And, obviously, they hadn’t stepped forward since, either, or he wouldn’t have grown up in foster care.
Jon looked tired. Far more tired than a day’s worth of hard work merited. Lillie had a feeling she was witnessing a side of him few people ever saw.
“You have no reason to be ashamed,” she said softly, wishing she had the nerve to reach over and run her fingers along his neck—to massage away the tension of a lifetime of having to be tough.
She understood so much more now. And was drawn to him more than ever. A dangerous combination.
“I’m not ashamed,” Jon said after a long moment.
But as he stood, gathered his things and wished her good-night, his shame hung between them.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
AT WORK ON Saturday, Jon got a call from Mark. A floating shift supervisor, Mark worked different areas as needed.
“Cooker seven is down,” Mark said without preamble.
“On my way.” Already jumping on his cart to head toward the area where the 500 gallon tank would be filled with raw juice squeezed from the prickly pear cactus fruit and heated to a boiling point of 221 degrees, Jon pictured the tubular, gas-fired cylinders beneath the vat.
If one of them was out, a safety valve would shut off the gas supply to the entire vat. And if allowed to cool, not only would 500 gallons of product be lost, the vat would be contaminated and have to be shut down for cleaning, which would take the entire line out of production—and cost the company more money than Jon could afford to contemplate.
“I cleared the premises,” Mark said, meeting Jon as he entered the area in the middle of the several acre plant. “Temp’s down to 219,” he said. “Larry called me as soon as he noticed the drop.”
“Still well above boiling point,” Jon said. Two degrees down. He had a window of another six to eight. He had to work fast.
“Gas is off.” First things first. Sliding under the vat, Jon saw the problem at once. “There’s a hairline crack in the main line,” he said. Not good news. The line had been down for what was only supposed to be occasional cleaning the month before. It wasn’t due to be down again for quite a while.
Sliding out from under the vat, Jon wiped his hands on the brown cotton pants he’d bought from a surplus store and grabbed a roll of heavy-duty duct tape off his cart.
“Wait a minute, what are you doing with that?” Mark asked.
“Taping the line.”
“No way, man. There’ll be gas left in the line. Static electricity could cause a spark and then―”
“It’s a minor crack. Just enough to throw the safety valve. We cover the crack, get the vat back online for the few minutes it still has to boil. We can shut down the gas as soon as it tips for pouring into the cooler.” The juice would sit in another vat to cool before traveling through a series of pipes into a vat where it would be sugared.
“At least that way we save the product,” Jon said, already heading back under the vat.
Mark was right beside him with a gas detector in his hand. “If this shows no gas leak, then fine,” he said.
Jon pointed to the damage. Mark checked the damaged spot for leakage and then proceeded to make his way around the other cylinders.
“We’re wasting time, man.” Jon didn’t want lost product on his watch. He couldn’t afford the write-up on his file.
“Lives are more important than money.” While frustrating, Mark’s reply wasn’t completely unexpected. Or completely unwelcome, either.
A couple of hours later, as Jon was once again under the now-empty-and-cooled vat, cutting out the damaged piece of line to replace it with a new section, Mark was right under there with him.
“Aren’t there some other folks who could use your eagle eye?” Jon asked, only half teasing. “If you’re not careful, you’re going to make me think that you don’t trust my work.”
“Has nothing to do with your work,” Mark said. “This is a gas line. A fire hazard. You work, I monitor, and we both go home tonight.”
Remembering Mark’s past, Jon understood. Mark had lost a close friend to an explosion on a line under his supervision. Back East, in the little town where he’d grown up.
Bearing down on his cutters with enough force to make it through the piping with one thrust, Jon recognized the warning signs of trouble.
Internal trouble.
Emotional attachment, whether it be friendship with Mark or something different with Lillie, brought risk. Especially, it seemed, for him. Once he started to care about someone, he got careless, quit watching his back so much, did things to please that person, lost his good judgment.
Threading new pipe into the coupler joining it to the existing gas line, he checked his work.
And double-checked. Mark slid out from under the vat after him and waited while he turned the gas back on.
“Let’s give it five and check for leaks,” Mark said, which left them standing there with nothing to do while they waited.
“How much do you think we lost today?” he asked his superior. Work was about dollars and cents for the company. Losing too much would cost him his job.
“Not much,” Mark told him. “Cleaning was already completed on nine. The switchover only took a few minutes. In the long run, we’ll show profit,” he added. “With nine done early, both will be back up before projected.”
Jon nodded, more relieved than he’d ever admit. He needed this job if he was going to stay in school. His scholarship covered his living expenses, but only his. And if he dropped out he’d have to pay back what he’d already spent: a semester’s tuition, rent, books and other expenses.
“I didn’t get a chance to ask when you picked up Abe last night, but how was your evening?”
“I put the doors in, no problem.” Jon had mentioned Lillie to Mark, but so far, Mark hadn’t asked any questions.
Leaning against a metal column, his head covered in the safety helmet everyone in the plant wore anytime they were on the floor, Mark crossed his feet at the ankles and grinned at Jon. “I knew you’d have no problem getting the doors in,” Mark said. “I wasn’t sure you’d actually been able to meet up with Lillie and get it done. So how’d it go?” Mark asked again. “Did you have dinner with her again?”
He never should have told Mark about the trip to the pub the week before. “Yeah. She made a salad.”
“You stayed home?”
“We were at her place, yes.”
Glancing at his watch, Jon was dismayed to see that only two minutes had passed. It was turning out to be a damned long five minutes.
“And?”
“And nothing.” He turned her on. Didn’t mean she cared. “I’m way out of her league.”
“Bullshit.” Mark’s vehemence was surprising, until Jon thought about his friend’s situation. Mark, a blue-collar guy like Jon who’d also grown up without a mom, was engaged to a lawyer.
“You’ve got the world’s greatest grandmother,” Jon said. “My mom was a druggie.”
“Mine was a drunk. Wrapped her car around a tree when I was twelve.”
“That when Nonnie took you in?”
“Nope. I was with her from birth.”
“Well, there you go, then. I was in foster care.”
But it wasn’t being a ward of the state that was the real cause of his shame and Jon knew that. Being an ex-con was.
He’d gone with his foster brothers of his own free will. He’d known they were going to rob the convenience store. He’d taken the goods from the site. He’d made the choices—damned stupid choices—because he’d wanted to be one of them. He’d wanted to belong.
“From what I hear—and living with Nonnie I hear everything—Lillie Henderson wouldn’t care if you were raised in a sewer.”
Mark wasn’t telli
ng Jon something he didn’t already know. But...
Four minutes had passed. Mark didn’t seem to be in a hurry to get the test done and move on.
“It’s obvious you’ve got a thing for her.” Mark passed the gas monitor he was holding back and forth between his hands.
“I do not have a thing for her.” The words were unequivocal. They had to be. Jon was not going to screw up again. Not this time. Because his son would pay. He needed Lillie Henderson to help him—with Abe’s stress issues, and with Clara Abrams, too, if the older woman ever decided to check up on him.
His friend sobered. “Sorry, man. It’s just that...Addy and I had a bet about how long it would take for you two to―”
“Hold it right there.” Jon straightened. Grabbed another gas monitor out of his cart. “There’s absolutely nothing going on...like that...between Lillie Henderson and me. She’s Abe’s child life specialist. She’s just helping me out with this tantrum thing.”
“The Parsons family has known Lillie for years.” Mark’s voice was low, and dead serious. “She’s had more clients than anyone can count. And they say that she’s never shown as much interest in anyone as she has in you and Abe. Truth be known, the whole town’s watching you two.”
He felt sick.
Will Parsons was president of the university. His wife, Becca, was Shelter Valley’s mayor. They were both close family friends of Addy’s—Mark’s fiancée.
“Lillie’s been alone a long time. No one thinks it’s good for her,” Mark said.
Finally, someplace Jon was in agreement with the rest of the world.
Not that he could have anyone watching him. Or looking too closely. Not with Clara Abrams’s interest in Abe. Not with the break-ins happening in town. And not with a son who had adjustment issues, either. Still, he said, “They think she’s interested in me?”
“It seems pretty obvious.”
Good God, could it be true? Could he really have finally met the one? Could his dreams really become reality? Could Abe one day have a mother?
“I gotta warn you, though,” Mark said, pushing back from the column and heading back to the underbelly of the vat. “If you do anything with her, you’d best be serious about it.” The warning tone allowed for no misunderstanding. “Because I can assure you, if you break that woman’s heart this entire town will lynch you.”
Even though Mark’s warning brought him back down a couple of notches, ex-con Jon Swartz still left work that afternoon floating with the knowledge that the people of Shelter Valley thought Lillie Henderson was falling for him.
* * *
“KIRK TOLD US he came to see you.” Papa waited until they’d ordered breakfast—Lillie was just having oatmeal and fruit because she didn’t know if Jon and Abe would want an early lunch—before bringing up the subject Lillie had feared would arise.
Sipping her Diet Coke, she said, “He did,” as if Kirk’s visit was no more of a news item than traffic on the freeway. It really hadn’t been anything more than that. An irritant that put you in a bad mood and then was over.
“If he did anything...”
Reaching across the table in the booth she shared with the two people she loved most in the world, Lillie patted Papa’s hand. “He didn’t do anything, Papa. I promise. He was a perfect gentleman. You’d have been proud.”
“I can’t imagine being proud of that boy.”
Not anymore. There’d been a day—many of them—when Papa and Kirk had been closer than most fathers and sons.
“Give him a chance, Jerry,” Gayle told Kirk’s father.
“I just don’t want you giving him any chances,” Papa was looking straight at Lillie. “After what he did to you...”
She gave his hand a squeeze. “It’s okay, Papa. I’m okay. I wish you’d believe I really am happy.”
“I’ll believe it when I see you marrying and having a family of your own. You were born to be a mother, Lillie.”
“Or to support children in another way,” Lillie said, looking to Gayle for help.
Her ex-stepmother-in-law was frowning, too.
“Look, you guys. Kirk’s affair, leaving me like he did, even abandoning Braydon, weren’t the worst things I’ve ever suffered,” she reminded them. “Losing Bray...that would have happened no matter what Kirk did. And if anything keeps me tied up inside, it’s that.”
“If you’d had your husband beside you, grieving with you, you wouldn’t have been able to retreat so deep inside yourself,” Gayle said. She’d been a schoolteacher, once upon a time. Before she’d met and fallen in love with Jerry Henderson.
“I lost my parents, too,” she reminded them. “Life goes on. We don’t forget, but we move on, right? And where Kirk’s concerned, I’ve moved on.”
“I wish I could be sure of that.” Jerry’s shrewd gaze was turned fully on her.
“Besides,” Lillie added, hoping only to reassure him, “I think Kirk really might have done some growing up since the last time I saw him. He seemed more mellow.”
A little disconcerted by the glance Papa and Gayle shared, Lillie wasn’t as hungry as she’d been moments before.
And, of course, the waitress appeared right then to deliver their food. Oatmeal for Lillie and broccoli quiche for Papa and Gayle. Leaving a basket of fresh-baked goods in the center of the table, she offered to refill their drinks and left.
Papa’s silverware remained on the table in front of him. Stopping with her second spoonful of oatmeal almost to her mouth, Lillie asked, “What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, Lil. I just can’t allow... My son’s a smooth talker. It’s my fault. I taught him how to sell to people. But I meant him to use the skill to sell valuable products to people who needed them. Or to sell things to people with too much money on their hands.”
Papa’s honesty was one of the first things that had endeared him to her. She didn’t know how he was with his clients, but in his private life, he told it like it was.
“Kirk’s one of the top advertising executives in the company. But as a man, he’s a lowlife.”
“No, he’s not.” Lillie couldn’t stop the words from escaping her lips. “He’s weak. Selfish. But he has boundaries. He wouldn’t ever do anything illegal.”
“Just immoral,” Jerry said.
“He wouldn’t harm a child, or steal from old people or leave the scene of an accident.” She knew that firsthand. Once, when they’d been out clubbing in college, Kirk had rear-ended a car as he’d been attempting to get his car out of a tight parking spot. He’d found the owner of the damaged car and made amends.
“He wouldn’t kick a dog,” Lillie added, trying only to ease the pain she read in Papa’s eyes.
“He also turned his back on his firstborn because he was ill,” Jerry said softly, leaning forward. “And he’s missed every single major event in Ely’s life.”
Gayle wasn’t eating, either. With her eyebrows drawn in worry over dark, compassion-filled eyes, she watched the exchange between Lillie and Papa.
“I won’t be able to live with myself if my son marches back into your life and somehow convinces you to give him another shot.” Papa’s eyes glistened.
“No worries there,” Lillie assured him.
“A woman’s heart is a funny thing.” Gayle spoke softly, too, but no less emphatically. “And I agree with Jerry in that Kirk is very convincing. Especially where you’re concerned.” With a compassionate tilt of her head she added, “You’re right, Kirk seems to have changed some, seems to be more aware...”
“...and truly contrite,” Lillie added, more to see if they agreed with her assessment, or if Kirk had managed to pull the wool over her eyes already.
“He’s sorry,” Jerry said. “I know that for a fact. But sorry doesn’t make up for what he did. Nor does it mean he wouldn’t break yo
ur heart again in the future.”
“There is no future between us.”
“He told us he’s going to do whatever it takes to win you back,” Gayle said.
And Lillie finally understood why they were having this conversation.
“If Kirk was truly sorry, if he really wanted to make his life right, the first place he’d start would be with Ely,” Jerry said. “That young boy loves his daddy. He’s hurt every single time Kirk misses an event.”
Papa and Gayle had made their bimonthly visits with their grandson no secret. But they didn’t usually talk about him, either.
“Papa?” She took his hand, held on. “There’s no way Kirk is going to hurt me. He’s never going to get that close to my heart again. I promise.”
He studied her and she let him, meeting his gaze head-on for as long as it took for him to believe her.
“But I need something from you,” she added after he finally nodded.
“Anything. You know all you ever have to do is ask.”
“I need you to forgive him, Papa. I have.”
“I―”
“He’s your son. You love him. He loves you. And he needs you.”
Glancing at Gayle, she saw the other woman nodding. “I’ve been trying to tell him the same thing.”
“Kirk looks up to you.” Lillie couldn’t believe she was pleading her ex-husband’s cause. Never thought the day would come that she could. “He listens to you,” she said, and added, “Most of the time.”
Lord knew that Kirk hadn’t listened—at all—when it came to Lillie and his marriage.
“Talk to him about Ely. Help him.”
“And if I do this, you’ll stay away from him?”
“I’ll make certain that he doesn’t get close enough to touch my heart.”
“You want me to have a heart-to-heart with my son?” Jerry shook his head. “I may need a stiff drink first.”
With a chuckle bearing little humor, Gayle cut into her quiche. Took a bite, chewing slowly.
Lillie tried again. “He needs your influence, Papa. And you need your son back.”
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