The Sweetheart Deal Read Free

when they entered his apartment, the man had wanted them to sit down and visit. “He said, ‘Here you are. Maggie’s run down to the store and should be back any minute,’” Leo said. “Christ, that poor, sweet man. Nothing but skin over bone.” But he didn’t always tell me. I knew after the shifts he finished when he didn’t want to talk. When he brooded and his mood was dark. He’d tell me if he wanted to, when he wanted to, and the only thing I could do was give him the space he needed to transition back to us.
    The night after the call with the man on fire, we were on the front porch with glasses of wine after the boys were in bed.
    “Come here,” he said. He patted the step between his legs.
    I slid down and over from where I’d been sitting next to him, and put my glass on the step below me. He kneaded the base of my neck with his thumbs.
    “I don’t know how you get through a day like today,” I said.
    “You hope there’s not another one like it for a while,” he said. “But the very same thing could happen again tomorrow. Accountants get audited, right? Surgeons have patients die on the table, and executives get thrown in jail. It’s what you sign up for.”
    How he could be so grounded that night I didn’t know, but I loved him for it. I thought of my father and not dissecting the flower.
    “Look at Gallagher,” he said. Leo’s closest friend at the station, Kevin Gallagher, had been a New York firefighter—a 9/11 survivor—before he’d moved his family to Portland. “Even after my worst shift, I’m lucky. That’s not a cross I have to bear.”
      
    That’s what I thought about, Leo’s jokes and what he had to do to get through on the job every day, while the time on the mountain dragged and I waited. We had had a flawless day, nothing but blinding blue above and new powder beneath. Because of the exquisite conditions, Leo wasn’t ready to call it a day. Minutes after he had said to me, One more. This snow is too good. We never have powder like this—just one more run and I’ll see you at the bottom, babe, minutes after I tracked his orange helmet to the lift and watched it rise until I lost sight of it, the weather over the mountain shifted and the low clouds socked in, fast. I thought nothing of it. We had all skied in worse. One more run and he’d be done.
    While I waited, I was glad to be warm and inside, my body having had its fun, and now having its rest. The boys changed out of their wet gear, got their games and books from the car, and ate. I kept checking my cell phone even though there was no coverage. The boys, by now used to their father often appearing when he did and not when he was expected, were busy and unfazed. But I kept looking and waiting for Leo to walk through the hallway in the lodge, back to me, maybe having done what he had as a teenager with Garrett: gotten lost skiing out of bounds to where they couldn’t ski back. They’d had to find the road and walk to the lodge. Everyone was frantic, while the boys had had an adventure. They were fifteen. I tried to think of what else could have happened. Maybe his delay was because he was helping someone else. But I started to think I should call the ski patrol office. We had season passes, and with Leo’s bracelet information, surely they could locate him. I had just told myself I would wait ten more minutes when I heard my name announced over the PA system with instructions to call a number.
    “Mrs. McGeary, this is Richard Allen,” said the voice on the other end. “I’m the physician here at the medical center today. Can you tell me where you are?”
    “Please, it’s Audrey,” I said. “What is it?”
    “Can you tell me where you are in the lodge so I can come to you?” he said. “Ski patrol was contacted for an incident involving your husband and they’re bringing him down.”
    Him. They were bringing him.
    I called the boys over and minutes later, three men in identical gear stood in front of