Sheltered Hearts (A Hidden Hearts Novel Book 2)

by Mary Crawford

  Rogue turns in her chair so she’s completely facing me. She grabs my other hand and looks directly at me as she pleads, “I don’t know how to explain this, but, I have to be there when you tell her. I’ll bring Marcus for emotional support so you can focus on taking care of Ivy. Now that I know she’s out there, I can’t ignore her existence. I’ve got to see tangible proof of that connection. I know you don’t understand, and right now I can’t adequately explain myself. It’s just something I’ve always felt.”

  I’ve got my own reasons for completely understanding where she’s coming from, so I merely nod and ask her, “Does Saturday work for you?”

  To the people who find the strength to get up and fight their own personal demons every day and win.

  Special recognition to those people who still get up and fight after they’ve been knocked down more times than they can count.

  We support you in your battle.

  “MOM, YOU DO REALIZE THAT I’m a sophomore in high school? You don’t have to drop me off at basketball camp every morning like I’m a kindergartner. I can take the bus like my friends. You are totally embarrassing me.”

  Gabriel’s words twist deep in my soul. There is still a part of me that sees him as I did the first day I dropped him off at preschool even though he towers over me. I know that he’s right of course. Unlike me, he really hasn’t given me a reason to be concerned. He is a much better child than I ever deserved given the upheaval he’s been through in his life and the role model I’ve been for him. As the traffic in front of me slows down for a passing train, I lick my thumb and wipe a smudge of paint off of his face.

  “Mom, that’s disgusting! Stop it,” Gabriel insists batting my hands away.

  “How late did you stay up working on the storyboard for your comic book? You’ve got paint all over yourself again.”

  “I’ve got news for you, Mom, you’ve got as much paint on you as I’ve got on me.”

  “Well, it’s kind of my job and, unlike you, I don’t really have anyone to impress today. I told you to get plenty of sleep. Your coach said he doesn’t take very many sophomores to play on the varsity team.”

  “Mom, relax. I’ll either make it or I won’t. Mindy and I have been practicing an insane amount. That girl is like a drill sergeant if she sets her mind to something. I don’t think I’ve ever thrown so many free throws in my life. I can make them in my sleep now. Hey mom, I know you said you weren’t trying to impress anybody but, have you noticed that same Beemer follows us to basketball camp every day? I think he’s checking you out.”

  “How do you know it’s the same one? To me they all look the same.”

  “Well, for one thing, he has a bumper sticker that says, “Sarcasm is my closest friend.” I noticed it a while back and I thought it was really funny. Secondly, he looks like us. That’s pretty uncommon around here, so it kind of stood out.”

  “I suppose it would, the Willamette Valley is not well known for its racial diversity, especially the small towns. How do you know he isn’t just checking out this cool car that Denny fixed up. Why do you think he was checking me out?”

  “Mom, I’m a guy, I can pretty much tell when people are checking out cars. He was not checking out the car, he was looking at you.”

  I shake my head at him as I respond with a laugh, “Just when I thought you were coping with the stress of basketball camp, now I find that you’re just delusional. Perhaps I should cut back on your workouts I think there starting to get to you. You seem to have lost your capability to think reasonably.”

  Gabriel turns to me and grins, “Go ahead, laugh, but the next time we stop at a stop sign, I want you to look over and see what he’s looking at. I bet you he’s looking at you. If I win, you have to take me to the art store to get more paint, deal?”

  “Well, let’s see what the risk is. You spend most of your time lost in your computer, drawing or playing basketball. I don’t think you have much time to observe the world around you. So, I think that the risk that your right is pretty low. Most days, I look like some reject from those “Worst Dressed at Walmart”websites. If, by some off chance, he looked at me on the first day, the likelihood that he would ever take a second glance is pretty slim. Given all of those factors, I highly doubt that he’s going to be scoping me out today,” I reason.

  Gabriel’s smirks at me before he replies, “We’ll see. I’ve got a whole list of new colors I want to get. This will be great.”

  I chuckle as I answer, “I’m going to take that as the compliment that I’m sure you meant it to be instead of a smart-aleck remark.”

  Gabriel rolls his eyes at me as he insists, “I totally meant it as a compliment, Mom. Don’t you speak teenager by now?” Gabriel sticks his headphones in and starts to read. His latest obsession is reading books on the art of drawing. We’ve been scouring secondhand stores across the state to try to find old paperbacks for him to read. It’s been quite an adventure to try find books. It’s not exactly a popular genre.

  As we drive down the freeway, I start to think about the last time someone was really attracted to me for me. To say I’ve gone through a little bit of a dry spell is the understatement of the century. I guess strictly speaking my whole life has been one big dry spell. My relationship with Gabriel’s dad was one huge mistake. The only thing good that came out of that relationship was Gabriel. Ricky had it all on paper— he seemed wonderful. He was everything I thought that I needed in a guy. He looked stable he had lots of money to flash around to support me with and he made all sorts of promises about how he was going to be the perfect guy. For a while he was. He took me out to dinner and to concerts and never forgot my birthday or our anniversary. I mean, the guy was good. He celebrated our one week together, one month together, six-months together. He was kind and thoughtful to my dog. Heck, he even brought him presents.

  On the surface it all seemed very stable, but what I didn’t realize was that it was all built on marbles. I don’t know why I didn’t see it all coming apart. If anyone should’ve seen it, it should have been me. After all, I’m my own alphabet soup of disorders. I have a history of eating disorders, alcoholism, drug addiction and I’m a survivor of incest. So, you might’ve thought that I would have been the first recognize that I had a drug dealer living right under my roof. Yet, somehow I wasn’t. I guess I wanted things to work out for Gabriel so much that I overlooked the signs. Eventually, I ended up like every other single mom with a deadbeat dad in the picture — only Gabriel’s deadbeat dad ended up going to prison and dying there in a gang fight. I have been unwilling, or unable to trust my own judgment since then. Sure, I go out and have a little discrete fun every once in a while; but it’s not as often as anyone thinks and it’s not nearly as wild as people believe. I can’t really blame people though because when you have a past like a mine it’s easy to jump to conclusions, even if they are unfair.

  I’m still lost in my inner musings when Gabriel taps me on the knee and instructs, “Mom, don’t freak out, but he’s right beside us.”

  Instinctively, I whip my head around to look at him.

  Gabriel releases a horrified gasp as he slinks down in his seat. “Mom,” he chastises. “I told you to play it cool—not act like Grandpa at an antique car show. This guy doesn’t need to know your checking him out. That’s just plain rude. Do you even remember how to play the game? You’re not supposed to know he’s checking you out and he’s not supposed to know that you’re giving him the once over —at least not at the beginning.” I don’t even have to be looking at Gabriel to know that he’s rolling his eyes in total exasperation.

  I glance over at my son and I wonder once again how it’s possible that he’s giving me dating advice. It seems like just the other day I was bringing him home from the hospital. The sad thing is he’s probably spot on. I have completely lost any finesse I even almost had with guys. I can’t even flirt in the produce aisle anymore. I used to have a little something, but the most action I see these days are from the romance
novels Madison throws in my direction.

  “Right, so how am I supposed to tell if he’s looking at me if I can’t look at him?” I ask as I stare straight ahead at the stop light.

  Gabriel sighs heavily as he patiently explains, “Mom, I didn’t say you couldn’t look at him I just didn’t want you to gawk like a tourist. A little chill factor would go a long ways. You don’t give away your game all upfront.”

  “Okay, okay I get it. No taking inventory. No ranking him or giving him stars…”

  “Mom, I think you’re losing focus here, the only goal here was to see if he was looking at you. That’s it, no big deal. Think you’re ready to handle that?”

  I raise my eyebrow at him as I respond, “Child-o-Mine, I’ve been flirting longer than you’ve been alive, I think I can handle a sideways glance and a few come hither looks.”

  “Eww. Keep your come hither looks to yourself and just leave it at sideways glances, okay? You don’t want to scare the guy off,” Gabriel answers with a shudder.

  I take a deep breath. It’s remarkably disconcerting to see who my matchmaking son thinks is appropriate for me. The last time he tried this maneuver, he was five and thought that the sixty-year-old male man would be a good husband for me despite the fact that the mailman was already married and had grandkids. I trust that Gabriel’s taste is at least marginally better by now.

  I risk a brief look over at the car next to me. Well, Gabriel wasn’t kidding about the BMW. It’s deep charcoal gray—it’s not a loud car, but it’s still quietly powerful in a solid, sedate kind of way; but imposing nonetheless. In the past, I had gone for much flashier guys in much flashier cars, but the result was predictable at best.

  For a minute, I thought that I had gotten away with peeking at the neighboring car without being spotted. However, it quickly becomes apparent that I made an epic miscalculation when the driver catches my eye and gives me a little salute.

  Either my son watches me much more carefully than I give him credit for or I wax poetically about men far more frequently than I realize, because the man in the car next to me looks like something I could’ve ordered off a fantasy wish list. His Royal Hotness is apparently old enough to know what he wants in life and how to get there. He obviously takes care of that gorgeous body. When he smiles at me, I literally feel the ground move.

  EVERY MORNING, I LAUGH AT MY own foolishness as I drive clear across town to get coffee at a little obscure coffee shop in the middle of nowhere. Don’t get me wrong, the coffee is delicious. Let’s be real. I don’t go there for the coffee. I go there because every day for the past three weeks, I have been able to see this gorgeous, intriguing woman. I know that I’m acting like some lovelorn teenager. There’s just something about the way she carries herself which holds my attention. She is truly striking. Most women are trying so hard these days to attract attention that they forget to be real. Yet from what I can tell from, Ms. Bold, (as I’ve nicknamed her) being real doesn’t seem to bother her. Most of the time, she wears her hair straight, but I’ve noticed that on Wednesday and Friday mornings, she lets it curl naturally and ties it back with a headband.

  A lot of people get really frustrated when we get caught by the long freight train on our commute. Ms. Bold just cranks up Michael Jackson and George Michael on the radio and starts to dance into her seat. I can’t tell if she really likes this music or if she’s just doing it to annoy her son. I’m pretty sure that the kid with her is her child because he is her spitting image right down to her dimples. Yet, it seems incongruous that she has a child that age.

  This is interesting. It looks like my days of silently observing her are over. I wondered how long it would take her to notice that I’ve been studying her like a lab animal for weeks. I’m starting to feel a bit like a creepy stalker out of some film noir. But, how exactly do you go about meeting someone that you only seen at the railway crossing on your way to the coffee shop? I guess technically, I could look up her plates, but that would be crossing a few too many ethical boundaries for me.

  I check my watch and when I look back up, she’s still watching me. This is both fascinating and frustrating, because from this distance, I can’t really read the full expression on her face. Just from watching her expressive body language, I suspect her eyes could tell more stories than I can fathom.

  I hear an odd sound behind me and my eyes travel up to my rearview mirror. I force myself to relax once my brain comprehends what I’m seeing as I take a deep breath and exhale. I know bracing myself will only make it worse. I am cussing myself for my decision to trade in my Mustang convertible. At least if I would’ve had my convertible, I would’ve been able to warn the other car. I feel absolutely helpless because I know what’s going to happen and I can’t stop it. Vaguely, I wonder if I left my bags in the back or in my locker. I know better than to do a mental countdown, but my brain does it anyway. All my brain can process is the loud crunching and grinding of metal.

  Astonishingly, it appears that my car is completely clear of the wreck and any blowback. I hit the trunk release and run around by car to grab my go bag. Much to my relief, it’s in the trunk where it belongs. I stop by the passengers side of the cherry red convertible first. The teenage boy is trying to undo his seatbelt but his hands are shaking from adrenaline. I reach over and unfasten it for him. He looks up at me with eyes widened with fear as he pleads, “Please check on my mom she looks really hurt.”

  “Okay, I’ll get there. I gotta give you the once over first. You doing okay? Can you see me and hear me? You got any bleeding or bones sticking out anywhere?” I ask. “What’s your name? My name is Jaxson. But most folks just call me Jax.”

  “Dude, no disrespect man but my mom is hurt. I’m fine. We can do all this social stuff later.”

  “Okay, I’m just checking in with you that’s all. Your mom is next. I promise, I’ll take good care of her.”

  I ran around to the other side of the car and unbuckle Ms. Bold’s seatbelt. I shout over to the other side of the car, “Son, what’s your mom’s name?”

  “Donda. Donda Whitaker,” the kid answers grimly.

  I gently shake her shoulder as I prompt, “Donda, are you with us?” As she lifts her head, I notice a pretty serious gash on her forehead. Inexplicably, the other thing that I notice is that her eyelashes are impossibly long. I know it has nothing to do with my medical assessment of her, but it’s impossible to ignore her beautiful face even though there is blood dripping down her forehead.

  Donda blinks slowly as she asks me, “Hey, aren’t you supposed to be in the other car? Did the earth really move when I looked at you?”

  I can’t hide my smile behind the illusion of a professional demeanor when she says that, because that’s exactly the way I felt when I first saw her and there wasn’t even a motor vehicle accident involved.

  “Well, I can’t address that situation one way or the other but, I can tell you that the earth moved in part because it had some help from a rather large vehicle. I’m just here to help you until the ambulance arrives. I already called for them from my car.

  Donda tries to tilt her head up and look around for the other vehicle. “Relax, you have a huge gash on your forehead and, no-one has cleared your x-rays for neck injuries. You can’t be moving around like that, you could do yourself some serious injury. You need to stay still for as long as possible. The only reason we’re allowed to move you is if your car is in danger of catching on fire.”

  Both mother and son look at me with great alarm as they ask, “Is it going to?”

  “I don’t believe so, but you’re going to need to go to the hospital. You need some stitches in that knee. Your laceration is pretty deep. They’ll probably want to do some tests to see how hard the blow was your head. You’ll probably need an MRI or CAT scan to rule out internal bleeding.”

  “Gabriel’s basketball tryouts are today. He’s supposed to find out whether he makes varsity. This sets him up for college. If he gets on the varsity team as a sophomore
, a lot more colleges will look at him seriously for sports scholarships. I mean, I have to give him the best chance I possibly can, I need to get him to that practice. He can’t be like me. I’m still trying to finish my degree one piddly course at the time. I don’t want him to be like me… he just can’t be like me.”

  The boy looks at me with pleading eyes as he responds to his mom, “Mom, I got you covered, okay? If it doesn’t happen this year, I’ve got two more. If basketball doesn’t happen, I’ve got grades. If my grades aren’t enough, I’ve got art stuff. We’re good. I’ll just call Uncle Tyler. He can pick me up from here. You know him, he’ll probably take me all the way to practice with lights and sirens on. So, go to the hospital and I’ll go to practice. I’ll meet you back at the hospital when I’m through.”

  The paramedics arrive and put Donda on a backboard and ask me, “Shepherd, anything we need to be aware of?”

  “Negative. But, I didn’t get a chance to get a full set of vitals, I just did a cursory search for acute injuries. Patient was mostly alert and conscious although a little confused at the start.”

  “Shepherd? Your name is Shepherd? I thought you said your name was Jaxson?” Gabriel challenges. “What the hell are they talking about? What were you supposed to be examining my mom for?”

  “My name is Shepard,” I respond. “My name is Dr. Jaxson Shepard.”

  “That sucks. I was beginning to like you too,” responds Gabriel in a dejected voice. “Unfortunately, that means you’re toast. Because my mom hates anyone in the medical field even worse than she hates the guy that used to be my dad. Well, it’s been nice knowing you Jax, thanks for trying to help us. I’ve got to call my uncle and get to basketball practice now.”