A Father At Last (17 page)

It wouldn’t have helped.”

“I knew that. When I thought about it, I knew the hurt would be worse than ever for the pair of you. I knew I had to…” He shrugged his shoulders, flexed his fingers some more.

“I knew I had to get on with it, do my time, take my punishment and get back to you as soon as I could.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t come and visit you in prison, Dad.” Kelly was surprised at the huskiness of her own voice. “I found that place frightening—I hated to think about you in there. It seemed so cold and…lonely.”

He shook his head briefly. “Don’t be sorry, love. It wasn’t a place for a little kid. I didn’t want you to be exposed to that side of life—prison bars, locked doors, guards all over the place. I didn’t want my little girl to carry those images home with her every week.”

Kelly looked away, fixing her gaze on a pair of blackbirds flitting in and out of the waving poplar branches.

“I was so sad, Dad,” she said, almost in a whisper. “It was like…like you’d died. I remember how it felt back then, when you first went in. The feelings were just as bad as when Mum died, only a hundred times more confusing.” The blackbirds dropped to the ground, and started busily scratching in fallen leaves. “I missed you.”

“I missed you, too.”

She heard the ragged breath he dragged in.

“But your mother brought me photos, and kept me up to date with things you were doing. I saw all your school reports. And when you got to high school, I had an arrangement where I would ring the principal once a year and talk to her about your progress.”

“You did?” Kelly jerked her gaze back to meet her father’s. She was stunned by his revelation.

“I did. Your mother would set up a time for me with the principal and I’d call her.

Before then, she would talk to all your teachers and make notes. She was most helpful and…kind. She didn’t have to go to all that trouble, but she did. I knew how you were doing in every subject.”

“You did?” Kelly repeated, astonished. “But I had no idea...no one ever told me.”

“You didn’t need to know,” her father said simply. “The teachers thought highly of you. One of them even made a video of you making your head girl’s speech at your last prize‐giving and the school sent me a copy.”

“Oh, Dad, I remember wishing you were there, so much.” Kelly thought she might cry. She clenched her hands into tight fists. “Mum was really sick by then, but she came along. When I got up to speak I looked down in the audience to see her. They’d given her a place near the front, so I picked her out easily. I remember feeling quite shaky because I Julie Mac

knew how sick she was, and I wanted to make her happy and proud of me. I wanted her to know that all her hard work, all her encouragement, all her sacrifices, had been worth it.

And,” she reached up and smoothed back her hair from her face, “I pretended that you were there, Dad, sitting beside her and that you two were…holding hands.”

She’d never told that to anyone.

“Oh God, Kelly, if I could have been there, I would have been. You must know that.”

Her father stepped forward and took one of her hands, dwarfing it in his own big, confident hand, and turned them both so they were facing the headstone together.

“Your mother was bursting with pride when you made that speech. She told me she cried a little bit.” His voice was even huskier now. “She was a wonderful woman, Kelly, and my biggest regret was that because of my own stupidity, I wasn’t there with her in the end—to look after her when she was sick, and to be there, beside her, right at the end, doing what I could to help her. To hold her one last time.”

Kelly opened her mouth to speak, but the words seemed to strangle in her throat.

She hadn’t realised she was crying, but now she felt hot tears streaming down her cheeks.

She sucked in a deep shaky breath and tried again. “She wasn’t…afraid. I asked her, on the fourth day before she died, on the day she finally gave in and they hooked up the morphine drip and she took to her bed. I asked her if she was afraid of dying, and she said she wasn’t.”

A long sigh escaped her father. As she turned her head, he reached up to brush tears from his face with the palm of his hand.

“She was so brave, Dad. And…” He was strong and upright as a totara tree, but crumbling inside now, and she wondered if she should tell him another time. She looked back at the headstone, and knew it had to be now. “She called your name, Dad, in the last few hours. It wasn’t in a desperate sort of way. She sounded quite peaceful and she smiled every time she called to you.”

He breathed in sharply, his face tense, the muscles stiff. Obviously, he was struggling.

“Sorry, Dad.” She cleared her throat. “Shall I leave you here, with Mum? Give you some time on your own?”

He shook his head, his chest expanding as he inhaled deeply. “No, don’t go. I’m glad you told me. Needed to know that.”

They stood together then, united by their hands and the tears that flowed for the woman under the earth they stood on.

Presently he said, “I tried to go to her, you know, when the message came that she only had a few days left. It was a Friday, and I applied for compassionate leave straight away, but the administrator who took care of all that stuff was away. He signed the papers on Monday, but they were still organising transport and a guard to come with me when A Father at Last

someone phoned the prison with the news. It was too late.”

Kelly brushed her wet cheeks with her fingers. “I know you tried, Dad. Mum’s sister told me. You did try, and I regret that I treated you so damn badly afterwards.”

“It’s okay, Kelly, love. No more talk about regrets, eh? I’ve got plenty, but I try not to think about them too much. I prefer to look to the future.”

He glanced across to her, straightening his shoulders and standing taller.

“I’m hoping you’ll be part of my future. I’d like to be a better dad to you.”

She pulled her hand from his, and put her arm around his shoulder, surprised how easy it was to do so. “I’d like that. And I’m going to be a better daughter to you.”

“So we’re agreed,” he said, “we’re going to move on now. Deal?”

“Deal.” She couldn’t help smiling. Being here, standing beside her father felt
right.

“Ben told me about your work and all the good things you’re doing for people now.”

“Nice guy, that Ben.”

She saw his face crease in the hint of a grin, and hoped she didn’t blush.

“Mm. Nice. But he’s not a law‐abiding citizen, is he, Dad? He’s been to your establishment—does that mean he’s been inside, or is he just there supporting mates who’ve done time?”

“Sorry, love, I can’t divulge information about my clients and contacts.” He cleared his throat noisily. “Anyway, I’ll always be grateful that he…ah…came across me and that he remembered me from all those years ago. And for him talking to me about you—talking to you about me—and organising our meeting on Wednesday.”

“Oh, our meeting on Wednesday!” Kelly started laughing. “We’ve already met now.

Does that mean we can’t meet again on Wednesday?”

“No way! I expect to see you there—after work, is that what he’s arranged?”

“I’ll be there, Dad. I want to see your rehab centre, and talk to you about your work and about things…” She wanted to tell him all about Dylan, here and now, but that could wait till Wednesday. “I’ll see you then. Now, I have to get back to work.” She leaned in and kissed his cheek.

It was a little scratchy with whiskers, and she felt a fresh surge of tears hot in her eyes. His scratchy cheeks were a long forgotten childhood memory.

“Goodbye, Dad,” she said softly, then turned towards the grave and whispered her goodbyes to her mother. As she walked across the cemetery towards her car, she heard him singing.

Julie Mac

Chapter 9

“Meet me at five fifteen.” Ben got straight to the point when he phoned her at work on Wednesday morning.

He sounded tense. Briefly, she debated telling him about the encounter at the cemetery on Monday. If she told him, he might decide there was no need to accompany her this afternoon.

But she
wanted
him to be there. She wanted to see him, talk to him, touch him. In two days, Dylan would be home, and there would be no more stolen nights with Ben.

“I’ll be there.” She listened while he gave instructions for their rendezvous, then he was gone.

Kelly parked her car in the side street, a couple of doors from the nondescript building that housed the prisoner rehab society. She sat for a minute, scanning the footpath.

‘Be sensible, be vigilant. Be suspicious of anything or anyone who doesn’t look as if they fit into the scene,’ the senior partner had said at the staff briefing on Monday morning.

One of the firm’s clients, a high profile drug dealer accused of murder, and now in protective custody, was particularly jumpy. Something big was about to go down in Auckland’s drug world, the senior partner believed. As the stakes ramped up, so did the danger for their client and anyone dealing with him—including his defence lawyers.

Now, sitting in the car, her hand on the door handle, she allowed herself a moment to smile. Her boss had taken her aside and given her another little ‘be careful out there’ pep talk just as she was leaving work this afternoon. An older man, kind, and aware of Kelly’s situation as a single mum with no close family, he was inclined to be a little more protective of her than the other staff. And in a moment of weakness, she’d told him about Ben—just the simple version: she’d met up with an old school friend recently, he’d been in trouble with the law when he was young, and now it was obvious he was dabbling on the fringes of Auckland’s organised crime scene. She wanted to help him. Her boss had looked at her for a long moment, saying nothing, but thinking, she knew, digesting her news, turning it over in his head. Then he said: ‘Call me at any time if you need help for your old friend.’ And he’d meant it.

Her smile widened. Here she was in this unfamiliar part of the city, in a decidedly past‐its‐use‐by‐date street with more than its fair share of dodgy‐looking characters hanging around, but she wasn’t afraid. Any niggles of worry were kicked into touch by the knowledge that her father was close. So was Ben. Both would lay down their lives to protect her, she knew that now.

A Father at Last

She looked at the building that housed the prisoner rehab society. Dad was in there, expecting her in fifteen minutes.

She turned her head towards the plain suburban café just across the footpath. Ben had asked her to meet him there, to talk a bit, he said, before they went across to see her father. But not together, he’d added. Him first, her a couple of minutes later.

It was surprisingly bright and cheerful inside the café, but there was no sign of Ben. It was almost empty, apart from a couple of young mums, babies in strollers beside them, at one table, and a group of senior citizens at another, obviously enjoying a good joke.

She’d order a coffee, then if Ben didn’t show in the time it took to drink it, she’d simply walk over to see her father alone. Aware of scrutiny from the big man with the shaven head behind the counter, she was surprised by his quiet question when she reached the counter. “Kelly?” At her nod, he gestured for her to follow, and pointed towards a door at the back of the café.

He came out from behind the counter to lead the way; at the door, he pushed it open and stood aside for her.

Ben was standing in the little walled outdoor courtyard beyond. She stepped through and heard the door close behind her—followed immediately by the unmistakable sound of a key turning in a lock.

Ben moved forward, took her in his arms and held her close. She felt the coiled tension in his body. Then he stepped back a fraction and smiled.

“Sorry about the—” he gestured towards the door “—the, ah, cloak and dagger stuff.”

His smile was strained and he looked tired—deathly tired. His eyes were bloodshot and he had several days’ dark growth on his face. “We—I—need to be careful.”

She felt an awful jolt inside. Her boss and Ben, both were urging caution. But from the opposite sides of the law.

“Ben. Please listen to me.” She had to say it now. “This lifestyle is not good for you.

You have to change. I can help you. Before it’s too late. My father can help you. He helps people turn their lives around.”

He said nothing, just looked at her with those unearthly eyes. She tried again. “He’ll help you. Please talk to him.”

His tired smile became wider for a brief moment, then it was gone. He took her hand and led her to one of the tables in the courtyard. On it sat a jug of iced water and two glasses.

“Do you want something? Coffee? Juice? A glass of wine?”

She shook her head. “Just a glass of water, thanks. Did you hear what I said? About letting someone help.”

Julie Mac

“I heard, and I’m giving your suggestion due consideration, my sweet.”

He had no intention of changing his ways. She knew that. Something inside her died.

She’d tried, she could do no more—but God, it hurt.

This would be the last time.

The last time she would ever sit at a table with Ben Carter, father of her son, and so recently her lover.

While he poured two glasses of water, she studied him. He was wearing dark jeans, a black T‐shirt, running shoes and a baseball cap pulled low on his head. She saw the enticing undulation of muscle in his arms as he performed his task. Never again would she feel those arms around her, never again would she experience the dextrous magic of his hands or, for that matter, his wickedly delicious mouth.

“Kiss me, Ben.”

As if in slow motion, he placed the water jug carefully back on the table, walked around to where she stood and placed his hands on either side of her face. For a long moment, he gazed into her eyes, unsmiling. Eyes were the windows to the soul, and what she saw now was the raw honesty of a good man who would love and protect a woman—

and her child—with his life.

But the eyes are lying, she told herself. He was most likely dealing in drugs and wrecking lives in the process. Goodness and honesty were fundamentally at odds with such a lifestyle. And even if he was reformed, he didn’t want a child.