“Wait until Sunday,” he said, glaring up at her.
“What?”
“Wait until Sunday, and I’ll introduce you to some of the families on the street.”
She rewarded him with a bright, warm smile. “Thank you, Jamey. Why, you’re not so bad, after all.”
“Of course I’m not. I’m not the one you have to worry about around here,” he said sourly.
Her smile turned a little secretive and she murmured something as she turned away. He wouldn’t swear to what he thought he’d heard, but it had sounded vaguely like, “I’m not so sure about that.” It would be only fair if he’d given her a few moments of serious thought, since she’d kept him preoccupied pretty much since the first moment he’d seen her.
She made her way carefully back up the slope of the roof, swung one leg inside the window, then looked back down. “To show my appreciation, how about if I fix you dinner tonight? I’ll bring it over to the bar around seven.”
He considered it a moment, then shrugged. “All right.”
She smiled again, an unrestrained, whole-body sort of smile, and climbed inside. “Good. I want to ask you about Reid.”
Before he could protest, before he could even summon up a frown, she had slammed the window shut, waved, then disappeared from sight, no doubt with that floppy mutt on her heels.
Yeah, hell, he groused as he returned to the bar. Talking about Reid was his idea of a fun evening. What had the kid done to catch her attention? He’d been making himself scarce in the last few days. Jamey had seen Ryan and the others any number of times, but there’d been no sign of Reid.
There had been a time—eleven years ago—when that had worried him. Jamey had known that he couldn’t count on Mrs. Donovan to let him know if the kid quit coming home sometime and so he had watched the streets for him. If even a day had gone by with no sign of him, he had begun to wonder if something had happened. In a place like Serenity, sometimes people just disappeared. They angered the wrong people, fell in with the wrong crowd, were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Some of the people who had gone missing over the last twenty years had probably moved on to someplace better, but some were undoubtedly dead. With no identification like a driver’s license—hardly anyone on the street had a car—or with a body too badly decomposed to identify and no concerned family members out looking for them, they wound up unclaimed in the morgue and eventually buried in a pauper’s grave.
Jamey had once made a visit to the morgue. It had been only a month after Meghan had dropped Reid off on Serenity for a ten-day visit with the grandmother he’d never met, then disappeared. Three weeks later he had disappeared, too. The old lady hadn’t been concerned. He could take care of himself, she had insisted. Yeah, right. He’d been all of fifteen and recently abandoned by his mother. When the body of an unidentified teenage boy had been discovered on the banks of the river—five foot ten, blond hair and blue eyes, wearing torn jeans and a Hard Rock Café T-shirt—Jamey had expected the worst, had feared the worst, and he’d gone to the morgue for proof. He had been so relieved to discover that it wasn’t his kid lying there dead, so relieved that some other father’s son had died instead.
And so angry to discover a few days later that Reid wasn’t dead or missing or in trouble but was simply stupid. He’d decided to return home to Atlanta, to hitch a ride with strangers, and he’d left without a word to anyone. There he’d found that his mother hadn’t simply forgotten about him down in New Orleans; she had skipped out on him. Their apartment was empty. Everything they’d owned, including his own things, was gone. Having nowhere else to turn, he had hitched his way back, no big deal.
No big deal. In those few moments before Jamey had looked into the face of that dead blue-eyed, blond-haired teenage boy, it had seemed a very big deal to him.
That had been the way of their relationship. Reid did stupid things, Jamey got angry, and Reid got angrier. He couldn’t recall ever having a single civil conversation with the kid. He couldn’t remember a time, from the day Meghan had dragged him into the bar for a quick introduction between father and son, that Reid hadn’t been hostile and determined to get under Jamey’s skin. To be honest, though, he also couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t expected the worst of the kid. Had he been taking a genuinely realistic view—the kid was a punk before he came to New Orleans and would always be a punk—or had Reid simply sunk to the level of Jamey’s expectations?
Back in the bar he settled in with the newspaper, refilled glasses, made small talk with the occasional gabby customer and surreptitiously watched the clock. Seven o’clock was a long time coming, but at last it arrived, and so did Karen. She had showered—her hair was still damp—and changed into a denim skirt and a plain green top, and she was carrying a box. With a smile friendlier than most people in the bar ever saw, she greeted several of his customers as she made her way to the back.
Without removing the toothpick from his mouth, he gestured for her to come around behind the bar. There was a table back there, situated where he could see the room but still have some small measure of privacy. He’d shared it with many people in the years he’d had the bar—women and men alike, friends and enemies, partners and rivals, an ex-wife and a few women who’d been angling to become a new wife—but never anyone quite like Karen Montez. Hell, he had never known anyone quite like Karen.
“I decided it was too hot to really cook, and I made olive salad yesterday, so...” She uncovered a platter with a homemade muffaletta—a round Italian loaf layered with thinly sliced meats and cheeses and topped with chopped olives marinated in olive oil. It was a specialty at a number of French Quarter restaurants and a favorite of just about everyone who’d ever tried one. One sandwich was big enough for two, maybe even three, depending on their appetites. Tonight Jamey had quite an appetite.
She had fixed potato salad to go with it and had brought plates, forks, napkins, everything but their drinks. He provided those while she dished up the food.
“Are Friday nights busy for you?” she asked, gazing across the room at the dozen or so people.
“Depends. Any night can be busy if enough people feel the need to forget.”
“Do you ever feel that need?”
The potato salad was the way he liked it—creamy and just a little sweet—but it needed seasoning. He added salt and pepper before answering her question. “Everyone does from time to time.”
“But you don’t forget in a bottle.”
He laughed. “Do you think I’d be in this business if I had a drinking problem?”
“So what are your sorrows, Jamey?”
After a long, uncomfortable moment, he shook his head. “They’re none of your business.”
He’d thought she might take offense—after all, he knew what surely must be her two greatest sorrows: her husband’s death and her inability to have children. But she didn’t seem at all offended by his blunt response. Maybe, when you spent your working hours probing into people’s private problems the way social workers did, you got used to such responses. She simply nodded once, then asked another question. “What about Reid?”
For a time he simply stared at her. How did she know that, if he were going to classify anything in his life as a sorrow, it would be Reid? For that matter, how did she know about them, anyway? He’d never said anything that might make her suspect they were related, and it was a sure bet Reid hadn’t, either. Granted, they had the same coloring, but if there was any real resemblance, he couldn’t see it. Their relationship wasn’t a secret in the neighborhood, though. Someone—Alicia—could have told her, or maybe she had simply guessed—
“What are Reid’s problems?” she went on. “What made him the way he is today?”
He felt a little rush of relief. She didn’t have any idea that Reid was his son. She was just being nosy, the way she was nosy about everyone down here. But there was no way he could answer her questions without telling the truth, and what would she think of him then?
; He didn’t care what she thought. He just cared that she stayed in one piece long enough to give up and get out of there.
“If you want to ask specific questions, I’ll answer them, but I’m not going to analyze the kid for you.”
“All right.” She finished her quarter of the sandwich, fastidiously wiped her fingers on a napkin, then rested both arms on the edge of the table. “Has he always lived here?”
“No. His mother brought him here when he was fifteen and left him.”
“Left him?”
“She told him she would pick him up in a week and a half. She didn’t. He hasn’t seen her since.”
“Why here?”
“She was from here. Her mother lived a couple buildings down. He lived with the old woman until she died about seven years ago.”
“What about his father?”
Jamey moved the last fourth of the sandwich to his plate and took a bite before answering. “His parents split up when he was a baby. His mother took him to Atlanta, and his father never saw him. He didn’t know where they’d gone, and he didn’t care enough to find out.”
“Does he live around here?”
His expression settling into grimness, he nodded.
“Does Reid live with him?”
“The kid hates him. He avoids him as much as possible, and you can’t blame him. His father was never around when he needed him. Life with Meghan was rough. He could have used a male influence. Hell, he could have used an adult influence. God knows, Meghan never behaved like an adult a day in her life.”
“So where does Reid live?”
“He shares an apartment with the Morgans. Why all the interest?”
“He’s an interesting young man.”
“He’s a punk. He had an arrest record in Atlanta before he came here. He spent time in juvenile detention here. It’s only pure luck that he’s not in prison now. It’s only by the grace of God that he’s not dead.”
“He fixed my gate.”
Jamey stared at her. “I warned you about him.”
“And you warned him about me.” Her voice took on a faintly defensive tone. “I didn’t ask him to do it. If I hadn’t awakened early that morning, I never would have known it was him. He didn’t want me to know.”
“Yeah, right. Reid and his pals never do anything without a reason. He’ll come around sometime, wanting something from you, and if you don’t give it to him, he’ll just take it.”
“I think you’re wrong. He’s not like his ‘pals.”’
He leaned forward, his voice every bit as heated as hers was stubborn. “He’s exactly like them, Karen. He’s no good. Maybe if he’d had a mother who’d loved him or a father who’d been around for him, maybe if he’d gotten the sort of parents he’d deserved, he could have been different. But his parents weren’t worth a damn, and he turned out no better than they had a right to expect. Stay away from him. He’ll hurt you.”
Unexpectedly, she smiled. “Oh, he might break my heart, but he would no more physically hurt me than you would.”
“Oh, you know that, do you? You’ve talked to him—what? Once? And you know all about him.” His sarcasm erased her smile, but it didn’t diminish her confidence one bit. It made him angry, made him want to grab her shoulders and shake some sense into her. It made him want to load her into her car and drive her back to Landry himself.
And, someplace deep down inside, someplace he couldn’t even acknowledge, it made him admire her. She had more courage than he did.
“And what makes you such an authority on him?” she challenged.
He looked away, wishing for a distraction, for anything that could halt the conversation right there. But there was nothing going on—no customers needing service, no major news stories interrupting the ball game, no meteors crashing through the roof. Finally he looked at her again and grimly, bleakly, disgustedly answered. “He’s my son.”
Sunday morning was a typical New Orleans summer day. The temperature was too high to measure, and the humidity drained the energy right out of a person. Even Jethro found the conditions unfavorable. He’d found a shady spot on the veranda next to Karen, sitting in the old rocker she’d hauled down from the second floor, and stretched out with his tongue hanging out.
She had cleaned and painted all day Saturday, working herself into a headache. It had all been pretty mindless, fortunately, because her thoughts had been otherwise occupied with thoughts of Jamey and his bombshell. His son.
A moment before he told her, she hadn’t had a clue. They both had blond hair, gorgeous blue eyes and naturally golden skin that looked like the healthiest of tans, and they were both handsome, about six feet tall, lean and strong. But so what? There were probably a few thousand other men in the city with the same blond hair, blue eyes and golden skin, who were also tall, lean and strong—though she doubted many could compare in the looks department. But as soon as Jamey had admitted it—He’s my son—she had immediately seen the resemblance: the nose, the jaw, not just the color but even the shape of the eyes. It had seemed so obvious that she couldn’t believe she had missed it.
Truth was, with thirty-six hours to get used to the idea, she knew it really wasn’t so obvious. It was more a matter of possibilities. A person who didn’t know could look at the two of them and say they might be related. They could be father and son.
Jamey had a son. A grown-up, twenty-some-year-old son. That was one she hadn’t been prepared for. Oh, she had known he might once have been married—at his age, probably had—but to have a son, and one who hated him, one he had miserably failed as a father... Who would ever have thought that she would be attracted to a man whose parenting skills put him in the same group as the people she’d come here wanting to help?
Wiggling in her chair to blot the sweat that was running down her back, she scowled. She liked Jamey, no denying that, but she wasn’t looking for anything beyond friendship and assistance. Her mother had pointed out to her a while back that Evan hadn’t been the only man in the world, that there would be someone else someday, and Mrs. Montez had gently told her that she didn’t have to spend the rest of her life alone to honor Evan’s memory, that it was all right to date, that it was even all right to fall in love and get married again, but she had thought they were both crazy. Evan had been the only man in her world. She didn’t want to date, didn’t even care if she never had sex again.
But if she ever changed her mind, she imagined Jamey could certainly make a woman think about sex—with a great big steamy capital S.
Unfolding the paper fan she held in one hand, she gave herself a few cooling waves, then tilted her head so her hair fell over the back of the chair. Once all the repairs were finished and all the supplies and furniture for the offices had been bought, if there was money to spare, she was going to buy a window air conditioner for the parlor that would become a waiting room. Maybe offering a respite from the deadly heat was the way to bring people in for help. They could print up flyers for the parenting classes an old friend with a master’s in psychology was planning to teach: Stay cool while you learn to keep your cool. Maybe, like the movie theaters in the early part of the century, they could lure clients in with a big banner advertising Air-Conditioned Inside.
Out front the gate squeaked, and she raised her head in time to watch Jamey walk through. He was dressed in faded blue jeans and a plain white T-shirt and couldn’t have looked better if he’d tried. Evan had been a jeans sort of guy. So was Michael. Remy might have owned a few pairs of Levi’s, but he’d always preferred something a little less casual, and Smith... She smiled at the memory of him here in her hot, hot house in his immaculate summer suit. Smith didn’t know the meaning of the word casual. That was okay. It worked fine for him...and jeans worked even better for Jamey.
He was holding a small can in one hand. Before approaching the house, before even greeting her, he stopped inside the gate and oiled the hinges. After a couple of creaky tries and another couple of squirts, the gate operated smoothly
and silently. Satisfied, he recapped the can, crossed the yard and climbed the steps two at a time.
“I would’ve gotten around to it eventually,” she said lazily, “but thanks.”
“It would’ve driven me crazy in the meantime.” He set the can on the railing, then crouched beside the dog. A sucker for any and all attention, Jethro rolled onto his back, exposing his round little belly. “This weather’s not fit for a dog.”
“I was thinking I might buy him a little wading pool.”
“And climb right in beside him?”
“That’s an idea. Too bad Serenity doesn’t have a community pool.”
“There was one over on Divinity. It closed down years ago and became the community garbage dump. You can find trash, furniture, a rusted-out old car and probably a body or two down in there.”
“Is it salvageable?”
He skipped the expected response—the we-don’t-need-whatever-you’ re-offering, you-can’t-help-us line—and shrugged. “I doubt it. It’s been a long, hard time since it last held water.”
She couldn’t help a wistful sigh. “It would be nice, though, wouldn’t it?”
“It wouldn’t be any different than anything else. The little kids and the decent kids would be afraid to swim there. The toughs like Morgan would take it over. They would use it up, and when they were done, they would tear it up.”
She noticed he didn’t automatically mention Reid, as he usually did when Ryan Morgan’s name came up, and wondered if he didn’t want to remind her that he was Reid’s father, and not a very good one at that. Maybe her disapproval had shown in the few minutes of stunned, stilted conversation that had followed his announcement Friday night. Or maybe he was just hoping to avoid an argument Maybe he was afraid that, if he mentioned Reid’s name, she would stick up for him. He was so sure he was right about the kid, and he didn’t want to hear anything that might prove him wrong. Just as he was so sure he was right about her future here on Serenity. He was so pigheaded... and so wrong.
Convincing Jamey Page 8