Storming

Thirty-Two

WHEN HITCH AND his group arrived in the Carpenters’ muddy yard, the rest of the searchers were already there. Nan’s husband Byron, Griff, and the Berringer brothers gathered beside Griff’s Baby Grand roadster in the mud of the yard, talking urgently. A distracted Molly—her red hair plastered into clumps down her back—herded the twins toward the porch. Nan’s urgent voice sounded from just within the house, as if she were speaking on the telephone.

As Hitch supported Aurelia on the way through the yard gate, they all looked up. Relief passed across most of their faces.

Only Griff’s tightened.

Nan burst through the screen door and down the porch steps. She wore a plaid kerchief tied under her chin and a yellow slicker belted at her waist.

She reached for her sister and pulled her into a hug. “Aurelia. Thank God, thank God.”

Jael and Walter both stepped back to give her room.

The rest of the group approached. Griff’s eyes were darker than the thunderclouds.

And… this was where it got awkward. Hitch let go of Aurelia and stood with his hands in his pants pockets. He’d done a good deed, but he was still the black sheep. He was standing on property Nan had told him never to set foot on. And he was trailing her kid, who she’d told him, in no uncertain language, to stay clear of.

Nan lifted her gaze to Hitch’s. Her mouth worked for a moment, as she seemed to consider all that. She’d sure like something else to be mad about. That was just the way she was. She’d love you forever until she hated you—and then she’d hate you forever. When he married Celia, he qualified for her love; when Celia died… well, there it was.

But if he’d ruined one of her sisters’ lives, he had just rescued the other.

She eased the clench of her jaw and took a breath. “Thank you. I… appreciate it.” The words sounded rusty as all get out, but at least she was giving him that much.

She started to turn toward the house, her arm around Aurelia’s shoulders.

Griff, who had stopped just in front of them, reached to take Aurelia’s other arm.

Nan glanced back. “Walter, come along.”

This was probably the closest Hitch was ever going to get to her not being full-blown angry with him. If ever they were going to clear the air between them, this was it.

He took a step after her. He didn’t look at Griff. “Nan—”

She turned over her shoulder. She bit her lip, her eyes big and a little afraid. For the first time in as long as he’d known her, she looked downright vulnerable—as if she knew what was coming and wasn’t any more ready for it than he was.

He swallowed past the sudden scratch in his throat. “Nan, I’m sorry.” He put all his energy into looking at her, not Griff. She was almost close to understanding, and shockingly it was somehow easier to say all this to her, instead of him. “Back then, I didn’t see any other way than leaving, but if I could do it over again, I’d do it all different. I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m just asking you to… to believe that.”

She had always been indomitable, tough as a mud hen protecting her nest and just as stubborn. When they were kids, she’d been able to beat up most boys dumb enough to tangle with her—or, worse for them, her sisters. She and he had never quite got on; they’d rammed heads too often for that. But before he left, they’d at least been able to share some kind of mutual respect for each other’s grit.

He’d never seen her weaken. Never.

The edge of her mouth quavered. “I… believe you.” She breathed out. Her voice was weary. “For whatever it’s worth anymore, I believe you.”

Griff closed up the hand he’d extended to help Aurelia. “What are you saying?”

Nan looked at him, and she gave her head a slow shake. “I’m saying I’m tired. I’m saying I have better things to do with my life than hate your brother for the rest of it. And so do you, Griff.”

“No.” He came forward. Rain ran off the back of his fedora’s brim. He turned his fierce gaze on Hitch. “It’s not going to work that way, Hitch. You can’t just come back after nine years, stay a couple days, bring Aurelia home, and get everybody to absolve your sins.”

Here it was then. At last.

Hitch looked him in the eye. “I didn’t ask for absolution.”

Griff kept coming. “You can’t stand there and tell me some part of you hasn’t always believed you’re going to slide by, one more time, and still get what you want. Because you always have, right?” He stopped in front of Hitch, only a few feet between them. He was actually trembling. “You always slid by, with a wink and a nod, doing exactly what you pleased and nothing else. And everybody forgave you for it. Everybody loved you anyway.”

Nan reached for Griff’s arm. “That is not what’s happening here. Griff—”

He ignored her. “I loved you, Hitch. I forgave you. Every single time. You’d go running off to chase your rainbows, and I would cover for you. I’d make excuses for you. That’s my big brother, Hitch Hitchcock! Isn’t he somethin’? And I believed it. Even after you left and let us all down, I believed it.”

This was heading to a fight and fast. Hitch backed off a few steps, both to maybe mollify Griff and to get a little distance between them and Nan and Aurelia.

He tried to keep a calm voice. “Griff…”

“But guess what?” Griff closed the distance to barely a foot. “I stopped believing a long time ago. You’ve got no more excuses left.” He spread his arms. “You think there’s a person here you haven’t hurt?”

Most of what he was saying was true enough. Hitch had admitted that from the start. But how long was this supposed to go on? He’d come home. He’d admitted he’d been wrong; he’d apologized with all his heart. What more was there?

His own anger flared. “I know I messed it up. And I’ll shout it to the world if you want me to. But I can’t take any of it back. It’s done.”

“Nothing’s done! It goes on every single day. Every day, Hitch! You think coming back here fixed things? It didn’t fix anything. You come back, and the whole world falls apart! Everything happening right now—to this town and everybody in it—is because of you. You cannot tell me you haven’t had a hand in every bit of it!”

“It fell into my lap, same as it did yours. Back off, Griff.”

He maybe deserved some of this, but not everything. And he was sick of it. So help him, it was time for all of them to let go of the past and cut their losses, one way or another. Nan was right about that.

He clenched and unclenched his fists. “You don’t want to fight me, and you know it.”

Griff’s glare flashed. Something in his face seemed to snap. “Don’t I? Things are different now, Hitch, and we’re not kids anymore. Family is about being there when people need you. You weren’t there for Celia, and you sure weren’t there for me. You think when Pop was dying in that bed, he didn’t ask for you?”

Hitch shook his head. “You don’t—”

“And don’t give me this about Sheriff Campbell! You shouldn’t have gotten mixed up with him in the first place. And even then, how was running the right answer? If you stayed, you think I wouldn’t have stood beside you? You think all of us wouldn’t have? Nan may be willing to suddenly forget it all, but I’m not!” He reached for the front of Hitch’s wet shirt.

Behind Griff, Nan started dragging Aurelia out of the way.

Hitch reacted without thinking, his own hand darting out to clench Griff’s wrist. Every muscle in his body hummed. With the last ounce of will left, he held himself in.

He’d never seen Griff like this. Griff was the quiet one—the controlled one. Griff didn’t start fights, and he was more likely to stop a brawl than finish one.

Hitch pulled Griff’s hand free of his shirt and pushed him away. “Back off.”

Griff threw a wide roundhouse that crashed into the side of Hitch’s jaw.

Hitch staggered back. Blood thundered through his head, and his vision went black and then red. Even before he could make sense of what had just happened, he came up swinging. He clipped Griff’s chin, but his brother had dived after him and was already raining blows. A punch caught Hitch in the cheek, then Griff started slamming Hitch’s ribs and stomach.

Hitch scrambled upright. He got his feet under him and pretended the world wasn’t tilting crazily. He closed with Griff and closed hard.

He had maybe an inch on his brother, but not much, if any, poundage. And Griff was right. This wasn’t like when they were kids. Back then, Hitch could beat the tar out of Griff and they both knew it. Now Griff was big and strong and full-on mad enough to give Hitch a run for his money and then some.

Hitch hit hard and low. His fist connected beneath Griff’s sternum, and Griff doubled over with a whuff.

Hitch stepped back and saw them all, frozen as if in a photograph. Himself, bleeding and dizzy. Byron and the Berringers, moving in to stop the fight. Nan with her arm still around Aurelia, shouting at them both. Walter staring on, wide-eyed. Jael, the lines between her eyebrows furrowing deeper than ever.

And Griff. His brother rose slowly, blue eyes coming up to glare right back at him. Griff wasn’t done with this fight. He wouldn’t be done until one or both of them were too woozy to climb up out of the mud. He was that mad.

That hurt.

Hitch had hurt him that bad. That’s what this was really all about.

Something inside of him shuddered. Of course it couldn’t be fixed in a few days. The kind of hurt that stuck around for nine years didn’t go away just because the person who’d caused it wanted it to. Durn his ignorant, idiotic hide.

He pulled his punch in mid-swing and backed up, hands in front of him. “Wait—”

Griff hit him anyway, another ear-ringing blow right across his jaw.

“Hold up there, son!” Matthew said. He and Byron caught Griff’s arms.

J.W., looking a little uncomfortable, stopped at Hitch’s side.

Hitch righted himself, one hand on the thundering ache in his molars.

He blinked several times and found his brother’s gaze. “Listen to me. What happened was never meant to be about you. I never once thought it would hurt you like it did. And I’m sorry.”

Griff stopped straining against Matthew and Byron. The fury in his face flickered, for a bare second.

Then he shook his head. “You’re sorry. Why shouldn’t you be? You’ve got Campbell stuck on your tail for the rest of his life. I hear you practically lost your machine to that charlatan Livingstone. You got nobody left to call family in all this world. And you brought pirates right in on your hometown. You are sorry, Hitch. You’re a sorry excuse for a man. And God knows why I ever looked up to you.”

Matthew shook Griff’s arm. “C’mon, son, you don’t want to be lying awake tonight regretting all this stuff you’re saying. Your brother’s telling you he’s sorry. Take his hand and put this all in back of you.”

Griff drew in a breath so deep his shoulders lifted a full two inches. Then he dropped his gaze away from Hitch’s and shook his head again. He pulled free of Matthew and Byron, picked his hat out of the mud, and limped across the yard to where his Chevrolet was parked.

And that, right there, was the end of Hitch’s luck. He watched Griff leave, and, inside his chest, something broke open.

A hand slid around his waist.

Slowly, he looked to find Jael beside him.

Her face was carefully passive. She slipped her shoulders under his arm. “Come.”

He tongued the blood from the corner of his mouth and looked up at the tableau he’d help create.

They all stood, frozen. They stared, not at Griff, but at Hitch. The eyes were wide and shocked and—almost sympathetic. Why? Because they thought Griff had been wrong in throwing that first punch at him? Or because they knew Hitch had just lost his last reason for staying?

With a gentle hand, Jael guided him away.

He started to turn with her and, from the very corner of his eye, saw Walter standing alone, off to the side. The boy stared with big eyes. This was probably exactly what Nan wanted to protect him from. Hitch couldn’t blame her. But it was as it was at this point.

He didn’t look the boy in the eye. Instead, he looked down at Jael.

She raised her face, briefly. Her eyebrows were creased, partly with pain probably, but also with concern, chagrin even. She had no family—and she wanted one. Seemed like she shouldn’t be too understanding of what had just happened here.

“Come.” That was all she said. “I will be helping you.”

He could only nod.

Together, they turned around, both of them hobbling. He left without looking back. Why not? Leaving was what he was so good at.