The Distraction (6 page)

After a while, he glanced up at me, reluctant to stare too long.

“So are you my new social worker or something?”

I shook my head, thinking back on the suspicious-eyed kids that had asked me that over the years. “I'm just a friend.”

“You got another job?”

“I give massages.”

“Oh,” he said. “Like a hooker.”

I choked on the soda I'd been drinking. “Not like a hooker. Nothing like a hooker.”

“My dad went to get massages at the Asian spa sometimes. My mom said it was 'cuz the girls there were hookers.”

Well. He had me there.

“I can tell you that I am
definitely
not a hooker,” I said. I was relieved that it didn't appear he knew what a hooker actually did.

“Tell me about your dad,” I said.

Jacob's little mouth pulled into a tight frown. He crossed his arms over his chest.

“Anything,” I said. “I'll start. My dad likes to work on cars.”

He wrapped the straw from his drink around his finger.

“My dad's an asshole.”

I tilted my head, thinking about the file I'd glanced through before handing it back to the receptionist at the front desk in the courthouse. It was so similar to countless files I'd seen before. Abusive father. Drug-addicted mother. Parents were given three strikes before custody was lost. What stuck out was that Jacob had been flagged for a psych eval due to violent outbursts. The kid didn't look violent to me, but there was definitely a lot going on under the surface.

“Want to talk about it?”

“Nope.”

“How about your mom?”

He flinched. “She's sick a lot.”

I nodded, remembering my own birth mother passed out on the bedroom floor, shirt soaked with her own vomit. Moving in that slow-motion way and slurring her words, and then gradually ramping up faster and faster until she was scratching at her skin and so agitated you couldn't even look at her without her thinking she was getting sassed.

“My mom was sick like that, too,” I said.

He looked up at me, again for confirmation.
Can I trust you?
that look seemed to say.
Or are you full of shit just like everyone else?

“Sammy's staying with me,” he said assertively. “I don't care what you or anybody else says.” He shoved his empty plate away.

“Who's Sammy?” I asked.

“Sammy,” he said. “My sissy.”

The word made him sound so much younger than the tough expression on his face suggested.

“I didn't know you had a sister.”

“She's six,” he said.

“Where is she now?”

He shrugged, then began kicking the leg of the table.

Was this what Alec had been like years ago? A kid who'd been hardened by life, staying loyal to the people he loved because they were all he had?

“Why does your file say you're violent?” I asked. It was a big question for a kid so young, but he seemed old enough to handle it. I wondered if Sammy had been taken away because he'd hurt her in some way.

“I didn't hit her,” he said. “I told them that. He hit her. I hit him.”

“Who hit her?”

“My dad,” he said. “So I hit him back with a plate.”

“A plate.”

“Yeah,” he said, as if challenging me to defy him. “A plate, all right?”

“You were defending your sister?”

He shoved out of the seat and stood, but didn't go anywhere. “She's staying with me, all right? I take care of her.”

“Jacob,” I said clearly. “I want to help you. But I need you to sit down and tell me everything.”

He waited one beat. Two. I thought he was going to run. I thought I was going to have to chase him. In those seconds I even contemplated slipping off my heels, just in case we were going to have to go tackle football style out in front of the Taco Bus.

He sat down.

An hour later we stood side by side in Wayne's office. Jacob had agreed to let me explain what had happened, and he listened with interest.

“Jacob never hit his sister. He needs to be placed with her,” I said.

Wayne gave me an exasperated look. “I know he didn't,” he said. “But we can't keep them in the same house. There aren't a lot of openings for two kids, much less a boy and girl. Most places take one or the other.”

Jacob stormed into the hallway, but there was nowhere to go. I kept my eye on him as he paced to the end and kicked the wall.

“I know it's tight, but you have to make it work,” I said quietly. “Or he's going to run, I promise you.”

Wayne scratched his hands over his head. “You'll go to the judge with that?”

I nodded.

“All right,” he said. “I'll see what I can do.”

I
was still thinking about Jacob as I pulled into an open spot on the street in front of Rave salon. There was a small lot in the back, but after everything that had happened I wasn't comfortable walking even short distances where someone couldn't see or hear me if I was in trouble.

Derrick, Rave's fabulous owner, was working the front desk, and as I walked in my eyes drew to his mouth, and the shimmery silver lip balm that matched his eye shadow. The man wore makeup better than any woman I knew.

“Good morning,” he said with a wave, and picked up the tablet where he kept our schedules. “You have three back-to-backs starting at eleven. Swedish, Swedish—maternity, second trimester, and hot stone.” He checked to make sure he had the massage types listed correctly. “Your first client is with Amy now, she'll bring her back when she's done.”

“Thanks.” The salon was split into two main areas—the spa, where all clients entered, branched into a quiet, dimly lit corridor with several rooms for massage, facials, and waxing. The other side was the salon, a bright eruption of silver and black, where hair clips and jars of dye clattered against metal carts, and stylists talked loudly over the whirring of the blow-dryers.

I caught Amy's eye and waved. She raised her scissors in response, and I smirked at how absolutely adorable, and still somehow sexy, she looked in pigtails. I wondered if Paisley had anything to do with today's look.

When she raised her brows at me, I ducked away. Amy had an uncanny ability to read people's moods. Even across a crowded salon she could see that something was up. She'd press me later I was sure, but I wasn't ready to talk about Jacob, or how when I'd given him my number he'd asked if I was really coming back, and as terrible as it was, part of me had wanted to say no. For the first time in my life I'd sympathized with my birth mother. Maybe Alec had been right when he'd said that I wasn't scared of getting left, but of being the one who leaves.

I dropped my things in the cubby in the back, spending no more time in the break room than necessary. Though Derrick had outfitted all the rooms with panic buttons after Melvin Herman—my very persistent stalker—had locked me inside, it still wasn't somewhere I could kick my heels up and relax.

Amy dropped off our shared client—a divorcée who was revamping her life, starting with plastic surgery and ending with a trip to the spa—and while she was getting undressed, I followed Amy into the laundry room.

“So . . .” she started.

“Alec's back,” I said before she could pry. “He came home last night.”

“Early,” she said. She'd known I'd been practically counting the minutes until his arrival.

“And I ran into Terry Benitez this morning,” I said, hurrying because I only had two minutes before I needed to begin the massage. “Bobby pled guilty. For my abduction and for Charlotte's murder. He's going to prison.”

And for some reason I was suddenly crying.

“Oh, Anna.” Amy had an incredibly strong hugging grip for someone who weighed a hundred and fifteen pounds soaking wet. “He's gone now. You don't have to worry about him anymore.”

“I know,” I sniffled. “I don't know why I'm crying.” I gave a watery chuckle and pulled back to blot the smeared mascara under my eyes.

“Because you're safe,” she said, still holding my elbows. “You get so used to looking over your shoulder it feels wrong not to.”

Sometimes Amy just got it. It was like she'd been walking in my footsteps this past month.

“Come here.” She licked her thumb and wiped away some smeared eyeliner on my cheek.

“Eww,”
I said.

“Shut up.” She stuck her tongue out at me. “When you're a mom, you'll do it, too.”

When I'm a mom.
I'd never deeply considered the possibility. I didn't think I had the right genes for it. Even if I wanted kids, I wasn't sure I deserved them after the thoughts I'd had when I'd left Jacob at the courthouse this morning.

“Go,” she said, “you're going to be late.” But before I could turn, she grabbed my elbow. “Things are okay with Alec, right?”

I nodded. “Things are great.”

She smiled, but I was pretty sure she didn't believe me.

*   *   *

After I'd finished the hot stone massage, I crossed the street and made my way to the deli at the corner. The sun was shining, and the tourists were in full invasion mode thanks to the cruise ship in port, but I had a prickly sensation on the back of my neck like someone was watching me.

“Bobby and Maxim Stein are locked up,” I said to myself. Even Melvin Herman was locked up in a psych ward. The people that had tried to hurt me couldn't hurt me anymore.

Still, I kept looking over my shoulder and carried my keys in my hand. I didn't relax until I was safely inside the restaurant, and had a seat with my back against the wall.

When the server, a perky thing in her early twenties, came around to my table, I ordered a sweet tea and a Cuban sandwich. Alec had sent a text saying he was running a little behind but would be here soon. I trusted he would show; he knew better than to stand me up.

“It doesn't seem right for a beautiful woman to sit alone.”

I turned in my seat, surprised to find not Alec, but Trevor Marshall before me. He sat down before I could stand up, and grinned in a way that I was sure made his advertising clients believe every word he said. He was wearing a suit, blue pinstripes, no tie. I'd never seen him dressed for work before. I hardly recognized him.

“Wow,” I said. “You clean up nice.”

“I should say the same to you,” he said.

I tore my eyes away from his to stare at the menu, remembering too late that I'd already ordered when the waitress brought my tea.

“Since we're both here,” he said. “Why don't you let me buy you lunch for your birthday?”

I eyed him suspiciously. “How'd you know it was my birthday?”

“I'm psychic,” he said. “And after you left the gym the girl at the front desk said you forgot to get your Happy Birthday smoothie.”

“Ah,” I said. She'd told me that when I'd arrived, and honestly I had forgotten. Not that I was sorry. A wheatgrass shot and a banana didn't exactly compare to a red velvet cupcake.

“That's sweet, Trevor, but I'm actually meeting someone.”

His brows shot up, and he brushed back his curtain of golden hair.

“Alec,” I explained. “He came home a few days early.”

“Lucky you,” he said quietly. “Or should I say, lucky him.” There was a probing look in his eyes that made me fidget in my seat.

“Thanks,” I said.

He leaned back in his chair. “You know, some people say I'm a good listener.”

“They do, huh?” Did I have it stamped across my forehead that I was in personal turmoil or something? Jesus.

“Things a little rocky in paradise?”

It annoyed me that he, like Amy, had assumed I was upset about Alec.

“Things are great,” I said flatly.

Trevor's look darkened. “Look, if he hurt you . . .”

“No.” I shook my head emphatically. He'd misunderstood my tone. “
No.
Why would you say that? Alec would never hurt a woman.”

He stared at me, a sharp, uncomfortable strain fraying between us. I'd never felt that before with Trevor, and when I blinked it was gone.

I sighed. “I'm doing this volunteer thing,” I said, focusing on my silverware. “Trying to help this boy who's had it pretty rough.”

“Rough how?”

I glanced as someone came through the door. Not Alec.

“His parents just lost custody. Mom's on drugs. Dad hit his sister so he hit his dad.” I couldn't divulge too many details without breaking confidentiality.

“Good for him.”

I tapped my fork on the table. “He's ten. Half my size. He could have been really hurt.” Still, I couldn't help agree with Trevor's sentiment. As ugly as the situation was, I was proud of Jacob.

“If someone hurt my sister, I'd kill them.”

He said this like a fact, as if he'd just said that the sky was blue, or birds could fly. And I shivered, because I had no doubt he meant it.

It kind of made me wish I'd had a brother when I was little.

“I didn't know you had a sister,” I said, trying to change the subject.

Trevor leaned forward, green eyes more intense than ever.

“What happened to the dad?”

I frowned. “Not sure. Probably a little jail time and some mandatory parenting classes.”

And then he could petition for custody, and Jacob would go home. Just like I went home every time my mom screwed up.

“There's not enough eye for an eye in the justice system,” he said. “Someone hurts a child, they deserve to be hurt. Someone beats a woman, they get beaten. Or castrated.” His gaze flicked to the side. “That woman on the news that was driven off the bridge? Someone should make the guy who's responsible jump.”

I had frozen in my seat. Did Trevor know of my involvement with the Maxim Stein case? Did he know Bobby had intended the same death for me as for Charlotte? Or was he just making conversation? We'd never talked about it before, and the times the story had played on the news at the gym I'd always been careful to avoid discussion.

Trevor waved his hand. “Sorry. Stuff like that just gets under my skin.”

“Me, too,” I said.

“Anna.”

I jolted in my seat at Alec's voice. He was standing beside me, but with the café's music and all the voices I hadn't heard him approach.

For a moment, I could only stare at him, my heart in my throat. In jeans and a plain white T-shirt, he was dressed like half the men in here. But he didn't look like any of them. He was on a different level, the type of man other men envied, and every woman wanted. The kind you looked at from beneath your eyelashes and dreamt about later because there was no possible way he'd noticed you. But Alec Flynn
had
noticed me, and here he was, danger, intrigue, and red-hot heat all rolled into one mouthwatering package.

And he was glaring at Trevor.

“Alec,” I said quickly. “This is Trevor. A friend of mine. From the gym.”
In case you needed that clarification.
I had nothing to hide, but it suddenly felt very wrong for these two to be in the same room together.

Trevor rose quickly; his thighs banged against the table and rattled the silverware. Alec had lifted his arm to shake hands, but Trevor stared awkwardly at it for a moment before taking it.

“Alec Flynn.” He rolled his shoulders back, appearing more relaxed in response to Trevor's discomfort, which was becoming more obvious by the second.

I hadn't known Trevor long, but he seemed like the kind of guy who wasn't easily rattled. He worked in advertising, and had told me several times about high-pressure presentations he'd had to make. He ran to manage the stress.

Right now it looked like he could use a marathon.

“Have we met?” asked Alec. “You look familiar.”

“I don't think so,” said Trevor, regaining his composure. I didn't blame him for being intimidated. Half the time
I
was intimidated by the man, though perhaps in a different way.

“One Cuban sandwich!” said the waitress cheerily. “Can I get you anything, babe?” She put one hand on Alec's biceps, and I fought the urge to slap it away.

“Maybe in a minute,” said Alec.

Trevor's body was visibly tense, and I stood to try to ease some of the pressure between them.

“Anna mentioned you'd come back from Seattle early,” said Trevor. “Sounds like you were busy. Bet it's good to be home.”

Oh no.

I didn't have to look at Alec's face to see the damage. I could feel it. The white lie on Alec's behalf had been the wrong choice.

“It is,” said Alec cryptically. I reached for his hand, gave it a tight squeeze.

He didn't squeeze back.

Instantly, I could feel the pressure mounting in my chest.
Breathe, Anna.

“I'm sure she's been dying to show you those dance moves.”

I turned to stare at Trevor. What the holy fuck was he doing? I wasn't violent by nature, but I was about three seconds away from punching him in the teeth just to get him to shut up.

“What dance moves would those be?” Alec continued to stare at Trevor, who seemed to have found his balls and was now staring straight back. Neither acknowledged me in the slightest.

“I'm taking ballet,” I blurted. “It's a class at the gym down the street from the apartment.” I still wanted to surprise Alec with what I'd learned but Trevor was threatening to ruin it.

“Ballet,” said Trevor, still not looking my direction. “She's a hell of a
ballerina
.”

“Like you would know,” I snapped. “Okay, clearly both of you have huge dicks and everyone is really impressed, but my sandwich is getting cold.”

Trevor glanced at me for the first time since Alec had arrived. “My fault. Enjoy your lunch. We'll go out to celebrate your birthday some other time.”

And then, right in front of Alec, he bent down and kissed me on the cheek.

I might have stepped back if I'd had seen it coming, but I was too in shock that he would even attempt something so bold in front of a clearly territorial man who had at least thirty pounds of pure muscle on him.

Trevor took a step away, then turned. When he looked back at me, there was a familiar kindness in his eyes. It was as if the last few minutes hadn't happened at all.

“Good luck with the volunteer gig,” he said. “That kid's lucky to have you.”

I stared at him, wondering if that friendly little remark was exactly what the last nail in the coffin sounded like.