Page 25 of The Banned Books Club

Cormac was looking forward to the weekend when Louisa poked her head into his office. “You heading home?” he asked when he saw her.

She nodded, said good-night and started to leave—but then stuck her head back through the opening. “I called Gia’s mom this afternoon,” she blurted as if she just couldn’t hold it in.

He’d been annotating the charts of the animals he’d seen today. At this, he shoved away from his computer. “Youwhat?”

“I couldn’t help myself.” Leaving the door open, she came in and slouched into the chair across from his desk. “I know Ida Rossi. She’s a fair and honest woman. She donates to the animal shelter every year. She brings her cat, Miss Marple, in for regular checkups and shots and is always friendly to us. I thought—”

“Ida Rossi is dying of cancer, Louisa,” he broke in.

“I didn’t mean her any harm. I just thought...maybe I could reason with her, get her to speak to Gia and convince her to have some compassion, before...before Ida isn’t around to have any influence.”

“Oh, my God!” He rubbed his forehead. “I hope you didn’t say that.”

“I didn’t, but—”

“Don’t tell me she hung up on you...”

“No. She was polite. She just wasn’t interested in helping.”

“Of course not. Gia’s her daughter!”

“But I’m not sure she’s entirely convinced Dad’s guilty, Cormac. I feel like she would’ve shown more anger back in the day—and wouldn’t have been so nice to us through the years.”

“Wedidn’t do anything.”

“Even so, there’s probably residual anger in that type of scenario.”

Cormac jammed a hand through his hair. “I wish you hadn’t bothered her. That was going too far. She’s dealing with more pressing problems than something that happened seventeen years ago.”

“What happened seventeen years ago is still very present inourlives. I’m desperate to dispel the black cloud that’s been hanging over us for so long—for Dad’s sake more than ours. I hate that he’s had to live with the assassination of his character all these years. I keep thinking that if we can clear his name, he might be able to pull himself together and be the man he once was.” She sighed. “But I agree that—”

The bell jingled over the door out front, causing Louisa to fall silent.

Cormac patted his desk, searching for his calendar. “Do I have another appointment today?” He’d thought he was done. He’d been planning to leave as soon as he finished updating his charts.

“Maybe we have a walk-in.” She went out to see, and Cormac came to his feet as soon as he heard her exclaim, “Gia!”

“Did you call my mother today?” Her voice was filled with anger.

In his rush to get out of the room, he whacked his thigh on the corner of the desk. Limping for one or two steps, he hurried to where his sister was squaring off against Gia Rossi.

His first thought was that it was after their normal business hours. Louisa should’ve locked the front door when their last patient left. Then Gia couldn’t have gotten in. But Louisa typically didn’t lock up untilsheleft. As a small-town vet, Cormac tried to offer some of the more personal care shown by regular doctors in the old movies his parents had watched when he was a kid. That sort of approach had always appealed to him. Taking satisfaction in his work meant it couldn’t all be about the money.

“What’s going on?” he asked, even though it was obvious that Gia was furious her mother had been disturbed at such a difficult time.

“Your sister called my house this afternoon and brought up what happened when we were in high school. She thought she could turn my own mother against me and...what?” She yanked her attention back to Louisa. “Get her to convince me that what happened wasn’t what happened, after all?”

“Itdidn’thappen!” Louisa insisted. “When will you finally admit that?”

“You weren’t there!” Gia cried. “Iwas.”

“If my father said he didn’t do it, he didn’t do it,” Louisa fired back. “Why would he risk his family, his career, his reputation—to touch a seventeen-year-old girl?”

“I don’t know what he was thinking!” Gia said. “I only know what he was doing. And he was hoping to do a lot more than cop a feel!”

“You’re just trying to save face, and you know it!”

Cormac couldn’t get the vision of Gia crying at the pool last night out of his mind. Seeing her in such a vulnerable state had messed with his impression of her as a hard, lying bitch. But regardless of how he felt personally, he had to make sure this confrontation didn’t get out of hand. He had his business and reputation to worry about. “Look, I’m sorry Louisa called your mother,” he said, stepping between them. “She shouldn’t have done that, okay?”

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