Bye-Bye Baby Page 13

  “But I thought she was!”

  “She is, but…” He trailed off as he realized just what a tricky conversation this was about to get. “She and I don’t share the same blood like you and I do, or Uncle Sloan and I do. Uncle Sloan and I are related. He’s my brother. But Uncle Sloan isn’t your mommy.”

  “Ew!”

  Cole chuckled. “Exactly. There is nothing wrong with you, or with our family. We’re not like most, that’s true, but remember that talk we had a while back about all the different kinds of people that make a family?”

  Calla nodded.

  “Now you just need to ignore Damon Comb, because he’s clearly not the brightest tool in the shed, okay?”

  Her nod, the second time was reluctant.

  “Good.” He kissed the top of her head. “Now, go get your things. I’ll take you to school.”

  He followed her inside and shut the door behind them. She hurried into the living room to grab her backpack while Cole ventured into the kitchen where all the adults seemed to be gathered.

  “What’s going on?”

  Lily turned away from the counter, a steaming mug in hand. Beth and Sloan were seated at the table, cups of coffee in front of both of them.

  “How is she?” Lily asked.

  “She’s good.” Cole moved to take the cup out of her hand and take a long sip. It was full of sugar and cream. He pulled a disgusted face and passed it back. “Getting her things. I’ll drive her.”

  “Thanks, Cole.” Lily sighed. “Did she tell you what was wrong?”

  He nodded. “Who’s Damon Comb?”

  Lily shrugged. “One of the boys in her class. Why? Did he do something?”

  “He’s a little fucker.”

  “Cole!”

  “He told Calla she was incestuous.”

  Lily’s face bunched up in confusion. “Incestuous? How is that—?”

  “Exactly.” Cole folded his arms. “He made the other kids laugh at her and tease her.” The more he thought about it, the angrier he seemed to get. “Who’s his father? I’d like a word with him.”

  “Cole…”

  “No! He needs to put a damn leash on his little bastard,” he snapped. “He’s got no right talking to my kid that way.”

  “I’ll deal with it,” Lily soothed.

  Cole clenched his teeth. “Yeah, well, that’s not good enough.”

  He drove Calla to school, kissed her on the cheek, and told her he’d see her after school. Then he watched his little girl shuffle up the path towards the gray stone building with her head down and her shoulders hunched up around her ears. The sight only intensified the fury coiling like fire through him. His temper snapped and growled the whole day. He was still riding his mad when Luanne Chavez poked her head into the office.

  “Morning, Cole.”

  Cole looked up from his papers and forced himself to return her smile. “Morning, Mrs. Chavez. Everything all right?”

  Her expression turned sheepish as she shuffled up to his desk. “This might sound a bit crazy, but I’m hoping you can help me.”

  Cole sat back in his chair and motioned for her to take one of the two across from him. “I’ll do my best. What can I do for you?”

  She sat, holding her purse tightly in her lap. “I’m having some problems with my laptop. It’s running real slow and it’s taking ages to get anything done. I went to Mr. Hobnish hoping he’d have a spare I could buy until I could get around to ordering another one, but he seems to be having computer troubles himself.”

  Cole nodded carefully, not certain where this was going. “I spoke to him about it last night.”

  “Yes.” She smiled widely at him. “He mentioned you were going to help him and I was hoping…” She grimaced sheepishly. “I know this isn’t your usual job, but I was hoping you could have a look at it and see if there’s anything that can be done.”

  “Look at what, exactly?” he wondered.

  “My laptop,” she said. “It’s not very old and I would really rather not have to pay someone in the city to look at it if there’s a possibility you could fix it. I would pay you, of course. For your time and any parts that might be required. You would really be doing me a great service.”

  Surprised, but seeing no harm in it, Cole shrugged. “I can do that. I’m picking Calla up from school later this afternoon, but I can swing by after dinner, if that’s not too late?”

  Mrs. Chavez beamed. “No! That would be perfect. Thank you so much. You can bring Beth along with you, if you like.”

  He didn’t even bother to ask how she knew that.

  “Thank you.”

  When she left, Cole picked up his phone and called Lily to let her know he would grab Calla and drop her off at home.

  “All right,” she said. “Just make sure she has everything? She forgets if you don’t remind her.”

  Promising that he would, he hung up and waited until three when he could see his little girl.

  The school yard was a mess of children screaming and running to get as far away from the place of torture as possible. Cole remembered Lily and him being like that. He’d wait for her by the basketball hoops and they’d hurry back to his house for snacks. They seldom went to hers. He always felt bad asking for things when he was over there, because they rarely ever had much more than water. Lily never commented about it, but he suspected she knew why he avoided her house.

  Calla’s class was in front. Other parents stood peering through the window, waiting for their spawn to make an exit. Each one was stopped by the teacher at the door and made to point out the person who was taking them home. When Calla came out, her blue eyes brightened and her face lit up when she spotted Cole.

  “Daddy!” She pointed enthusiastically with a gloved hand.

  Cole bent at the knees and scooped her up into his arms when she bounded towards him and launched herself at him. He crushed her close and nuzzled the warmth of her cheek.

  “Hey, baby, how was your day?”

  “Okay.” She drew back and he saw it at once, the red rimming her eyes and the streaks of dried tears on her cheek.

  His arms tightened even as fury lashed through him. “What happened?”

  Her small face crumpled and she quickly hid it in his shoulder. “They were still mean to me.”

  His gaze swung over the faces still around them. Each little boy that left the class made him wonder if that was the little bastard whose parents he wanted to kick across the fucking yard for not teaching him better.

  “Which one’s Damon?” he asked his daughter.

  Sniffling, Calla raised her face and peered at her classmates. “That one.”

  She pointed to a boy of six with a head full of dark hair and shrewd blue eyes. He stood next to a man with similar features. The man was saying something to the kid and pointing at a picture while the boy stared mutely at the ground.

  “Okay.” Cole patted Calla lightly on the back. “I’m going to take you to the car, and then I’m going to have a word with Damon’s dad. Man to man.”

  He took Calla to his car and strapped her securely into the backseat. He turned the heat on, left the engine running and waited for the pair to walk by.

  He didn’t wait for very long.

  “What’s the matter with you, huh?” the man was saying to the boy. “Are you a faggot, boy? No one colors the sun pink, unless they’re a faggot.”

  The boy said nothing. He walked like a miniature-sized shadow behind his father. He paused once to pick something off the sidewalk. He examined it in the palm of his hand before stuffing it quickly into his pocket and scurrying after his father.

  “I won’t have any son of mine sucking cock. You just wait until we get home. I’m going to beat the gay outta you, you’ll see.”

  Cole stepped in front of the pair. His earlier fury had evolved into something else, something cold and hard. It balled around his fists and curdled in the pit of his stomach. His gaze dropped to the boy who had raised his face after bumping in
to his old man’s legs. His blue eyes were haunted, standing bright and sharp against the faded shadows of a bruise. There was a handful of freckles scattered across his nose and over his cheeks. His face was unnaturally pale, making the splotches of diminishing yellow all the more visible. Half-moon circles hung in dark rings beneath his eyes. There was a scab on his bottom lip that looked about two weeks old. Cole recognized the signs all too well.

  “Got a problem?” the man snarled.

  Cole turned his attention away from the boy to meet the other man’s blue eyes squarely. “My father was a man like you,” he said quietly. “A mean drunk who loved kicking the shit out of his kids.”

  Something sparked in the man’s eyes. Fear maybe. But it was quickly covered by arrogance.

  “What I do with my kid is none of your fucking business.”

  Cole gritted his teeth together, stifling the many things he wanted to say. Instead, he replied, “You’re right.” His gaze moved down to the boy who had gone back to staring at his worn sneakers. “It’s not.”

  “Are you done, or was there some other fascinating life story you wanted to share?”

  “What’s your name?” Cole found himself asking.

  The man’s eyes narrowed. “How’s that your business?”

  “Because I want to know the name of the man I’m going to destroy if he lays one more hand on that kid.”

  Damon’s head came up sharply. His eyes were round with terror as he looked from his father to Cole. All color had been leached from his face. Even his lips were bloodless.

  “I didn’t say—”

  “Shut up!” The man growled at him before cutting Cole a vicious grin. “You can’t prove shit.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.” Cole closed the foot separating him and the man who stood a good three inches taller than him. “I am not the kind of person you want as your enemy, Mr. Comb. I will ruin you, if I don’t kill you first.”

  “Is that a threat?”

  It was Cole’s turn to fill his grin with all the hatred and anger rampaging through him. “No, Mr. Comb. That was a promise.” Cole took one last look at the boy, was met with those enormous eyes full of pleading, and had to resist the urge to snatch him up, stuff him in the car, and leave. “We’ll meet again,” he said to the boy. “Soon,” he added to the father.

  Calla was watching his every move when Cole circled the car and got in behind the wheel. She didn’t say anything, but he could feel her confusion and concern beating against the back of his skull. This was a side of him he was careful to never show her. He couldn’t even recall the last time he’d raised his voice to her. And while his frustration and rage wasn’t directed at her, she had to be a little afraid.

  “It’s all right, baby,” he assured her quietly. “Want to take a ride with daddy?”

  Her blonde head bobbed in the rearview mirror.

  He took one last look at the two walking away and prayed to God he hadn’t just made things worse for the boy.

  Chapter Ten ~ Beth

  For a four year old, Willa was an unusually quiet child, Beth thought as she watched the girl color feverishly inside her coloring book. Calla was never that calm, she recalled. The other girl had been a whirlwind of activity and noise at four. But Willa was content just to sit and color all day if allowed.

  “What are you going to do when Willa’s in school?” Beth asked.

  Lily shook her head. The steam from the pot boiling on the stove pushed strands of hair back from her flushed face.

  “Sleep in?” She laughed. “I don’t know. I still have to man the office here and there’s my photography, so I guess not much will change.”

  Beth nodded slowly. A purple crayon rolled away from the pack and bumped into Beth’s water glass. Willa’s head came up, she stared at it like she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do, but made no move to take it back. Beth nudged it into place next to the others.

  “Thank you,” Willa whispered, and went back to coloring.

  Lily was watching them when Beth looked up. “Ever think about having one of your own?”

  “A crayon?” Beth teased.

  Lily swatted her with a towel in passing. “A baby.”

  Beth eyed Willa. “Yeah, a time or two, but Cole was always dead set on waiting until we were married. Like people can’t have children without a piece of paper.”

  “Being married isn’t so bad,” Lily said, taking the seat next to her daughter. “It’s actually kind of nice being with the man you know you want to spend the rest of your life with.”

  “It doesn’t always work like that,” she mumbled, watching as Willa crudely colored in a bird yellow. “Sometimes it only sounds like a good idea in theory.”

  “I’ll be honest.” Lily smiled a little wistfully. “I really thought you and Cole would be together forever. But I guess everything looks perfect from an outsider’s perspective.”

  Beth shook her head. “No, I thought the same. And it was perfect. Maybe a little too perfect.”

  With a chuckle, Lily frowned. “How can anything be too perfect?”

  “When my parents met, my mom was seventeen,” Beth murmured. “My dad was twenty-five. They were crazy about each other. I mean so much so that they defied everyone, including my mom’s parents. It got so bad that they disowned her and threw her out of the house. But that didn’t stop them. They got married when she turned eighteen. A year later, they had me. Everything should have been perfect. They were soul mates, if you believe in that kind of thing. Instead, he started cheating on her and she OD’d. I always wonder, if they hadn’t married then maybe…”

  “Aw, Beth.” Lily reached across the table and set her hand lightly over Beth’s bandaged one. “Them getting married had nothing to do with the way things turned out. Honestly, the way it sounds to me, they were young. At least, she was and they stayed together for the thrill of it being forbidden. When that thrill died…”

  Beth shrugged. “Maybe, but I’d die if Cole looked at me the way my dad used to look at my mom.”

  “Do you honestly see that happening?” Lily gave her half smile. “That boy is so gone over you that I don’t even think he knows how to get back from it. Even after you left, he waited for you. He never said as much, but I knew he was hoping.”

  “The day I left, he was already moving on just fine with someone else.”

  Lily arched a brow. “Do you mean Cora Kennedy?” She rolled her eyes before Beth could answer. “He told me all about that and I will tell you right now that he came here that night, drunk off his horse. I remember it as clear as I remember this morning, because Cole and Sloan don’t drink, not in all the years I’ve known them and that night was the worst I’ve ever seen him.” Lily pulled her hand back at last. “I’m not telling you to do something you don’t want to do. If you don’t think there’s anything there anymore, then hell yes you should leave. But if the only thing keeping you guys apart is your parents’ mistakes, then I think you need to think long and hard on whether or not you’ll ever find that kind of love again.”

  Leaving Beth to think it over, Lily rose and hurried to the pot of pasta boiling on the stove. Willa continued to color with all the focus no four year old should possess. The rest of the house was quiet, but she knew it wouldn’t be for much longer. Any minute now, Cole would arrive with Calla and Sloan would get home from work and the house would be full of voices and movement.

  “Lily?”

  Rapping the ladle against the lip of the pot, Lily set it down and wiped her hands before turning to Beth. “Yeah?”

  “I still love him.”

  The blonde grinned. “I know.”

  Beth was on the verge of pegging the woman with a crayon for being so smug when the front door opened. Lily’s brows furrowed. Her gaze jumped to the clock on the wall.

  “It’s not Sloan,” she mused. “I better check. Could be a customer.”

  No sooner had she taken a step towards the door when a tiny voice called out, “Mo
mmy!” and Calla barreled in. She threw herself at her mother’s legs and clung.

  “Hey, sweetheart!” Lily scooped her up, backpack and all, and kissed her noisily on the pinkened cheek. “How was school?”

  Whatever Calla’s response was, Beth didn’t hear it. Her attention had all reverted to the figure that stepped into the doorway after the girl. Her heart missed a beat at the sight of him a split second before she saw the dark cloud behind his eyes.

  “What’s wrong?” She was out of her seat before she even realized she was moving.

  Cole spared her a fleeting glance before his gaze went to Lily. “Where’s Sloan?”

  Setting Calla down, Lily met Cole’s eyes. “He won’t be home for another ten minutes. What happened?”

  Rather than answer her, Cole looked down at the tiny person tucked into her mother’s side. “Can you take your sister upstairs, please? Daddy needs a minute with Mommy.”

  Nodding, Calla reached over and prodded Willa hard in the shoulder, jerking the girl’s arm and leaving a streak of green across the page.

  “Hey!” Willa wailed.

  “Calla, that was not nice,” Lily chided.

  “You’re so stupid!” Willa raged, pitching the crayon at Calla’s head. It beaned off the girl’s forehead.

  “She threw a crayon at me!”

  Lily grabbed Calla by the backpack before she could launch herself at her sister. “That is enough, you two! Calla, take your sister upstairs. Willa, no more throwing things.”

  Scooping her things up, Willa stuck her tongue out at Calla before marching from the room. Calla huffed, rubbed her forehead, and followed.

  “Calla, hang your things up before you go upstairs!” Lily called after her.

  “Maybe one,” Beth mused quietly to herself.

  Lily looked at her. “What?”

  “I think I only want one,” she decided solemnly.

  The two women laughed at the joke. But it died quickly when Cole shifted in the doorway, regaining their attention.

  “What do you know about Damon Comb?” he demanded once he had Lily’s focus.

  Lily shrugged. “Not much.” She turned to the stove and snapped the element off. “He and his dad live on my old street. You know the one with the broken fence? I’ve seen the father a time or two when I’ve gone to visit my parents. Never spoken to him though. Why?”