Imperfect Rebel

by Patricia Rice

  "You're right, I don't understand. Why should we let a kid know what's best for her? They don't, usually."

  "How do you know?" She cruised out of the kitchen and down the hall in search of a suitable shirt. When she'd left her ex, she'd taken his entire wardrobe of shirts with her, figuring he didn't own anything else, and he owed her. She was ambivalent about Jared McCloud wearing one.

  He followed right on her heels, drat the man.

  "That's what I was always told while growing up, that I didn't know anything and adults had more experience. Makes sense to me," he said.

  "Yeah, some adults have more experience. You don't. Go back to Never-Never Land and take my word for it on this one." She reached in the closet, grabbed a gray rayon, and shoved it at him. Having Jared McCloud in her bedroom did not sit well on her already disturbed psyche. She didn't look at him as he took the shirt.

  "You think I'm some kind of Peter Pan?" Insulted, he shrugged on her offering.

  Just her luck, the shoulders of the shirt were too narrow, and she had to admire the way it stretched snugly across his upper body. Well, David had been younger when he'd worn that. So had she.

  The back door slammed, and she forgot the argument. "That's Kismet. I'm fixing popcorn. Say one thing to scare her, and I'll have your hide."

  Jared shoved his hand through his hair and watched her walk away from him—again. One of these days, he'd figure what made her tick. For now, he had to figure out how to confront a child who had just been molested.

  He was way out of his league and ought to be running as fast as his feet could carry him.

  Cleo's perspective forced him to stay and reexamine his methods. He'd thought handing out money would help the kids, but he'd only clipped the tip of the iceberg. Maybe money was just another form of shallow. Damn.

  Chapter 13

  He didn't have to hang around where he wasn't wanted, Jared told himself as he avoided the kitchen and Kismet under Cleo's orders. He had Hollywood and success at his fingertips.

  Provided he could ever draw again.

  Jared leaned against the door frame between kitchen and front room, watching Cleo popping popcorn for the fey child curled in the kitchen window seat, ignoring his presence. He ought to leave. He needed to get back to work.

  He swung away from the family scene, planning on getting the hell out of a place where he so obviously didn't belong, when his glance fell on the sketchpad on the sofa. Kismet was always sketching in that thing. Drawing was something he understood. Heaven only knew, he'd spent half his teenage years with pencil in hand, or at a computer keyboard playing with graphics programs, probably because drawing was the only thing that got him noticed.

  Dropping down on the wide, comfortable sofa, Jared flipped open the sketchbook. A fire-breathing dragon practically flew off the page.

  Okay, dragons were common stuff, although the angle on this one was close to brilliant. She'd probably have a white knight on the next page. Symbolic, after all.

  Pumpkins, coaches—she ought to do well at Disney. Nice, relaxed hand, a little instruction needed in perspective—

  An entire page crayoned in black with only a pinpoint of color in a corner. Not in the center, but almost cringing in the corner. He held the page closer to better discern the figure, but it looked like a worm or caterpillar. He couldn't grasp the significance.

  He flipped another page. An upright fire-breathing dragon with rather distinctive genitalia threatened the cringing worm. Jared squirmed beneath the power of the vision. He could almost feel the dragon's breath on his neck and could crawl into the worm's skin. He didn't need a degree in psychology to read this one.

  Almost afraid to turn the page again, Jared lifted his head and listened to Cleo's voice in the kitchen. She spoke in a sane, sensible tone, reassuring the child with pleasantries, food, and attention. How many women knew how to do that? The ones he knew would be hysterical, frantic, phoning the police, and screaming helplessly had they come upon the situation he'd presented to Cleo. He'd seen her panic, then quell her distress and set about finding Kismet in a rational manner. It gave him cause to wonder about Cleo's background.

  Had Cleo been molested as a child? Is that why she reacted as she did?

  The thought made him feel dirty inside. He knew nothing about the woman, but he'd been salivating over her like a randy teenager. No wonder she'd hit him.

  After this episode, he'd have to quit looking at women as ripe oranges begging to be squeezed.

  All right, so he'd spent the better part of his lifetime wrapped in his own cocoon, without any thought to others. He could learn to look around him. Cleo was a damned rough place to start, but he thought she might be worth the effort.

  Either that, or she was a better distraction than the script he couldn't finish. His shallowness knew no depths.

  Okay, bad joke.

  Taking a breath, Jared flipped to the next page of Kismet's sketchbook. To his startlement, Cleo jumped out at him, but it wasn't through any face she'd ever presented to him. He studied the drawing, trying to see how Kismet had done what she'd done.

  It was Cleo as a hawk, or possibly a phoenix, since fire danced about her feet as she spread broad wings and protected the worm from the encroaching dragon. He didn't know how he knew it was Cleo. The eyes, maybe? The attitude? The hawk certainly had plenty of attitude.

  Only a teenager could imagine a pose like that. The hawk ought to be wearing a backward baseball cap and baggy pants. So, maybe it wasn't all Cleo, but some brash combination of people that Kismet admired. But Cleo was definitely part of the saving grace in this scenario.

  He was afraid to look further. Kismet's pen wielded passionate skill whereas his teenage years had drawn on cynical wit. If he wasn't mistaken, she drew from a well of despair and anguish he'd never tapped. Teenagers had thin skin. He remembered that part of adolescence entirely too well. What must it be like to not only be scorned by one's peers, but mistreated by the adults who were supposed to protect you? Maybe his parents had been absentmindedly negligent, but they'd never caused harm.

  Carefully closing the book, Jared stood and roamed restlessly about the room. He ought to leave and come back after Kismet was settled. He didn't know anything about kids, girls especially. He'd only scare her.

  He didn't belong in this situation any way he looked at it. He was the outsider here. He couldn't do anything to help.

  Clenching his fingers into fists, he ached to cream the bastard who'd touched her.

  He glanced out the big windows and watched as a pair of blue-jean-clad legs approached. Fine view Cleo had here. Was that how she'd watched him walk up that first day? Legs first?

  Gene climbed the porch steps and, whistling, merrily flung open the front door as if he belonged here. Well, they'd said Cleo left the place open for them. Now he understood why.

  Gene looked surprised and a little wary at finding Jared here, but he produced his cool-dude smile and improvised. "You camping out here, too? You and Cleo got a thing goin' on?"

  He ought to pin the little turd against the wall for disrespect, but it was obvious these kids hadn't grown up in his world, and wouldn't know the meaning of respect. He'd have to teach them.

  He was out of his ever-lovin' mind. Shrugging, Jared shoved his hands in his pockets. "I like Cleo, and I won't insult her with that kind of talk. She has class."

  Gene looked disbelieving, but Jared couldn't tell if he doubted him or Cleo. Then the boy nodded and jerked his head diffidently at the front door. "Want to see what I taught Porky to do?"

  Why was he doing this? He needed to get back to work. He didn't need to see what tricks a potbellied pig could do.

  He followed Gene out to his zoo.

  * * *

  Sitting on her back stairs as the sun sank behind the pines, Cleo watched Jared climbing up the path from the beach. He'd kept Gene occupied for the evening while she tried talking with Kismet. She hadn't had much success, but at least the kids were squirreled awa
y in the bunk beds in Matty's room for the night, safe and well fed. She could count that as some form of success, she supposed.

  She didn't know where Jared had gone after Gene came in to eat. In the twilight, she couldn't tell how badly the bruise had spread across his cheek, but she could see a definite discoloration. He'd cleaned up and put on one of his own shirts, so that must be hers he was carrying over his arm. If he was just returning the shirt, she might handle it. Anything more, and she was likely to curl up in a ball and cry until her heart wore out.

  She'd thought running up to Columbia and meeting Matty and Maya at the zoo might take her mind off things, but it had only weakened every resolve she'd ever made. Matty had been thrilled to see her and had danced around and chattered incessantly the whole time. She'd felt loved and wonderful and wished she could take him home right then.

  Then he'd happily run into Maya's house with his cousins at the end of the day as if she didn't exist at all.

  Kids were versatile, she told herself. He'd love it here, too, once he moved back.

  Gene and Kismet didn't exactly make likely playmates.

  "Hi." Jared dropped onto the steps without asking permission.

  "Did no one ever teach you the rules of civilized behavior?" she asked with more curiosity than acidity. She was too wiped to be sarcastic.

  "Nope. My father always had his nose in a book, and my mother always had her nose in someone else's business. I went by unnoticed," he said with disarming charm, handing her the shirt. "What rule have I fractured?"

  "Normal people wait for an invitation before making themselves at home." She folded the shirt on her lap, and crossing her arms over her knees, returned to staring at the trees. He was all sexy-smelling male and ought to make her nervous, but apparently she was too tired even for that. Somehow, she almost felt comfortable with him sitting one step below her.

  "Way I see it, I'd never be invited anywhere at that rate. It's easier to drop in and make people laugh until they let me stay."

  "So, make me laugh." Wondering how anyone as good-looking and famous as Jared McCloud could feel unwanted anywhere, Cleo refused to fall for his charm.

  "I'm fresh out of laughs," he said in a disgruntled tone, stretching his legs across the sandy walkway. "You'll just have to take me as I am."

  "A guardian angel for fifteen-year old girls? Okay." She owed him for that. He looked more like a sulky boy than a dangerous man right now, so she saw no need to fear him. And she was too wrung out to respond to her rampant hormones. She simply wouldn't look at him.

  She'd probably spend the whole damned night dreaming about him.

  He wrapped his hand around her bare ankle and stroked it without any apparent thought. Energizing heat instantly flowed through her, striking a place better ignored. Cleo tried to wriggle her foot free.

  He caught her ankle firmly. "I won't remove your foot, I promise. I just can't talk unless I'm touching, all right?"

  She settled down and contemplated means of scalping that beautiful head of thick hair. "You'd better have something good to say."

  "Wish I did." Tensely, he stroked her ankle, and at her irritated attempt to retrieve it, he glanced at her. "Did I mention I'm usually good at distractions? I lack focus."

  He said that in such an aggrieved manner, Cleo figured he'd been told that by his browbeating family a few times as well. She almost chuckled. "You must be a trial and a nuisance," she agreed.

  "I am." He fell silent a minute longer while he rubbed her. "Hell, I'm no good at this. It's not any of my business, I know, but what are you going to do about Kismet?"

  She'd kind of figured that was what this was about. She shifted her trapped foot sideways, but he wouldn't budge, just ran his hand higher up her calf. How did he expect her to think when he touched her like that? "She's inside, safe and sound. Just butt out. It's none of your concern."

  "I looked at her sketchpad."

  Cleo caught her breath. She'd never dared invade Kismet's privacy by prying, but Jared had strange ideas of personal space. She waited.

  He shot her a wry glance when she didn't speak. "No curiosity? Or is that disapproving silence I hear?"

  "Along with all your other faults, you're an annoying bastard, you know that, don't you?" Too bad her voice lacked conviction.

  He chuckled, and in the warm September night, it sounded healthy, familiar, and somehow reassuring.

  "So I've been told," he replied without rancor, his thumb rubbing at her ankle. "But this isn't about me. Kismet has enormous talent and potential, and it's being crushed by the hell she's living in. We can't let that happen."

  "I think it's about time you recognize that all the money in the world can't fix some things," she answered wearily. "People have to want to change. I can buy Kismet's mother a new house, put her through school, find her a job, but until she's ready to accept that she's worth saving, she won't give up drugs or booze. Believe me, I know. And those kids need their mother."

  He sifted through her words and came up with the wrong part. "How do you know? How can you say a new house and job won't give the woman her self-respect back?"

  Her stupid statement could have raised any of two dozen questions, and he had to pick on the personal one. Well, fine. Let him know up front what he was dealing with here. No point in getting too comfortable. "Because I've been there, done that, and I know. Got it?"

  He sat silent for a while longer, his thumb tracing a steady circle around her ankle. His touch drove her crazy, but she wouldn't let him know he was getting under her skin. People didn't touch her. She didn't like being touched.

  But he hadn't run the instant the words were out of her mouth, and she couldn't break the tentative bond forming between them. He was listening. Really listening. She longed for someone to actually hear what she was saying for a change—someone who wouldn't condemn or pity her for what she said.

  "You're a recovering alcoholic? What brought you around? Is there some way we can apply it to their mother?"

  He was listening, but he wasn't hearing. She ought to be content with half a glass, but she couldn't leave well enough alone. For the first time in centuries, she'd forged a human contact, and she wanted either all or none.

  "Forget alcohol. I'm an addict, period. My brain chemistry is screwed, my life is screwed, and my self-esteem rates right around minus ten. I dried out in a jail cell, and came out still possessing enough intelligence to figure out if I touch another illegal substance, my life is over and Matty will end up like me. Linda hasn't got that much intelligence, and no family for support. Just exactly what do you think her chances are?" That ought to sever any illusion of bonding.

  His fingers circled her ankle again. "If she wants her kids back, wouldn't she be willing to straighten out?"

  Cleo listened, amazed. She'd just told him she was an addict and an ex-con, and he still wasn't letting go. Didn't he have any understanding of what was happening between them? He should be running for his life.

  "No. I just told you," she said with irritation, momentarily surrendering to his insanity so she could get her point across. "She has to want to dry out for herself, and that isn't going to happen if she loses the kids. That will just give her one more excuse to kick herself. And the kids will be shoved into situations they can't handle, which is even worse."

  "Worse than rape?" he asked quietly.

  Chapter 14

  There, he'd said it—the word that scared him shitless—"rape." Jared wasn't at all certain he had the right interpretation. He wasn't a child psychologist, after all, just a cartoonist. He was still struggling with Cleo's revelation that she was an addict who had been in jail.

  His mother would call his current companions trailer-park trash. She would be appalled at his association with any woman who'd admitted to addiction, much less jail time. He was pretty appalled, as well, but whether with himself or Cleo, he didn't know yet.

  He had ten dozen questions and no lessening of interest in the woman who was barely to
lerating his stroking. Electricity and tension vibrated through his fingertips, and he didn't think it was all his. He'd done shallow attraction before, but what he felt right now shot off the altimeter.

  But first things first. They had to save Kismet. Like he was capable of that.

  Cleo dug her fingers into his hair. Jared merely glanced up at her.

  "You saw that in her sketchbook?" she demanded, hastily releasing his hair at his heated look.

  "The sketch is ambivalent, but I'd say it reflects oppressive fear and an unhealthy knowledge of male physiology, okay? I don't know how a psychologist would say it." He released her ankle before she yanked his hair. Tension throbbed between them, and he figured he'd better concentrate on matters of importance. Avoiding Kismet's situation wasn't an option.

  Cleo practically breathed a sigh of relief as he inched to a safer distance. Jared was tempted to reach over and stroke her, just to feel her tense up again. His ego shot several notches higher knowing she wasn't as impervious as she pretended. Better yet, he liked that she was focusing on his concerns and not scoffing at his overactive imagination.

  "I can't believe Linda would let her men out of her sight long enough to cause harm, but if today was any evidence of what might have happened in the past..."

  He waited while she struggled with the consequences. He didn't understand her passion to protect the children on her own. As far as he was concerned, that was the job of the police and social workers and whatnot. But he didn't live here and she did. He'd have to rely on her judgment, respect her opinion as she apparently did his. He could get into being appreciated for his intelligence instead of his money or warped humor.

  She unconsciously ran her fingers through his hair as if he were no more than one of her weird animals. Well, he could handle that, he supposed. For now.

  "I'll keep Kismet here, talk to Linda again," she muttered aloud. "She may take a knife to her current boyfriend if she suspects it's him, or she may not believe me. It's a no-win situation. I wish I could teach Kismet how to protect herself, but she doesn't know the meaning of fighting back. I could teach Gene..."