by Lyn Cote
“That much I already understand,” Gil said in a self-deprecating tone. “But how do we stop his misbehavior?”
Patience folded her hands and stared at them, not Gil. Though he tempted her sorely. Why do I want to be near him? Does it have anything to do with my concern for his son? “I’m not a child psychologist, but I’ve learned a few things myself. First, how often do you hug Darby?”
“Hug him?” Gil looked as though she’d just asked something ridiculous.
She finally let herself touch his hand. We all need to be touched, Gil. “You’d be surprised how healing the human touch can be. Even in these days where everyone is hypersensitive about misconduct, I try to touch my students hello and goodbye. A pat on the shoulder, on the head, the cheek. Just a touch can make a difference to a child.”
“I’ll try to remember that.” Gil’s voice had roughened.
Was it with emotion?
She gazed into his eyes, seeing genuine vulnerability in this man. He loves his son. He just wants what’s best for him.
She felt her heart move toward him. How could she be angry with a man who would bare his secrets and ask his enemy or at least, his least favorite person in town, for help with his son?
Gil folded his larger hand around hers.
“And you did right not making a big deal over the helmet in front of Darby.” Her voice quivered with her reaction to his first tentative touch. “But you still stood up to your ex-wife for your son’s safety. I think you did pretty well in a difficult situation.”
“I did?” He sounded pleased and his hand tightened around hers.
“You did.” Her heart raced at their contact and she began to feel a lightness of spirit she hadn’t felt in many days.
The waitress interrupted by serving their meals. Patience pulled her hand from Gil’s. The young woman blushed…at catching them holding hands? She disappeared immediately.
Patience tried to focus on the meal in front of her, not thoughts of holding hands…and kisses. The aroma of beef floated up.
“I don’t like my ex’s new boyfriend.” Gil picked up his knife and fork.
She tried to reel in her mounting curiosity about Gil. “Just because of the Harley?”
“No. The first time he met me he said that he and D.A.’s didn’t get along.”
I know how he feels. Patience allowed herself a wry grin. “Don’t you think that might be just a reflex remark?”
“What do you mean?” He eyed her as if she spoke a foreign language.
“I’m sure your ex—what is her name?”
“Coreena.”
“I’m sure Coreena had told him who you were in the community and he probably felt outclassed.” Patience took a steadying sip of coffee and watched Gil’s eyes, so revealing of his concern. “By throwing out that line, he was letting you know he won’t be pushed around just because you have status he doesn’t.”
“You think so?”
“I do.” Patience put her cup in the saucer and appraised him. Time to see if he would accept the advice he’d sought. “Now, how often does Darby visit his mother?”
“He spends every other weekend with her. She works at a supper club in the next town and makes sure she gets off two weekends a month.”
A real sacrifice because her tips would be the best on the weekends. Do you realize that, Mr. District Attorney? “That means she does value her time with her son.” Patience kept her voice even. “Do you ever prompt Darby to call his mom during the weeks they are apart?”
Gil’s expression twisted. “No, I try to minimize their contact. It seems to upset him. He always acts up when he has to go to her place and when I pick him up.”
“I think that’s fairly common, too.” Patience said a quick prayer. Giving advice was no small responsibility. “I think if you encourage Darby to have more consistent contact with his mom, the coming and going would be less of a…break or an emotional bump for him. And I think you’ll find that he begins to feel better about himself.”
“But she doesn’t…”
“She doesn’t what?” Patience studied his eyes, trying to read his struggle there. She imagined cupping his smooth cheek in her palm. She quickly refocused her thoughts on his son, where they belonged.
“She’s…not a very good mother.” The hesitant words sounded wrung from him. He stared at his plate.
That’s your opinion. Maybe she is and maybe she isn’t, Gil. But I won’t argue with you about that now. “But she is Darby’s mother. You’ll have to help her improve by encouraging what she does that is good and discouraging what is detrimental. Just like you did over her taking Darby out of school when he should have been serving detention.”
“You heard about that?” Irritation flashed over his features.
I’m not prying into your affairs, Gil. “Of course…I’m his teacher. And after it happened, you put into place the procedure that Darby’s mother isn’t allowed to take him out of school without your permission.”
“You sound like you think I overreacted.”
Patience chewed, stalling. “I’ve never been a parent. But sometimes a special trip like that isn’t a bad idea. I know that Darby was happier the next day. Maybe a day with his mom was just what he needed after the squirrel incident. Maybe his mom sensed that.”
She observed from Gil’s expression that this was a completely new idea to him.
The meal ended and Patience and Gil left the bright café for the dark night. At the corner of the square, Patience shivered in the bitter end-of-November wind. “I can walk home alone. You’re paying for a baby-sitter.”
Gil didn’t like the way she was dismissing him. Somewhere during the meal, this had become a date to him. Obviously not to Patience. “I could use the exercise and Darby likes his baby-sitter,” he replied. “She’ll play video games with him.”
“Okay.” Patience stepped off the curb and stumbled.
Gil caught her arm. “Careful.”
“I’m okay. My heel hit a loose rock.” She glanced around as they crossed the quiet street. “I hate it when it gets dark in winter so early.”
Breathing in a fresh scent that clung to her skin, Gil kept her elbow in his grip.
At the other side, she tugged away from him.
Her pulling away disquieted him. Her blond hair shone in the darkness. And her pale face reflected the scant light from the street lamps. He drew nearer and kept in step with her. He tried to come up with some conversation, but his mind had gone blank. All he could think of was kissing Patience Andrews.
I can’t kiss this woman. She’s my son’s teacher. And we’re on the opposite sides of an ongoing case. But this line of reasoning didn’t seem to dampen his urge to kiss this tall, willowy woman.
The street they walked along was deserted. Lights glowed in the windows of the houses they passed. A profound silence crowded in around them, broken only by an owl repeating its mournful call. Gil wrestled with his acute awareness of the woman beside him. Why won’t she look at me?
“I appreciate your honesty,” he said at last. They walked beside a high hedge in front of a large Victorian home.
“I appreciated yours.”
Meee-ooow! A black cat sprang out in front of them from the hedge.
Patience leaped to one side, coming up against Gil.
His arms of their own accord wrapped around her. She turned within his arms, flush against his chest. And he kissed her.
He let his lips gently touch hers, drawing her warm breath into his own mouth. “Patience,” he whispered. Shock rippled through him as she hesitated and then began to kiss him in return.
He drew her closer, closer, pressing her tightly against him. He wanted to trap her softness, her warmth there, keep it to warm him when he would again be alone.
“We shouldn’t,” she whispered.
He heard the halfhearted plea in her low voice, the voice that had attracted him from the first. “Right,” he whispered back and he deepened his assault on her
tender mouth.
A car drove by, momentarily bathing them in headlight glare. The intrusion broke their connection, but not their touch.
He was breathing hard. He shook himself mentally and gazed into Patience’s face. She looked puzzled.
“I should be getting you home,” he said, his voice rasping in his throat. But he refused to release her.
She nodded and they began walking again. This time, hand in hand. Only their gazes looked forward, not touching.
Finally on the front steps of Mrs. Honeycutt’s, Patience said good-night to Gil. He still held her hand. She didn’t know exactly what she should add…thanks for dinner and that kiss?
“Good night,” he murmured and then he kissed her cheek. He swung away, hurrying down the steps and to the sidewalk without a backward glance.
But Patience couldn’t move until he was swallowed up by the dark night. Then she let herself in quietly. She didn’t want to bother her landlady. Or give in to the temptation to relate any of the confidential conversation she’d just had with Gil. Or reveal the fact that he’d kissed her.
She needed time to consider all he’d said to her. All she’d said to him. All he’d made her feel…
As she silently hung her coat on the hall tree, she heard voices coming from the open kitchen door at the other end of the front hall.
“I really appreciate the way you are standing behind my daughter,” Patience’s mother said.
“You have a fine girl,” Bunny replied. From the sounds of water and clinking of china and silverware, she must have been washing dishes. “She’s so busy, but she still volunteers at the Rose Care Center.”
Patience didn’t want to eavesdrop. She needed to make her presence known. But before she could speak up—
“My daughter is a good person,” her mother said, “but none of that is my doing.”
Patience froze. No, no, don’t…
“Oh, Martina—”
“No, it’s true,” her mother interrupted Bunny. “You know I attend several AA meetings a week. I’ve got to stay dry this time. I’ve missed out on most of my only child’s life. I don’t want to miss the rest.”
Jonesy sauntered out of the living room and approached Patience, purring. Mother, please don’t…
“I find it hard to believe,” Bunny insisted, “that you did as bad a job at mothering Patience as you seem to believe. She’s a wonderful person.”
Jonesy began rubbing Patience’s pant legs. She stooped to pet the cat. What was it with cats and her tonight?
“I don’t know how I could have done worse.” Martina sighed loud and long. “I wasn’t married to her father. I went from one destructive relationship to another throughout her childhood. And then when Patience was fifteen, I married Chet, a fellow drunk, and she ran away.”
Patience stroked Jonesy, fighting her angry reaction to this revealing recital. Resentment of the past gripped her taut nerves in its gritty palm. How can it still hurt me, Lord?
“Oh, dear.” Bunny’s voice was filled with distress.
“If it hadn’t been for my brother, Mike,” Patience’s mother continued, “I don’t know what would have happened to Patience. He went and found her and took her to live with him.”
“I think Patience has mentioned her uncle Mike.”
“She loves him.” Her mother paused.
Yes, I do. He’s the one adult who really loved me, the only one in my family. You never have loved me, Mother. You don’t know how. Even as Patience thought these accusations, she felt guilt over holding on to her grudge, her anger. Jonesy stretched, begging to be picked up. How do I get rid of these bad feelings, Lord? They make me sick.
And then her mother went on, “Sometimes I wonder how Mike and I could come from the same family. He’s a hardworker, a God-fearing man in the best sense of the word.”
Patience had wondered this, too. But Uncle Mike said it was all the work of God, his Holy Spirit.
“And I’ve been AWOL for most of Patience’s life,” her mother finished with something like a gasp.
Patience picked up Jonesy and cuddled his soft fur close against her cheek. Was Martina crying, trying to get Bunny’s sympathy so that when she fell off the wagon, Bunny would already feel sorry for her? Patience couldn’t trust her mother.
“Well, you’re here now,” Bunny said in a bracing tone. “That’s what matters.”
Mother, how could you dump everything like that? Still trapped in the foyer, Patience felt vulnerably exposed. Her mother had revealed facts about Patience that she didn’t want anyone to know. Embarrassment shimmered through her in hot insistent waves. She hid her face in Jonesy’s golden fur.
Dear Lord, I know the truth shouldn’t bother me, but I don’t like looking back. Uncle Mike taught me that much. And I know I should show love toward my mother, but how can I? Can’t I just leave all this in the past where it belongs?
Back home after leaving Patience at Mrs. Honeycutt’s, Gil paid the baby-sitter and looked at Darby, who was playing a video game on the floor in front of the TV. Gil recalled Patience’s advice to him. More hugging. More contact with his mother.
More contact… Tonight’s kiss replayed in his mind. Why had he let go of Patience? Why hadn’t he asked her to…to what? Where is this going?
Patience disagreed with him, but that didn’t keep her from trying to help him. Not a small, petty person, Miss Andrews. She acted as if she didn’t like him. But why would she have let him kiss her and even responded to him if that were the case?
Well, let’s see if her advice works. “Hey, Darby, want to call your mom?” Then he remembered Coreena would probably be working tonight. “If she’s not home, you can leave her a good-night message.”
His son looked up at him. Puzzlement was plain on the boy’s face. “Can I?”
“Sure. Come on.” Gil motioned his son toward the phone in the kitchen.
“I can dial it,” Darby insisted, fixing his dad with a stare.
“Okay. Go ahead.”
“Are you going to listen?” Frowning, Darby climbed onto the kitchen chair to reach the wall phone.
“Do you want me to?”
“No, I want to talk private.” Darby waited with the receiver in his hands.
“Okay, I’ll wait for you in your bedroom. It’s time we got you in bed.” Gil walked out of the room and down the hall. And then, feeling some guilt but unable to resist, he waited inside the open door to hear what his son would say.
Darby punched the buttons. Pause. “Hello, Mommy, this is Darby. Daddy said I could call you and say good night. I wish you were here so you could sing me to sleep like you do when I stay at your house. Okay. Say hey to Blaine for me. ’Night.”
She sings him to sleep? Gil moved quickly to sit on the bed so his son wouldn’t find him hovering near the door. Then Gil recalled Coreena singing to Darby as an infant when she’d cradled him in her arms. The memory brought shivers to him; Coreena’s singing voice had always been low and sweet. I didn’t know she still did that, Darby.
Then Patience’s low, innocently enticing voice played in his mind also. He’d never realized that he was so sensitive to the sound of a woman’s voice. Interesting.
He turned his mind back to the present. The baby-sitter had already gotten Darby into his pajamas. But Gil oversaw the last bathroom trip and the brushing of teeth. Then he sat at the end of his son’s bed and watched Darby slide his feet under his comforter.
“Would you like me to read you a story?”
Darby eyed him. “Okay.”
“Do you have a request?” Gil asked.
“The Little Engine That Could.”
“Good choice.” Gil reached for the book on the shelf at the end of the bed. He slid up to sit beside Darby, his back resting against the padded headboard.
Patience came to mind again and he put his arm around his son so that Darby leaned against him as he read his son’s favorite story. Gil couldn’t read Darby’s mind, but this closeness felt lik
e a benediction on the day. An armful of warm little son eased through Gil, helping him relax.
When he finished, he pressed a kiss onto the top of his son’s dark head and then stroked the fine hair. “Now it’s time for lights out. Sunday school in the morning. Good night. Sleep tight.”
“Good night, Dad.” Darby gave him a boisterous hug.
Gil hugged him tightly in return. Then he got up and turned off the light and walked out, thinking again of Patience’s words.
Gil had liked the happy expression Darby had worn when he’d run to the phone to call his mom and leave her a message. Why didn’t I think of that before?
She’s right so far. Darby does need more hugging. He remembered again the sensation of holding the slender, lovely teacher in his arms only an hour ago. He needed more hugging, too. What would Miss Andrews say to that?
The telephone ringing woke Gil from a sound sleep. He groped for the bedside phone and picked up. He squinted at the clock—1:36 a.m. “Gil Montgomery.”
“Hi, Gil, this is Sheriff Longworthy. Got bad news for you.”
Gil sat up in bed. “What is it?”
“Another robbery. And it’s just like the Putnam one.”
“What? You’re kidding.” Gil shoved back his tousled hair.
“I’m not joking.” Frustration leaked from the sheriff’s voice. “We got a call an hour ago. A neighbor woke up and saw that a Mrs. Carmichael’s lights were all on well after midnight. The neighbor knew that Mrs. Carmichael never leaves a light on that isn’t being used and that she’s usually in bed by eight every night.”
“Okay. So?” Gil massaged his forehead where a headache was starting.
“The neighbor couldn’t get back to sleep, so he finally got dressed and went over. He found the back door open and Mrs. Carmichael on the floor unconscious, bound and gagged.”
Gil sucked in air. “No. How badly was she hurt?”
“I don’t know. She was breathing but still unconscious when the ambulance took her to the hospital.”
“Let’s hope she doesn’t have a stroke like Mrs. Perkins.” Please God, no, Gil prayed. “What was stolen?”
