The Naughty Corner (30 page)

“The cat?” Rafe couldn’t seem to help opening his mouth at that point.

But Lola waved him off. “No, don’t say anything. She’s fine. It wasn’t your fault that the door was open. I’ve just never known a sweeter boy. I mean, you’re seventeen and they’re only fifteen and a half, no friends in the area. And your ages are miles apart in teenage years. But you took them under your wing with no ulterior motive.”

What the hell was she talking about? Rafe had ignored the twins.

“Oh, and the flowers.” She closed her eyes briefly in an expression of absolute bliss. “That was so sweet of you.”

“I didn’t give you the flowers,” Rafe said, but his voice was weak, his gaze on the concrete. He removed his hand from his pocket, his fingers working the keys.

“Don’t be so modest. You can tell your dad. He’d be so proud of you.” She finally looked at Gray. “They were all dried and ready to be pressed. Absolutely perfect.” What was she trying to tell him? He didn’t have a clue.

Rafe swallowed, looked at him, then just as quickly his gaze darted to the car. His feet even shifted a step closer to the driver’s side.

“And all those lovely messages and texts you sent me. I can’t begin to tell you how good they made me feel. If I’d known they were from you, I would have immediately thanked you.” She winked at Rafe. “But you sly devil, you blocked the number and sent the emails from a generic account. You just didn’t want to take credit for being so nice, did you?”

Rafe remained speechless, a flush staining his cheeks red. Embarrassment? Gray was beginning to realize it might actually be shame.

“But the sweetest thing was that letter.” Lola put a hand to her chest. “It truly touched me.”

Rafe cocked his head. “I didn’t send a letter.”

She waved a hand at him. “I know you don’t want to take credit for such heartfelt words.” She smiled sweetly. “So eloquent.”

“But I didn’t send a letter,” Rafe insisted.

She fluttered her eyelashes at him. “Well, never you mind. I’ll leave you two alone, and I’m sure your dad will want to hear every detail of your benevolence.”

“But—” Rafe’s hand shot out as if he wanted to grab her. But he stopped dead instead.

Reaching into the purse dangling from her arm, Lola pulled out a folded piece of paper which she handed to Rafe. “And just in case you forgot all those wonderfully eloquent words you wrote”—she wrinkled her nose at his son—“I thought you’d like a copy for a keepsake.”

For a moment, the paper hung in the air between them. Then Lola opened her thumb and forefinger, the folded sheet falling, and Rafe reached out to snatch it before it landed in the puddles on the drive.

Stupefied by her performance, Gray realized he hadn’t said a word. It was time to take charge. “You should stay and tell me more about it yourself.” Because he sure as hell didn’t know what was going on, except that there was a subliminal message threaded through everything she’d said. And Rafe knew exactly what she was referring to.

But Lola was stepping back from him, too. He not only saw it, he felt it, the sudden distance that was more than just the few feet between them.

“No,” she said. “I think it’s time for me exit stage left. Rafe can tell you everything. You don’t need me in the middle. In fact, I shouldn’t be between you at all. It really was a bad idea.”

He could read between the lines.
Don’t call me. And I won’t call you.

What had she said last night? That contrary to what most people believed, men were the ones who ended up wanting a relationship. And that’s when Lola exited stage left. She didn’t want a relationship. And certainly not with a man who had parenting issues. She was walking out, cutting her losses.

He felt the ache in his gut, and she hadn’t even left yet. When she turned, her sandals slapping on the concrete, the ache became a tear across his midsection. Then she was gone.

26

LOLA DROVE AWAY, HER FINGERS NUMB ON THE STEERING WHEEL.

Gray had let her go. He hadn’t tried to stop her. He hadn’t even asked what the hell she was talking about. He’d just looked at her with resignation. Like he knew that letting her walk away was inevitable.

When she’d thought it up in the split second between seeing Gray with his son and pulling up to the curb, the method had seemed perfect. She’d tell Gray without telling Gray. She’d lay it on so thick that the boy would be rolling on the ground with remorse. Okay, it was the same thing Julie Andrews had done in
The Sound of Music
when the children put a frog in her pocket and a pinecone on her chair.

Except that where the children had started crying, Rafe had done nothing at all. And Gray let her walk away.

It was over. Just like that. She was alone again, the way she liked it. She was free to come and go as she pleased—at least as soon as the twins left. No attachments, no one to pick-pick-pick until she couldn’t stand it a moment longer. No one trying to mold her into something else. No man she was dependent on to make her feel good about herself. In charge of herself, her life, and powering through the next project. Yep, the way she liked it. Alone.

The way she
used
to like it. Before Gray.

* * *

IT TOOK GRAY SEVERAL MOMENTS TO COLLECT HIMSELF. HE
couldn’t act like Lola had walked away with a big piece of him in the palm of her hand.

“Are you going to tell me what that was all about?” His voice came out husky, laced with an edge of emotion.

Rafe didn’t answer. He was reading the letter Lola had given him, and with each second that ticked by, his face grew more pallid. Then he swallowed.

“I didn’t send this letter,” he said. “The rest of it was just a little fun. But I didn’t send this.” He shook the paper emphatically. “I wouldn’t send this, Dad, I swear.”

What the hell? Gray held out his hand. Rafe passed it over, his fingers shaking. And Gray read the
wonderfully eloquent
words.

I know who you are, Bitch, and I know what you’re doing. You can’t treat people like this. You’ll be sorry for what you’ve done. You will pay. And you’ll never hurt anyone like this again. I promise you.

His belly crimped. He looked at his son. “You better tell me the rest of it. Now.”

Rafe told him. About the flowers—which were all dried and ready for her to press rather than
dead
—the texts, the voicemails, the emails, all with words like
bitch
,
slut
, and
whore
. About plotting with the twins, how they were to gauge her reaction. How he’d noticed Gray watching her that first day of camp. He’d seen Lola looking back, too. His son wasn’t stupid. He’d read all the signals. He’d seen her car at Gray’s house.

“It was just a game, Dad. Harry and William said she was on their case all the time, taking their phones and their video games when they”—he finger-quoted—“misbehaved.”

Gray stared at him. “Did I actually raise you? Because if I did, I failed miserably to teach you
anything
.” The words came out like they were from someone else’s mouth.

For the first time, Rafe’s face turned sullen, his lip curling slightly. “
You
called her those names, too. I saw your text to her.”

He remembered that night in the kitchen, the phone on the counter, Rafe’s obviously furtive and guilty expression. “If I were you, I wouldn’t choose this moment to admit you invaded my privacy.”

A lawnmower started up next door, but he didn’t raise his voice. Rafe could hear every word. “Words have appropriate uses and inappropriate ones. Sending a woman anonymous messages calling her a bitch and a slut is one of those inappropriate uses.” He threw his hands in the air. “Don’t you realize that’s harassment? How could you do that?”

“It was just a game.”

“Don’t use that excuse again. It wasn’t a game. You were pissed because I was dating her, and you punished her instead of being a man and talking to me about it.”

“I tried to talk to you about it that night. But you said you were busy.” Rafe’s voice rose. “You’ve always been busy. You were too busy for Mom. All the times she used to cry when you didn’t answer your phone while you were traveling. You always have time for everyone else. Even the kids on the football team.”

He ignored the stuff about Bettina. It was a battle he couldn’t win. But he needed Rafe to understand about football. “I started the camp for you. To spend time with you.”

Rafe shot the explanation down. “You don’t spend time with
me
. You’re busy with drills and game plans and exercises and wiping Stinky Stu’s nose or Pete’s butt.” He stabbed a finger at his chest. “I even had to beg you to buy me a car so Mom didn’t have to drive me around all the time. I just wanted to make it easier on her.”

It always came back to Bettina, but she was beside the point now. “You think I’m too busy so you harassed a woman?”

But Rafe wasn’t listening anymore. His fingers clutched around the keys, he turned on his heel, ran to the car, backing out of the driveway while Gray watched.

He wasn’t angry. He was defeated. After all the years of trying to make things right, he finally accepted that they never would be. He had lost his son. And he had lost Lola.

* * *

HE WAS DEFEATED, BUT IT WASN’T IN GRAY TO GIVE UP ON HIS SON.
He climbed in his car, started up the engine, and followed. Of course, Rafe was nowhere in sight, so Gray chose option one on the list of places he would have gone: home.

He had to admire the way Lola had gotten her point across. She hadn’t gotten angry; she’d praised Rafe. She hadn’t shouted; she’d simply sounded amazed and appreciative. The result was shaming his son in a way she could never have accomplished with anger. And Rafe deserved shaming without a doubt. He could only hope his son learned something from her method.

The Subaru was in Bettina’s driveway, the hood still warm as he passed his hand across it on the way to the front path.

He knocked. Bettina opened the door. “What on earth did you do to him this time?” Frown lines slashed her forehead.

“I’d like to talk to him,” he said politely. He didn’t want a boxing match with her as well as Rafe.

“Well, he’s up in his room and he doesn’t want to see you.” She barred his way, arms folded, defensive. Her hair was perfect, her blouse ironed, everything about her crisp, even her walking shorts.

He closed his eyes for one second and breathed deeply. “Bettina, I still pay the mortgage on this house, and I don’t need permission to speak with my son.”

Wrong thing to say. She drew her mouth into an ugly purse, lines marring her upper lip. “You don’t have any rights here. You gave them up when you abandoned us.”

He wanted to laugh; she was so good at rewriting history. But he was interested in Rafe, not Bettina’s never-ending grievances. “We have an issue with our son, so I would appreciate coming inside to discuss it.”

Bettina hated it when he got reasonable. “What issue?” she snapped, not opening the door even an inch wider.

“Bettina,” he said calmly, “you don’t want to air our dirty laundry out on the porch, do you?”

She hated his equanimity, but she hated publicly airing her quarrels with her ex-husband even more. She stepped back and let him in, but no farther than the high-ceilinged front entry.

It was a two-story house, living room on the right, dining room on the left, a hall leading back to the kitchen and family room, and the stairs to the second level straight ahead. Rafe’s room was directly across the landing, his door open. Anything said down in the hall could certainly be overheard.

Gray stated things flatly without embellishment or emotion. “Rafe has admitted sending harassing messages to the aunt of two of the boys on our football team.”

She scowled. “He wouldn’t do anything like that.”

“I just told you,” he said evenly, rationally, maintaining composure. “He
admitted
it.”

“Well, he must have had a good reason.”

Gray put steel into his voice. “There’s never a good reason for harassing anyone. There’s always a better solution for addressing any problem.”

“Well.” She tossed her hair, gave a slight shrug of her shoulders. “I want to hear his side.”

“Fine. By all means”—he thrust a hand out in the direction of the upstairs landing—“call him down.”

Bettina didn’t. “Who was she?”

He’d already told her. “She’s the aunt of two of the boys on my team.”

“So this is the little floozy you’ve been screwing?”

Gray didn’t say anything because if he let one word out, all the rest would come. And getting angry with her wouldn’t help Rafe.

Bettina went on as if he’d spoken. “Rafe told me all about her. All those heated looks”—she rolled her eyes—“you and this woman have been giving each other out on the football field whenever she picks up her brats.”

He glanced to the head of the stairs and Rafe’s open door. Were those his words? Or Bettina’s?

“I’m appalled at the way you’ve exposed our son to your rampant sexual activity.”

This was her usual modus operandi, put him on the defensive, make him start explaining. And the original point was dead, buried, and forgotten.

Not this time. “My private life isn’t the topic of discussion. We need to come to some resolution on Rafe’s behavior.”

Two steps closer, Bettina stuck her finger in the center of his chest. “
Your
private life is exactly why he did what he did. You leave your cell phone around where he can see whatever filthy texts you’re sending to your paramours.”

“He had to push several keys on my cell phone to get to any messages I might have sent.” Dammit, she was making him explain, diverting him.

“He told me about them. All your filthy language, your degradation of women. I won’t have him exposed to that.” She stabbed his chest for emphasis, and it was all he could do not to shove her.

He had never understood her anger. She didn’t want sex, but she sure as hell didn’t want him to have it with anyone else either.