Her Surprise Hero

by Abby Gaines

  She deserved better. He wanted to punch Jonah for making her feel less than loved…then maybe he should punch himself while he was at it.

  Now wasn’t the time to tackle her dad, but if he was going to dole out affection based on achievement, Ethan would help her get her fair share. “It’s fair to say, sir, that Cindy, uh, Cynthia, has earned the respect of the whole town. Which wasn’t easy.”

  This time she looked at him with warmth and gratitude. “Her legal integrity is beyond question,” he said, “even if folk don’t always like the verdict, they haven’t been able to point to any irregularity or inconsistency.”

  Jonah was nodding, but enough suspicion remained to tell Ethan the man had guessed that his relationship with Cindy overstepped the professional boundary.

  This was way more than Ethan had bargained for when he came out this morning. But as some small compensation, there was definite approval in Jonah’s eyes as he regarded his daughter.

  Then Justice Pearson said, “Do I know you, sir?”

  Uh-oh.

  “I do know you.” The justice’s eyes narrowed. “It must have been some years ago, but I have an excellent memory for faces…” Great, couldn’t Ethan have had a judge who had a terrible memory for faces?

  “You were in my courtroom,” Justice Pearson said triumphantly. “Up for aggravated assault.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  ETHAN HOOKED HIS thumbs in his pockets. His eyes found Cynthia’s as he replied to Justice Pearson. “You sentenced me to ten years. I served five.”

  The office dissolved around her, people and objects swimming through her vision. Ethan had served time. In jail. For assault. Five years.

  “That’s where you did your degree,” she said, the revelation as painful as it was obvious. “In prison.”

  He nodded. “Distance learning in Ohio University’s College Program for the Incarcerated.”

  She shuddered convulsively. “Your work scheme on the ranch…”

  “Is intended to get through to kids before they end up like I did, too angry to control themselves.”

  No wonder he was afraid of losing his temper! No wonder Sam’s mother had decided her son was better off not having his father.

  “I should have told you, Cindy,” he said. “I wanted to. I’m sorry. But no one around here knows, apart from my mom. She and I agreed to put it behind us.”

  “You haven’t even told Sam?” she said, aghast.

  She put her hand to her mouth; this had to stop. She couldn’t have this conversation in front of her dad and Harold. She looked like a total fool…exactly what she was. Ethan was a convicted criminal! He’d kissed her, seduced her…made her fall in love with him…aware that if she’d had full possession of the facts she would never…

  Her instinct was to usher everyone out of her chambers, then dive into the broom closet. Curl up in a ball with her hands over her head until the pain went away.

  What would her dad be thinking? All her objections to his emotional manipulation melted away. He was all she had.

  “Cynthia.” Her father was studying her, attempting to read her mind. “You and this—this man, you’re not…”

  She didn’t let him finish. “When I first arrived here I had some questions about Ethan’s rehabilitation program. That’s caused some friction. I see now why he didn’t want me inquiring too closely into his work.”

  “Hey,” Ethan protested. She shot him a killing look. It left him distressingly still alive. “Think what you like of my past,” he said, “but don’t diss the work I do with those kids.”

  She would do whatever she had to. She’d lost any hope of a relationship with Ethan—which had only ever been a false hope, she saw now. Hadn’t she told him she wanted an honest relationship? And he’d kept this from her. She wasn’t about to lose her new job, her father’s respect…everything.

  Nor was she about to get in the broom closet. She would do her best to win her father back, but if she failed, she wasn’t going to collapse.

  She wanted to order Ethan out of her chambers, but she couldn’t afford to have him refuse to leave.

  “As I said to you a while back, Dad,” she continued, “conflict of interest is a real problem here.” She widened her focus to include Justice Pearson, shooting him a confident smile. “It’s fair to say small town is a synonym for conflict of interest.” Both her father and the justice chuckled, albeit warily, at the phrase she’d stolen from Ethan.

  “There’s a further problem,” she said, “in that people are unrealistic about the role of a judge—it’s a fundamental lack of understanding of the judicial hierarchy. I ended up judging cakes and cookies at the county fair.” Hal laughed at the ludicrousness of it.

  Cynthia pushed aside the thought that it had been one of the most satisfying days of her life. “I’m also expected to boost storekeepers’ morale by clamping down on shoplifting, to consider DUI defendants’ transportation problems, and to…” She spread her hands. “Well, it’s been a challenge, to say the least.”

  Hal was looking at her with exactly the right blend of sympathy and admiration. Approval gleamed in her dad’s eyes.

  “That’s not what you think of us,” Ethan said harshly. “You don’t just think we’re a bunch of hicks who don’t understand how the law works.”

  “Careful,” Hal said.

  “I’m not in your court now, Justice,” Ethan retorted. “This is my town, my home. A place I love. A place I thought Cindy was growing to love.” His eyes bored into her, but he was the one who was out of line here, not her. She lifted her chin and looked down her nose at him.

  “You might just be talking to the next member of Georgia’s superior court bench,” Justice Pearson warned. Jonah practically punched the air in excitement. “Then next time you’re up on an assault charge…”

  “I’m not the man I was then.” Ethan’s gaze flickered to Cynthia, as if he’d realized he was repeating what she’d said to him.

  He ran a hand through his hair, making it stand up and look even messier.

  “Cindy,” he said, “I should have told you.”

  “But you wouldn’t,” she said. “You never do, Ethan.”

  “Dammit, Cindy, listen to me!”

  “Sadly,” Jonah said to the justice, “our prison system leaves some people with a resentment for authority that they never shake off.”

  The justice nodded. “While others are just trouble from the moment they step into the dock, and you know they always will be.”

  “Oh, for f—” Ethan stopped.

  Cynthia should be glad that his refusal to lose his temper wouldn’t let him say the things that would offend Justice Pearson. Otherwise she would be tainted by association and would lose any chance of getting this job. Already, she felt sick at the thought of explaining all this to her father, trying to restore his faith in her.

  Real love isn’t about what someone does or doesn’t do. It’s about who they are in your life. If that was true, she wouldn’t have to work so hard with her dad…She quashed the thought—taking relationship advice from Ethan was like asking a tobacconist how to quit smoking.

  “Cindy,” Ethan said, “let’s finish that conversation we started last night. Tell me how you feel.” What, he expected her to bare her feelings in front of the justice and her father, while he got to keep his locked away?

  “You agreed with me that love should be about who people are to you, not about what they’ve done,” Ethan said. “Where’s that, now you know I have a criminal record? Or does that only apply to your father?”

  She sensed Jonah’s mounting alarm. “You’ve held up our meeting long enough,” she said. “Goodbye, Ethan.”

  He drew in a sharp breath. Then he headed for the door. “See you around, Judge.”

  “See you in court,” she snapped back, the hurt of his deception still knifing her. She’d thought Ethan was opening up, in his own limited way, and all along he’d kept his past from her. She’d been crazy to even conte
mplate making a place for herself here in Stonewall Hollow. To dare to hope she had a place in Ethan’s heart.

  She turned back to the justice, schooling her expression. “I’m sorry you had to witness that, Hal, Dad. As I said, this job isn’t always easy.”

  “You handled that hothead well,” Hal said.

  “Thank you, but I have to admit I’m feeling I made a mistake,” she said calmly. “When I first felt doubts about Ethan’s program I should have inquired more deeply into his background. Instead, I accepted the recommendations of the sheriff and the probation officer.”

  “I appreciate your willingness to be held accountable,” Hal said. “Everyone makes mistakes, Cynthia. It’s whether you learn from them or not that sets the winners apart from the losers.”

  “You’re right,” she murmured. Ethan had learned from his mistakes, the bad youth had become a good man…but he hadn’t quite learned enough.

  “I think we’ve covered the essentials.” Hal stood. Her dad did the same. The justice shook her hand warmly. “You’ll need time to prepare yourself mentally for court, I know I always do. We’ll see you in there.”

  “Of course.” She turned to her father. “Dad, I want to come back to Atlanta.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “I’ve learned everything I can here,” she said. “Whether or not I’m honored enough to be appointed to the superior court, I’m coming home.” She’d never been so firm with him. She eyed him without blinking.

  “Of course you should come home,” he said. “We all miss you.”

  Cynthia nodded, but didn’t let her relief show. She would be gone, soon, and Ethan couldn’t hurt her.

  “ALL RISE FOR THE Honorable Judge Merritt presiding,” the bailiff announced.

  Cynthia walked to the bench, careful not to focus on the public seating in case she saw Ethan. As the morning’s work got underway, she settled into the rhythm of listening, questioning, listening some more, judging. A wave of calm carried her along, giving her a clarity of vision that was almost painful.

  A DUI, neighbors disputing a fence line, a simple assault—she dispatched each case efficiently and without conflict. One of the defendants even thanked her for her sentence.

  The last ticket on the morning’s docket was Sam Barrett, with criminal trespass added to the shoplifting charge. He stepped up into the dock appearing far more subdued than he had the first time. She saw his mute appeal, fear. Under the law he was an adult…but right now he seemed more like a confused, unhappy child. Tom Cadman, the lawyer, looked at her expectantly. She was supposed to order a transfer to the court in Gonville.

  Where the sentencing judge would take one glance at Sam’s escalating record and see a young man headed for major trouble. He might throw him into jail as a warning.

  It might work, but Cynthia didn’t believe Sam got into trouble for any reason other than to force Ethan to show some emotion. In which case, jail wouldn’t do a thing for him. Other than screw him up the way his father had been screwed up.

  Blind Justice. She thought about what Melanie had said earlier, about seeing beyond the law at the people involved. A legal system couldn’t work like that, of course, it needed structure and rules. But did that have to preclude compassion, good sense?

  Cynthia thought about what Ethan had said in her chambers this morning. Not the I’m-a-convicted-felon part, but that brief acknowledgment he needed to make some changes. She wondered if he meant it, if he could change enough to save Sam.

  She cleared her throat. “How does the defendant plead?”

  She was telling the lawyer, and Ethan and Sam, that she would hear this case. If they thought she was too personally involved, they could appeal later. But now she was going to do her best for Ethan. And Sam.

  Sam pleaded guilty. As Ethan said, he was honest, which gave her reason to hope. The D.A. presented his case, then Sam’s lawyer did his best to show that Sam was a good kid at heart. A challenge that was getting tougher with each new charge.

  Eventually, it was time to pronounce her judgment. She could defer sentencing to another day, so she didn’t have to do this in front of her father and Justice Pearson. But who knew how soon she would leave. And Sam needed help now.

  “Mr. Ethan Granger has some recommendations for sentencing,” Sam’s lawyer announced.

  Ethan stood slowly, almost painfully. Sam’s eyes sought his father’s but Ethan was focused on the bench. On her.

  Don’t blow it. Give me something to work with. Give Sam some hope.

  “YOUR HONOR,” ETHAN BEGAN. It was difficult to look at Cindy when he’d just hurt her so badly…and when she’d hurt him. But he couldn’t take his eyes off her. Couldn’t unscramble his brain to give the argument he’d prepared. It was all getting mixed up with the words she’d thrown at him last night.

  “I want to ask the Court…” He paused, glanced at Sam. His son’s glazed expression said he was a thousand miles away and right this moment thumbing a lift out of Ethan’s life, out of his heart. He’d never make it, of course, Ethan would never let Sam out of his heart.

  “Mr. Granger,” Cindy said, and he realized the silence had grown to elephantine proportions.

  He cleared his throat. “As I was saying…”

  She leaned forward over the bench and said, slowly, deliberately, “Say something else.” Her voice was low and urgent.

  “Excuse me?” He stared at her.

  He saw a hint of a smile on that mouth that drove him wild in so many ways—kissing him, telling him how to raise his son, accusing him of all kinds of things. Saying she thought about forever when she was with him. “Mr. Granger, how did you feel when you heard Sam had been arrested for vandalism?” The question she’d asked that very first day in court.

  “I was disappointed,” he said, as he’d said then.

  She didn’t reply, just sat back, her hands folded in front of her.

  Sam’s eyes lasered into him, twin points of burning heat. What had Cindy said, that the boy didn’t know Ethan loved him? Garbage. Of course he did. Ethan might not have said those words, but Sam had seen his love in the way he stood beside him when he was in trouble. In his eagerness to have Sam with him at the ranch for his community service. In the way he controlled his temper when Sam did his best to provoke him. The way he hadn’t thrown him out.

  Exactly the same things he did for every other kid in trouble in this town.

  The realization hit Ethan like a runaway freight train. Hell. Cindy was right. Sam didn’t have the faintest clue.

  She was watching him now. As if she anticipated what he had to say, but didn’t believe he’d do it. Sam’s expression mirrored hers, Ethan noticed, but without the smidgen of hope.

  “I was angry,” Ethan said quietly. “Sam is my son—” his voice grew in strength “—and although I haven’t been in his life very long—and I’ll regret to the end of my days that I wasn’t there for him when he was younger—I love him like there’s no tomorrow.”

  Sam’s mouth dropped open; so did Cindy’s. Ethan almost laughed. But he was fighting for his life here.

  “Sam’s mom threw him out of his home because of the trouble he was getting into, and I know from experience that kind of rejection is about the toughest thing that can happen to a kid.” Linnet was in the front row, but he figured she would understand he needed to say this. “When he got here, instead of finding what he needed—a dad who understood him and would reassure him he was loved—he found me. A jerk with a ton of good intentions, but no clue how to say something as simple as I love you. Sam, you’re my son, I love you, but I have to tell you, you ever screw up like this again, I’ll kill you.”

  Sam gulped; he blinked rapidly. But he didn’t make eye contact with Ethan. What had Ethan expected? That Sam would say, “I love you, too, Dad,” and they’d have a Hallmark moment right there in court? As if anything worth having had ever come that easy.

  “Your Honor,” Ethan said to Cindy, “I’m not going to kill Sam
, I love him. But this trouble he’s in is killing both of us. I’m asking you to give me and my son a chance.” He could have stood right here and announced he loved her, too—that was what he’d realized overnight though the full impact hadn’t hit him yet. But there was no chance for him and her. Even if he opened his heart, this morning had changed things. She knew his past, which would surely be insurmountable for a superior court judge.

  Cindy was staring down at her notes. The silence in the courtroom was complete, he could have heard an onion growing.

  At last, she lifted her head. “Samuel Barrett, you have pleaded guilty to criminal trespass.” As her clear voice rang through the courtroom, Ethan saw Sam’s shame. “Unlike some of the young people who appear before me,” she continued, “you don’t have to face the consequences of your actions alone. You have a father who loves you more than he loves his own life—” Ethan’s gaze flew to hers, she wasn’t prone to using such emotional words in court “—and a loving grandmother. You are, in fact, lucky. And today—” she half smiled “—is your lucky day. I sentence you to work with your father, to talk to him every day for however long it takes for you two stubborn idiots to realize how much you mean to each other.”

  Sam half laughed, half sobbed. Ethan knuckled his eyes. He caught a flash of horror on the face of Bert Gregg, one of the town’s toughest men. Bert would never be caught close to tears over Bert Jr. But Bert’s wife, Hazel, gave Ethan a tender look. Several other women did the same.

  “When you believe you have reached that stage,” Cindy continued, “you may apply to the court for discharge of your sentence.”

  She would be gone by then.

  “Thank you, Your Honor,” Sam said. She smiled at him.