The First Time Again: The Braddock Brotherhood, Book 3

by Barbara Meyers

  “The doctor who admitted you suggested treatment. They’ll transfer you directly. You don’t have to go home. Admit you’ve got a problem and you get help starting today. If you don’t, say goodbye to your daughter. After that you can probably say goodbye to your other daughter. Your son and grandsons. You’ve got a lot to live for, it looks to me like, but if you don’t wise up, you’ll lose it all like I did. You’ll wake up one morning and everything and everyone you loved or cared about will be gone.” Trey snapped his fingers. “It slips through your fingers and you can’t get it back. So what’s it going to be?”

  Some of Dan’s defiance had left him during Trey’s speech. Trey saw a man twice his age who was afraid. Afraid to commit to treatment. Afraid to give up the crutch he’d depended on for so long.

  Sensing Dan was close to capitulating, Trey pulled up one of the visitors’ chairs and sat. “I won’t lie to you. It isn’t easy. At first I hated rehab. I was pissed at the whole damn world, but when it came down to it, mostly I was pissed at myself. I screwed up everything and it was my own fault. I stuck it out in treatment because being under the influence is how I got where I was.

  “I’m going to make this one-time offer to you. You go into treatment right now, transfer in from the hospital when they release you today, and I’ll be there to help you every step of the way. I’ll help you in whatever way I can. What do you say?”

  “Why? You don’t know me. Why would you bother?”

  Trey held Dan’s gaze. “Because I know Baylee cares about you. And I care about her.”

  “There you are.”

  Baylee looked up from her seat in the waiting area to see Lisa step off the elevator and charge toward her.

  “Thanks for leaving me a note. I’ve been trying to call you all morning and all I get is your voice mail.”

  “Sorry. I guess I turned my phone off last night when I was here and I forgot to turn it back on.”

  Lisa took the seat next to her. “I saw Dad as soon as I got here.”

  “How is he?”

  “Not happy. Dr. Barber is under the impression that Dad’s planning to transfer to the rehab clinic once he’s released.”

  Baylee bit her lip.

  Lisa stared at her. “You know he won’t go.”

  “He might.”

  “When pigs fly,” Lisa snorted.

  “Okay, we’re all set.” Trey materialized in front of them. Baylee stood and so did Lisa. Baylee let Trey wrap his hand around hers.

  “Trey, this is my sister, Lisa. Lisa, Trey Christopher.”

  Lisa’s hard gaze went from Baylee to Trey and back. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I talked to him,” Trey informed them. “Your dad agreed to in-patient rehab. It’s all set.”

  Lisa’s gaze narrowed. She gave both Baylee and Trey a look filled with skepticism. “I’ll believe it when I see it. I have to get back to work. Trey, your reputation precedes you, but it was lovely to meet you in person.” She poked Baylee’s chest. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  Trey watched Lisa walk away. “Kind of a hard-ass, isn’t she?”

  Chapter Twenty

  Matty’s palms were sweating. He had that sick feeling of dread he always got when he was anywhere near that cop Spoley. He was missing something important to be here today. The whole family was supposed to be at the rehab clinic for a family therapy session. His dad had stopped drinking and sought treatment. The least the rest of them could do was show up today and try to be supportive. That’s what Lisa had told him yesterday. Even the twins would be there. And Baylee, of course.

  Matty had been torn. He never stopped wanting his dad to get better, to lay off the booze and be a dad. Be a man. Now that his dad was giving it a shot, Matty had bailed on him.

  He’d considered all the options last night. He didn’t want to do whatever it was Spoley wanted him to do. But he didn’t think he had a choice. He’d laid it all out in his head. There wasn’t anyone in his family he could go to. There hadn’t been since his mom had died. Now with them all rallying around his dad, Matty’s problems were even less important.

  He could go to Jack Frost. Explain everything about Mamacita and Des. How he was trying to help them and that’s why he broke his curfew so often. But Jack Frost was a by-the-book kind of guy. Matty didn’t think his probation officer would care what his reasons were. Probation was probation, and Matty needed to toe the line and follow the rules. Jack would likely make sure somehow that Matty couldn’t help Mamacita any longer. Maybe Jack would even go to her and explain how Matty had gotten into trouble and about probation. Mama would be so disappointed. Matty didn’t think he could stand it. Maybe she wouldn’t love him anymore or want him around.

  He’d lose Jasmine too. In her eyes he wouldn’t be the kid who was helping Mama. He’d be a loser who couldn’t stay out of trouble. She’d want nothing more to do with him. He had no idea how he’d gotten together with her to begin with, but he knew he didn’t want to lose her and whatever had started between them.

  Matty swallowed down his fear as he saw Spoley approach on foot. They were at the far end of a deserted soccer field in the county park. Matty planned to make it clear to Spoley that he wouldn’t be blackmailed a second time. He had his reasons for going along with it once, and they were good reasons. But he wouldn’t do Spoley’s dirty work in the future. If Spoley tried a second time, Matty had made up his mind he’d tell everything to anyone who would listen and take whatever came.

  “Right on time. I appreciate that,” Spoley greeted him. He offered his hand, but Matty just stared at him.

  Spoley gave Matty a look, and then he glanced around the area. There wasn’t much to see except more fields, a small concrete block building that housed restrooms, and a closed concession stand.

  “I’m not sure I care for your attitude, son. You need to show some respect.”

  “I’m not your son.” I’m not anyone’s son. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “I could call your probation officer right now,” Spoley said.

  “Go ahead. I thought about calling him myself.”

  “But you didn’t.” Spoley offered up one of his self-satisfied grins.

  “Not this time.” It occurred to Matty that he had something on Spoley now. A cop blackmailing a kid instead of turning him in. Spoley was breaking the rules. “Just so we’re clear, you try and pull this shit on me again, I will make that call.” It felt good to call Spoley’s bluff. Matty relaxed a degree.

  “I doubt it will be necessary. You do this for me and we’re done.”

  “Good.”

  “Your sister works for Trey Christopher.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I heard you been out there doing some work for him too.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “Arrogant son of a bitch, isn’t he?”

  Matty shrugged, not feeling so relaxed now. He wished Spoley would get to the point. Truth was Matty liked Trey. The guy had been decent to him. He’d overheard Lisa and Baylee talking, so he knew Trey had something to do with getting his dad into rehab. Plus, even though Baylee was typically clueless, he was pretty sure Trey was in love with her.

  “Thing is, he screwed me over a long time ago. Now it’s payback time. That’s where you come in.”

  Matty stared at Spoley some more. What did the guy expect? That’d he’d jump up and down in excitement to be part of whatever the payback scheme was?

  “I want you to plant something in Christopher’s car for me.”

  “What?”

  “Drugs.”

  “Drugs? You have got to be shitting me.”

  “Not real ones. They’re fake prescription drugs,” Spoley went on. “Nothing will happen to him. This is more like a practical joke I’ve been dying to play on him.”

  “I don’t know—”

  Now it was Spoley’s turn to stare. They had a deal. Matty had already agreed to it. It was too late for him to back out and they both knew it.

 
Matty knew Trey had money. Even if Spoley was trying to trick him by telling him the drugs were fakes when they weren’t, Trey could hire a good lawyer and probably get off with a fine or something. That’s how the world worked.

  “Fine.”

  Spoley smiled his creepy smile. “Good. Now here’s how it’s going to go down.”

  “Let’s take a break,” Trey suggested after he and Matty had stacked the last of wood from the walls of the old chicken coop in a pile.

  They both yanked off their work gloves, and Trey handed Matty a cold soda from the little cooler they kept nearby. He took one for himself as well and leaned against the trunk of a gnarled tree. Matty leaned his butt back against the pile of planks and drank a third of his soda.

  Over the past few weeks Trey and Matty had also leveled an old shed and another tumbledown structure that had no clear purpose. Trey was thinking of throwing a big party, maybe over the Labor Day weekend, and using the old wood for a bonfire. He’d invite his cousins, aunts and uncles, and his parents, of course, along with Baylee’s family and Ryan and Jenny. He’d been toying with the idea of proposing to Baylee right in the middle of the party, getting down on one knee, the whole nine yards. He wasn’t, however, entirely sure what her answer would be. If she accepted, maybe he’d start his own tradition of throwing a Labor Day party every year similar to his parents’ Fourth of July shindig. If she didn’t accept? He didn’t want to think about it.

  “How’s your girlfriend?” he asked Matty to get his mind off Baylee.

  Beneath his tan, Matty blushed. “I told you she’s not my girlfriend.”

  Trey grinned. “Yeah, she is. You just don’t know it yet.”

  “You think?”

  Matty looked so young and hopeful, Trey knew he couldn’t tease him. “She kissed you, didn’t she? She hangs out with you all the time, doesn’t she?”

  “Yeah.”

  “C’mon, Matty, you can’t be that clueless. She likes you.”

  “But…but…”

  “But what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Rather than offer a lecture on male/female relationships, which Trey didn’t feel qualified to give considering his own misgivings about his relationship with Baylee, he simply said, “She likes you.”

  Matty swallowed some more of his soda and gazed back toward the house. “Hey, are you going to plant more flowers in your grandmother’s garden?”

  Trey glanced back to the garden. “I don’t know. Maybe. Why?”

  Matty set his soda down. “Because a friend of mine gave me something for you.” He dug into the side pocket of his loose cargo shorts and removed a couple of plastic sandwich bags filled with seeds. He held them up to look at the labels Mamacita had written. “These are marigold seeds,” he informed Trey. “These are zinnias.”

  He handed them to Trey. “Hey, thanks. Who do you know that gives you flower seeds?”

  Matty had been tempted more than once to tell Trey about Mamacita, about Spoley, about everything. He didn’t know why, but out of all the adults he knew, his instinct was to trust Trey. Trey had helped his dad to quit drinking. Trey had gone to the family meeting Matty himself had missed. He’d heard Trey had also helped Dan find an AA sponsor. But Trey might tell Baylee Matty’s business, and Baylee might feel obligated to tell Jack Frost the reason for his curfew violations. With Jack Frost, it could go either way, and Matty wasn’t prepared to take the chance of being told he couldn’t help Mama until Des came home.

  “A lady I know. Jasmine knows her too,” he said by way of explanation.

  As she unloaded the dishwasher, Baylee glanced out the kitchen window to discover the old chicken coop was no more. She had to admit Trey’s instinct to hire Matty to help him had been a good one. Her brother appeared to have a decent work ethic. He didn’t complain. He followed Trey’s guidance and asked questions when he needed to.

  Still, Baylee worried about Matty. He didn’t get enough supervision, especially the past few weeks with her dad in rehab. Lisa had packed the twins off to visit their father and his parents, and she was enjoying her few weeks of freedom. Baylee hardly saw her. Lisa made only a brief mention of Matty violating his curfew the last time they’d talked.

  Trey and Matty were taking a break, chatting beneath the shade of an old tree. She saw Matty reach into one of the many pockets of his shorts and withdraw something. From this distance she couldn’t tell what it was. He held it up for Trey’s inspection and appeared to be explaining something. Trey took the item from him. From where she stood, it looked like a small bag.

  Baylee frowned.

  Trey stepped into the kitchen a few minutes later. “I’m going to wash up and take Matty home.”

  He went into the bathroom, but the moment he came out, Baylee asked, “What did Matty give you?” She inclined her head toward the area where the chicken coop had stood. “Out there?”

  “You wouldn’t believe it if I told you.”

  “Try me.”

  “Flower seeds.” Trey gave her a quick kiss. “See you in a bit.”

  She watched from the door as he got into the Cayenne. Matty lifted a hand in her direction as they rolled down the driveway. Trey was right. She didn’t believe it.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Baylee woke in Trey’s bed with a delicious sense of well-being, even though Trey wasn’t there. When he’d left the bed earlier, it had been to make coffee, shower and dress. He’d left an insulated travel mug on the nightstand for her and whispered that he was going to pick up Matty and he’d be back soon.

  She sat up, yawned and stretched, then picked up the mug on her way to the bathroom. She stood under the shower and sipped her coffee, not even trying to wipe the smile off her face.

  I’m happy! For maybe the first time in her life she felt that way deep in her bones. She couldn’t help but think the tides had turned in her favor as well as her family’s. Her father was getting the help he needed. Matty was on the right track. The twins were behaving better now that her father took a more active role supervising them.

  She had a good-paying job as Trey’s assistant, and the benefits were the cause of the smile on her face.

  She’d almost stopped waiting for something to go wrong. Almost. She wanted to trust Trey completely, to believe they had a future together. He’d dropped a few hints about a long-term commitment, probably trying to get a read on where she stood, but she hadn’t encouraged him. Even though having Trey in her life permanently was exactly what she wanted, she told herself it was too soon. She’d jumped at the chance to be with him once, and she had no intention of repeating that disaster.

  She was almost done attempting to style her hair when she heard Trey come in. The bathroom door was open and he slid in behind her, wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled her neck. She leaned back against him and stared at their reflection, the dopey smile on her face. He lifted his head and grinned at her. His burnished blond hair and blue eyes complemented her brunette waves and light brown eyes. We’re perfect together.

  “Ready to go?” he asked, releasing her.

  “I am. Where’s Matty?”

  “In the barn. I told him to drag everything out of it so I can see what we’re dealing with. I know a lot of it’s junk we’ll have to get rid of. When we find a contractor to remodel the house we’ll see what he has to say about the barn, whether it’s worth saving or not.”

  “We?” She gently poked him in the ribs.

  He poked her back. “You’re not going to bail on me now, are you?”

  “Hmm.” She pretended to think about it. “Probably not.”

  They stopped in the dining room to pick up the items they’d need for their trip to Hendersonville. They had to drop off some FedEx envelopes and stop at the bank. Baylee had a list of office supplies and groceries to buy while Trey was at his final PT appointment.

  As they stepped off the porch, Baylee said, “Let me get my purse.” She occasionally left it in her car simply because she didn’
t need her keys or her wallet when she was at Trey’s.

  Matty was wrestling a rusted roll of fencing material out of the barn. Baylee waved to him and got a half-hearted wave in return. He didn’t look too happy, probably because the work Trey’d given him wasn’t much fun.

  “I can’t believe we’re going to New York again in two weeks,” Baylee said as they approached the Hendersonville city limits. “This time I’m going to the Guggenheim. And I want to go to Macy’s too. I know they have stores everywhere, but I want to go to the original one.”

  Trey grinned. “You purposely booked one room this time, right? And you’ll bring that sexy nightie?”

  “Yes and yes.”

  “I thought of somewhere else we could go while we’re there.”

  “Where? Giants Stadium?”

  “No.”

  “The Jets’ stadium?”

  “They both play in MetLife Stadium now, but no.”

  “Madison Square Garden?”

  “Tiffany’s.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s somewhere else you’ve never been and because—”

  A short siren sounded behind them, and Trey’s gaze went to the rearview mirror. Baylee turned to see a patrol car with its lights twirling right behind them. “You weren’t speeding,” she told Trey.

  “No,” he said grimly as he pulled over.

  Baylee squinted at the patrol car. “That’s not Justin, is it?”

  “He better hope not,” Trey said. He opened his door and got out. Baylee did the same. Two deputies exited the patrol car. One of them addressed Trey.