Accused (Troubled Boys, Strong Men #1)

by Wendy Byrne

  “It’s obvious from your behavior.”

  “Such as?”

  “You feel guilty your son is charged with a crime of his own making and are doing everything in your power to make it go away.”

  She let his words digest for a few seconds before she spoke. “That’s strange. I thought I was being a good parent.”

  “You shouldn’t be blind to your son’s faults.”

  She drew in a breath and willed the tears away. Could he be right? “Thank you for coming by and I appreciate your candor.” Archie’s words reverberated inside her. ‘The truth hurts, doesn’t it? You don’t know how to parent because your parents were lushes. They didn’t parent you. They were too busy getting drunk.’

  “Let me know if you would like to set up an appointment to talk.” He shook her hand before reaching into his pocket. “Those drug companies are always handing out freebies. Here’s something that might help you sleep. You look like you might need it.”

  She started to refuse, but thought better of it. Over the last week she’d barely slept a couple of hours a night. Her body couldn’t sustain that kind of abuse. Sooner or later, it would rebel and she’d get sick. Reluctantly, she took the pills. A part of her wanted to down a couple right now.

  “Thanks for talking to me.” She hoped her forced smile didn’t give away her true sentiments.

  “Maybe Travis will be more forthcoming with you than he has been with me,” he said.

  While she wanted to ask about his opinion, he’d made his point abundantly clear. Chalk another one up for the ‘guilty as sin’ side of the equation.

  Were both she and Sam being gullible? Was there a part of Travis that she, as a mother, couldn’t see? Then again, Mama Iris had said the same thing. Surely not all of them could be wrong about how they felt in their gut about the situation. Or did each of them have ‘co-dependency issues,’ as Dr. Stern would say?

  Chapter Twelve

  “Travis, I’m Cole Matthews.” The man held out his hand and stood as soon as Travis entered the room. “I’ve been retained by your mother to represent you.”

  “Boy, am I glad to have a new lawyer.” He wanted to scream a big ‘hells yeah’ but held back. Travis figured any lawyer would be better than Reggie, but having Coach’s blessing made it way cooler.

  “I don’t know Reggie Saunders personally, but let’s just say he has a bigger than life persona.”

  “And a big ego to match.”

  Cole laughed as he sat down at the table. “I want you to tell me everything you can about what happened.”

  While Travis felt he’d recounted what he remembered about that night a million times, he didn’t feel the normal frustration. At least this guy looked at him and paid attention when he talked. Occasionally he’d jot down notes on his pad, but other than that he seemed engrossed in what Travis said, unlike asshole Reggie who practically had one hand on the door the whole time he met with him.

  Cole tapped the end of his pen against the pad of paper. “I understand you confessed to Harvey Costrow.”

  “Who?” Travis had been on such a high from the meeting, it took him a couple of seconds to process what he’d heard.

  Cole flipped through a couple of pages until he found what he was looking for. “I talked to the State’s Attorney this morning. The kid’s name is Harvey Costrow.”

  Travis shook his head. The memory bounced around inside him like one of those tiny bouncy balls. He should have known the kid was full of shit when he said he wasn’t a snitch. “Harvey? No wonder he calls himself Slash.”

  “Slash, huh? Tell me what happened.”

  “I wanted to play football. Slash and his friends said I should tell them what happened. Like how I killed the guy.” Travis suddenly felt like an idiot. “They were all up on me and I thought they might leave me alone if they thought...” He hung his head. “It was stupid, but you don’t know what it’s like in here.”

  “Believe me I know exactly how scary it can be inside here. Now we have to figure out how to undo the damage.” He tapped the end of his pen against the paper. “This Harvey kid—or Slash—I had a friend of mine do some digging and he has a list of priors longer than his arm. He’s been in for everything from petty theft to armed robbery.” He held up his hand to quell Travis’ enthusiasm. “That doesn’t mean it will come up if he testifies. The way I hear it, there’s some kind of deal in the works for his testimony, but I’m not yet sure of the specifics. A kid like that normally comes off pretty good in court if nobody knows what he’s getting in return for the testimony.”

  “Oh, man.” Travis felt like the hole he’d dug himself in had gotten deeper. “I should have walked away, but they had me cornered. It was like admit it, or get beat up.”

  “I’m not going to lie to you. It’s a problem, but that doesn’t mean we’re lost yet.” He flipped through his pages. “How do you feel about Dr. Stern?”

  “He’s okay, I guess,” Travis shrugged. “I haven’t thought much about it. It’s not like I have any choice. I have to see him or I get in even more trouble.”

  “I’d like to send a friend of mine to talk to you.”

  “He a shrink too?”

  “Actually, she’s a social worker. Her name is Felicia Jones. I’d like to see if she comes up with the same diagnosis as Dr. Stern. It’s best to cover our bases on this.”

  “Sure, no problem. Whatever—” Before Travis could finish his thought a guard came to the door.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt but Travis, your mother is here and she insists on seeing you right away. She seems pretty upset, says it’s an emergency.” The guard looked to Cole. “Is that okay with you?”

  He nodded. “No problem.”

  Travis’ insides turned to Jell-O. “Oh crap. She’s not going to understand.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll talk to her.”

  Seconds later, his mother burst through the door. “Travis, how could you?”

  “I can explain, Mom.”

  “How? They trusted you. They gave you....” For a brief second she glanced at Cole, then back to Travis, anger and disappointment in her expression. “I never expected ....” She wiped a tear from her eye.

  He felt like shit all over again. “You don’t understand—”

  “Travis Connor Beckett.” She held up her finger to signal his silence. “You do not get to talk right now. Only listen.” She drew in a shaky breath. “They’re good people. They never did you any harm. How could you allow people to trash their house? That is beyond unconscionable. You will pay them restitution out of your bank account. I don’t care if it takes every cent you have.” The fire seemed to puff out of her as she sat down at the table across from him. For the first time, she seemed to realize Cole was in the room as well.

  “Hmm, Mom. Don’t get mad, but I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

  She ran her fingers through her hair. “Come on, Travis. Dr. Stern told me all about it. Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” A flush came to her face. “Don’t tell me you can’t remember trashing the Fitgeralds’ house?”

  “I know you don’t want to hear this but I didn’t do it on purpose. I was being stupid and told Jeremy about the code for their alarm. He told some of the other kids and before I knew it they’d set it up as a party house while the Fitgeralds were gone.” He held up his hands. “I honestly figured they’d changed their code by then. I was like twelve when I helped out with their dog.”

  “Don’t even tell me you’re blaming them for trusting you?”

  “No, I’m not saying that,” he shook his head. “I take total responsibility for being a moron. I wanted to be a big shot and fit in. It was stupid. After I heard about what happened I felt terrible.”

  “You should have.” Her voice had gone low and raspy and she drew in measured breaths. “Didn’t you work through the program? If I remember, step eight was about making a list of people you’ve harmed and then making amends. I never saw you approach the Fitzgeralds o
nce to say you were sorry.”

  “I’m really sorry, Mom.” Travis hadn’t thought it was possible to feel any worse than he had moments earlier, but he was wrong. “I wasn’t thinking straight.”

  “Might as well tell her the rest.” Cole glanced at him and nodded his head.

  While it wasn’t real reassuring, it meant at least Cole might be able to help explain things to his mother. “I kind of confessed to,” he swallowed the boulder-sized lump in his throat, “killing Lexie’s stepdad the other day.” He held up his hand when his mother looked about to faint. “These guys were scaring me, and you have no idea how bad it can get it here.”

  Her throat worked for a few minutes before she managed to speak. “Travis, tell me the truth. Did you do it?”

  He shook his head. “No, Mom.” His whole body seemed to twitch. “There’s a lot of time to think in here. Even though I still can’t remember much, I’m positive I would remember something like that.” He examined his fingers with more intensity than he’d give an award-winning science project.

  The breath whooshed out of Jillian as she looked at Cole. She quickly returned her attention to Travis. “Tell me again why you confessed to something you didn’t do. Were these boys trying to hurt you?”

  Before Travis had a chance to speak, Cole interrupted. “This is a survival of the fittest kind of place, as you might imagine. I believe Travis was doing what he had to do. The guy who came forward is an habitual criminal who’d do anything for a break in his sentencing. Ratting on the most ‘notorious’ kid in here is one way to do that. It’s not great, but I’m pretty sure I can shoot down his testimony pretty quickly so I’m not too worried.”

  “I’m sorry, Mom. It was stupid. I know that now, but these guys…” How could he explain things without causing his mother to worry even more? “I just wanted them to leave me alone.”

  “Admitting to murder helped them leave you alone?”

  “Well, yeah, Mom. It kind of did.” He could only hope.

  ***

  Still shaking, Jillian got into the car and buried her head in her hands. She felt like the worst mother in the world. How could she be so blind? What else didn’t she know about her son? Confessing to a murder he didn’t do? God, could this thing get any worse?

  She’d done everything to be supportive as part of Travis’ recovery. She’d been involved in family sessions—without Archie of course—and they’d made great progress. Or at least she’d thought so. Maybe she’d been too supportive, as Dr. Stern had said.

  When she thought about how she’d dissolved in front of Cole, her face flushed. Everything she’d said in front of him made her want to crawl into the closest hole and hide.

  She hunched over the steering wheel and fought against the all too familiar symptoms crawling through her chest. Retreating into a shell wouldn’t help her or Travis. She’d done that once with nearly disastrous results.

  Her phone rang as she was trying to untangle the nerves of her body in order to make her limbs work properly. Although her first instinct was to ignore it, when she spotted Dr. Stern’s name on the readout she picked it up.

  “This is Jillian.”

  “I don’t want to be a pest, but I was wondering if you’ve had a chance to talk to Travis?”

  “I’m just leaving.” She sucked in a gulp of air, valiantly trying to suppress the urge to scream, cry and withdraw all at the same time. Feelings of betrayal, worry, and fear threatening to pull her underwater.

  “You sound upset. I have some time if you’d like to come in.”

  She brushed off the invitation with a noncommittal grunt. Right now talk was the last thing she wanted. “He confessed about the Fitgeralds.” Something that happened several years ago seemed to be insignificant in the larger scheme of things. Maybe, as Dr. Stern indicated, it was symptomatic of a larger problem, but right now she couldn’t deal with anything more than what was already on her plate.

  One day at a time.

  “I’m so sorry to hear that,” he paused. “But there’s more, isn’t there?”

  Tears welled behind her eyes. Where to begin? Where to stop? If she started, where would it end? Every time she closed her eyes, her parents’ faces floated before her. Guilt inched down her spine until she thought she might dissolve into a puddle onto the floor.

  “Give yourself time. I recognize this is very difficult for you. I think you should come in so we can talk about how you’re feeling right now.” His voice had a soothing quality to it that drew her in even over the phone. “If you don’t think you can do that, go home and lie down. Take some of those sedatives I gave you.”

  Slow deep breath: in from the abdomen, out the through the mouth. Relax the muscles one by one. Imagine a stream of water trickling down a hill. All those skills she’d been taught flitted like elusive butterflies. She needed to focus, but how could she when it took all her energy to keep the tears inside.

  ***

  “I just got back from juvie. Travis seems like a good kid. Felicia’s going to do an assessment to either confirm Dr. Stern’s diagnosis or hopefully tell us the good shrink was way off base.” Cole spoke as Sam settled himself in the seat across from him. “Although a problem did come up.”

  “What was that?” While Cole’s expression was unreadable, Sam suspected by the intensity of his stare, it was serious.

  “He confessed to a jailhouse snitch. From what I can tell they were gunning for him. You and I have been there, done that, so we know how it works.”

  “Shit.” Sam shook his head. Travis didn’t have the street smarts or the killer instinct to last long locked up in juvie. “How did Jillian take it?”

  “Not good, although she was a little preoccupied because the shrink told her Travis had staged a house party at the neighbors’ place when they were out of town. It happened a year or so ago, but she was definitely more pissed about that.”

  “The fun doesn’t stop.”

  “On that note, everything you heard about this Carlos Sutton kid and more is true. Word on the street is he is one bad dude.”

  “Crap. I had a feeling you were going to say that.” He’d figured Aaron was right on with his vibe. “So how does he figure in with what happened to Travis?”

  “Don’t know yet. I’ve still got feelers out, but most of the kids don’t want to say much,” he shrugged. “We’ll have to wait and see what we can barter for.”

  “Or we can find this little weasel ourselves.”

  “Aren’t we getting a little old for that crap?”

  “Maybe you are, but I’m not.”

  Cole stood, put on his coat and grabbed his phone. “I kind of figured you were going to go all Superman on me. I hope you ate your Wheaties this morning ‘cause things might get rough.”

  Sam patted his friend’s shoulder. “Nothing we can’t handle.”

  “Twenty years ago maybe.” Despite his words, Cole locked the door and walked with Sam to the truck and got in. “Did I tell you I found out about the other murder?”

  “What other murder are we talking about?”

  “The gun they found in Travis’ bedroom.” Cole buckled in. “It was some rich guy. They’re saying home invasion, but didn’t have any suspects until they unearthed Travis. Since his alibi panned out, they’re back to square one.”

  “How about that Jeremy kid?”

  “I checked. He was at one of those boot camps things during the same weekend,” he chuckled. “You see how well those things work.”

  “Which one? Maybe there’s some kind of connection.”

  “Didn’t ask. I can find out though.” He pointed toward a kid. “Speak of the devil. Is that him hanging on that corner?”

  Sam didn’t even bother to park, just turned the wheel toward the curb and jumped out. Cole followed right behind.

  “Jeremy.” Adrenaline pumped as he trotted toward the teen.

  Clearly the kid knew something or was scared of anything and anybody as he turned and started running. Sin
ce the kid didn’t know Sam, he must think he was a cop. Either way, that didn’t bode well for his innocence.

  “The kid’s fast.” Cole and Sam kept pace together, but were not making much progress overtaking him. “Why couldn’t we get the ones who weren’t track stars?” Sam’s labored breath came out in thin puffs of air.

  “You’re getting soft old man.” Cole kicked it into high gear and Sam followed. They were within ten feet of Jeremy when a car screeched to a halt bumping onto the curb and separating them from Jeremy.

  Two men exited the vehicle, hands on guns holstered at their sides.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Family secrets. The phrase traversed her brain until she couldn’t think anymore. How long had they burned and festered inside like an open wound?

  Archie knew—hell, he’d assisted in the blood money—but most times he’d had the good grace not to say the words. But it didn’t matter. She saw the accusatory look in his eyes and sensed the epitaph curling around his tongue with each barb.

  The guilt had only intensified after Travis got into trouble. What Archie had implied had been enough to seal their fate as a couple: ‘What did you expect? It’s in the genes, babe.’ The sarcastic edge to his voice had been a dagger to her heart. The possibility that the statement had validity made it nearly impossible to function. Now inadequacies, self-doubt, and guilt crawled around inside her like a thousand tiny spiders.

  Dr. Stern had never said a word during their numerous sessions. Obviously he’d guessed, at the circumstances surrounding the accident, but she doubted he knew about her addiction to the pills.

  Were shrinks mind readers? Was that why people avoided their guidance?

  She’d read all the books and knew about the legacy and breaking the cycle and patterns of behavior. Somehow the little box they wanted to stuff her in didn’t fit. Co-dependency, was that her problem? Did she see innocence where there should be guilt? The pain held within her wanted to scream in protest, but they were good people. And Travis was a good young man.