More Than Friends (16 page)

He looked confused, "Where I've been, they talk lots about patterns of behavior. I didn't have one, not so far as murder went, which is why they let me out after eight. I hadn't done anything, other than that one big crime, and I didn't do that one for kicks. The prison shrink talked about an anger that had been growing for years. He talked about a highly charged emotional situation that exploded, like a keg of dynamite hit by a match." His gaze grew more direct. "We know why I exploded. Why did you?"

Teke didn't follow.

"You cheated on your husband once," he said. "Just once. You must have had good reason."

"I did," she snapped, throwing caution to the winds. Her relationship with Grady had never been pasteurized, as suburban ones were. It had been naked and unadorned. "I was sitting in that chair, remembering everything we'd had, everything I'd been pushing out of my mind for years. I had tried so hard to forget you. But it was useless right then. Your letter was real. It all came back. I found myself wanting you, the passion we had together, and getting angry about that. Sam came. I wanted to be swept up in his excitement. I hadn't counted on my body being so ready for you."

Grady didn't blink. "What's wrong with your husband?"

"Nothing's wrong with him."

"Why didn't you call him?"

"I didn't think to call him."

"Why not? He could have come home."

"He was at work. He wouldn't have left. But that's not the point. The point is that I wasn't thinking at air

Grady focused on Michael. After a time, in a voice hard with conviction, he said, "You'd have called him if your marriage was good."

"It was," she protested. She was desperate to believe it.

"It couldn't have been, or you'd never have done it with Sam."

"If that was true, why did Sam do it with me?" she asked. "He adores Annie. They have a terrific sex life, a terrific marriage." Grady raised his eyes. "I wouldn't have cheated on you if you were my wife, and you wouldn't have cheated on me."

"But I'm not your wife!" she shouted and the anger was back. "You precluded that."

Her anger had no effect on the heat that entered

his gaze. "It was good between us, Teke."

She moaned and put a hand up to steady her heart. Her anger had no effect on her own heat, either. It was stirred by the smallest, briefest memory. "Right from the first. Do you remember?" She closed her eyes and nodded. She was suddenly breathing more quickly, just as she'd been doing that night. She had been fifteen, Grady seventeen, and she had worshiped the ground he walked on. They had been seeing each other whenever they could, meeting in dark, hidden corners of Gullen, innocently at first, then with greater purpose. Grady, whose body had been a man's for years, had been taught by the best in town, yet he had treated Teke as though it were all new. The hands that held her face for his kisses had shaken, same when he had lowered those hands and unbuttoned her shirt. She had been shy, unsure of the new body she'd grown, but needful of him, and he had been so very gentle. She remembered the way he had cupped her breasts and the strangeness of the feeling. She hadn't understood how he could touch her there and she could feel it so much lower. But he had soothed her worry with small words and deepening kisses. He had made that lower feeling so commanding that she had been desperate to take off her jeans. The hurt had surprised her, but he had kissed away her tears, teased her breasts with his tongue, and held himself still inside her until the sting had passed and the tingle begun. Then he had taken her to the stars. They visited one one night, and another the next. There was a whole universe to explore, and they had been determined to do it, until Homer Peasely had come in their way.

Covering her face with her hands, Teke took deep, gulping breaths. She had loved Grady so. She

would have gone to prison for him if he had let her, or died for him if that would have spared him his fate. But he had told her to leave and never look back, he had ordered her to leave and never look back. When she had resisted, he had used even sharper words. He had spurned her attempts to visit and to write. She had been hurt and heartsick, young and naive. What choice had she had but to obey him?

"Not fair," she charged now. "Not fair."

"What in the hell is he doing here?" J.D. roared. Teke swung around to the door, then swung right back when she felt Michael move. She blotted out all else but that. "It's your dad, baby. I told you he'd be here. Move again, honey. Let him know you know."

"Get out," J.D. said to Grady.

Grady held up a hand. "I'm going."

"You put my boy in this bed. I don't want you here." Teke released a breath when she didn't see further movement from Michael. "It wasn't his fault," she murmured, but J.D. disagreed.

"He was driving down a street in a neighborhood he shouldn't have been in at all. He's got no business in Constance."

"Yes, I do," Grady said. His voice was quiet, but Teke heard his steel. When she saw it mirrored on his face, she felt an instinctive fear. She knew what that steel could do.

"Don't, Grady," she warned.

But he was focused on J.D. "I was hired this morning by a man named Charles Hart. His mother lives on Chadwell Street in an old Victorian with a carriage house behind it. He wants the carriage house turned into an apartment. I get to live there free while I do the work." J.D. pursed his lips. "Obviously Charlie Hart doesn't know you're a murderer."

"Feel free to tell him," Grady offered, and set off. Teke couldn't believe he wasn't defending himself. "Grady--"

"That's right," J.D. called, "and don't come back. We don't want you here. You upset my family. The police may have no cause to file a criminal complaint against you, but if I see your face around here again, I'll go for a restraining order, and if I have to do that, I'll slap you with a civil suit at the same time."

Grady moved, tall and smooth, past the window and down the hall.

"A civil suit for what?" Teke asked J.D." who looked at her with such dislike that she would have cringed, had she not been hot in defense of Grady.

"For being a public nuisance. For causing mental anguish. Hell, I'll sue him for trespassing, since we're paying so much for this goddamned hospital room."

"He has every right to be here."

"Are you kidding?"

"He's my friend."

J.D. nodded. "Ahhh. Your friend. What's the matter, Teke? Now that you know that I won't touch you and that Sam doesn't dare, are you desperate for somebody new?"

Her hand came up so unexpectedly that she was the one who reeled when it hit him hard across the face. She had never hit another human being that way. It shook her.

Hugging herself, she said, "Damn it, J.D." you bring out the worst in me."

He held his head high. She knew he wouldn't touch his cheek, though it had to be smarting. Her hand certainly was. But he wouldn't give her the

satisfaction. He was prideful that way. She had seen him hold his head high just like that any number of times, though never because of her. Through the course of their marriage, they had rarely argued.

"Maybe it's just the real you," J.D. said. "Another thing to learn about, along with your appetite for men other than your husband. Is there more?"

Pride, yes. And smugness. She could understand the first, but the second galled her. He was putting himself up to be perfect. But Grady was right. Something had to have been wrong with her marriage for her to betray her husband. No way would J.D. have run home if she had called, and she wouldn't have called. She would have satisfied herself before she'd have done that.

"Yes," she said in a moment's bravado, "there is more. If Grady Piper wants to come here, he's coming. He feels terrible about what happened. No matter that through no fault of his, Michael ran in front of his truck. Grady is suffering, too."

"Fat chance. He can't feel the way we do and still be capable of taking a life. He's a convicted felon, a murderer." She was shaking her head. "He killed a man, but it wasn't intentional. He was found guilty of manslaughter, not murder one or murder two. If he'd had money enough to hire a good lawyer, he might have gotten off even that. I've seen Sam win acquittals when men have done worse. But Grady was dirt poor, like I was, so he had to serve his time. That's over and done. He's as much a thinking, feeling person as you or me or Annie or Sam."

J.D. was regarding her strangely. "How did you know it was manslaughter?"

"Because I was there," she told him. Keeping the secret no longer seemed to matter. Far more important to her was telling the truth. "I told you. Grady's

my friend. I've known him all my life. He came from Gullen." J.D."s jaw dropped, then snapped right back up. "He came to see you, didn't he? That was why he was in our neighborhood. He came to see you. So this is even more your fault. If he hadn't come looking for you, Michael would have run across the street and been fine. Of course, that's not taking into consideration the emotional trauma of seeing you with Sam." He made a face. "You're disgusting."

"Maybe," she said and turned back to Michael, "but I'm still rational. Don't threaten Grady, J.D. If his being here bothers you, he'll leave when you come. But no lawsuits. Please. The only thing they'll accomplish is to embarrass us all."

J.D. wasn't one to take defeat lying down. That evening, after dropping the girls at home, he drove to see Charlie Hart. They were casual friends and sometime tennis partners, but the relationship had never evolved into more. For one thing, Charlie was a staff doctor at the small hospital in Constance and, as such, didn't run in the circles that merited J.D."s interest. For another, he was something of a bleeding heart, championing causes that bored J.D. to tears. J.D. was optimistic that he could make Charlie see the light. He calculated that all he had to do was to mention the word murderer, and Charlie's dedication to the preservation of life, as evidenced by his work, would take it from there.

His calculations were wrong on two counts. First, Charlie knew about the murder conviction. "He told me about it right off," he explained as they stood on his front porch in the balmy October night. "He told me about spending time in prison and about his

parole. He said he had nothing to hide. He had impressive references."

"From whom?"

"Past employers. The pastor of his hometown church. His parole officer."

"Were these letters?" J.D. asked. Letters could be easily forged. Every lawyer knew that. Doctors, well, they weren't quite as astute.

"Yes, they were, but I followed them up with phone calls. Every reference vouched for him, except one. George Wiley." Charlie arched a brow. "That's George Wiley, as in representative to the U.S. House. I tried his Maine office, but they said he was on a fact-finding trip in the Baltics. His letter was authentic enough. Piper built a family room for him several years ago. He showed me pictures of it and of some of his other work. He looks to be quite skilled." J.D. was beginning to feel thwarted. "He's the man who hit my son, Charlie."

"I know. That's one of the reasons he wants to stay around here. He feels responsible."

"He is responsible."

But Charlie scratched his head. "That's not what the police say. I called them after I checked out the references. They say he was going slowly and that he did his best to stop. Hell, J.D." this is a good deal for me. I pay for raw materials; he provides his labor and know-how in exchange for my letting him live there. He'll be cold, let me tell you. That place will be like a barn until he gets guys in with the heat. He says he's lived in worse."

Reluctantly J.D. said, "I'm asking you as a personal favor, Charlie. My family suffers every time we see him. The sooner he leaves here, the better. I'll help you find someone else, but I'd rather you didn't hire this particular man."

Charlie grew thoughtful. "What am I supposed to tell him?"

"That you've reconsidered and decided you'll be uncomfortable having a convicted felon working around your mother's house." Charlie remained thoughtful. "I could. But that'd be wrong. I have no problem having him around."

"He could rob your mother."

"He could also protect her from a robber." He set his mouth and looked at J.D. apologetically. "I'm going to stick with it, I think. The guy's a straight talker. I like him. I like the idea of giving him the chance."

Which was, in a nutshell, J.D."s second miscalculation. Bleeding hearts pulled for the underdog. No matter what.

seven

over the weekend. He respected the family's need to have their own time with Michael, and in truth he didn't relish another confrontation with J.D. Oh, he was up for the fight. He could out-lawyer-speak J.D. in a minute, he knew that much about his rights. But Teke would be the one to suffer, and he didn't want that.

So he settled for updates from the I.C.U nurse and, between those, moved his few possessions into Cornelia Hart's carriage house, began drawing up plans for its conversion to an apartment, and explored the offerings of local lumberyards and supply houses.

Midmorning Monday, when he figured J.D. would be at work, he went to the hospital. Michael was alone and unmoving in his room. Behind him the bank of machines bleeped steadily, but another sound now joined those, that of music from a boom box on the bed stand

It was a nice touch, he thought, a way to clue Michael in to the familiar, another of the changes Teke had made in the room. The place had been

humanized. It was brighter, warmer, more personal, even if--disturbingly--it implied the boy might be there awhile.

"Hi there, Michael," he said. "How's it goin'?" He wondered where Teke was. He had been hoping to see her, too. "I like your T-shirt." This one was white. At its center was a bright neon circle with a diagonal slash through pointy letters spelling DEADHEAD. "Don't agree with you about the Dead, though. They're cool." He sifted through the compact discs that lay by the boom box. "Not your taste, huh? Maybe it wouldn't have been mine, either, if it hadn't been forced on me. When I was in prison, there was a guy on my cell block who was a real Deadhead."