by JJ Knight
“I’ll help,” Ted says.
The officer peers over at Ted. “And who are you?”
“My hired security,” Danika says.
“All right,” the officer says. He pulls Denham up by the handcuffs. “Into the car.”
Denham stands. The officer and Ted lead him over to the vehicle. When he’s safely inside and the door closed, my hands start to tremble. It’s too much. All of it. I wish I had never met him, never talked to him, never let him near me.
I wish he had told me he was my brother, and we’d just been friendly and graduated from the same school. Or even that he hated us all along and ran off with his parts-stealing friends.
The sidewalk bites into my knees. I want to get up and go back in the academy, but I don’t have the strength. The class yesterday. The stress today. I can’t handle it.
A breeze picks up the loose tendrils around my face, but I can’t even lift my arm to push them away. I just want to lie down and do nothing, think nothing, be nothing.
I know when Blitz comes out because I feel his arms around me. “Come on, Princess,” he says. “They’ve got the bad guy.”
I want to say that he isn’t the bad guy. That I am. That I led him to all of this. I pursued him when we were young. And I led him to this arrest. It’s me. All me. I’m the worst thing to happen to him.
When I don’t move, Blitz scoops me up and carries me back to the academy. We pass everybody, the wheelchair girls, Janel, Suze.
I keep thinking each day that this is the worst day, but it just keeps happening. Bad day after bad day. This nightmare won’t end.
Blitz carries me down the hall to the storage room. It’s our happy place, dimly lit from the light coming in the high windows, rays landing on costumes and sparkly hats. He sets me on a stack of mats.
“Talk to me, Princess,” he says.
“He knows I know where Gabriella is,” I say, gulping air.
“That’s okay,” Blitz says, smoothing loose hair back from my forehead. “That’s different from knowing where she is.”
“But I can’t even see her anymore. Gwen removed her from the academy.” More fat tears roll down my face.
Blitz lets out a gush of air. “That’s tough. Do you know where they live?”
“Yes, but I can’t exactly show up there.” I throw up my hands. “Hello, Gwen, we stalked you all the way to your house to force your daughter to do a dance lesson!” My voice is shrill. I feel on the verge of hysteria.
“We can handle it delicately. We can say that we agree that the academy isn’t safe and we have a new location.” His voice is calm, but this only upsets me more.
“Do you know how crazy that sounds?” I cry. “I just have to accept that I’ve screwed up. As soon as I went on your show, I put everything at risk.”
Blitz holds my head, his palms on both my cheeks. He bends down until he’s looking right in my eyes. “No, Livia. When you went on my show, you saved everything. You saved us. You saved me. And we’re going to make this work.”
“He’ll tell everybody,” I say. “Gwen will find out. God. It’s over.”
Blitz drags me against him and holds me tight. “Not if he’s on our side,” he says.
I hold my breath for a moment. I couldn’t have heard him right. “What do you mean?”
“Let’s go bail him out of jail. Get him a lawyer. Clean him up. Let’s help him, and work out a deal we can all live with. You. Him. Gwen. She had to know this day might come. They didn’t have a signature for a father. Did you ever look to see who your dad wrote down on the birth certificate?”
“I did.” I force out a laugh. “Engelbert Humperdinck.”
“The singer?”
“Yeah. Dad was always fascinated with his name.”
“Well, that should have been a red flag for the adoption agency,” Blitz says. “For Gwen. They ignored it. They’ll know they did.”
“They let it go, I guess. I don’t know what Dad told them. We’d have to ask him.”
“This is great, actually. The sort of thing a lawyer can build a case on.” Blitz lifts me up and sets me back on the ground. “Let’s call Jeff and have him refer somebody local to help us out. Then we can go bail out your baby daddy.”
I follow him back to Studio 3 to change out of my ballet slippers. I don’t know if helping Denham is the right thing. But it’s a plan. It’s something.
Chapter 23
By mid-afternoon, Blitz has secured a lawyer to meet us at the city jail to bail out Denham. His bond was set by the judge right after lunch, so it’s just a matter of heading there to pay it and get him out.
We take the gray car to the courthouse. The lawyer said we won’t be allowed back to see Denham, but he assured us that he’ll meet with him and make the necessary arrangements.
“Are we liable for what happens to him if he does something once he’s out?” I ask Blitz as we wait on a stiff row of chairs in a waiting area.
“I don’t know. I’ve never bailed anyone out before,” Blitz says. He holds my hand in both of his.
I smooth my simple black skirt and soft sweater. I’ve tied my hair back, trying to look as plain as possible. Blitz wears his sunglasses so he won’t be spotted at a courthouse, casual in jeans and a sweater.
The room is large and filled with anxious people. I’m pretty sure I’m the only person in the room without a tattoo. One very tattooed grandmother watching a passel of small children talks with exasperation into a cell phone until an officer asks her to put it away or step outside. She tosses him an angry look, but shoves it in her bag.
A girl keeps staring at Blitz. I keep an eye on her, worried she has recognized him, but she is careful not to meet my gaze.
A man in a sharp navy suit comes out of a door and looks around. He spots me and Blitz and approaches. “Benjamin,” he says, holding out his hand. “I’m Jeremy Trudeau. Let’s go back to a private room to discuss the situation.”
We stand up right as the officer barks “No cell phones” again. The room jumps. Must be the grandmother. I sympathize with her, probably having to wait on one of the parents of all those children.
We follow Jeremy through the door, held open by a uniformed officer. We go down a quiet hall and turn into a small stark room with only a table and a few plastic chairs.
Jeremy sits on one side, and Blitz and I settle in across from him.
“I had a conversation with Denham Young, and he says he doesn’t want your help unless you’re going to tell him the location of his daughter,” Jeremy says. “We put together a provisional agreement.” He pulls a sheet of paper out of a briefcase. It’s covered with handwritten notes in tiny print. Denham’s signature is at the bottom.
“That’s all he wants? Her location?” Blitz asks.
“Yes. I came up with some demands for your side of the agreement given your concerns for the adoptive mother.”
I sit forward on the chair. “What are they?”
“To approach the adoptive mother prior to requesting visitation with the child. To handle it privately, rather than involving social services. And to allow the birth mother equal access to the child.”
Blitz nods. “What did he say?”
“He was okay with all that.”
“Is he okay?” I ask. “How did he seem?”
Jeremy sits back in his chair. “Edgy. Anxious.”
“Not angry?” I ask.
Jeremy shakes his head. “I didn’t get that from him. He did ask about his truck. Seems everything he owns is in it.”
“Did you tell him we’d take care of it?” Blitz asks.
“I did,” Jeremy says. “He’ll get his keys back from Admitting when he’s freed.”
“Will he just walk out?” I ask.
“Yes and no,” Jeremy says. “We have to speak to his probation officer. And we’ll need to have a place for him to stay. He’ll also have to jump through some hoops about looking for employment here in town. Normal aspects of his probation, but par
ticularly critical now that he’s been in trouble again.”
“It was my fault,” I say. “I led him right into the protection zone.”
“We explained that to the judge,” Jeremy says. “I was here when the bond was set.”
“So what’s next?” Blitz asks.
“Either my office or yours can get him a residence,” Jeremy says. “Someplace semipermanent so he can receive correspondence. We’ll pay the bail, and he’ll sign an agreement with me that I represent him.”
“Sounds good. Do we sign this thing?” Blitz asks, pointing to the paper.
“We’ll keep it informal as long as possible,” Jeremy says. “You sure you want to take this on? You can walk away. With the probation and his priors, he’ll get another six months, easy.”
Blitz glances at me. “No, we have the bigger issue to settle. The child.”
Jeremy nods. “I’m not a family lawyer,” he says, putting the paper back in his briefcase. “But I’ll get him in a position where you can move on that.” He snaps the case closed. “But I’ll tell you, if he does anything else, I’d drop him like a hot potato. You don’t need that publicity on your head.”
Blitz nods. “Understood. You going to go get him now?”
“You want to transport him?”
“No,” I say. “Just let us know where he’ll be staying. We’ll meet up with him there.”
“I’ll have my people arrange it the moment we walk out of here,” Blitz says. “They’ll send you the address to get the probation officer to approve.”
Jeremy stands and extends his hand. “That sounds good. I’d say you’re crazy, but I guess you know what you’re doing.”
Blitz shakes his hand. “We don’t, but then, who really does?”
Jeremy nods and moves to the exit. “You know where to find me.”
He raps on the door and an officer opens it. Jeremy heads farther down the hall, and we go back to the waiting room.
“Should we stay here?” I ask.
“I guess not,” Blitz says. “I need to call my assistant to arrange for BD’s room and board. Probably can’t do it here with the hounds monitoring our phone use.”
Another officer opens the door to the waiting room.
And we are not prepared for what we see there.
Chapter 24
“Papá?” Blitz says, incredulous.
Blitz’s father stands in the middle of the room, his face angry, his arms crossed. No one is paying any attention to him.
When he sees Blitz, he says, “I always knew I’d be down here eventually for one of you boys.” His voice is gruff. He gets out his wallet and looks around. “You need me to bail you out?”
Blitz lets out a strangled laugh. “I didn’t get arrested. How did you know I was here?”
“Your mother follows Tweeter or Nitwit or whatever it is,” he says. “Apparently everybody’s talking about how you are at the San Antonio jail. She made me get down here right away.”
He sees a woman sitting behind a wall with a small glass window. I guess he figures she’s the one to pay to get Blitz out because he heads that way.
Blitz reaches out and grabs his arm. “I’m not in jail,” he says. “I was here to help someone who got arrested.”
They keep talking but I survey the room in a blind panic. Who recognized him? Was it that girl from earlier?
I despise that Blitz Burn hashtag and wish it would die a terrible social media death.
The girl isn’t here anymore. Nobody seems to care, absorbed in their own drama. Moms, girlfriends, buddies, all with the same grim expression. The grandmother has also left.
I pull out my phone to see what is happening, but then I feel the eyes of the officer boring into me. Right. They don’t want anyone using one. Now I see why. Compromised privacy.
“Livia?” Blitz finally gets my attention. “You ready to go?”
“You might want to rethink just walking out,” his dad says. “There’s a mob out there ready to take your picture.”
Blitz stares at the door. “Really?”
“Out on the street,” he says. “They didn’t know who I was, but one step and you’ll be all over those little newspapers your mother picks up at the grocery store.”
We sit down in a mostly empty row. “What do we do?” I ask Blitz. “They’ll recognize you no matter how we try to hide you.”
“There’s bound to be a back way,” Blitz says. “Let me go ask and see.”
He heads over to the woman behind the glass. I’m alone with his dad. I straighten my skirt self-consciously.
“You stick by my boy,” his dad says. “That’s something.”
I don’t know how to reply to that, since technically right now he’s sticking by me. So I just give him a quick nod.
“Quite a life you’re walking into.” He looks around the room. “You sure you’re up for it?”
“I’ve been up for it all along.”
He leans forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. “Ben is an all-right boy,” he says. “I guess if he’s hung on to you this long, it’s going to work. Nobody else has ever lasted a week.”
This is probably as good as it gets in terms of praise from Blitz’s father.
“He’s a great man,” I say. I avoid adding, “Despite his father.”
David seems anxious. He taps his thumb on his knee, a gesture I’ve seen Blitz do.
“I know I’m not the most pleasant person to be around. But I do try. Renata wouldn’t have stayed around if I didn’t. So if you need anything, Renata and I are happy to help out.”
My jaw drops open and I have to think to close it. “Thank you,” I say.
He sits back, as if he can relax now that he’s gotten past that.
As Blitz comes for us, and his dad stands up and holds out his hand as if to help me up too, I realize he cares about his son. He’s here. He can’t be all bad.
“They won’t escort us out the back themselves,” Blitz says. “But the lawyer can take us out that way. We’ll just wait on Jeremy.” Now he’s looking around the room too, wondering if anyone is covertly taking his picture.
We sit down again, feeling obvious and vulnerable. Blitz turns his back to the officer and covertly pulls his phone out. Then grimaces. He shoves it back in his pocket.
“Bad?” I ask.
“More than bad,” he says. “I’m trending. Everyone’s trying to guess my crime.”
His dad snorts. “Can I send them some ideas? That blue pantsuit you wore on your last show is bound to be illegal in most states.”
Blitz laughs and pounds his dad on the back. “You watched it!” He settles back and takes my hand. “Yeah, my wardrobe girl probably needs to rein it in.”
He seems happy and relaxed, despite the circumstances. I don’t have a Twitter account, and I wouldn’t dare comment on the situation even if I did. But I wish I could Tweet the truth.
Blitz Craven is only guilty of being a nice guy. #ForgetTheBurn
~*´`*~
After an hour’s wait, Blitz’s dad decides to take off. “They don’t know who this old fart is anyway,” he says. He looks at me. “You want to come with me rather than get caught with this crazy fool?”
“They’ll recognize her, I think,” Blitz says. “Unless you’re tired of waiting.”
“No, I’ll stay,” I say. “Thank you, though.”
David pats Blitz on the shoulder. “Be careful out there,” he says. He gives me a nod. “Make this rascal come see his old man every once in a while.”
“I will,” I say.
When he opens the door, the crowd noise is tremendous. Flashes go off until someone yells, “It’s not him!”
A whistle blows, people shout. There’s a foyer between this room and the outside door, so we’re buffered against the crowd out there. Nobody is close enough to see in. We can’t see them either. Thank goodness.
It’s another hour before Jeremy peeks through the hallway door again. “I’ve got him,” he says. “
You guys can come this way.”
As we stand up, I whisper to Blitz, “What does he mean by he’s got him?”
Blitz shrugs.
But when we get in the hall, it’s clear. Denham is there, shrugging on his jacket and shoving things in his pocket from an envelope.
“Hey,” he says.
Another uniformed officer follows us as we walk down the hall.
Denham doesn’t waste any time. “So when do I get to see her?” he asks me.
I glance over at the lawyer.
“We’ve got some things to arrange first,” Jeremy says. “You need a temporary address. Check in with your probation officer. We need to contact the birth mother.”
Denham cuts him off. “Livia, shut this clown up. When can I see her?”
Blitz steps up as if to speak, but I hold up my hand.
“We have to talk to her mother first,” I say. “She has no idea about any of this. She doesn’t know who I am.”
Denham stops walking. “What do you mean? Have you been seeing her or not?”
I glance at Blitz, then the lawyer.
“You don’t have to go into this right now,” Jeremy says. “Denham currently has no rights, and you should see a family lawyer before this moves forward.”
The officer interrupts us. “Move along. This isn’t time to chat.”
We continue down the long snaking hall.
“I have the right to know if you’ve seen her,” Denham says. “As her father.”
“Yes,” I say. “I have seen her.”
He smiles at that. “My baby girl! Tell me what she’s like. Does she look like you?”
“She does,” I say. “Black hair. She’s smart. And pretty.”
“I bet she is,” Denham says. “Does she dance like you? Tell me, does she go to that school? Is she a ballerina?”
I glance over at Blitz. His calm face gives me strength.
I take a deep breath, and just say it. “Denham, she’s in a wheelchair. She was in a car accident when she was three and she can’t walk anymore.”
Denham stops. The officer tries to move him forward, but Denham is rooted to the spot. “Our baby can’t walk?”