Between Darkness and Daylight (37 page)

"You're jumping to conclusions, Youngblood."

"You don't want custody?" Zane asked warily; he wouldn't sleep on this guy for a minute.

Trevor shrugged. "Who knows? Maybe I do, maybe I don't."

"Either shit or get off the stool, Cross. You can't have it both ways."

"Okay, okay, look. This is the dea—"

"You want money." Zane didn't know why he hadn't realized the game before.

"Just a little something to tide me over. You know, until I get back on my feet."

"You'll never change, and I have yet to see you get 'back on your feet.'"

"Youngblood, it's a small price to pay to get me out of your hair."

"I should trust you to stay away?"

"If the price is right."

"And what makes you think I'd give you the time of day after the way you treated my sister and nephew?"

Trevor shrugged again, that ever-present grin in place. "Look, you're probably right, I ain't ever going to get custody. But I could make your life
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miserable hanging around and making you wonder
what if
. And that's no environment for you to be raising a kid in, now is it?"

The man had a point. He could make Ran's life miserable with anxiety and doubt. Who knew – maybe Cross had been doing just that already.

Maybe he was the individual shadowing and vandalizing Zane's loft.

He gazed at Trevor, tempted to ask, but he didn't want to reveal any uncertainties or weaknesses. The man had already gotten the drop on him, stopping by out of the blue today. And he'd done enough damage to the Youngblood family to last a lifetime—abusing his own kid to the point of hospitalization and swindling Sage out of thousands of dollars.

Zane didn't want the man anywhere near his nephew any longer than was necessary. The kid had been through enough already. "How much are we talking, Trevor?"

"I was wondering when you'd start seeing things my way."

* * * *

His heart had started thumping faster, right before sinking when he caught sight of the man sitting behind his uncle’s desk.

Ransom knew almost instantly that the man was his father, and right on the heels of this realization, he’d wondered if his uncle had finally had enough of him and was sending him away to live with the man. He'd almost been ready to throw himself at Uncle Zane's feet and beg him not to send him away, before his uncle told him to go to class.

He didn't understand the sudden turnaround.

Sure, their trip out to Gram's had started off on the wrong foot, and he had given the dude a rough way to go at the beginning. But Ran had been pretty sure they were on decent footing once they'd spent several days at Gram Addie's, stuffing their faces, playing board games, and reliving old stories about his mom and Uncle Zane's antics as kids.

But maybe his uncle had finally gotten fed up with his smart mouth, his—as Gramma put it—"smelling his piss" and giving him back-talk at every turn. No one liked a fresh kid; his mom and Gram Addie had told him that more than once. More importantly, his father had stressed it to him over and over again with every beating.

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It had been a long time ago, but Ransom remembered every pinch, slap, and punch, every instance when he'd lied to his mom to cover up what his daddy had done to him.

He swallowed now as he pictured his dad behind Uncle Zane's desk, grinning.

He remembered that grin most of all, how his dad would wield it at his mom to convince her that he was just a hyperactive, clumsy kid and that's how he got all the bruises. And Ransom had gone along with the lie—too young and too afraid to speak against his father, too afraid to make his mom unhappy, too afraid that she might not believe him and would send him away instead of his dad.

I'm sure you don't tell me everything, especially the stuff I "don't need
to know."

He wasn't a scared little kid anymore, and he'd gladly spill his guts if it meant that Uncle Zane wouldn't send him away to live with his father.

Ransom didn't even know he was crying until Mr. Richards stopped him in the hall, sleep-walking to his next class.

"Hey, sport, what's the matter?"

He didn't blink or think twice before he spilled his guts to his fitness teacher.

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Chapter 23

Enrique didn't know who to tear apart first: the unfeeling uncle or the absentee father who'd resurfaced to make his young son's life that much more difficult and unpleasant.

Here he was, mourning all the time he wasn't able to spend with his kids, and those two guys didn't recognize a gem of a kid right under their own noses.

He'd never been one to let a golden opportunity pass him by when he saw one, and he had enough time before the next period changeover to make something happen and get rid of this pent-up rage. Glancing down at his outfit, he frowned. Pity the suit he was wearing was one of his favorites. But what he had to do was too important. He'd just have to make the sacrifice and change into one of the spare warm-up suits he kept in his office locker later.

He spotted Ransom's father leaving Mr. Caseworker's office, watched as the man slicked back his shiny black hair with a palm and smoothed his tie. He looked like a reject from a B gangster movie—alligator shoes, slick wet-look suit, thin tie, and an exaggerated bop to his step that could put any young homeboy to shame.

The guy had all the prerequisite assets that might make him seem a catch to some poor unsuspecting female—the lean, athletic build, the full black hair, the deep-blue eyes, and cleft chin all combined into a young, swoon-inducing façade.

None of it fooled Enrique, not one bit. He saw past the smooth handsome veneer to the corrupt insides of a man who would beat and abandon his son; a man who would rob the child's mother of any hope that all men didn't leave when things got too rough or didn't go their way. He saw an abuser, a bully, and a womanizer.

Enrique saw his father.

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He hadn't, however, seen any hint of Ransom in the man's face and was glad for this small favor. He didn't know how he would have handled seeing his young friend's amber eyes set in the man's face before he killed him.

He made sure they were alone in the hallway before he quietly followed Ransom's father down the hall. He was pretty sure no one was in the yard behind the school, but he'd just have to take a chance and improvise, if need be.

When Trevor opened the door and stepped outside, Enrique hooked an arm around the slightly shorter man's neck and pulled him to the side of the building. The man struggled for an instant before Enrique pressed the blade of his trusty hunting knife to his throat.

He listened to the satisfying sound of the heavy steel door slam-locking into place behind them, its echo seeming to seal Trevor Cross's fate, and scanned the yard area beyond the back exit. Empty, as he'd hoped. His gamble had so far paid off. Or did he have his mother's freaking God to thank for his luck today?

"If it's money you wan—"

He pressed the point under Trevor's chin and drew a drop of blood, instantly cutting off any possible plea. Grabbing him by an arm, Enrique turned and threw him against the wall, crowding him in as he pressed the knife right next to his bobbing Adam's apple. "You're Ransom's father."

Trevor frowned. "Who are you?"

"A friend of Ransom's. And your executioner."

Trevor gawked, tried to push himself from the wall, but Enrique blocked him with a forearm to the throat. Guy was fast, even strong, but Enrique was faster. He stuck the knife into Trevor's torso to the hilt, right below the breastbone, twisting the handle several times as he pushed deeper and listened to the gurgling sound of the man's last gasps.

He was getting pretty good at this, considering he'd only used his knife to kill someone once before. Where he'd been out of control and disorganized then, he was now cool and calculated, taking care not to let emotion get in the way of his job.

There was something so intimate and direct about killing someone this way, so efficient, very up-close and personal. Not like running someone down with a car.

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He would have loved to take care of that girl this way, but it wouldn't have paid to have too many deaths leading back to the point of his hunting knife. Not that the police could have made a connection if their lives depended on it. And Enrique loved mixing things up, mixing
people
up.

Trevor caught him by the arms in a desperate attempt to stay upright, as if he could hold onto life if he held onto his killer long and hard enough. Enrique shook him off, stepped back and watched as he slid down the wall, clutching his abdomen as he slumped to the ground.

"Why?"

"Because I care." Enrique smiled, then withdrew his knife and wiped the blade clean on the other man's tie. He opened Trevor's jacket and checked the inside pockets for a wallet and ID. He stifled a guffaw at the thought that he might have killed the wrong man; now that would have been a real shame.

Ah, there it was, a driver's license. Trevor Cross. Good likeness, a rarity in driver's license pictures. His own looked more like a mug shot.

Ah-ha, and what was this here? A baby picture of Ransom in one of the wallet sleeves, circa 1994; that put him at about three or four. Cute kid, chubby cheeks and all.

Too bad your father didn't do more to honor your existence than just
carry around a picture in his wallet, huh?

Enrique rifled through another pocket and found a check—more zeros than he was used to seeing on a personal check—written out to one Trevor Cross. The signature at the
bottom belonged to none other than Ransom's uncle.

Paying Cross off to stay out of Ransom's life, or to take Ransom off his hands?

He thought twice about leaving the check on the body, but finally decided to take it with him; he didn't want Mr. Caseworker to appear more of a suspect than would already be the case. Guy would have enough to worry about contending with the run-of-the-mill suspicion that came with being an acquaintance of the victim.

Enrique didn't want Mr. Caseworker so preoccupied with other things that he wouldn't be able to appreciate what he had in store for him. He wanted Mr. Caseworker's full attention, wanted him free and clear to enjoy every minute of their trip together.

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* * * *

Nova opened her eyes with a start—drowning in blood, in disgust—

her fingers wrapped around the steering wheel so tight, the color had drained from her hands.

She glanced up at the smoke-and-glass façade of the school, afraid of what she would find when she went inside. But she had to make a move if she wanted to see Zane and make sure he was okay; it was why she'd come over in the first place, to see him and finish their endless stalemate.

She'd been back in the city now for a couple of weeks, they both had, and yet they'd only had contact over the phone. Neither of them appeared ready to make that move to see the other. Zane wouldn't suggest a date or a meeting, and Nova didn't want to push him.

Today, she'd had enough. The vision had pushed her over the edge enough to throw caution to the wind and stop by. She knew he'd be here; the school was his second home. But her vision had her doubting what condition he would be in.

Two men behind the school, one wielding a knife, the other afraid for his life. That was it. She'd evidently burst into the picture in the middle of the action, had only a second to catch her breath from the shock of what she was experiencing before the man with the knife plunged it just under the other man's sternum.

Nova had gasped and been thrown from the scene without getting a good look at either man, had only a lingering impression of a name scrawled across her brain: Trevor Cross.

Was that the man who'd been stalking Zane? The one who'd thrown the rocks and painted the graffiti? The one with all the rage and hate?

She didn't believe so. She’d received more a sense of a slick wannabe gangster who'd met his match and an untimely demise at the hands of the real McCoy, a victim of his own greed. She hadn't sensed evil on the level of her man with the knife, or even that the victim was capable of real violence, at least not against someone his own size.

She tried to remember if Zane had mentioned anything about

Ransom's father, whether he matched the emotional and psychological description of the man who'd died in her vision—whether he’d abused
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Ransom. The thought that someone was capable of hurting her little man, and, by proxy, his uncle, brought bile to her throat, had her feeling the same kind of vengeful rage as her friend with the knife. On automatic pilot, Nova put her handbag on the X-ray machine's conveyer belt and went through the metal detector at the school's front entrance, then submitted to the female security officer's pat-down before she was finally allowed into the school proper.

Following a group of kids in the direction of Zane's office, she walked past the unattended outer office and knocked on his closed office door.

When she didn't get an answer right away, she knocked again and waited a minute.

"He's in with a new student." Nova turned to see the student assistant who'd entered the outer office behind her. "You can wait over there if you want."

She smiled a thank you at the young girl as she took a seat on the leather sofa to the right of the office.

Within a few minutes, the door opened and a teen about Ransom's age came out, glancing her way before continuing outside the office.

"Anyone else on the schedule, Dora?" Zane peeked his head into the outer office and paused when the assistant pointed at Nova sitting on the sofa. "Hey, why didn't you call me?"

"Wanted to surprise you." She stood and followed him into his office, closing the door and leaning back against it as Zane stood in front of her.