What She Lost (The Tide is Rising Book 2), page 1
M.C. Castille
What She Lost
First published by Belle-Jones Books 2021
Copyright © 2021 by M.C. Castille
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
M.C. Castille asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
First edition
This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy
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In loving memory of Maureen de Castilla
Acknowledgement
Thanks to MV for lending his technical expertise.
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Prologue
Rain pounded the windshield as Mac gripped the passenger-side door. The pain medication from the surgery to remove a Fallopian tube was wearing off. A painful ache grew stronger in her side, a physical reminder of the child not meant to be. At seventeen years old, she was hardly equipped emotionally to process the loss, so she put it in a mental box and tucked the pain away.
I’ll deal with it later. Whatever happened to my mother is more important.
“Can this thing go any faster?” she asked.
Charlie had the pedal near the floor on his green ’76 Ford pickup as it was. How he kept the old thing running was beyond her.
“I’ll hydroplane if I drive any faster,” Charlie replied.
His windshield wipers struggled to keep up with the torrent hammering the glass. The sudden storm had brought evening early on this spring day.
“What do you think happened?” he asked gently.
“I don’t know,” she replied.
Everything happened so fast. She couldn’t be sure what she’d heard. “It sounded like a shot was fired,” she said.
“But you’re not certain?”
“No, it happened so fast. One minute I was explaining to my mother that I was pregnant but the baby wasn’t viable, and the next, she screamed, and the phone went dead.” She held her throbbing side and pressed her forehead against the glass. Cool against her skin, it eased the warmth burning through her head.
“Maybe we should call the police?” he asked.
“My father is the chief of police. If we call them . . .” She wanted to avoid involving the cops. That hadn’t helped any of the times her father had beaten her mother; it certainly wouldn’t help now. “I’m probably overreacting. My mom could have seen a mouse or a spider. She hates spiders. Once, she spent a whole hour standing on a chair, refusing to come down unless we killed it.”
Please let her have seen a spider and gotten scared.
But that sound—that distinctive pop that Mac knew so well from accompanying her father to the range during her childhood—had nothing to do with mice.
And then there was the fact that her mother wouldn’t answer the phone no matter how many times she called.
Charlie reached over and squeezed her hand. “We’re almost there.”
Almost there.
And what will we find when we reach my house?
Releasing her grip, he spun the wheel with both hands and turned onto Whitman street. Both her parents’ cars were in the driveway, which meant they were home, though the house was dark.
If they’re home, then the lights should be on like in every other house on the street.
As they approached, a neighbor ran down the front steps, waving her arms and yelling words Mac couldn’t hear over the wind tearing through the trees.
“Stop the truck, Charlie,” she said, throwing open the door and hopping out. Instantly, she doubled over as pain seared through her side.
Charlie jumped from the truck, leaving it running in the middle of the street. “The doctor said to take it easy.”
“I can’t. Something’s wrong,” Mac replied, hobbling toward the house.
“I heard something,” the neighbor shouted.
“You heard what?” Charlie asked.
“It sounded like gunshots. Should I call the police?”
Gunshots.
Plural.
Good hell, what did he do?
She didn’t know what she was going to find; she only knew she didn’t want the neighborhood to see it. “Please, go home.” Mac pushed past the neighbor and headed for the front door, which was locked. She fumbled through the pockets of her jacket and located her keys. With shaking hands, she struggled to put the right one in the lock. “Mom? I’m coming,” she hollered.
“Here.” Charlie took the key and opened the door, shutting it firmly on the neighbor.
The first floor of the house was dark save for the illumination from the television set in the den. Peter Jennings—the only news anchor who didn’t annoy her dad—was on. Charlie flipped on the light while she stayed in the hall.
“All clear. I’ll check the kitchen,” he said.
“Okay.” She moved to the staircase to the second floor. With a deep breath, Mac began the climb. Her hand gripped the wooden banister that her parents had fought over installing. Always a cheap bastard, her dad would never invest in their house. Her mother had completed the project by having the installation done when he went fishing for a week.
Her legs were heavy, and her mind was empty. As she climbed higher and higher toward the door, which was cracked open enough to allow a tiny beam of light, Mac struggled to breathe. She should have told Charlie not to bother looking elsewhere. The light was beckoning her to her parents’ bedroom, the place where their worst fights always happened.
On the top step, her legs tensed and locked at the knees. Grasping the wall and digging into the plaster with her nails, she dragged herself to the door and nudged it open with her foot.
A lamp was broken on the floor, leaving the glowing white bulb naked. Shards of glass littered the brown carpet. Their family photo frames were crushed, and the pictures were torn.
Her father’s body was slumped over on the bed. She looked briefly at his face, or what was left of it. The gun—his service revolver—rested on the floor next to the bed.
Wrapped around his left hand was the gold locket her mother wore every day. A gift from Mac’s great-grandmother, the jewelry was a precious family heirloom that meant the world to her mom. Mac tore the necklace from her father’s hand and rubbed the locket against her jeans to wipe away the blood splattered against its surface.
If he weren’t already dead, she would have killed him for taking it.
A faint moan from the other side of the room made her heart skip with hope.
On the floor, between the bed and the window, was her mother. She’d been shot in the stomach and was gurgling blood that trickled down her chin. A purple bruise encircled her swollen right eye.
“Mom?” Mac was on her knees, crawling to her.
“Mija,” her mother gasped.
At thirty-seven years old, Elena Mendoza-Cordova Cahill was too young to be dying.
Mac lifted her mother from the wet carpet. There is so much blood. “Please don’t die. I need you.”
Charlie appeared in the doorway. “Oh, my—” He covered his mouth with his hand and averted his eyes from her father’s body. “Is she . . .”
“Call an ambulance!” Mac shrieked.
“Listen,” her mother said.
“Que, Momma?” Mac sobbed as she tried to apply pressure to her mother’s wound with the comforter from the bed.
Her skin was clammy and her voice barely audible. “It’s your job to protect them now.”
Mac didn’t have to ask. She knew whom her mother was referring to. Ever since her Aunt Alejandra had gone missing, her mother had worried constantly about the fate of her sister’s children, particularly Alejandra’s daughters, Isabel and Marisol.
“No, no. I’m not the oldest. Drew is.”
“He’s not strong like you.” Elena’s eyes closed. A puff of air escaped from her lips.
Mac grabbed her face. “No, you can’t go. I can’t do this without you. Please!” Her heart pounded so fast that she could barely catch her breath to speak.
Her mom’s eyes opened slightly. “Protect them. For me.” Her lashes fluttered and then closed. Suddenly, her body was lighter in Mac’s arms.
No! No! No!
Mac checked for a pulse that wasn’t there. She wanted to do something—to pound life back into her mother’s limp body. “Momma!” But there was no need for CPR. At least a liter of Elena’s blood had saturated the carpet.
Mac slumped against the bed frame, holding her mother to her chest. This wasn’t right. Elena had held her this way, comforting Mac through the worst life had to offer. She had to come back. If God let her mother live, Mac would do anything.
And they would finally leave her father.
“Please God, send her back to me. Please,” she cried.
“Mac?”
She looked at Charlie through a blurry sheet of tears.
“She’s gone,” he whispered.
“Because he took her from me,” she said.
“Your dad can’t hurt anybody anymore.”
She didn’t care that her father was dead. Her raven-haired mother, with sunshine in her smile and soft caramel skin, would never dance with her in the kitchen again. The joy in Mac’s life had died, along with a piece of her soul. She gripped the body with all her might, sobbing and screaming.
Not even Charlie could get her to let go.
Minutes later, the paramedics sedated her.
They had to.
It was the only way that Maria-Alejandra Mendoza-Cahill would leave the greatest love she’d ever known.
Her mother.
CHAPTER ONE
Rubber wheels on the glossy cement floor; people buzzing past them. A sea of voices and metal carts rolling through the grocery store. In the space between heartbeats, where time was suspended. Mac stood, drowning in the sensation of having already lived this moment. Had she fallen backward in time to that day seven years earlier when she crossed paths with Charlie?
No, the girls are here.
This is real.
But how is it happening again?
She blinked hard, hoping he was a desert mirage or a stress-induced fantasy brought on by the events of the past year.
He’s still here.
Strands of silver weaved through his jet-black hair. His light brown skin was smooth everywhere but around his almond-shaped brown eyes, where tiny lines gathered at the edges. When his lips parted, and he smiled with bright, white teeth, she squeezed the grocery cart handle as her knees threatened to buckle. Sweat gathered under her arms and along her bra line. The moisture turned the cotton-covered wire into sandpaper, grating her skin like soft cheese. The silk blouse, which had been a good idea when she dressed that morning, clung to her chest in wet patches.
The twelve months that had passed since her husband was murdered by his mistress’s brother were a blur filled with tears, heartache, and a quest to start anew.
She’d come home expecting to struggle with the past.
But not like this and not so soon.
I could have handled seeing anyone but Charlie.
“Mac? Are you okay?” he asked.
Shit! I’m sweating through my best suit.
Her gaze zeroed in on his visage like a missile locked on a target, unable to undo its programming. “I’m fine.”
If she were to describe love in a word, it would be Charlie. He was the physical embodiment of her every hope, dream, and lustful desire wrapped up in a big ball of warmth.
And he was twelve inches away from her.
“Maybe this isn’t the time or place.” He looked sideways at Riley, who was clutching a bag of Doritos and a block of Velveeta cheese. She stomped her left foot while glaring back at him.
Clearly, we need to have the nutrition talk again.
Joanie and Kali, their arms filled with junk food, walked toward them. Joanie frowned at Charlie.
No doubt they’re all wondering who he is. And that’s a conversation I want to avoid having.
“I want to apologize for standing you up that night,” he said.
He doesn’t need to apologize. I’m the one who should have walked away.
“It was a long time ago. We don’t need to rehash the past,” she replied.
“I wanted to be there,” he said.
Grief smacked her in the chest as the memory of sitting in the bar, waiting for the man she adored, sprang to the surface.
“Then why weren’t you?” she said in a tone sharper than intended.
I have no right to be angry with him. If I hadn’t made that deal with my grandfather, Charlie and I would have married after college. It’s my fault we aren’t together, not his.
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other and back again, lowering his voice. “Something happened, and I tried to call you when I woke up, but you’d changed your number.”
What did Charlie mean, he woke up?
“Mom!” Riley’s irritated voice rang out.
Mac turned in the direction of her daughter’s voice.
“It’s time to go home,” Riley said sharply.
And let’s talk about respect while we’re at it.
Mac was torn between calming Riley and understanding what Charlie had just said. “Just a minute, please.”
“I have homework to do.” Riley’s voice was filled with panic.
She feels threatened.
By Charlie.
But she doesn’t need to be. He’s the one who was supposed to get away.
“Girls, I would like you to meet an old friend of mine from high school. This is Charlie Rodriguez,” she said. While she smiled with her lips, Mac’s eyes conveyed a very direct you better behave if you ever hope to drive a car someday look.
Riley did not take the hint. “Can we go now?” If her daughter were a cartoon character, steam would have been pouring from her ears.
“I heard you got married,” he said quietly.
“Yes, she did. In fact, she’s still married,” Riley huffed.
Being a widow didn’t exactly count as still being married.
“Their father passed away last year,” Mac said. She didn’t have to explain that she’d adopted Riley and her sisters. Charlie knew she couldn’t have children of her own.
“Mom!” Riley’s voice was shrill.
“I need a minute,” Mac replied between clenched teeth. There was no mistaking her message this time.
Charlie smiled at Riley, who rolled her eyes in return.
“Fine,” Riley replied.
“I’m sorry to hear about your husband. I’m surprised that Drew didn’t say anything,” he said.
“You’ve seen my brother?” she asked.
“Yeah, I’ve seen him around a couple of times. We ran into each other when I was in physical therapy after the shooting and then again about six months ago when I was visiting my dad in the hospital,” Charlie replied.
Mac went deaf momentarily as she processed what he’d said. He said shooting. Charlie was involved in a shooting. Her brother had never mentioned seeing him. Not even after she and the girls moved back to Tacoma. “What shooting?” she asked.
Charlie’s eyebrows rose. That was when she noticed two faint, circular scars near his hairline. “Didn’t he tell you I was shot that night I was supposed to meet you?”
The grocery store spun before her, and her empty stomach swirled acid up into her throat. “No, he didn’t say a word. What happened?” she said.
He ran a hand through his thick hair. “I fell after I was shot. I struck my head on the sidewalk and ended up in a coma for months.”
“That’s horrible,” Mac replied.
Riley whined. “Mom, let’s go.”
Mac held up a finger for her to wait. This might be her only chance for the closure she’d waited years for. “How long were you in the coma?” she asked.
“Seven months,” he said.
Seven months?
I was already married to Griffin.
I’m such an asshole. I should have tracked him down when he didn’t show up instead of running away.
She wouldn’t cry. Not in front of the girls, because then she would have to explain she’d abandoned Charlie when he needed her the most.
“I’m so sorry you were hurt. I had no idea,” she said.
Charlie smiled the aw shucks, ma’am way that used to make her warm and tingly all over. “Don’t be. Everything worked out,” he said.
“You mean because you met your wife?” she asked.
He tilted his head to the right, puzzled. “Wife? I’m not married.”
“But I saw you on Facebook. You were wearing a suit and had your arm around the shoulders of a bride,” she said.
“That was my cousin, Carolina. I was the best man at her wedding,” he replied.
Her face flushed with warmth. “Oh.”
Everything I thought I knew was fundamentally wrong, and my dear brother knew for years and didn’t tell me.
I might just kill him.
“This is good tea, and I am here for it,” Kali said, opening the bag of popcorn in her hands and shoving a handful into her mouth.
Riley gave her younger sister a sharp elbow to the shoulder. “Shh!”
Kali pushed her back and continued to scarf down the popcorn Mac hadn’t yet paid for.
