Rogue Nights

by Ainsley Booth

  It wasn’t a kiss to end an encounter that was fun, a moment that took the edge off physical need. It was a kiss that declared that whatever was between us wasn’t over. Not yet.

  “Gifts of grace,” Adam murmured as we pulled apart one final time.

  “Second chances,” I responded, knowing that I wouldn’t waste this one.

  7

  Judah

  “I remember the two of you.”

  I paused in my reach for a coffee cup and turned to look at Samuel Ballard, the tribal judge assigned to my case. He was a few years older than me, someone who’d always been a presence in my life moving closer or farther away as our ages changed. He’d been solemnly disappointed in me when I’d been arrested and convicted but a strong supporter since I’d gotten out. As he’d said when I’d run into him after one of my first visits with my parole officer, “you want to change your life Judah, I’m here to help.”

  He’d been true to his word, lending his vocal or silent support when I’d needed it.

  “You do?” I asked as I poured myself a cup of the hot brew and added my one packet of sugar. I didn’t need to ask what he’d meant. His eyes had widened with shock he seldom showed when I’d introduced him to Adam and he’d quickly added up two and two.

  He nodded, hesitating and then clearly his throat. “You two were the first gay couple I’d ever known.” Judge Ballard met my eyes, his own warm and without judgement. “I could tell that you two had deep feelings for each other.”

  We did,” I nodded since I had no idea what else I could possibly say to that statement. It had been three days since the encounter in my workshop with Adam and the silence between us had turned my tentative hope into restless doubt. I changed the subject to something less perilous. “Thank you for filing the statement in my favor with the court. I appreciate your faith in me, Judge.”

  He clapped me on this shoulder, his big hand heavy on my back as we both moved towards the large table where Adam and the Project staff were working. “You earned it Judah. Everything you’ve needed to do since you got out, you’ve done. It’s clear to anyone who looks at you that you’re a different person.”

  Adam looked up from where he was reading over documents and smiled, his grin making my stomach flip and my whole body jump in recognition. I felt myself blush, wondering if the judge had felt my physical reaction to him.

  “Let’s finish this up, Judge Ballard, and I think we can cut you loose,” Adam said.

  “I’m here as long as you need me,” the judge said as he pulled back his chair and settled in. I walked around the table and slid into the vacant one next to Adam, glancing at the stack of papers in Adam’s grasp. It looked like a court decision but I couldn’t be sure. Legal documents weren’t my thing.

  Adam launched right into the discussion. “Since April wasn’t living on Rocky Boys when she died your tribal court only has concurrent jurisdiction with the State of Montana but we’ve pushed to make sure that your brief is in the record and that you have equal footing at the table even though the state will issue the final judgment on custody.”

  “Are you anticipating any problems due to the recent federal district court case in Texas?” Judge Ballard asked, his voice rough with his irritation. The iffy state of the Indian Child Welfare Act and the position of tribes in court proceedings was a hot topic within the tribe. “Decades of federal precedent and recognition of our tribal sovereignty just thrown out by one man’s ignorance. It’s ridiculous.”

  “We agree, Judge,” Sally, one of Adam’s staffers agreed. She was a pre-law student who volunteered at the Project. She was smart and not afraid to speak her mind. Adam had a lot of confidence in her and I followed his lead. “And luckily Judge Garnett appears to still recognize the validity of the ICWA and she’s following the rules.”

  “She didn’t even blink when Judah’s attorney filed the papers to recognize concurrent jurisdiction,” Adam added, his expression serious. “I’m glad because I don’t want Judah’s case to get weighed down by politics.”

  “Agreed,” Judge Ballard said, looking around at the crowd in the room. “Judah has busted his ass to turn his life around since he got out of prison. He’s an excellent father to the extent he’s allowed to be as well as an upstanding citizen of Rocky Boys. He lends a hand to anyone who needs it.”

  “The testimonials from so many of residents completely backs up what you’re saying, Judge.” Adam looked at me and smiled, it was warm and apologetic. “Sorry to talk about you like you’re not here.”

  I waved him off. “It’s okay. You get used to it on the inside.”

  I winced when I said it. Even though it was true, I wasn’t looking for sympathy and I was glad not to see it on his face. His hand, heavy and firm on my knee under the table was welcome and helped me relax. It had been a long day of sitting here with the Project people, answering questions and going over everything in my files until I was numb to the meaning of it all. I appreciated all of their hard work but I was getting close to the end of my rope and I craved a little time with Gideon or in my workshop to feel like myself and less like an animal at the zoo.

  Sally flipped through some papers, her voice clear even though her face was half-buried in the file in her hands. “I still say that the best angle is the death of the mother. The child has a surviving parent and that is huge in this case. We should make that point early and often. The sympathy over her death could get us serious leverage.”

  “Sally,” Adam said, his voice heated with warning as the entire table went silent.

  I gripped the edge of the table with shaking hands, unable to keep the tremor from my voice. It wasn’t emotion, it was anger.

  “Her name was April Windrunner and she was the mother of my son.”

  “Judah.”

  I ignored Adam, dodged the touch of his hand as I pushed back my chair and left the room, headed for the solitude of the restroom. I locked the door behind me and leaned against the wall, taking in deep breaths and settling my mind and my emotions.

  They were just doing their job.

  They knew what they were doing and they would pick the right path to get me my son.

  Just a few more days and I would have Gideon. I could do anything, endure anything, to make that happen. That was all that mattered.

  I rubbed my hands across my face and crossed the space to the sink. I turned on the taps and scooped up water, splashing my face and shivering a bit at the touch of the cold liquid on my skin. I caught my eyes in the mirrors, watching droplets roll down my cheeks and off my jaw. My eyes were tired, the dark circles from too many nights of restless sleep made me look like a dead man walking.

  Truth be told, I’d slept better in prison than I had the past two weeks. The stress of not knowing how the hearing would turn out was heavy on my mind. It was why I was here and why I needed the help of the people at the Project. I needed to get back out there and do what needed to be done.

  I dried off my face and exited the restroom and found Adam waiting for me in the hallway. His hands were jammed into his pockets but he tilted back on his heels with the discomfort and nervousness that had taken over his face.

  “I’m sorry Jude,” he said, glancing over his shoulder towards the other room where the others continued working on my case. Making sure we had our privacy, Adam shuffled closer, his lips twisting into a grimace of apology. “She’s young.”

  “Well, then, she’ll outgrow it,” I said, attempting a smile. Anything to wipe the sympathy from his face.

  “True. It is a disease we all outgrow if we’re lucky,” Adam answered. He reached out his hand towards me, his fingertips brushing against mine. “But, that’s no excuse.”

  I shook my head. “Adam, you guys are doing so much for me. You know what needs to be done.”

  Now it was his time to shake his head, his expression tight as his fingers entwined with my own. “No. No. You’re not case. You’re not charity. You’re a person. April was a person.” I opened my mout
h tell him it was alright but he shook his head even harder and tugged me closer. “This one is on me. Neal was right. I’ve kept people at a distance, treated them like cases so that I wouldn’t get too close. Sometimes it makes the job easier but it makes it easier to forget why I started the Project in the first place. Sally learned that callousness from me. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” I said, giving his hand a squeeze as our heads dipped together, foreheads pressed, noses brushing. “It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay. I want to let you get close, Judah. I want that. So much.”

  I gasped in surprise, my heart pounded at his words. “I want that too.”

  Moments passed as we stood there together, breaths mingling as every drop of anxiety I’d had about what our time in the workshop had meant to him melted away.

  “Tell me something I don’t know about you. Something new,” Adam asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

  I sighed, knowing that this is what was going to happen if we tried this again. I’d have to share the good, the bad, and the ugly. We couldn’t just act like ten years hadn’t passed. I was older and hopefully wiser. He was a man where I had loved the boy.

  “I sleep with a night light on.” I’d expected a laugh but Adam’s only response was a hum, a sound of encouragement and question. “It’s never completely dark on the inside of a prison. The safety lights, the lights so that the guards can see us. It’s always light. I still can’t sleep in complete darkness.”

  I held my breath, heart pounding as I waited for his reaction.

  “I’ll make sure you’re never in the dark again,” Adam said and even though it was sappy and cheesy, I laughed softly, relieved and soothed by the words as his mouth closed over mine.

  His lips were cool and smooth but his tongue was warm and slick as it entered my mouth. I moaned, mindful of the people just in the other room. I slipped my arms around his waist, pulling him closer as his hand wrapped around the back of my neck and held me close. Adam was insistent, his erection pressing hard against my abdomen as we kissed like high school kids in the hallway. I moaned again, pressing my own hard cock against his as my need grew and my ability to give a fuck about the people in the other room diminished.

  Voices rose and I pulled back, our pants loud in my ears as we both listened for the approach of footsteps. We both looked at each other and huffed out a guilty laugh, one more press of lips before we pulled apart.

  “I look forward to getting to know you again Judah,” Adam said, his voice low and his smile warm.

  “Me too,” I answered. “Me too.”

  8

  Judah

  His hair was short.

  Gideon was smiling so I kept my own, fake and painful, plastered on my face so that he wouldn’t see the anger and sick that was roiling in my gut. His hair, halfway down his back just a week ago, was now short. Above his ears with a fade in the back and on the sides. The hair on top was longer and it flopped over his eyes. It looked good on him but it still broke my heart.

  “Dad, check it out!” He made a move that flipped the hair out of his eyes, a move I’d seen on countless kids his age. It was cute and I wanted to scream. “What do you think?”

  I peeled my tongue off the roof of my suddenly desert dry mouth and answered him. My voice was rough but I thought it sounded normal. “It looks really good on you buddy. Really good.”

  “All the kids in the class have their hair cut like this.” He babbled on in his obvious happiness and I tried to focus on that and not the million other thoughts going through my head. Gideon was happy and that had to be enough.

  I cleared my throat. “Why did you decide to get it cut?”

  Gideon paused, his eager expression slipping and uncomfortable hesitation replacing it. The break in my voice had given me away and now he was worried about what I thought, worried that I was mad at him. I sighed, forcing myself to relax and soften my expression for his sake.

  His voice was quiet and small when he answered me. “I didn’t want to be different anymore.”

  Oh shit. I took a deep breath and willed my blood pressure to drop back into the normal zone. He was one of few native kids at his school. It was a good school but it wasn’t on the Rez. He was different.

  “Did somebody tell you that you were different, Gideon?”

  He nodded. “The other kids. They …” He took a deep breath and it came out as a shuddering sigh, wet with unshed tears that hurt my heart. “… they made fun of my hair, Dad. They said I looked like a girl.”

  Damn. It. All. To. Hell.

  I gritted my teeth and took another deep breath. No matter what I was feeling right now it didn’t matter. Only Gideon mattered. I had to make my little man be okay with this. I had to let him know I was okay with this, even though I wasn’t.

  “Well, I don’t think you looked like a girl but if you want it to be short, that’s okay with me.”

  Gideon’s head whipped around so that he was looking me in the eye, his face full of hope that I wasn’t going to be mad. “Really? It’s okay?”

  I grabbed him and gave him a huge hug, kissing the top of his head, the soft bristle of the newly cut hair a new and not unpleasant sensation against my skin. I lifted my other hands to wipe the tears from my eyes that I would never let him see.

  “Yeah, it’s great.”

  Going to the bar on Rocky Boys had been a bad idea.

  I’d known that the best idea was to go straight home after my visitation date with Gideon. To go home and go to my workshop and take out my anger and my heartbreak out on a piece of wood.

  But I’d made a left instead of a right. And I’d walked into the smoky bar and almost ordered a drink but I knew from my own childhood that the bottle didn’t hold any answers. But I did let the two, drunk assholes at the bar amp my already ridiculously hot temper to a nuclear fusion level. And then I’d decided that their faces were the perfect place to put my fists. Two on one was never a good idea and the aches and pains on my face and along my sides were only going to be worse tomorrow.

  The sensation of my fist connecting with their flesh had been good. The sound of flesh and grunts of pain were cathartic. I’d needed it and I’d taken what I’d needed until the cops had pulled me off them.

  Now Sheriff Sanders had decided that the best place for me was the holding cell in the jail.

  And for some reason I’d decided that calling Adam was the best option.

  He was here, talking to the Sheriff in low voices and shooting daggers at me. I leaned against the wall of the cell, testing the soreness of my jaw from where the bigger guy had hit me. I was going to have a bruise for my custody hearing which made my chest tighten with the added stress of it.

  I was an asshole. A stupid, irresponsible asshole. And my stupidity might have cost me my son.

  Adam and the Sheriff stopped talking and the Sheriff disappeared into another room while Adam walked towards me. I could tell from the set of his jaw that he was angry but the shadow of disappointment in his eyes was the hardest part to face. He waited until he was right next to me to speak.

  “I think I talked him out of arresting you.”

  I nodded, letting out a sign of relief. “Thank you.”

  “Don’t fucking thank me.” He ground out, more pissed at me than I’d thought.. And rightfully so. “Damn it, Judah. He’s going to write you up. A warning but it’s going to get back to the court. You’re just lucky that those guys aren’t going to press charges. Too many people saw them take the first swing.”

  My head fell forward, biting back the curse right on the tip of my tongue. I’d done this to myself. No bitching. Not for me.

  But Adam had plenty to say. “Don’t say anything until we’re out of this place.”

  9

  Adam

  His house was dark when we entered.

  Fat Dave sauntered out from Gideon’s bedroom and wove his body between my legs as I watched Judah in silence. He walked over to the fridge and brough
t out two waters and offered one to me. I shook my head and crossed my arms across my chest and stared him down. This wasn’t a damn social call.

  He leaned against the kitchen counter, opened his water and took a long, slow drink of water. I waited for him to say something but he was taking too long and my anger was making me impatient.

  “Judah, what the fuck were you thinking?” I paced towards him, closing the gap between us in three strides. I got in his space, forcing him to look at me. His eyes were hooded, dark with his own anger and a million other emotions I couldn’t name. But he didn’t look like he was going to answer me, so I prompted him again. “Judah, start talking if you still want my help at the hearing.”

  He shoved past me, his shoulder clipping my body as he went by. It hurt and I was probably going to have a bruise tomorrow but I ignored it. I followed him into the living room, watching his slide down onto the couch, long legs extended in front of him and his head bowed with the pain that clearly weighed on his shoulders. I wanted to reach out in comfort but I was too angry. Too frustrated.

  “Gideon cut his hair,” he said, his voice etched with the hurt I’d seen in his eyes. “The Morgans let him cut his hair.”

  Shit. I turned away from him, pacing around the room as I processed this information. Now I understood why he’d acted this way tonight. I understood but it didn’t make it any less of a disaster.

  I tuned back in as Judah started talking. “I know that not everyone keeps their hair long. I know this. It’s a tradition that’s not as common anymore.”

  “But, it’s one that is important to you,” I said.

  He nodded. “Long hair, it’s a symbol of our connection to the earth, to Mother Nature. The long grasses are her hair and we keep our hair long to keep that connection.” He ran his fingers through his hair, looking at it with an intensity that proved how much this tradition meant to him. “This is one of the ways I keep my connection, it keeps me grounded and focused on who I really am. They made me cut my hair in prison and growing it long has been important to me.”