Page 120 of Malibu Rising

“It was the most honest you’ve ever been,” Kit said. “It matters more than anything.”

Nina turned, and looked at her sister. “It’s Madeira. I’ve always wanted to live in Madeira in a tiny house on the water, the kind of place where you only go into town once a week to buy food. I’d love to be somewhere where no one knows who I am or who my dad is and no one has my posters on their wall and I can eat anything I want to. And I can cut all my hair off if I feel like it and maybe be a gardener or a landscaper. Something outside. Where no one knows I was married to Brandon. And when the waves are good, I’m always in the water.”

Kit saw it in perfect Technicolor. The thing they could all do for Nina.

• • •

Mick knew that if he really loved his kids, he would leave them alone. That seemed easy, that seemed doable. He thought of it as his own redemption.

And so, as he made his way up the steps, he decided he’d hug each of them, give them his direct phone number, tell them he would be there if they wanted to go get lunch, and then get in his Jag and drive away.

He turned to Casey, just as his feet hit the grass, and he said, “I’ll take a paternity test. If you want. Just let me know.”

Casey, still finding this night beyond belief and sad and a tiny bit thrilling, smiled at him. Then, just in case he was her father, she grabbed his hand and squeezed it.

• • •

As the family came up to the lawn, the remaining cops shined their lights on the faces of Mick and his five children. And it was thenthat, for one of the first times in their lives, they saw why it’s good to have Mick Riva as your father.

They all went inside and, after ten minutes of smiles and handshakes and autographs and polite laughing at inane stories, the cops resolved to be on their way.

“We had some arrests,” Sergeant Purdy said. “Nobody you’d miss, I can’t imagine. Vandals, really.”

Nina wasn’t sure what to say to that and she wondered who the cops had arrested. “Thank you, Officers,” she said. She showed them to the front door.

Then she turned and looked at her family. Her brothers had blood crusted on their faces, her sister had a hickey—what?—and there were two more bodies than there’d been at the beginning of this whole thing.

“All right,” Mick said. “I believe this is my cue to leave.”

He entertained the fantasy that someone might try to stop him. He wasn’t too surprised when no one did.

He hugged his sons first, and then his possible daughter, and then the one with the big mouth, and then as he got to the front door, the one who had saved the family he had started.

“Thank you,” Mick whispered in her ear as he pulled Nina to him. “For the person you’ve been your entire life. And all that you’ve done.”

And then, before Nina could even realize she was crying, he was gone.

Nina sat down on the steps facing the door and her brothers and sister sat down next to her.

“You OK?” Hud asked.

Nina looked up at him, so many feelings dancing around inside her, out of the grasp of words. “I mean …” she said and then gave up.

“Right,” he said.

“Me, too,” Kit added.

“Yeah,” Jay said.

Casey stood by the door.

Hud looked at her there, alone and unsure, on the threshold. “Come on, sit down. I don’t care who your dad is. You’re one of us.”

Kit scooted over to make room. And when Casey sat down next to Nina, Jay squeezed her shoulder. Nina patted her knee.

She needed someone to love her. And they could do that. That would be very easy for them to do.

June was gone. Yet here she was, living on through her children.

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