Something Better

by Gail R Delaney

  *****

  "So, your ex says he has grounds to contest custody of your son. The question is... does he?"

  Andi took yet another breath to push down the nervous twittering caterpillars in her stomach, licking her lips before she answered. "He says he can because he doesn't like the type of people I have around Jake. The type of people that influence him."

  She tightened her hold on David's hand.

  "Who specifically?" Attorney Theresa Rodriquez asked, arching one perfectly shaped eyebrow.

  "My best friend, Maggie Connelly," Andi said, clearing her throat. "She's also my agent. And David."

  Theresa's eyes shifted from Andi to David and back to Andi. "I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions. You're probably not going to like them, but it's better I ask and know the answer than not in hopes of protecting your feelings."

  Andi nodded. She dared a glance at David, and found him watching her. When their gazes connected, he smiled just a little and his hand squeezed hers.

  "I'm going to want to talk to Ms. Connelly. You two live together, correct?"

  "We own a home together."

  Theresa arched an eyebrow. "Is this a sexual relationship?"

  Andi almost protested, but realized these were the types of questions Theresa said she had to ask. And they would probably get much worse from Lawrence, especially if he represented himself. If it went that far. "No. Never. Maggie and I are best friends, and she supported me when I left Lawrence. It started with Jake and I staying with her, and eventually we decided nothing needed to change. Except for buying a bigger house. But, no... Maggie and I are not..." She shook her head, leaving the last of the statement unsaid.

  "You consider her a positive influence on your son." It was a statement, not a question.

  "Without a doubt. She loves him as if he were her own."

  "Does she make any lifestyle choices that your husband or the court might find unsavory?" When Andi didn't answer right away, Theresa qualified. "Does she drink to excess? Does she use drugs? Is she promiscuous? Does she have a criminal record?"

  Andi shook her head. "No."

  "What about her past? Anything in her past that might be brought up?"

  Andi sighed, lowering her eyes as she thought. The truth of it was that she knew very little about Maggie before they became friends. Maggie tended to hold her past close to her chest, and if it came off, she blew it off saying 'The past is the past'. Andi said as much to Theresa, adding, "She's a widow. She was married in her twenties, and her husband died after just a couple of years. I don't know how. It's one of the things she doesn't like to talk about."

  Theresa nodded and hummed, making a note on her legal pad. "The two of you... you're involved?" she asked, only glancing at them over the rim of her glasses.

  "Yes," David answered this time.

  Her response was just a small sound in the back of her throat. "Serious, I take it."

  Andi opened her lips but no sound came out. David answered instead. "Absolutely." He lifted Andi's hand enough to kiss her knuckles, but kept his attention on the attorney who had come all the way into Los Angeles at the request of Joe Canning just to talk with them. Joe said Theresa was the best Family Law attorney in the county, and during the drive there, David told her he'd never had any reason to doubt Joe's word or advice.

  When Theresa raised her head, she looked directly at David. "You're going to be more of a challenge, Mr. Bishop. If this goes to trial and character is brought into question, we're going to have to be completely honest with the court. The judge is going to have a perception of you -- whether it be true or not -- based on what he or she has read or seen about you, and how much weight they give entertainment news reporting. If we put everything out there from the get-go, with complete honestly, they're more likely to accept what we say. Whereas if we wait for them to dig out the skeletons, they're going to wonder what else we're hiding."

  David nodded. Andi watched his profile and caught the almost indiscernible tensing of his jaw. His thumb stroked a constant rhythm across her knuckles. "What do you want to know?"

  "You tell me," Theresa said with a shrug. "I could rattle off all the things I can remember, and we can put them in the true or false column, but that'll take awhile. What are your skeletons?"

  David shifted, tugging his jeans down his thighs before he lifted one leg and rested his ankle on the opposite knee. He rubbed the fingers of his free hand across his lips, clearing his throat. Andi held her breath. She hadn't really thought about the man he had once been, because that wasn't the man she knew. The man she knew was considerate and affectionate and kind, and he loved her.

  "I'm a recovered alcoholic," he finally said, his eyes flicking in her direction for only a brief second. He cleared his throat again. "Over seven years."

  Theresa hummed and wrote, seemingly unsurprised by his revelation. "Do you still have a sponsor?"

  "We exchange Christmas cards these days, that's about it."

  "You say recovered, not recovering... you consider it behind you?"

  "Absolutely."

  Theresa quirked a smile. "You say that a great deal, Mr. Bishop."

  "Only when I'm without a doubt."

  She nodded. "Good. We want that kind of conviction. Anything else? Drug use?"

  "Not since I was twenty-two. It wasn't a problem, more recreational. I preferred alcohol." His voice was flat and emotionless, he could have been reading off a grocery list. But each time he paused, Andi caught the clenching of his jaw.

  "Arrests?"

  David released a slow breath and almost let go of her hand, but Andi tightened her hold, refusing to let him. His eyes flicked to her, and she dipped her chin with a small smile. This was all new information to her, but she wanted him to see that it didn't matter. Yes, she'd read some things about him online, but she hadn't dug in deep. She hadn't done far enough to know any of this.

  He cleared his throat again. "One DUI when I was twenty-four. That's it."

  "Did you enter rehab after that?" Teresa said, glancing back at her notes.

  "Yeah."

  "Didn't take much to make you change your ways."

  "With a mother like mine, the straight and narrow tends to be pretty straight and narrow. I strayed too far, and she slapped me back in line."

  Theresa nodded. "So, nothing since then? Not even a parking ticket?"

  David chuckled. "I didn't say that..."

  She grinned, setting her pencil down. "I got all this information from public records before you got here, I just wanted to make sure you were being honest with me."

  They hashed out everyone's dirty little secrets for the next hour. Beyond her divorce, and her chosen profession, Andi didn't seem to have any marks against her that raised Theresa's flags. They talked about Lawrence, specifically the multiple affairs and the reason for the divorce. When Andi filed for divorce on the grounds of Adultery, Lawrence hadn't contested and hadn't denied the claim. Theresa explained that might work in their favor, and made more notes. By the time they were done, she had five or six pages of notes jotted down.

  "Let's revisit the past with you, David," she said, shifting in her chair to face him. "In cases like this, where Bonherre is using a former spouses current lover as grounds to claim custody, I've seen the petitioning spouse drag up said lover's past relationships in an attempt at finding dirt. Do you think any of your past relationships could come to bear here?"

  David swallowed, jerking his head. "No. Other than casual dating, I've only been with two women who could... comment," he added with a wry quirk of his mouth. "One was and is still one of my best friends, Rachel Leighton. She's been in Milan until recently. The other is Josie Connors. We split over a hear ago."

  Theresa arched her eyebrows. "As I recall, the events leading to that break-up have never been discussed in a public forum."

  "We want to keep it that way." His voice was firm, without question. Andi watched him, realizing with surprise that her heart pounded... wondering...
waiting. They'd never talked about Josie, although he'd talked about Rachel more than once, and always with a smile. The same kind of smile he had when he talked about his sisters.

  "I'm not the public forum," Theresa said with as much authority.

  David's mouth twitched, like he fought a frown, and he sighed. He looked to Andi when he answered, not Theresa. "I left when she slept with her co-star."

  "So, Bonherre doesn't like David... why?" Theresa asked, apparently satisfied with David's answers.

  "He gave a list of reasons. All just... prejudices," Andi said with a shake of her head and a shrug. "He believes anyone associated with Hollywood must be morally corrupt deviants. And he won't have his son exposed to that. And..." Lawrence's last complaint stuck in her throat, and she realized that of all the reasons he gave, his final blow was the one she found most offensive.

  "And..." Theresa urged.

  Andi shifted her hand within David's hold, weaving her fingers between his, and met his curious gaze. "David is Jewish," she finally said, embarrassed by the rough scrape of her voice. "Larry has a problem with it. He didn't explain why he has a problem, but he said it like it was... a disease or something."

  "So, we add anti-Semitism to the list." Theresa added a note to the third page in her pile. It amazed Andi how unaffected Theresa seemed by most of what they said. She must have seen and heard some horrible things as a family lawyer to think nothing of their ever-unfolding drama. She raised her head with a sigh. Theresa met Andi's eyes, holding her gaze for several heartbeats before asking the next question. "Did Bonherre every physically abuse you?"

  "No--"

  "Andi," David said softly, stopping her rote answer.

  Theresa looked between them. "Speak."

  Andi swallowed and slowly pulled her hand free from David's. He wanted her to tell Theresa about the confrontation the day before, but she could do better than that. Except that David hadn't seen the evidence yet. He watched her, a hard line digging into his brow, as she pushed the loose sleeve of her sweater up her arm, exposing her elbow and the dark bruise that wrapped around her arm just above it. The clear impression of four fingers and a thumb met above the bend.

  "Damn it," David cursed, cupping her elbow gently as he twisted to get a better look. He shot her a sharp look, but she knew it wasn't for her as much as for the man who wasn't there. "When did he do this?"

  "In the house. Before..."

  David pulled back and scrubbed his hands over his face, groaning into his palms. Theresa opened her desk drawer and took out a digital camera, coming around the desk. She motioned for Andi to stand, and took several pictures of the bruises from different angles, asking Andi about the events of the previous day.

  "So, this was the first time he's been physically violent?" she asked, returning to her desk.

  Andi sat, and David immediately reached for her hand again. His jaw was still set firm, that same deep line digging into his brow.

  "Violent, yes. He grabbed me once before, a few weeks ago, but it wasn't rough and he let go as soon as I said to get his hands off me."

  "Did you report what happened yesterday to the police?"

  Andi swallowed and bowed her head, realizing now how stupid she'd been to say nothing. She'd hoped -- -obviously in error -- he'd just go back to Chicago.

  "Well, that makes things tougher. I don't know how to play that quite yet."

  Andi nodded, stealing another glance at David. His knee bounced in a frustrated rhythm and he ran his fingers across his brow. Tension emanated around him like a force field. Andi swallowed, looked down at their joined hands, then looked to Theresa again.

  "Okay, so you said he claims he'll file on Monday if you don't break up this little affair of the heart," Theresa said, motioning between Andi and David with the eraser end of her pencil. Andi nodded, the lump of fear she'd managed to swallow for two hours choking her again with a vengeance. "This is going to play one of two ways. First, you call his bluff and he backs down. If he has half a brain, that's exactly what he'll do. He'll concede defeat and go back to Chicago, and you'll have to put up with him on the random holiday. Second, you call his bluff and he actually goes through with the filing."

  "What happens then?" Andi managed to whisper.

  "Then he makes a damn fool in front of himself in front of the court."

  "He told me--"

  "He's blowing smoke," Theresa said, cutting her off. "He's making a power play, trying to make you think he can do whatever the hell he wants because he's got esquire after his name. The truth of it is this is LA, and in LA we eat little minnow attorneys like him for a mid-afternoon snack." Theresa sat back, popping her feet on the edge of the desk. "Truth be known, I hope he does. I'd love to see the look on his face when the judge gives him a solid dressing down."

  "So, what you're saying is he hasn't got a snowball's chance in hell..." David leaned forward in his chair.

  "That's what I'm saying. He can huff and he can puff, but he's not going to blow your pretty little house down unless you hand him the matches and jug of gasoline."

  "And if I don't call his bluff?"

  Andi's question snapped David's attention to her, but she didn't dare look at him. Her insides waged a battle between bubbly ecstasy and unbelieving dread.

  "You do what he says, you mean?" Theresa tipped her head to the side and made a dismissive face. "Then he's got you by the back pockets until your son turns eighteen."

  A new thought hit her, but to ask it she had to pull her hand free of David's. "You said the question of character might be brought up. Ultimately this is about Jake."

  "Yeah," Theresa said with a nod.

  "Will Jake have to testify or give his opinion or anything?"

  "Are you worried about what he'll say?" Theresa sat up, picking up her pencil again.

  "I just don't want him to be involved unless he has to be."

  "The judge may ask him what he wants... who he wants to be with. Do you think he'd say he wants to be with his father?"

  "No," Andi answered with unwavering conviction. "There's no doubt in my mind."

  "We'd try to keep him out of it," she said, tapping her pencil against the pad. "But, he's of an age that the judge would value his opinion if he feels he needs convincing one way or another."

  Andi clenched her hands in her lap and pressed her lips together to fight the panic. Theresa stood, holding her hand out to each of them. As she shook Andi's hand, she held it for a moment longer. "You tell me what you want to do, and I'll take care of the rest. If you call his bluff, make sure you hand him my card when you do it."

  Andi nodded and took the proffered cards, tucking them into her purse. They left the office, walking through the silent and dark building to the bank of elevators. Theresa had agreed to meet them at her office, and since it was Saturday afternoon, the building was almost completely empty otherwise. Only the lights in the hall closest to the exterior doors of Rodriguez, Santovalle and Smith – Attorneys at Law were lit. Moving away from the elevators, the stretch of hallway dimmed into darkness.

  Once she'd let go of his hand in the office, David hadn't tried to take it again. A tense muscle jerked along his cheek and his lips formed a straight line. He only took his hands from his pockets to push the button for the elevator.

  Andi's insides shook, but she knew her decision. Once Theresa had laid everything out, there was no doubt in her mind. The doors opened and they stepped inside. Not until the doors closed again could Andi take a breath. David remained silent, and she knew her question had hurt him -- or angered him -- or both, because she knew what he wanted to hear. What he wanted her to do.

  The elevator gave a small jerk when it began its descent, and David leaned back against the handrail that ran the perimeter of the cabin. He had his head down, that jaw muscle twitching. Andi couldn't control the small tremors in her hand when she reached for him, using both her hands to pull his free from his pocket. He didn't resist, and when she stepped close to him, he curl
ed his fingers around hers to hold them against his chest. His long breath stirred her hair.

  Andi swallowed and raised her head, looking into his face. A deep line dug into his forehead between his eyes -- not quite a scowl, but evidence of the thoughts she knew had to be running through his mind. She almost couldn't breathe correctly, each breath a ragged jerk in her lungs. She was terrified to make the decision, and could only pray it was the right one.

  "I'm sorry," she said softly.

  David closed his eyes and dropped his head forward until his brow rested against hers. He released her hand and brought his palms up to stroke her hair and touch her cheeks, his eyes slit closed. Andi blinked against hot tears when he whispered a curse before wrapping his arms around her and pulling her so hard against him that her breath caught.

  "I had to make sure," she said against his shoulder, holding on. Another ragged breath shifted through him and she felt it when she pressed her hands against his back. David nodded into her neck. "But now I know."

  Andi pulled back, and at first he fought against releasing her, but finally let her shift enough that she could see his face. She touched his cheek and he turned into the contact.

  "I won't let him win."

  David's eyes snapped open, and the sheen clouding them jerked at her heart. "What?"

  She shook her head. "I won't let him win. I won't kowtow to him anymore. I refuse to let him destroy my chance at..." She smiled. "At something so much better than I ever--"

  She never finished the thought. Andi reached for him the same instant he reached for her, and the hard kiss stole her breath. David wrapped his arms almost completely around her, nearly lifting her toes off the ground with the intensity of the embrace. He twisted them, putting her back to the wall, and shifted to take her face in his hands.

  "I love you," he whispered against her mouth before kissing her again. "I love you."

  Only the gentle jerk of the elevator and the ding of the opening doors stopped them.