Wedding Tea Read online

  “Because it makes sense.”

  “Maybe Suzi sent him a letter without thinking. Or maybe it was the whole divorce thing.”

  “They were divorced before she moved into this house. And you don’t send a letter to your ex-husband in prison — the one you’ve sworn you don’t deal with — without thinking about the return address you put on the envelope. And I doubt they let letters into a prison without a return address. She told him. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

  “Even if she did, and I’m not saying she did, she thought he’d be in prison for decades. She didn’t think he would walk out a fire door and escape.”

  “That’s the point. She didn’t think. Even if Barry never got out, letting him know where we live is unacceptable. He could have some other guy from prison come here. She put Evelyn and you in danger.” His frustration was growing. Tiptoeing toward rage. He threw my favorite teacup. It shattered everywhere, and he didn’t even seem to notice. “It’s not okay.”

  Why was I defending Suzi so hard? How else did Barry get our address? How else would he come straight from the fire door to our house? And on the day she just happened to forget to put on the alarm?

  I slapped that thought right out of my head.

  “You know, A.J, sometimes you add everything up and come up with the completely wrong number. Don’t let this get all weirded out in your head, at least until you talk to your sister.”

  “She’ll have all night to think about what happened. I’m going over there.”

  “What?”

  “I’m not giving her time to come up with a cover story.” I’d never heard his voice so cold.

  “She isn’t going to need a cover story, because she didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “We’ll see.”

  He stood, made it about three steps, turned around, and glared at me.

  “You coming?”

  “Jessie and Teagan will be here with food.”

  “I don’t care about food, Cara. I’m not leaving you here alone. Let’s go.”

  In all the time A.J. and I have been together, he’s never been that forceful with me. I’m not liking it.

  “My sister has had a rough day. Because of me. Just knowing Barry escaped has got to be killing your sister. She felt safe when she thought Barry couldn’t get to Evelyn. Now that safety is gone. Right after the whole baby monitor thing. I really think it would be best if we just stayed here and calmed down. Maybe talk to Jessie about it. He’s a superspy. Maybe his warped little brain can come up with a different scenario.”

  Jessie’s voice startled me. “What scenario is my warped little brain working on?”

  Turns out Teagan had forgotten her purse, and she had some hyper-money-saving coupon in it.

  The smile on Jessie’s face made it okay.

  Thank God.

  I don’t need any more drama than I’ve already got.

  By the time we’d finished our food, A.J. hadn’t changed his mind about confronting his sister, but he had calmed down a lot.

  Teagan volunteered to be a neutral third party. She offered to go over to Gran’s and talk to Suzi. She said if something was said wrong, and Suzi ended up hating her, that was okay, but if Suzi ended up hating A.J. or me, totally not okay.

  A.J. thanked her for the offer, but declined.

  He asked if maybe Teagan and Jessie would like to stay with me, and he would talk to Suzi alone.

  I gave Teagan a don’t you dare look, but she ignored me.

  “If that’s what you want to do, we’d be happy to stay with Cara.”

  I was about to pounce on her when she continued.

  “I will say, though, if Jessie did that to me, we would be having a very long and ugly conversation when he got back. I’m an adult and part of a partnership, and I don’t get excused when my partner thinks he can deal with it. Or worse, that I can’t. Of course, every relationship is different, and there are times I have no need to be in the middle of Jessie’s family stuff, but since this was more about Cara than it was about Suzi, my guess is if you leave her behind, you’re going to pay a pretty high price for it later. Maybe always.”

  While I didn’t really agree with everything Teagan said, it seemed to get A.J.’s attention. “You’re right. I’m being an ass. Thanks.”

  I’m gonna have to hire Teagan as a consultant.

  Even if A.J.’s confession of ass-i-ness seemed to lighten the stress, there’s no doubt this is far from over.

  SEVEN

  SUZI STAYED AT Gran’s last night. I offered to come home and pack her a bag — at least a bag for Evelyn — but she refused.

  She and A.J. had a hell of a fight.

  A.J. still doesn’t trust she’s innocent in all of this.

  She’s offended he could believe, even for one moment, she would put anyone in our family at risk.

  The mystery is simple. How did Barry find out where we live?

  At one point, I asked if we should have Roland’s guys find out. I know it’s not their job to solve my problems, but A.J. and Suzi were so mad at each other, I would have gladly paid Roland’s outrageous fees to get to the bottom of it.

  I find it amazing — and disheartening — I am the one being forced to defend Suzi when it comes to Barry, of all people. Besides the obvious, it’s kind of making me wonder if I’m mentally ill.

  For more than a year, it has bothered me how Suzi didn’t step up and take my side in everything related to Barry. Just the other day, Teagan told me to pick a side. Either I have forgiven Suzi and moved on, or I can continue to resent her.

  My mother’s voice was in my head. Love, every lesson gets harder until you learn it.

  Please, God, if Barry showing up in my house was a lesson, please let me learn my lesson well. I never want to see Barry again. Not ever.

  I still have a headache. I’m not sure if it’s some phantom pain from the memory of getting the crap kicked out of me or if my blood pressure was so high I almost stroked out.

  They could have buried me in my wedding dress.

  That’s not funny!

  I need to get the voices in my head under control. I’m losing it.

  Maybe the lesson is how to get through a family crisis. A non-O’Flynn family crisis. I have to tell you, Suzi and A.J. are not O’Flynns. I know it seems obvious, but the way they fight is ugly. Really ugly. They don’t use humor or reason. They don’t have a line that can’t be crossed. I’ve never, ever heard A.J. speak so harshly.

  Even Gran couldn’t get them to calm down.

  When they got particularly ugly, hissing at each other like copperhead snakes, I tried to lighten up the whole situation. I commented on hissing copperheads, but changed it to Cooper-heads. Cooper is their last name.

  Yeah, they didn’t think it was funny either.

  Anyway, when it got really ugly and threatened to get even louder, Gran took Evelyn for a walk. I was so torn. I didn’t want to make Gran carry Evelyn all over the place. She’s tiny, but she can get heavy after a while, and Gran hurt her back not long ago.

  But I didn’t want to leave A.J. and Suzi either. I had this weird thing going on in my head. I figured if I was there, they would use some measure of control.

  Boy, was I wrong.

  Long story short, they’re both still mad. We have no evidence either one of their positions is correct, and unlike Teagan and me, they don’t care if the other one has a sleepless night.

  If it had been Teagan and me, one of us would have at least said something deeply spiritual before we split up for the night. Something meaningful to remind the other how much they are loved. Something like Don’t let a serial killer get you tonight; I have dibs on killing you tomorrow.

  A.J. and Suzi didn’t leave it like that at all.

  Somewhere around three this morning, I was wide-awake and thinking about it.

  Suzi once told me A.J. had a really bad temper when they were younger. She made it clear the A.J. she knew then and the one I know now were tw
o different guys.

  I basically passed it off as him being aggressive when he was young and maturing his way out of it.

  My mom told me when she was younger she was really negative. One day, someone took her aside and pointed out she was the most negative person they had ever encountered. That day, my mom changed it. She became the most positive person I’ve ever met. My mom could find the good in anything. She taught us how to do that.

  Or at least she taught me.

  Being positive is a choice, just like anything else.

  Mom proved to me over and over again that it doesn’t take any more effort to be positive than it does to be negative, and it’s a lot more fun.

  If Teagan and I were having the fight A.J. and Suzi were having, I would be confident we’d work it out. Usually within a day. I think our biggest blowout took us a couple of days.

  But I’m not sure A.J. and Suzi are going to get past this.

  What about the wedding?

  What about her living here?

  I had to get up and blow my nose, and it woke A.J. up.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’m just worried about you and Suzi.”

  “You don’t need to worry about that.” He sounded so cold.

  “Please don’t get mad at me.”

  He instantly relaxed. I could feel it next to me. Like he’d turned off a switch. “I’m sorry. I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at her. How could she do it? Put you in danger. Evelyn? She knows that bastard … ”

  “A.J., we don’t know she had anything to do with it.”

  “How else would he know? And I know my sister. She wouldn’t have reacted so strongly if she didn’t feel guilty. If she hadn’t done it, she would have told me to go jump off a building. Again.”

  “What?”

  “When I was about five or six, I got really angry one day. I climbed up onto the garage and jumped off.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “Gran talked to a counselor, and the counselor was convinced I was trying to kill myself.”

  I was so shocked I couldn’t breathe.

  “At six?”

  “I don’t believe I was. It’s just what the counselor said. I think I was trying to fly away. I was heavy into superheroes then. I thought I could fly away and build my own superworld and not have to deal with my parents or Suzi. It was rough back then.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Not your fault.”

  “I’m still sorry.”

  We were quiet for a bit, A.J. lost in his memories and me trying to figure out what I could say that wouldn’t make things worse. With any luck, if I got it right, I would be able to actually make things better.

  I figured I’d give it a shot, and if things started to go badly, I’d just shut up and talk to Teagan tomorrow. She’s better at this kind of stuff. “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure.”

  “What reason could Suzi possibly have to tell Barry where we live?”

  “What?”

  “I’ve been thinking about it. Suzi is smart. Really smart. It’s not like she would make the mistake of telling Barry where we live thinking it didn’t matter. So if she told Barry, she did it on purpose. Purposefully, you know what I mean? What would her purpose be?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s having second thoughts about the divorce.”

  “You know that isn’t true. Her whole world is Evelyn. She knows she has complete control over Evelyn right now. Why open the door to complications? If she keeps her distance from Barry, she doesn’t have to negotiate anything about Evelyn. It’s all done. Why would she take a chance?”

  “I’ve seen women go back to their abusers. Over and over. One of the models I used to work with a lot kept going back to her abusive husband. I had to stop using her because she would come to work with such bad bruises and swelling that makeup wouldn’t cover it. I tried everything to help her, but she just wouldn’t be helped. I think for some women, it’s a sickness, and for others, it is something I don’t begin to understand.”

  “But do you think Suzi is like that?”

  “I’m not sure. What do you think?”

  “I think Suzi got pulled into a bad situation with Barry. I think you guys have a complicated background. The way a man treats his daughter is the way she will expect men to treat her all her life. My father treated me like I was precious to him. I would never stand for a man abusing me that way. How did your father treat Suzi?”

  “He didn’t.”

  “What?”

  “She was more on the periphery of all of it. He would rage at my mother and me, but he would just kind of ignore her. She saw all of it, but it really wasn’t about her.”

  “That’s not good.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Think about Barry. He was full of rage. I’m not a psychologist or anything, but if I were looking at this, I’d see a young woman that was on her own. Your parents really don’t have much to do with you guys. Your Gran was so deep in mourning when your grandfather died, she wasn’t really there for Suzi. You were far away, and she lied through her teeth, telling you she was okay. My family tried, but Suzi wouldn’t really let us get very close. Suzi found a guy that raged just like her father, and then she tried to build a relationship with him so she could fix it.”

  “Do you really think so?”

  “It sounds right. Damn, my mother would know.” I took a deep breath and tried not to get lost in missing my mother. To stay on point. “I think it’s possible.”

  “So she replaced my abusive father with an abusive Barry. It makes sense to me, but if she’s that messed up, what would keep her from doing anything Barry wants?”

  “I’m not saying Suzi is messed up. The first thing that comes to mind is Evelyn. Suzi would give her life for Evelyn. She would certainly do anything in her power to keep Barry from being a negative influence.”

  “Lots of women stay with abusive men. My mother, for example.”

  “True, but Suzi was blessed.”

  “Blessed?”

  “Barry beat the crap out of me.”

  “And that’s a blessing for Suzi?” He looked sick.

  “In a way. It’s harder to watch someone you love being hurt than it is to be hurt yourself. When Barry was here, the only thing I could think was that I could live with him killing me, but if he killed Teagan, I couldn’t survive it.”

  A.J. pulled a face.

  “You know what I mean. It was probably harder on Suzi to see what Barry did to me than if he had done it to her. But more importantly, when he kicked the crap out of me, he ended up in prison. She had a clean break from him. She had control. If she didn’t want to talk to him, she just didn’t answer the phone. She didn’t have to worry about him showing up and harassing her because he was behind bars for a very long time. A lot of abused women go back to the abuser to protect the people they love. They figure they’ll be a punching bag so the abuser doesn’t threaten — or do something worse to — the people they love most.”

  “I can’t believe that works.”

  “You’re trying to be rational with an irrational problem. Remember, I don’t know a lot about this, A.J. I’ve read a bunch. Some of Adeline’s charity stuff works with or around abused people, but I’ve never been in this situation, and as much as I’d like to believe I never could be, who knows? We’re all capable of things we don’t understand.”

  “It scared me.”

  “What?”

  “What would I do if something happened to you? Or Evelyn? Or Suzi?”

  “Nothing is going to happen.”

  “What if Teagan hadn’t been here?”

  “Teagan is always here.” I gave him a smile.

  “You know what I mean. Would he have raped you? Worse? Where would it have stopped? And Evelyn? Would he have taken her? What would he have done to Suzi? She helped get him thrown in jail. She divorced him. And Gran? She holds the key to his jail cell.”

  “Wha
t?”

  “She wouldn’t give me any details, but on one of the trips she made with her friends, they were successful in getting the goods on Barry, and that’s why he didn’t fight when he had the chance. Whatever Gran has on him is serious enough he would rather go to prison than have her use it.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.”

  “Now who’s trying to be rational in an irrational situation?”

  “This is too much for my brain. I need tea. I’m never going to get back to sleep anyway. You want anything?”

  “Hot chocolate.” He got very still and quietly asked, “Do you think I’m wrong?”

  “I think you probably aren’t right.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t blame a person for protecting his family. Sometimes that looks a lot like an attack on a member of the family. I think if you’re wrong, it’s for all the right reasons. I also think you and Suzi have a bunch of unresolved stuff that you never dealt with.”

  “Sounds right.”

  “I’m the queen of unresolved stuff. I recognize it when I see it.”

  “What unresolved stuff do you have?”

  “Can we save that for another day? First, we need to get you and Suzi back on track. Then we have a wedding to plan. Agatha is supposed to have my dress ready for me to try on today. Today is going to be a good day, no matter what.”

  “So, you’re okay with Suzi?”

  “Yep.”

  “And if it turns out she told Barry where we live?”

  “It won’t.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because that would break my heart, and I’m about to marry the man of my dreams. It’s my turn for everything to go right for a while.”

  We never got to the tea and the hot chocolate.

  EIGHT

  SUZI CAME HOME about seven this morning. I’m not sure if her intent was to simply pack up and leave or to make peace.

  The reason I’m not sure, she didn’t use her key. She rang the doorbell.

  I answered the door.

  She obviously hadn’t slept.

  I let all the concern I was feeling into my voice. People need to know you care. “Are you okay?”

  “Not really. Is it okay? Can I come in?”