The Devil Inside Part 2

By the end of the evening, it turned out that their first exchange when Hayden threatened to leave was the easiest part of the night. Hayden had inherited the Casey temper as well as looks, and if Emma was hoping for an open-arm welcome, it wasn't going to happen over her plate of perfectly cooked fish. A few tables over, the talk wasn't as stilted, and Cain was having a pleasant time while she kept an eye on her son.

"Thank you for coming tonight, Hayden, and I hope we'll get to a place where you can let me in a little bit. Could you get Cain to join us again so we can talk before you go?"

Hayden walked to the table Cain shared with the woman she'd met at the bar. Not too worried about keeping Emma waiting, he joined them for bread pudding with whiskey cream sauce before finally dragging Cain back to Emma's table. He reasoned his birth mother had kept him waiting for four years so it was only fair.

"Thanks for bringing him tonight. I don't need an answer now, but I'd like to know if you'd let him come meet my parents in Wisconsin. That's all I ask. After that I'll go away forever if you want me to." Cain couldn't see it, but Emma had twisted the linen napkin on her lap into a knot while she was asking.

"Hayden, would you join Constance for a moment, please?"

The boy got up without question, knowing Cain didn't want him to hear whatever she was about to tell Emma.

"You want coffee?" he asked Cain before he walked away.

"No, son, we'll be leaving in a minute, but thank you." Cain watched as he sat with the pretty brunette she had dined with, not glancing in her direction again. "You came to see me alone this afternoon, and you just bring this topic up now? Did all that fresh air and open s.p.a.ces you left us for make you forget who you're dealing with?"

"Are you kidding? It took me a year to build up enough courage to come here, Cain. Forget who and what you are? Not even if I tried hypnosis. I just want my mother and father to meet their grandson."

"I've met your parents, Emma. h.e.l.l, I listened to you complain about them for years. What would make them want to meet the child you had with me?"

"Because he's half mine, which means he's a part of them as well. A week, Cain. Surely you could see to giving me that. I can look at him and see he's more than a certified card-carrying Casey, but don't forget he has other family as well, and it's time he met them."

Cain leaned into the table a little and lowered her voice. "What makes you think that you deserve anything from me?"

"Because I gave him to you. He's your mirror image. He acts like you, thinks like you, and probably feels like you, but I'm foolish enough to think there might be something of me still trapped in there somewhere. I might not have called in all this time, but don't fool yourself that I haven't thought about him. I've thought about him every day, until some days it's hard to get out of bed, I get so sick over it."

"Like I said today, it's his decision. But whatever he decides, don't be stupid enough to think Mook's not going with him." Cain pointed to the man in question and watched Emma's head fall forward in defeat. She nodded to signal she understood.

Almost as if he knew their talk had come to an end, Hayden turned around and excused himself when Cain waved him over. "I won't go alone, and I'm not going if you don't come with me," Hayden informed Cain when Emma asked him to visit.

"A couple of days with just us, Hayden. Then you can bring the whole Casey clan if you want." Emma tried to salvage something of what she wanted, mainly a relationship with Hayden, before it all slipped away and Cain's watchful eyes exposed all her secrets. But in the end, if everything turned out like she hoped, even Cain's presence had its purpose.

"I'll come for two days. Then Mom comes for the rest of the time, and Mook stays with me. Neither one of us is going to talk her out of that," said Hayden. He liked the big blond bodyguard, and it would be a blessing to have him along. "He's a reality, so that's the deal."

"Is there something you're afraid of, son?" asked Emma.

"My name is Hayden, and I'd prefer you call me that. And no, I like being with my family and that's Mom, only Mom. We always spend Thanksgiving together, no matter what her schedule's like, so it's not fair for her to sit at home alone because you decided to get in touch again. Maybe you feel great about yourself for suddenly remembering you have a family, but she never forgot. Remember, I'm a Casey. Very little scares us."

The declaration made Cain lean forward and ruffle his hair, getting the boy to laugh.

"I can respect that," Emma said.

"Where are you staying?" asked Cain.

"Why?"

"His break begins next week, so if he's going, I need to know where I'm sending him."

Emma knew Cain wouldn't just let her leave town with Hayden without every ounce of information on where he was going and how he was going to get there. She was so close now to having everything she wanted. If things worked out, Hayden would eventually forgive her, and they could make up for the years they had been separated.

Chapter Five.

The flight up north and the drive into Hayward pa.s.sed in silence. Emma realized Hayden probably didn't resent being there; he was just comfortable with silence. When they had first met, Cain wouldn't talk for long stretches, which had taken some getting used to.

The more hours that ticked off in Hayden's company, the more he reminded Emma of Cain. Because of that similarity, her plan, which had seemed so foolproof months ago, now seemed like a pipe dream.

"Your grandfather owns a dairy farm here. His major buyer is Kraft, but he actually still makes all the cheese we eat at the house, like his father taught him." She was fishing for things to say and laughing at herself that an eleven-year-old could be so intimidating.

Hayden was thinking of the dozens of trips he'd taken with Cain and how different they were from this forced visit. He remembered when Emma was in his life, the stories she'd read him at night and the way she would run her fingers through his hair when he was sick, but the good of that relationship was gone. The sound of her voice held no comfort for him now, and a small part of him mourned that fact.

The scenery out the window of the rented Tahoe held his eye, so he answered without looking at her. "I don't know what you're expecting from me, but these people are as much strangers to me as I am to them. I came because I thought Mom would be disappointed in me if I didn't at least try. Aside from that, nothing else could've dragged me out here with you."

"What she thinks is so important to you?"

"What is it about her that you find so offensive? You just didn't leave her, you left me too. So whatever it is, it must've been pretty bad. I read a lot, and the moms in books usually don't just drop their kids. Unless it's something terrible or they're just not cut out to be parents. If you're telling me how much you care about me now, I have to a.s.sume you're laying the blame at Mom's feet."

Emma snorted in amus.e.m.e.nt and peered out her own window in an effort to find something to focus on to calm her emotions. She'd been right in thinking Hayden was intimidating. He had her in the corner without lifting a fist, which was something else he had in common with Cain when it came to her enemies. "Do you honestly think she'd have let me take you with me when I left?" She turned back when she felt him move in his seat.

Hayden did look at her then, and like Cain, his cold eyes told her she had no chance. "Do you honestly think I'd have left with you even if she had allowed it?"

"Touche, Hayden. Can we try and spend this time getting to know each other better? You might find I'm not the monster Cain made me out to be." Emma put her hand on his leg and prayed he wouldn't knock it off.

"You want me to tell you a story?" He glanced at her hand and turned his attention back to the scenery they were driving by.

"If you want to, sure." She gave his knee a little squeeze, glad he had left it alone. Emma was willing to take her small victories where she could find them.

"Every night before I go to bed, Mom points to a picture of the three of us and tells me somewhere you're taking the time to think just about me and saying a prayer that I'll be safe and happy. When I was seven and I cried for you, it's the one thing that got me to stop crying and made the pain go away. Her telling me that you were thinking about me made me believe it. Does that sound like she's been bad-mouthing you all this time?" His voice sounded as cold as the weather they had flown into.

"You love Cain a lot, don't you?"

"Do you make a habit of asking unnecessary questions? You have to know the answer without me saying anything, right? Maybe it's all this open s.p.a.ce out here. It makes you fish for something to talk about so you can forget you're in the middle of nowhere."

"You don't act like a child, and you sure don't sound like one." You let too much time pa.s.s, Emma. He's lost to you forever. And to think Cain did it by talking you up. Emma was sure when Hayden had figured out she was the only topic his beloved Cain ever lied to him about, she looked that much worse. She could just imagine how much discomfort and anger Cain had buried to say anything nice about her.

"Mom says the uneducated grow up to be prey. If you want to learn to be a hunter, then you have to be smarter, quicker, and stronger than everybody else."

"Is that what Cain is to you, a hunter?"

"Cain is a G.o.d to me."

"And what are Hayden's thoughts? All I've heard from you is what Cain thinks."

"Why reinvent the wheel if you don't have to. There's plenty we don't agree on, and we know what those things are. What I talk to my mother about is no one else's business. I'm not a puppet, if that's what you're worried about."

Emma squeezed his knee again and smiled. "I do worry about you, Hayden. I don't want Cain to drag you into something you might think you have no choice in."

"Ah, it was the family business that drove you out here to this boring town. Save your worry and your pity for the times you need to pacify yourself for abandoning us. You were so worried it took you four years to check on me? I'm overwhelmed, and I shudder to think if you hadn't cared for me. I'd have never seen you again."

Emma was shocked, not only by his command of the English language, which was astounding, but by his cool, detached delivery. Any trace of the sweet boy who had picked flowers for her was gone, and she was left only with the memory of him. She would be fortunate if he didn't hate her forever, because he would never forgive her.

"Hayden, relax and look at the lake." Mook spoke up from the front seat of the Tahoe he'd rented at the airport. He knew the kid could slice and dice a person without ever laying a hand on them. Looks weren't the only thing he'd inherited from the Casey clan. As his guardian, though, Mook took it upon himself to guide Hayden when he veered toward unacceptable or rude behavior.

Emma removed her hand and prayed the tension in Hayden would relax a bit before they got to the house. She didn't want to add to the list of wrongs her mother kept well tallied in her head. From the time she had come home, she had tried to fit into the role her mother expected as a way of atonement, but she was finding the righteous road wasn't so easy to walk. With the baggage she'd brought home, every time she stumbled, she dug deeper to find the woman her mother wanted.

Carol Verde wasn't the most forgiving of women, so Emma found herself stumbling a lot. She was supposed to have had the life Carol hadn't been able to achieve. Instead she had run off, found Cain, and brought Hayden into the world. That was not the life Carol had missed out on, and she found it abhorrent that her daughter had chosen such a path.

Carol hadn't been thrilled to open her home to the boy, no matter what it would accomplish, and Emma's father had just shaken his head at what she had arranged to do. Her parents had only met Cain once, but Ross respected Cain for never abandoning Hayden. Whatever happened or didn't happen in the coming week would occur without his help.

Emma rode the rest of the way in silence, looking out her side of the car and remembering happier times when she didn't know all she had learned about Cain. She recalled the terrified faces of those escorted to the office of the pub when she worked there. She didn't know who the men were or what their fear stemmed from, but after those meetings they disappeared. For so long her love had shielded her from realizing how Cain made a living, but the day came when it wasn't enough to make her stay.

Once she had left, though, when her longing for Cain almost overwhelmed her, she liked to relive those first years.

Fourteen Years Earlier at Emma's Apartment "Thank you for dinner tonight." Emma stood in front of her apartment door and gazed up at Cain, hoping to get her to bend and kiss her before they parted.

"You're welcome. Maybe we can do it again tomorrow night?"

She watched as Cain put her hand on the wall and leaned in closer. "I've seen you with about ten different women in Erin Go Braugh since I started working there. What makes me so special?"

"I like talking to you, Emma. Trust me. If I just wanted s.e.x, I would've turned on the charm by now and we'd be done." Cain moved her other hand to the other side of Emma's head, effectively trapping her in a human cage.

The deep voice was getting closer, and Emma battled herself not to lift her own hands and run them through the thick black hair. "That confident in yourself, huh?"

"Most of the time I go with what I know. That way I'm seldom disappointed, so yeah, I'm that confident. Let's say seven tomorrow night?"

"I'll be ready. And thanks for telling me you like spending time with me. That means a lot."

Cain leaned down and kissed her softly. "You're welcome again. Thanks for wanting to talk to me. That means a lot to me."

Emma remembered their courtship as a slow process that ended with her falling so in love with Cain that she thought the world would end if they ever parted. She'd never wanted for anything, especially Cain's time and affection, and she'd never worried about someone else replacing her in the mobster's heart.

Thinking back now, she acknowledged Cain had never shown her dark side around her, but she knew Cain was capable of violence against anyone who hurt her or the family. On long winter nights alone with just her memories, Emma sometimes had a hard time conjuring up a solid reason for leaving, but then the image of Cain's b.l.o.o.d.y hands would return, and so would the tears. As hard as being away from Cain was, Emma was certain in her justification for leaving.

"There it is." Emma pointed out the window of the Tahoe to a large two-story house with a barn standing near it.

The temperature was starting to drop along with the sun, and the cows standing near the fence huddled together for warmth. A man and woman stepped off the front porch when the car stopped, and like Emma, they were both fair and slight of build. The man stepped forward and held out his hand.

"Welcome. My name's Ross and this is my wife Carol. We're your grandparents."

The boy, who was taller than all three of them, glanced at the hand before he took it. Ross was surprised by the strength of Hayden's grip, and by not finding anything about his looks that connected him to his daughter.

"Nice to meet you, sir. Thank you for having me." Hayden let go of Ross's hand and offered his to Carol. "Ma'am, I'm Hayden Casey." He smiled and c.o.c.ked his head when Carol ignored his hand. His gestures reminded Emma so much of Cain, a sharp pain shot through her chest.

Ross stepped forward, obviously hoping to make up for his wife's rudeness. "Thank you for coming, Hayden. After watching you grow up in pictures, it's nice to finally have you with us. Would you like to take a look around the place?"

"Daddy, he might be tired," Emma reminded him gently.

"I'd love to, Mr. Verde. Lead the way."

Emma and her mother watched as Ross led Hayden and Mook toward the barn, pointing his finger in a hundred different directions as he talked. Ross had been a wonderful parent, but Emma could tell now it might have been a good thing for him to have had a son as well.

"He certainly looks like that woman." Carol glared as Ross walked the boy and his shadow closer to the barn. "If this works out, he'll only add to our shame when you go parading him around town. I warned you long ago that going to that G.o.dforsaken city was a mistake. You bedded down with evil, and look what it's gotten you." She pointed in Hayden's direction. "G.o.d won't look kindly on you for bringing that sp.a.w.n into the world. It's a sin, I tell you."

"Hayden was never a mistake, Mother, and he's anything but evil. I don't give a d.a.m.n how you feel about him. I'll never be ashamed of him, no matter what. And please try to be nicer to him. If he tells Cain we treated him like c.r.a.p when she gets here, she won't let him come back if things don't work out. Not to mention Hayden's not going to want to come back."

"Don't curse at me, Emma. Wait, she agreed to come?"

"Hayden wouldn't come unless she was invited."

"I don't want her kind in my house. Though it might be nice to see that smug smile get wiped off permanently, and have her know who was responsible." Carol turned and went back into the house.

Emma talked to herself as she b.u.t.toned her coat and followed the guys to the barn. "Enjoy it, Emma, 'cause when Cain gets here and gets reacquainted with your mother, you'll either never see Hayden again or you'll attend a funeral when Cain orders Merrick to shoot the old windbag."

Hayden and Mook smiled through dinner, and Hayden wasn't too concerned that no one spoke a word through dinner aside from the prayer when they had sat down. He thanked a still-unresponsive Carol for their meal before stepping outside with his cell phone to call Cain.

"Hey, kid, how are things in the sticks?" The static was so bad Hayden had to go inside and ask to use the phone, which sat in the empty living room.

"Cold and full of cows."

"You're in Wisconsin, Hayden. What'd you expect?"

"Where were we supposed to go this year on break?" Hayden looked out the front window as Ross closed the barn doors for the night. The older man seemed eager to please, and Hayden found himself liking him. Maybe the next two days wouldn't drag out too much.

"I think we'd narrowed it down to Vegas for some golf."

"You owe me, Mom."

"I do, huh? How do you figure I owe you?"

"The way I see it is, if anyone else had been my father, I'd be swinging a golf club instead of dodging cow patties. Get me, Dad?"

His laugh made Cain feel a little better. "I get you, son, but if anyone else had been your dad, all you'd know is cow-patty dodging. See how life works?" When Cain heard him sigh from the other end, she turned off the treadmill she'd been running on.

"You never have told me why she left."

"You're right. I haven't, even though you used to ask me all the time."

Hayden turned from the window and sat on a flowered print chair near the phone. "You don't think I can handle the truth? I didn't stop asking because I lost interest in the answer, you know."

"I know, Hayden. I just wanted you to form your own opinions about your mother. You may not want to hear it now, but you've got to have some kind of relationship with her. What that's going to be is up to younot me and not her, just you. Accepting the things in life we can't change or can't take back will make you a man. Trust me on this one, buddy."

"Will you get mad if I ask her?" He picked at the tag on his hiking boots as he asked, and wondered for the millionth time what the answer to his question might be. This was his opportunity to ask Emma all the questions that had acc.u.mulated in his head since she'd left. But not at the risk of upsetting Cain.

"No, honey, that won't make me mad. I love you, and that means you'll never have to worry about disappointing me no matter what choices you make."