A few days later, Cady stood on the corner of the busiest intersection in SoMa, Cady juice in one hand, her guitar case in the other. She’d had dinner with Chris while Conn had another in a series of mysterious meetings he’d been involved in lately; she didn’t ask, and he didn’t tell. Chris had wandered off in search of a gift for Natalie. With Conn’s watch cap tugged low over her eyebrows and ears, and her hair caught in a scarf, Cady had so far managed to avoid being recognized. A familiar energy pumped through her veins—anticipation, excitement, fear, and the thrill of doing something that left her both intensely vulnerable and intensely happy. It was, she realized, a throwback to the girl she’d been, singing anywhere, anytime, for anyone just for the sheer joy of it.
The group of kids playing Christmas carols on the opposite corner finished up and packed up their instruments and stands. She waited until they’d piled into their mom’s minivan before heading over to claim the corner, then took a picture of the street sign, Christmas lights dangling in the enormous potted tree behind it, and sent it to social media. Christmas carol sing-along, SoMa … come on down.
Twenty seconds later a girl across the street looked up from her phone, scanned the street corners, and saw Cady. She waved. Cady waved back as she lifted her guitar strap over her shoulder and started tuning it. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Conn settle against the hood of the LPD patrol car parked by the corner. He was in street clothes—jeans, boots, Henley, denim jacket—but the way he exchanged a few words, then a laugh with the officer also leaning against the car sent the message loud and clear: also a cop.
The crowd gathered quickly as she started with holiday standards, then segued into popular carols. Just her voice, her guitar; no amps, no lights, nothing but her and the crowds. She tuned out the lifted phones and serenaded her hometown crowd the way she wanted to, not with a big concert, but just her, close enough to touch, back where it all began, on a corner in SoMa.
A bigger crowd was starting to form, spilling onto the brick-paved street and blocking traffic. The cop leaned on his cruiser, keeping the peace, but keeping an eye on the crowd in case he needed to shut them down. Conn was just keeping an eye on her.
“Move closer, folks,” she called. “Get comfy with your neighbor. If we stay out of the street, I can keep singing.”
She ran through all the standards, “Rudolph,” and “Silent Night,” and “God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman,” even launching into “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” when a little boy shouted out the request. When she finished Dave Matthews’ “A Christmas Song,” she opened her eyes to find Conn standing next to the cop. She caught his eye, smiled. He smiled back.
“Okay,” she said, then cleared her throat. “Okay. Thanks for coming down. One more. It’s something new.”
A whoop went up.
“Really new. So it might change,” she warned. “It’s kind of a love song, and it’s kind of a work in progress.”
She sang with her eyes closed, her head tilted back, her guitar dangling from her back, keeping time with her palm against her thigh, snapping on the opposite beat. Her voice, when it emerged from her throat, started in a conspiratorial croon, rising in volume, throaty and raspy, singing the song of defiant proclamation.
It wasn’t a love song. It was real. It was the song that came to her like a gift from the gods, nearly fully formed, melody and harmony and words all at once, flowing from her in one short session. She didn’t hide behind the easy, the power ballad, the sweetness. She held up guaranteed loss, time passing, the inevitable struggle and tears and pain, then wove the most quintessential truth of all, that only love redeemed the pain. She sang a promise, that she’d stand by him forever, not just when it was easy, but when it was hard.
In the back of her mind she knew the cafés and stores were emptying, customers gathering in doorways and windows, standing on the balconies of apartments over the shops and restaurants. The crowd went quiet, so quiet she could hear the bells jingle on the carriage horse’s harness, the soft rush of tires on bricks as cars drove carefully through the intersection.
She could put this song on the label’s album. It would fit the theme. But it belonged on the album she was making now, pouring from her, songs coming almost whole. Sharing this one was the biggest risk she’d ever taken, but she’d never felt so powerful, so vulnerable, and so whole. She stopped keeping time, lifted her hand as if calling for a witness, head back, throat bared to the sky, the last notes ringing clarion clear in the cold winter air.
Silence.
She stared at them, so she wouldn’t look at Conn. They stared back, and then the corner exploded with applause and whoops, nearly lifting the bricks out of the street. She ducked her head, smiled, said thank you until she thought the words were meaningless. Then, because she couldn’t stand it anymore, she slanted a look at Conn.
Tears stood in his eyes. He hadn’t moved, looked like he wouldn’t ever move. The cop beside him had tactfully moved to the intersection and was helping a couple of tourists find a restaurant. The crowd clapped and clapped and clapped, calling for an encore, but Cady barely heard them.
She put her hand to her heart. I’m yours.
He nodded. Blinked. Looked up at the sky. When he looked back at her, he withdrew his hand from his pocket and patted his own heart. And I’m yours.
The moment broke when someone surged forward and asked for a selfie, an autograph. She said yes to everyone, until the last person walked away smiling.
Conn straightened and strolled onto the sidewalk. “Sure you’re ready to sing that for the rest of your life? Because based on that reaction, I think you’re stuck with it.”
“Every single day.” His face was relaxed, casual, a smile twitching at the corner of his mouth. Conn McCormick, easy and happy and holding her close. “Forever and ever, amen.”
He swooped her up in one arm and set her on a low wall surrounding the planter. With the added height they were face to face, which made it so much easier for him to kiss her.
“Well, isn’t this cozy?” Chris said. He wore a hat with reindeer antlers on it, and carried a cup of what smelled like spiced cider.
“What are you doing here?”
“You gave a concert. I came to hear it,” he said serenely. “And Natalie’s working tonight. So am I, for that matter. This town has a pretty astonishing music scene. I’m going to some clubs.” He turned to Conn. “I hear you’ll be joining Cady’s entourage.”
She’d sprung that on him over dinner. “We haven’t talked about pay or anything,” Cady said. “Conn’s got some things to finish up here, too.”
Chris’s gaze flicked over Conn, clearly assessing what a beat cop in Lancaster would make. Then he pulled out his phone. “Do you know what we paid Evan?”
“No,” Cady said. “That’s what I pay you for, and I know what I pay you.”
Without looking up from his phone, Chris named a figure that made Conn’s jaw drop.
“More than the City of Lancaster offers, I assume?”
“It works for me,” Conn said.
“You suck at this. You always, always negotiate. I just lowballed you, and Evan did mediocre work,” Chris added. “Cady routinely told Evan to fuck off because he was annoying her.”
“Well. He did annoy me and he fucked off and here you are. I don’t eat tongue,” Cady said. “Do not ever mention beef tongue, or any animal’s tongue to me in the context of food.”
“Okay,” Conn said, obviously letting it go.
“I’m not going anywhere for a few months,” Cady said, shooting Chris a stubborn look. “So we can finalize salary then. For now, Conn’s staying with the police department.”
Conn turned to Chris. “Are you okay with this?”
Chris sighed. “You’ve proved you’re a paranoid, suspicious control freak who will stop at nothing to keep Cady safe. I can’t believe you accused me of trying to terrorize her!”
“Like you don’t eat kittens for breakfast,” Conn shot back.
“Oh, I do,” Chris said with an evil smile. “I do. But I use their delicate bones to pick out the tufts of fur left in my fangs so it’s not obvious.”
“I give up,” Cady said, throwing her hands in the air. “The two of you will drive me insane. Just don’t mention tongue.”
Chris smoothed the front of his jacket. “As I was saying, a paranoid control freak who will stop at nothing to make sure Cady’s safe, which is the only thing I care about when it comes to the individual in your role with the Maud Squad.”
“Cady. I’m Cady, from here on out.”
Chris raised an eyebrow, but acquiesced. “With Cady.”
“So we’re good,” he said to Chris, obviously wanting to hear him say it.
“What do you want, to exchange heart-shaped necklaces and pinkie swear?” At Cady’s glare, Chris relented. “We’re good. Remember I said that when someone with deeper pockets tries to hire you away from us. Which will happen. Oh, and that song you just sang? The one that didn’t sound anything like ‘Love-Crossed Stars’? Already on YouTube and already racking up the views. Twenty bucks says I hear from Eric before the night’s over.”
* * *
“This was the stupidest idea ever,” Cady said. “Whose idea was it to wait until Christmas Eve to finish shopping?”
Conn wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her out of the flow of harried last-minute shoppers jostling for space on SoMa’s narrow sidewalks. Instantly Cady relaxed into his heat and strength and wrapped her arm around his waist.
“I’m not the one who waited until the last minute to do her shopping.” He kissed her ear, then let her go.
“Rub it in.” She looked through the shopping bags in her hands and checked the contents against the list in her phone. “You ordered everything online. That’s cheating.”
“When it comes to buying toys for kids, that’s the only smart thing to do.”
“True.” She looked him up and down. “I doubt you’d be crushed at Toys ‘R’ Us.”
“I wasn’t worried about getting crushed. I was worried about having to break up a mob fighting over the last Nintendo DS. Then I’d have to do paperwork.”
She laughed, her heart as bright as the lights strung along the overhang. “No paperwork on Christmas Eve.”
He reached for her hand, and they strolled down the sidewalk. The crowds were too harried to recognize her, and if they did, they gave her the gift of a quiet night. “What time are the McCools expecting you tomorrow?”
“I said I’d come over for the game.”
They were loading their bags into the trunk of the Audi when Cady leaned her hip on the taillight and looked at him. “Is the track open tonight?”
He laughed. “Hell yes. It gives guys an excuse to get out of the house. The weather’s turning next week. Between extreme cold and bad weather, we don’t run much in January and February.”
“How about a couple of runs tonight?”
He thought about it for a moment. Something felt different. Everything felt different since Cady showed up at his door, strong and courageous. For the first time, he would go to the track without an expectation for a particular outcome. Somehow, one one-hundredth of a second didn’t feel like the weight of all eternity on his shoulders. “Yeah,” he said. “It’s a good night for a run.”
They drove out to the airfield, and turned into the pit. A rectangle of light shone through the open doorway to the hangar, and some joker had put a light-up Santa and reindeer on the hangar’s roof, with Rudolph’s nose flashing like a warning beacon. Shane and Finn were there, tinkering with one of the other McCool racer’s cars.
“Hey,” Shane said warmly, exchanging the now familiar fist clasp and shoulder bump. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
Conn shrugged out of his denim jacket and into his racing coat. “I’m feeling good tonight. And I’m too stubborn to quit.”
Shane tossed him the keys. “The weather’s perfect. Go get ’em, tiger.”
He couldn’t really explain what was different. The answer was nothing and everything. The car was exactly the same as the last time he drove it, the night Cady sent her Audi flying down the track, a maniacal grin on her face. The weather was nearly identical. But at the same time, everything was different inside him. No matter the time on the board, tonight was his last run.
He rolled up to the warming strip, shifted into first, set the parking brake, and revved the engine. Roiling, oily smoke rose above the rear end. He got a thumbs-up, released the brake, and rolled forward.
Aside from a few heated hours with Cady, he’d never been so present in his body, so comfortable in his own mind. It was, he realized, because he was alone in his mind. All the shame he’d been carrying around, the voices of his family members saying it was time to go, time to pack up and move to the next sofa or partially furnished spare room or, worse, a room crammed with hoarder’s crap were gone.
For the first time, he was racing for himself.
When the lights ticked down to green, he floored the accelerator and shot down the runway. A black watch cap over honey-colored hair caught his eye as he whipped past the bleachers. It was another detail, another stream coursing into the river of time carrying him along. The seconds felt elastic, like he had all the time in the world, could hear every revolution of the motor and drive shaft. Each shift felt magical, crisp and clean. Flow. Perfect, perfect flow.
Nine point nine-nine flashed up on the clock. When he rounded the corner to crawl back to the line of cars waiting for their run, Shane and Finn were going berserk, jumping and shouting, fists pumping in the air. People on their way to and from the concession stand made a wide circle around the two of them, turning from spots in the stands to stare, because Shane put the cool in McCool. It wasn’t a great time, but they knew what it meant to him. He’d tied his dad.
Shane jogged up to meet him at the back of the line. “Yeah!” he shouted as he leaned into the window. “Nine point nine-fucking-nine!”
“Nailed it!” Finn shouted from behind him.
“You going again?” Shane asked.
He looked over at Cady. Tears stood in her eyes, but she lifted her fists over her head and pumped them twice. “Go again!”
“Yeah.”
“Good.” Shane swatted affectionately at Conn’s helmeted head. “You own this tonight. Watch second. You still rush out of second.”
It didn’t matter if he did or didn’t have it. This was his last run. Nine point nine eight or not, he was setting down this burden and moving on. The only way to prove he was a better man than his father wasn’t to beat his time, but to be that man. With Cady, with her family, within the department.
Wait. Warm the tires. Wait some more. Watch the lights tick from red to orange to green, slowly, so slowly. Time had stretched and doubled back on itself. He had all the time in the world to step on the gas, shift through the Camaro’s range of gears. The engine purred like a kitten, a soft, sweet rumble in his chest.
He knew. Deep in his bones, in his heart, he knew. He didn’t even have to look at the clock, or turn to see Shane’s and Finn’s reactions. He could feel their energy all the way across the track. 9.97. He’d broken out. Disqualified.
Free.
He’d beaten his father’s time. The extra weight he’d been carrying was his shame, his loneliness, his fear of never belonging anywhere. He’d put down his demons and picked up Cady’s hand, trading the existential weight for a connection both weightless and stronger than steel.
He parked by Shane’s truck and got out of the car only to get rammed back into it from the force of Shane’s hug. Finn was applauding wildly, the sound muffled by the thick gloves covering his hands. Was this how Cady felt at a concert, this kind of exuberant, wild energy coming at her from the audience? Incredible.
“Damn,” Shane finished. “Just … goddamn. You did it.”
“I did.” Conn bounced the keys gently in his palm. Then he caught Finn’s eye and tossed them to him.
Finn caught them, then looked at Conn, as wide-eyed as a little kid on Christmas. “I can drive her the rest of the night? Thanks, man!”
“You can drive her the rest of your life, or hers, which will probably be shorter.” Conn reached into the glove box and pulled out the title. “She’s yours.”
Finn’s eyes got impossibly wider. “No way.”
“Way,” Conn and Shane said in unison.
“You should keep her.” Shaking his head, Finn held out the keys. “She was your dad’s car. Your dad gave her to you.”
She was his dad’s car, his pride and joy, but to Conn an anvil dragging him down like Wile E. Coyote after he ran off a cliff. His father never gave him the car. Conn just took it on, because he wanted to be close to his dad, to cling to all he had left of him. “Now I’m giving her to you.”
“What’s Mom going to say?” Finn said, looking at Shane.
“Conn and I talked to her a couple of hours ago. She says no street racing or she’ll drive the car to the salvage yard herself, but okay.”
“I’ve got a couple hundred bucks saved,” Finn said. “I’ll get you the cash as soon as I get to the bank. Or I can transfer the money with my phone. What email address—?”
Conn held up his hand, stopping Finn midsentence. “You’re going to need that money. The head gasket’s going to blow any run.”
Finn seemed about to protest again, but shut his mouth when Conn gave him his stare. “Thanks,” he saw awkwardly. He looked to be somewhere between tears and total joy. Conn remembered what that was like, to want wheels, cool wheels, that thing that defined you to your peers.
“I catch you street racing her and I’ll have your ass in jail so fast you’ll think you were caught in a time warp. And then I’ll call your mom. Got a pen?”
“I won’t. Just the track.” He launched himself at Conn, thumping him on the back, all gangly teenage puppy energy. Conn took the pen Shane extracted from his jacket pocket and scrawled his signature on the title. Finn’s hands were shaking when he took it. “Thank you. I mean it. She’s the coolest car out here. Do you care if I tinker with the gear ratio?”
“She’s not my car anymore,” Conn said gently, feeling an unutterable sense of relief. “Turn her into a clown car like the Shriners drive. Go to town. She’s all yours.”
“Come back and race her any time,” Finn said.
“Thanks,” Conn said, genuinely surprised. “I’ll do that.”
Just like that, he turned and walked away from the fight he’d been fighting his entire life, whether to be like his dad or to leave him behind. His dad had taught him to go down fighting, locked in a cage match, but Cady taught him that sometimes the only way to win was to walk away. Before he’d had nothing to walk to.
Now he did. He had Cady.
She was waiting a few feet away, smiling. “That was a nice thing to do,” she said when he joined her.
“Looks like I’m going to be traveling a lot in the future.” He shrugged. “He loves that car.”
“Win-win.” She snuggled under his arm.
“Getting cold?”
“A little,” she said. “I’m dressed for shopping, not the track.”
“Let’s get you home, then.”
She looked up at him. “Good. A fire and some hot cocoa sound perfect right now.” She lifted her chin for a kiss, hummed when his lips brushed hers. “But I already am home, Conn. I’m with you.”
It all came together, the song and the season, Cady’s body against his, the feeling of love and belonging transformed into a sense of weightlessness that carried him off the airfield. It was true. She belonged to him, and he belonged to her.
He was home.