by Sally John
Not that Teal blamed Lacey. Despite Lacey’s efforts to keep a relationship going between them, one did not truly exist and never had. A shared moment now and then, like that long-ago afternoon in the bookstore with their grandmother, did not count. Their grandmother? Correction. Lacey’s grandmother, no blood relation to Teal.
She blamed herself. She was the sister who wanted no part of family ties. Therefore it shouldn’t matter whether Lacey clued her in on things. It shouldn’t feel like another millstone of guilt had been added to the ones she already wore like a necklace, a string of gems designed and manufactured in Cedar Pointe, Oregon.
It shouldn’t feel like that. But it did.
There was a brief knock on her door and it opened. Her assistant, Pamela, leaned inside. “Your one o’clock is here. You okay?”
“Sure.”
Pamela’s brows disappeared behind her steel-gray bangs. At fifty-five, she was a paralegal and mature enough to be willing to chip in with secretarial duties when needed. Her mother-hen routine was icing on the cake. “You can do this in your sleep, Teal. Just listen to her story and take notes. Then go home.”
Teal smiled her thanks. “Give me five minutes.”
“You got it. Hannah Walton is in conference room B.” Pamela shut the door.
The woman hadn’t used the intercom in two weeks, not since the earthquake. She hovered, a quirk everyone in the city seemed to have taken on. It was sweet and disheartening at once. Life at home was the same. In some ways, the three of them seemed closer than ever, yet the emotions were rooted in fear that something bad was about to happen.
Would life ever return to normal?
Teal massaged her neck, where the string of millstones pulled heavily. “Lord, I’m sorry once again for being a lousy sister, but I really can’t take on Lacey right now. I just can’t.”
As if the God who allowed such recent destruction across the second-largest city in the United States gave a hoot about her concerns.
Three minutes into the meeting, Teal wasn’t so sure she could take on Hannah Walton, either.
It was at that point when her new client spoke the words biological father. Teal stopped taking notes, set down her pen, and clenched her hands on her lap under the table.
The woman was twenty-five and drop-dead gorgeous in every clichéd California beach interpretation of the term. Sparkling, even, white teeth. Long blonde hair. Big blue eyes. Pouty lips. Flawless complexion. A body made for bikinis, evident even in the conservative floral-print dress she wore. Sweet little-girl voice. On top of that, she was quietly confident.
If Hannah stood before a jury of her so-called peers who happened to include seven women of average, mediocre looks and self-esteem, she would lose. It was the way of the world.
“Ms. Adams, what do you think?”
“Please, call me Teal.” She gave her a brief smile. “I think . . .” I think this is my worst nightmare. “Uh, there are avenues to pursue.”
“Have you done this before?”
“Yes, I have experience in similar cases. We all do here.”
“Did they work out?”
Teal picked up her pen and leaned forward to speak directly to those big blue eyes. “Hannah, every situation is unique to the individuals involved. Please believe that our goal is to protect your rights and your child’s. We will do everything we possibly can to make it work out for you. All right?”
She nodded hesitantly. “I just want to keep my baby away from that man. Do you have children?”
“A fifteen-year-old daughter.”
“You’re a mother!” Her face lit up. “Then you understand.”
Oh, more than you can imagine. “All five attorneys at Canfield and Stone Family Law are mothers.” Teal wanted to add that family was their raison d’être, but that would be fudging. That would make the firm sound ooey-gooey, fuzzy-wuzzy. Those adjectives did not square with their true pursuit: family law.
She sat back and poised the pen over her legal pad. “Tell it to me again, from the beginning.”
Five years previously, Hannah had had an affair with James Parkhurst, her older, married boss, a big-name producer. She got pregnant. He wanted nothing to do with her or the child. Hannah quit her job and lost touch with him. The daughter, Maddie, now four years old, lived with Hannah and her husband of two years, Ryan. Out of the blue, Parkhurst was suing for visitation rights.
Hannah’s chin trembled. “Everyone kept telling me that biological fathers have rights. That’s why we never pursued Ryan adopting Maddie. We were afraid James would have to be told and that he might do something crazy like this. He is a mean, vindictive man.”
“Do you have any idea why the sudden interest in your daughter?”
She shook her head, the blonde curls swishing.
“Did you tell him you were pregnant with his child?”
“Yes, when I first found out. He called me a slut and said I cheated on him and he doubted the baby was his.” She wiped at the corner of her eye. “I never slept around or cheated on him.”
“After that, did you two have any contact with each other?”
“No. I never even went back into work.”
“Did you quit or were you fired?”
“I quit. I went to the office one Sunday when nobody was around, put my resignation on his desk, and cleared out my things.”
“Did you hear from anyone?”
She shifted in her seat, as if uncomfortable with the question. “No. I did receive a final paycheck with severance. It came in the mail, but that was it. I was sort of, you know, on the outside with the staff. Because of sleeping with the boss.”
Teal nodded at the typical scenario. “Have you and Mr. Parkhurst had any contact in the past four years?”
“No, none at all. I met Ryan, and he’s as beautiful as Maddie.” She began weeping. “He’s the best husband and daddy in the world. We have a happy life.”
Teal begged to disagree. River was the best husband and daddy in the world. She would have lain down and died if Maiya’s biological father interfered with them.
Which was why she could not allow River to adopt Maiya. That would have meant contacting the loser who had never been in their lives from the moment of Maiya’s conception. Teal would have had to inform him that he had parental rights that she wanted him to sign off on. Nope. Like Hannah, no way was she walking down that road. It was full of land mines.
She regretted that River could not legally become Maiya’s father, but not as much as she would regret the painful ramifications of the other path. Adoption was a piece of paper, a technicality that could not enhance the family ties the three of them now so thoroughly enjoyed.
Teal slid a box of tissues across the table. “Hannah, we have to dig deeper, but from the preliminary information you’ve given me, I might suggest that we file a countersuit for termination of Parkhurst’s parental rights based on abandonment.”
“Meaning he has no rights?”
“He has no rights. He gave them up.”
“You can do that?”
“If everything you said is solid, yes, I think so.”
“Oh, thank you, thank you!”
Teal had not meant to jump so quickly to a solution. She doubted that all of Hannah’s information was solid. There would be extenuating details, dark secrets to bring to light. But the compulsion to offer ooey-gooey fuzzy-wuzzies to a mom whose story resembled her own was just too strong to ignore.
Teal directed Hannah down the hall toward the restroom. She headed to her office to check messages and find an assistant to help with the interview. Her emotions were clouding her thought processes. She couldn’t trust herself to listen with an unbiased ear.
On a good day the case would have been tough, but she had handled two similar situations in her ten years with the firm. She should have been able to deal with this one.
She blamed the earthquake. Hyperconcern for her family’s well-being permeated every waking moment. River still winced
whenever he sat down or stood up. Maiya still pulled at the reins like an unbroken mustang.
Nights brought little relief. Teal got up often and walked the floors and looked out the windows, as vigilant as a security guard on night duty. The sound of sirens gave her a stomachache. She either did not eat or binged. She was falling behind on regular life, not responding in a timely manner to e-mails or phone calls. Even clients were relegated to the back burners.
She thought now of the pamphlet stuck in a kitchen drawer. It was a list of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms. Some caring volunteer had knocked on the door and placed it in her hand before she shut the door. She had skimmed it, pitched it, dug it out of the trash the next day, and stuck it in the drawer, refusing to believe it described her.
Which was probably a symptom in itself.
As she rounded a corner into the central part of the firm, she spotted Pamela at her desk outside Teal’s office, on the phone.
As Teal approached, Pamela turned. Sheer horror distorted her face.
“Teal!” She held the phone out. “It’s River.”
The large room tilted. The cubicles in the middle section swirled. Teal’s feet slogged through thick mud.
“He needs to talk to you.” Pamela’s voice sounded as if it came from a far distance.
An eternity passed. At last she reached the outstretched phone. “River?”
“Teal, the school just called. Maiya’s. It’s on lockdown.”
Her legs wobbled. “What?”
“I got an automated message. That’s all it says. Your cell’s probably off?”
“Yeah.” She pulled her phone from her jacket pocket, its volume off for her meeting, and read one missed call. “What do you mean, lockdown?”
“The doors are locked. Security is doing their thing. Nobody goes in or comes out until—I don’t know.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
Pamela waved for her attention. “It’s online.” She glanced up from the monitor. “It says there’s an unauthorized person on campus.”
“River, the online news—”
“Got it here, too. Unauthorized person. All right. Let’s not panic. It’s probably no big deal.”
“I’m on my way.” She heard the panic in her voice. Her heart resounded in her ears.
“Teal, slow down. We won’t be able to get near the school.”
“Then they’ll direct us somewhere else! I’m on my way.”
“I’m closer. I’ll get there first and call you, direct you where to go. Turn on your cell.”
Teal handed Pamela’s phone to her and looked at the cell in her hand. She couldn’t remember how to turn the sound back on.
Before she sank to the floor, Teal felt Pamela’s arms around her, leading her to sit on a chair.
Teal could take a lot in stride. Watching a bridge collapse and dozens die in their cars, for one. Learning that her daughter had entered a rebellious season, for another. But the image of Maiya locked up on a campus with a crazy person who probably had a gun or two?
Total paralysis.
Chapter 19
River stood with dozens of other parents on the perimeter of a shopping center parking lot. Arms crossed and lips pressed shut, he held himself together and gazed from behind dark sunglasses. The panic in the growing crowd was palpable.
He had lived through a couple of his own school lockdowns and faced gun-toting and knife-wielding teenagers crazy high on chemicals. San Sebastian Academy housed boys who had been expelled elsewhere. Some did not easily get the hang of new rules.
But at SSA, with a student-teacher ratio of six to one and a male population focused on being their brother’s keeper, rule breaking was next to impossible. A lockdown at Saint Sibs meant somebody was already sitting on top of the out-of-control kid while the other boys were confined to their rooms until the director got to the bottom of the situation.
Life wasn’t that way at Tremont High.
He felt a tug on the cuff of his jeans and looked down at Teal sitting on the curb. Her legs had given out twenty minutes ago. No hint of fight remained in her eyes.
As he lowered himself to the ground, his breath caught. He silently swore at the earthquake, himself, and the bins of books. “It’s going to be okay.” He pulled Teal close.
“You don’t know that.” Her voice was muffled against his shirt.
“We have to believe it.”
“I can’t. Not at this moment in time.”
He couldn’t either. Tremont High was a public school with a solid academic reputation and a blend of ethnicities that added a richness. Maiya loved it. And yet . . .
Metal detectors and police officers were part of the campus decor. Strict dress codes and codes of conduct were enforced. And yet . . .
There were thirty-five hundred students. Some did not play well with others. Some did not play well at all.
River hugged Teal as tightly as he could.
His cell phone beeped, and he unhooked it from his belt. A variety of tunes erupted around him, a discordant ringing of a dozen cells.
“Hello.” Before the word was out of his mouth, an automated voice began reeling off good news. The lockdown was over, everyone was safe, parents could leave or pick up their children.
“Thank you, God.”
Beside him Teal had her own phone to her ear and was talking.
River felt his smile fade.
“Y-yes.” Her voice faltered. “We’ll be right there.” She clasped the phone in both hands and met his stare. “That was the vice principal. Maiya is in his office, and Jake Ford is in handcuffs.”
In the five years River had known Teal, he had seen her fly off the handle at injustices and all but hyperventilate over various things involving Maiya. But she had always maintained an air of control.
Except for once.
And except for today. Today made twice.
The first time, Maiya was in seventh grade and had accidentally been marked absent one day. The school contacted Teal—who had dropped Maiya at the school earlier—and asked if she was home sick. Teal phoned River and the police and went to the school. When he arrived, he heard her voice from the front door at eardrum-shattering decibels. The school nurse entered the fray and informed them all that Maiya was in her office, sick to her stomach. By noon that day, River had tucked both of his girls into bed, Maiya with a stomach bug, Teal with a migraine. He had to make her promise not to sue anyone at the school.
It crossed his mind that this time, he himself could be in her lawsuit sights.
In all honesty, he felt grateful to be out of her line of fire for the moment. He’d much rather be in the back of a police cruiser than inside the school. He’d left Teal there, bouncing off the walls and yelling at the vice principal about his decision to suspend Maiya from school.
He turned to Jake Ford beside him, the goofy kid who had so captivated his daughter. “I don’t know what to say.”
The lanky boy winked. “Maybe you could say to the cops they should uncuff me?”
“You snuck into a high school, Jake. Be glad they didn’t shoot you.”
“I didn’t sneak in. A friend opened a back door for me.”
Thank God that friend had not been Maiya.
Unless they were both lying.
Jake smiled. “I swear again, it wasn’t Maiya.” His freckled nose and mop of curly red hair easily disarmed others. He wore a denim jacket, but even when his tattoo-covered arms were exposed, people gravitated toward him, people from all walks of life, including the uptight and middle-aged. He was a natural charmer—nothing phony about his charisma—and seemed not to have a harmful bone in his body.
River truly believed he didn’t. The kid simply made idiotic decisions that got him into trouble. “You’re going to have to rat out the friend.”
“I can’t do that. It’s all my fault. I talked her into it.”
Her? A list of Maiya’s friends ran through his mind and his stomach twisted
. “But it was her choice, and the authorities think that girl was Maiya. They’ve suspended her.”
“No way! Really?”
“What did you expect? She was hiding you in a band room closet.”
“We went in there before the lockdown announcement. We just wanted five minutes alone.”
“Why, Jake? Why did you do this? You promised me you would not contact her. I trusted your word.”
He shrugged. “It’s not what I planned. It was just going to be a quick duck in and out. Hand her the flowers, profess my undying love, and split.”
“And how was that not breaking your promise?”
“Man, we hadn’t talked for two weeks. We needed some kind of closure, you know? I had to tell her good-bye.”
“Jake, you’re nineteen and intelligent enough to get it: breaking promises will get your friends in big trouble. Breaking laws will land you in jail.”
“I was just trying to see my girl.”
“Ex-girl.” River heard the steel in his voice.
“River, I care for her. I really do. I swear I’ll stay away, but I miss her. I think she misses me, too.”
“Let me tell you something about love. It means you want the best for the other person and you will help bring that about. The best for my fifteen-year-old daughter at this moment is that her mother and I are not upset. Guess what? We’re upset. We are very upset.” River stopped himself short of heaping hot coals of blame on Jake. He thumped the window with his fist to get a nearby cop’s attention to open the door.
Jake said, “Hey, I’m new at this, okay? Can you at least put in a good word for me?”
As River slid out the door he turned to look at the boy. “And what would that good word be, Jake? That you can’t keep a promise if it’s hard?”
“Come on, man. You know me. I got through Saint Sibs with flying colors. I got a regular job at the garage. I make good money.”
River straightened, swore softly, rested his arms on the door, and swore again. Jake’s life had been one abandonment after another. If River quit on him now after their mentoring history, the impact would rank just below that of Jake’s mom and dad.