by Lexi Blake
She looked so earnest it made his heart break a little. He leaned over and kissed her. “All right. I’ll talk to her and you figure out what you think is best. I’ll make sure she goes to all her appointments.”
“Thank you. It’s been worrying me.” She laid back down.
He followed, happy that was over. It might be good for Noelle to get out more. He would talk to her about the colleges. She obviously couldn’t actually attend a college since she couldn’t live on her own, but he could talk to her about community college. There was one an hour away. It would be hard, but he might be able to find a way to get her to and from school.
“Have you thought about having other kids?” Lila asked.
The hits kept on coming. “Not really. I’m forty.”
“That’s not old. A lot of people are starting families at forty these days.”
“A lot of people don’t have a disabled kid to deal with.”
“She’s not a kid, though, is she?” Lila mused. “She’s a young woman, and she won’t always be at home.”
He supposed Noelle might find a husband. Probably would since she was lovely. God, he couldn’t think of a single teen in town he would trust with his daughter. He rolled onto his side. “Why are you asking?”
Her eyes were on him, soft and luminous in the low light from the lamp on the nightstand. “I don’t know. I’m curious, I guess.”
This was getting serious. He knew it, but he wasn’t sure he was ready for this conversation. “I hadn’t thought about it at all. Monica had a rough time when she was pregnant with Noelle. She didn’t want to try again. I suppose I got used to the idea of having one kid. Then we got divorced and the accident happened and I haven’t thought about remarrying or even dating at all until I met you. I kind of thought you wouldn’t want kids.”
That seemed to startle her. “Why?”
This was a conversation filled with land mines. “You’re very focused on your career.”
“The funny thing is if I was a man, you wouldn’t even consider that being a barrier to me wanting a family. The other funny thing is a couple of years ago I would have said you were right. I would have said the last thing in the world I wanted was to be a mom. I didn’t have one. I mean I did, and she’s all right now, but when we were growing up . . . Kids need stability. I did not have that.”
“Because your mom was an addict?”
“Oh, yes. She was addicted to a lot of things. Mostly I think she was addicted to not dealing with things. She always wanted to be out of her head. It started with liquor and men.”
“When did she start going to jail?”
“The first time I was six,” Lila explained. “My aunt came and stayed with us while my mother was incarcerated, but she wasn’t terribly interested in four kids under the age of ten. She was there but she wasn’t. She spent most of the time teaching us how to take care of ourselves. It felt harsh, but I was grateful for the lessons later.”
He didn’t like to think about her childhood. “She should have taken care of you.”
Lila shrugged. “We weren’t hers. She never wanted kids and she wasn’t going to spend her life cleaning up her sister’s mess. We found that if we didn’t ask much of her, she was willing to help us with CPS. That was our whole life, trying to convince CPS not to split us up. No one wants to foster four kids together. We learned how to take care of each other, how to push each other to excel because it was the only way we were ever getting out of that trailer park.”
“You grew up fast.”
“I didn’t have much of a childhood, but I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how I might be able to offer a kid a good one. Childhood, that is. For a long time I thought I shouldn’t have kids because my own childhood was rough, but I know what not to do. That’s something.”
What would it be like to start over? Did he have any right to when he had Noelle to take care of?
“Hey,” she said, reaching out and touching his hair, a soft look on her face. “I’m just talking, Armie. I’m not demanding sperm. I promise I’m really on the pill.”
“I wasn’t thinking you lied to me.” He trusted her.
“But you are wondering how we could work long-term if I want kids and you don’t,” she pointed out.
“I haven’t thought about it. Honestly, I haven’t thought much about the future at all since the accident,” he admitted. “I’ve gotten through the days. I’ve sat up nights praying my daughter will be okay. She was depressed after the accident.”
“Of course she was.”
He hated even thinking about those first few months. “I would go into her room at night to make sure she was still alive. Like when she was a baby and I had to get up in the middle of the night to assure myself she was still breathing.”
“You’ve done an amazing job with her. Don’t think that my wanting to try something new with her therapy says anything about what a great dad you are.” She moved to him, cuddling up. “We don’t have to talk about this now. I don’t know why it’s on my mind. We should just have fun.”
“This isn’t fun, Lila.” He was serious about her, and that meant getting real. “I’m not playing around. I’m not having some fling. Can I think about this for a while? I don’t know what I want when it comes to more kids, but I know I want you in my life. I want this.”
He kissed her and felt her relax against him.
The buzzing of his cell phone interrupted the moment. He wanted to ignore it, but he had to pick it up because Noelle might need him.
There was a smile on Lila’s face. “Go on, Sheriff. I’m not ever going to give you hell for needing to answer your phone. I’m on call most of the time, too.”
There were distinct advantages to dating a woman who was also a first responder. He kissed her forehead and rolled over, grabbing his phone.
And his skin went cold because it wasn’t Noelle, who might call him because her tablet froze and she didn’t remember how to fix it. It was Roxie, who would never disturb him unless it was serious.
“What’s happening?”
“You need to come home, boss,” Roxie said. “There’s been an incident. A house burned down. The fire department is trying to save what they can right now, but I don’t like their chances.”
“Whose house?”
He knew the answer before she said the words. “It’s Lila’s place.”
He stood up because their night out was over.
chapter thirteen
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Sheriff.” Bobby Petrie stood in the small cell, his hands on his hips. “Obviously, I couldn’t have burned down anything. I was here.”
“I’d like to know where your brother was last night.”
He suspected Donny Petrie had been busy the night before. Lila’s small home had been completely gutted. They’d made it back to Papillon in the middle of the night, but the morning had brought with it the sight of her destroyed house. She’d held his hand tight as she’d stared at the house she’d briefly called home and then she’d gone to work.
And so had he.
Bobby looked like he’d slept perfectly fine. He was bright-eyed this morning as he looked at Armie through the bars on his cell. “You would have to ask him, but I suspect he was busy trying to find me a lawyer since the only one in town turned us down. He probably spent the whole night on the phone trying to work something out. I assure you my brother wouldn’t have burned down some random woman’s house.”
He could feel Roxie moving to stand beside him. Likely she was going to try to make sure he didn’t murder their prisoner. “She wasn’t a random woman and you know it. You’re lucky Dr. Daley wasn’t in the house at the time.”
Bobby shrugged. “Why would I want to hurt Lila Daley? All she’s ever done is try to help my wife out. She doesn’t understand how sick Carrie is. I blame myself. I should h
ave talked to her. I should have let her know that Carrie can be delusional at times and she loves to get my attention. That’s all this is. You should talk to Doc Hamet. He knows all about my wife’s problems.”
“You can’t fool Dr. Daley the way you did Hamet.” He wasn’t about to let Bobby muddy the waters by bringing the doc into this.
“Not trying to fool anyone. I’m worried about my wife.” He managed to sound like he gave a shit. “Look, I understand that she told you a bunch of stories about how I hurt her and I have, but not physically. I’ve been having an affair with another woman. This is how she’s trying to get back at me. We’ll go over all of it in court, I suspect. If I could talk to her, explain to her that I’m sorry about cheating on her, I’m sure we could handle this on our own. You know how women can be.”
“I don’t,” Roxie interjected. “Why don’t you tell me how women can be.”
“Vindictive,” Bobby replied, his eyes sharpening. “Sometimes nothing you do is enough for a woman.” He seemed to shake off the darkness that had briefly clouded his eyes. Or he’d managed to get his mask back on. “Marriage is hard. It’s definitely more complex when the wife has a mental illness.”
It was easy to see Bobby knew how he was going to play this. The problem was Armie could see some people buying into what Bobby was saying. Lila would be the one who had to explain to the judge and any jury how those injuries couldn’t have been self-inflicted or accidental.
Lila could be the one who tipped the scales of justice in this case, and there was zero question that she would do it. Lila wouldn’t back down.
“Sheriff, can I talk to you in your office?” Roxie turned away from the cell.
She was obviously trying to get him to back off, and she was right to do it because if he didn’t put some distance between them, he might reach in and throttle the asshole. Lila was going to be in this man’s way, and he’d already proven he was capable of hurting a woman.
He’d listened to Carrie on the long drive to New Orleans and he believed her. Even if Carrie hadn’t told him her story, he would have believed Lila’s logic.
Losing his cool here and now wouldn’t help Carrie or Lila down the line. He took a long breath and faced Bobby. “You settle in. I heard the judge is moving slow these days. I’ll let you know if your lawyer shows up. And don’t think that getting out on bond means I won’t be watching you. I see you even breathe around Lila Daley and we’ll be right back here.”
He turned and strode away before Bobby could get another word in. He nodded as Major walked in, ready for his shift. Roxie had spent the night at the station house, but she looked none the worse for it.
Ah, youth. He was getting old, and late nights showed on his face. He wanted to be just waking up, warm and happy with Lila cuddled up beside him. He would have kissed her and made love to her again, and then they would have gotten dressed and walked to Café Du Monde hand in hand. He would have driven her back, talking to her the whole time.
Damn, but he was falling in love with that woman, and that could be dangerous because she might want more than he was willing to give.
“We have to bring in an arson investigator from New Orleans. He’ll be here tomorrow afternoon, but right now the fire department boys are saying they think it was faulty wiring,” Roxie said as soon as she closed the door. “They think it started in the laundry room, and the place went up fast. Something about old newspapers.”
Lila had been planning to recycle the massive stack of papers Bill had collected but hadn’t gotten around to it. And there was no doubt the place had bad wiring. He’d seen it himself. Still, it was awfully coincidental. “I want to know where Donny Petrie was, and while we’re on it, I want to make sure Momma Petrie was out on her island last night. I wouldn’t put it past her.”
“I’ll get right on it. You don’t buy what the fire chief is saying?”
“I don’t know. He’s a good man, but he’s not an arson inspector. I’ll wait until we get that report in. Until then, I want us to keep an eye on Lila.” She’d lost everything. She didn’t have clothes. He was certain her sister was already working on that problem. Lisa had shown up at the site a few minutes after they’d gotten there, throwing her arms around her sister and crying freely.
Lila wouldn’t cry. Not in public. She would wait until they were alone, and even then he would have to make love to her. When he’d stripped down all her walls, she would give in and let the tension out.
Was she planning on moving out to Guidry’s? There was an apartment over the bar. Or she could stay at Lisa and Remy’s home close to town.
He didn’t want that. Was he being a bastard by thinking about using the situation to get her to move in with him? If she did move in, would she get comfortable, maybe so comfortable she forgot the problems they had? Could he convince her to forgo the possibility of having children of her own?
Did he want to do that? The idea of Lila with a baby in her arms was a pleasant one.
The idea of loving that child, of worrying about that child, of potentially losing that child was the thing that made him hesitate.
There was a knock on the door and the very object of his worry opened it.
“Dad, is Lila okay?” Noelle moved into the room, her backpack on her lap. It would include her lunchbox, a couple of books, and her laptop so she could catch up on schoolwork when she wasn’t answering the phone.
Would she be stuck here, working dispatch in a tiny station house for the rest of her life? She’d always been fascinated with chemistry. When she’d been a kid, she’d wanted a chemistry set when other girls her age had asked for Barbie Dolls for Christmas. The fact that she couldn’t walk didn’t disqualify her from working in a lab. But she would need the education to get there.
How would she do that? She couldn’t live in a dorm. His house was equipped to handle her wheelchair and all the problems that came with her lack of mobility. He couldn’t send her out into a world where no one would care.
But wasn’t that the worry every parent had to face?
“She’s fine,” Roxie said. “Lila wasn’t in the house at the time. She was in New Orleans with your father.”
“I didn’t mean physically,” Noelle replied. “She lost her home. I would be devastated.”
“Daley’s a tough one.” Roxie eased around the wheelchair to get to the door. “She’s already back at work. I like her. I would have her watch my back. Boss, I’m going home. I’ll be back for the night shift. Call me if you need anything.”
Noelle turned to him as the door closed. “Seriously, is she okay?”
“As okay as she can be,” he replied. “I need to talk to you about that. She doesn’t have a home. She could go to her sister’s.”
“Or she could stay with us,” his daughter replied quickly.
“You understand that there might be a reason her house burned down.” He wanted to be careful about this. He didn’t want to scare her. “It might be faulty wiring.”
“Or it might be that jerk in the jail cell.” She pointed toward the station house main floor. “Maybe he didn’t do it personally, but he had it done. He wanted to hurt Lila because she helped Carrie get away from him. I’ve heard all sorts of terrible things happened to her out on the islands. Did you know some people think the Petries run drugs?”
He groaned. “Don’t listen to gossip.” Although it might be helpful now. “They’re not blaming Lila for sticking her nose in other people’s business?”
“I was in the café last night and someone called Lila an outsider and Dixie nearly took his head off,” Noelle explained. “I swear she told everyone if they had a problem with the new doc helping women leave their abusive husbands, then they should understand they weren’t welcome in her café. There were a whole bunch of old guys who shut their mouths real fast.”
Since Dixie’s was one of the only places in town to
get a good breakfast, he could bet they had. It was good to know they had at least one person on their side. It didn’t solve the problem, though. “I don’t have any proof that the Petries had anything to do with the fire, and it could be a while before I do. That means Lila could be in danger. If she comes to stay with us, that means you might be in danger, too.”
“I’ll be fine, and I think they’ll think twice before coming after her in the sheriff’s home. She should stay with us.”
That was what he’d hoped she would say. And the truth of the matter was the Petries would be stupid to push it any further. He had a security system, and his house wasn’t vulnerable the way hers had been. “I’ll talk to her. Now tell me why you threw away the counselor’s letter.”
Her eyes widened and a fine flush made her skin pink. “How do you know about that?”
“Lila found it. She didn’t know what it was.”
Noelle frowned. “I wish she’d given it back to me instead of reading it.”
“Why, sweetheart? That was nothing to be ashamed of.”
“And it was also nothing to get excited about. It doesn’t mean anything. I’m going to find an online school and I’m going to get a business degree. I might look into accounting. There’s always work for accountants.”
Somehow he couldn’t see her as an accountant. “I thought you wanted to be a chemist.”
“I can’t get an advanced degree in chemistry online, not one that would get me a good job, and there’s not a lot of call for chemists in Papillon. I’m realistic, Dad. The counselor can talk all she wants, but she’s not the one who would have to figure out a way to get around campus. It’s fine here.”
“Lila thinks you might have more mobility if she changes your physical therapy.” He didn’t want to give her false hope, but he also didn’t want her to not try.
A long sigh came from his daughter’s mouth. “She wants to fix me.”
That might be the case. “I think for Lila this is a way to show she cares about you. You have to go, so why not try? After all, she’s helped you out before. After that purchase she helped you make, I’m fairly certain our electricity bill is going to double.”
