To Protect Her Son

by Stella MacLean

  His mom took another deep breath. “Your father has been released from prison. He’s become a Christian. He wants to help prisoners make a life on the outside. He was interviewed on the TV today. This morning, actually.”

  Wow! His dad was involved in religion, and Adam had never seen the inside of a church. Strange or what? “Is he coming here to see me?”

  His mom stood up and went to the mantel over the fireplace. She picked up a photo taken when he joined the Boy Scouts. “I didn’t tell him about you.”

  “My dad doesn’t know I exist?” His chest was so tight he could barely breathe. “So this is all about you. Not me. You’re not telling me about my dad because you want to. You’re telling me because you have to, in case someone in the media figures out that Harry’s ex-wife and his son are living in Eden Harbor.”

  She turned to him, her face covered in tears. “Adam, I’m sorry for all this. I should have done things differently. Can you understand at all?”

  He looked at his mom, someone he’d always loved and admired. Sure, there had been times when they didn’t get along, times when he’d wished he had a normal family. A sibling. A cousin. Any family at all.

  But all he had was a mother who had lied to him his entire life. Nothing seemed real anymore. “I don’t want to see you again. I’m leaving tonight.”

  Her sobs filled the room. Nate put his arm around her shoulders, and when Adam saw the look of gratitude on his mother’s face, he realized that his mom had feelings for this man who had come into their life to help him. Nate had acted as if he cared for Adam, but he was really here just to help his mom, the person responsible for not telling him the truth.

  Adults! They were all alike when it came to playing games with kids like him.

  “You can’t leave. You have nowhere to go,” she said through her tears.

  “I’ll figure it out,” he said, immediately aware that his mother was right. But it didn’t matter. His dad would want to see him. He turned his fury on Nate. “And you stay out of this. I’m going to find my father whether either of you like it or not. I don’t care what he’s done, and the courts wrongly convict people all the time. I’m going to help my dad get his life back. He’ll need me. We’ll be a team.”

  He raced upstairs to his room to discover that his mother had already packed his clothes in his duffel bag. Had she been planning to run from Eden Harbor rather than tell him about his father? Feeling utterly betrayed, he emptied the cash in his drawer into his pockets, slung his bag over his shoulder and stomped down the hall to the stairs, taking them two at a time.

  Nate and his mother were waiting for him. “Please don’t go. Please,” she begged.

  He couldn’t listen to her after what she’d done, after all her self-righteous talk about his friends and their bad influence. At least they hadn’t lied to him. “I’ll call you when I’ve found Dad. He may or may not want to talk to you after what you’ve done.”

  He slammed the door hard as he left, the action making him feel good—in charge of his life. He went around the side of the house and got his bike. Swinging his leg over the seat and his duffel bag over his shoulder, he went down the driveway toward the street leading downtown.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “WE HAVE TO stop him! Nate! Please!”

  “Shh...” he murmured, easing her into his arms, feeling the trembling in her body. He wished he could change everything in her life up until the moment he’d met her.

  She pulled away, wiped the tears from her cheeks and opened the front door. “I can’t let him go like this. I have to know where he is. What if he’s gone to meet up with those friends of his, the ones that got him in trouble?”

  “He probably is headed there now.”

  Her expression radiated shock. “Then why aren’t we going after him?”

  “Give him a little time. He can’t get far without money. He’s driving a bike, not a car.”

  “What if he steals a car? What if he’s like his father? Harry took whatever he wanted whenever he wanted it.”

  “Adam isn’t like that.”

  “How do you know?” she asked, her voice shaking.

  “Have a little faith in him and yourself. You raised him to be a caring individual. He won’t let you down...not now.”

  “What do you mean? Not now?”

  “When he has time to think about it, he’ll know that his best chance of finding his father is by talking to you. Sure, he can go to the press, but their tactics will drive him straight back here.”

  “I don’t want him to face that alone,” she cried.

  “He won’t if he gives us a chance to help him. If he doesn’t, he’ll have to learn on his own terms.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” she said, reaching out to him, to the safety of his arms.

  He hugged her close, then held her at arm’s length and looked into her eyes. “In the meantime, I’ll call the police, tell them what’s happening here. Get your purse and we’ll follow him downtown. I’m sure we’ll find his bike at one of the local hangouts.”

  “And if we don’t?” she persisted.

  “It’s a long, expensive trip to California, one he can’t do on his own. Let’s find him and save him the embarrassment of eventually having to come back.”

  Gayle touched his arm. “Nate, would Adam have been a different teenager if he’d known about his father and his criminal behavior?”

  “We’ll never know, will we? But my guess would be that he could have gone either way. Learning about his father might have been a very upsetting thing, or he might have wanted to get to know him.”

  “And now that Harry claims to be a Christian?”

  “Faith in God can change everything in a person’s life, and only with time will we know how it’s affected Harry. If it’s been a positive influence on him, he might be just what Adam needs right now.”

  “How?”

  “Adam needs his father, and if Harry has changed enough to understand what that means to a teenage boy, he could be very supportive to his son.”

  “When did you get to be so wise?” she asked, a slight smile warming her face.

  He kissed her lips and ran his fingers along her shoulders. “I’m still on a learning curve when it comes to being wise.”

  She could not imagine what she would have done without Nate beside her now. She was so relieved that the risk she’d taken by asking for his help had paid off. That she put her trust in him, something she had never done with anyone before.

  They drove along every street downtown looking for Adam’s bike. The longer they drove, the more apprehensive she became. “Where could he have gone?” She turned to Nate. “What if he headed to the highway?”

  “I’m going from what I know about Adam. He’d want to talk to the guys he hangs out with. He’d figure they’d understand. Adam is very bright. It would have occurred to him by now that he needed someone’s help to find his father, that driving a bike along a road by yourself with no plan would be dumb on his part. I’m guessing he’s somewhere down around the docks.”

  He parked in the public lot along the wharf. The air had begun to chill with the incoming tide, the currents stirring up a slight breeze.

  “Where should we start?” she asked, getting out of the car, slinging her purse over her shoulder and pulling her jacket tighter.

  “The boys Adam hangs with like to ride motorcycles and play pool,” Nate said, glancing along the pier toward the far end of town.

  “We already checked Denny’s Pool Hall. There isn’t another in town, is there?”

  “Not anymore.” Nate rubbed his jaw in thought. “It would probably be faster if we split up.”

  “I don’t want to do that. I mean, what if I came across Adam with some of his sleazy friends? I wouldn’t know what to do,
and he might leave when he sees me.”

  “Okay, let’s get moving,” he said, starting off ahead of her along the walkway, his cane clicking on the wooden boardwalk.

  She caught up with him and matched his stride. She felt uneasy out here in the quiet of late afternoon when her son could be almost anywhere. “What if we don’t find him?”

  “I know it’s easy to think the worst in a situation like this.” His gaze warmed her. “But we’ll find him. Trust me.”

  She’d never trusted a man before in her life. Not her father, her half brother or the few men she dated. And definitely not Harry. Yet as she let her gaze travel over the face of this man, from his firm jaw, to his sensuous mouth, his concern-wrinkled forehead and his eyes—especially his eyes—she was convinced that he was different. “I do trust you,” she said, feeling reassured by those words.

  Nate had promised to be there for whatever lay ahead. Somebody finally had her back. “Has anyone told you lately how much you’re appreciated?” she asked.

  “Not lately,” he mused. His smile held a hint of embarrassment, making him seem younger to her.

  Just then a police cruiser pulled up alongside them. The officer rolled down his window. “Highway patrol called in to say they didn’t see any kid on a bike on Route 1A, but they’ll keep a lookout.”

  “Thanks.” Nate kept pace with the cruiser.

  “Can I help?” the officer asked. “I’ve checked around town for his bike, the places he might have gone, but nothing.”

  Gayle felt herself start to panic and grabbed Nate’s sleeve. “Where could he have gone? I was right, Nate, we should have driven after him the minute he left the house. But you wanted to wait,” she said, blaming herself for believing in what Nate had said about her son.

  “Look, why don’t you let the officer take you back to the house. Adam might have forgotten something and gone back. You should be there to reason with him if he does. I’ll keep searching along the waterfront.”

  His eyes held hers, his face showing the first flicker of uncertainty since Adam had left the house. What if while she was down here searching, her son had gone back to the house? “I hadn’t thought of that.” She turned to the officer. “Would you give me a lift?”

  He nodded.

  As she crossed the street, her thoughts were on her son. She hated to admit defeat so easily, and more than anything she wanted to find Adam. Yet she had nothing to go on except the gut instinct that he wouldn’t leave town without seeing her before he left... She had to believe that.

  “Wait a minute,” Nate called out to her. “One day when I was with Adam, he mentioned a hangout up behind Ketchner’s Inn on Maple Street. Some of his friends went there. Didn’t there used to be an old pool hall down where Maple Street was blocked off when they built the highway?”

  “You’re right,” the officer said. “I think the building’s been sold, but the new owners haven’t taken possession as yet. It’s worth looking into.”

  Nate strode back to his car.

  “Wait! I’m coming with you,” Gayle called out to him as she ran across the street.

  They followed the police car to the site of the old pool hall and discovered several motorcycles snugged up against the wall near the door. The three of them entered the building, greeted by the sound of pool balls smacking against one another.

  Gayle cringed. She’d always avoided places like this, the kind of places where Harry had spent a lot of his time. In the dim light she could make out four people. One of them was Adam.

  “Mom, what are you doing here?” Adam said, striding toward her, his youthful face twisted in a scowl.

  “Adam, you have to come home with me, please. We need to talk.” She sensed Nate’s presence as he came to stand beside her. It felt so strange to have his support, strange yet wonderful.

  “Mom, unless you’re willing to help me talk to my dad, I’m not going anywhere with you,” he said, his gaze flicking to Nate, “or him.”

  When Harry learned that Adam had been told so little about him, he’d use it to gain Adam’s sympathy. Or what if Harry had no interest in Adam other than to use him for good PR? She couldn’t let Harry hurt her son that way. She had to stall for time while she figured out what to do next.

  “Talking to your dad will not help you, especially now that’s he’s a major news item. What if the news media want to interview you? Are you prepared to have the press parked outside the door?”

  Adam wrapped both hands around the pool cue as he studied the floor. “I want to see my father. I want to... I need to...” He lifted his head, his eyes meeting hers. “Mom, please understand. You can’t stop me from seeing my dad. If you don’t let me talk to him I’ll go to the press. I’m not afraid of them, and if talking to the press would help my dad, I’ll do it.”

  “Adam, I understand your feelings,” Nate said, moving closer to Gayle, his body nearly touching hers. “Can we go home and talk about this a little more? This is hardly the place to call your father from.”

  Somehow she had to convince Adam not to speak with the press. If Harry thought he could get sympathy over what she’d done, he wouldn’t hesitate to expose her lies. Harry had always used people, anytime, anyplace.

  She couldn’t allow him to victimize her or Adam ever again. “Come home with us and we can call your father after I tell you about him.”

  “Is that a promise?” Adam asked.

  She sighed in resignation. “Yes, it’s a promise.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “HEY, MAN, WHAT’S up with you?” Sam Mason demanded when Adam announced he was going with his mom and Nate.

  “I’m going to get to talk to my dad finally.” Adam wasn’t sure if going home with his mom was a good idea or not, but he had to meet his dad somehow. When he’d first arrived at the hangout, Sam had loaned him his cell phone and he’d called the local TV station. They’d wanted to know why Adam needed to be in contact with Harry Young, but he’d simply said he had a friend who knew Harry from years ago. The person at the local station seemed to accept that explanation and gave Adam a California number to get in touch with his dad.

  He’d wanted to call right away, but realized that if things didn’t go well with his dad, he’d look like a loser in front of his friends. He didn’t need that when being part of this group meant so much to him.

  “Your dad? Cool.” Sam slapped him on the back.

  “Will you guys still be here later?” he asked, wanting a chance to tell them about his father and how famous he was now that he was out of prison. He’d wanted to be a real member of this group, and he would be after they learned about his dad. But first he had to go home with his mom. So embarrassing. But what choice did he have?

  Sam gave him a derisive glance. “We’ll be around.”

  Adam pulled his bike out from behind a scraggly hemlock tree and let Nate put it in his SUV. As they drove home, his mom seemed so quiet and dejected he wanted to hug her and tell her he didn’t mean to be a problem to her. He only wanted to have a life, to know who he was and where he came from. He couldn’t say those words right now. He didn’t know why, except maybe he was afraid of crying. He hadn’t cried for a long time, not since he was a little kid. Somehow not crying made him more of a man, at least in his own eyes. None of his friends ever cried.

  He fisted his hands in an attempt to maintain control as Nate turned onto their street. He could feel the tears stinging his eyes as he thought about his dad, about how he was only minutes away from speaking to him.

  As they entered the house Adam was only vaguely aware of Nate and his mother talking about how to find his dad. He was focusing on what he’d say to him, how he’d start the conversation. “I already have a number for my dad.”

  “You do?” Nate asked. “Where did you get it?”

  He didn’t a
nswer Nate. He didn’t need to. This was between his father and him.

  “Adam, honey, are you sure you want to do this?”

  “Why wouldn’t I? Dad and I need to talk, and maybe get together sometime,” he said, taking the grubby piece of paper with his father’s number on it out of his pocket. Ignoring the anxious look on his mother’s face, he dialed the number.

  “My name is Adam Sawyer, and I need to speak to Harry Young.” He clutched the phone tight in his hands as he went into the den away from his mother and Nate’s prying eyes.

  “What about?” the voice asked.

  “I’m...I’m his son,” he said, feeling a weight lift off his shoulders at the sound of those words.

  There was only silence. He waited, wondering what might have gone wrong. “Is Harry Young there? I need to speak to him,” he repeated.

  “Just a minute,” the person said. In the background Adam could hear people talking excitedly. Was his father among them?

  “Hello, who am I speaking to?” a man said in a loud voice.

  “Are you Harry Young?”

  “Yes,” the man said with more gentleness in his tone.

  “My name is Adam Sawyer. My mom is Gayle Sawyer. You’re my dad,” Adam said, sucking air through his constricted throat.

  “How old are you?”

  “I’m almost fourteen,” he said, his uncertainty growing. Was this his dad? “Are you Harry Young?”

  “I am, son, but I need to be sure who you are.”

  “Weren’t you married to my mom, Gayle Sawyer?”

  “I was, but I only found out a couple of days ago that I had a son...” Harry’s voice trailed off. “I understand you’re in someplace called Eden Harbor with your mother?”

  “How did you know that?”

  “Never mind how I know. You’re living in a house your mom’s aunt Susan left to her in her will.”