“I don’t know yet, but I believe you.” She asked him about Tally. “She’s going to be all right. It’s going to take her a few days of her resting before I’d be happy with her being released. But where she’ll go after that is beyond me. The complex where she was living has been condemned, and they’re finding places for people that are there. I’m sure she could be on that list, too, but I didn’t put her on it yet. I wanted to see if there were other takers for her that could keep an eye on her.”

  “You know that I’d love to do it.” Darrel thanked her. “You’re welcome. All right, I need to get my ass home and put my feet up. Then I have rotations with you tomorrow morning. Are we still up for that?”

  “Yes. I can’t thank you enough for helping out with my practice while I take this trip. I’ve not had a vacation since I got out of college. I need it.” She told him it was her pleasure. “When the baby comes along, I’ll be there for you too.”

  “I know that all of you will be.” The nurse said there was a call for Darrel, and Elizabeth told him she’d talk to him later. “I’ll be home if you need anything from me. I’m going to be working with the others on finding out some information about this family.”

  After saying his name in the phone, he had to pull it away from his ear so that he wouldn’t damage his ear drum. Whoever was on the other end was not a happy person with him. As soon as the man took a breath to no doubt start on him again, Darrel whistled. That got his attention.

  “Now, calmly tell me what the hell you’re going on about so that I can understand. I don’t have a clue what it is you’re screaming at me about.” He said that his name was Howie Washer. “All right. I know who you are. What do you want?”

  “Someone told me that you took my kid from me. I’m going to make sure that I own your wallet before the end of the day.” He said that he’d had nothing to do with his son being taken out of school. “Then who is it I have to murder to get him back. That kid is my ticket to a lot of things. One of them getting my sister in line with my stuff.”

  “You mean your sister, Tally Washer?” He asked him how he knew her name. “She’s here at the hospital as well. She’s been shot. Not for the first time, either, it seems.”

  “Well, hell. How is she supposed to pay me if she’s lazing around the hospital? You fix her up good enough that she can get out and get herself a job. I have things to pay off.” He asked him why he didn’t have a job. “I have a kid to watch over. Didn’t you hear me saying that?”

  “I heard you, but I doubt very much that you watch him all that well. From the report I’ve gotten, he’s barely eaten in a few days. Not to mention has anything to keep his feet warm in the winter.” He told him that was Tally’s job. While Darrel didn’t have any reports yet, he could guess. “Why is that? You said he was your kid. Why is your sister paying for his things?”

  “So I keep him.” That sent a chill so far down his back that he was sure he’d feel it for a week or two. “I got to find out where I can find my kid. If you know anything about him, you call me. I don’t deserve to be treated like this. I might just have to come down there and hassle Tally some to find out what she’s done now.”

  Darrel hung up the phone and then made a decision. “I don’t want anyone to be able to come in and see Tally Washer unless it’s my family. Nurses that you trust too.” Nurse Able said her son would come in and guard her door. “I don’t want anyone to get into trouble. Just make sure that no one goes in there without permission. I’ll tell the front desk too.”

  “I’ll take care of the desk downstairs. I’ll even tell them that you said no information either. That’ll keep his butt out of here. And Jeremiah won’t get in a bit of trouble. He’s a bouncer for that bar in Columbus that’s so popular. I’ll just say that I know her brother and that I don’t want any trouble for my staff. If anyone says anything, I’ll have them talk to your momma. She’ll be on my side.”

  She would be, indeed. After checking on Tally again, Darrell made his way home. He’d been working a lot of shifts lately and was looking forward to going on his trip. He’d not been skiing since he’d been in his last year of med school and was looking forward to it more than he could imagine. Not only that, but he was hoping to get laid once or twice. It couldn’t hurt him to be a little relaxed once in a while.

  Chapter 1

  William didn’t want to be in charge of getting information about Tally and Howie Washer. He certainly didn’t want to have anything to do with the kid. He was a good kid, sure, but he didn’t want to form any attachments to him that might come back to bite him in the ass later. William didn’t want any attachments in the form of a wife right now.

  There had to be services out there that could have done what his mom told him to do, but since she was his mom—looking up information on someone. However, he was going to do it for her. He was afraid of his mom. In fact, he was afraid of all the women in his family. They were pushy and sometimes mean about things. Of course, he’d ever say that to them, but he could think it all right.

  Tally was still recuperating in the hospital. That was where he was now, watching over her so that when she woke up, he could ask her a couple of questions about what he’d found. She’d done well enough with her recuperation that tomorrow she was going to be staying with his brother and sister-in-law in their home. Elizabeth being a doctor, could take care of her better than most would have, but he was still in charge of getting some information from the woman. He looked at Tally when she snorted. He’d forgotten if she’d answered his questions or not now.

  “What the hell is wrong with you? Why do you look like you’ve just had a fight with someone and lost? Or better yet, you seem to be pissed off about something. Is it me?” He stretched his neck, hearing it pop several times before he stared at her again. “Yes. I can see where you’d think that popping your neck like that makes you appear to be such a macho man. Fuck you. Leave me the list of questions you have, and I’ll answer them on my own.”

  “My mom said that I have to get them from you.” That embarrassed him even more, and William glared at Tally. “Why don’t you just give me the answers so I can get home and do some real work?” That earned him another glare from the woman. “If you really wanted to keep your nephew from being sold off, you should have done something more than just sending shit to him.”

  The punch to his face knocked him back enough that he slipped to the floor. Once he landed on the chair, he felt like he might be able to save some face. However, with his weight and the way he fell back, the chair broke under his weight, and he landed hard on the floor.

  He didn’t move. William knew that he’d deserved that and more from the woman. He’d been crude and cruel. When she started out of the bed, he didn’t think but grabbed her around the ankle and pulled her atop of him. He didn’t know what his plan had been, but once she was on his lap, she was a hell cat.

  It took him long enough to grab both her hands that his face was hurting. Not only had she scratched him a few times, but she managed to bloody his lip as well as pull his hair. She fought dirty, and for some reason, he was proud of her for it.

  “Calm down. Please. I’m sorry that I’ve done this to you. So if you’ll please let me talk, I can…please?” She did, but only for a second before he pulled her arm back behind her and held them there. “I’ve been a bastard. I know that, but if you’d just give me a second here, I’ll let you go. I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me when I said those things to you, but I’m so very, very sorry that I said them. There was no cause for me to be nasty to you.”

  “You’re right. There wasn’t. I didn’t deserve any of this shit going on either.” He nodded and looked at her. Tears were rolling down her cheeks so fast that he could barely catch them with his fingers. “Don’t be nice to me now, you overgrown baboon. You’ve done nothing but hurt me since you came into my life. Even before that, I’m thinking. If you don’t want to be here, then just fucking leave me alone. I’ve had enough shit going on in my life—do you think I didn’t want to go and get Clay? Every time I got within a few yards of the little guy, Howie would catch me and make me go home with my body so banged up that I could barely move. He lied to me all the time. I was living on peanut butter and crackers for months because he told me he didn’t have any money to pay his rent. And he had more than enough to pay me money instead of me paying him. Always threatening me with selling off Clay. Do you have any idea how hard it was on me to—no, of course, you don’t. Look at you in your thousand-dollar suit judging me because I only wanted to keep my little nephew safe.”

  When she burst into tears, William felt his heart break; his eyes filled with tears for what he’d done to this young woman. He really was an ass. He had caused this for her. Not her trouble with her brother, but he’d not been all that sympathetic to her. It was all his fault, and he didn’t know how to fix it. Gently pulling her into his body, he held her as she beat at him for a few moments before giving in and letting him hold her. Her sobs broke him in ways he didn’t have any words for.

  When she was limp in his arms, he continued to hold her. Even though his back was hurting and his legs had long since fallen asleep, he didn’t let her go. It was, holding her like this, the most comfort he’d gotten from anyone in a long time. Again, he thought, that was his fault too. Thinking about how he’d been treating her for the last several days, he thought about the report he’d been given when she arrived at the hospital after being shot.

  Tally had been living in a one-room closet-like place for the past four years. There wasn’t any kind of heat in the place she was living. No appliances to speak of. She did have a hot plate, but he discovered that every time it was turned on, it would blow the fuses in all the rest of the place.

  Her bed was nothing more than a child’s mattress on the floor. The blankets she used were as thin as the paper towels he used in his own home. To keep her things cold, such as milk and eggs, she would bury them in the snow outside her place during the winter months. William wondered what she did in the summer to keep food safe.

  William also knew she’d lost her job when a company had purchased the little grocery store where she had been working. It wasn’t all that much, either. The place was falling down around their ears. No coolers but the kind that were used on camping trips and the like.

  The company had given her severance pay that he’d been asked to give to her as he was an attorney close to where she lived. He knew for a fact that it wasn’t much. Not enough to get her into a nicer place, much less a safer one, at least. He decided that he was going to help her with that and a great many other things too.

  When she woke and looked up at him, he watched her face. She was embarrassed, he was sure. But when she started to move off his body, he had to hold her still. The blood going back to his extremities was painful, and he couldn’t help but moan and beg her to sit still.

  “You should have tossed me off you when I fell asleep.” He said he thought he’d done enough to her for one lifetime. “I guess you have. However, my lot in life isn’t all your fault. As you pointed out, I could have done more to get—”

  “Not without repercussions. To either you or Clayton. Or even both of you. I’m sure that Howie would have gone and done what he threatened you with, and you might not have been able to ever find him.” She moved off his legs when he asked her to. “I’m so very sorry, Tally. I’ve been an ass, and I’m so sorry for the way that I treated you.”

  “You’ve been more than an ass, and I don’t like you at all.” He told her that he didn’t like himself all that much either anymore. “I’m not going to tell you that I’m sorry you feel that way, but if you’re pissy like this all the time, perhaps you should see someone about it. At least keep away from people so that you’re not taking your moods out on them—what does the rest of your family think about your ‘moods’? I’m sure they’re avoiding you as much as I’d like to.”

  “My mother won’t talk to me right now. I’m ashamed to say that I was telling myself that it was all your fault, though I have no idea how that was to work. My brothers want to beat the shit out of me whenever I’m around them. I’ve gotten good at avoiding them—which I hate more than anything because I love my family more than myself. I don’t even want to think what my sisters-in-law want to do to me. I’m sure that it’s going to be painful and that I’ll be reminded of it every time I look in the mirror.” He was finally able to get up off the floor and helped her back into bed. “I’ve been sulking around for the last several weeks because I think that one of the women that have been coming around wants to be my wife. I don’t have a clue why that has upset me like it has. My brothers who are married seem to enjoy it very much.” She smacked him, and William couldn’t help it. He grinned at her. “Yes, once it was out of my mouth, I knew it was the wrong thing to say. That’s another thing that has everyone upset with me. I’ve not been filtering what comes out of my mouth—or I simply didn’t care what slipped past my lips. I’m sorry for that too.”

  “I don’t want to be anything to you. Not even your friend at this point.” His heart hurt over that, thinking that while he deserved it, he was still hurt by her words. “Why are you here if you find me to be such a horrible person? It can’t be because you think I’m going to be nice to you. As I said, I don’t like you at all.”

  “I’m sorry for that. I feel as if I’d lost…can we start over?” She glared at him. “You know, you’re kind of cute when you’re all pissy with me. The reason that I’m here? Well, it was to give you what information I had on your brother. Then I was to keep an eye on you to make sure that you had everything that you needed while being laid up. They removed three bullets from your body. The neighbors that shot you didn’t even deny it when they were asked about you being hurt. Now there is a couple that should be put on a poster for the way a marriage does not work.”

  “You’re not getting any brownie points for being nice to me now. As I told you already, I don’t like you.” Again, he felt the loss of something huge and sat down in the other chair in the room. “If you think I’m going to pay for that chair you broke being an ass, you’ve got another thing coming. I didn’t break it. You did.”

  “I’ll take full responsibility for it. You don’t have to worry about anything. I promise you that it’s all been taken care of by my family.” She didn’t seem convinced, so he changed the subject. “Clayton has been put with a family, mine, as a matter of fact, that is keeping him safe. He’s a great kid but very cautious. He’s getting food when he wants, which is a big deal for him, I’m to understand. As well as clean clothing that fits the seasons. He told my brother that all he had was a pair of shorts that he had to wear all of last year through the winter months. Also, he has three pairs of shoes because he was so excited about having one pair that Elizabeth couldn’t help getting more for him. When we went to the house he was staying in, there wasn’t one thing that looked as if it belonged to him there. Especially no food. It had been locked up with a combination lock on not just the cabinets but the fridge as well. What else can I tell you? Oh yeah. Howie has been arrested as of three days ago. My brother found the recordings of conversations that you had with Howie, and he used them to have him brought up on charges. I hope you don’t mind, but they’ve packed up what little you had in your old place and put it in storage. The other people in the building have been moved out as well. The place wasn’t fit to have dogs living there, much less humans. As I said, the neighbors, Jim and Dana Write, have been arrested. Also, so you know, I’ve not been made aware of how long Howie will be in jail. As I said, no one is hanging out with me much anymore, but I guess he’s being held with child endangerment and other charges. If I hear that he’s been released, I’ll make sure you know. He’s dangerous.”

  “He said he was going to sell Clayton off. Howie was never a nice person, not even as a child. Nowadays, they’d say he had an over-inflated sense of entitlement. Back then, I thought he was a monster. I guess he was able to get a food card as well as housing. I was sending him about all my money a week, and he was living much better than I was from the get-go. Bastard.” He said that he had heard that too. Also that he’d been selling off his food card for cash and had been hoarding the money instead of keeping his son in clothing and food. “The school, they should have done something. I don’t know what it would have been, but someone should have stepped up and asked Clay why he wasn’t getting food and wearing the same thing every day. Don’t they have things in place that is supposed to take care of kids like Clayton?”

  “I don’t know, but I do agree. My brother just started as a teacher part-time there, but Clayton wasn’t in his class, or he would have immediately done something. He’s teaching first grade while one of the teachers is on maternity leave. As it is, he feels horrible that it wasn’t taken care of. It took my other brother, Sherman, volunteering at the school, that saw what was going on.” She asked him if his brothers were deadbeats. That made him laugh. “No. We’re all just trying to find something to do with our lives. I, as well as most of my brothers, are attorneys, and they’re working with the state to make sure that Howie gets the most jail time possible. Del, my youngest brother, is an engineer. He makes things like hospital equipment to use in operating rooms. His wife, Merce, they together own several companies that work with other companies to retool them to work better and more efficiently. Darrel, you’ve met him. He’s a doctor. I think he enjoys his job more than any of us besides Del. I don’t know that any of us went into it thinking we’d love the job of being an attorney. We were good at our job, but none of us like it. It was a way to make…no, that’s not right either. We didn’t go into it thinking that we’d make our mom proud of us. She has told us all our life that she thinks she’s gotten the best of the best in her children. Confessing that we hated it when we were all together, felt like a huge burden had been lifted off our shoulders. We do work for the family and such, but we’re not bogged down with going to work every day. And as I said, we’re all looking for something to do outside of the courtroom.”