“Yeah, I can visualize it. How much land have you got here?”
“Four and a half acres.”
Hands stuffed in his pockets, Jake rocked back on his heels and looked at the large yard Max had platted by removing some of the trees that surrounded it on three sides. “I like the privacy.” He shot Max a crooked smile. “We’re so gonna have to have the next barbecue here.”
The idea of hosting anything sent a blip of panic racing through him. It wasn’t that he was against the idea—and for sure he’d been to enough dos put on by Jake and Jenny that he likely needed to reciprocate. He simply didn’t have any idea how to go about pulling together anything more complicated than putting out beer and chips. Swallowing his discomfort at the mere thought, however, he said, “Yeah. Maybe.”
Jake snorted and shot him a fist to the shoulder, along with a knowing smile, as if he could somehow look right into his mind. But before Max could respond—or even decide how he should—his brother turned to look at the house again. “What were you doing when I got here?”
And just like that, Max’s discomfort disappeared. He loved his place and, unlike a lot of other subjects, could always discuss it without having to dig for conversation. “This is the original stain job,” he said. “Or at least the one that was on the house when I bought it. I’ve been waiting for both a spate of nice weather like we’ve been having and time off to spruce it up. Today I’m washing the shakes and scrubbing out mildew on the north side, getting it ready to restain.”
“Handy guy. Need a hand?”
Max laughed and eyeballed Jake’s designer T-shirt and shorts. “Yeah, right. And screw up your GQ look?” He indicated the muck splattering his own chin and neck and shoulders, smeared in the hair on his chest and down his abs and spackling his cutoffs. “Your duds probably cost more than my mortgage payment.”
“Please.” Jake made a rude noise. “That’s an easy fix.” Reaching over his back, he pulled his T-shirt over his head and tossed it aside. Then he unzipped his shorts and let them drop to the ground, stepping out of them and kicking them toward the discarded shirt. He turned back to Max wearing nothing but a tan, a pair of boxers and his Tevas. “I’m good to go.”
“Jesus.” Max shook his head. “You must be wicked bored.”
“Yeah.” Jake gave him a sheepish smile. “Jenny’s at work, and Austin went out on his boat with Nolan and Bailey. I’ve cleaned up all my photo files and have been a fucking Suzie Spotless around my place. I need man work.”
Max laughed and led his brother around the corner of the house where he showed him how to scour the shakes. Once Jake started attacking the siding, Max went to the garage to scrounge up another scraper.
With two people working, they finished the north wall in record time. Max found sharing the chore and jawing with his brother a nice change to his usual solitary dig-in-and-just-get-it-done routine. So, after cleaning the brushes and putting them away along with the ladder, he invited Jake into his house to clean up. Then he showed him around, pointing out the improvements he’d made in his spare time over the past couple of years.
“This is really going to be something when you’re done,” Jake said with clear appreciation as they came back downstairs after viewing the still unfinished bedrooms. “Jenny and I have to start looking for something that’s big enough for the three of us and an office and darkroom. I’m tired of living in separate houses.”
“I bet. You gave her the ring—you got any concrete plans on tying the knot?”
Before Jake could answer, the phone rang. Max unearthed his cell from beneath a short stack of Law Officer magazines on the coffee table in the living room and checked the readout. Seeing the caller’s name, he felt his usual combination of enjoyment and tension.
He looked over at Jake. “I’ve gotta get this. There’s beer in the fridge and some chips in the cupboard above it.”
When his brother walked into the kitchen, Max hit the talk button. “Hey, Ma. How’s London?”
“Rainy,” she said, and Max exhaled softly.
So it was going to be one of those calls. Ignoring the discontentment of her tone, he said cheerfully, “We’ve had a pretty good run of weather here for the past couple weeks. I look at it as our reward for the crappy wet winter.”
“Well, I suppose we did have a pretty nice spring here,” his mother allowed.
“There you go. How’s Nigel?” he asked, naming his stepfather.
“He’s doing great.” Her voice perked up, and Max smiled to himself.
He’d been shocked to come home after mustering out of the Marines to discover his mother had packed up and moved to London to marry the man. She hadn’t given him so much as a heads-up.
But Nigel Shevington had turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to Angie Bradshaw. She’d met him while waiting tables at the restaurant in The Brothers Inn. Nigel had proven himself a fast worker, sweeping Angie off her feet and getting her to agree to move halfway across the globe with him practically before she’d even presented him with the check for dinner. Nigel thought she hung the moon, and since meeting him, Angie was probably the happiest she’d ever been.
Happier than he’d ever seen her, at any rate.
Old habits were hard to break, however, and sometimes when they talked she fell back into her old churlish ways. He was content to have diverted her now.
“So what are you doing with yourself in the nice weather?” she asked him. “Are you working today?”
“No, I have a rare Saturday off. I spent some time scraping the shingles on my house to get it ready to stain and thought I might hit the beach in a bit.”
“You and that canal,” she said, her voice half indulgent, half exasperated. “Never in my life have I met anyone else so drawn to the beach and the water as you. I’m surprised you didn’t buy yourself a house on the canal.”
“The sheriff’s department pays a pretty decent salary. But not that decent.”
“I bet that little shit Jake—”
“Ma,” he said with flat-toned warning.
“All right, all right.” She was silent for a heartbeat, then asked, “So, what color are you going to paint your place?”
“I haven’t quite made up my mind yet. I thought I’d ask—” Shit. Jake, he’d almost said, because his brother had a much more artistic eye than he did. And wouldn’t that go over like a fart in church? “—a friend I know who’s good with that sorta thing.”
“Well, I’m sure it will look very nice. We’ve enjoyed the pictures you’ve sent. You’ve made a lot of progress with the place.”
“Yeah. I have.” He shoved down the memory of her demanding why the hell he was sinking good money after bad into such a dump. “It’s coming along pretty good.”
“Jesus, bro,” Jake called from the kitchen. “You’ve got the diet of a twelve-year-old.” He walked into the living room with a beer in one hand and a bag of Doritos in the other. “Oh, sorry,” he said, stopping just this side of the doorway. “I didn’t realize you were still on the phone.”
“Who’s that?” Angie demanded. “Bro? Who the hell calls you— Oh. My. Gawd.” Her voice rose in both pitch and volume with each word. “Is that Jake Bradshaw?”
As much as he wanted to say no, if only to avoid the inevitable temper tantrum about to rain shit on his head, he not only didn’t lie to himself, he tried to make truth-telling an all-around general policy. Well, unless a woman asked him if something made her butt look big, that is. Because if it did, he’d lie like a rug with no compunction at all. He wasn’t a complete idiot.
Okay, maybe that was debatable. Because, given the long history of bad blood between Charlie Bradshaw’s first and second families, a smart man would probably lie his ass off. But not him, boy. Oh, no. He said, “Yes.” Then braced himself.
His mother was nothing if not predictable, and it didn’t take her any time at all to go off. “What the hell is he doing at your house?” she demanded. “And bro—he calls you bro?
Aren’t you all cozy with the enemy.”
“He’s not my enemy, Ma, he’s my half brother. We’re trying to get past our old relationship to build a new one. It’s what grown-ups do.”
A slight, ironic smile tugged at Jake’s mouth, and he turned to go back into the kitchen. A second later Max heard the back door open and close and wasn’t sure if Jake had just gone outside to give him some privacy or, reminded of the toxic treatment Max had subjected him to in the old days, had lit out for home instead.
“How can you say such a thing?” The fury in his mother’s voice redirected his attention back to her. “He stole every damn thing that rightfully should have been yours.”
He’d had a lifetime of practice letting her anger roll off his back. But wondering if his exchange with her had driven Jake to leave dredged up an ice-edged anger of his own. “No, Ma,” he said with a cold finality. “He didn’t. Dear old Dad did that all by himself. And your constant anger over it sure as hell didn’t help. But Jake didn’t ask for the situation any more than I did. Jesus, we were boys—just a couple of little kids caught in the crossfire of an adult war. But I’m not that teen who was angry because my mother thought I should be anymore. I’m through with that crap, and I’m getting to know my brother. Deal with it.”
“Well, I never!”
“Yeah—and that was part of the problem. You never let me forget how badly we were wronged. Never let me just be a kid.”
Jesus, Bradshaw. He had no intention of giving in on this, but he dealt with worked-up people on a regular basis and knew better than most how casting blame and putting them on the defensive benefited no one. So, with more effort than he liked to admit, he expunged the attitude from his tone. “Listen, Ma, I’m sorry—I’m not blaming you. But this is the new reality. I have a half brother that I’m getting to know, and I don’t think that’s an unreasonable thing. So give it some thought and call me back when you decide you can live with it.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” she snapped.
“That’s up to you. But you might want to keep in mind that I don’t plan to change mine. So if you want us to have a relationship, you’re the one who has to make adjustments this time.”
They disconnected after an exchange of stiff goodbyes, and he took off for the kitchen. Once there he paused only long enough to grab a beer out of the fridge before barreling through the back door.
He spotted Jake leaning against the trunk of an evergreen, calmly sipping his brew and taking in the yard and the woods around him. Max blew out a breath as he felt the tension leave his shoulders.
Looking up, Jake pushed away from the tree. “Your mother still hates my guts, huh?”
“Yeah. But I don’t.” And hearing himself say as much out loud, he realized he truly had let go of the old baggage concerning his brother once and for all.
Jake grinned. “I loved the ‘It’s what grown-ups do’ comment.”
“’Course you did. You were the one who acted like an adult first.”
Jake laughed. “Yeah, I did, didn’t I? Am I a fucking genius or what?”
“A fucking something,” he agreed.
“God, you’re a hard case.” Jake shook his head. “Probably due to your lousy diet. Christ, Max, there’s nothing but junk food in your cupboards.”
“What are you talking about? I had cereal for breakfast.”
“With Coke. Don’t try to tell me otherwise, the can was next to your bowl in the sink. Besides, oatmeal is cereal. Honey Smacks and Froot Loops are boxes of enriched candy.”
“Enriched being the operative word.”
“No, idiot—candy being the operative word. I wouldn’t let my kid eat that shit.”
He shrugged. It was what he’d grown up on. “Hey, the stomach likes what the stomach likes.”
“If you need sweet cereal, I can recommend some healthier options. They still have sugar, but at least you get a decent amount of fiber to go with it.”
Max stared at him. “Boy, you must be bored, if you’re sitting around reading cereal box nutrition labels.”
A trace of color climbed Jake’s cheeks, but he merely said, “Jenny educated me when I came back into Austin’s life. Dude, my fourteen-year-old has better eating habits than you. And that’s not saying much.”
Max gave him a look and Jake shot him a cheerfully unconcerned smile. “Okay, okay, I’m changing the subject now. Just...maybe think about it a little, okay?”
“Sure thing, Dad.” His gaze dropped to the bag of Doritos in his brother’s hand. “I’ll do as you say, not as you do.”
“Shit.” He shook his head—then dug out a handful of chips. “Shut up and drink your beer.”
Max laughed. “Now, there’s fatherly advice I can get behind. What do you say we finish these up, then head down to the access to watch the idiots launch their boats?”
“Sounds like a plan to me.” Jake gave him a sidelong look. “Let’s go in your cruiser so I can work the siren.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE FOLLOWING TUESDAY Harper parked her newly rented car in the Cedar Village parking lot. This was the first opportunity she’d had to check the place out since arriving in town, and the prospect of making her initial assessment of the nonprofit boys’ home had a little frisson of excitement slithering up her spine. She locked the car and strode across the pavement to the archway in the black-stained wood fence that formed the grounds’ front perimeter. Gazing out across the property, she noted that its other borders were made up of woods comprised of cedar and alder trees.
On the other side of the archway three paths veered off in separate directions. A post at their confluence bristled with wooden hand-shaped signs pointing toward the various buildings to be found down each one. As she started along the path indicated by a thrusting finger that read Administration, she looked around.
The homey, sprawling collection of one-storied buttercream-colored, black-trimmed buildings took her by surprise, even though she hadn’t consciously envisioned the setting ahead of time. Somewhere in her psyche, however, she must have had a more formal configuration in mind. These structures, while immaculately maintained, looked as though they’d been shaken in a giant dice cup and tossed willy-nilly across the emerald landscape. It lent the place a friendly vibe—and made the “village” in Cedar Village seem particularly apt.
An outdoor basketball court slanted between her destination building and another that was set at an angle just this side of it. It rang with the shouts and grunts of a game of Shirts and Skins. Sneakers squeaked, a leather ball thumped, and, giving the constantly moving game a closer, but hopefully inconspicuous, examination, she saw it was made up largely of teenage boys with a few men she assumed were counselors or teachers thrown in.
Even as she watched, the boy currently in command of the ball, a tall, good-looking black kid with yard-long dreads pulled back in a thick ponytail, stopped dead and tucked the ball beneath his arm. When another teen tried to knock it from his hold, he twisted away, ramming his free elbow in the boy’s side.
The kid on the receiving end swore roundly.
The black youth didn’t take his gaze from her. “Dawg,” he said by way of explanation to the other boy, jutting his chin in her direction, “we got us a woman come visiting.” He subjected her to a slow, appreciative up and down appraisal. “A hawt woman.”
Good God. Males were the same no matter what their age, apparently. Finding herself the sudden cynosure of an entire basketball court full of males, she simply gave them a cool glance and continued toward the admin building.
Until a voice she knew said quietly, “That’s enough, Malcolm,” even as another adult said, “Remember what we discussed about appropriate conversation?”
She whipped around and zeroed in on Max, who—Lord have mercy, didn’t it just figure?—was on the Skins team. How on earth had she missed him the first time around? The guy was half a head taller than anyone else there.
He was just an immense, strapping male, peri
od. Hell, when he was clothed she found that chest, those shoulders and long, muscular arms infinitely sexy.
Seeing the whole package dressed in nothing but a glaze of perspiration, tattoos and dark body hair that feathered his forearms, fanned across his pecs and ran in a narrow path down his abs to disappear in his low waistband drove every drop of moisture from her mouth. And, dear God. Was that a nipple ring she saw glinting through his chest hair?
It felt like a millennium that she stood there staring, but in actuality it was likely only a second or two before the kid named Malcolm mercifully broke her single-minded focus.
“Hey,” he said with a shrug, “is it really inappropriate if it’s true? I mean, you can’t honestly tell me she ain’t hawt, right?” His teeth flashed white. “And she’s a sister, too—at least partly. That’s something you gotta admit is in seriously short supply in this white bread burg. Hey, baby, wanna date?” he called, then turned back to the men. “Now that’s inappropriate. But only to demonstrate the difference, ya dig?”
She had to swallow a smile at his smart-ass insouciance. Knowing better than to engage him, however, she turned away and headed with new purpose—one that didn’t involve gawking at Deputy Bradshaw’s very fine body—toward the administration building. She heard the game start up again as she reached it.
A sign on the door invited her to come in, and, opening it, she poked her head in.
There was a small reception area with a desk facing the door, but no one manned it, and of the two doors she could see at first glance, one was closed and the other all but. Feeling a little like an interloper, she stepped inside.
The deserted room was clean and cheerful, with walls painted a few shades brighter than the exterior hue and hung with colorful framed posters of classic hot rods. She liked the way that, even in the management section, it was geared toward boys’ interests. “Ms. Schultz?” she called softly.
“Yeah, hang on a sec,” replied a female voice from behind the door that was just barely cracked open, and Harper heard the sound of a chair being pushed back. A moment later a middle-aged woman appeared in the doorway.
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