by Dani Collins
“Good to have you back,” he said.
“Good to be back,” Mercedes said, and stepped away only to have her attention demanded by Mrs. Garvey.
“We weren’t sure you were going to make it.” No affection from Mrs. Garvey. She was like Dayton. Liked her personal space.
“I was waiting for my sister.” And waiting and waiting. Cocking her head, Mercedes tried to hear the children and doubted it was good news that she couldn’t.
“They’ve been here ten minutes already,” Mrs. Garvey said.
In the quiet, her remark carried. Mercedes sent a faint smile at ‘they.’
She had understood from Harrison that four young men had broken into the back units of the complex, but only one stood across the room. He looked surprisingly clean-cut for a B&E artist.
However, if the man beside him was a relative—and he must be since they shared the same dark coloring—then it explained everything. The older brother or uncle or whatever he was, looked like cheap beer, dirty talk, and sweaty sex.
He smiled at her as if he knew she possessed a learning disability where guys like him were concerned.
Clenching her stomach against flutters of intrigue, Mercedes dredged up a cool smile and approached with her hand extended. “I’m Mercedes Kimball, the Manager of Coconino.”
In his mid to late thirties, the man straightened from a slouch against the wall, giving the impression he was on the wrong side of pulling an all-nighter. His hair was in need of cutting or combing. Both really, and his jeans looked clean, but were faded and frayed. He hadn’t shaved in days and he had to know that old-fashioned senior types like the ones in this room expected a tidier appearance for important meetings like this.
Then again, a man like him didn’t usually give a damn.
“L.C. Fogarty.” He shook with an all-encompassing grip that could easily lead her to the nearest broom closet. He kept her hand while he said, “My son, Zack.”
“Son,” she said with mild surprise and eased her tingling hand free, smiling at Zack.
Zack didn’t meet her gaze, too busy giving his father a weird look.
“What?” L.C. asked.
Zack shook his head, held out his hand for Mercedes, and said, “It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Kimball.”
Really the kid was too much a contrast to the punk father, his hair freshly cut, his slacks and collared shirt clean and ironed, his attitude respectful rather than knowing and wicked. He had shaved. Maybe the wrong Fogarty had been copped for the crime.
Mercedes drew back and briefly introduced the board before saying, “I’m not sure why you requested this meeting, Zack. I understood the school and police settled everything yesterday.”
“So did we,” Mrs. Garvey said behind her.
Mercedes sent a questioning glance at L.C.
“Don’t look at me. I just got here a couple hours ago.” His lips were well-defined in a masculine way, speaking of strength and purpose and a restless spirit. “But it seems he doesn’t want to be expelled.” He jerked his head at Zack.
“Right.” She dragged her gaze to Zack.
The young man cleared his throat. “I, um, spoke with the faculty and the judge, and, um, worked out a way for me to stay in school.” He rubbed a hand against his thigh. Sweating, not surprisingly, with the way the residents here resisted the cost of air conditioning. “I’ve, uh, written this apology.” He withdrew a folded envelope from his back pocket and offered it to Mercedes.
“Hardly sufficient,” Mrs. Garvey murmured in the background. “A letter doesn’t repair damage—”
“Oh, Ma’am, that wasn’t us,” Zack said.
“Did he just interrupt me?”
Mercedes turned to see Mrs. Garvey direct the question to Mrs. Yamamoto.
The board had taken their usual seats behind the table. Mrs. Garvey’s narrow cheeks flushed and she sat with her spine very straight, fully adopting what Mercedes privately thought of as her Stork On A Nest pose. Her gaze moved to the notebook in front of Mr. Dolinski. His pencil was poised but not moving, which seemed to displease her. Mrs. Yamamoto hunched over her knitting and Harrison leaned back, eyes closed, napping.
“Hooligan,” Mrs. Garvey muttered.
L.C. shifted, scraping his boot on the tiled floor.
Mrs. Garvey tensed and lifted her nose, but kept her gaze on the notebook, tapping the page. “Write down that due to the extensive damage to the duplex—”
“—that has been neglected for years,” Harrison murmured, rousing himself enough to open one eye at Mr. Dolinski. “Write down that I interrupted her, too.”
Mrs. Garvey made an impatient noise. “The windows were smashed, they left foul messages, and they intended to start a fire.”
“Don’t forget the sodomy they were planning, Edith.”
“Matches were found, Harrison.”
“Two of the guys smoke, Ma’am,” Zack said. He had his hands deep in the front pockets of his chinos. “No one was planning on starting a fire. I, uh, wasn’t planning on doing anything. Just some of the guys saw the hole in the fence and wanted to look around. I tried to stop them.”
Mrs. Garvey frowned at the notebook and said, “He’s wasting our time.”
“I don’t lie, Ma’am.”
Mercedes lowered the eloquent, seemingly sincere apology she’d been reading and walked it over to Harrison. He patted his chest and came up with his glasses.
Mrs. Garvey leaned forward to look past Mr. Dolinski to Harrison. “The police said they had all been reprimanded and the Dean expelled them for the semester.”
“That’s right, Ma’am, but the school is willing to let me finish out the year if I write a formal apology, serve community hours, and take care of the repairs to your building. I’d really like to do that, Ma’am. Finish the year.”
Mercedes felt something in her melt. She remembered her first community hours. The dollar-store earrings she had shoplifted had not been worth the six weeks of litter pick-up, making her forever averse to repeating that particular crime. Of course she’d wound up in a stolen car that other time, but she hadn’t stolen it. Those hours had been even more boring, working in an insurance office, taking calls and filing, but she’d come away with skills that had ultimately helped her on the job front. Serving hours worked for the right kids.
Still speaking to Harrison, Mrs. Garvey said, “In my day, we didn’t allow criminals off the hook by writing lines.”
“It was my idea, Ma’am,” Zack said. “Well, the repairs part. The Dean suggested a hundred community hours and that I serve them here.”
Yes. Mercedes mentally had him painting the main lounge, mowing the lawn, and reading the book club novel aloud before Mrs. Garvey could say, That’s absurd!
“That’s absurd! Let a jailbird into our homes?”
“Mrs. Garvey.” Mercedes forced a tight smile. “If it’s just the one incident, I’m sure he would appreciate the opportunity to turn himself around.”
Looking among the board members, Mrs. Garvey muttered, “I’d like to know if it is just the one incident.”
“Then why don’t you ask him?” L.C. scratched the stubble beneath his chin. “Rather than talking around him like he’s not here.”
Mrs. Garvey flared her nostrils. The rest of the board swung their gazes to Zack.
Please don’t help, Mercedes tried telegraphing to L.C., but only got a hello-there stare that slithered heat from behind her breastbone down to her pelvis. Her heart gave another skip of response and she jerked her gaze to Zack.
He shifted his weight, seeming uncomfortable.
“Is this the only time you’ve been in trouble with the police, son?” Harrison asked.
“Well, there was this one other time—”
“Why in hell would you bring that up?” L.C. asked.
“Language,” Mrs. Garvey murmured, touching the broach on her sweater.
“I just told them I don’t lie.” Zack waved his hand at the board.
“It didn’t count,” L.C. said.
“Now we’re playing horseshoes. How could an arrest not ‘count’?” Mrs. Garvey asked Mrs. Yamamoto.
Mrs. Yamamoto set her knitting in her lap and tilted her head questioningly at Zack.
“He was trying to take the rap for his old man,” L.C. explained.
“Oh, jeez!” Zack rolled his eyes to the ceiling. “You’re supposed to just look at the repairs with me, all right? I don’t need your help with this.”
“Apparently you don’t need help at all,” L.C. said. “Sounds to me like they’ve made up their minds and don’t want anything fixed.”
Zack’s sigh rang with impatience.
Mercedes’s feelings of affinity for the young man grew. She knew exactly how it felt to parent one’s parent. She was just about to go to bat for Zack, despite his convict father, when Zack spoke again.
“Look, that first incident was a big misunderstanding. Dad was accused of something he didn’t do and I— Well, I can give you the name and phone number of the officer involved. He’s my stepdad now.”
“He was only aspiring in that direction when he arrested me,” L.C. drawled. “Which had more than a little to do with why he cuffed me.”
Harrison snorted. Mr. Dolinski scratched his upper lip. Mrs. Yamamoto lifted her knitting so she could titter behind it.
Mrs. Garvey frowned. “I don’t follow.”
Mercedes knew that could be the kiss of death for Zack. He’d come so far, too.
She opened her mouth to plead his case but a huge noise, like a redwood coming through the wall, crashed in the next room. A high-pitched scream trailed it.
The kids!
Chapter 3
Mercedes bolted out the door, cursing herself for being no better than her sister when it came to those kids, but she was just an aunt. She didn’t know the first thing about being a mother and— Oh, God. Blood.
The armchair was on its side along with the side table, the wooden legs of both in the air. One leg had broken off the table, revealing a bent nail.
Ayjia clutched her chin. Scarlet stained her fingertips while tears rolled down her cheeks and frightened sobs shook her skinny little body.
“What happened?” Mercedes knelt and Ayjia allowed her hand to be drawn away long enough for Mercedes to wince at the sight. “Did that nail cut your chin?”
“I don’t know.”
“Dayton, what happened?” Mercedes asked.
He shrugged and scowled. “I dunno.”
Above her she heard a feminine gasp. “Mercedes, why are these children here?”
“My sister was delayed.” Mercedes used her most cheerful, Everything Is Normal voice. “Ayjia needs the first aid room.” Scooping the girl onto her hip, she said to Dayton, “Could you pick up the crayons for me?”
“Where are you going?” Dayton’s brows came together.
“Just down the hall.” Mercedes pointed, staying focused on Dayton so she wouldn’t have to meet the gaze of her employers, pretending she couldn’t hear Mrs. Garvey muttering to Mrs. Yamamoto.
“I specifically asked her if this would turn out like last Christmas. She said it wouldn’t, but she’s used all her vacation time. What are we going to do?”
Dayton glared at Mercedes with betrayal for suggesting leaving him in a roomful of strangers, while Ayjia sobbed and tucked her head into Mercedes shoulder, leaving a hot, wet patch. Mercedes didn’t dare look to see what damage her bloody chin was doing to the white blouse she’d borrowed from Porsha’s closet for this meeting.
“I’ll leave the door open,” Mercedes told Dayton. “Bring everything in when you’re done.”
“I’ve got it,” Zack said, bending to scoop crayons. “He can go with you.”
Dayton gave Zack a dark look and edged toward Mercedes.
“Thank you.” Mercedes smiled, definitely wanting to help that young man. Of course, that’d be a little tricky if she lost her job. Not that she was willing to get into that right here and now. How lousy a person did it make her that she was relieved to have an injury to deal with, so she could motor down the hall and avoid a confrontation with Mrs. Garvey and the rest of the board?
The first aid room was cooler than the rest of the building since the door was left closed and it lacked windows. Mercedes sat Ayjia on the counter and touched her chin, drawing her attention off the jar of cotton swabs and up, revealing the cut.
“A butterfly bandage would do it, I think,” L.C. said, coming to lean in the doorway. “I don’t think it needs stitches.”
And how insane did it make her that she was relieved this bad boy had come to flirt with her so the well-meaning seniors couldn’t push in to question her? God, he was hot, slouched there all sexy and interesting.
Interested. She felt his gaze moving over her like a knowing touch, not sweet and warm like sunlight, but firm and possessive. Squeezing her ass. No hesitation. Taking charge.
She let out a subtle breath, hot all over. Sex, she thought, wanting it quite badly for the first time in a while. When had she even dated last? That guy from the coffee shop? Kissing him had left her underwhelmed. Before that, she’d let one of the seniors fix her up with a nephew and he’d been nice, but a little too nice. She carried enough responsibility without driving a relationship, too. Thankfully he lived out of town so things had died a natural death. Maybe if he’d been more assertive about continuing to see her... But he hadn’t.
This guy... She tabled thoughts of L.C. and sex for later.
“What about tetanus?” she managed to ask. “She might have cut it on the nail.” She held a cotton swab to the injury, stemming the sluggish well of blood.
“Tetanus comes from bacteria, not rust. If her shots are up to date, it’s probably fine.”
No nonsense. So refreshing in her world.
Mercedes looked at Dayton. “Have you guys had shots lately?”
“What’re shots?”
Right. Mercedes stifled another curse and peeled a butterfly bandage.
“These aren’t your kids?” L.C. asked. She knew what he was asking.
“My sister’s,” she answered, friendly but not too friendly. Not as friendly as she would have been under different circumstances. Not yet.
She slid a glance his way and noted that he’d heard her, loud and clear. They held the gaze and her blood heated again, until Ayjia said, “He thinks you’re our mom?”
“Pretty silly, huh?” Mercedes smiled and tilted Ayjia’s chin up again to set the bandage.
“Our mom’s on vacation,” Dayton said, leaning into Mercedes’s leg, glancing up to Mercedes for confirmation.
“She is,” Mercedes said in a confident voice, dropping a light get-better kiss on Ayjia’s stained chin and resisting the urge to finger-comb Dayton’s hair with the other. The way he was leaning on her felt nice. She didn’t want to scare him away.
“She was supposed to come back after spring break but she’s playing a April Fools’ joke on us,” Ayjia told L.C.
“Ah.” The look L.C. sent Mercedes held zero amusement and one-hundred percent understanding. “Parents do that sometimes.”
Did you? Mercedes was tempted to ask, but wasn’t sure if she was trying to push him away or whether she really wanted the answer. Actually, she didn’t want to know. She didn’t have time for men, even too-nice, stand-up ones. This one struck her as a serial reprobate. She would only want to save him from himself. That never worked out well for her.
“Everything okay?” Zack came to the door and set her overstuffed beach bag on the floor then straightened, noting L.C.’s attention on her. Apparently he was old enough to sense the sexual undercurrents that were flying past the kids because he snapped a confrontational stare to his father.
Wow. That was a serious challenge. Maybe L.C. had abandoned his son on a few occasions.
L.C. didn’t seem terribly remorseful, just shifted his attention to Zack and met his son’s glare with a flat stare of his own. A silent, What?
“Thank you,” Mercedes said to Zack, trying to defuse the young man’s animosity. She smiled more than a simple thanks. She wanted to reassure him she would do what she could to help him.
Except not right now. Not with the board gathering in the hall beyond the open door. Mercedes drew Ayjia onto her hip again.
“I need to get Ayjia a tetanus shot. If it’s all right with everyone, perhaps we can try this again tomorrow morning?”
“Oh, Mercedes!” Mrs. Garvey frowned.
“It’ll give me a chance to call my sister,” Mercedes said in a blatant manipulation of everyone’s hopes, including her own. Shouldering her beach bag, she waited for L.C. to move from the doorway.
He turned sideways, still holding Zack’s gaze, forcing her to brush past him.
“Do you mind coming back tomorrow?” she asked, raising her gaze to L.C.’s.
“I don’t mind one little bit. What time?” Dark, bedroom eyes delivered a sensual kick low in her abdomen.
“N-nine thirty? Ten?”
“We’ll be here,” Zack said behind her and lifted the bag off her shoulder. “I’ll carry this to the car for you.”
“Thank you.” Ducking her head, sending a breezy wave to the board, Mercedes got the hell out of Dodge.
“Pretty gal, my Mercedes,” a man said.
L.C. dragged his attention off her short blue stewardess skirt and the best landing gear he’d ever seen.
The voice belonged to the barrel-chested old codger who’d taken on the passive-aggressive crone. The crone shot L.C. a mistrustful glare as she scuttled away with the knitter and the pencil pusher.
“My?” L.C. repeated. “You’re her father?”
“Hell, no, son. I’m her boyfriend.”
