Stoneface

Chapter Twelve

Gwen looked over Liam’s shoulder as he hacked into Amy’s online calendar. He pointed. “There.”

“Can you e-mail that to me?” Gwen felt a little bad about the invasion of privacy, but only a little. She’d tried calling Amy several times over the past three days, reaching her voice mail every time.

All she’d received in return was a brief e-mail from Amy telling her the apology was accepted.

Gwen felt bad. She deserved the silent treatment from Amy after the things she’d said to her, but she wanted to say them to her in more than just a recorded voice mail. She wanted to try to rebuild a bridge that apparently was never really there in the first place.

Amy wouldn’t talk to Liam, either. He’d received a frantic call from their mother a day earlier, telling them Amy had arrived with a couple of friends and a moving truck while their father was at work.

Apparently Amy didn’t drop the bomb about the baby or her secret guy on the side. She only told their mother that with Liam gone, she’d received an offer to be roommates with a friend of hers who needed the financial help to keep her house from going into foreclosure.

Gwen didn’t approve of the lie, but she did admire Amy’s ingenuity. It was a story their mother might not like, but she couldn’t guilt-trip Amy too terribly much, considering the supposed circumstances.

In a way, Gwen felt sorry for her mom. She was now stuck at home, alone, with their father.

Gwen wanted to have a relationship with her sister. She’d eat crow, apologize like hell, and bite her tongue clean in two if she had to. And if this was the only way she could get Amy to sit still for a few minutes to talk to her, so be it. She wanted to apologize to her sister and try to make amends. This was no time to be petty.

This was a time for her to man up, so to speak, put the past behind her, and be there for her sister.

Liam nodded, brought up another window, and a second later Gwen’s BlackBerry buzzed. “There you go,” he said.

“That’s this afternoon?”

“Yep.”

“Am I doing the right thing?”

He shrugged. “If I thought I could shake some sense into her myself, I would.”

“You going to be okay by yourself?”

“Yeah. I’ll only slow you down. Call me when you know what’s up, okay?”

She kissed his cheek. “Yeah.”

All the way to the doctor’s office, Gwen wondered how to handle this. She wanted her sister back, wanted her in her life.

Missed her like hell.

No, they didn’t always get along the greatest growing up, but she was usually an ally, or at the very least a buffer, against their parents now that they were adults. Despite the angry words she’d tossed at Amy in the kitchen the other morning, there were times she could remember Amy trying to step in when their mom or dad started in on Gwen over her career choice.

I will not lose my temper. She took a deep breath and let it out again. If nothing else, she could mend the rift with her sister, and the three of them could have a relatively peaceful, supportive relationship. Even if it was only because they’d united against their parents.

Amy would need help, because Gwen strongly suspected the baby’s father wouldn’t be involved that much. Despite Amy’s assurances to the contrary, Gwen knew what men could be like. Especially lying, cheating assholes who got women other than their wives pregnant. And besides, Amy didn’t need a man in her life. She had enough in savings to get her by until she started working full time again. Gwen and Liam would babysit for her. They could talk her into moving in with them.

She wistfully smiled. Kids of her own weren’t on the radar, especially now and maybe never, but she wouldn’t mind being able to spoil a niece or nephew rotten. Liam would make a great uncle. He wasn’t much more than a big kid himself in many ways.

This would all work out okay, once they finished running interference for Amy with their parents. They’d take the brunt of it for her, shelter her, let her focus on being a mom so she could enjoy it as much as possible.

She didn’t see Amy’s car when she pulled into the parking lot. She parked off to the side, hopefully where Amy wouldn’t notice her.

Her nerves a jangled mess, Gwen walked into the doctor’s office and was surprised to find Amy already sitting in the waiting room. Amy didn’t look up when she walked in, until Gwen walked over to her.

Amy’s jaw dropped. “Gwen! What are you doing here?”

She sat beside her. “Please, don’t be mad at me. I’m sorry we fought and I lost my temper.” She grabbed her sister’s hands. “I’m so sorry. I was a total bitch, and you didn’t deserve for me to go off on you like that. Listen to me, Liam and I love you, and we want to support you in this. We don’t want you going through this alone. Liam and I agree we want you to live with us. We’ll help you take care of the baby. We’ll babysit for you when you go back to work, and we’ll help you with Mom and Dad.”

She shook her head. “I–I–”

“Stop, please. Let me finish. We don’t care what happened or why, and we’re not going to play the stupid blame games Mom and Dad are so fond of. It happened, and we’re here for you.” She took a deep breath. “We mean it. We’ll—” Her voice broke off as Ruthie’s husband, Bob Tamsin, emerged from the bathroom and froze when he saw Gwen sitting there. After a moment’s stunned shock, he walked over

“Bob? What are you doing here?” Gwen asked. Then she looked at Amy and spotted her horrified expression. The Rapid City desk clerk’s description of the man Amy stayed with came back to Gwen.

All the pieces suddenly clicked into place. Bob had been on a business trip the same time Amy left.

Bob hadn’t been available to help Liam move.

Ruthie still swore Bob was having an affair.

The prepaid phone Gwen spotted in Amy’s stuff.

Gwen didn’t want to contemplate if Jack knew about this part of Amy’s secret or not. Had she even told him about Ruthie? She couldn’t remember.

As the full impact of Amy’s betrayal hit Gwen, her breath left in a whoosh. She stood on feet that had suddenly gone numb. “No,” she whispered, shaking her head and backing away from them. “I don’t believe it. I can’t believe it. After all she went through, you do this to her?”

Bob tried to speak, but Gwen pointed at him. “No. Don’t. Don’t you dare make excuses!”

Amy hadn’t moved from her chair. “Gwen, please, we didn’t mean for it to happen. It just did.”

Gwen felt ill. Worse, she felt like an idiot. No wonder Amy didn’t want to tell her and Liam about the secret man in her life. “How long has this been going on?” Gwen shrilly asked. She didn’t care that the whole waiting room had gone silent and was staring at them.

“Six months,” Amy softly admitted.

Six months. For six months, Ruthie had kept insisting something was wrong.

How right she’d been.

Gwen couldn’t stop shaking. She somehow managed to turn herself around and get pointed toward the exit. Bob caught up with her outside and tried to grab her arm to stop her, but she wheeled on him. “Don’t fucking touch me, you son of a bitch!” she screamed. “How the fuck could you do this to Ruthie?”

“You don’t know what it’s like living with her, Gwen. I didn’t mean for it to happen, but it did. I’m sorry this is going to hurt Ruthie, but I’m not sorry I finally have a chance to be happy with a normal woman after all the years of crap I’ve had to deal with.”

Gwen’s stomach rolled. She thought she might actually throw up. She held up a hand to silence him and stumbled backward. “Get the fuck away from me, you lying bastard. I can’t believe I actually thought you were a good guy.” She ran for her car, only realizing she was sobbing once inside. Her fingers trembled so bad she dropped her key three times before she seated it in the ignition and started the engine.

When she walked into the living room at home, she found Liam on the couch, working on his laptop. “How’d it go, sis?” Once he spotted her tears, he set the computer on the coffee table and opened his arms.

She fell onto the couch and Liam held her while she sobbed. She felt grateful he didn’t bother asking what happened.

Retelling it might make her sick.

Her BlackBerry rang—“Wipe Out.”

Ruthie.

She shoved it at him. “I can’t talk to her,” she said, her voice a haggard whisper. “Please, talk to her. Tell her anything, but I can’t talk to her yet.”

Confused, he answered. “Hiya, Ruthie, what’s up?…She’s upstairs taking a nap. I kept her up late last night. Don’t want to talk to me, huh?” he joked. “That’s okay, you know I was just teasing you, kiddo. So what’re you up to?” After chatting with her for five minutes, he got her off the phone.

His eyes met Gwen’s. He brushed the hair from her forehead. “All right, sis,” he quietly said. “I take it things didn’t go well. What happened? Talk to me.”

“I met the baby’s father,” she managed to choke out. “Now I know why Amy was terrified to tell us who he was.” She stared at her phone, which he still held.

He frowned as he studied the phone. Then he closed his eyes and swore as he connected the dots. “Oh, no.”

She nodded. “Oh, yes. The fuckwad was there at the doctor with her.”

He looked at her. “Oh, fuck me. Poor Ruthie. Did he explain himself?”

“I didn’t give him a chance. There’s nothing either of them can say to me to explain themselves. They’ve been seeing each other for six months.” She laid her head in his lap and let him stroke her hair. “There is no excuse. What? She accidentally fell on his dick enough times to get knocked up?”

He laughed. “That’s a good one. You should use that in a book.”

“It’s not funny.”

He sighed. “No, unfortunately, it’s not funny.”

She wanted Tim and Jack. She wanted to curl up in their arms and sob herself to sleep. But they were a half a country away in Rapid City, and Jack wanted nothing to do with her.

“I can’t tell Ruthie,” she finally said. “It’ll kill her. Or she’ll kill him. Or I’ll kill him, I don’t know. All I do know is I can’t tell her.”

“Don’t tell her. You shouldn’t. It’s not your job.”

“But what do I say? She’s my friend.”

“That’s why you shouldn’t say anything.” He stroked her hair. “It’s between Bob and her.” He glared. “And Amy.”

“I hate Amy for this.” She looked back at all the times Amy made snide comments about Ruthie. “She knew, all this time, what she was doing and could look me in the eye and…” She swallowed back bile. “I hate them.”

“I think it’s safe to say you’ll agree with me on rescinding our invite to her to live with us.”

“Uh, yeah. And she can fend for herself with Mom and Dad.”

They sat quietly for a few minutes. He laced his fingers through hers. “I hear real estate’s pretty reasonable in South Dakota. You know damn well Jack loves you, too. I saw how he was over you, talked to him myself. He was probably trying to protect his heart, afraid you’d never come back once you left for Ohio.”

She ignored the last part of his comment. “I’m not leaving you.”

“Who says you have to?”

She rolled over in his lap and looked up at him. “What do you mean?”

He shrugged. “There’s nothing keeping me here. I sure as hell don’t want anything to do with Amy after this, either. I think my relationship with Mom and Dad would benefit from some distance and a few state lines between us. I can work from anywhere I have high-speed internet. I bet Tim’s offer is still good.” He played with her hair. “You and Jack could have a heart-to-heart and patch things up.”

“You’d do that for me?”

He nodded. “Uh, duh. You’re my baby sister. You’re the one person in my life I know loves me the way I am.” He brushed another stray hair away from her face. “You’re as miserable without them as I was living at Mom and Dad’s. I’ve got my happily-ever-after, romance writer girl. Well, happily enough for me for now considering what the past couple of years have been like. It’s time for you to get yours.”

She snorted. “Tell Jackson Kelly that. I won’t ask Tim to break up with him, and Jackson made it perfectly clear to me where I stand with him.”

“So? Then we can move anywhere you want. You name it. I’ve got health insurance, so that’s not an issue. I’ll pay my share of the bills. Roomies. We could move to Laguna Beach.” He winked.

She ignored his implication. “Too expensive to live there.” She’d never lived anywhere but Ohio, within twenty minutes of her parents. “I don’t know. Moving’s a huge step.”

“Think about it. Whatever you want to do, kiddo. Seriously. You and me.” He held her chin and made her meet his gaze. “Let’s take a chance and do it. As long as we have each other, we can do anything, right? Just you and me.”

She patted his arm. “You and me.”

Jack spent a miserable morning at work. He knew he radiated a foul mood from the minimum ten-foot distance everyone gave him. He threw pens and file folders down on his desk, and nearly broke his desk phone when he slammed the handset down.

It didn’t help that he’d gotten into a screaming match with Tim the night before over the phone, and again this morning. Now he was wondering if he’d lost both Gwen and Tim because of his stupidity.

I should call her. I should call her, apologize, and beg her to come back.

He couldn’t make himself do it. Mostly, because he didn’t know why he wanted to do it. He still wasn’t convinced his feelings for Gwen were really for Gwen and not because she looked like Mel. Sure, Gwen was a great person in her own right, but would it be fair to her in case in a month or a year he realized he wasn’t in love with her for who she was?

That didn’t ease the ache in his heart.

She called Ruthie back a little later, after she’d blown her nose and washed her face and didn’t feel like throwing up. She forced cheer into her voice. “Hey, girlie, what’s up?”

Ruthie sounded subdued. “I need to talk to you.”

Gwen’s stomach knotted and threatened to upend. “About what?”

Gwen heard her take a deep breath. “I’m going to leave Bob.”

“What?”

“Before you ask me, yes, I took my meds this morning, and yes, I had breakfast and lunch.”

Gwen ignored Liam’s questioning look. “Honey, what’s going on?” As if she couldn’t guess. Gwen wondered if the rat bastard told Ruthie she’d confronted him and Amy at the doctor’s office.

Ruthie actually sounded calmer and more rational than she had in years. “I overheard him talking to someone on the phone last night. I didn’t confront him. I heard him talking about meeting her today. So I called him on his cell a little bit ago, asked him how he was doing, and he said he was at work.”

Gwen closed her eyes. “And?”

“So I hung up with him and called his office. I told them who I was, that I’d just got off the phone with my husband, and said he asked me to call them to see if he left his umbrella there. See? I didn’t go off half cocked. The receptionist went and looked for me. Obviously, he wasn’t in his office. So I called him right back and pretended like I forgot I needed him to bring stuff home for me from the store and talked for another minute or two, like everything was fine. Then he told me he has to go, that he’s going into a meeting.”

“Maybe he didn’t mean at the office.”

“No, he told me his receptionist came in to tell him his appointment was there early.”

Gwen didn’t know what to say, so she kept her mouth shut.

“Gwen, I can’t live like this. I know I don’t always think clearly, but dammit, for the past six months, something’s been different about him and even I know it. He hides his cell phone all the time. If he leaves it around, he’s wiped the call logs. He changed the password on his e-mail account. He did a bunch of little stuff I didn’t think about at first. I know I’m not easy to live with, but I can’t live with him if I can’t trust him.” She cried. “He’d be better off without me anyway.”

“Ruthie,” she soothed, “please don’t talk like that.”

She let out a snort of disgust. “I don’t mean killing myself. I don’t even mean killing him.” She sniffled. “I already called my brother. He’s driving over right now. He said I can stay with them. He’s always hated Bob anyway.”

“Are you sure this is what you want to do?”

“Yeah. I don’t even want to know who it is. I don’t care.”

Gwen stifled a guilty pang. “I’m so sorry, honey.”

Ruthie sniffled again. “Listen, I need to get off here and pack some stuff. If Bob calls you looking for me, don’t tell him where I am, okay? Please? Just tell him I’m safe and that I wanted to go away for a few days. I need to get my shit together, get my life back. I’m tired of living like this. You can call me on my cell, I’ll have it with me.”

Maybe this was a good sign. “Can I tell you something?”

“Of course you can, as much as you put up with me.”

“Liam and I might be moving.”

She gasped. “You’re getting back together with your guys?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know if I’d say that.” She wouldn’t allow herself the luxury of hope. “I haven’t even decided for sure if we will move, but Liam wants to move, and frankly, I want to be someplace else. We love Amy and our parents, but we agree it’d be healthier for both of us to put some distance between us and them. At least for now.”

“Good for you!” She laughed. “I’ll still call you and bug you.”

Gwen laughed, too. “You’d better. I’ll get mad if you don’t.”

“You’re a good friend, Gwen. Do you know how much I love you?”

She would miss Ruthie like hell. As exasperating as her friend could be at times, she really did love her. The things that had happened to her weren’t her fault, and Gwen couldn’t honestly say she wouldn’t have reacted exactly the same way Ruthie had. “I love you, too, Ruthie. I promise we’ll come visit you.” They said good-bye. After Gwen hung up, she stared at the phone.

“Well?” Liam asked.

She related the conversation and he shook his head. “Well, that saves you the hassle. Talk about fortuitous.”

“Yeah.” She looked at him. “You mean it? You really want to move?”

“Anywhere you want to go, sis. I have money saved up, about thirty grand. I was going to use it to move out of Mom and Dad’s. Might as well use it for us to move. Or we can use it for a down payment on a house even.” He studied her expression. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m scared.”

He smiled and pulled her in for a hug. “Me too, kiddo. We can be scared together, okay?”

To keep fireworks to a minimum, they’d relented and accepted their mother’s invitation to come over that night for dinner. Gwen prayed Amy didn’t show up despite her mother complaining she couldn’t get Amy to return her calls. Liam rolled out of his bedroom door in his wheelchair.

“Are you hurting?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Nope. Just resting up.” He grinned. “I’ll be damned if I’ll show up there in my chair. We’re not even taking the walker. I’ll take my cane. But I’ll use this until we leave so I don’t wear myself out.”

“Do we tell them tonight about the move?”

He nodded. “Yep. I plan to. We’ll tell them I accepted a job out west.”

“Why? We don’t even know where we’re going yet.” She didn’t even know where she wanted to go. Anywhere far enough to allow her to run from her painful memories.

Anywhere that would take her mind off Tim and Jack.

“Because it’ll take the pressure off you, and because you damn well know where we’re moving to.” He smiled. “I’d love to live out there and be able to see the West. If we don’t like it, in a year or so we’ll move somewhere else. Or hell, we can buy an RV and travel. Neither one of us needs to be tied down.”

She put her hands on her hips. “You need doctors.”

He shrugged. “So? We schedule travel to coincide around my doctor appointments. No biggie. There are doctors out there who deal with MS who aren’t in the Columbus area.” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “Come on, hot guys for you, hot guys for me, we can scope them out together.”

She burst out laughing. “You’re too much.” She walked over and hugged him. “And I wubs you, bro.”

“Wubs you too, sis.” When she straightened, he grabbed her hands and squeezed, hard. “You and me, right? No matter what they say to us at dinner? You have my back and I have yours, right? Promise?”

“Yeah, I promise. No matter what.”

She didn’t know if she liked the devious grin he wore. “Good. Now let’s get my ass loaded.”

They pulled up to their parents’ house a little after six. Gwen no sooner had the ignition turned off when her mom flew out the front door, hovering over Liam as he tried to get out.

“Mom,” he said, a hard edge to his voice, “I love you, but back the hell off.”

She looked hurt. “I just want to help!”

“I know, but I can do this. Just stand back.” He used his cane and carefully unfolded himself from the seat. He smiled. “See?”

“Where’s your chair? You should be using your chair outside!”

“I made Gee leave it home. I didn’t need it, and it’s stupid to make her load it.”

Her mother shot Gwen a dark look through the car to where Gwen hadn’t unfastened her seatbelt yet. “Why are you letting him walk and wear himself out?”

Before she could respond, Liam waved his hand in his mother’s face. “Helloooo, standing right here, Mom. Not a baby, not an invalid. Get over it.”

Gwen knew that look she gave him, the hard set to her jaw. Guilt trip alert. “Well,” she huffed. “I’m glad to see I’m not needed.”

Liam’s sharp tone surprised Gwen. “Mom, stop it. Right now. Cut the guilt crap. I tried for years to tell you I wasn’t a baby, and you never listened. I love you, and believe me, I really appreciate everything you and Dad did for me, but I’m okay and I’m getting along fine with Gwen. You and Dad should be enjoying your privacy.”

Their mom turned on her heel and stormed back to the house. Liam ducked his head and looked inside the car. “Bok bok bok,” he clucked at her.

She finally unfastened her seatbelt. “I’m not a chicken.”

“Bok.”

She stuck her tongue out at him, earning herself a laugh from him.

After getting out and locking the car, she followed a step behind him, close enough she could steady him if he stumbled, but not hovering. He made it up the drive and onto the front porch without trouble or hesitation. He went straight to the dining room, where their mom had already set the table. Their dad walked in, a thunderous look on his face.

“What did you say to upset your mother?” He directed the question at Gwen.

Liam raised his hand. “Get off her case. Mom’s mad at me. I told her I didn’t need any help walking from the car and she tried to chew Gee out for not bringing my chair.”

Their father’s gaze didn’t waver from Gwen. “Well, why didn’t you bring his chair?”

“Yo, Dad. I’m sitting right here.” Gwen recognized the frustration and barely checked anger in Liam’s voice. He’d had enough, and now that he wasn’t living here, he’d make his stand. “I told her not to bring it.”

“You’re supposed to take care of your brother—”

Liam’s fist slammed into the table, rattling the dishes and making Gwen jump. “Dad, stop it! Right now!”

Their father finally looked at Liam. “What did you say to me?”

“I said stop it. I’m thirty-five, not a kid, not a baby. Lay off Gee. If you have a problem, take it up with me, not her.”

Their mother appeared in the doorway, a pinched look on her face and a casserole dish in hand. She set it on a hot pad on the table. “Everyone sit down,” she said, ignoring the fireworks. “It’s ready.”

“Do you need any help, Mom?” Gwen asked.

She didn’t even look back as she turned. “No.”

Without the leaf, the dining room table was round. Gwen sat with Liam on her right and her mother on her left. Liam reached under the table and patted her thigh reassuringly.

Their father sat in his usual place, a dark, thunderous look on his face as he glared at them.

Gwen wondered when the true fireworks would start. She fought the nervous roll her stomach took and prayed she didn’t yak all over the table.

Her mother finished bringing out the food. During her father saying grace, Liam reached over and held Gwen’s hand under the table. As their father finished, Liam gave her hand a gentle squeeze. When she looked at him, he winked.

This would be okay. This time she was fine letting him step into protective big brother mode without feeling guilty or irritated about it.

Truth be told, she needed it. She didn’t know if she was strong enough to stand up to their parents on her own about this, even at her age.

The conversation was strained all throughout dinner as they moved on to dessert. Liam forged on as if everything was fine, deliberately ignoring their father’s stony silence and their mother’s clipped replies.

Finally, their mother thawed a little. “I still can’t believe Amy has turned like this. I don’t know what is wrong with her. I wonder if she’s taking drugs?”

“No, Mom, she’s not taking drugs,” Liam said. “She’s just trying to figure out her life. Midlife crisis.”

Mom sniffed. “Well. I don’t know why she should be having a crisis. What is there to be…crisising about? She only works part time. If she’d stayed here, you wouldn’t have moved out—”

“Mom, don’t,” Liam gently warned. “Don’t go there. Please. Let’s enjoy dinner.”

Gwen inwardly groaned at their mother’s high-pitched tone. That indicated tears would soon follow. “Well, it’s true, isn’t it? She leaves, you leave.”

Gwen gave Liam credit for trying. He kept his voice gentle. “Mom, I moved out because it’s time for you and Dad to get your lives back. When he retires, you two can do everything you planned. Gee and I get along great—”

“And we didn’t? I thought you were happy living here. I tried so hard.”

Their father said nothing.

Gwen’s stomach rolled, but Liam continued, undeterred. “Remember how you freaked out when each of us left for college? Think of it like that. Only you should be glad it’s me and Gee sticking together. You always told us as kids that we should stick together.”

That mollified her a little. “Well, I do have to say I’m proud of you two for being so close. Now if I could only figure out where we went wrong with your sister.” She dramatically sighed.

“You didn’t ‘go wrong’ with any of us.” Liam took a bite of his peach cobbler as Gwen was suddenly seized by a really bad feeling her brother was up to something. He didn’t disappoint, either. “Being pregnant will do that to you,” he blithely added.

Gwen froze. Liam continued eating as if he hadn’t just dropped a Hiroshima-sized bomb on their parents.

Their father finally spoke. “What did you say?” His voice sounded tight and strained. She prayed he wasn’t close to having a coronary.

Liam took another bite of his cobbler as if nothing was wrong. “Pregnant. Amy had her OB appointment today.” He frowned a little. “Didn’t she tell you about it? Mom, this cobbler is great, as usual. Gee, do you have the recipe so you can make it for us at home?”

Gwen fervently prayed Liam had an exit strategy. Her stomach dangerously rolled again.

Their mother looked stunned. “Amy is not pregnant. She’s…she’s not married. She doesn’t even have a man in her life!”

Liam snorted. “Um, yeah, she is.” He faked innocent confusion. Gwen recognized that expression from when they were kids. “I could have swore she said she told you guys about the baby.”

Their father threw his napkin on the table. “What is going on? No one’s told us anything! What baby? What in Heaven’s name are you talking about?”

Gwen forced down the last bite of her cobbler and kept her mouth shut. Liam finished his and leaned back in his chair. “I’m sorry, Dad. I thought she told you.” The picture of Mr. Innocence.

“Who’s the father?” their dad demanded.

“Now that I don’t know. She didn’t tell us that.” Okay, technically that was the truth. She didn’t tell them. Gwen had figured it out on her own after catching Amy and Rat Bastard red-handed.

Oh, good, another man to nickname.

Their mother shook her head in disbelief. “No. I don’t believe it.”

Liam scratched his head. “Well, sorry to be the bearer of all this bad news tonight. Amy’s pregnant, Gee and I are moving to South Dakota, and I’m gay.”

Gwen closed her eyes, her lips pressed together, cringing, waiting.

Their father did not disappoint. “If this is some idea of a joke, young man—”

“Oh, it’s no joke, Dad.” She heard Liam push his chair back. She didn’t dare open her eyes yet. “We love you, but you two have been operating under some pretty unrealistic ideals for a long, long time. Gee makes a damn good living at what she does. Amy has a life to live, and so do I. I’m tired of being scared of hiding who I am around you. Now I don’t have to. I’m going to move out there and start a new life, and Gee is willing to pull up stakes and go with me.”

Gwen finally dared open her eyes. Her parents stared at her. Her father trembled with anger and jabbed a finger at her. “This is all your fault, young lady! You writing that…that…filth! You’ve corrupted your brother!”

“Stop!” Liam stood, holding on to the table for balance. Gwen felt close to tears, but the protective anger on Liam’s face kept her from breaking down. “Gee is the one person I felt safe coming out to. The first person I came out to. This isn’t her fault, it’s the way I am, the way I was born. So back off, Dad. I knew you’d react this way. It’s why I was afraid to admit the truth to you. Well, I don’t have to be afraid anymore. I love you, and I love Mom, and I’m grateful beyond words for your love and support and care when I got sick, but it’s time for me to suck it up and move on and be who I need to be. Now I’m not scared to take care of myself anymore.” He grabbed his cane and held his hand out to Gwen. “Come on, kiddo. Let’s go home.”

“You’re not going anywhere!” their father screamed. “You’re going to stay here and discuss this, and then I’m calling our minister and have him come talk to you.”

Their mother didn’t rise from her chair. She sat there and cried. Gwen felt a little guilty about that, it coming down to this, but she trusted Liam and knew a confrontation would have happened regardless of how they approached it with their father.

Liam shook his head. “Sorry, Dad. This isn’t a demon you can say a few prayers over and exorcise. I’m gay, not possessed. Deal with it. You have a gay son, you have one daughter who makes her living writing erotica, and another daughter knocked up out of wedlock. The irony is, of course, that the knocked-up daughter is not the one who writes erotica, but the ‘good’ daughter, the one you’ve thrown in poor Gee’s face all these years.”

Gwen took his hand and stood, her own tears close to the surface.

Liam looked at her. “Come on, sweetie,” he gently said. “Let’s go home.” She let him lead her toward the front door.

Their father moved faster and blocked their exit. Liam still had a good three inches of height on him. “You’re not going anywhere!” their father roared. “You’re going to stay here so we can pray over you!”

Liam’s voice dropped, angry. “Get out of our way, Dad. We’re leaving.”

“I’m not moving!”

“Okay then.” Liam hooked his cane over his arm and, without releasing Gwen’s hand, reached into his pocket for his cell.

“What are you doing?” their father demanded.

“I’m calling 911 and telling them you’re holding us hostage and refusing to let us leave.”

Their mother finally stood and rushed to the front door. She grabbed their father’s arm. “Dave, please, just let them go!”

Liam’s thumb hovered over the send button on his phone. “What’ll it be, Dad?” Gwen never remembered hearing Liam sound so angry. “We’re not staying and being subjected to your abuse about our lives. We’re not backing down. Not this time. It’s time you see the truth about who your children are and learn to deal with it. You want to go after someone, go after Amy for scaring the crap out of all of us by disappearing the way she did and getting herself pregnant.”

Gwen clung to Liam’s arm, terrified he’d follow through with his threat to call. As pissed off as she could get at her parents, she didn’t want either of them in jail.

Their father finally let their mother pull him aside. Liam nodded and thumbed the end button to clear the number from his phone before he slipped it back into his pocket. “Mom, Dad, we love you. We are grateful to you, and we think you were good parents. But we are adults and we are tired of having to hide the truth about ourselves and trying to fight for your approval. We love you the way you are. We just wish you loved us for who we are and saw us for the functioning, successful adults we became. You did good. That should be good enough for you, and I’m sorry it’s not. No matter how much we love you, I’m not letting you bully us anymore.”

Gwen didn’t miss Liam’s particular phrasing, still the protective big brother.

Liam tugged on Gwen’s arm and pulled her toward the door. He grabbed his cane as she opened the front door for him. Not releasing her, he led her through the doorway and guided her to her car.

He didn’t let go until after she opened the passenger door for him and he got in, where he winked at her. “Let’s go.”

She cast a nervous glance at the front door, where her parents stood, staring at them.

Her tears hit a block from their house. She pulled over into a parking lot and cried with her forehead on the steering wheel until she laughed, then cried again. “What the fuck, Li? You told them about Amy!”

He rubbed her shoulder. “Well, I figured hey, it would take some of the sting out of me coming out to them and telling them about us moving. It worked, didn’t it? They didn’t even complain about the move.” He shrugged. “Besides, serves Amy right for sleeping with Ruthie’s husband.”

She spied his playful smile, which started her laughing again. She leaned over and they hugged for a long time. “Well, now you are really stuck with me,” she said.

He patted her on the back. “Yeah, well, if you think I’m going to let my baby sister move halfway across the country without me where I can’t keep an eye on her, think again.”

They both sat back. Gwen found a napkin between the seats and blew her nose. “So what now?”

He laughed. “I’d suggest a bar, but that might get us in trouble. How about over there?” He pointed down the street, to a liquor store.

She nodded and shifted the Element into drive. “Damn fine idea, bro. Damn fine idea.”