An Old-Fashioned Love

Max’s chin wobbled, and tears welled up. “Y-yes, sir.”

Wyatt let his hands fall away from his head, his mouth dropping open at the same time. He split an enraged look between them. “Have you ever heard the word theft?” he bawled. They both jumped, but he was beyond pity. “Let me get this straight! You stole a pile of lumber from the old ice-cream shop, cut it up and somehow fashioned it into that wreck out there in the backyard that you call a clubhouse! Have I got this right?” He blared the question at Rex and was actually surprised but not necessarily pleased to see that boy recoil before stiffening and licking his lips.

“Yes.”

No groveling “sir” for Rex. Wyatt had to admire the boy’s spirit. On the other hand, Rex lacked Max’s sensitivity. It struck him again how very different his twins were. Wyatt pulled his mind back to the matter at hand. He had no doubt who was the mastermind of this little caper, and it was time the mastermind faced the consequences of his actions. Wyatt made a show of glancing at the paper in his hand, though in truth every word was already printed indelibly on his mind. Then he very deliberately drew himself up, stretching his six-foot frame another couple of inches.

“That covers the theft,” he said smartly. Then he slowly leaned forward. “Now we come to the vandalism.” That last he said with his face shoved up right next to the boy’s, scant room for an eyelash between the ends of their noses. “What does it mean, Rex?” Was it merely his perspective, or did the boy’s eyes widen?

“I…don’t know.”

“Rex!”

“Unless it was the doorknob.”

Wyatt pulled back, blinking, puzzlement overshadowing meager satisfaction. “Doorknob? What about a doorknob?”

Rex got a pugnacious look on his face, but he answered nonetheless. “It was just junk, anyway. That’s why it broke when we tried to get it off.”

Wyatt rolled his eyes at the ceiling. “You were trying to steal the blasted doorknob and it broke?” It was as much exclamation as question.

Rex pushed his chin to his chest, fuming. “It was junk! That place was abandoned a long time ago. Nobody steals junk. We were just going to use it!”

“And destroyed it in the process! Of all the ignorant, idiotic—” Wyatt forced himself to stop and count, clenching his jaw. He got well past ten before he could trust himself to go on, and even then he required the fortification of a deep breath. “All right,” he said, “so you broke the doorknob. Anything else?”

Rex lifted his head, resignation showing in the dullness of his eyes and the stern line of his mouth. “We pulmm-um some floorboards,” he mumbled.

“What? Speak up!”

The boy fixed him with a hard glare. “We pulled up some floorboards!”

Wyatt balled his hands into fists, completely forgetting the paper he crumpled in the process. “Pulled up…You actually pried up the boards from the floor of that old ice-cream shop?” He threw up his arms. “What? No spray painting? No broken windows?”

“Two,” Max said quietly, causing his father to whirl in his direction.

“But the first was an accident!” Rex defended.

Wyatt whirled back, too dismayed to check himself, only to hear Max give the final explanation.

“We did it trying to take down that thing over the window.”

Wyatt spun again. “What thing?” he barked.

Max’s chin was wobbling, and his eyes brimmed with tears. “Th-tha blue-and-white-striped thing. W-we thought it would make a good h-hammock.”

Wyatt’s jaw descended slowly. “An awning. You tried to steal an awning and broke the window in the process. For pity’s sake! We’re talking delinquent activity here—criminal activity.”

“Wh-what does that mean?” Max asked.

“It means we have to go to court, stupid,” Rex answered harshly, and it was this that fixed Wyatt’s mind.

He struck the pose of lieutenant colonel again, quite unconsciously. “That’s right,” he said. “We are indeed going to court, and when we get there you two miscreants are going to confess everything, and I do mean everything.”

“Will they p-put us in jail?” Max wailed, causing Rex to grimace with disgust.

“They don’t send kids to jail,” he said. “Do they?”

“They do,” Wyatt replied firmly, “but not in this case. Miss Temple, bless her, has filed a civil suit instead of making a complaint to the police. But don’t think you’re going to get off easy. This little escapade is going to cost me a pretty penny, thank you very much, which means I’m suspending your allowances from now until the end of the summer.”

“The whole summer!” Rex exclaimed.

“That’s right, the whole summer. And in addition you’re grounded until the court date, which is late next week. That means you go to school, you come home and you go to your rooms. No TV. No video games. No comic books. No telephone. And that isn’t the end of it, not by a long shot! But first, get out there and knock down that damned clubhouse! I want every board down, every nail pulled and the lumber stacked in piles according to length. After that, you can straighten this place up. This living room looks like a trash can, and I’m sick of it! The rest will come later, and you can just stew about it until then. Now have I made myself plain, misters?”

“Yes, sir!” Max snapped, but Rex merely flipped him a weak salute.

Wyatt glared at him and lifted a shaking finger. “Go. Now. Before I decide to take my belt to you!”

Both turned and walked away, Max with tense, hurried steps, Rex shuffling side to side with every show of reluctance. Wyatt closed his eyes and gritted his teeth to keep from shouting at them again. It was less than they deserved, blast them, but he knew what they were thinking, what they had always thought. They were thinking that he didn’t love them, didn’t want them. What else could they think after he had neglected them so long, seen them so little? Damn him, and damn Marie, for having brought them to this. He and his ex-wife were too selfish to be parents, and he blamed her no more than he blamed himself.

She might have abandoned the boys nearly a year ago to run back home to her beloved France, but that was no more than he’d done when they were barely six and Marie had issued her ultimatum. She had vowed to divorce him if he reenlisted, but he had signed on that dotted line, nonetheless, seeing it as a way to end the arguments and accusations. If he was dealing with the aftermath of that decision now, then so be it. It was probably less than he deserved, after all. And he did love them. Would his failures rankle so deeply if he didn’t?

Traci smoothed the skirt of her dress, a simple sleeveless sheath with a boat neck, belted at the waist beneath a long, loose jacket. The fabric was white cotton, covered with tiny red embroidered flowers. Her navy shoes had substantial heels; to her mind, flats simply did not work with shorter skirts. To accessorize the outfit, she wore a necklace of heavy red beads strung between links of a wide gold chain and matching drop earrings. Her hair had been swept up into a thick roll from which a few stray curls escaped. The overall effect was both businesslike and emphatically feminine. It was a look she had skillfully and successfully cultivated during her four years as a legal secretary, years that had served her well, but years she would not care to repeat, owing to the workload, long hours, pressure and intensity, not to mention the less-than-overwhelming financial compensation.

Those years had served her well, however, because she had learned a good deal about legally protecting herself and the best ways of seeking redress through the court system, which accounted in part for her decision to sue retired Lieutenant Colonel Wyatt Gilley in small claims court. True, her compensation for damages would be limited to fifteen hundred dollars, but the filing fee was less than forty bucks, the papers were easy to fill out, no attorney need be involved, and her chances of collecting were as good as in any other court, which was to say not really very good at all.

Indeed, given his attitude the two times she had attempted to talk to him about the situation, she did not even expect Wyatt Gilley to show up for the hearing. He just didn’t seem inclined to take her losses seriously. Clearly those two redheaded urchins had him thoroughly bamboozled, but it didn’t matter. A judge was bound to be more objective. In addition to her own eyewitness account, Traci had come armed with notarized statements from those individuals who had actually seen the little vandals carting off her building materials. She, therefore, had scant doubt that the judgment would be in her favor.

What she doubted was her ability to collect a cent in damages, for Gilley would undoubtedly cry poverty, though he was known to own several rental properties and operate a small carpentry business, and of course there was his Army retirement pay. What, she wondered, did lieutenant colonels pull down by way of retirement pay? One thing was certain, it had to beat her grandmother’s monthly Social Security check. Nevertheless, she was not likely to collect unless he one day sold property within the county, and only then would she be able to attack his income if she filed the judgment with the county clerk, which she most certainly would do.

Still and all, she knew she was going through all this primarily as a matter of principle. Well, so be it. With the help of her charming friend, the Reverend Bolton Charles, she had placed the matter in more capable hands than her own. This, then, was an exercise in faith, if nothing else.

Crossing her slender legs, she tugged at her skirt to be sure that it covered her adequately and settled back on the uncomfortable bench to wait until the bailiff called her into the courtroom. A quarter hour passed, then twenty minutes, before the door swung open on the chamber where the special district judge was holding court. Almost simultaneously, the red indicator light above the elevator lit up, and suddenly passengers were spilling out into the waiting area. To Traci’s surprise, she spied two redheads and a closely shorn, blond-haired man among them. Well, well. Those two little gangsters must be consummate performers to convince their father that their protests of innocence would hold up in court. She dropped her gaze to her hands, a sense of impending satisfaction causing the corners of her mouth to quirk up. She told herself that she must not gloat. It was no pleasant thing to have one’s confidence in one’s children destroyed, particularly when the moment of reckoning took place in public. That thought caused an intense stab of pity for retired Lieutenant Colonel Gilley, and unthinkingly she lifted her gaze in his direction. To her utter shock, Wyatt Gilley seemed to be waiting for her attention to return to him, and once it did, he offered her what could only be called a timid, apologetic smile.

She was given no time to consider that unexpected turn of events, for at that precise instant the bailiff opened his mouth and called out several names, hers among them. Abruptly Traci stood and fell in behind others making their way into the courtroom, being certain she had her pocketbook and file folder in hand. She was acutely aware of the Gilleys standing together just outside the door and avoided them by simply staring straight ahead. Keeping her chin up, she strode confidently down the center aisle of the room and slipped into a seat near the front, where she relaxed again. Confrontation averted, or so she thought, until she felt a slight nudge against her knee and looked up to find Wyatt Gilley, twins in tow, looking down at her.

“May we?” he asked softly, indicating with a nod of his head the vacant space on the bench between Traci and an elderly couple at the opposite end.

Traci felt the impact of those brilliant blue eyes all the way to her toes. Why hadn’t she noticed before how absolutely breathtaking they were, shining out of that leanly sculpted, tan face from beneath lashes and brows so blond as to be almost white? For some reason, she felt instantly panicked. Would those eyes lie? Would any judge doubt the word of the man behind them? The next moment, reason prevailed and relief shot through her. This case did not turn on the veracity of the man towering over her, but on the denials of a pair of obvious mischief makers and eyewitness testimony. She smiled at her own absurdity and was shocked once more by Gilley’s thousand-watt answering gleam of perfect white teeth. Reflexively she dropped her head, an action which Gilley seemed to take for assent.

“Thanks,” he whispered, and slipped by her. Whereupon his insensitive sons trampled her feet in following him. Taking the seat next to her, Gilley prodded the boys past him and glowered them into stillness at his side.

Almost at once the bailiff called for order and instructed all to rise. The judge swept into the room in a swirl of robes and seated herself on a raised chair behind a tall, featureless desk built of pale wood. The bailiff called out a case number and two names. Four people got up and walked through a low, swinging gate to two lecterns standing equidistant from the bench. The judge, an attractive woman in late middle age, read off the particulars of the case, none of which Traci heard because of Wyatt Gilley’s shoulder. With his arms crossed over his wide chest, one hard shoulder pressed against her own.

Traci could feel the warmth of that shoulder through the layers of his shirtsleeve and her jacket and dress. Moreover, she could see from the corner of her eye the strong, callused hand that rested a mere inch or two from her arm. Its palm was wide, its fingers long and blunt, its back smooth and tan, and it unnerved her as nothing else ever had. For long, seemingly endless minutes, Traci could think of nothing, hear nothing, see nothing, feel aware of nothing but the man sitting next to her and the shoulder pressing against her own. Then, suddenly, his hand stretched out and gently tapped her forearm. Traci nearly jumped out of her skin.

“Miss Temple.” The voice, though soft, came to her over the roar in her left ear, and she impulsively turned her head in that direction, only to come nose to nose with her opponent. To her utter dismay and extreme excitement, his handsome head with its short, thick brush of pale blond hair bent toward her. “It’s our turn,” he whispered, each word carefully enunciated.

Turn. Court. Sudden realization galvanized her. She sprang to her feet and out into the aisle in one sharp, jerky movement, purse and file folder clutched to her sides. What was she doing? What was she thinking? What had she done? Not a single answer formed in her mind, but Wyatt Gilley and his wayward sons were getting to their feet and turning toward her, which was enough to drive her through the gate in the short partition that separated spectator seating from the court of law. By the time she reached the lectern, she had herself well under control again, and all her bodily functions, both mental and physical, seemed to be working properly, which was not to say that she wasn’t still shaken. She was relieved to find, however, that she could put the questions circulating through her thoughts out of mind long enough to concentrate on the matter at hand. So doing, she cleared her throat and opened the file folder before her, turning her attention to the judge, who stared at her over the tops of clear-framed reading glasses.