Last-Minute Marriage. Marisa Carroll

wouldn’t have lasted as long as it did.

      But when Sam was six, his parents had died in a car accident on the sort of foggy night tonight promised to be. Kara had called it quits soon after, taking off for the bright lights of Chicago, where she could be free to find herself without the impediment of a handicapped son and a husband she’d “outgrown.” Now it was just Sam and Mitch and Mitch’s granddad, Caleb. And if it wasn’t the ideal arrangement for raising a child or living your life, Mitch was mostly content with the way things were.

      He coasted to a stop in front of Lily Mazerik’s big old Victorian house and headed up the walk to the front door. He could have buzzed Sam’s pager and had him meet him at the curb. It was a special one that vibrated, instead of beeping when a message came in. But he wanted to say hello to Lily and ask her how Sam was coming along, so he hadn’t bothered. He turned the key on the old-fashioned metal doorbell and waited.

      A moment later Lily appeared at the door wearing a paint-stained smock. Her silvery blond hair was pulled into a soft knot on top of her head. There was a smudge of paint on her cheek and a smile on her lips. “Hi, Mitch,” Lily said, stepping back so he could enter the house. “Do you have time to see Sam’s latest masterpiece, or are you in a hurry to get him home?”

      “I’ve got time.”

      “Good.” Her smile widened.

      They’d been friends all through school and fellow River Rats, which was the name given the gang of kids who used to hang out together by the river. Over the summer Lily had fallen in love with Aaron Mazerik, the high-school coach and proverbial bad-boy-made-good. Aaron had also turned out to be the illegitimate son of Abraham Steele, the president of the bank and Riverbend’s leading citizen, who’d died of a heart attack back in the spring. The revelation had created speculation and gossip that had lasted most of the summer.

      Mitch followed Lily to the back of the house. Aaron was nowhere to be seen, and Mitch figured he was probably at the gym. Preconditioning for basketball season had started that week even though football season was still in high gear. Lily and Aaron’s romance had had tough sledding for a while, but it looked as if everything was working out for them now. They’d been married in a quiet ceremony right after Labor Day.

      Actually, when he thought about it, a lot of his old River Rat pals were pairing off. Charlie Callahan and his ex-wife, Beth, were back together after a fourteen-year separation. Mitch had promised Charlie he’d be best man when they retied the knot on Valentine’s day. Lynn Kendall, the pastor at the Riverbend Community Church, and Tom Baines were seeing a lot of each other, and Mitch wouldn’t be a bit surprised if something serious developed there.

      He was the only one of the bunch left single except for Nick Harrison, who was now his lawyer, and Jacob Steele, Abraham’s legitimate son. But for all he knew, Jacob could be married with a dozen kids by now, or he could be in jail, or dead. No one in town had heard from him in years, not even his aunts Ruth and Rachel. His old friend hadn’t even come home for his father’s funeral, and Mitch didn’t have any idea why.

      “Dad!” Sam looked up from the table in Lily’s kitchen where he was sitting. “See what I did?”

      “Hey, tiger,” Mitch greeted him, moving past Lily to look down at Sam’s drawing.

      “It’s…Mothra destroying Tokyo and…Godzilla’s coming to the rescue of everyone in that building Mothra’s going to step on.” Sam smiled and shrugged. “How’d I do?” He’d made a hash of the monsters’ names, but Mitch wasn’t in the mood to correct him.

      “Not too bad. We’ll add them to your vocabulary list and practice later. Your picture’s great.” Mothra and his nemesis, the legendary Godzilla, were towering over the hapless Japanese capital, tiny human figures cowering at their feet. Perspective had obviously been the lesson of the day.

      “He’s one awesome dude.” His son’s smile reminded Mitch of Kara. Sam had his mother’s blond hair, which turned almost white under the summer sun, blue eyes and one crooked front tooth. But Mitch also recognized himself in the boy. He had the Sterling square jaw and a nose that was going to be too big for his face for a few years to come.

      He ruffled Sam’s hair. He was a good kid—an antidote to all the lonely nights and lonely years that stretched ahead of Mitch. There he was, thinking about being alone again. “Tell me how you did this,” he said a bit grimly.

      “It’s called perspective,” Sam explained, enunciating as clearly as he could. Mitch shot Lily a grateful look. It was obvious she’d taken the time to help Sam with the word. “I’m learning how to make things look bigger and smaller just like you see them in real life. See, Mothra is fifty feet taller than Godzilla, but that doesn’t mean anything. He’s still going to get his ass whipped.”

      “Sam!” Lily’s eyes widened, but the corners of her mouth twitched in a suppressed smile.

      “Whoa, son.” Mitch laid his hand on Sam’s shoulder and applied some pressure so Sam would understand the importance of his words. “That’s not a term you use in front of ladies. In fact, it’s not a word you should be using at all.”

      Sam clapped his hands over his mouth. “Oops, sorry,” he said, signing the apology for good measure. “It just slipped out. I mean, Godzilla’s going to kick butt.”

      “Well, that’s some improvement,” Mitch said.

      “You’re forgiven,” Lily told Sam. “How do you sign ‘forgiven’?”

      Sam showed her and she tried to repeat the swift movements of his hand and fingers. Mitch encouraged Sam to use spoken words as much as possible even though he knew sign language. It was a controversy in the world of the hearing impaired, sign versus speech, and Mitch had listened to both sides. But he’d decided that everyone Sam encountered would speak to him, and only a very few would sign. So they’d put most of their emphasis on speech therapy.

      “Slow down,” she said with a laugh. “I can’t keep up.”

      “Practice,” Sam teased, but the r sound slid away as it so often did. Consonants were particularly hard for his son to reproduce, since he’d lost his hearing before he was fully verbal, but Lily understood and rolled her eyes.

      “Very funny. I’ll practice signing. And you practice your perspective. Is it a deal?”

      “Deal,” Sam said.

      “Okay. Your assignment for next week is to draw something you can see from your bedroom window using the proper perspective, okay?” She had been looking directly at him as she spoke. She formed her words carefully and didn’t speak too quickly so Sam could read her lips.

      “I promise. Can I take my picture home tonight to show Granddad?”

      “Sure.” Lily produced a heavy cardboard folder to protect Sam’s picture from the rain on the trip home. “See you next week, Sam.”

      “See you. Come on, Dad. I want to watch Unsolved Mysteries.”

      “Homework first.”

      Sam wrinkled his forehead into a frown. “I’m sick of school already.”

      Lily laughed. “It’s only October.”

      “Tryouts for basketball are in four weeks,” Sam told her. This was Indiana. Basketball season was as real an indicator of the passing year as falling leaves.

      “You’ll make the team this year, I know it,” Lily said. “Aaron’s told me how hard you’ve been working all summer.”

      “Really?” Sam brightened at the praise.

      “It all depends on your report card,” Mitch reminded him with a touch on his shoulder so Sam would look his way. “Now come on. Granddad is waiting for us, and he’ll want to see your drawing, too.”

      Sam picked up his backpack where he’d left it beside the front door. “He’s very talented, Mitch—before you know it, I’ll have taught