Shame swamped her that she should be standing here, waiting for this man to take her to her brother and that he should be bored by it all.
“Yep, there he is,” the officer said, never looking up from the computer. “Shoplifting.”
How petty and stupid it sounded. What a dumb thing to do.
She was going to kill Javier when he came out.
The officer kept tapping at the computer. “The store is still deciding whether or not to press charges.”
“He hasn’t been charged?” There was a little bit of hope. Please let the store drop this.
“Not yet,” the officer confirmed. Rawlings, his nametag read. “I’ll take you to him.” As he rose, he caught sight of Benedict and stilled.
Did he recognize Benedict? Or was he simply going to forbid Benedict from coming along?
Officer Rawlings’s gaze stayed on Benedict for just a beat too long and then slid away, his face tightening with embarrassment.
He did recognize Benedict. And Rawlings was embarrassed for him.
Perfect. That extra dollop of disdain was just perfect. And that would be the start of the gossip.
“Follow me,” the officer ordered.
Javier sat in a holding cell by himself, shoulders slumped almost to the floor. It was all wrong to see him behind bars in that dingy, industrial-green box. A surge of pity and protectiveness rose within her. She should have stopped this somehow.
Now she had to make it right.
Javier raised his head as they approached, his eyes red, but dry. Poor kid.
He said nothing as they approached, only watched warily. And she might have imagined it, but did his eyes harden when he saw Benedict?
Javier wouldn’t dare pick a fight. Not in this situation. Please God.
“What happened?” she asked. Neutral. Calm. She would get them through this.
Javier chewed on his lip for a moment, then shrugged, trying for bravado. “They think I stole some stuff, but I didn’t, there was nothing on me—”
“Hang on.” She held up a hand. “Start from the beginning.”
He blinked and his lip trembled a hair.
“Take a breath,” she said, heartened by this show of emotion from him. He was no criminal. There must have been some kind of mistake. “Take your time. We’re not in a rush.”
Benedict might have flinched beside her, but she couldn’t be certain. Besides, Javier needed her attention, not him.
“Eduardo and I were in the store, looking at some work boots.” Javier’s voice held a hint of the little boy he’d once been, tugging at her heart.
And yet…
“Work boots?” she asked. “You don’t work.”
But those pants in his room, the ones that he shouldn’t have been able to afford—those were work pants. A terrible suspicion began to form in her mind. One she didn’t want to allow purchase.
She wrapped her arms around herself, wishing she’d thought to bring a jacket. It was so cold in here. And stuffy. It stank of grease and sweat and fear. She wriggled her nose to try to clear out that smell.
Javier didn’t answer her question. “We didn’t buy anything,” he said, “but as we were leaving, the security guard stopped us, asked if he could check our pockets. We said no, there wasn’t anything in them. Then he said that there had been a lot of thefts lately and that the suspects fit our description.”
She knew where this was going. A teenager who looked like Javier, with his sullen attitude—boys like him were often the first suspects.
And yet—there had been those expensive pants in his room. How had he paid for those? He said they’d been looking at work boots…
She didn’t want the accusations to be true. But wanting wouldn’t make them false if he’d done it.
“Did the police search you when they came?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He almost rolled his eyes. Well, at least his attitude was intact.
“Did they find anything?”
“No! I just said I didn’t take anything.”
Benedict crossed his arms, and she could no longer ignore the disbelief in his stance. But she would have to deal with that later, once she got Javier out of this cell.
“Okay,” she said slowly, “the police didn’t find anything, but they still arrested you—”
“You don’t believe me,” Javier burst out. “You never believe me.”
They could not have this fight here. Not in the middle of the sheriff’s office with bars between them. And not with Benedict and Officer Rawlings watching.
Time to take Javier home. She could figure things out better there.
She turned to the officer. “Is he free to go?”
“Yep.” The man unlocked the cell as uncaringly as he’d done everything else. No doubt he’d seen worse family arguments here.
She just wished it hadn’t been her family argument.
“Let’s get out of here,” Benedict said under his breath. His first words since they’d walked in.
She sighed. “Come on, Javier.”
He didn’t need to be told twice. He was out of the cell and going for the front entrance before she’d finished. But no matter how fast he ran, they’d have to come back since the legal issues were far from resolved. For now though, she only had to get her brother home.
The night was colder than she remembered, instantly raising goose bumps on her arms. She rubbed at them, but the cold seeped through anyway.
Javier was waiting under the harsh spotlight by the front door, his head down and his lip curled. He was trying for tough, but he just looked young. Still so young.
And so stupid.
“How could you get arrested?” she snapped.
He went even sulkier, all of him closing off. “You heard the cops. I didn’t have anything on me.”
Benedict came to stand near them, just outside the reach of the light, making it impossible for her to see his expression.
She turned her focus back on Javier, the only one who mattered in all this. “And those work pants in your room? Oh yes,” she said at his look of shock, “I found those. How did you afford them?”
“You think I stole those?”
“What else am I supposed to think? You don’t have a job.”
He dropped his head and muttered something to the sidewalk.
“What?” she asked.
“I got a job,” he practically shouted this time.
“What? Where? How did you do that?”
A job? How could he have gotten a job? He was supposed to be in school.
“I’m eighteen,” her brother grumbled. “I don’t need your permission.”
“Watch it,” Benedict growled, shifting menacingly in the shadows.
She held up a hand to him. This was between her and Javier.
“Where is this job?” If it was anything illegal…
“It’s at Ángel’s shop,” Javier admitted.
“A car shop.” All that work to save, to get him an education, to clear his path to college… “You want to work on cars?”
Wow, that was shrill. But she was so pissed she was literally shaking, the cold banished by the anger rising in her.
“I’m not actually working on the cars, just cleaning up, fetching parts. But I’m learning so much just watching him.” And for the first time since she could remember, Javier looked happy. Interested in something.
Still. “You want to work on cars?” she repeated.
This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be. Damn it, he couldn’t do this.
“No, it’s building cars!” he protested. “It’s an art.”
“It’s not a career.”
“You went to college! Where’s your career?” Javier gestured at Benedict, his mouth twisting into a sneer. “You just take his notes and fetch him coffee.”
She took a sharp breath, the cold rushing back in to coat her skin.
He was right. All those years of school, of working toward what she’d wanted—and she was on
ly Benedict’s secretary.
She had the sudden sense of something large crumbling about her, suffocating her with the dust from the rubble.
Javier wasn’t going to college—and she had been this close to taking back her resignation. This close to spending her entire life under Benedict Merrill’s shadow.
Everything was turning out exactly how she didn’t want it to.
“That’s enough,” Benedict snapped at her brother. He stepped into the light and stabbed a finger toward his truck. “Get your ass in there and work on your apology to your sister.”
She didn’t even try to stop Benedict. How could she, when she felt numb all over? She rubbed at her arms again, dimly noting the prickles of her goose bumps, the quivering of her limbs.
Why hadn’t she brought a jacket again?
And how was she going to fix this? Oh God, how could she ever fix any of this? She rubbed harder, barely feeling her own skin beneath her palms.
“Pilar.”
Benedict was calling her, but it wasn’t gentle. It was harsh and almost mean.
“What?” Amazing that her mouth still worked. She could hardly feel her lips.
“You need to let him fall.”
That snapped her right out of it.
“Let him fall?” She narrowed her eyes at him, anger bubbling through her veins. Which was certainly better than the numbness.
No, Javier wasn’t falling on this one—not when the cops hadn’t even found anything on him.
“Yes,” Benedict said. “It’s the only way he’ll learn.”
“Learn what? That he can be punished for shoplifting when he didn’t have any stolen stuff?” Of course Benedict couldn’t see how unfair that was. He’d never even set a toe wrong.
He turned his head, the light only illuminating half his face. But that half could have been carved from stone. “The punishment won’t be so bad. And it’ll get his head right. Isn’t that what you want?”
She did, but not like this. “And if he didn’t do it?” she countered. “He’s an adult. This will go on his record.”
“He needs it.” Firm. Final. A judge pronouncing a sentence. “You heard how he spoke to you.”
“He’s mad, and he’s a teenager,” she said, exasperated. “He’s not Josh.”
That… that might have been a blow too far. His face went ghastly in the harsh light, his expression sagging.
But she was right: Javier wasn’t Josh. He hadn’t done anything near as bad.
“I never said he was,” Benedict ground out.
“But you want me to punish him as if he were.”
He didn’t deny it. He just stood there, trapped in the beam of the spotlight, jaw clenching.
“How many cars did Josh smash up before that final crash?” She pressed on. “How many DUIs, bar fights, did you guys cover up for him?” She didn’t need him to answer that. She already knew—a lot. And he knew that she knew. “And you want me to come down hard on Javier this first time? For shoplifting?”
She didn’t add the bit about Javier not having any stolen items. She didn’t need to. Benedict’s silence—still, all encompassing—told her she’d more than hit her mark. That there was no farther to dig.
She’d cut as deeply as she could.
He stared off at nothing, his expression stark, his breathing harsh. And never saying anything.
Finally, she shook her head. “You don’t get a do-over with my brother.”
That broke the spell holding him. He blinked as if clearing away a fog, and his face twisted into something perilously close to hatred.
It made her blood turn to ice, that expression she’d never seen before on him.
“You’re right.” That wasn’t Benedict’s voice, not that cold, harsh thing. How could it be coming from his throat? “I’m sorry. I won’t interfere again.”
There was something terribly final to the words, as if he were really saying I won’t bother to care again.
Now that she knew how much she craved his care—loved his care—it hurt. More than hurt. It ached.
Her knees wobbled, shuddered with the shivers wracking her, but she couldn’t collapse here in front of the sheriff’s office. She had to get Javier home and then figure a way out of this mess for him.
And then… and then Javier would graduate, just as she’d planned, and she’d leave. Just as she’d planned.
She could fix all of this. There was still a chance.
She climbed into the truck with shaky legs, thankful that Benedict didn’t try to help her in. He said he wouldn’t interfere any longer, and he’d hold to it.
Javier was silent and small in the back seat. No mention was made of the apology Benedict thought he owed her.
Benedict said nothing at all. He drove them home in silence, dropped them off in silence.
She wondered if he might never speak to her again.
CHAPTER TEN
Pilar was all cold efficiency as she stood from her desk and snatched up the reports she had to give to her boss. As chilled and stiff as she’d been all week.
She pushed open the door to his office with no hesitation, her heels echoing through the blankness within.
He, as usual, didn’t look up from his computer. His arm lay casually across the desk as he scrolled down the screen.
“The projections you wanted from Luke. Sir.” The folder hit his desk not half as hard as she would have liked, only an inch from his hand.
He might have flinched when she said Sir in a near sneer. Might have, but she couldn’t be entirely sure. Maybe she just wished he had.
“Thank you,” he said to his screen. He was still as polite as ever—please, thank you, could you—but there was a hollowness there, as if he were only going through the motions.
Well, so was she.
He never met her eyes anymore. He gave her no lingering glances, no half smiles when he caught her looking. She hadn’t realized how much he’d done those things until he suddenly didn’t.
She was glad he didn’t. Meeting the implacability in his gaze, seeing the evidence of his resolve, his need to push her away—it might break her.
Three more months. At least he wasn’t going to refuse to accept her resignation now.
“Get Ronald on the phone.”
“Of course.” As smoothly emotionless as he had been. “Once I do that, I’ll be leaving to meet with the sheriff.”
She didn’t imagine the flinch this time. All of him went to iron, the pretense of ignoring her lost in that moment.
“You don’t need my permission,” he said, low and stark.
“Oh, I wasn’t asking for it,” she said, wanting to hurt him with her insouciance. “I was just telling you where I’d be.”
His fingers curled into a fist, and he drew his hand back as if he couldn’t bear to even be that close to her.
Which was fine. She couldn’t bear to be this close to him either.
“I’ll get your call started.” She went for the door, keeping all of her attention on leaving and not on him behind her. Her fingers curled around the knob—
“Pilar.”
Had he really said her name? It was barely a whisper if he had—too soft to tell if there was any yearning within it.
She was imagining the yearning. Completely imagining it. And maybe even imagining that he’d spoken her name.
Keeping her hand tight on the doorknob, she turned to look back at him.
He wasn’t watching her. He was studying the report she’d tossed on his desk, as if she weren’t even there. As if she’d never been there.
He hadn’t called her name. He wasn’t even thinking of her.
She turned and wrenched the door open. Fine. She wouldn’t think of him either. Besides, she had more important things to fret over.
When she arrived at the sheriff’s office twenty minutes later, Javier was waiting for her, thank God. He’d been coming home every night this week, eating dinner with her and conversing like a normal person instead o
f a surly Neanderthal. They talked mostly about inconsequential stuff—nothing at all about Javier’s job or his future and nothing about Benedict and her future.
Once they figured out what was happening with these charges, they could discuss what was next.
She smiled at her brother, trying to keep her relief out of the expression. He’d get pissed if she let on that she’d thought he might not show up. He was dressed for work, in heavy navy-blue pants, thick-soled boots, and a shirt with his name stitched across it.
She had to admit he looked good. He looked happy. Even if it wasn’t the work outfit she would have chosen for him.
“Ready?” she asked.
“Yep.” No sullenness, no sniping.
She’d have to remember to take that image out later and savor it. “Let’s go.”
The sheriff was kindly in that distant way many authority figures had. He wasn’t against them, but he wasn’t yet for them either. She could work with that.
“Thank you for meeting with us,” she began after shaking his hand. He’d been the one to request the meeting, which she’d thought a bit odd—did the sheriff himself handle these things?—but she knew better than to question it. He’d wanted to meet, so here they were.
“No problem. And how are you, young man?” he asked Javier.
“Fine. Sir.”
Perfect. Javier was playing the upstanding young man. That would help.
“Good, good.” The sheriff folded his hands across his belly, his mouth pursing. “I have to tell you, the store wanted to press charges.”
She released a slow breath. Okay. That wasn’t good, but there were ways around that. “Your officers searched Javier and didn’t find any stolen items.” That had to count for something, didn’t it?
“I know,” he said. “But the manager claims that the security footage shows a man fitting your brother’s description committing the other thefts.”
She wondered how to tackle that. Hispanic male, late teens, early twenties—wasn’t that always the suspect in these kinds of things? But she couldn’t say that outright.
“Oh,” she said lamely. Maybe they could get a copy of the security footage.
And then what? Convince the manager it wasn’t Javier?
“Now, I talked with the manager—after I talked to Benedict Merrill,” the sheriff went on.
Her Billionaire Rancher Boss Page 12
