The silence had already lasted too long. Long enough to become vibrant with unspoken suggestions and innuendo, long enough for the heat to gather in Summer’s cheeks and the questions in her eyes, long enough for the sweat to bead on Riley’s forehead and upper lip. Way too long for graceful exits, plausible explanations or any chance of redemption.

Still, what could he do but try? He gave his head a slight shake, cleared his throat and said, “I’m sorry-” all of which he knew only made it worse “-what did you say?”

She touched her lips with the back of her hand, cleared her throat and murmured, “I said, you must be hungry. I can cook one of those steaks for you, if you-”

“Mom?”

Never had a child’s voice sounded sweeter to Riley. He turned to see the boy David standing in the doorway, blinking in the harsh kitchen light. He was wearing briefs and a dark T-shirt with the words The Truth Is Out There pointed on it. For some reason, he thought, the child’s knees seemed knobbier than they had in the oversize swim trunks, his legs spindlier, his shoulders narrower and more vulnerable.

He felt Summer brush past him, so closely he felt the tickle of her hair on his face, saying breathlessly, “Oh, honey-what’s the matter, can’t sleep?”

David nodded, at the same time throwing Riley a look that held a strange kind of appeal, but more, he thought, of mute embarrassment. The boy’s mother put an arm around his shoulders, forming a barrier of privacy with her body, but Riley could hear her voice murmuring words of comfort, David’s voice answering. He heard the words “bad dream.”

“Would you like Beatle to sleep with you?”

Again David threw Riley that unfathomable look, half wistful, half ashamed, then nodded. His mother walked him into the hallway, still talking to him in her low, soothing voice, her strong hands gentle on his shoulders and the back of his neck, ruffling and then smoothing his hair. Mother’s hands…

“Git up outta that bed, you little piece a…! What’d you do with it this time, huh? You got it hid, you better tell me where. Better not a’poured it out, or I swear I’m gonna beat the tar outta you. Don’t you dare run from me! Hey, boy-you come on, now, you git back here! Go on, then-sleep with the snakes, ya little weasel! Hey-yer gonna hafta come back some time-y’hear? I’ll be waitin’ fer ya. I’ll be waitin’…”

“He had a nightmare,” Summer said, coming back into the kitchen. She was wearing her worry lines again, and a flushed, defensive look that made Riley realize he must be frowning. He nodded and muttered something, he didn’t know what. He felt chilled, and there was a heaviness in his chest he couldn’t dislodge.

She brushed past him and began to take groceries out of plastic bags and arrange them on the countertop with rapid, almost angry movements. “Look-he probably wouldn’t want me to tell you this-it embarrasses him, okay? He had a…a bunny blanket. It was destroyed in the fire. He’s trying to be grown-up about it. He’s trying so hard to be grown-up…about a lot of things. And I wish-” She ducked her head and he saw her make a surreptitious swipe at her cheek with one hand. Then she lifted her chin and threw him a defensive look. “I know you must think he’s way too old to sleep with a security blanket. He probably is. But dammit-” she stopped to take a deep breath, and when he said nothing, continued in a deliberately calmer tone “-he’s a very sensitive little boy who’s had a lot to deal with, and if a lousy blanket could make him feel safer and more secure, I was damned if I was going to take that away from him. And now that those… thugs…have robbed him of that, I’m going to do whatever I can to make him feel safe without it, okay? I’m sorry if you think I’m babying him, or spoiling him-”

“Mrs. Robey,” Riley said stiffly, “I’m afraid you’ve misunderstood me.” Unbelievably shaken, he turned and stalked out of the kitchen.


Riley looked forward to spending his weekends quietly at home catching up on his reading, Saturdays and Sundays being the only days he had time to do justice to a newspaper. He saw no reason why this weekend should be any different just because he happened to have three extra people sharing his living quarters. His plan was to walk down the drive to the gate while it was still relatively cool, then barricade himself in his den with the papers and a large cup of coffee while Summer and the children were occupying the kitchen. Once the diminishing decibel levels informed him that they had adjourned to the pool, he would emerge from his lair just long enough to fix himself a hearty brunch-a nice omelet, perhaps-Mexican-style with plenty of salsa. Or, if his sweet tooth was in charge, French toast made with that cinnamonraisin bread he liked so much.

There was a reason Riley could feel optimistic about his plans for the weekend, in spite of the recent catastrophic changes in his household’s population and routine. The truth was, ever since the incident in the kitchen on Tuesday evening, it had been apparent that Summer was doing her best to avoid him. And doing a pretty good job of keeping the children and animals and their associated debris out of his way as well, with the help of the crayons and the lint roller, and a few other things she’d since added to the list-such as powdered pet deodorizer, and something in a spray bottle that seemed to work magic on the revolting puddles Peggy Sue habitually threw up on the carpets, almost always where Riley would be sure to step in them in his stocking feet. In fact, except for the samples of their artwork that now decorated the refrigerator and most of the windows in the kitchen and garden room, he saw little of the children. In the mornings, Summer contrived to keep them busy upstairs in their suite of rooms-showering, coloring or watching cartoons on television-until Riley had left for work. He had no idea how they spent their days, and truthfully, hadn’t given the matter a lot of thought. In the pool, he imagined. He did have a vague idea they might be constructing themselves some sort of hideaway out in the backyard. Summer had asked him about it, and since it seemed to him a relatively harmless way for the children to occupy themselves, as long as nothing already in existence was altered or destroyed in the process, he’d given his okay. But he’d seen no signs of such a project, and had heard nothing more about it since.

In any event, by the time he arrived home, which was customarily around eight o’clock in the summertime, Summer would already have fed her brood and hustled them off upstairs once more, leaving a place set for Riley at the table in the morning room, and his dinner on the counter, neatly covered with aluminum foil. He told himself he was pleased with this arrangement. The forced cohabitation was working out very well. And if it suddenly seemed unusually lonely to be dining, as he’d always done, with only Mozart for company, he told himself it was just as well, and much better for the health of the attorney-client relationship.

The first part of Saturday went according to plan. Riley retrieved his newspaper, stopped in the kitchen long enough to pour himself a cup of coffee and retired with both to his study minutes before he heard the first thump on the stairs. He had worked his way through the national and local news and was well into the business section when he heard a timid knock on his door. Lowering the paper to his desktop, he let the glasses he’d recently begun to wear for long, uninterrupted bouts of reading slide onto the tip of his nose, frowned over their tops and said, “Yes? Come in…”

The door opened silently, and the boy, David, stuck his head tentatively around it. “Hi,” he said, his eyes shifting to one side.

“Hey,” said Riley, and waited.

The boy’s eyes slid to the other side of the room. “Mom said to ask you if want some breakfast. She’s makin’ blueberry waffles.”

“Waffles, huh?” In spite of himself, Riley’s mouth began to water. “Uh… sure Tell your mother yes, thank you. That sounds good.”

The boy’s head disappeared, and a split second later came a bellowed “Mom, he said yes!” Riley picked up his newspaper.

Alerted by subtle changes in air currents, or a sixth sense, perhaps, he lowered it again to find that, instead of leaving and closing the door behind him, David had entered the room and was wandering silently, gazing around him in apparent awe. Riley watched him over the tops of his glasses, saying nothing.

Presently David sighed, craning his neck to take in the bookcases that filled the entire wall behind Riley’s desk from floor to ceiling, and said, “You sure have a lot of books”

“Mmm-hmm,” said Riley.

“Did you read all these books?”

“Most of them, yes”

David’s head swiveled and his jaw dropped. Then, lifting one shoulder in a belated attempt to look unimpressed, he sniffed and said, “I like to read books.” His gaze slid wistfully back to the shelves. “Maybe… you could let me read some of yours sometime.”

Riley coughed and harrumphed. “Oh, well, I don’t know about that These are probably too grown-up for you. I don’t think they’d be very interesting…” Then, to his astonishment, he heard himself say, “Now…I might have some books upstairs you’d like.” He rubbed at his unshaven chin and regarded the boy’s solemn but hopeful face. Damn, the kid did look like his mother… He cleared his throat. “How old are you?”

“I’m nine-almost ten.”

“Think you’re old enough for Tom Sawyer?”

Instead of answering, David heaved another sigh. “Mom reads us stories. She read us James and the Giant Peach, and she was reading Black Stallion-that’s about this horse that gets washed overboard in a shipwreck, you know, and this boy tames him? But anyway, I guess she can’t now because it got burned up in the fire.”