His First Choice

by Tara Taylor Quinn

  And then took a small nip of the lobe of her ear. “I’m still recovering... How about you?”

  “I’ve been starving all day.”

  “Too bad all we get to eat tonight is dinner...”

  She kissed him then, long and hard. A reminder of what they’d shared, what they could be starting. An invitation for more meals to come. If all went well...

  * * *

  JEM GAVE LEVI his bath.

  While Levi landed a plastic airplane in the bubbles with his good arm, his casted arm wrapped in plastic resting on the side of the tub, Jem stood in the hallway just outside the open door and returned Tressa’s call from half an hour ago. She’d had a great weekend, but didn’t want to go to work the next day. She planned to quit her job and really wanted Jem’s approval before she did so.

  She wasn’t threatening, or crying, or screaming. She just didn’t feel comfortable at the bank anymore. Her outburst had embarrassed her, and she didn’t feel like the people who answered to her respected her anymore.

  Because she was probably right, he reluctantly gave his agreement, but told her that she was going to have to find another job. Immediately.

  She agreed.

  He also told her she was not coming to work for him. His gut was knotted while he waited for her response. Tantrum or no, he couldn’t let her force him into something that he knew was not right. But if she went off again, so soon after the last time, if Lacey found out...

  “I know, Jem. It would be like going backward, huh? I’d go crazy seeing where you are every minute of every day, wondering if your new client is cute, if she makes you laugh like I used to...”

  So there was a God. He relaxed against the wall, keeping an eye on the arms he could see above the bubbles in the tub just beyond the door across from him.

  “But...could you ask around for me?”

  His first thought was of Mick, of the position she’d put him in.

  “You know so many more people than I do,” she told him. “You’re so much more outgoing, and with your job, you deal with small businesses every day. I think that’s where I need to be, Jem. Running the finances of a small business. Look what I did with yours. It’s what I’m good at. Besides, then I don’t have to work with so many people and there’s less of a chance I’d piss anyone off or offend somebody.”

  This was the woman he’d known in the early years. The one who was rational and honest and thought of others. He knew this woman wouldn’t be around to stay; he’d been through the upheavals enough times to know they’d always be back. But he’d also learned to be grateful for the good times.

  “I’ll ask around,” he told her and then used their son in the tub as an excuse to end the conversation.

  * * *

  JEM DIDN’T TAKE Levi into bed to read stories. Or even out to sit on the couch and watch a video. He sat his son down in his booster seat at the kitchen table and poured milk in a sippy cup, pushing on the lid to make certain it was secure.

  He wanted no chances of spilled-milk interruptions.

  Grabbing himself a cup of coffee from the one-cup-at-a-time maker, he took his seat.

  “We having a man-to-man talk, Dad?” Levi asked, his brow slightly furrowed.

  He wanted to laugh. To get the moment on video.

  “Yeah, we are,” Jem said instead. They’d had them a time or two in the past, these man-to-mans—when Tressa had moved out, again when Levi had moved from the day care class to preschool to discuss the new rules and expectations. And before he’d taken the boy to a work site without a trailer present. The trip had been unavoidable and Tressa had been in the city.

  “What’s the trouble?” Levi asked, his rounded r’s making him sound so adorable Jem wanted to haul him up and hug him. Levi’s good arm was crossed with his casted one on the table in front of him.

  God, how he loved that kid and saw how careful he had to be, too. He’d noticed Levi mimicking him more and more lately. How many times had he asked his son “What’s the trouble?” in just that tone over the years? Pretty much every time he’d come to him crying.

  It was what his own father used to say to him...

  He took a sip of coffee. Motioned toward Levi’s cup with the back of his hand and waited while his son sipped.

  “You know about man-to-mans,” he said, bringing his head down enough that he could meet Levi’s gaze almost head-on.

  Levi nodded.

  “We talk about hard things and we might not like them and we always tell the...”

  “Truth.” Levi emphasized the word with a nod of his head.

  “Right.”

  He didn’t feel good about this. Would have given up his savings account if he could have bought a way out of the conversation.

  But Lacey wasn’t going to let Levi go back to Tressa’s without making Sydney aware of the incident she’d witnessed. She hadn’t said so. But, like he’d been telling her, he knew her.

  Knew her conscience. Knew how seriously she took her work and how much she cared. Even after all of his introspection over the past days he remained fairly certain Lacey was wrong to worry about Levi, too. There was no way on earth Tressa would hurt Levi, or that the boy wouldn’t tell him if she had.

  If the hospital hadn’t called—due to red tape because of the number of hospital visits, he remained certain of that, too—there’d be no one even looking into their lives.

  “Am I in trouble?”

  Four-year-olds didn’t have much of an attention span. Or patience, either.

  “Of course not.”

  He was off on the wrong foot already. No way could he get through Levi’s defenses if he thought he’d done something wrong. And he had to get through to him.

  To assure himself once and for all that Lacey Hamilton was wrong and no one was hurting Levi.

  Because she’d managed to instill that one bit of doubt.

  “I want to talk to you about your mom.” One parent should not berate another in front of the children. He knew the rule.

  “Did she get in trouble?” Levi sounded mildly curious. And nothing more.

  “I don’t know.” He took the opening. “Do you think she should be?”

  He shrugged and Jem’s stomach knotted into physical pain. Not mere discomfort, like that caused by Tressa’s shenanigans, but bend-over physical pain.

  “What about Kacey?” he asked, the words coming to him slowly. “Should she be in trouble?

  “’Course not!” Levi said. “Kacey’s fun.”

  The knot tightened another notch.

  “How about Lacey?”

  “No...” The word was accompanied by a vigorous shake of the head. “She’s nice, Dad, huh?”

  “Yes, she is. I like her a lot.”

  “I like her, too.” He took another sip of milk. Jem sipped his coffee.

  “So how come you don’t know about Mommy?”

  Levi shrugged again.

  Jem’s certainty dissipated.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  HE WAS IN over his head. Had no training in dealing with possible victims of abuse. But he knew how to be a dad.

  “Son, remember, this is a man-to-man. Rules are you have to talk,” he said. He didn’t want to be like Tressa and create drama where there wasn’t any. Didn’t want his son overreacting like his mother every time something didn’t go exactly as he wanted it to.

  But Lacey’s reaction to Tressa’s outburst the other night... She hadn’t said a lot, but it had been enough to tell Jem that she’d found the behavior outside the bounds of acceptable.

  He’d found it pretty tame.

  The disparity in their reactions to the same situation had prompted this conversation. If he was wrong...if Tressa was abusing their son in any way...

&nbs
p; “Why do you think Mommy should be in trouble?”

  “I don’t,” Levi said, his chin to his chest.

  “Levi, look at me.”

  The boy did.

  “This is really important, son. More important than anything that has ever happened before in your whole life.”

  How was that for scaling down the drama? He hated hearing the words coming out of his mouth.

  Levi’s eyes were wide, his mouth open as he nodded.

  And Jem’s gaze fell to the cast his son had been lugging around for weeks.

  “Tell me about that cast,” he said, zoning in, as though guided by an instinct he hadn’t known he’d had.

  “I fell.”

  No mention of Tressa.

  If you don’t, Jem, I’ll...

  He heard her voice.

  “Do you remember having a bad dream the last time you spent the night at your mom’s house?”

  Levi nodded. And then, as though remembering he had to speak, he said, “Yes.”

  “Can you tell me what it was about?”

  He shook his head.

  “Levi?” He put enough warning in his voice to let the little boy know he was serious.

  “I don’t remember it all.” The boy was looking right at him.

  From the odd place of calm he’d sunk into, Jem asked, “What do you remember about that bad dream?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  He barely stopped himself from flying out of his chair. To pace the room. Breathe. But he couldn’t leave the moment.

  His boy needed him.

  “This is a man-to-man, Levi. You have to tell me. It’s the law.”

  Tears sprang to his eyes. “Then I have to go away?” His voice rose and wobbled.

  “What? No, son. You aren’t going away. Ever. At least, not until you’re all big like me, and then only if you want to.”

  So Tressa was the one who’d had it right? All of this...uncertainty...stemmed from Lacey’s first visit?

  But Levi had said she was nice. So... “Who told you that?”

  “I can’t...” Levi looked at him. Covering his son’s hand with his own, wanting instead to pull the little guy onto his lap and shield him from every bogeyman ever, Jem took a sip of his coffee.

  And then, keeping a hold on the fingers sticking out of the little cast, he nodded toward Levi, who took a sip of milk.

  Okay. Normality.

  “Tell me what you remember about the night of the dream, buddy.”

  “Do I have to?”

  “Yes.” He held on to those fingers. Not coddling. But loving. And doing everything he could to let Levi know that while he had to man up, his dad had his back.

  “I waked up with Mommy shaking me. She was mad.”

  He held on to those fingers. Maybe for himself now.

  “Why was she mad?”

  “I hit her in the face.” Levi started to cry again. “I’m bad and now do I gotta go away?”

  What the hell?

  “You hit your mother?”

  He shrugged.

  “Levi.”

  “She said so.”

  Everything in him stilled. “You don’t remember hitting her?”

  “I remember sleeping.”

  He was getting the picture, more clearly than ever. And felt bile in the back of his throat.

  Tressa had called because Levi was having a nightmare and she couldn’t wake him. He’d been flailing his cast in the air and she’d said that she was afraid he was going to hurt himself.

  That grain of truth. The goddamn grain of truth that led one down the wrong path. She wasn’t afraid he was going to hurt himself. At least not at that point. She’d been afraid because he’d hit her and she’d overreacted.

  “You aren’t in trouble,” he said softly, floundering as he tried to corral his thoughts, determine how bad things were and figure out what to do. But one thing was a given: taking care of the little boy that he loved more than life. “You aren’t bad. What happened wasn’t your fault because you were asleep, and we can’t help what happens when we’re asleep, can we?”

  Levi shook his head, his little cheeks still wet with tears.

  “So do you remember anything else about the dream night?”

  “I throwed up.”

  Lacey had had that one right, which didn’t surprise him as much as it should have.

  “And that’s all?”

  Levi nodded, but he didn’t meet his gaze.

  Jem racked his brain for more words. What came next? Where did he go with this?

  “The swimming,” he said aloud. “You told Lacey and Kacey a story about you learning to swim,” he continued, hoping to hell his voice was filled with loving interest—not accusation.

  Levi nodded and then said, “Yes.”

  “Did Mommy get mad then, too?”

  He nodded, eyes wide again.

  “How come?”

  “She telled me do this...” He moved his arms in a crawling motion. “But I jumped under and drownded.”

  He’d scared the shit out of Tressa. He’d had that part of the story already, almost to a T.

  “Then what happened?”

  “She held me.” He put his hands on his sides at his rib cage. “And made me stay under and bringed me up.”

  “How many times?”

  “A hundreds.” Levi’s word for more than he could count.

  “What happened next?”

  “I sneezed a lot.”

  He’d had water up his nose.

  “Then Mommy buyed the basketball and we played and it was fun.”

  All’s well that ends well.

  Except that, if Lacey’s source was correct, his son had worn bruises all over his torso as an aftermath to that event. Tressa gripping him out of anger, not fear? Or both?

  Which led him to another question. Who’d called Lacey? Because she’d known about those bruises.

  And Tressa hadn’t had any reason to take Levi to the hospital. Nor had he had a doctor’s appointment during the time Jem had been gone. Even if Tressa hadn’t told him about a visit, he’d have seen it come through on his insurance...

  He leaned down. “Man-to-man, son, why didn’t you tell me these things?”

  Levi’s head dropped.

  “You have my word you are not going to have to go away,” he said.

  If you do, Jem, I’ll...

  “Did your mom tell you that you’d have to go away if you told me what had happened?” To save her own ass. At the expense of her son’s.

  The little boy’s eyes filled with tears again as he nodded.

  And Jem wanted to wring that little bitch’s neck.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  LACEY WASN’T SURPRISED when she got a call from Jem later Sunday night. She was in her room, sitting in bed trying to read, but had really just been reliving delicious moments from the night before. Over and over again.

  And so, when she saw his contact come up on her phone, she answered with “I’ve been lying here thinking about you.”

  “Hold that thought.” He didn’t sound sexy at all. “Seriously. I want it. Just...”

  “What’s wrong? Is it Levi? Is he okay?”

  “He’s fine. Probably better than he’s been in a while. He’s in bed, sleeping soundly.”

  “Is it Tressa? Did she call you again?” She’d been expecting the other woman to be a problem. Just hadn’t known how soon.

  Her territory had been threatened. And she thought Jem had had only one date. When Levi visited her again and mentioned Kacey and Lacey, all hell was going to break loose.

  But Sydney would know before it happened. She’d have a me
asure in place...

  “She did, but she’s not on a rampage, if that’s what you mean,” he told her. “She was actually better than I’ve heard her in a long time—rational, kind, thinking of others.”

  Lacey felt a twinge of jealousy and turned away from it. She wasn’t going back down the road of self-doubt. It was unhealthy—for her and for those she cared about.

  Jem wasn’t hers.

  And even if they were officially together, if he suddenly decided he wanted his ex-wife, Lacey wanted him to say so and go. Because if he truly felt the need to be with her, then that was where he was meant to be. Right?

  Her thoughts were all over the place.

  She hated it.

  “You were right, Lacey...” Jem sounded beaten. The self-doubt came clearly over the line and scared her.

  “Right about what?” She clutched the sheet up to her chin.

  “About Tressa. And Levi. I don’t think it’s actionable,” he said. “I’ve got a pretty clear picture now. I only wish I’d seen it sooner. He’s been suffering through this all alone and...”

  “No.” Relief made her giddy. Such relief. Levi was going to be safe. Safe. And Jem? “He wasn’t suffering alone, Jem. He had you all the time. Your constant love and attention give him security. And we caught it in time.”

  “But...”

  “Look at how well he took to Kacey and me and going off alone with either one of us. That’s the sign of a secure kid.”

  “He cried when I left him at his mother’s house.”

  “Understandable.”

  “But I didn’t understand. I just thought he was upset because he couldn’t come to work with me. Or work on the boat. Or...”

  “Be with the dad who made him feel safe,” Lacey finished for him.

  “Anyway, I need to know where we go from here.”

  “What did you mean when you said there was nothing actionable?”

  “I’ve been doing some reading. Tressa’s got control issues. She overreacts. When she’s sad, she bursts into tears. When she’s happy, she’s like a little kid. When she’s angry...”

  “She lashes out?”