The Wrong Man For Her

Her intense gaze never wavered from his. “I’m good, Nick, really good.” She stood. “I’ll show you your office.” She gestured around the room. “This is where you’ll hold your support groups.”

Nick studied the formal space with its dark cherry paneling and furniture. “Unacceptable.”

She sighed, exasperated. “Why?”

“I can’t hold a support group here for kids. It has no teen atmosphere.”

Her eyes sparked with interest this time.

“We need a place to call ours. Teen-friendly furniture, posters on the wall, books and materials spread around. I’ll also need a fridge for snacks, personal journals for each kid, arts and crafts materials.”

“Sounds like you have things all planned out.”

“As you said, I know what I’m doing.”

“Yes, of course you do.”

“Is my office big enough to turn into a group room?”

She thought for a minute. “We can do better than that. Come on, I’ll show you a storage area that you can use. It’ll need some work, though it does have big windows.”

“Thanks. For giving in on this.”

“I’m not giving in. I never had any intention of blocking good ideas. I will not, however, let you steamroll me.”

“Of course you won’t.”

She started to gather her papers.

“I’d like to say one more thing.”

“What?”

“I, um, want to apologize for everything that happened in the past. How I behaved.” He cringed, thinking of the last time he’d seen that pretty face of hers; it had been awash with tears. The last thing he’d heard that husky voice say was, You’re leaving because I thought I was pregnant, aren’t you? “I’m sorry, Maddie.”

“Apology accepted. In return, I’d like your promise not to bring up our past again. We need to concentrate on helping people here. Are you capable of doing that? Because if you’re not, this will never work.”

For some reason, he felt offended. “I’m capable of doing that. Obviously, we’ve both gone on with our lives.”

“Yes, we have. Best you remember that, Nick.”

“I will, Dr. Walsh.”

CHAPTER TWO

“WATCH OUT THERE, beautiful, you’re up damn high.”

Tessa smiled down at Nick from the ladder, which allowed her to reach the twelve-foot ceiling of his newly designated group session room.

“Because you’re afraid of heights, doesn’t mean everyone is.” Tessa giggled at his phobia. It was good to see his sister-in-law happy after the trouble she and his brother had last summer. A man from her past had stalked her and ended up dead. The scandal almost destroyed their marriage. “Anyway, it makes you human.”

“Oh, I’m all too human.” He tapped the side of the paint can. “You sure about this color?”

“The kids will like it. Blue is soothing, makes people more relaxed. Its deep shade won’t be too prissy for teenagers.” She scanned the area she’d already done. “The four windows are great and there’s enough room for the kids to sprawl out. But maybe we could have waited for them to pick out the color.”

“No, I’ll let them choose what stuff to put up on the walls. I want them to feel welcome here at the first session. Lucky me that you had today off and could help paint.” He glanced at his watch. “I’m expecting the furniture tonight, so we’d better get going.”

Roller in hand, he began to slather paint on the parts of the wall he could reach, while Tessa cut in from the top. They made small talk as they worked. “Everything going well at the Villa?” he asked.

Tessa had taken a job as a librarian at a local teen detention center. Much like him, she worked well with troubled kids because she’d been one herself.

“Couldn’t be better. I got a grant from the New York State Arts Foundation for more books and am itching to spend it.”

“I’d be interested in what you’re ordering. I was hoping to have some teen lit in here.”

“I could do some research into adolescent literature about victimization.” She cocked her head. “One author I know of is David Pelzer.”

“Yeah, his books are gruesome enough to snag the kids’ attention.” Pelzer had been abused by his mother for years and vividly recounted his experiences in his writing.

“He’s coming to town for Crime Victims’ Rights Week.”

“Really?” Nick said. “Nobody told me about it. Then again, nobody told me about a lot of things.”

“The Villa clients are going. Your kids probably can, too.”

From the corner, soft rock drifted out from the CD player as they continued their task.

“What did you mean, nobody told you about a lot of things?” Tessa asked.

He hesitated. “Madelyn’s back at the Center.”

Tessa stopped painting and looked down at him. “What?”

When she and Dan had put pressure on him to move to Rockford, Nick had confessed to them what had happened between him and Maddie. God, he hated to talk about his failures, even with people who loved him.

He also explained about John and Lucy.

“I’m so sorry. I know how close you are to them. Is Lucy all right?”

“Yes, but John’s easing off on his work here because of her.”

“That must have been a hard decision for him to make.”

Tessa was right about that. John’s daughter, Zoe, had been beaten and raped, then shot to death twenty years ago. The Kramer family had practically fallen apart and there’d been no organizations to help them out. After they’d begun to heal, John had vowed to do something in Zoe’s memory for other crime victims’ families, as well as for the victims themselves.

Nick smiled, proud of the fact that, two decades later, the Kramer Group, which eventually became the Rockford Crime Victims Center, was one of the most renowned victim assistance organizations in the state.

“It gets worse, Tessa.”