Mistletoe And Murder

“Fine.” Bruised and sore, but she was alive, so who cared? “How about you? I heard you were limping after the blast.”

“Muscle pull. It worked itself out.”

“You’re a real hero. Carrying me while you were hurt.”

He shrugged. “I was happy to do it, Mallory.”

“I hope you still feel that way after we talk.”

“Yeah, so do I.” He sipped some of his coffee while she slipped out of her jacket and put it on the chair to his right, which she chose so she could have a view of the place. Despite what she’d said to Ginny yesterday about not being afraid, she wasn’t stupid. She planned on being careful, just not paranoid.

She needed to forget all Ginny’s worries about Shamus. He’d saved her life. His little jab about only doing so for selfish reasons had stung for a few minutes, but he had saved her life. That was all that mattered.

Sitting down, she faced him and rubbed the arms of the Victorian red pullover sweater she had knitted herself for warmth, glad she wore it. His silence felt chilly.

She’d just have to be the one to break the ice.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to be here talking to me, Shamus,” she said. “I’m used to it. My probationers are never happy to see me, either.”

“I can’t imagine why not.”

There was a hint of teasing in his voice. Teasing was good. “They’re usually not happy because I get information out of them they don’t want to give.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You’ll be happy to know I’ve changed my mind about going after Tripp myself.”

He remained silent, his expression guarded, as always.

“Aren’t you going to say ‘I’m glad’ or ‘That’s good’ or something?” she asked.

“I’m waiting for your punch line. You’ve changed your mind about going after Tripp yourself, but…” He flexed his wrist outward, expecting her to fill in his verbal blank.

“This is me you’re talking to. There are no ‘buts,’ I promise. Ginny convinced me it would be too dangerous to go after him alone.”

“So she’s going with you?”

“Shamus,” she chided gently. “I’m not going to search for him. But I would like an update from you on what’s going on with my probationer. All Detective Sullivan said when he questioned me Saturday was that Tripp had escaped the blast after dropping a knapsack in the building, and whether it was the one he was wearing when we saw him or a different one is unknown. Are the police any closer to finding him or his daughter yet?”

Shamus started to say something, but shook his head instead. “What makes you think I would know that?”

“What? You don’t?” She twisted her mouth into a smirk. “They do let me supervise lawbreakers, Shamus. I might be cheerful and caring, but I’m not stupid.”

He grinned. Full-out and natural. She sucked in a breath at the sudden pull on her heart.

“So there is cynicism under all that sweetness,” Shamus said.

She shook her head resolutely. “No cynicism in me. I believe in staying positive no matter what. I’m not letting life take away my happiness.”

She didn’t add “like you did,” but she might as well have. His grin disappeared, and his eyes hardened.

“I hope you never have to eat those words, princess. Because I don’t think you realize just how bad life can get.”

“I’m not a princess,” she told him. “I grew up working-class poor with a distant father who started drinking and became emotionally and physically abusive when I was eleven. And—does this sound familiar?—he focused on the bad in life and nothing anyone ever did made him happy to this day, even though he’s stopped drinking.”

Shamus’s eyes narrowed at the sides. Before he had seemed guarded. Now he had that intensity back she’d seen right after the bomb had exploded and she’d opened her eyes while in his arms.

Oh boy, she didn’t need to be thinking about that intensity.

“What changed your father when you were eleven?” he asked.

“You promise not to think less of me if I tell you?”

His lips parted as if he was surprised by the question, but his gaze never changed. “I don’t think there’s anything you could say that would change my opinion of you, Mallory.”

She didn’t want to tell him. Didn’t want to think about what had happened that had made her aloof-but-otherwise-okay father into a moody, verbally abusive man who couldn’t succeed in drowning his sorrow. But if she told him, maybe he would understand he didn’t have to end up being another Gideon Larsen, minus the booze.

It was one way she could pay Shamus back for saving her life.

The story was sad, and she focused on the two children talking to the street Santa outside, hoping the happiness she saw there would get her through it.

She lowered her voice and leaned closer to him so he could hear. “I was eleven, and my older brother was fourteen. My parents both worked, so during the summer vacation, the two of us were responsible for watching our little sister, who was six.”

She wanted to stop there, to tell him how pretty and sassy Kelly had been, but if she did, she’d never finish. Just like always when she got to this part in the story, she wanted to cry. Watching the children outside wasn’t helping at all, so she transferred her gaze to her coffee cup.

“My brother, Ethan, had a ball game, and he told me to watch Kelly. We walked two blocks to the school playground so she could go on the swings, and then we walked back home and into the house, and I locked the back door. Before our parents got home, I was supposed to put clothes in the dryer and fold a couple of piles of clean laundry in the cellar, but Kelly was afraid of going down there, because sometimes there were mice. So I let her stay upstairs in the kitchen and went downstairs to turn on the dryer. When I finished the work, I went upstairs. The back door was open, and Kelly was gone.”

“They didn’t find a…her?” he asked quietly.

“No.” She met his gaze. His eyes had softened. She had reached him. But there was more. “My father blamed my brother and me both. I didn’t think my mother did, but she didn’t protect us from his yelling, so maybe subconsciously she did and wanted us to be punished. I don’t know. Anyway, Ethan was my best friend after that. Life was rough, and he kept promising me when he was eighteen, he would get an apartment and get me out of there as soon as he could. He said if need be, we’d move to another state.”

“It didn’t happen?”

“Oh, he got the apartment in another state, I guess. I don’t know for certain because he broke all ties with me and didn’t leave a forwarding address. Just a note saying he was very, very sorry, but he had to leave. That I would be all right. Haven’t heard from him since.”

“How long?” Shamus asked, frowning.

“About thirteen years, give or take.” She gave him a sad, closed-lipped smile. “It’s over and done, all of it. I just wanted to tell you this so you can see I know what misery is. I just choose to follow what the Bible says, that no matter what our circumstances are, we should be content.

“So if I’m happy and try to look at everything in a positive light, Shamus, it’s not because I’m stupid or naive. It’s because I don’t want to lose the life God wants for me.”

Like her father had. Like, maybe, Shamus would. She didn’t have to say that. Shamus understood. She could tell by the way his features changed to a pensive look.

“You know you weren’t responsible for whatever happened to your sister, don’t you?” he asked.

“I know it in my head, Shamus. But in here—” she tapped her finger against her chest “—I’m not so sure.”

“I know what you mean,” he admitted.