Redemption's Touch (Kimani Romance)

by Ann Christopher

  Chapter 5

  So much for being ready for this moment, Dawson thought.

  Well, he was ready—for most of it.

  Having run into Bishop last night, he knew he’d see exactly this drop-jawed horror on the old man’s face. And Andrew and Eric hadn’t changed even half an iota, so Dawson had known he’d see those thundercloud expressions, all lowered brows, flashing eyes and jutting chins…aaaand yep. There they were.

  Arnetta, he’d prepared for. She pretty much had one expression, no matter the occasion: disapproving. She looked disapproving if you broke a window, spilled a drop of water on one of her precious rugs or reappeared in her life after ten years without a word. So, yeah, she looked disapproving now. Dawson felt a moment’s pang for what he was about to do to her well-ordered life, because he hated to hurt her.

  He’d been ready for all that when he walked back into this room.

  The thing he hadn’t been ready for was linked arm-in-arm with the old man, as though she was a beloved member of the very family that hated his guts, and she was staring at Dawson with those same brown eyes that had shone so brightly for him last night, sending his world spinning in new directions. Only now those eyes were wide with dismay. Hurt. Humiliation.

  “Dawson?” Arianna said.

  The intensity in her voice got him. He couldn’t tell whether she was mostly hurt or angry because he wasn’t who he’d said he was last night.

  On the other hand, who the hell was she, and what was she doing here?

  And then Arnetta Warner, queen of Heather Hill, came forward and put a protective arm around both Bishop and Arianna, and this simple gesture clicked all the pieces into place for him.

  “I’m just visiting my aunt for the summer,” Arianna had said last night.

  Suddenly he knew: Arianna Smith was a Warner by another name.

  Just like him.

  Ironic, huh?

  And now her aunt, Arnetta the Matriarch, wanted to protect the little princess from him, the Big Bad Wolf. Too bad Auntie hadn’t been on the job last night, but better late than never. This little meeting was the reminder that both he and Arianna needed: they had no place in each other’s lives, regardless of whatever unexpected magic had passed between them in that greenhouse.

  What he was about to do—what he had to do—would strip any remaining illusions from Arianna’s sweet eyes. But that was for the best, right? Even though it felt like a sharpened blade right through his sternum, Arianna deserved better than him. Hadn’t he warned her so last night? She hadn’t believed him, but she’d believe him now, by God.

  And that was enough thinking about and staring at Arianna.

  Showtime.

  “Hello, family.” The smile he tried on for size felt like a wolf’s snarl. “Miss me?”

  Arianna and Bishop were still gaping, but Arnetta was on the job. “Hello, Joshua,” she said, and he had to hand it to the old girl. She said it all calm and breezy-like, as though it’d only been yesterday when he last swam in her pool, sat at her table and watched her television. “How are you?”

  “I’m great,” he said, because he was. This was what he’d waited for, and he damn sure meant to enjoy it. Sauntering deeper into the room, he put his hands into his pockets and leaned against the mantel, settling beneath that disturbing portrait of Reynolds Warner, the one he’d always hated. “What’d I miss around here while I was gone? Anything?”

  His boyhood pals Andrew and Eric had also begun to recover. Unsmiling, they both got up from the sofa and went to stand with the others in a protective gesture that was the rough equivalent of circling the wagons in the face of an Apache attack. They looked serious but not particularly concerned, and Dawson had to tip his invisible hat to them because he knew his sudden appearance had to scare them down to their overpriced loafers.

  Andrew, apparently appointing himself family spokes-person for the duration, held out his hand, and they shook. How civilized. “Joshua. What brings you back here?”

  Snippets of their shared past rose up to haunt Dawson, and for a minute he had a tough time remembering that they were no longer boys together, running around the grounds looking for deer, snakes or any other creatures they could find, or sneaking into the kitchen to raid the fridge for chicken salad sandwiches and Cook’s homemade strawberry ice cream.

  “Well, Andrew,” he said, “I thought I’d stop by for a minute and let you know what I’ve been up to for the last several years. Won’t that be fun?”

  “Joshua.” Eric also shook Dawson’s hand and then edged closer to Andrew, the two of them forming a united front against Dawson and protecting the others from this unfurling ugliness. “You don’t want to do this.”

  “Actually, I do.” Dawson shoved away from the fireplace and helped himself to some coffee from the cart. Taking his time, he sipped appreciatively—man, they always served the best here at Heather Hill, yes siree—before continuing. “Maybe I should start with my name. I changed it, so I’d appreciate it if you’d all stop calling me Joshua. I go by Dawson now. Dawson Reynolds. Nice, huh? It’s got a good ring to it.”

  At this, he couldn’t resist a quick glance at Bishop and Arnetta, both of whom gasped. Bishop, whose skin really wasn’t looking too good, had something to say about this.

  “Your name is Joshua Bishop. Don’t matter what you change it to. You’re the same person you always were.”

  Dawson checked, his thought process stalling and skidding to a stop.

  Surely—surely, God—those words hadn’t just come out of that man’s mouth. Surely he hadn’t said them with a straight face.

  You’re the same person you always were.

  Way to escalate the situation, old man.

  Blind fury had Dawson’s fist clenched tight enough around the fine china cup to break it. For the first time since he’d arrived this morning, he felt his face heat up and his muscles tighten down, and he worked hard to keep from erupting. The last thing he wanted to do at this long-awaited moment of his life was lose control and let these people know how they’d hurt him.

  “Actually, Bishop—”

  “Don’t call me Bishop,” the old man roared.

  “—I’m not the same person I always was. Prison changed me—”

  From the corner of his eye, Dawson saw Arianna’s entire body stiffen.

  “—and having everyone in my family turn their backs on me also changed me. But I don’t want to belabor this whole name thing.”

  “What the hell do you want, then?” demanded Andrew.

  Whoa. Was that an edge he detected in Andrew’s voice? Good. With a cool smile, Dawson returned to the sofa, sat, crossed his legs and smoothed the crease in his trousers. And then, because the tension in the room still wasn’t quite high enough, he waited for another beat or two before he looked up and met Andrew’s killing gaze.

  “I came to tell you my great news. Surprise!” Dawson waved his hand with a flourish. “I’m out of prison now.”

  Absolute silence from all sides.

  He’d meant to keep it lighter than this, but Dawson couldn’t strip the stone-cold bitterness from his voice. “Of course, that’s not really new news. I’ve been out for a while now. Sorry for the delay in getting in touch. I had to spend a little time getting back on my feet, which wasn’t easy, let me tell you. I lived in a halfway house for a while, and then I lived with a buddy, then I lived in the buddy’s car. Let’s see…what else? Oh, yeah. I worked at a car wash, and dug ditches for a landscaper—that was fun—and various other odd jobs so I wouldn’t starve to death.”

  They all stared at him, their eyes round and wide like five sets of dinner platters.

  “So while you were getting married and starting a family, Andrew, and you were getting married and starting your family, Eric, I was in counseling trying to deal with my anger-management issues. Apparently I had some problems dealing with prison and then returning to a society that didn’t want anything to do with me.”

  “Jesus.” Eric
hung his head, running a hand over his face.

  “By the way,” Dawson said, “I didn’t get an invite to either of your weddings. Guess that was a tiny oversight on your parts, huh? Nothing personal against me, right? Well, don’t worry. I forgive you.”

  Andrew and Eric exchanged an indecipherable glance; Arnetta huddled closer to Bishop and Arianna, keeping them in the protective sweep of her arms; Arianna blinked furiously, her eyes sparkling with tears.

  Dawson turned his face away from her and continued with his story.

  “And then I got a grant from the Phoenix Legacies Foundation. Maybe you’ve heard of it? Former Virginia governor Beau Taylor runs it. You know Beau, right? Of course you do. He’s family. He gave me the funds to start up a house-flipping business, and I made a couple good decisions with investments and whatnot, and now I’ve got a little money. Not as much as you official Warners have, but still.”

  He paused, giving someone—anyone—time to react, but they were all still speechless. What? They had nothing to say? No reaction to his long list of hardships and humiliations?

  Yeah. No reaction. And he hated them more for it.

  His face prickled with growing heat until his ears burned, but he kept his temper on a firm leash, yanking it back like a rabid German shepherd trying to run free and maul everything in its path.

  “So, my loving family,” he finished, clearing his hoarse throat, “I wanted you to be the first to know—well, not the first, because you all turned your backs on me years ago, but you can be among the first—that I didn’t rape anyone and I’ve been completely exonerated of all charges. So you and the rest of the world only thought I was a rapist. I wasn’t a rapist. And I’ve got the paperwork from the Innocence Program to prove it. Great, huh?”

  Bishop held out a placating hand and squeezed between Andrew and Eric, creeping closer like a kid trying to feed a snarling lion a rare steak from his palm.

  “Joshua,” he said softly, peaceably, “we knew you didn’t do it—”

  “Bullshit.” Dawson took a deep breath, trying to control himself, but a muscle had started ticking in his jaw, and he couldn’t get it to stop. “When did you know I didn’t do it, I wonder? When you locked the doors against me? When you didn’t hire a lawyer for me and let some court-appointed hack represent me? Or was it when you refused to answer my calls from the justice center and prison?”

  “Joshua,” Bishop tried.

  “I’m just trying to understand. Because when you’re locked up, you know you have to stand in line to use the phone, right? You know that speaking to someone in the outside world can be your only lifeline, right? But you never took my calls. Was that when you had faith in me? Help me out here.”

  Andrew put a supportive hand on Bishop’s shoulder, which pissed Dawson off more than anything else had this morning, because when had anyone ever supported him? When had anyone ever cared that he was hurting or upset?

  “You wrote this family off long before you were arrested, Joshua,” said Andrew. “You turned your back on us.”

  “That favor’s been returned on all sides, my brother.”

  “So…” Andrew spoke with slow deliberation, as though he didn’t want to disrupt any fragile peace that might break out but also wanted to make sure he understood everyone’s relative positions. “We’re square, then?”

  “Of course,” Dawson said.

  He shrugged and smiled, trying to look like he didn’t understand why such a question was necessary, but no one looked reassured. They all glanced at each other and looked wary and alert, as though they knew another two-ton shoe was about to drop. Dawson would almost laugh, if his gut didn’t feel so sick and knotted. That was the thing about life here at Heather Hill: there was always another shoe, another agenda, another lurking betrayal.

  People here didn’t trust each other, with good reason.

  Reaching for a scone, he took a bite, fortifying his strength while he enjoyed the wait. Blueberry. Tasty. Cook hadn’t lost any of her skills since he’d been gone, that was for sure. He swallowed, took another big bite and snapped his fingers as though he’d suddenly remembered something.

  “There was one other thing,” he said out of the side of his mouth.

  Everyone stiffened, bracing for the blow.

  A muscle now pulsed so prominently in Andrew’s jaw and up to his temple that he could barely get the words out. “What’s that?”

  Dawson licked his fingers and then used a napkin on the residual icing. When that was done, he looked up at Andrew, nailing him right between his eyes with his anger, bitterness and righteous determination.

  “I want my birthright and my inheritance. I want my place in the family.”

  Someone made a low moan at this announcement. Arnetta fished a lacy handkerchief out of the end of her sleeve and dabbled her nose with it. Bishop pressed one hand to his temple and the other to Dawson’s arm.

  Dawson looked into those wizened brown eyes, kindly now, and felt a twinge of something long buried and forgotten. Don’t fall for this, man, he told himself, but something was still there between him and Bishop, some connection that wouldn’t stay sealed in the past.

  Bishop squeezed Dawson’s arm with a grip that was strong and sure. And Dawson tried to remember that, before last night, it had been ten years—longer—since he felt this man’s touch.

  “Joshua.” Bishop’s voice, gravelly on the best of days, was now froggy with so much emotion it was hard to understand him. “You’re my son. That’s your birthright. That’s the only important thing. You’re my son. Mine and Mama’s.”

  That was a low blow, bringing Mama, God rest her beautiful soul, into this mess. Dawson jerked his arm free and wheeled away, shamed because he knew Mama had to be spinning in her grave right now.

  “Adopted son,” Dawson clarified. “And she wanted me. You never did.”

  Bishop looked aghast. “That’s not true, boy. You know that’s not true. I loved you. I treated you like—”

  Dawson held up a finger, stopping this self-serving little declaration before it could really get started. “That’s the thing, Bishop—”

  Bishop erupted, looking for a minute as though he may hit Dawson. “You call me Daddy, boy, or so help me—”

  “—you didn’t treat me like your son.” Strangely, Bishop’s fury only calmed Dawson down, centered him on this crucial point of his life and the reason he’d turned into the person he now was. “You’re not honestly standing there and telling me you treated me the same as you treated, say, Scooter, here—” he flapped a hand at Andrew, using Bishop’s childhood nickname for him “—or even Eric, are you? Because you didn’t. You never did.”

  “God knows I tried,” Bishop said.

  “Oh, well, that’s different, isn’t it? Trying versus doing. You tried to teach me to swim, and you tried to play checkers with me, and you tried to plant tomatoes in the greenhouse with me, but you looked at me different, Bishop. Didn’t you? Did you think I didn’t notice? Did you think I didn’t wonder, from the time I was five years old, why my father didn’t like me?”

  Bishop blinked, but tears rose in his eyes anyway, turning the brown irises into shining crystals. “I did the best I could for you, boy, but—”

  Tears? Was this guy for real? He had the nerve to cry these crocodile tears in front of this audience, as though he’d ever given a damn about Dawson? What kind of bullshit was this?

  “But I was forced on you. Right, Bishop? You’re not going to deny it now, are you? You were happy to throw it in my face the last time we saw each other. Did you all know this?”

  He paused here to glance at the others and make sure they felt included in the revelation of this, yet another skeleton from the rattling closets here at Heather Hill. They all stared back at him, silent and riveted.

  “Did you all know that’s why we fell out? Because saintly Bishop here got fed up with me and my partying ways and my drinking, and decided to tell me I was no son of his. Did you know this? Huh?
And he was none too gentle about this news, let me tell you. He took the opportunity to tell me how he’d never wanted me and would never have taken me, and I gotta tell you, it hurt a little. Didn’t do much for my self-esteem.”

  The sarcasm was a defensive measure, and he clung to it. These people could never know how that one scene, that one fight with his so-called father, had hurt him and altered the course of his life. No one could ever know how that one conversation had ruined him, probably forever. He could never reveal how that one moment had sent him on the trajectory that ended in a wrongful accusation and prison.

  Bishop hung his head and lost it for a minute, his shoulders shaking with quiet sobs. The rest of them watched with concern, hovering, not sure whether touching him would make him cry harder or not, but Dawson watched the display, unmoved. And when Bishop looked up with his tear-slicked face, Dawson’s iron heart didn’t so much as twitch.

  “I’m sorry,” Bishop said. “You have to forgive this old man, son. I’m so—”

  Sorry. Well, didn’t that just beat all?

  “I’m not really in a forgiving mood today, Bishop, so we’ll have to put that on the shelf for now. What I really want to talk about—”

  “Joshua,” Andrew said, a distinct note of warning in his voice.

  Dawson ignored him. “—is my real father. My birth father.”

  Andrew shot a worried glance at Arnetta. “Now is not the time—”

  Dawson waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, don’t worry about her. She knows who my real father is. Don’t you, Arnetta?”

  A ripple of shock traveled around the room. Arianna and Eric, he was guessing, were shocked because they didn’t know this bit of family history. Bishop, Arnetta and Andrew, on the other hand, were no doubt shocked only because he’d decided to say it aloud, like this.

  But then Arnetta surprised him. Dabbing at her shining eyes, she straightened, replaced the handkerchief up her sleeve and squared her shoulders. “Yes.”