Taking the Heat

by Brenda Novak

  She tilted his chin up so she could clean the cut on his lip and was moderately surprised to find she felt none of the repugnance she’d expected to feel at touching him. He might be a convict, but he was a man of flesh and bone, and the more honest part of her had to admit that his flesh felt better than most. The rough jaw she cupped in one hand and the soft lip she pressed down with her thumb to reach the cut in the very corner sparked a response someplace deep inside her—someplace that didn’t seem nearly as concerned with character as it should have been.

  She hurried to finish before he could read her grudging admiration of his physical attributes as easily as he’d read her earlier fear and reluctance. “How are your ribs?”

  He didn’t answer, but he winced as she ran her fingers over his injured side. She was searching for something obvious, something that could possibly puncture a lung, but if his ribs were broken, she couldn’t tell. So long as Tucker was still breathing, she doubted she could get Hansen do anything about it, anyway.

  “Maybe they’re only cracked,” she said at last, refusing to acknowledge how smooth and warm his skin was. His wife had probably enjoyed the same sensation…once.

  A heartening amount of distaste finally came with that thought. Gabrielle put some space between them and started packing up. “At least your cuts are cleaned and bandaged. Hopefully time will take care of the rest.”

  He said nothing. Now that she was finished, he looked even more exhausted and wrung out from the pain, which made Gabrielle do something she hadn’t intended to do at all.

  “Let me see your hand before I go,” she said.

  Tucker hesitated, as though his first inclination was to deny her, but then Roddy piped up. “Come on, you ain’t gonna to be able to do anything for his hand.”

  “You’re done playing nursemaid to this lowlife,” Brinkman added.

  Their intervention was enough to convince him. Defiance etched in every line of his face, he held out his injured hand.

  Shifting to block Roddy’s and Brinkman’s view one more time, she rummaged through the first aid kit, came up with two Tylenol tablets and dropped them into his palm.

  So much for rules. They’d all broken their share today.

  “Now get some rest,” she said softly and left.

  “TELL ME Allie had a good day,” Gabrielle said, stepping inside her single-wide trailer and letting the door slam behind her.

  “She did great,” Felicia said. The eighteen-year-old girl she’d hired to watch Allie was sitting on the couch painting her toenails blue, while Gabrielle’s thirteen-month-old daughter toddled around the living room, using the furniture to help her walk. When she saw her mother, Allie gave a huge smile that revealed two new teeth.

  “Hi, baby girl,” Gabrielle said, sweeping the child into her arms. “Boy, has Mommy missed you.”

  “Are you okay?” Felicia asked, putting the fingernail polish away.

  “Yeah, fine,” Gabrielle told her.

  “You seem a little…I don’t know, flustered.”

  “I feel bad for being late, that’s all. I was rushing, in case you have somewhere else you need to be.”

  “No, I’m good. You’re not that late, anyway. It’s only a little after four. And you know Allie’s okay here with me.” She grinned at Allie, who grinned back, and Gabrielle noticed that Felicia had painted her child’s fingernails the same color as her own.

  “She sure loves you,” Gabrielle said. “I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you take such good care of her.”

  The girl shrugged. “We’re buds.”

  Gabrielle dodged Allie’s chubby fingers, which were reaching for the earrings she’d put in as soon as she left the prison—sometimes she needed just a little something to remind her that she was still a woman and still living in the world she’d always known. “I wish I could afford to pay you more—”

  “You pay me enough. A few more weeks with Allie and I’d probably be willing to do it for free. She’s such a good baby, aren’t you, Allie?”

  Allie gurgled in response, and Felicia stood. “Sorry I don’t have dinner waiting. We’ve been playing. Want me to help you cook?”

  Gabrielle stowed her purse on an end table. “Don’t worry about it. Dinner isn’t your job. Just keep me company for a minute. Tell me about your day.” Carrying Allie on her hip, she headed into the kitchen.

  Felicia followed her and started washing out an empty bottle she’d left on the counter as Gabrielle checked the cupboards. “We went for a walk this morning, before it got too hot. Allie played in her little swimming pool for a while after that. She loves it when I dribble water on her. You should hear her giggle.” She shook her head. “Crazy kid.”

  Gabrielle considered chicken noodle soup, thinking a salad sounded much better. But she was low on fresh vegetables, so soup would have to do. “Swimming is always a favorite,” she said. “Allie should’ve been born a fish. Did she nap?”

  “She slept for an hour in the morning and an hour and a half this afternoon.”

  “Good girl!” Gabrielle kissed her baby’s soft forehead as she delved into the freezer for something to add to their meal.

  “I was going to take her for another walk, but it was too hot,” Felicia said.

  Gabrielle noted the chugging of her air conditioner, knowing it had probably been on all day, and shuddered at the thought of opening her next utility bill. “August in the Arizona desert. We don’t get much of a break from the heat.”

  “Yeah. My folks are sick of it. They’re talking about moving to Idaho,” she said, setting the bottle in the drainer.

  Gabrielle felt a stab of worry and paused in her digging. “The winters here more than make up for the summer heat. We have months and months of beautiful, perfect weather.”

  “I know. After living here most of their lives, they’re not thrilled about encountering snow. But they’re convinced they want to live where it’s green for a change.”

  Though Gabrielle had spent the first seven years of her life in the Phoenix area, she’d moved with her adoptive family to the Oregon coast and knew all about green. She’d met Allie’s father while waiting tables in Portland. But a few years after she and David were married, she’d begged him to take her to the hot dry place she remembered from her childhood, trading the rolling, misty hills, forests and picturesque valleys of Oregon for the rugged, harsher beauty of the desert. Because his parents were already living in Phoenix during the winters, he was familiar with the area and agreed easily enough. Phoenix was growing; the economy was good. He’d felt confident that he’d be able to start his own mortgage company here, and his business had flourished almost immediately. Five years ago, his only brother had moved to Arizona, as well. So for most of the year his entire family lived in the valley.

  Gabrielle had no family. Though her adoptive parents and their two daughters remained in Oregon, she didn’t miss them. They stayed in loose contact, but they’d always treated her more like a guest than a part of the family. She certainly wasn’t close to them.

  “Would you go with your parents?” she asked Felicia, tensing as she waited for the girl’s answer. Gabrielle was finally establishing her independence. She’d moved far enough from David that she couldn’t lean on him too much. She had a steady job, a healthy baby-sitting situation for Allie and was just starting to find herself, to decide who and what she wanted to be. She couldn’t lose Felicia now.

  Felicia folded her arms and leaned against the counter as Gabrielle discovered some frozen peas that Allie, at least, would enjoy.

  “No, I’d stay. All my friends are here,” she said. “I’m going to live with my cousin and save up for school. But I doubt my parents will really move, anyway. They say they’re going to Idaho every time we have a monsoon.”

  Gabrielle breathed a sigh of relief as she put the peas on the counter and pulled two pans out of the cupboard. Dust storms hit Arizona every August, usually out of nowhere, often accompanied by thunder and rain. Once, a
monsoon broke several large branches off the old olive tree she and David had in their backyard in Phoenix and swept the limbs and a bunch of dirt and leaves into the pool. But the storms were so dramatic and such a startling change from the constant heat that she actually liked them. “The last one we had was pretty bad,” she said.

  “That’s what got them talking about moving again,” Felicia responded.

  “I hope that’s all it is, talk. In any case, I’m glad you’ll be staying.” Gabrielle gestured at the neat kitchen. “Thanks for cleaning up, by the way.”

  Felicia glanced around and smiled as though proud of the job she’d done. “You bet. I opened the bottom drawer, the one with all the plastic icebox dishes and measuring cups, and let Allie toss them out while I cleaned. She played for at least thirty minutes without a whimper.” She checked her watch and shoved off from the counter. “But I guess I’d better go. I’ve got a date tonight. You want me at four-thirty again tomorrow morning?”

  “Yeah. I have to be to work by five.” In a little more than twelve hours. Gabrielle couldn’t face the thought of returning to the prison so soon.

  Telling herself she’d let tomorrow take care of itself, she trailed Felicia into the living room and watched as the girl slipped on her sandals and gathered her purse.

  “See ya tomorrow.” Felicia gave Allie a quick kiss on the cheek and hurried out.

  “Have fun tonight,” Gabrielle called as the door banged shut. Then she and Allie were alone, with the whole night ahead of them and nothing much to do.

  “Are you hungry, babe?” she asked.

  Allie made another grab for her earring, and Gabrielle caught her hand just in time.

  “I hope that’s a yes,” she said, but before she could return to their dinner prospects, the telephone rang.

  “Gabby? It’s me, David.”

  Her ex-husband. Gabrielle smiled. She and David didn’t work as marriage partners—she didn’t love him in the right way—but they made great friends. “You always seem to know when I need to hear from you. How are you?”

  “Fine. Busy. Is something wrong? Did you have a bad day?”

  Gabrielle hesitated. David had never liked the idea of her leaving Phoenix to move to Florence, an hour and a half to the southeast. He’d liked the idea of her becoming a prison officer even less. It wasn’t exactly most men’s number-one job choice for the mother of their children. But then, he didn’t understand what was driving her, didn’t understand why she needed to support herself, why this strange, rather barren place somehow felt like home to her.

  “Come on,” he coaxed. “I’m not going to say anything. You’ve already heard all my arguments against what you’re doing.”

  Gabrielle handed Allie a toy and set her in the middle of the floor, then sank onto the couch. She generally told David everything. Holding out now was only delaying the inevitable. But when she finished relating the day’s events, he didn’t react as she’d expected. He was completely quiet at the other end of the line.

  “David? You said you weren’t going to say anything but I didn’t think you meant it quite so literally.”

  “I’m thinking,” he said, “and I’m fighting my natural tendency to beg you to get the hell out of there and come back to Phoenix.”

  “You know I can’t do that. I came here for a reason.”

  “And have you done anything about that reason? Have you spoken to your mother, at least?”

  Gabrielle closed her eyes. She didn’t want to have this conversation. “No, not yet.”

  “Gabby, the investigator found her weeks ago. How long is it going to take to summon the nerve to let her know you’re there?”

  “I’m not sure. I’ll do it someday. It’s not that easy, David. She abandoned me when I was three.”

  “I know that was rough, but it isn’t as if you weren’t adopted within months by a good family.”

  Gabrielle had no concrete complaints about the Pattersons. Her adoptive parents, Phil and Bev, owned a successful sandwich shop by the wharf in Newport, Oregon, and had, for the most part, provided for her physical needs. They’d never been abusive or overtly neglectful. They’d just never really embraced her as their own. They doted on their twin girls, who were only eighteen months older than Gabrielle. And the natural affinity between Tiffany and Cher had always made Gabrielle feel like an unwanted tag-along. She felt as though the whole family tolerated her presence, but didn’t really want her. Especially when she’d reached her teens and begun to rebel. Then she could definitely sense a limit to the Pattersons’s acceptance. They’d taken her in to do a good deed and had felt it highly unfair that she’d give them any trouble at all.

  But she hadn’t been trying to give anyone trouble. She’d only been searching for a place where she would truly belong.

  “It wasn’t the same,” she said, knowing from past experience how hard it was to describe the subtle difference in the way the Pattersons had treated her compared to their own children. David had met them a few times and couldn’t see anything wrong with them. The Pattersons had come to their wedding and been polite, grateful she was “settling down.” But Gabrielle and David had paid for everything, and David hadn’t really had a chance to get to know them. Since then, Gabrielle had gone back for Tiffany’s wedding, but David had been too busy with work, so she went alone and returned the next day.

  “It’s in the past, Gabby,” he said. “You’ve got to let it all go at some point.”

  “I will when I’m ready.”

  “Then introduce yourself to your birth mother, if that’s what it’s going to take.”

  “I will eventually. I’m just hesitant, okay? I’ve never known my father. He wasn’t around when I was little, so she’s all I’ve got. And she obviously didn’t want me to disrupt her life twenty-five years ago. She probably doesn’t want me to disrupt it now.”

  “I don’t want to sound hard-hearted, but if she’s not interested in getting to know you, that’s her loss. Face it and get over it. Then you can leave Florence and that damn prison and come back to Phoenix where—”

  “David, I’m not coming back,” Gabrielle interrupted. “You know that. I want to be here, at least for now. I want to build my life on my own, see where I can go with it. Besides, I could have sisters, aunts, uncles, a whole family here in Florence. You don’t know how much that means to someone who’s never felt connected.”

  He sighed. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to get into an argument. I grew up with both my parents, so I can’t pretend to know what being adopted means to you. I only know that I don’t like having you and Allie so far away. I don’t like you working such a dangerous job. I—”

  “We’re less than two hours away. That’s not far. And it’s not as if what I do is anything unusual. Thousands of people have the same job. Someone’s got to do it. Besides, I thought you didn’t want to argue.”

  “I don’t.”

  “So ease up, okay?”

  Silence, then, “What do you plan to do? About the problem at the prison, I mean?”

  Gabrielle let her hair down from its ponytail and ran a hand through it. “I’m thinking I have to report it to the warden.”

  “That’s what I was afraid you’d say. Why don’t you file a complaint with Hansen’s boss?”

  “Working my way up the ladder could take months. Tucker needs help now. Besides, Warden Crumb has an open-door policy, and I feel he should know what’s going on. There’s more at risk than Tucker. Someday Crumb might be facing allegations of major corruption. I’d want a chance to deal with the situation before I was hit with something like that, wouldn’t you?”

  “I don’t care about the warden. I care about you, and I don’t want you to go to him even if he’ll see you. What if this Hansen guy denies what happened? Won’t the other officers back him up because they’re guilty, too? It’s you against the rest. Not even Randall Tucker can substantiate what you say. A murderer sentenced to life doesn’t exactly possess a lot of credibility
.”

  “I can’t let this kind of thing go on. It’s not right. Randall Tucker was seriously injured. He could’ve been killed.”

  “I doubt Hansen would’ve let it go that far.”

  “So that makes it okay? Tucker accused him of staging fights. The only thing missing is the bookie.”

  “I understand that. But you’re new there, Gabby. You don’t know how everything works yet. Why not lie low for a while and see what happens? Maybe it was a personal thing between Hansen and Tucker. Now that Tucker’s had his beating, it might be over. For all you know, Tucker deserved what happened to him.”

  “That’s not for us to decide.”

  “So don’t. Just wait a week or two, that’s all I’m asking. See what happens,” he said again. “If you won’t do it for me, do it for Allie.”

  “You and Allie are the only reasons I didn’t go to the warden today.”

  “Thank heaven for small favors,” he muttered. “You don’t want to alienate everyone your first week, Gabby. Did you get my child support?”

  “I did, but you sent more than we agreed.”

  “I don’t want you eating noodles every day.”

  “I’m not your responsibility.”

  “You’d send it to me if you thought I needed it.”

  That, at least, was true. “I’m working now. What makes you think I need money?”

  “I helped you move into that piece of junk you call a trailer, remember?”

  David was right about the trailer. Nearly eighteen years old, it had brown shag carpet, fake wood paneling and pieces of tattered, mismatched furniture. A small awning covered Gabrielle’s white Honda Accord, and various cacti dressed up the desert landscape that predominated in the park, but the place didn’t have much to recommend it. Except that it was cheap and clean and she could call it her own.

  “I remember. But this is only until I can afford something better.”

  “I’m sorry I haven’t been around very much since the move,” he said.