Page 13 of Inherited Light
“I know, most almost twenty-four-year-old guys don’t have a BMW coupe, right?”
She laughed softly. “Most fifty-four-year-old guys don’t have a BMW coupe.”
I gave her the point by holding out my hand and she slapped it gently, the way we used to when we were kids. “I inherited the car from Mabel. She left each of us something. Cinn got the house, Tabitha got the family jewelry, and I got the car.”
“Sounds like Mabel had to know a little bit about you if she left you her car.”
“Interestingly enough, she didn’t know me well. For the most part Mabel passed through our lives like a ship heading out to sea. The only one of us who really spent very much time with her was Cinn. They managed to form some sort of bond. Mabel rarely made attachments, to people or things. This car meant nothing to her other than a way to get from point A to point B.”
She swiveled in her seat to gaze at me. “Why do you call her Mabel?”
“It’s what she wanted us to call her. She said calling her grandma meant she was old,” I said, shaking my head a little bit. “She was a real character.”
“It sounds like it from the stories you and Cinn tell,” she agreed. “I wonder if she did form attachments, but in a way most normal people don’t, so what you experienced as aloofness was actually how she loved.”
“It’s possible. She’s been gone a few years now, and as you know, she was murdered or she might be with us still.”
“You said at the dog park she was killed, but I wonder why the papers didn’t report it more in depth.”
I turned onto the highway and babied the accelerator to get the car up to speed without sucking gas. “We asked they respect her privacy, and ours. Mabel made some enemies in her day and broadcasting her murder might give some of them an opportunity to start sniffing around again. With Cinn living in Mabel’s house, we didn’t think it would be a good idea. The police offered Malik a plea bargain. If he pleaded guilty to attempted murder and blackmail, they wouldn’t charge him with murder in the first degree. There were multiple other charges against him anyway, and he was going down. He took the plea and no one ever questioned who the attempted murder charge was on. Most people assumed Tabby, and we didn’t correct them. There was no trial, since he pled guilty, and he will be in jail for at least thirty years. Since he was sixty when he went in, it doesn’t look good for him getting out alive.”
She laid her hand on my bare arm and a sense of comfort passed over me. “I’m sorry, Ren. I had no idea how bad things were then. I only reconnected with Cinn a few months ago.”
“Thanks, but the whole situation has made us a stronger, closer family. Since moving into Mabel’s house, Cinn has discovered pieces of her life we never knew existed. Mabel never had much time for sentimentality, but Cinn keeps finding little things here and there. Last year she found photos Mabel took during the years she worked at the shelter. Cinn and Foster framed them and displayed them at the carnival.”
She had her hands on her lap now, and I missed the warmth of her hand on my arm. “I remember the display on the wall of the shelter. I told her how eye-catching it was. I offered to host it in my gallery, but she didn’t want to. She said the images belonged to the shelter and it’s where they belonged.”
I signaled left and held my hand out, resting it on her diminutive thigh. “Wait, what? Your gallery?”
She chuckled, her head back and her smile wide. “I’m an artist, Ren. What did you think I do with my work?”
“I know you sell it, but I didn’t know you had a whole gallery,” I said honestly.
“I own Crow’s Feet Gallery on Vine Street in Little Ivywood,” she explained and the name hit me in a moment of recognition.
“I had no idea,” I said, laughing. “I drive by it all the time. It’s on my way to my apartment above Miss Mary’s Café. Oh, but you already know where I live.” I sighed at myself for always being a dork.
“I love her empanadas,” she said. “Maybe we can have lunch there one day soon?”
I grinned. “Sure, it’s a date, but first we have to have this date,” I laughed and she giggled, clearing her throat at the last minute so it didn’t sound girlish.
“You make a good point, where are we going?”
“More like, we’re here,” I said, steering the car into the parking lot and letting it idle in the parking space.
“Oh, Coronado’s Cantina. I love their blue cheese and steak tamales,” she said, excitedly.
“You do get around, don’t you?” I joked and she shrugged.
“Cooking for one kind of sucks, don’t you think?”
I took her hand and squeezed it. “Why do you think I live above Miss Mary’s?” I asked with a wink.
“I don’t like eating alone,” she ruminated. “I rarely eat when I’m home alone. I guess I need to think about a dog. I’m far too lonely in the house by myself these days.”
My next move was impetuous and out of character, but I did it anyway. I unbuckled her seatbelt and tugged her toward me into a hug, cursing the console which kept me from hugging her completely.
“I know exactly how you feel. Sometimes the loneliness overwhelms me.”
