by Lisa Jackson
Christina was dirty and bleeding, like a refugee from a war zone. Stephen didn’t look much better. Most of his usual bravado had evaporated and his face was bruised, one eye nearly swollen shut. Scarcely a teenager and yet, it seemed, on the brink of big trouble with the law.
Not good. Not good at all.
But then J.D. had suspected as much.
“Mrs. Santini?” The officer who had driven the car, a short man with thick, wavy brown hair and wire-rimmed glasses, approached.
“Yes.”
“Officer Talbot, Bittersweet Police.”
“Hi.”
He glanced at J.D. “Mr. Santini?”
“Yes, but I’m not the boy’s father.”
Brown eyebrows sprang upward, over the tops of the policeman’s glasses. J.D. thrust out his hand. “J.D.,” he said. “I’m Stephen’s uncle.”
Stephen shot J.D. a suspicious glance that spoke volumes, then reached into the back seat of the patrol car for his battered skateboard.
“You might want to have his eye looked at,” the officer said to Tiffany. “Helluva shiner, if you ask me.”
“I will,” Tiffany promised as Christina buried her face into the crook of her mother’s neck, smearing blood and dirt on the long column of Tiffany’s throat.
“I’m okay,” Stephen mumbled, a hank of black hair tumbling over his forehead and partially hiding the eye in question.
“I still think it should be checked,” Tiffany said, her nervous gaze skating over Stephen’s injuries. Then she asked, “How’s the other boy?”
“Looks about like this one here.” The officer touched Stephen on the shoulder. “Let’s hope this is the last of it.”
Sullenly Stephen studied the ground.
“It will be,” Tiffany promised as Talbot offered a patient smile, then turned back to his car just as the interior radio crackled to life. Talbot’s pace increased and he climbed behind the wheel of the cruiser. He snapped up the handset of the radio.
“What happened?” J.D. asked Stephen. The cruiser took off.
“Nothin’.”
“Black eyes like that don’t appear by themselves.”
With a disinterested lift of his shoulder, Stephen carried his skateboard and sauntered toward the house.
“Wait,” Tiffany commanded. “I think we should have your eye checked at the clinic or the emergency room.”
“I already told you it’s okay.”
Christina, as if sensing all of the attention was focused on her brother, sniffed loudly. “My chin hurts.”
“I know it does, honey.” Tenderly Tiffany placed a kiss upon her daughter’s temple. “We’ll fix it while we take care of your brother,” she assured her daughter.
Stephen snorted. “I don’t need you to take care of me.”
“Sure you do,” she quipped back and followed him inside. J.D. didn’t hesitate but walked past a fading Apartment for Rent sign and up the two steps to the front porch.
“Gosh, Mom, just get off my case, okay?” He rolled his one good eye and with as much attitude as he could manage, he dashed up the stairs. An instant later a door on the second floor slammed and within seconds the sound of angry guitar chords filtered down the stairway.
Tiffany hesitated as if she wanted to chase after him, but finally shook her head. “I’ll just be a minute,” she said to J.D. and he noticed the worry in her amber eyes, as if some of the fight had left her.
His heart twisted stupidly. “You need some help?”
She looked at him straight on, those intense gold eyes holding his for a second. He saw the beat of her pulse at the base of her throat and some of his suspicion melted. Maybe she was just an overworked single parent. “Thanks, but I can manage,” she said coolly as she carried Christina to the little bathroom tucked beneath the stairs. “I have the extra key, if you just give me a minute I’ll get it for you. It’s in my purse, in the kitchen. Why don’t you wait for me there—have some iced tea or . . . whatever is in the refrigerator.”
“Fair enough.” The scent of her perfume teased his nostrils as she closed the door behind her and his groin tightened at a sharp, poignant and oh-so-sensual memory. Don’t go there, Santini. Silently he called himself a blind fool, then strode to the kitchen. He nearly banged his head on one of the pots suspended over the cooking island and resisted temptation upon spying a plate of home-baked cookies that rested on the edge of the counter.
Christina let out a yelp. “Stop it, Mommy!” she cried, then he heard Tiffany’s voice, hushed and soothing, though he couldn’t make out the words.
Gritting his teeth, he opened the refrigerator, found a couple of bottles of beer tucked inside the door and pulled one of them out. What the hell was going on here? One kid was banged up and the other beaten to a pulp before being escorted home by the police. Despite all her intentions, good or not, Tiffany seemed to be sliding in the motherhood department.
He twisted off the cap and tossed it into the wastebasket under the sink.
“Owww, Mommy, that hurts!” Christina was admonishing, her voice trembling.
“Shh, honey, it’ll just sting for a minute.” Tiffany’s voice faded again. Disturbed, J.D. walked out the back door into the hot afternoon. The covered porch opened onto a wide backyard. A swing and two rocking chairs were pushed against the worn siding and planters filled with blossoming petunias, marigolds and some other flower he didn’t recognize, splashed color against the porch rail. A small foil pie plate had landed upside down on the top step and a spray of mud, flower petals and grass littered the walk.
J.D. eased past the mess and stepped onto the sun-dried lawn. Philip had bought this place—an investment of sorts, as their father was interested in expanding to this part of the state—just a year before his death. All the buildings—house, garage and carriage house—were painted a soothing dove gray and trimmed with black shutters and doors. The white gingerbread trim and steeply pitched roofs added a touch of Victorian élan that, he supposed, appealed to nostalgic types who felt more comfortable in a rambling old manor than in a modern, utilitarian apartment house. Those renters would gladly forgo the convenience of a dishwasher for the gloss of original handcrafted woodwork.
He took a long sip from his bottle and felt the cold beer slide down his throat. Philip had never intended that his small, second family would move down here, but then Philip hadn’t planned on dying suddenly at forty-eight. Scowling, J.D. took another cool swallow. A hornet buzzed past his head while a neighbor’s dog began to bark incessantly, only to be scolded by a woman’s sharp voice.
“Cody, you hush!”
The dog ignored her and kept yapping.
A wail from a discordant guitar screamed down from the open window on the second floor of the main house. Squinting, J.D. looked up and saw his nephew standing in the middle of his bedroom. Biting his lower lip, Stephen bobbed his head, a hank of dark hair falling over his eyes while he banged on the strings. As if he sensed he was being watched, Stephen glanced through the window and the guitar immediately fell silent. He disappeared from view.
J.D. wondered about the kid. Would he make it? Stephen seemed about to embrace the wild side of being a teenager. Just as he himself had done. J.D. had had a broken nose, stitches running up one leg from an automobile wreck and a juvenile record that fortunately had been cleared before he reached adulthood. Stephen seemed about to embark on the same dangerous path away from the straight and narrow—a path that included drinking underage joyriding in “borrowed” cars, shooting BB guns at mailboxes and generally raising Cain.
“Hell,” J.D. muttered under his breath as Tiffany, with Christina in her arms, stepped outside.
The little girl had a bandage on her chin as well as her knee, but she was clean again, face scrubbed, with no trace of the tears or dirt that had tracked over her round cheeks.
Tiffany, too, had taken the time to release her ponytail and apply lipstick. Her glossy black hair framed her face which, aside from the touch of lips
tick, was devoid of makeup. Nonetheless she was a striking woman. No doubt about it. With high cheekbones, pointed chin, straight nose and those golden eyes accentuated with thick, curling lashes, she had a way of making a man notice her. Add to the already fine-featured eyebrows that arched so perfectly they appeared arrogant and the image was complete.
“Are you Daddy’s brother?” Christina asked. Her eyes rounded as if she’d just made the connection.
“That’s right.”
“Daddy’s in heaven,” the imp said so matter-of-factly it was almost chilling.
“I know.” J.D.’s jaw tightened.
“He’s not coming back.”
He exchanged glances with Tiffany and her eyes warned him to be careful. “I know that, too.”
“Are you staying in a ’partment?”
“For a while,” he said and felt more than a trace of guilt.
“How come?”
Good question. He noticed Tiffany stiffen, the tremulous smile on her lips freezing. “Uncle Jay is here on business—for his work—and . . . he decided to visit us.”
“That’s right,” J.D. said, mentally noting that it really wasn’t a lie. “But I’ll be in town awhile.”
Tiffany’s mouth tightened a little.
Bored with the conversation, Christina wriggled and Tiffany set her on the ground. “You know, Jay, I still can’t picture you working for your dad. You were always . . . well . . . you know.”
“The black sheep, the son who swore he’d never work for his old man, the guy who did everything he could to keep his distance from anything remotely associated with Santini Brothers Enterprises.”
His off-center smile was a little self-deprecating and his eyes, gray as evening clouds, darkened as if a summer storm were gathering in his soul. Tiffany tried not to notice. She’d been caught in the web of those eyes before and wouldn’t make that mistake again. She couldn’t. He tipped his bottle back and drained it. “As I said before, the prodigal had a change of heart because his older brother died.” The grin fell from his face.
She folded her arms over her chest and sighed. “Life has changed for us all.”
“Hasn’t it, though?” His gaze touched hers so intimately she shivered, then looked away.
“So what’s going on with Stephen?”
If only I knew. “He’s nearly fourteen.”
“And already in trouble with the law.”
“Nothing serious,” she countered, ready to defend her son against anyone and anything, including his uncle if need be. Rather than meet the questions in his gaze, she went to the back porch, grabbed a broom and swept up the remnants of Christina’s mud pie.
“Looks serious to me.” J.D. followed her and rolled his bottle between his palms.
“You should know about being a rebellious youth.”
He hesitated, then set his empty bottle on the rail. “That was a long time ago, Tiffany.” The way he said her name sent a stupid little thrill down her spine and an unwanted memory started to rise to the surface of her consciousness, a memory that she’d sworn to bury so deep it would never appear again. But there it was, in her mind’s eye. Clear as the day it had happened: J.D. stripped to the waist, drips of sweat sliding down the finely honed muscles of his chest and abdomen.
“You can’t just forget the past, pretend it didn’t happen.” Her throat constricted and she wanted to call back the words, but it was too late.
“It would be better if we could sometimes,” he said, and she knew in a heartbeat that he, too, was fighting unwanted memories; forbidden, painful recollections of something that, if acknowledged, would only cause more damage.
This conversation with its intimate overtones was getting her nowhere in a big hurry. She swept the last of the drying pansy petals into the shrubs and noticed that Christina was busy plucking blades of grass and tossing them into the air. “Don’t worry about Stephen,” she said a little too sharply. “I can handle him.”
“It’s a tough load. Teenage boy, little girl, part-time job, and running this place.”
“Not a problem, J.D. Well, at least not yours.” She forced a confident smile and wiped her hands on her jeans. No reason for him or any of the Santini family, for that matter, to know any of her troubles.
“It looks like you could use a man around here.”
“Excuse me?” she said, nearly stammering at his gall. “A man? Is that what you said, that I could use a man?” She let out a puff of disbelief. “Let’s get one thing straight, Jay. I don’t need a man. Not now. Not ever. I—we’re just fine.”
“Are you?” He hooked his thumbs in the belt loops of his jeans and she was suddenly aware of his bronzed forearms, all muscle and sinew, where his sleeves had been rolled up. His fingers framed his fly and she looked up sharply to see an amused smile slash across his face. Set defiantly, his jaw showed the first shadow of a dark beard and his teeth flashed white as he spoke. “Let me tell you the way I see it,” he said, moving closer. Too close.
Tiffany’s heartbeat quickened.
“Your daughter is only three, probably doesn’t really understand what happened to her daddy, your son is on his way to becoming a major delinquent, this house is falling down around you, and you’re dead on your feet.”
“Is that what you see?”
“On top of all that, you’re trying to deal with being a widow and single parent.”
“Not that it’s any of your business.”
“These kids are my brother’s.”
She rolled her eyes and fought a surge of anger. “Come on, J.D., you haven’t shown much interest in them until now. Why all of a sudden? Don’t tell me that just because you had a motorcycle accident you’ve had some kind of epiphany, because I won’t believe it. It’s not your style.”
“And you know what my ‘style,’ as you call it, is?” His voice was low. Way too sexy. It brought back all those old, ridiculous emotions that she’d fought for much too long a time.
“Unfortunately, yes. I think I already mentioned that you’re too independent, irreverent and self-serving to work for your father.”
His eyes glinted with male challenge. “No doubt he’d agree with you, but he didn’t have much choice because he seems to think blood is thicker than water.”
“Is it?” There was no use continuing this conversation. “Time will tell.” She turned toward her little girl. “Chrissie, I’m going into the house and check on Stephen. Stay in the backyard.”
The imp, squatting and watching a butterfly flit from one dandelion head to another, didn’t reply.
“I’ll watch her,” J.D. offered.
“The gate’s locked, she’ll be all right,” Tiffany retorted. “You don’t have to—”
“I said I’ll watch her.”
Fine. What did she care? “I’ll just be inside,” Tiffany said rather than argue with the man. She stalked through the house and up the stairs, telling herself that she only had a few weeks with J.D. so close at hand, several months at the most. She could handle it.
She had no choice.
A DO NOT ENTER sign was posted on the doorknob of Stephen’s room. Tiffany ignored it, tapped lightly on the door and opened it herself.
Stephen was half lying on his unmade bed, staring up at pictures of models and rock bands and fast cars that he’d taped to the ceiling. His guitar lay across his abdomen and his injured eye was nearly swollen shut. He rolled it toward her as she approached. “I want you to come with me to the emergency clinic and I don’t want to hear anything else about it,” Tiffany said.
“Forget it.”
“We’re going, and right now. I can’t take a chance with your eye. So come on and get into the car. On the way there you can tell me why you and Miles got into it.”
“It wasn’t a big deal.”
“Of course it was, Stephen. Otherwise you wouldn’t have landed at the police station sporting the biggest shiner I’ve ever seen.” She stepped over CDs and video games to stop at the window. Chris
tina had climbed into the old tire swing and had conned J.D. into pushing her. Tossing her black curls over her shoulder, the three-year-old clung to the ropes suspending the swing from a branch of the old apple tree and laughed delightedly. Tiffany sighed. When was the last time Christina had laughed—really laughed? When had Philip pushed her in a swing, or helped her onto a slide, or sat on the other end of a teeter-totter? Never. He’d never had the time, and here was J.D.—with most of his weight resting on his good leg as he shoved on the worn black rubber—sending Christina into a slowly spinning circle in the shade of the leafy tree.
Muttering under his breath, Stephen set his guitar aside and climbed to his feet.
“The officer said there was talk about a girl.”
Stephen snorted. “It wasn’t about a girl.”
“Then what? Isaac Wells?”
Stephen’s muscles tensed. Suspicion slitted his good eye. “I already told you that I don’t know nothin’ about him taking off.”
“I know, but the officer on the phone said you were found with keys that might belong to Mr. Wells.”
Stephen paled to the color of chalk.
“No way.”
“They have the keys down at the station. With Mr. Wells’s initials on them.” She paused at the door and her son, chewing nervously on the corner of his lip, nearly ran into her. “You want to explain?”
“They weren’t mine.”
“Then whose?”
His jaw worked in agitation. “I—I don’t know.”
“Stephen—”
“I mean it, Mom. I found ’em. In, in, the park when I was in-line skating.”
“And you didn’t tell me or turn them in to the police?” Oh, how she wanted to believe him, but this was way too much of a coincidence.
“No.”
“You know that the police are going to take those keys out to Mr. Wells’s place. If any of them fit in the locks of his house or his cars, they’ll have a lot more questions for you. A lot.”
Stephen’s lips clamped together and Tiffany realized it was useless to argue with him at this moment. She’d give him a little time to think things over, but then she intended to get to the bottom of whatever it was that was bothering him.