Page 67 of Rebel

I grinned at her and pulled her helmet out of my storage compartment. “Yeah, I already know all about how well your dad’s doing. I talked to him last week and he’s thinking about renewing their vows.”

“My mom will be thrilled. She needs something special to pick her spirits up right now.” Glancing away, she murmured, “We’ve all been through so much lately.”

I stepped forward and tilted her face up to look into her eyes. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here to support you when you talked to your cousin. I know it was traumatic for you when your family skeletons came tumbling out of the closet so unexpectedly. But don’t worry darlin’—from here on out I’m gonna be by your side.”

She reached up, locked one arm around my neck and pulled me down for one of the sweetest kisses I’d ever had.

Chapter 23

Lacey

My parents got back two days after Rebel’s homecoming. I talked him into coming with me so I could speak to my mom about the letter she was holding for Richie. He was reluctant at first because he was worried that he needed to catch up on the jobs he’d missed. I’d hired an extra electrician and had decided to give Richie a trial period working for the family firm as a trainee, so he was currently paired up with Harvey getting hands-on experience. If he was serious about getting clean, then I wanted to do everything I could to help him. That also included seeing if we could get the police to drop the charges, as there was nothing stolen. I was hoping my mom would agree. The thing was, I wanted to keep my father distracted while I had a heart-to-heart with my mother, and that was why I needed Rebel here.

When my mom opened the door to see both of us standing side by side her face lit up. “Come to welcome us back so soon?” she asked. Holding the door open, she added, “I put on a peach cobbler. Come on in and I’ll make coffee to wash it down with.”

When my father reached for the remote control to turn off the television, Rebel spoke up. “I hope you’re not turning the game off. I’d love to watch it with you.”

My father waved him into the living room with a pleased smile. “You’re welcome to watch with me anytime, Rebel. Who are you putting your money on today?”

Rebel slid into my mother’s rocker, which was beside my dad’s recliner, and they began chatting about the teams. I followed my mother to the kitchen. She started a fresh pot of coffee and told me, “The cobbler has another twelve minutes. Should we add a scoop of ice cream?”

“Sure, but I need to talk to you for a minute about Richie.”

Her expression dimmed. “Did the police finally arrest him?”

“Not yet, and if they do, I’m going to intervene.”

She sat down across the table from me, frowning. “I know he’s family, but he broke into our home, Lacey. I don’t know how we can look the other way on this.”

“He’s got problems, Mom. He didn’t take anything, and I think he needs a chance,” I said.

My mom didn’t say anything, but I could see her lips thin out in a disapproving manner.

“Maybe if you hear what I have to say, you might think differently. I have a question for you. Sometime before Aunt Susan died she gave you an envelope, inside was a letter for Richie. Do you mind if I ask why you never gave it to him?”

She hesitated for a moment before answering. “It was because his stepfather asked me to wait until he was clean. He felt like the letter would cause him to spiral deeper into drugs.”

I dived straight into it, “Were you aware that she had a daughter, that Richie had a sibling?”

My mother’s mouth fell open, and she shook her head. “It must have been a stillbirth, otherwise she would have mentioned it.”

“No, Mom. Aunt Susan had a daughter. She would have been born when Richie was seven. From what he told me, she had problems. She was born with a missing arm and a club foot. They put her in a home and left her to rot there after visiting her every Sunday for years and letting Richie get close and play with her.”

My mother’s expression grew angry. “No, he’s lying. Susan would never abandon her own child that way. You’d do well to stop listening to your cousin. Richie is nothing but trouble.”

“Why would he make up something like that? You’ve admitted that Aunt Susan gave you a letter. Why don’t you get it so we can find out for ourselves what it says? Richie said we could read it as long as I give it to him afterwards. He doesn’t want any more secrets in our family. That’s what he came here to find. He wanted to know what happened to Debbie.”

My mother murmured, “I can’t remember where I put it.”

I quietly redirected her, “It’s got to be in your safe. Richie looked everywhere else but couldn’t get into the safe. It has to be there.”

“Fine, I’ll get the letter, and you can see for yourself that this is all rubbish.”

She stalked out of the kitchen towards the safe in the family room. I hoped she would bring it back without messing about. I didn’t know how much more of this I could take. When she came back, the hand holding the letter was trembling. “I found it. Are you certain we should open it? It’s marked ‘Private and Confidential for Richie.’”

When she put it on the table in front of me, I reached for it without a single reservation. “Yeah, Mom. We should keepwhatever is written to ourselves though and give Richie the choice to share the information with whoever he wants to have it.”

She sat down across from me again, and I read the letter out loud. There were profuse apologies along with an explanation that made sense. She talked about her daughter, Richie’s half-sister, with a certain kind of resignation, like she had no choice but to place her in a home. She didn’t lay all the blame on her husband, but the implication was that he insisted on a placement for her. It was heartbreaking to realize that she went through with it to please her husband but lost her son in the process.

---