The Lost - J. D. Robb [50]
“Not me, I like it. The dog days. Benny go to sleep?”
“Finally.”
“Seems to me like he’s doing pretty well.”
“You cheer him up, Pop. I think he’s too quiet.”
“You were like that.” Charlie took a sip of beer and then belched a few times, softly. He still had a full head of sandy hair, but he was going soft and round in all the places Sam was hard and angular. “Quiet kid, you were. Always figured that’s why you took up magic.”
“But Benny’s a talker.”
“That’s for sure. Nonstop. But he’ll be okay. He will be, Sam.”
“Sure, I know.”
“Hey, getting that dog was a great idea.”
“Well . . .”
Well, what?
“No leash—you’re not worried she’ll run off?”
“No way. She sticks to us like a shadow.”
“What about when you and Benny are gone all day? Him in school, you at work?”
I stopped sniffing around in the grass and trotted over. What work? Sam had work?
“She’s housebroken,” Sam said.
“Yeah, but cooped up in the house all day, that’s no life for a big dog.”
I thought of myself as medium.
“I’d take her for you myself, but they’ve got a weight limit on pets.” Charlie lived in a retirement community in Silver Spring. But what a sweet offer. I nuzzled his hand in gratitude.
“I’m more worried about Benny than the dog.” Sam set his beer on the step and pulled out the deck of cards he always kept in his pocket. “I hate it that I won’t be here when he gets home from school.”
“So what’ll you do?”
“There’s a neighbor who’s offered to keep him. She’s got two boys his age, so it should work out.”
Monica? “Mupf?”
“Hush, not now,” Sam said, thinking I wanted to play.
“Well, that’s good. Yeah, that sounds like it’ll work out all right. Kids adjust,” Charlie started saying. “When they’re little, they can adapt to almost anything . . .” So on and so on. I quit listening. Monica Carr was going to take my child after school every day? Why? Where was Sam going to be?
“Queen of spades.”
“So tell me about your new job,” Charlie said, pulling a random card from the flared deck Sam held out to him. “Queen of spades,” he confirmed without surprise, and handed it back.
“It’s not what I wanted. I was hoping for something part-time, but that was a dead end. There’s been a lot of downsizing and merging since I got out of the field. I had to take what I could get. Two of clubs.”
Charlie picked a card and nodded. “Two of clubs. But you hate this job.”
“No, Pop. Don’t say that.” He gave a weak laugh and concentrated on his overhand shuffle. “Anyway, it’s irrelevant. I have to make some money.”
“I was real sorry to hear about the cabin.”
Sam nodded, shrugged.
“I know you had high hopes,” Charlie said gently. “Spend more time with Laurie and all.”
Really? I tried to read Sam’s face in the dimness. That wasn’t why he’d wanted the cabin. Was it?
Charlie patted his knee. When I came over, he started ruffling my ears and blowing into my face. I wagged my tail, ready for a game. “Kinda ironic,” he said.
“How so?”
“Laurie always wanted you to go back to work.”
I wheeled away, out of Charlie’s reach. That’s not true. Even if it was, Charlie never knew it. Sam never knew it—because I never said it. Not out loud. I looked at Sam, waiting for him to deny it.
“Laurie . . .” he said and stopped.
Yes? What?
“She thought she was marrying an actuary. It’s not her fault she ended up with a part-time magician.”
“Oh, yeah?” Charlie sat up straight. “Well, the way I remember it, you didn’t think you were marrying—”
“Hey, now, Pop.”
“—a type-A workaholic go-getter who—”
“Pop.”>
“—lived for making dough and setting sales records. Okay, okay. Sorry. But if she was disappointed in you, I say that went two ways.”
Charlie! I thought you loved me!
Oh, this was so unfair. I slunk farther out into the yard, beyond the circle of the porch light. If only I could disappear. I found a patch of dusty-smelling ivy and burrowed down in it.
What was wrong with liking your job? I was not a workaholic. Charlie was right about one thing—when I met Sam he was working in one of the biggest insurance companies in the country, climbing