Tyler looked at him, and Mike felt his heart make an elevator ride to his shoes. “Did you help get him out? You and Carrie?”
Mike leaned forward. “No, Tyler, we didn’t. We got there too late to help him get out.”
“Daddy’s dead, Tyler.”
“Like Max?”
“A little like Max.” “A puppy,” Lori mouthed in Mike’s direction. “It will be like Max because Daddy won’t come home again. The part of him that made him walk and talk and be Daddy isn’t here anymore. Being dead means he went to heaven to be with Jesus.”
That wasn’t an assumption Mike would have made about Gary Harper, but Mike forgave Lori for the fib. After all, this was Harper’s kid.
“Do you think Max bited him when he got there?”
“No, I think they’re friends. In heaven nobody remembers the bad things you did,” Lori said simply.
“So Daddy’s still in heaven with Max and Jesus? Can we call him on the phone there?”
“No, Tyler, we can’t.” Lori was fighting tears now.
Tyler looked puzzled. “Last time he went away, we could talk to him on the phone.”
“That’s true. But this time is different.”
This was raising a lot of questions. Mike felt an ache in his chest at what Lori was facing. “I think I’d better leave both of you alone for a while. Can I go talk to my mom about the house?”
Lori looked up from the bed. “I think you’d better. I’m going to need more help than I thought. Maybe you’re going to be the answer to a prayer twice in one day, Mike.”
The answer to a prayer? It was the first time he’d ever been called that. Mike wasn’t sure it fit. But looking at the glowing eyes of the young woman in the room, he was willing to be the answer to any of her prayers. He’d never been part of a miracle before. But for somebody like Lori, trying to explain the finality of death to a child too young to understand, he could try. She needed all the miracles she could get.
Chapter Four
Mike rehearsed his speech to his mother while he drove home. It earned him a few strange looks from Dogg, who sat in the cab of the truck with his head tilted sideways. True, he’d told Lori everything was worked out and Mom would be fine with her renting the house next door. Now he just had to make sure of that.
He pulled into the drive that circled the house. Parking the truck in his accustomed spot off to the side, where he could pull out any time night or day that a volunteer fire call sounded, he held the door open until Dogg leapt down. He still looked mightily relieved to be rid of those antlers.
“Wipe your feet,” he told the beast as they both entered the kitchen. Dogg looked as tired as he did, except the animal’s tongue was hanging out farther. Still, he didn’t have to worry about the dog’s manners; Mike swore Dogg was better about neatness indoors than he was.
The kitchen smelled wonderful. There had to be either veal stew or beef Stroganoff in that pot on the stove for Christmas Eve dinner to make his nose twitch like this. My mother loves me was his first thought. She showed it in a variety of ways, but as a savvy woman, Gloria Martin knew how to get to her son through his stomach.
“Hey,” Mike called through the house, knowing where he’d find her anyway, even on Christmas Eve.
“Hey, yourself.” Gloria was in stocking feet, black pantsuit made festive by an enameled pin in the shape of a holly sprig. As she stood up from the desk in her office, Mike marveled that this tiny woman had borne a big brute like him, and put up with him for all these years.
“I was beginning to think we had to call out the search party. Except you usually are the search party, so that didn’t leave me with many options.” Her red lipstick was unsmudged even this late in the day. Her lacquered nails were the same glossy red. She looked the picture of the successful middle-aged woman.
Mike shrugged. “Well, we had plenty to do. Remember that water rescue we did in August? The department decided his widow should be our Santa Claus case this year. When we went to tell her, we nearly delivered a baby that was a surprise to everybody involved except the mother.”
Gloria’s hand flew to her mouth. “So what will that woman do? Are there other children? And didn’t you tell me that man was a drug dealer? Obviously there’s no insurance or anything…”
Mike knew his job would be far easier now. “There’s another kid, a little boy about five. He and his mom and his new sister are all as well as can be expected. And as far as what they’re going to do now, I think I solved that, as well.”
Gloria’s eyes narrowed. “You rented them the house in back, didn’t you, Michael? Or knowing you, the use of the house has been promised, but this woman has no hope of paying rent.”
“Got it in one, Mom. She does promise to do the heavy cleaning. In fact if it was up to her, I think Lori would be doing the heavy cleaning before the first of the year.”
Gloria’s artfully tinted brown curls bounced as she shook her head. “Not that soon. I’m glad you did it, Mike. It will be good to have children around. Especially since I seem destined to be without grandchildren until I am too old and feeble to hold them.”
Mike scowled. “Okay, it’s Christmas Eve. We are not going to get into that tonight. You going to open your present before supper or after?”
“After.” Gloria laughed. “It’s not even dark yet. I don’t open presents before dark on Christmas Eve. And you need a shower before dinner anyway. Go wash up and come back presentable.”
“Okay, but no decorating Dogg while I’m gone. He’s had enough of that today.”
“Not even one plaid bow?”
Mike sighed. “If he’ll let you put it on, you can do that. And of course you can brush him. But no jingle bells or pine roping or anything.”
His mother gave a very unladylike snort behind him. “Pine roping. Who does he think I am?” Even though he was headed out of the room, Mike already knew that Dogg’s big head was in her small hands. They both loved the attention. “You’d eat pine roping. And mistletoe is poisonous, so we can’t have you wearing that, either. Let’s go find that plaid ribbon, the one with the gold edges, shall we?” Mike heard the sound of Dogg’s nails ticking down the hardwood hallway as they both went their separate ways to prepare for Christmas Eve.
An hour later they were all in the dining portion of the big country kitchen. Mike tried to disguise his exhaustion with aftershave and a bright red sweater. It might work, depending on how close Mom was paying attention.
There were candles everywhere there was flat space in the kitchen. It did seem kind of quiet, just two people and one dog, even if he took up more floor space than one of the people. Maybe his mom was right about the lack of grandchildren. A few rug rats would definitely spice up the holidays. Of course he’d have to meet the right woman first. One that would pass muster with his mother, as well as being able to put up with all his foibles.
