“I’ve grown up,” she added softly. “Dad and I write now—a couple of letters a week. His wife is a lovely, gentle woman, and his three sons are beautiful. I know you’d want him to be happy—that’s why I’m telling you this. He is. Happy for the first time in ages. He’s got a wonderful family and he’s made peace with his past. He still believes the war was wrong, but he deeply regrets his involvement with the bombing.”
She waited a few minutes and then brought up the subject she’d come here to talk to her mother about. “I’ve decided to put the house on the market,” she said. “I waited because…well, because it helped me deal with losing you and Jack. I might have continued to live here if Alberto hadn’t come down with strep throat last month. El Mirador doesn’t have a medical clinic, and Dad ended up taking Azucena and the baby into Mérida to see a doctor. By the time they got there, Alberto’s temperature was 106 and he had scarlet fever. He nearly died. The town needs a medical clinic and a trained medical professional. Do you realize what I’m saying, Mom? What I want to do?
“Alberto should have been on antibiotics much earlier, and he would have been if El Mirador had a clinic. Dad and I’ve written to each other about this several times now. I’m going to take the money from my inheritance and the sale of the house and use it to build a clinic in El Mirador. So many people want to help. Gary got Med-X to donate supplies, and even Group Wellness wants to contribute. If you don’t mind, I’m going to name the clinic after someone you never met, someone I’ve told you about. His name was Jack Keller.
“You probably wouldn’t have liked him,” she said, and smiled sadly. “In the beginning I didn’t, either, but I came to love him and in time you would have, too.”
Peace settled over her. An inner peace that told her she’d made the right decision. There was nothing more for her in Louisville. Her father, his wife and her three half brothers, all the family she had in the world, waited for her in a Mexican village on the Yucatán Peninsula. There she would build a lasting memorial to Jack. There she would make a new life for herself the way her father had all those years ago.
“Jack, Jack.” The six-year-old boy raced across the yard, rimed with autumn frost, to join Jack at the fence. They stood together watching a number of llamas graze contentedly in the pasture.
“How’s it going, Andy?”
“Good.” The boy was the spitting image of Jack’s friend and fellow mercenary, Tim Mallory. He leaped onto the bottom rung of the fence and folded his arms over the post. “Hey, you’re walking without your cane!”
“Yup.” His offhand response showed no hint of the massive effort and patience this accomplishment had required. Jack had lived in Texas with Murphy and Letty for nearly a year, using the time to recover his strength and learn to walk all over again. He’d never intended to stay that long, but his physical therapy had been extensive.
Recently Cain and his wife, Linette, had visited him from their cattle ranch in Montana and brought their two daughters with them. Cain’s girls were relatively close in age to Murphy’s boys, and the kids had gotten along famously. Cain had hoped for a Deliverance Company reunion, but Tim and Francine couldn’t get away. Their llama ranch on Vashon Island up in Washington State was thriving, and Tim Mallory had a small but growing herd.
When he could travel comfortably, Jack went to visit Tim and Francine himself. He’d originally planned to stay a couple of days, but found he enjoyed the view off Puget Sound. It reminded him of Mexico and the years he’d spent aboard Scotch on Water and those all-too-brief weeks with Lorraine.
“Mom says one day no one’ll know you used to walk with a cane,” Andy said. He rested his chin on the top of his hands and heaved a deep sigh.
“Hey, there’s Bubba!” the boy said next, pointing toward a llama at the far end of the pasture.
“Bubba?” Jack asked, grinning.
“Dad and him don’t get along very well, but I know he gives Bubba some extra feed every day.”
“Did you ask him why?”
“Yeah.”
“And what did he say?”
Andy shrugged. “That Bubba did him a favor once and he hasn’t forgotten it.”
Jack knew all about that favor. Six years ago, the very night Andrew Mallory was born, two hired assassins had paid a visit to Vashon Island. Their job had been to eliminate Tim and Francine. Unbelievably enough, the timely appearance of the big llama had been a lifesaving intervention.
“What else did your mother say?” Jack asked. “About my walking, I mean.” At one time Francine had been the best physical therapist on the West Coast. She’d been in charge of his rehabilitation from the beginning.
“She said—” Andy paused and let out a slow breath “—it would take longer for your heart to get better. Did your heart get hurt when you fell off the cliff, Uncle Jack?” He turned and regarded Jack quizzically.
“In a manner of speaking.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It’s difficult to explain.” Jack didn’t want to talk about Lorraine and, in fact, hadn’t. Not to Murphy or Tim or their wives. But that didn’t mean she was ever far from his thoughts. Although it’d been a year and a half, not a day passed that he didn’t think of her.
Bits of memory came to him at the oddest times, often when he was least prepared to deal with them. He couldn’t help wondering what had happened to her once she’d returned to the States.
Was she happy? Had she told her husband about him? How had Gary Franklin reacted? Had she forgotten him and gone on to have the baby she’d wanted so badly, badly enough to mention to Dr. Berilo’s nurse? The thought of Lorraine with a child wrenched his heart. Only recently had he come to realize how much he wanted children himself. It was seeing his friends with their sons and daughters….
“Is Andy talking your ear off?” Tim joined him at the fence.
“Hardly.” Jack enjoyed the boy’s company and his energetic bursts of conversation.
“Some pretty freakish weather going on around the country,” Tim said, glancing up at the sky, which was a clear bright blue with clusters of high clouds.
“Looks downright perfect to me,” Jack murmured. In fact, he liked Washington and had given some consideration to purchasing a few acres here himself. Somewhere near the water. Early on, in a moment of pain, he’d sold Scotch on Water. He’d done it knowing he’d never be able to sleep on the boat again and not think of Lorraine. Little did he realize then that he wouldn’t be able to sleep anywhere and not think of her.