Sanctuary

caught me off guard. Knocked me flat,” Brian corrected, and went to the refrigerator for breakfast meats and eggs. “Maybe I could accept it if I knew what you were apologizing for.”
    “For not being there when you were twelve and getting pounded on. When you were fifteen and sicking up your first beer. When you were seventeen and too stupid to know how to make love to a girl without becoming a father.”
    More than a little shaky, Brian took out a skillet. “Kate took me over to Savannah and bought me condoms.”
    “She did not.” If the boy had slapped him over the head with the sausage meat, he’d have been less shocked. “Kate bought you rubbers?”
    “She did.” Brian found himself smiling over the memory as he heated the skillet. “Lectured me up one side and down the other about responsibility and restraint, abstinence. Then she bought me a pack of Trojans and told me if I couldn’t control the urge, I’d do a damn sight better to wear protection.”
    “Sweet Jesus.” The chuckle escaped as Sam leaned back on the counter. “I just can’t picture it.” Then he straightened, cleared his throat. “It should have been me telling you.”
    “Yes, it should have been you.” As if the arrangement were vital, Brian set sausages in the skillet. “Why wasn’t it?”
    “I didn’t have your mother telling me that I’d better go talk to that boy, something was on his mind. Or that Lexy had new dress shoes and wanted to show them off. I saw those things for myself, but I got used to her prodding me on them. Then when I didn’t have her, I let it all go.” He set the coffee down, shot his hands in his pockets. “I’m not used to explaining myself. I don’t like it.”
    Brian took out another bowl, broke the first egg for pancake batter. “Your choice.”
    “I loved her.” It seared his throat, and Sam was grateful that Brian continued to focus on his work. “It’s not easy for me to say that. Maybe I didn’t tell her enough—the feeling came a lot easier than the words. I needed her. Serious Sam, she’d call me, and wouldn’t let me stay that way for long. She loved being around new people, talking about everything under the sun. She loved this house, this island. And for a while, she loved me.”
    Brian didn’t think he’d ever heard a longer speech from Sam Hathaway. Not wanting to break the flow, he poured the butter he’d melted into the bowl and said nothing.
    “We had our problems. I’m not going to pretend we didn’t. But we always got through them. The night you were born ... Jesus, I was scared. Piss-yourself scared, but Belle wasn’t. It was all a big adventure to her. And when it was over and she had you cuddled right up in her arms and nursing, she laid back against the pillows, smiling. ‘Look what a beautiful baby we made ourselves, Sam. We’ll have to make lots more.’ A man’s got to love a woman like that,” Sam murmured. “He doesn’t even have a choice.”
    “I didn’t think you did. Love her.”
    “I did.” Sam picked up his coffee again. All the talk had dried out his throat. “It took me a lot of years of being without her to stop loving her. Maybe I did push her away, but I don’t know how. The not knowing ate at me bad for a lot of years.”
    “I’m sorry.” He saw the flicker of surprise in his father’s eyes. “I didn’t think it mattered to you. I didn’t think any of it really mattered.”
    “It mattered. But after a while you learn to live with what you’ve got.”
    “And you had the island.”
    “It was what I could depend on, what I could tend to. And it kept me from losing my mind.” He took a deep breath. “But a better man would have been around to hold his son’s head when he puked up too much Budweiser.”
    “Löwenbräu.”
    “Christ, an import? No wonder I don’t understand you.”
    Sam sighed and took a long look at the man his son had become. A man who wore an apron to work and baked pies. A man, he corrected, with cool and steady eyes, and shoulders strong and broad enough to carry more than his own load.
    “We’ve both had our say, and I don’t know as it’ll make any difference. But I’m glad we said it.” Sam held out a hand and hoped it was the right thing.
    Jo walked in on the surprising tableau of her father and brother shaking hands in front of the stove. They both looked at her, identical flickers of embarrassment on their faces. Just then she was too damn tired and irritable to analyze