Wrong thoughts, for sure. Too . . . personal. Where was his usual detachment?
He knew better than to get too involved. He knew how important it was to maintain a level of professionalism.
“Can I talk to you a moment, Ms. Walsh? Alone?”
Her lips pressed flat and for some reason he thought it was the Ms. Walsh designation that did it. There probably weren’t a lot of people in this town to address her so formally. She probably thought he was mocking her.
Without waiting for her agreement, he set the clipboard down. Turning, he walked down the hall. There was a moment of silence before he heard her follow. The slight staccato slaps of her tennis shoes on the tile trailed behind him as he led her into the conference room they used primarily for meetings and interrogations. He held the door open for her and closed it after she passed through.
She crossed her arms over her chest, creating a ledge for her small breasts. Of course he looked. Even though he liked generous breasts on a woman (preferred them, even), he was a typical guy and what Piper had distracted him. They were small but well formed. Perfect for her frame.
He snapped his gaze back to her face and kept his eyes trained carefully above her neckline. He’d learned long ago to keep things professional with the females in his county. She watched him with a wary expression, her fine dark eyebrows knitting together.
“Are you aware that two of the other kids your sister was hanging out with tonight have been brought in before? One for drug possession? The other for assault?”
Alarm softened her gaze and made her appear vulnerable for the briefest moment before her expression returned to hard. She tucked a strand of dark hair behind her ear, clearly agitated. “Did any of them have drugs on them tonight?”
He took his time answering. Crossing his arms across his chest, he leaned back on the table, lowering himself almost to her height. “No.”
“Did an assault take place?”
“No.”
“Then I can take her home?” Her dark eyes narrowed on him expectantly.
He stared at her for several moments before answering. She shifted on her feet, clearly anxious to be on her way. It didn’t take any great discernment to figure out she didn’t care about what he was saying. He wondered if she was even going home or just going to head back to Joe’s once she dropped her sister off at home. And then he wondered why he cared so much. People came and went out of this department every day. Some innocent. Some guilty. He couldn’t afford to care too much and maintain his objectivity.
“I hope you will talk with your sister about the kinds of friends she chooses to associate with. These are the types of choices that can affect the rest of her life. One wrong decision—”
“Thank you for your concern.”
He shook his head. She couldn’t even be bothered to hear him out. He knew he should let it go. Let her go, but he heard himself asking, “Do you care about your sister, Ms. Walsh?”
Hot color flamed her cheeks. She uncrossed her arms and stabbed a finger in his direction. “You don’t know anything about me or my family.”
“Actions speak for themselves. You’re in my station in the middle of the night because you can’t keep tabs on your sister.”
She flinched and then quickly recovered, her eyes like dark chips of obsidian as they fixed on him. “You won’t be seeing me or my sister again, Sheriff Walters.” She paused for breath. “I can promise you that.”
“I hope you’re right, Ms. Walsh.”
“May I take her and go now?”
Still, he hesitated, which made him wonder. What else did he want to say? What could he say? He wasn’t a social worker like his sister. It wasn’t his job to reform anyone. “Yes.” He waved her out of the room.
She stalked ahead of him and he followed, watching her storm off with more appreciation for her well-rounded ass than he should feel.
His gaze skimmed all of her. For someone so small, she radiated enough fury that she actually looked like she could level a small village. She seized the clipboard on Doris’s desk and scrawled her signature.
“One moment,” he called.
The sisters both froze, exchanging uneasy glances.
He slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. Inside he fished out two business cards and handed one to Piper and then the other to Malia. “If y’all ever need to get ahold of me. My cell number’s included there.”
Malia looked from the card to her sister, her expression uncertain.
Piper Walsh glared at him with blazing eyes. She understood what he wasn’t saying: If either one of you are ever in trouble, you can call me.
Her nostrils flared, clearly offended and he didn’t know why. He gave his card out all the time. Especially to people in need. Especially to children living in questionable circumstances. He never wanted a kid to feel like there was no lifeline available for them.
“Thank you for your concern, Sheriff, but it’s not necessary,” Piper said again, her voice like ground glass. She thrust his card back at him, forcing him to take it. With a smile reserved for Doris, she took her sister by the hand and led her from the building without a backward glance at him.
He stared at the double doors through which they’d departed. Dark night pressed against the glass panes. Several moments passed and a flash of headlights streaked across the front doors, briefly filling the lobby as they exited the parking lot.
“Sweet girls,” Doris commented.
He glanced down at the woman who served as dispatch for his father and now him. He had known her all his life. She was more than an employee. She was family. When he was a boy, she used to sneak him candy out of the top drawer of her desk.
“Trouble is more like it,” he countered.
She grinned at him. “But who doesn’t want a little bit of trouble in their life now and then? Makes for an interesting time.” She paused a beat and then added, “That Piper sure is a pretty thing.”
“I hadn’t noticed,” he lied.
Doris tossed back her silvery-haired head and laughed. “Oh, that’s funny.”
“What’s so funny?”
She inched away from her desk. “You thinking I can’t tell when you’re fibbing. You forget I changed your diapers.”
He ignored her—what he usually did when she mentioned the fact she changed his diapers. She mentioned it a little too often. “She’s not my type.”
“Oh, I know the type you usually cavort with, but they’re not your type.”
He knew he shouldn’t, but he took the bait and called after her retreating figure. “Really? And what is my type, Doris?”
She didn’t slow down and she didn’t look back. “Oh, you’ll find out someday soon, I warrant. And you won’t need to ask me then.”
He felt himself scowl as she disappeared into the break room wondering what the hell kind of answer that was.
Four
The nerve of that man. He thought she was some bit of filth under his shoe. Just like the night she had overhead him talking about her in Joe’s. She’d known then he thought she was trash. Even if she hadn’t overheard him say those words, she had seen it in his eyes, heard it in his tone. It shouldn’t have stung. Others had thought it and said it to her face before. She’d developed a thick skin. It rarely bothered her anymore. And yet for some reason the sheriff being among their ranks affected her.
“You’re very mad at me,” Malia said quietly, interrupting the spin of her thoughts inside the car.
Piper took a shuddering breath. She was mad. Furious, even. Although one of the things she had learned after she became a parent, which she was essentially, was that when she was this angry she should wait before reacting. Wait and compose herself. Words spoken in anger led to regret.
And the thing was . . . right now she was mostly angry at the sheriff. The big jerk. She didn’t want to take her temper out on Malia.
Sheriff Hale Walters thought he knew her, but he was wrong about her and it killed her t
hat she couldn’t convince him of that. And that, in turn, ate at her. Because why should she give a damn what he thought about her?
He didn’t matter.
“Please. Say something. I can’t take the silence, Piper.”
Her mother had been one of those loud drunks. A real screamer. And considering she was intoxicated pretty much all the time, there was never a lot of silence in the Walsh household. Screaming was the only method of communication. Piper had vowed to live differently. She and Cruz said they’d be nothing like their parents.
Except he was in prison, which pretty much put him on the same path of every other male Walsh.
And she was raising their baby sister. Alone. While working in a strip club. Not exactly a stellar existence.
She sent Malia a quick glance before looking back at the road. Malia . . . their baby sister, who she just picked up from the sheriff’s station. Clearly she wasn’t doing a bang-up job parenting. She sighed and gave her head a slight shake.
“How mad are you?” Malia pressed.
Malia was a good kid. Ever since she was very little, she’d been an old soul who studied the world with wide, knowing eyes, taking it all in. A quiet observer, watching and learning. She was eons smarter than Piper could ever hope to be.
“I’m not mad.” She inhaled, proud of her calm and even tone. There had to be an explanation for tonight’s misadventure. Malia wasn’t a bad kid. “At least, not very mad,” she amended. “I’m just disappointed. Who were these kids you were hanging out with? The ones the sheriff said were trouble?”
“Just some kids from school. They’re . . . popular. They invited me and I was . . . flattered.”
Piper nodded. “They might be popular but they’re not the kind of people you need to be around if they’re going to get you into trouble like this. You’re better than this, Malia.”
Her voice was small and full of regret. “Claire said the same thing.”
That only made her sigh. Claire was her friend from soccer. Her mom helped get Malia to and from games when Piper couldn’t. They were good people who made it possible for Malia to play soccer on a select team outside of school. “Then why don’t you listen to Claire?”
Malia pressed her lips flat in petulant silence.
“Did you have a fight?”
Still no comment.
“Malia?” she pressed.
Finally she burst. “Because what else am I supposed to do? Claire is with Rafael now. She spends every spare minute she has with him. I only see her in history class and when we play soccer.”
Piper flexed her hands around the steering wheel, her stomach knotting as she grasped the situation. “Claire has a boyfriend?” She was a freshman like Malia. God, she wasn’t ready for her sister to start dating. She wanted her to stay little and innocent forever and—most importantly—never, ever get hurt.
“Yeah.” Malia expelled a breath and there was a wealth of frustration in that sound. “Maybe I overreacted. I shouldn’t have gone out with those kids. I knew I shouldn’t . . . I knew you wouldn’t approve. I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t, I guess. I’ll be more careful, Piper.”
They exited the highway and passed a few fast food places, the lights of the buildings gleaming brightly even this late at night, like bright, watchful eyes in the dark, following them as they moved along the quiet highway. West Texas was always quiet. And endless. A place for secrets.
The farther they drove outside the city limits of Sweet Hill, the terrain turned rugged, an untamed land of extremes, whipped raw by wind and sun. Not that different from those spaghetti westerns from fifty years ago—minus Clint Eastwood.
Her stomach growled, reminding her that she had long neglected it.
“I’m hungry,” Malia complained, as though she had heard Piper’s stomach.
“I’ll make you a grilled cheese when we get home.” Mentally, she ran over what was in their fridge. It was pitifully meager. Hopefully they still had a couple of cheese slices.
Malia craned her neck, looking longingly at the hole-in-the-wall taco stand that served the best tacos this side of the Rio Grande.
They hardly ever ate out. Twenty dollars’ worth of tips could buy groceries that lasted them for three days versus a single meal of fast food tacos.
She’d learned how to economize long ago when her mother forgot to feed them. She and Cruz would dig for change in the couch cushions and then walk to the corner store to buy a loaf of bread and cheese slices. Milk if they had enough. Cruz insisted milk was good for them and worth the splurge. Yes, in her world, milk was a splurge item.
“Guys come and go, you know,” Piper volunteered as she turned off the feeder road, still thinking about Claire having a boyfriend. The fleetingness of love and relationships was one of many lessons courtesy of her mother. She had a lot of boyfriends after their father. They never stuck around. “Real friends last. They hang in there. Claire will come around again. A guy can’t take the place of you. She’ll figure that out.”
Malia didn’t comment and they fell silent for the rest of the drive home. From the slouch of Malia’s small shoulders beside her, Piper knew she was feeling bad about tonight.
Tapping her fingers on the steering wheel, she resisted the urge to reach out and pat her arm. Comforting her and telling her everything was forgiven and all would be well would be counterproductive. If ever there was a time for a little tough love, it was now. Malia should feel guilty. It meant she still gave a shit. Apathy would be the end of everything. That she could feel regret, that she felt empathy at all, meant she was nothing like their mother. That had always been Piper’s fear. That despite everything she did, she would fail to raise Malia right and she would turn out like their mom anyway.
Piper needed to be a parent now and not a friend. Not even a sister. Cruz had told her that when he went to prison. She’d only been eighteen at the time, but she remembered his words and the burden that had settled on her shoulders with them. You’re her mother now, Piper. She might not call you Mom but that’s what you are. I know it’s a lot to handle, but you’ll do great. Better than our mom ever did.
“Better than their mom” wasn’t a high bar to hurdle, but she wondered what Cruz would think of her tonight. If he would think she was doing great.
Piper had lost her job. Malia had been hauled to jail . . . kinda. And they were flat broke. She felt like a failure.
She wanted to believe that Malia’s shenanigans were just a one-time thing, natural growing pains that any other typical teen went through. But what if this was just the start of trouble? The beginning of the end?
If, if, if . . .
She shook her head and ordered herself to stop theorizing and playing the “what if” game. It wasn’t helping. She flexed her suddenly sweating palms on the steering wheel. It only made her more neurotic than she already was. She wasn’t screwing up Malia. Malia was a good person. She knew this.
To make matters worse tonight, that behemoth of a sheriff with his square-cut jaw and bedroom eyes had lectured her. His looks alone flustered her. The fact that he dispensed punishment to those he deemed deserving of it only made her skin itch and feet long to run in the opposite direction every time she saw him—which up until recently had been not at all. She needed to return to that “not at all” status ASAP.
Humiliation burned her cheeks as she remembered their conversation.
She’d had to deal with frequent visits from CPS when she first gained guardianship of Malia, but over the last few years those visits had dwindled. She had been lulled into a false sense of security that they were in the clear and no one would ever take Malia from her. Malia getting into trouble could change all that, however. All it would take was Sheriff Walters whispering to CPS and Piper could lose custody. It wasn’t an unreasonable fear. It was obvious the sheriff thought she was unfit to care for Malia.
What if he was right?
She’d convinced herself they were doing just fine over the years—that she
was doing fine raising her sister—but who was she kidding?
She was tired of eating ramen and tired of waitressing almost every night until her feet ached—and all for measly tips. It was hard, degrading work that took her long hours away from Malia.
Maybe the dancers were smarter than she was. At least they were well paid. If she danced, she’d be able to work less and feed them better. She could buy things for Malia and move them into a nicer place.
With all these fears whirling around in her head, she exited the highway and took the county road that led home, passing a few trailer parks and small houses that had been there since the turn of the century—weathered bits of clapboard sagging under the light of the moon.
She turned down a dirt road that led to her complex. Well, she wouldn’t call it an apartment complex exactly. It was more like a cluster of efficiency housing. Single-room units that consisted of a bed she and Malia shared, a kitchen and a shower. It was a dump. Even more of a dump than the dump she had grown up in.
Piper pulled into the complex, Sunset Views. The building was at least forty years old with ancient air-conditioning units hanging off every window. A depressing stucco gray with mold stretching across the bottom half of the structure. Once upon a time that gray had probably been white. It was all flat lines and angles common from the nineteen seventies.
Even when Mom lived, they at least had two bedrooms in their trailer. Cruz slept on the pull-out sofa in the living room and shared her closet. His meager clothing didn’t take up much space. When her mom would party and entertain friends, he would stay in Piper’s room. They would lie in bed and talk late into the night. Over the sounds of partying they would make up names and pretend they were someone else, living somewhere else. Whoever Piper pretended to be, she always had a pool with a waterfall and huge birthday parties with a DJ and waiters carrying trays of food just like Shelley Rae Kramer. Not that she had ever been invited to one of her parties, but Piper had heard all about them. Everyone at school talked about them.