my toes.

  At the water’s edge, I stopped. I’d never been to the ocean before, and the vastness of the Atlantic demanded the kind of reverence normally reserved for grand cathedrals or national monuments. Waves of turquoise charged at me, crashing into the sand at the last possible moment lest their mighty force devour me. White foam circled my ankles as the waves retreated to their mother the sea to regroup for another attack.

  Beneath my feet, wet sand deserted me, but I wasn’t afraid. As soon as the sand ran way, thousands of identical grains rushed in to take their place. A cool breeze softened the heated assault of the late May sun.

  "What do you think, Becky?" Frank asked.

  "I love it. Don’t you?" Before he could answer, I kissed him.

  A wide smile captured his face. "I should’ve brought you here before."

  "That’s for sure." I jumped into his arms. He swung me around until we became so dizzy we fell down laughing.

  Frank loomed above me. "I take it you like your present, Miss College Graduate."

  "It’s amazing."

  He helped me sit up, moved behind me, and put his arms around me. "You deserved a break after all the work you’ve done the past two years."

  Two years. It seemed impossible anyone’s life could change as much as mine had in just two years. I’d turned twenty-one the first of May and graduated junior college with honors two weeks later. Both stores were doing better than either Frank or I ever dreamed possible, and we had plans to start a wholesale division soon. We envisioned flats of bedding plants stamped with the Cooper logo going out to all the major nurseries in the South. Papa and Grandpa Eli would’ve been proud.

  Helen spent most of her time concentrating on teasing and tantalizing Henry Nash. She claimed she loved him. Frank, the eternal optimist, believed her. I didn’t. But as long as she didn’t intrude into my life with Frank, I didn’t care.

  When I looked in the mirror, I hardly recognized the young woman staring back at me. Red hair fell to her shoulders instead of halfway down her back and a few extra pounds had been added in the right places. The glimmer of happiness in her eyes and the hint of confidence in her voice fascinated me. It’s amazing what a girl can do when she has one person in her life that loves and believes in her unconditionally.

  I leaned back against Frank, relishing the tide’s dampness as it seeped into my shorts. "We both deserved a break. I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish anything without you."

  I swiveled around, kissed him again. A trace of desperation fueled our feelings due to the stepfather-stepdaughter public charade we played in order to maintain the illusion of respectability. The possibility of having our secret lives revealed added an aura of intrigue to our relationship and to Momma and Henry’s as well.

  Helen thrived on the deception, spending hours dreaming up elaborate ways to secretly rendezvous with Henry. She viewed it as a challenge—her imagination and intellect pitted against the curiosity of nosey neighbors. She claimed to know the secrets of most everyone in Sugardale, information gathered from her liaisons with Sheriff Tate and Henry. Hairdressers are like bartenders. People tell them secrets they wouldn’t discuss with their pastor. Momma assured us that if anyone unearthed the skeletons in our closets and thought to disclose the information, she could blackmail them into changing their mind. Frank said Momma should’ve been a spy for the CIA because she would have never been held back by a conscience. She took his comment as a compliment.

  The cries of hungry gulls interrupted our necking. Frank stood up and held out his hand. "Let’s go find the beach house I rented."

  I brushed the sand off my shorts. "Is it far?"

  "Shouldn’t be. The real estate agent said it was near the fishing pier."

  "Let’s get some groceries so I can cook supper."

  "You’re on vacation, Honey. I’ll take you out for supper."

  "Let’s go out tomorrow. I’ve something special in mind for tonight."

  Frank grinned. "Okay, but I’ll want a second helping."

  I kissed his cheek and whispered, "You always do."

  *****

  I shoved the last of the clean dishes into the cupboard and slammed the door shut.

  "I don’t want to talk about this."

  Frank pulled a barstool out from beneath the counter that divided the kitchen and living room. "I’ve given the matter a lot of thought."

  "Really? Just how long have you been thinking about getting rid of me, Frank? Since we got to the beach? Since the last time we made love on that damn mountain you fancy so much?"

  "Don’t be silly and don’t cuss. It doesn’t become you."

  I rinsed out the dishrag, folded it in half, and laid it over the faucet. "Haven’t you heard? I’m twenty-one now. I can do anything I damn well please. Drink, cuss, or make a fool of myself." I snatched up the dishrag and wadded it up in my hand. "I made a fool of myself over you long ago, didn’t I?"

  "If you would calm down a minute, Becky, you’d see that I’m right."

  I threw the rag at Frank’s head. He ducked. The cloth hit the pale blue wall behind him. It left a damp impression on the sheetrock before falling down onto the end table and knocking over a jar of seashells. The tiny shells scattered across the gray linoleum. I headed for the patio.

  "Just a minute, Becky." As he stepped forward to intercept me, Frank’s bare foot came down on the sharp little shells. "Shit." He hopped toward the bar. "Dammit," he yelled as his other foot crushed another batch of wayward shells. He reached the barstool and found refuge. Thin trails of blood trickled across the bottom of his feet as he plucked the tiny barnacles from his skin. "My sandals are by the bed. Will you get them for me, please?"

  I didn’t move.

  He stopped pulling shells and glared at me. "Will you get my damn shoes?"

  "You shouldn’t cuss, Frank. It doesn’t become you." I ground my flip-flop into the slick floor covering, did a quick about-face pivot, and was awarded with a shrill squeak. Thanks to Momma’s tendency to throw breakable objects at me, I’d learned early in life that one should never be barefooted during a fight. If Frank thought picking seashells out of his feet was bad, he should try prying slivers of glass out of a bare foot. I yanked open the patio door and stepped out onto the deck.

  "You can be just like Helen sometimes," he shouted.

  "You should know, Mr. Wooten. You’ve screwed us both," I yelled before jerking the sliding door closed.

  *****

  I spent most of the afternoon out on the deck, going inside only when Frank went for a walk. I locked myself in the bathroom intent on soaking my troubles away.

  Around suppertime, he knocked on the bathroom door to ask if I wanted to go get something to eat. He begged me to unlock the door, urged me to be reasonable.

  I ignored his pleas. How could he think about food while our life together deteriorated by the minute? There was only one answer. Frank no longer loved me.

  Tears burned my cheeks as I watched him speed away in Momma’s new Dodge
van. Deep down, I knew he would never leave me stranded, but I still checked the bedroom to make sure his clothes were there.

  I spent my time alone doing what most women do when faced with a similar situation—vacillate between wondering what I’d done wrong and cussing the man. Frank had been the one who’d insisted I go to college. Now, he was using my degree as an excuse to send me away.

  Momma had warned me about trusting any man completely, even one as nice as Frank. But I’d considered the source of the advice and had done the exact opposite. I should’ve known better. Any man who could talk my mother into trading in her fancy Thunderbird for a Dodge van—even one with a backseat that folds down into a bed—has got to be slicker than Crisco.

  By the time Frank returned, I’d convinced myself he was nothing better than a snake oil salesman, and I exited our rented love nest before he could change my mind. I wandered up and down the beach for hours before going back.

  *****

  Frank was mad. It wasn’t the sort of mad a person gets when his favorite record gets broken or the kind of rage that swells up inside of you when you slam the car door on your own finger. This brand of anger pours over you when someone you care about gives you a bad scare.

  "I didn’t mean to worry you, Frank."

  "Didn’t you?" he asked. "Where the hell have you been?"

  "I went for a walk along the beach." I pointed at the starfish-shaped clock hanging above the wicker sofa. "It’s only half past nine."

  "I searched the beach for you, Becky."

  "I met some folks on the pier and tried my hand at crabbing. I caught three big—"

  "I checked the damn pier twice."

  "We’ve must have missed each other somehow."

  Frank stood there, his head bobbing up and down like the plastic dog Johnny’s cousin once had on the back dash of his ’63 Chevy.

  "I didn’t mean to stay gone so long. I lost track of time."

  "I should’ve given you a watch for graduation instead of a trip to the beach." He headed for the deck.