The Visitor: Alien Hunger Special Edition (25 page)

Marla studied her. “Let me guess—he’s
trying to use Diablo as an excuse to keep you away from
Larry?”

Chelsey felt her face heat, but it was
mostly from anger. “Garryk … and I don’t know. All I know is that
he doesn’t even make excuses for not letting me pick Larry up
anymore. He told Larry to inform me that he didn’t have to come
anymore.”

“
Diablo is the real
problem, though,” Marla said pointedly. “You know that as well as I
do. What other leverage could he think he had?”

“
Garryk
,” she said pointedly, “has his own place! That’s not a
reasonable excuse and I don’t see why the judge would listen to
that bullshit! I wanted to complain first. I think it might make my
chances better if I petitioned the court and he had to defend his
actions. He can’t arbitrarily ignore the court order!”

“
If he can convince the
judge that you’re exposing Larry to unwholesome behavior and/or a
felon, it won’t matter whether you’re the one that files or
not.”

Anger flooded Chelsey. “Exactly why is
it that it’s ‘unwholesome’ for me to have a relationship and it’s
ok for Larry to live with Lawrence and his girlfriend—who’s barely
legal, I might add!”

“
I don’t think she’s a
stripper,” Marla said dryly. “And I think she’s in her mid twenties
so the ‘barely legal’ thing won’t fly. As for the living together
thing, they claim to be engaged from what I’ve heard.”

“
So … really what you’re
saying is that it’s a double standard?”

“
If that surprises you,
Chelly, then you’re more naïve than I thought!” She shrugged,
heading for her purse and pulling her checkbook out. “I hope you
win this one, Chelly. You’re long overdue for a break, but you
should expect the worst. At least that way you won’t be
disappointed.”

* * * *

Chelsey supposed she was just asking
for trouble, but when Garryk suggested they go out to a nice
restaurant and then take in a movie, she didn’t try to make an
excuse to stay at home or suggest they just grab a bite at a fast
food joint or some hole in the wall as she’d been in the habit of
doing. Garryk only had two evenings off a week and Sunday was the
only one that coincided with her days off.

Of course, he also got two evenings
off from his other job, too—mostly—but those never coincided with
his nights off from the club, or her off days, and that didn’t
leave a very big window for going out on the town.

He looked surprised but pleased enough
she felt guilty for not having had enough guts to stand up to
Lawrence before. He had never come right out and accused her of
being ashamed of being seen in public with him, but she knew it had
crossed his mind—probably more than once.

And what good had it done to hurt his
feelings? None! Lawrence had still found out she was seeing him and
he’d still decided he could use it against her!

In any case, she felt the
need to make it up to Garryk for almost puking on him that morning.
He’d behaved ever since as if it was some sort of criticism of his
performance, and it wasn’t as if she could
say
anything that would soothe the
wound to his manhood!

As
if
it hadn’t mortally wounded
her
dignity!

If just
figured
that Garryk
would pick Lawrence’s favorite haunt and Lawrence would be there!
If she hadn’t known better, she would’ve suspected that Garryk knew
and had taken her there with the hope of running into Lawrence—or
that Lawrence had somehow found out about the reservation and
followed them!

Oh, it was cozy, though!
They were fortunate enough to get a table in direct view of
Lawrence, his girlfriend, and her son—who pretended he didn’t know
her. Actually, although all three looked up and stared at them as
they were escorted to their table, they
all
pretended thereafter that they
didn’t know them. It was a struggle to focus on Garryk—at first—but
he took care of that by shifting his chair so that he was directly
between her and the other table, cutting off her view.

She’d just begun to relax enough to
begin to enjoy the outrageously expensive meal Garryk had paid for
when Lawrence sauntered over the table. “Good evening, Chelsey,” he
said with false joviality. “I thought I’d just be polite and speak
… and perhaps introduce myself to … uh … Diablo, is it?”

Garryk shot out of his chair so fast
Chelsey sucked in a sharp breath and choked on her own spit.
Lawrence looked more than mildly alarmed if came to that as Garryk
rose to his full height and looked down at him, a feral grin
curling Garryk’s lips and exposing a lot more teeth than she was
used to seeing. “Garryk Sinclair,” he growled, grasping Lawrence’s
limp hand and trying to crush it as he pumped it a few times. “You
must be Chelsey’s ex?”

Lawrence flexed his hand
surreptitiously when he managed to reclaim it and pasted a false
smile on his face. “And you’re her current.”

Garryk slid a glance at Chelsey. “And
future if I’ve got anything to say about it.”

Lawrence’s brows rose. He glanced at
Chelsey and returned his attention to Garryk. “Is that a
fact?”

Garryk’s smile vanished abruptly.
“That’s a fact, Jack.”

They eyed one another like two
bristling cur dogs. “Well! Congratulations are in order, I guess?
Or am I being premature?”

“
Not by much, I hope,”
Garryk assured him with exquisite cordiality. “We’ll be sure to
send you an invitation since you’re so interested.”

Lawrence’s face tightened.
“I’m sure
our
son
would appreciate that.”

“
I wouldn’t think she’d
need to send
her
son an invitation.”

They glared at one another assessingly
for several moments. Lawrence looked away first, smiling at Chelsey
a little tightly. “Nice seeing you, dear.” He sent Garryk a smug
look at the endearment and strode back to his own table.

Chelsey hadn’t even realized everybody
at every table around them had frozen to watch until they returned
their attention to their dining partners. “I’m … not feeling very
well,” she murmured through stiff lips when Garryk sat down
again.

He sent her a hard, angry glance and
then his expression abruptly softened as he shifted his focus from
his encounter to her. He reached across the table for her hand.
“Breathe slowly, Baby. Deep breath in—relax—exhale slowly. That’s
my girl,” he murmured when she’d complied and taken several calming
breaths as instructed. He lifted her hand and kissed her knuckles.
“Feeling a little better?”

She smiled with an effort. “A
little.”

He seemed to wrestle with himself. “I
upset you,” he said flatly.

Chelsey swallowed a little
convulsively. “No, you didn’t.”

He seemed unconvinced, but he returned
his attention to his meal. Chelsey tried to do justice to her own,
but it was a struggle.

It if wasn’t just like Lawrence to
ruin their evening—or try! When Garryk suggested they forget about
the movie and head back to her place, she vetoed it and insisted on
going. She was glad they did. She enjoyed the movie and it helped
her to put the nasty episode behind her. Garryk rewarded her for
her efforts when they got back to her place by rocking her
world.

Chapter Fourteen

Chelsey discovered when she called her
lawyer Monday morning that he was in court and expected to be there
all day. She made an appointment to talk to him in person on
Wednesday, the first day he had an opening. She discovered on
Friday that it was a good thing she’d retained him, because she got
a letter from Lawrence’s attorney informing her that they had a
hearing in family court the following week.

Considering the heart
palpitations Garryk had given her when he encountered Lawrence in
the restaurant, she was not only glad she hadn’t told him about her
problem before, she was determined
not
to tell him. If he could act
that hostile only because Lawrence had tried to provoke him in the
restaurant, she didn’t want to know what he might do if he felt the
need to protect her!

She had, in fact, avoided any
reference to the incident since, compelled by a need to protect
Garryk from himself—which sucked because she’d desperately wanted
to try to discover just how serious Garryk had been when he’d
informed Lawrence that he expected to be around awhile and had even
hinted that they might get married!

Luckily, she’d been too
dumbstruck at the time to make any comment to the contrary, but she
would’ve dearly liked to hear a little more on the subject.
Unfortunately, there was no doubt in her mind that Garryk had been
as intent on provoking Lawrence as the other way around. The
question was, had he
only
said it to be provoking or had he meant
it?

And if he’d meant it, why hadn’t he
asked her—before or since?

That was the burning question and the
one she was almost afraid to have the answer to since it seemed to
her he would’ve brought it up if he’d meant it.

She was almost tempted to
tell him about the baby to see if that would prompt him to suggest
they really ought to get married, but she’d promised herself she
wasn’t going to push it. If he had other plans, she wasn’t going to
throw up another roadblock for him. She thought he would probably
feel obligated to marry her if she told him, but she didn’t
want
him to feel
obligated, damn it! She wanted him to ask her because he loved her,
and if he didn’t—well she was better off just keeping it to
herself. A marriage begun that way was almost certainly doomed to
failure. He was bound to feel resentment that she’d ruined his
plans and she could end up in just as big a mess as she had
now—with another child caught in the crossfire.

It might be hellish trying
to go it alone, and probably would be, but that was surely better
than
that
possibility!

She didn’t actually have a
lot of time to devote to worrying about it. The one thing that was
absolutely clear to her as soon as she got the summons to family
court was that the confrontation in the restaurant had been
Lawrence’s opportunity to gloat, to see if he could make her
squirm—because he’d already made the arrangements to take her to
court again. There was no way he could have gotten it arranged so
quickly
after
that. She supposed her own threat might have prompted it, but
she didn’t believe that either. He had to have known about Garryk
almost from the start and been planning his coup for
weeks.

So much for thinking she might
actually get the jump on the bastard for a change!

She was such a nervous wreck by the
time the day rolled around for the hearing that she thought she was
going to have a panic attack before they were called. She knew if
she couldn’t pull herself together she didn’t stand a chance in
hell of getting a decision in her favor, but knowing that didn’t
help her attain any peace. The only thing that helped at all was
the discovery that the hearing would take place in a small
conference room rather than the court room, and she wouldn’t be
facing the bastard that had presided over her custody case
before.

Her tentative relief at the discovery
that the judge was a woman wasn’t enough to soften the shock she
got when she discovered Garryk had also been summoned. He settled
at the conference table beside her and dropped a folder on the
table in front of him, sending Chelsey an indecipherable look.
Dragging her gaze from his, she turned to her lawyer on the other
side and gave him a questioning look.

He leaned close. “The plaintiff
suggested since it was Mr. Sinclair’s reputation at issue he should
be present. The judge agreed.”

Anger sprang to life in Chelsey’s
belly and began to churn and build as Lawrence’s attorney
introduced Lawrence’s complaint and his allegation that her
intimate relationship with a stripper potentially exposed his son
to unsavory situations, if not dangerous and possibly criminal
elements. He respectfully requested that the court constrain his
former wife from unsupervised and unrestricted visitation and
require that she be limited to such places and times as were
convenient to the child’s father and under his
supervision.

The judge stared at him for a long
moment after he’d finished speaking and then looked down at the
papers in front of her, reading them. When she lifted her head
again, she studied Garryk assessingly for a moment and then Chelsey
and finally lifted a brow at Chelsey’s attorney.

“
My client maintains that
Mr. Sinclair in no way represents any threat whatsoever to her son.
She maintains her own household as does Mr. Sinclair. Furthermore,
she had already approached me with a counter complaint regarding
the fact that her ex-husband has blatantly and repeatedly ignored
her court ordered visitation rights and prevented her from seeing
her son at all.”

The judge turned to look at Lawrence.
“Is this true, Mr. Ledger?”