“More,” she said, five minutes down the road.
He’d told her she was boss. Jay let the bike have its way with the road a little more, and more again another mile farther. Ellen’s inner thighs gripped him he took a curve. Her hands moved down to his waist, holding him securely.
He increased the speed once more and she laughed out loud.
And that’s when the whole damn thing went bad. The laugh, the touch of her hands, or maybe it was her thighs holding his. Whatever…Jay felt a nudge of sensation between his legs that started to grow.
ELLEN TURNED HER SUV onto the dirt path leading up the mountain, honking her horn as she did so. She’d told Joe she would stop by early in the week, but he probably hadn’t been expecting her on Monday.
She needed to talk to someone, and it sure as hell couldn’t be anyone in Shelter Valley.
He flashed a piece of cloth in front of the window as she pulled up so Ellen got out and made her way to her window seat.
“What happened?” The gruff voice didn’t even say hello.
“What do you mean?”
“The look on your face when you walked up.”
First him, then they could talk about her. “I wanted to make certain you’re okay with the books and supplies. Do you need anything?” He couldn’t give up on this.
“A pack of number two pencils.”
“What about the other pencils I got you?”
“I keep breaking the damn lead on the mechanical ones. Never did see the likability in them. And ink means I can’t erase.”
He was taking notes?
“Of course,” she said, trying to keep the excitement from her voice. “Is tomorrow soon enough?” She didn’t want to push too hard.
“Next week is fine.”
“Okay. Do you have anything for me to take to Dr. Sheffield?” Since the semester hadn’t yet started, Phyllis wasn’t in her office. But she’d asked about Joe so many times, Ellen knew she was itching to see something from him. Eager to help him if she could.
“School hasn’t started yet.”
“You aren’t attending class, either. You’re enrolled, but until you come down to class, she’s creating a separate syllabus for you.”
“I didn’t realize I was causing trouble. I thought…”
“You aren’t causing trouble, Joe.” Ellen stared out at the dirt and trees between her and the path that led down the mountain to civilization. “Phyllis, Dr. Sheffield, has been after me for a couple of years to talk you into studying with her.”
“Why?”
Ellen didn’t usually talk to Joe about people in the valley. And certainly didn’t want to leave him with the uncomfortable belief they were all talking about him. But maybe it was time for the old man to face some things, too. Maybe it was time to push a little.
Pushing a little was supposed to help her, so…
“The sheriff talked to her about you. After you helped him catch his dad’s killer, he wanted to do what he could for you.”
“She’s a teacher. And I don’t need help. Not much, anyway.”
She knew Joe appreciated the groceries. Before the sheriff and Ellen had been making their treks up the hill, the man had hiked the many miles to town once a month to buy what would fit in the rudimentary cart he’d made.
Ellen had no idea how the man handled his banking. Joe paid her in cash for everything she brought.
“Phyllis is also a certified psychologist.”
“I’m being poked at by a shrink.”
“No! You’re taking a psychology class. I’d like you to think about an English class, too. A friend of Phyllis’s teaches several literature classes that I think you’d like.”
“One thing at a time, young lady. Take this down to Dr. Sheffield. She might change her mind about this whole remote teaching thing.”
Hearing the rustle of something sliding against the sill, Ellen reached behind herself to grab it. Joe had given her one of the spiral bound notebooks. Every single page was filled, both sides, from top to bottom with precise, neat handwriting.
Her plan was working. Joe needed more than his mountain could give him. More than anything, Ellen wanted to help the man find a way out of his prison. It was as though by helping Joe heal, she was also healing herself. If she could guide him to freedom, she was also setting herself free.
The past could only hold them hostage if they let it.
“Can I talk to you?” She’d thought about this a hundred times during the night.
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“I belong here.”
“Okay.”
“Don’t be thinking you’re going to change that.”
“That’s not what I want to talk to you about.”
“Then talk.”
“I went on a motorcycle ride yesterday. And another one today.”
“Didn’t know you had one.”
“I don’t. I’d never been on one before.”
“You were with someone else.”
“Yeah.”
“A man.”
“Yeah.”
“A date?”
“No! It was nothing like that.”
“Too bad.”
“He’s a therapist. My therapist. The rides are part of my treatment.”
“Don’t fall for that, Ellen. You call someone. This morning. Before you get to town. Let them know about this guy. No therapist takes a beautiful young woman on a motorcycle ride.”
“He works with Shawna. She referred him to me.”
“She check his credentials?”
“Of course. He works with some of my people at Big Spirits, too. Remember Hugh? I told you about him.”
“The cantankerous one. Won’t leave his room until his kids visit and they won’t because he was a controlling bastard their entire lives.”
“That’s their story.” Ellen couldn’t quite connect the hurting old man with tears in his eyes to the character Hugh’s son had tried to depict. She suspected that the son was describing himself and wasn’t going to be dictated to by his father who no longer had anything to contribute to his life—his son’s words.
“Anyway,” Ellen said slowly, “Hugh was so stiff from lack of exercise that he couldn’t get himself to the bathroom last week. Jay had him walking within a couple of days. Hugh does whatever Jay tells him to do.”
And she knew that Jay had stopped in to say hello to Hugh every single day. Including Sunday.
Jay hadn’t mentioned the visits to her.
“Don’t you be doing whatever he says. Motorcycle rides? How did he justify that one?”
“The idea is to put me in a situation where I have to touch someone to stay safe. But the experience has to be a good one so that I will associate the touch not only with safety, but also with pleasure.”
Ellen relaxed when Joe remained silent. If he’d found no potential validity in the exercise, he would have blurted his concern without taking time for a breath.
That was Joe. Her watchdog. And hopefully she was the chain that could pull him out of seclusion and into the life he’d let go. He was alive. And deserved to live.
“How’d they go?”
“I loved the rides. They reminded me of a time when I was a kid and Dad was still home, in love with Mom. Shelley and Rebecca had been born, but we didn’t have Tim yet. We all went to an amusement park and my father took me on this swing ride. My sisters stayed with Mom—they weren’t tall enough. It was just me and my dad and it was the greatest thing I’d ever done. I felt wild and free and special and like I could do anything in the world. Like the world was perfect. I’ve never forgotten.”
She was talking to the trees. Watching a mental movie. And smiling.
“Did you touch him?”
“Yeah, to hold on.”
“And?”
“It was a little awkward. I mean, he’s like a doctor to me and I hardly know him. But otherwise, no problem. I was in control. So that doesn’t really mean
anything, does it?”
“Therapy usually works in stages. I read about that.”
In a Psychology 101 textbook? Or was Joe reading the other books Phyllis had sent? Ellen hadn’t looked through the packet she’d delivered.
“He wants me to ride with him again. Until I don’t feel any awkwardness at all.”
“How does he look at you?”
“I don’t really know.”
But she thought she had noticed something when Jay got off the bike yesterday. Then he’d turned, occupied by storing their gear. She hadn’t looked in that direction again, either.
“Did he come on to you? Ask you to his place?”
“I told you, it’s not like that.”
“You’re sure?”
“About that? Yes.”
“I don’t like it.”
“I’m not sure I do, either.” Which was why she was talking to Joe. She certainly couldn’t talk to her mother or anyone else in Shelter Valley. They would keep her under lock and key until they booted Jay out of town.
“I worry about you living alone every single day.”
“I have Josh. Most of the time.”
“A young child is no protection.”
“I have a gun. Took self-defense. Carry pepper spray. You know that.”
“And I know that you are a woman and a man’s a man and one is genetically stronger than the other.”
She hated when he talked this way. But she knew that if he was ever going to accept the world, ever rejoin society, he had to see that not every woman was in imminent danger of attack.
“There are ways to take someone down regardless of physical strength.” She knew them, and would use them if she had to.
“And when you’re in bed at night, asleep, what then? What if you’re taken by surprise before you have a chance to think of your techniques? You need a man in your house, protecting you.”
“I want to marry and have a partner and…maybe even more children,” Ellen said quietly. “But I do not need a man for protection.”
“You need this therapy.”
“I think so, too.”
“You’ve told me about it. Now I’ll worry. Keep me informed. Okay?”
“Yeah. And Joe?”
“What?”
“Thank you.”
“Next time the sheriff’s up this way I’m telling him about what you’re doing with this guy.”
She’d figured he would. And was glad for the protection. Even if she didn’t need it.
CHAPTER NINE
JAY RECOGNIZED THE NUMBER on his phone Monday evening and answered immediately.
“Yeah.”
“Jay, I haven’t heard from you,” Kelsey said.
He hadn’t heard from her once in the twelve years his son had been alive—not even a birth announcement—and now all of a sudden there was a rush? “I know.”
“You’re not running out on us, Jay. Not again.”
“I didn’t run out on anyone before,” he reminded her. He’d been the one left in the cold. Not one of the families who had opened their homes to him had had any qualms about letting him take the fall for them.
“You know what I mean.”
No, he really didn’t.
“You turned traitor. You’re the one who made the call that sent you to prison. You did it to yourself and had no right taking everyone else down with you.”
Yes, because saving a drugged girl from life-altering devastation was not the right thing to do.
“Was there a point to this call, Kelsey? I’m in Arizona. I told you I would be in touch soon and I will be.”
“Cole cut school twice last week. He’s back on pot. I’m certain of it.”
Maybe if they didn’t give the kid enough money to buy the stuff, or maybe monitored his friends a little better, they wouldn’t have this problem. But what did he know? He had no skills with this parenting thing.
“You said he was being tested regularly.”
“He is.”
“And?”
“The last two tests were clean, but after each test he’s had this smirk on his face—the one that tells me he’s up to something. I think he’s found a way to manipulate his drug tests.”
“You sure you aren’t paranoid because you know what you got away with when you were growing up?” Jay couldn’t resist the taunt. It helped take away the sting of concern for the son he’d never met. Despite all they’d done, Kelsey and her crowd had all turned out all right.
“I’m sure, Jay. None of us ever ended up in jail.”
No, but not because they hadn’t committed the crimes that would have put them there.
“You have to do something. Cole’s out of control and we can’t handle him anymore.”
“I have some things to clear up,” he said. “I told you I’d be in touch and I will be.”
“When?”
“Soon.”
“Soon is not good enough.”
He wasn’t sure he was going to be good enough, either. Hell, the last thing a troubled kid needed was a guy who had no clue what to do with him. If Cole was already riding on the edge, he couldn’t afford a parental screwup. He couldn’t afford to trust—or need—a guy who wasn’t capable of being around for the long haul. A guy who made a habit of moving rather than dealing with women who wanted more from him than sex.
Jay could tell Kelsey that. He could say no. Tell her to find someone else to help her kid.
If he were some other guy, maybe he could. But whether he was father material or not, Cole was his son.
“Soon is going to have to be good enough,” he finally said. “It’s all I’ve got.”
JAY TOOK ELLEN OUT AGAIN on Tuesday. During the early-morning hours at her request. Early morning was good for him. He had things to think about as he rode. He focused on upcoming appointments, clients at Big Spirits and, when that wasn’t enough to distract him from an awareness of the female body behind him, he thought about his father. He’d been searching for a week—perusing every document he could find—and he was no closer to locating the bastard than he’d been before he started looking.
If he didn’t turn up some clue soon, he was going to have to ask Sheriff Richards for help. Though Jay hated to ask anyone in this town for anything, he needed more official resources and his access to them was in Miami.
He thought about his son, too—about the most recent call from Kelsey. Jay knew nothing about kids, living with them or raising them. He had no idea what she thought he could do to help.
Leaning to the left, he rounded a corner, comfortable with the powerful machine between his legs. He and the bike were one. Part of one body.
And thinking of bodies…
Ellen’s hands were on his shoulders. Their third time out and her touch was still tentative.
She was enjoying the motorcycle, and, he hoped, learning to trust him so that they could move to the next stage of therapy—light massage. On top of her clothes.
“Can we stop a second, I’m getting a call.” Ellen’s voice came through the buds in his ears.
Pulling over to the side of the road, Jay guided the bike with his feet until they were far enough onto the shoulder to be safe.
Ellen shifted behind him. “It was my mother.”
He couldn’t miss the displeasure in her voice.
“I have to call her.”
Jay pulled the buds out of his ears when they crackled with Ellen’s movement as she removed her head gear. She got off the bike and he turned to watch her.
She pushed one button and paced while she held the smartphone to her ear.
“Mom?”
That was it, nothing else for what seemed an inordinately long time. He tried not to listen when Ellen eventually spoke.
“Yes, Beth was right. I’m riding on his motorcycle.”
Beth? As in the sheriff’s wife? Jay wiped at the chrome on his handlebars with his thumb.
“It’s not like that, Mom.”
Another silence.
“Mom, don’t do this to me.” Her voice was firm. “Yes.”
More silence.
“Because I didn’t want you to do exactly what you’re doing. I made a decision. An educated decision.”
Ellen paced in front of the bike. Then around it. She didn’t look at Jay, but she didn’t stray far, either.
“I know. But you have to trust my judgment. I’m a grown woman.”
He’d had a lot of attractive clients. He’d never had trouble maintaining the walls between the therapist and the man. What was it about this woman that raised these uncomfortable feelings?
“Not anymore, I’m not. Besides, it’s therapy. He’s reporting to Shawna.”
She was so damned beautiful and seemed completely unaware of that fact. Which had to worry her mother.
Beautiful women didn’t usually get their hooks into him. So why did this one seem to be doing so?
Was it the town? The loving environment that was so foreign to him? Was it the knowledge of Cole? The possibility of a family on the horizon?
“I have to go. I had Jay pull over when my phone rang. I didn’t want you to worry.”
He tinkered with the key in the ignition, the back of his neck burning as her voice grew closer behind him.
“I know. But you undermine me when you don’t trust me.”
Ellen had her head on straight. Jay had already figured that out.
“I know,” she said. “I love you, too.”
He heard the phone click closed seconds before the bike took her weight. Securing his earbuds, Jay didn’t turn around as Ellen fidgeted then said, “I’m ready.”
“Everything okay?” he asked as he rolled the bike toward the road, checking for oncoming traffic. “Yeah.”
He didn’t pursue the subject further. He had to trust that she knew the situation well enough to know.
“SO WHAT IS IT THAT you have to tell me?” Ellen stood in her mother’s kitchen that afternoon, after work. She was still holding on to the joy of her day, reluctant to discuss anything that would crush it.
The residents at the center had been in particularly high spirits as they’d played bingo for brownies. And Hugh had joined them. For the first time since he’d moved in.
He’d won a brownie.
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