Page 29 of Shelter for Shay
She leaned her elbows on the bar, sizing him up like he was danger. “You want to talk now? After you ran off sixteen years ago? You abandoned me and your father. You’re an ungrateful little shit.”
Well, that was a statement. “I’m not here to fight,” he said. “I just lost the one person who ever cared if I lived or died. I don’t have space for grudges right now. I was in town and thought I should stop by and say hello.”
Her expression didn’t shift. But something behind her eyes flickered. Guilt? Regret? It passed too fast to catch and he wasn’t in the space to chase it.
“I always cared,” she said. “You just didn’t like the way I showed it and expected too much. You were always a needy and demanding child.”
He laughed. Loudly. “You showed it by disappearing for days. By choosing every bottle and every man you turned a trick for over your own kid.” He held up his hand. “And as far as me being needy goes? I think that’s just a kid wanting his mother to tuck him in at night.”
“Right, because I had so many choices in life,” she snapped, voice suddenly sharp. “You think I wanted this life? You think my dreams were tied up in being a bartender and now waiting for your dad to get out of prison? What are you, high?”
“No,” Moose said calmly. “But let’s be honest since I’m sitting here. You didn’t want me, but getting rid of me meant losing the help you got from the government.”
She looked like he’d slapped her. But she didn’t argue. She simply glared as what little fight she had in her floated off her skin.
“I’m not here to fix anything,” he said. “I just needed to look you in the eye and say I made it. You didn’t break me.”
She blinked, and this time, her mouth trembled just a little. “So, you’re here to gloat.”
“No. I just thought you’d want to know that your son is a decorated SEAL.” He downed the rest of his drink before pulling out a twenty and slapping it on the counter, feeling like a thousand pounds had shifted off his chest and landed somewhere behind him. “Take care of yourself,” he said, turning toward the door.
She didn’t say goodbye.
And she didn’t stop him either. That said it all.
He stepped outside and sucked in a deep breath of fresh air. He glanced around the parking lot.
A man dressed in a dark suit leaned against a fancy sports car with a cell in his hand. He glanced up, stuck his phone in his pocket, opened the driver’s side door, and slipped behind the wheel. A minute later, he drove away.
Moose shook his head. The man—and his car—didn’t belong at Kelly’s Taproom. Then again, addiction didn’t discriminate, and this place was known for being the place to buy. Moose climbed into his rental, started the engine, and headed back to Shay’s, his past finally firmly in his rearview, and his present and future, well… she had a name.
He hoped.
8
SHAY – LAKE GEORGE, NEW YORK
GRAVESIDE SERVICE – LATE MORNING
The wind was too soft, too polite. As if it didn’t want to be heard over the sound of goodbye.
Shay stood at the edge of the burial plot, her mother’s casket settled low in the ground, the preacher’s final words dissolving into the quiet rustle of tree branches overhead.It should’ve rained, she thought. Margaret Whitaker deserved a dramatic send-off—a storm, a sky cracked open, a downpour so fierce it made people remember. Instead, the sky stayed overcast but dry. Gray and ordinary.
It felt wrong.
Until she turned her head and locked gazes with Moose, and everything snapped into place as if his presence made the world right again.
People stood in clusters behind her—former students, old colleagues, neighbors who’d been on the receiving end of Margaret’s fierce compassion at some point over the years. The turnout was bigger than Shay had expected. Not that it surprised her. Her mother had always made herself unforgettable.
Still, standing here now—next to a rectangular hole lined with artificial turf and floral sprays—Shay felt completely, utterly alone.
Except for Moose. It seemed everything came back to him and his quiet demeanor. His strength.
She sighed, lifting her gaze, staring over the rows of tombstones of all shapes and sizes. Some of them were new, others had been there for decades or longer. A man, dressed in all black, stood under an oak tree. She sucked in a deep breath, wondering why he was standing all the way up there.
Moose inched in close to her. He didn’t touch her. Didn’t speak. Just stood near enough for her to feel his heat and the weight of his presence. Solid. Grounding. Like a wall she could lean against if the wind got mean.
She was grateful for that.
