Whiskey Island (20 page)

“Jon, that’s a very valuable doll,” Casey warned.

“Not half as valuable as a little girl.”

Ashley seemed to debate the offer. She never did anything quickly or easily. Casey understood why, but every time, it broke her heart. Finally Ashley held out her arms.

“I’m very glad you decided to help out,” he said. He placed the doll, a beauty with glossy brown ringlets and a Victorian era sailor suit, in Ashley’s arms. “She’ll sleep better tonight if you play with her.”

“Dolls never sleep.”

“Don’t they?” He sounded perfectly serious.

“They watch things, things that happen at night. They know.”

Casey closed her eyes.

“That’s right. They watch over you,” she heard Jon say. “They make certain little girls dream good dreams.”

Casey opened her eyes to see the little girl clutching the doll to her chest. It would be a long time before Ashley’s dreams were good ones, and no doll in the world could change that.

Jon led the way back to the living room. Casey set a stack of papers on the coffee table and made herself comfortable on the leather sofa while he poured their drinks. Ashley retreated to the corner, turned her back on Casey and set the doll in front of her. Casey heard her whispering and decided to leave her alone. Ashley needed time to herself, and the doll seemed to interest her when little else did.

Obviously Jon worked in this room when he was home, and now that she’d seen the rest of the house, she could understand why. She thumbed through the stack, curious about what kind of cases he was handling, but his handwriting was every bit as bad as it had been in high school.

He arrived with a basket of pretzels, and she didn’t have the heart to tell him that since she’d begun serving drinks at Whiskey Island, she’d sworn off any food that crunched. He set a bowl of pretzels beside Ashley, along with a plastic cup, but he, too, seemed to sense that the little girl was off in a private world and shouldn’t be disturbed.

“You should have been a doctor.” She gestured to the papers when he joined her. “You have the perfect scrawl.”

“Checking on me?”

“Just wondering what you do.”

She was surprised when he settled beside her. They’d sat that way often as teenagers, hip-to-hip, shoulder-to-shoulder. But that had been a long time ago.

He handed her a glass, slippery with condensation, heavy with ice, and she set it on the coffee table. He slung his arm over the back of the sofa. “There’s been an ongoing investigation into some vandalism down on Whiskey Island near the railyards. We thought we had our culprit, but it turns out he has an alibi. It’s a pretty big deal. Equipment destroyed, a fire set. We were hoping to nail this guy.”

“Too bad.”

“The right person will turn up eventually. In the meantime, the company is posting extra security and bringing in dogs. He’ll get a nasty surprise if he returns.”

“My uncle has a business down there. Grogan Gravel.”

“He probably knows, but you might tell him to be careful.”

She realized they were chatting. He was waiting for her to begin.

“In the saloon today, you asked me why I chose this moment to come home.”

“Actually, it wasn’t a completely fair question. I already know a little.”

“Do you?”

“When I was washing dishes, Megan told me you used to be a caseworker for a child welfare agency in Chicago, but you quit. Not an uncommon response, I know.”

“And since you’re trained to ask questions, I bet you did a little checking around in Chicago, right?”

He didn’t deny it. “You didn’t give notice. You just left. Didn’t even clean out your desk.”

She leaned back and closed her eyes. “That’s what I’m remembered for? That I didn’t throw away a half-used box of tissues or reclaim my personal paper clips?”

“As a matter of fact, you’re remembered fondly. So fondly that no one would talk about the reasons why you left in such a hurry.”

“It was simple, really. Because a child in my care, a child whose life was in
my
hands, was killed by the father I’d okayed for routine visitation.”

Jon was silent beside her, and she was grateful. She’d been told so many times it wasn’t her fault, the words no longer had power.

She lifted her head. “You were right, I always wanted to help kids. Maybe it’s because I needed so much help when I was growing up, I don’t know. But after I bummed around for a while and saw a little of the world, I settled down, got a job and started college. I did well enough to earn a scholarship for my sophomore year. After that it wasn’t so bad. I worked hard and went on to graduate school in Chicago. I stayed in the city after graduation. It was close enough to Peggy that she could visit easily. And after I got back in touch with Megan, she came to visit a few times. It was as close to home as I wanted to get.”

“Tell me about the job.”

“I was putting in fifty, sometimes sixty, hours a week. I had a caseload of ninety families, plus I was doing work for the court, helping the authorities evaluate families with custody issues. I was exhausted. Only I didn’t have the good sense to realize it. My work was affected. I can see that now. But I’ve worked hard all my life. It doesn’t scare me.”

Jon’s fingers dangled over her shoulder. Not touching. Comforting, making her aware that he was there if she needed him.

She grimaced. “Well, those are the salient details of my life.”

“Tell me about the case you mentioned.”

“It’s not very complicated. I was asked to evaluate a family going through a divorce. The Collins family. Mrs. Collins claimed that her husband was violent, that he’d beaten her and beaten their children, particularly the youngest boy, Steven. Her husband didn’t want custody, but he did want visitation, which she was fighting. It’s not uncommon for one child to bear the brunt of a parent’s wrath. I liked Mrs. Collins and disliked the father, but not for reasons I could easily put into words.”

“Was there any evidence supporting her claim?”

“Not conclusive. No doctor’s records, no suspicious reports from the school or neighbors, no emergency room visits. We had the children examined by a pediatrician, and there were no healed fractures. A few small scars, nothing that couldn’t be easily explained away.”

“So far it doesn’t sound as if you had any reason to bar the father from seeing his children.”

“I saw Steven alone just twice. The first time I was late, because I’d had a crisis with another family. Steven was eight, and resistant to talking to adults. I got very little out of him. I felt that I hadn’t given it much of a shot, so I scheduled another interview. I was late again. That time he gave me nothing. When I asked if he missed his daddy and wanted to spend time with him, he said maybe.”

“You didn’t have much to go on, Case.”

“But I
did.
That’s the problem. I knew in my heart that there was something wrong. I believed Mrs. Collins. The father was too slick, and he had a way of looking at his children that gave me chills. He could shut them up with a glance. Steven, especially, seemed frightened of him. In the end, that was all I could put in my report. I had no hard evidence, just a gut feeling. Do you know how far that goes with a judge?” She gave a humorless laugh. “I’m sorry, Mr. Collins, but the court-appointed social worker doesn’t like the way you look at your children. Visitation denied.”

“It sounds like you did everything you could.”

She took a deep breath. “Steven died of a brain hemorrhage during his first weekend with his father. Collins is in jail. Steven’s in heaven—if there is such a place. Mrs. Collins is still trying to cope, and I’m out of social work forever.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“No, I’ve pretty well come to that conclusion, too. Oh, I could have done more. Maybe if I’d worked eighty hours a week instead of sixty, I could have gotten Steven to open up to me. If I’d been able to see him ten times instead of two, or maybe even if I hadn’t been late or preoccupied both times I did see him. Who knows? Maybe then I could have gone to the judge and given her something concrete to go on. Maybe they would have scheduled him to see a court-appointed psychologist. Or sent the father for help.”

“But you’re human, Case. The odds were against you.”

“The
system
was against me.”

“And that’s why you quit? You didn’t want to deal with the system anymore?”

“Close enough.”

“There are other jobs, private agencies with more time to do what’s needed. You could get a job with one of them.”

She shrugged. “So far I’ve chosen not to.”

“And so you’re tending bar?”

“Where the only big decision I make is whether to cut limes in slices or wedges.” She put on a smile. “Although a time or two this week I’ve debated whether to give a favorite customer an extra maraschino cherry.”

“You’re wasting a gift.”

The smile disappeared. Anger bubbled up and poured out so fast that she had no control over it. “You have no idea whether I’m wasting a thing!”

“I know you had dreams you’re not pursuing.”

“You think you know me, Jon, but it’s been ten years, for God’s sake! You think you have the right to criticize decisions I’ve made since then?”

He swallowed her hand between both of his. “Case, I wasn’t criticizing.”

She tried to snatch back her hand, but his grip tightened. “The hell you weren’t! You have no idea what I went through, the guilt I suffered, the mornings when I couldn’t drag myself out of bed. You have no idea about any of that because you don’t know me. We’re strangers!”

“Are you fighting?”

Casey realized the question had come from Ashley.

“No, we’re not fighting,” Casey said. “We’re just talking. Loudly.”

Ashley went back to whispering to the doll.

“We will never be strangers,” Jon said in a low voice.

She just stared at him. She was tired of whatever game he was playing with her. And she was beginning to believe it
was
a game. He had very little to root him in Cleveland, and she was a tiny piece of his past. Until he felt more comfortable, more settled, she was an interesting diversion.

She had almost convinced herself that she was right when she looked in his eyes, and the anger and certainty melted away.

He cupped his hand under her chin, with just the faintest pressure to keep her eyes locked with his. “Case, I know you as well as you know yourself. I haven’t forgotten anything about you. Or anything about the way I felt one morning ten years ago when I heard you’d skipped town. It was like somebody turned off the sun.”

She couldn’t speak. Suddenly she had no words.

He smiled, the warm, confident smile she was growing to know. “So I left, too. I knew you’d come back home eventually, and when you did, I wanted to be here and ready for anything. At the time, I didn’t expect to be gone so long. But I had a lot I needed to learn. Then, when I was finally ready to return, I found out you were married.”

She rediscovered her voice. “Jon, surely you’re not saying you felt anything for me but friendship….” She lost it again.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for you to grow up—to grow up myself, for that matter.”

“It’s been ten years!”

“We’re late bloomers, what can I say?”

She supposed this was part and parcel of her inability to understand men. Jon had been her best friend, the only person besides her sisters she could really talk to. He had been safe. Their relationship hadn’t been about sex; it had gone beyond sex and all the trappings that went with it. She hadn’t had to flirt or pretend. She could be herself.

And she had thought that he could, too.

He shook his head. “This possibility never occurred to you, did it?”

She shook hers.

“Megan knows,” he said.

“You told Megan, and you didn’t tell me?”

“I never had to tell her. She never had anything invested in avoiding the truth, the way you did.”

“Maybe I wasn’t avoiding anything. Maybe you hid your feelings damned well when you were around me.”

“I don’t think my acting was that advanced. I think you were afraid.”

“Are you trying to say that I was in love with you?”

“No. I’m saying that as long as I was simply your friend, you could share whatever you were feeling with me. And that was so unique that you didn’t want to lose it. If our relationship had changed, that might have changed, too.”

“You’ll have to pardon me, but you’ve had a head start on the psychologizing here. This all sounds like so much feel-good mumbo jumbo.”

“Does it?” He sounded genuinely curious. “I thought it sounded like a man trying to explain himself.”

His gentle tone defused a tantrum in the making. Tears sprang to her eyes. “Jon, if you’re saying what I think you’re saying, you’ve picked a loser.”

“I owed you an explanation, but you don’t owe me anything. In fact, I’d say we’re dead even right now. Let’s start where we left off, or even back a little further. Let’s be friends again. We’ll enjoy each other without pressure. We’ll just see what happens. Agreed?”

After everything he had said, she was surprised he was so willing to take this slowly. She had been poised to tell him to forget a serious relationship, and now he wasn’t even pushing for one.

“But just as a hint of what might happen…” He pulled her close, an easy enough gesture, since he’d kept one arm behind her and the hand that had cupped her chin was now gently gripping her shoulder. She had no time to resist, and no thoughts of it, anyway. One moment she was facing him, the next his lips were warm and firm against hers.

For a moment she couldn’t breathe. Not because he wouldn’t let her. His lips were wooing, not punishing. No, she couldn’t breathe because her body no longer seemed to be hers. Her heart seemed to pause midbeat; her lungs forgot to inflate. She hung suspended in time between the girl she’d believed herself to be and the woman she might be yet.

Then both the girl and the woman were relaxing in his arms, and her fingers were threaded behind his neck. Effortlessly she kissed him back, and the feelings that filled her were like a promising summer rain.

He was the one who broke away at last. He smiled his compelling, maddening smile. “Not bad for a hint.”