In deference to those heels, Kirk chose the sidewalk.
“You seem to know your way around,” she said.
He slid the tips of his fingers into the front pockets of his jeans. He seemed to be doing that a lot, lately. Maybe it was time to wear something other than jeans. Until a year ago, he hadn’t even owned a pair. “I’ve been here before.”
“Testifying?”
He supposed that could be a valid explanation, considering he worked around kids all day. Maybe there’d been a ruckus on the playground that had gotten out of hand… No, he decided. Too complicated to lie. And what would be the point.
“I was here…before.”
“For what?” She’d put on sunglasses. Which made her look, in her long skirt and stylishly tight gold sweater, like a Hollywood star. “When?”
“Sixteen or seventeen years ago.”
“What, you were here for a tour? I know they used to bring all the kids in for a ‘scared straight’ type of experience.”
Once they were away from the front parking lot, there were very few people around. Just an occasional car driving by on the street. A voice calling somewhere off in the distance. The rumble of the nearby freeway. The birds. And the blue sky and sunshine.
“I had kind of a tour,” Kirk said. “And I’d like to say it scared me straight.”
She glanced over at him. “You’re trying to tell me you were here as a perpetrator?”
“Actually—” he shrugged “—I think I’m trying not to tell you that.”
“But you were.”
“I was.”
“For what? You get caught jaywalking?” She was grinning. Apparently she didn’t believe him. Kirk allowed himself a second to be gratified.
“The first time was for breaking and entering.”
Her step faltered. “The first time.”
“The second was breaking and entering with robbery thrown in.”
He made light of it. But the memory made him sick.
“Oh my gosh.”
“The third time…”
“The third? Kirk! You go to jail for these things.”
Some people did. And eventually, briefly, so had he. He’d begun to wonder, mostly since his talk with Steve McDonald, whether his life might have turned out differently if his father had forced Kirk to pay his own debt to society that first time.
“The third time it was car theft.”
“You stole a car.”
His father’s Corvette. The car Kirk had driven there that day. He’d been driving it most of his adult life.
As a reminder.
“Charges were dropped on that one.”
He’d been brought in, booked. Strip-searched, required to shower where anyone could—and did—walk by. Dressed in the same blue cotton pants and T-shirt as every other juvenile locked up in detention.
And then his father had found out who’d stolen his car.
And Kirk had been taken out for a steak dinner to recuperate from his dreadful experience. While his mother had sat in a corner of the booth with silent tears trailing down her cheeks.
“The fourth time was aggravated assault.”
Valerie laughed out loud. “Now I know you’re kidding.”
Yeah. That was how it felt to him, sometimes, when he remembered.
But he knew.
Who he was. What he’d done.
“I pleaded not guilty for reasons of self-defense.” He felt compelled to finish what he’d started. It was time she knew the nature of the man.
“You’re not kidding.”
They stopped under a tree, just standing there, staring at each other through their tinted lenses. “I’m not kidding,” he admitted, his voice completely serious.
“What happened?”
“A punk football player grabbed my date in the parking lot after a dance one night. He’d had too much to drink. He kissed her, squeezed her breast. I hauled him off her. He hit me. I hit him back.”
Again and again and again. It had been his first introduction to an anger that could drive him to the bitter end. And it was the last time that anger had been given a physical outlet.
“Then it was self-defense. I can’t believe they even pressed charges.”
“He was the mayor’s son.”
And had been unconscious after the first punch. With his bare hands Kirk had nearly killed an unconscious kid. He would have if his date hadn’t started screaming at the top of her lungs.
Only the fact that Kirk’s father had been the mayor’s biggest financial supporter and that the mayor’s son had been unable to recall what had happened had saved Kirk that time.
He’d eventually married his date.
“Was there a fifth time?” Valerie asked, starting to walk again.
“No.”
“Were you ever detained?”
“Only until my dad came to get me.” But it had been enough. That last time, when he’d been booked for beating up the mayor’s son, Kirk’s folks had been up in the mountains. Unreachable for four days.
Four days for him to be grabbed in the shower by some pervert, spit on by another of his fellow inmates, treated—it seemed to him at the time—as though he were no better than cow dung, forced to submit to the ignominies of a full physical, to undress and leave his regulation blue pants and prison shoes in a brown paper bag before he could walk down the secured hall to his cell each night. To use the rest room in full view of anyone who wanted to watch. And to remember.
Kirk had been plenty angry by the time his parents came to get him.
Driven by something he hadn’t understood then, he’d made their lives hell for weeks after that.
His father had given him the Corvette.
He understood now, though. Courtesy of Alicia’s death. He’d been driven by fear, by the knowledge that he couldn’t control everything in the world around him. Even though he’d been taught that was his right since the day he was born.
It had taken him years to figure out what made him resent his parents, what created the underlying anger he felt when he was with them. They’d given him a world where he could have anything he wanted, taught him that he was the lord of his existence. They’d set him no limits. Seventeen was a hard age to learn that he wasn’t always in charge, that he couldn’t control everything.
Too hard. While Kirk learned that he never wanted to be on the wrong side of the law again, he hadn’t learned the part about control. Instead, he’d spent the next seventeen years of his life proving that, on the contrary, he controlled all.
Or so he’d thought.
“You’re awfully quiet.” Her words sounded more like a question than a statement.
The court buildings no longer in sight, Kirk put a friendly arm around Valerie’s shoulders, half expecting her to call him on it—or shrug it off.
“Just remembering.” He grinned—sort of. “So how much damage did I just do?”
“To what?”
“That pedestal I’ve been put on.”
She sputtered and laughed. “You were never up on a pedestal, Mr. Chandler,” she said. “Far from it.” Sobering, she added, “And you didn’t do any damage at all.”
“Come on, Judge, I’m just another one of your juvies.”
“Hardly.” She bumped his side. For safety’s sake, he chose to believe it had been by accident. “Not a single one of my kids has a body that—”
She broke off.
“That what?”
“Nothing.”
Because he was treading dangerous ground himself, Kirk left it at that.
“Actually,” Valerie said, bumping his side again as they walked, “I’m impressed, and very grateful to you.” Her tone had dropped to a more serious level.
The Kirk Chandler of old would have taken that straight to his ego. “Why?” he asked now, honestly perplexed.
“Impressed because, despite those rough experiences, you built something to be proud of. Look at your life, dedicated to the betterment of ch
ildren. But you haven’t done like most of us, working our jobs and going home. You’ve taken it steps further. Your life is those kids. You let them know they matter, give them a sense of value when they see how much you value them.”
If she got that, then why didn’t she understand how important it was for him to see Abraham Billings? Kirk dropped his arm.
“And grateful?” he asked. They turned a corner, bringing them back in sight of the Arizona Superior Court, Juvenile Division.
“Because you just validated the one thing that gets me through my days here.”
“Which is?”
“The belief that troubled kids can and do grow up to be good, law-abiding, caring and successful citizens. Every decision I make is geared toward that end.”
He wouldn’t abuse that belief by telling her exactly what kind of citizen he’d grown up to be. Ruthless. Out to win. To be the one holding all the cards—at almost any cost. He’d drawn the line at breaking laws that could land him in jail. But the laws of human decency and kindness he’d trampled on whenever necessary.
And without compunction.
Those were things she’d never know about him.
Traffic was picking up as the morning calendars drew to a close and court personnel were leaving for lunch. Someone in a dark blue Mercedes honked at Valerie. She smiled and waved.
“Have you heard any more on the paternity suit?” she asked him as they neared the front parking lot where he’d left his car.
“Nope.” Troy had told him it would take time. The first step had been a formal letter to Susan requesting that she submit her son to a paternity test. The second had been a pleading filed in family court.
“Have you thought about just asking her for the test yourself?” Valerie asked.
“No.” When he’d found out about the child, Susan had refused to speak to him.
Stopping at the side of the building, where there was a private entrance for employees with clearance, Valerie turned to smile at him, squinting beneath the bright sun.
“Speaking as a woman, not as a member of the legal profession, I’d suggest that, given the intimate nature of the situation, it might be best to handle this on a personal basis rather than through lawyers. Reassure her that you aren’t trying to take anything away from her. That you just want to share in the responsibility.”
Kirk doubted that Susan, even in the good days, had ever thought as logically as Valerie. But he was desperate. He’d give her another try. He wouldn’t accuse. Or challenge. He’d simply ask.
It could work.
In a different lifetime.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ROCKING HER SON, Susan Douglas studied his perfect features and fought the ready tears that threatened whenever she really looked at Colton. She just couldn’t escape the memory of another time. Another warm body against her breast. Another face with exactly the same features.
And still, she loved this child fiercely. For himself. Not in place of the sister he’d never know.
Which was why she didn’t feel the least bit guilty about the phone call she’d made an hour before. She’d caught Valerie Simms just as the judge was leaving her office for her Wednesday-afternoon session. The conversation had to be quick.
She’d received a call from Kirk. A confusing call. She hated the man she’d divorced three years before.
But she’d adored the man she’d married ten years before that. To distraction.
And although she knew it was inconceivable, he’d almost convinced her that he’d really changed. That fathering Colton mattered.
There was a time she would’ve given anything to have Kirk be a father to her child. To his child. And those old aches still had power over her.
The power to destroy reason.
She couldn’t let him do that.
So she’d called Valerie. And didn’t feel the least bit guilty about telling her friend that things were getting desperate and she really needed the paternity issue settled once and for all. A court order, anything Valerie could do to get her ex-husband off her back.
And when Valerie had asked what was going on, she’d told her she was afraid for her life. That Kirk had threatened her. That he had a horrible temper and she was afraid of what he’d do.
Smoothing the top of her son’s head, Susan relaxed a little more. Her tactic had worked.
But then, she’d known it would.
Susan Douglas had learned from a master.
COACH HAD PROMISED come hell or high water, that he’d be there Wednesday afternoon. Four o’clock sharp. Abraham came straight home from the school he hated worse than being slugged by a disgruntled trick—though definitely not worse than having the bastard grab at his pants—and hung out at the corner where he could watch for the Vette. If he went in the house, his foster mother would start analyzing crap she knew nothing about and never would, playing Donna Reed or June Cleaver. She didn’t have a clue what the real world was like.
Mothers still loved their kids, but they had responsibilities nowadays, had to work for a living instead of hanging out wearing aprons and baking cookies. And they sure as hell didn’t have time to analyze a kid and think they knew all the answers.
Thank God for that.
He started to sweat at twenty to four. Something might’ve held Coach up and he might not be coming. Maybe he forgot. Or found some other kid he could help. He might’ve decided that Abe’s new place was too far to drive.
Sinking down onto the curb, he didn’t care that he was making the backside of his jeans dusty, since he and Mom didn’t have to wash them, anyway. They hadn’t even let him bring his own clothes and he hated the stiff new things they were making him wear. He picked up a handful of pebbles.
His backpack still strapped to his shoulders, he jiggled the rocks in his palm. It wouldn’t matter if Coach didn’t come. He’d be free to head out then. He was only staying because he’d promised the coach. And if Chandler didn’t keep his promise, then Abe’s was null and void. No second chances.
Not for a world that didn’t give him any.
Ten minutes to four. Abraham stood up. He might as well head out. Chances were Coach wasn’t going to show. And he’d feel stupid standing there like a little kid, waiting for him anyway. Backing up to the stop sign, he considered his options.
There was no reason to return to the house. Every morning when he left there, he had everything he needed in his backpack. Glancing up and down both streets at the quiet intersection, he pondered which way to go. He wasn’t quite sure where the freeway was, but knew he’d find it.
Abraham always found his way.
At five to four, just as he was heading north, away from the corner, Coach Chandler pulled up to the curb.
“Hop in.”
Quenching the relief in his belly, he did.
“DOES MRS. MORTON KNOW you’re with me?” Kirk eyed the sullen-faced boy as he slouched down in the leather seat of his forty-five-thousand-dollar car.
“Yeah.” The sweater they’d bought for the boy wasn’t anything Kirk could imagine Abraham choosing for himself. Seeing Abraham in it irritated him. They’d taken the kid from everything he knew. Couldn’t they at least leave his clothes alone?
“You told her I was taking you to dinner like we discussed?” he pressed, mostly because Abraham was staring out the passenger window.
As though he could read Kirk’s thoughts, Abraham turned his hard eyes directly on Kirk. “I said I would, didn’t I?”
With his years of honed instincts, Kirk wasn’t satisfied with that look, but he trusted the boy anyway. Someone had to. So Abraham was plotting something. But the boy wasn’t lying to him about this.
He’d just have to be smarter than Abraham, talk him out of whatever plan he had for the evening. And make sure the boy was still in the car when he pulled up to the Mortons’ later that evening. Abraham Billings had no idea who he was dealing with.
Though he suggested every restaurant he could think of, Kirk ended up eating
fast-food hamburgers and French fries with the boy. In his car. It was the only thing he’d agree to.
Abraham obviously didn’t realize that eating in a vintage Corvette was a sin.
Just as Kirk didn’t realize what kind of bomb he was going to detonate when he asked how Abraham was doing.
After the string of cusswords, the boy spent fifteen minutes talking about all the things going undone in his mother’s life.
“Don’t you think she’s old enough to take care of herself?” Kirk asked, chomping on a double burger and fries as though he ate in his car parked in the back of a hotel lot every night of the week.
Abraham’s tanned, perfect features turned toward him, and Kirk had trouble swallowing the bite of food he’d just chewed. Those big brown eyes had never looked so completely sincere.
“Not my mom, Coach,” he said. “She’s one of those women who are too sweet for their own good. She always believes the best is going to happen. She’ll forget to pay the electric bill because she figures no one’s really going to turn off the power when it’s a single mom and her kid living in a trailer. Especially since she ‘most always pays it.”’
“You paid it, didn’t you?” Kirk read between the lines.
“Sometimes.”
“And the other bills, too?”
“Mostly. She kept her money in a little chest under my bed and I’d take it and buy money orders to pay for stuff.”
Abraham didn’t seem to be very hungry. He held his hamburger in one hand and picked at his fries.
“She can’t live alone, Coach. She’s afraid when she’s alone. She’ll go crazy and invite some jerk to stay with her because she won’t think she has any other choice.”
Kirk wondered if anyone had ever wrung that woman’s neck.
As if by mutual agreement, they shied away from uncomfortable conversation and tended to their food for several minutes.
“If they don’t let me go back there, Coach, I’m running,” he said suddenly, his voice as filled with determination as any judge’s had ever been.
“Whoa, buddy, remember what we talked about? Think of your future.”
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