"Like her daddy," Cait whispered.
Dante's big hand covered hers where it clutched her purse. "Like her mamma, too. It takes a hell of a lot of courage to go against Tyler McClane when he's in the kind of mood he's been in since his arrest." Dante squeezed her hand in understanding before withdrawing his.
Cait swallowed, but the raw taste of panic remained. "I'm not brave, Jess. I just didn't have any other choice, not when I know what will happen if he has to go to prison."
Dante glanced down at his hand without answering.
"He'll die this time. Won't he?"
His gaze flickered toward Kelsey, who was slowly walking toward them with her hands pressed together tightly and her expression solemn.
"Yes, Cait. I think he will." His gaze came back to hers. She read sympathy there and a grief that rivaled her own. "His time with you has changed him too much. I don't think he can make himself hard and unfeeling the way he was before."
Cait's eyes filled with tears. "Don't say that," she pleaded. "Don't even think it."
"How much longer, Uncle Jess?" Kelsey asked as she drew close.
Dante looked at his watch. "Shouldn't be too long now, squirt. These things never start on time, though. Sometimes your fanny gets darn tired."
Kelsey giggled, but her eyes remained fixed on the closed door across the corridor. Cait and Dante exchanged looks. That was the door leading to the cell block where Tyler was locked away.
It was almost ten minutes later when the door opened and Tyler stepped through, followed by the same guard she'd seen in the visiting room.
"Daddy!" Kelsey jerked to her feet, intending to go to him, but Cait caught the hem of her dress and stopped her.
Tyler was shackled hand and foot. It would be awkward for him to hug her, even if the guard would allow it, which, she decided after a swift look at his set face, he wouldn't.
"Let me go, Mama Cait," Kelsey cried as she tried to jerk her dress from Cait's grasp. "It's Daddy."
"I know." Cait's gaze was fastened on Tyler's face. Everything else blurred. The shabby, institutional furniture in the waiting room. The guard's face. Even when Dante hooked his arm around Kelsey to pull her against his thigh, Cait was only dimly aware. Nothing could interfere with her need to make Tyler understand.
"Tyler," she whispered. "Please listen to me. I love you. Don't put this between us. Please don't."
He paused to look at her. Tension rode his shoulders and whitened his jaw. She saw only his eyes. Smoldering with black, embittered anger too strong to be controlled, they impaled her.
"Nothing's changed, Cait," he said in the coldest voice she'd ever heard.
She sat stunned and hurting as he walked slightly ahead of the guard toward the hearing room. His back was proudly straight, his shoulders braced to take whatever punishment the board handed out. The chains hobbling his long legs rattled obscenely against the floor.
Next to her, Kelsey was crying softly. Dante's expression was frozen. Cait's gaze clung to Tyler's back as the guard knocked once, then opened the door. She was still staring long after the door had closed behind him.
* * *
Ninety agonizing minutes later, the three of them, Cait, Dante and Kelsey were back on the same uncomfortable bench.
It had been as bad as Cait had expected. Worse.
Prompted by Harvey Shuffler, Lamont had been unrelenting in his nasty insinuations that Kelsey was lying now to protect the man who was sleeping with her mother.
Tyler's face had turned stark white at that. Like sudden frost over iron, his eyes had gone cold. Cait knew that he had been ready to explode. Even though she had been across the table, too far away to touch him, she leaned forward enough to draw his quick, machine-gun gaze.
Please don't, she had signaled with her eyes. Trust me. Trust your daughter. His jaw had clenched, but he'd made no move to protest.
Dante had been superb, countering Lamont's accusations with calm rebuttals. Step by step, he'd led Kelsey through her story, pausing to let her calm herself when she seemed on the verge of panic, stopping to pour her a glass of ice water when tears flooded her eyes and her mouth trembled uncontrollably.
All through her ordeal, however, it was Tyler's face the little girl watched. Her daddy gave her strength.
Now it was all over but the waiting. Cait had never been so nervous. Her palms were sweating, and she had to keep swallowing to ease the pinched dryness in her throat.
Next to her, Dante was fidgeting with his tie, his hair, just about anything his hand could reach.
Kelsey's head was cradled in Cait's lap. Her feet rested on Dante's hard thighs. At the moment her quiet breathing and the hiss of the ventilation system overhead were the only sounds in the long, empty corridor.
"I'm so proud of you," Cait murmured, bending low over the exhausted little girl.
"Me too, squirt," Dante's deep voice chimed in. "You handled some mighty tough questions like a real soldier."
Kelsey's lashes swooped up and down. "I still don't like that Mr. Lamont," she murmured indignantly into the folds of Cait's skirt. "He was real nasty to Daddy when he was trying to explain about that man Bronsky."
"When wasn't he nasty?" Cait muttered, bringing a chuckle to Dante's throat. Kelsey grinned, too, before her eyelids fluttered closed again. Cait suspected that the little girl hadn't slept much last night.
She herself had paced the floor until well past midnight before climbing into bed to spend the rest of the night staring at the wishing candle on her bedside table.
"It just has to come true," she muttered. "It just has to."
"Pardon?"
Cait gave Dante an apologetic look. "Just talking to myself."
He nodded. "Whatever gets you through the night. Me, I like to pass the time imagining what I'd do to that bastard Shuffler if I ever got him alone in a dark alley."
Cait grinned at that. Perhaps that had been his intention. She had learned that under the rough exterior, Tyler's friend was almost as kindhearted as Tyler. But then, maybe that was why they were friends.
"Jess," she murmured, "what are his chances?"
Dante glanced down at his hand, which slowly closed into a fist. "Less than fifty-fifty."
"How much less?"
He shot her a rueful look. "Ty's right. You can be as stubborn as he is."
"Don't change the subject."
His expression sobered. "Twenty-five, seventy-five."
Cait slumped against the hard bench. In her lap, Kelsey slept peacefully now, but the signs of her ordeal were still visible in the paleness of her skin and the puffy eyelids.
The others who'd attended the hearing—Lamont, Shuffler, Tyler, the guard—were still in the hearing room. They'd remained after the board members had retired to an inner office to deliberate.
Kelsey had wanted to stay, too, but Cait couldn't bear another instant of Tyler's cold withdrawal. Bless his heart, Dante had opted to wait outside with the two of them.
"How long does it usually take?" she asked him now.
"Varies," he answered with a bleak grin. "I remember once it took nearly five hours."
"Five hours!" she exclaimed. "I'll be a wreck."
"Don't worry. This is pretty clear-cut. Either they believed Kelsey, in which case they'll be on Ty's side and inclined to be lenient—at least until the know the results of his new trial. Or they'll believe Shuffler and Lamont, in which case they'll think Kelsey is lying now and throw the book at Ty."
"Thanks a lot," Cait muttered through lips so dry they hurt.
"Just trying to lighten the mood," he said with a grin that looked frayed around the edges.
"There's only one thing that can do that." As though in silent agreement, they both looked toward the hearing room where Tyler waited to learn his fate. Just as I'm waiting out here, Cait thought.
Dante cleared his throat. "How about some coffee? There's a machine outside."
"God, no. I'd be sick."
"Maybe you're right," he muttered.
Cait was silent for only a few seconds before bursting out, "Why is he so stubborn, Jess?"
"He's a man. And every man needs to feel that he has something to contribute, something of value to give to the people he cares about. The last few years have left him with little more than his pride. He thinks you took it away. To a man like Tyler, that can he damn near unbearable, like stripping away his manhood."
Cait gaped at him. In his own way Dante had said the same thing that Tyler had said. "Is that what he told you?"
"No, it's what I know." He hesitated, then touched his sleeve. "When I lost this, I thought I was washed up. As a race driver, certainly, but also as a man. My wife left me because she wanted the fame and money that went with me more than she wanted me. I felt emasculated. In fact, I actually was impotent for a long time."
He paused, gathering his thoughts. A faint red tinge overlaid the olive of his skin, and his eyes were focused on some distant spot.
"Ty came to see me 'long about the time I'd hit bottom. I was broke, still weak from all the surgery, disgusted by my body. He literally kicked my ass out of bed and bullied me into admitting I was just feeling sorry for myself." He turned his head to look at her. "In a way, maybe that's what he's doing, too."
"If he saw it in you, why can't he see it in himself?"
Dante shrugged. "You're the shrink. You tell me."
Cait smiled and turned away. Because he doesn't love me enough to fight, she thought on a wave of pain. Maybe he never can.
"Uh-oh," Dante muttered. "Looks like something's happening."
The door was opening. Shuffler came out first, walking fast. Fear engulfed her. Time seemed to stand frozen. And then Tyler was striding through the door.
"The chains are gone," she murmured to Dante, who rose.
"Damn straight they are!"
"Does that mean—"
"We won," Dante murmured. "Damn it, we won!"
Tears flooded Cait's eyes. "Wake up, Kelsey," she whispered as she gently shook the little girl. "Wake up and look."
"Hmm?" Kelsey's eyelids opened slowly, as though she had been deep in sleep. Cait helped her to sit up.
"Daddy's coming," she murmured past a thick ball of relief and gratitude clogging her throat. At that, Kelsey's eyes snapped wide.
"Daddy!" she shouted.
This time, when she shot to her feet, Cait didn't stop her. With a whoop of joy Kelsey ran toward her daddy, who swept her up in his arms and hugged her hard against his heart. His head was bowed and his shoulders shuddered, as though he were having difficulty coping with the emotions moving through him.
Kelsey was laughing and crying at the same time. "Did we win, Daddy?" Kelsey cried. "Did we?"
"We sure did, thanks to you," Tyler said with deep feeling rasping his voice. Behind him, the members of the parole board were filing out in groups of two and threes, heading for the exit to the right. One or two smiled in their direction. Lamont stared straight ahead as he passed by.
"Really and truly, Daddy?"
"Really and truly." Tyler kissed her heartily before shifting her to one arm so that he could pull Dante into a clumsy hug with the other.
"Thanks, friend," he muttered.
"You ain't seen nothing yet," Dante said with a grin so wide it threatened to crack his strong jaw. "Wait till the trial. With a dynamite witness like this one, we can't lose." He planted a big kiss on Kelsey's cheek before stepping back out of the way.
There was nothing between Cait and Tyler now. Nothing but the cutting words he had flung at her. Nothing but the action she'd taken against his wishes. At the moment those things seemed as high as the tallest prison walls and just as unscalable.
"Congratulations," Cait said softly. Her cheeks were still wet, and her hair was falling from its pins. Tyler nodded, but he didn't speak. Instead, he kissed Kelsey again, then lowered her to the ground. Her hand found his, and he held on tight.
He seemed friendly enough, Cait realized, watching through her tears. Friendly, but distant. Terribly, terribly distant.
"Isn't it terrific, Mama Cait? Daddy can come home now."
"Very terrific, sweetie." Cait managed a smile, but her hands were busy ruining her best purse. Tyler watched her steadily but said nothing. Dante looked from one to the other impatiently.
"C'mon, Kels," he said, holding out his hand. "Let's you and me go get the car and bring it around front."
"Okay," Kelsey said before wrapping her arms around her daddy's lean waist in another happy bear hug.
"Hurry up, okay?" she said over her shoulder as she skipped beside Dante toward the exit.
"Okay," Cait called after her. She continued to watch until Dante and Kelsey disappeared around a corner. Slowly she turned to face the only man she'd ever loved.
"So," she said softly, "you're a free man."
"In a manner of speaking," he said at last. "My parole is still in effect."
"There's the trial in six months."
He wanted to touch her so badly that his hands were shaking like an intern's as he faced his first incision. He shoved them into the pockets of his red jumpsuit and nodded. "You look tired."
Cait mustered a small smile. "I haven't been sleeping well."
"Neither have I." His voice was muted. "I kept thinking of you."
She took a step toward him, then stopped. "What were you thinking?" she asked softly.
"That I needed to hate you."
His words were softly spoken, but his mouth was hard. Hurt shivered through her, as sharp and stinging as any blade.
"I see," she said, and her voice seemed hollow in the empty corridor.
"I'm not sure you do."
"Then tell me." She took a step forward. He stiffened, and she stopped.
Tyler took a deep breath and cast his thoughts backward to a time and place he never wanted to visit again. "There's a game cons play in prison, even the guys in for life. They spend hours on it. Mostly it's just talk. About the things they'll do when they get out. The first meal, the first drink, the first woman—things like that."
"Did you do that, too?" Cait asked softly. In spite of the hurt still living inside her, she needed to know.
"Rarely." His voice was clipped now, as though he hated talking of such things but was determined to do so anyway. "Sometimes, late at night when it was too hot or too noisy to sleep, I couldn't seem to help myself. And then I would think about starting over with a woman who wanted me for me and not what I could give her."
He ran his tongue over his bottom lip as though his mouth were suddenly dry, before continuing. "She never had a face or a name. How could she? The only woman I'd ever really wanted thought I was some kind of depraved monster." He took a slow, painful breath. "You, Cait."
Emotion misted her eyes. "Then why—"
"Let me finish, please."
Biting her lip, she nodded. She was afraid to breathe, afraid suddenly that he would close up again.
"I said that it was a game, and it was. That's all it was, because the real world is a hell of a lot different than the one a guy behind bars wants it to be."
"It doesn't have to be," Cait murmured softly.
He smiled, but there was no humor in the quick movement of his hard mouth. "Be realistic, Cait. You live in a nice house in a nice neighborhood. I live over a saloon, which, at the moment, isn't even paying me a salary."
"So?"
"So a man has to offer a woman a lot more than that."
"Who says?"
"I say. And you know I'm right."
This time when she went toward him, he stood stoically still and waited. When she reached for his hand, he flinched but folded his fingers over hers.
"I know that you'll be acquitted when you come to trial again. And that means you'll get your license to practice medicine again."
Tyler lifted their joined hands and looked down at her carefully tended nails. They were covered in clear polish that only seemed to make them seem more graceful. And fragile.
She yanked her hand from his and propped it against her hip. At the same time she thrust her jaw a good half inch closer to his. "So you're just going to give up? Is that it?"
Anger flared in his eyes, turning them silver. "No, I'm not giving up. I'm trying to show you why it can't work between us."
"Is that supposed to make me feel better?"
"Cait, I have nothing to offer you."
She reminded herself that he'd been hurt very badly. Healing would take time, but it had to start sometime. And it couldn't start with pity or misunderstanding.
"Thank you very much for assuming that I'm like my sister," she threw at him with all the honest fire she could muster. "I can't tell you how gratified that makes me feel right now."
There it was again, he thought in astonishment. That quick burst of temper from her that always caught him off guard.
"I never said—"
"Oh yes you did. Not five minutes ago you stood there in that stupid, ugly red suit and told me in that stiff voice you use when you're keeping everything buttoned up tight inside that there couldn't be anything permanent between us because you were no longer a rich, prominent doctor and, of course, that means that I couldn't possibly want you."
"Cait, I—"
"Oh no! You've had your turn, Tyler. Now it's mine." Her eyes smoked, and her cheeks grew pinker with each word. Her scent swirled around him, filling his senses. His heart sped faster and his respiration increased, making him realize just how helpless he was around her.
"I've had two lovers in my life before you," Cait rushed on. The swift surge of some volatile reaction in his eyes encouraged her. At least he wasn't still looking at her in that frozen way she hated.
"Both were prominent, successful men. Both asked me to marry them. I'm not saying that to brag or make you jealous, but because it's true. It's also true that I turned them down."
The challenge snapping in her eyes dared him to ask why. It was a dare he would be a fool to take. He took it anyway.
"Why?"
Her answer was ready and sure and rocked him back as surely as a sucker punch. "Because I didn't love either of them enough to want his baby. But I want yours, Tyler. And I want you, just the way you are. Stubborn, moody, impossibly sexy and the father of all the rest of my children."
PAROLED! Page 23
