I turned to Quaid, ready to beg him to do something, to do anything to fix this, but he was looking at the prosecutor with narrowed eyes and a frown. The tip of his elbow brushed against mine. I thought it might was an accident, but then his gaze shifted back to me and the annoyance was replaced with calm assurance.
“Mr. Jackson, I’m sure you have plenty to say about the State’s recommendation for your client, so let’s hear it.”
“I think Mr. Townsend has forgotten that my client is only being charged as an accessory to this crime. There is an actual perpetrator in custody awaiting his own time before the court on actual charges, not just accessory charges relating to the commission, Your Honor. Yes, Ms. Walker has made some unfortunate choices in the past when it comes to following the law, but none of those charges are felonies and none of them resulted in time served. But because I’m realistic and know the court can’t overlook those prior indiscretions, I won’t push my luck and ask for my client to be released on her own recognizance. As for being a flight risk”—a grin pulled at his mouth, and again I wondered if he used it as a weapon because the damn thing was a killer—“Mr. Townsend was kind enough to point out that Ms. Walker isn’t working and doesn’t have a long employment history, so I’m not sure how the State assumes she would fund going on the run from the law.”
A deep chuckle rumbled from behind me and all I wanted to do was turn around and throw my arms around my dad. The judge grunted and made a “go on with it” gesture with his hand.
“As for her permanent residence, Ms. Walker has and still does keep a room at her father, Mr. Brighton Walker’s, home here in Denver. Once we agree to a reasonable bail amount”—Quaid shot the other attorney a hard look that made the man scowl—“Mr. Walker is going to pay it and take his daughter home. He has also given his assurances that his daughter will be present and willing to participate in her own case as well as the case the State is building against Jared Dalton. While Ms. Walker may not have ties to the community, her father has them in spades and I believe him when he says he will make sure Avett is present and accounted for as we move forward.”
I held my breath. It felt like an eternity passed as the judge returned his attention to the file in front of him and then once again lifted his gaze and let it settle somewhere over the top of my head.
When he looked back at me I stiffened my spine and tried to make my expression look as innocent as I possibly could. That was a challenge because I sure as hell didn’t feel very innocent. Quaid’s elbow rubbed against mine again and I realized it hadn’t been a mistake the first time. He was letting me know I wasn’t alone in this, that my fate wasn’t in my own hands. It was barely a touch, barely a connection, but that little bit of pressure, that tiny brush, hit me harder and more deeply than any full embrace I had ever been wrapped up in.
“Ms. Walker.” I jolted when the judge addressed me directly. I blinked at him a little stupidly and gulped before I spoke so I didn’t sound like a bullfrog croaking.
“Yes, Your Honor?”
“Your counsel is trying to make light of the charges you’re facing, but I need you to understand they are serious and that the State has every intention of pursuing its case against you.”
I nodded, and when Quaid nudged me, I cleared my throat again. “I understand.”
“You seem to be a young woman with a bad habit of ignoring the law. The court doesn’t appreciate that attitude but also recognizes that you are young enough to learn from your litany of mistakes. I agree with your attorney that the amount of bail requested by the State is unreasonable considering the circumstances and your prior history.” He looked over my head again and I actually felt the air shift along with my dad as he moved on the bench behind me. “Young lady, I also hope you appreciate how influential it has been to know you have a strong support system in place to keep you from making any more foolish decisions as you await your preliminary hearing. The court agrees to release the defendant on bail in the amount of $150,000. The defendant is being released on the grounds she remains at the permanent address of the home of Brighton Walker until the court proceedings are concluded.”
I wilted. I couldn’t help it. My knees folded and relief blindsided me so strongly I couldn’t stand up under the weight of it. Quaid’s strong arm was around my waist before I fell all the way into him and he gave my hip a little squeeze before setting me back on my feet.
“Ms. Walker.”
I sucked in a breath and tilted my chin up at the judge as he said my name again.
“Yes, Your Honor?” There was a tremor in my voice but I didn’t bother to try and hide it.
“My advice to you is to wise up. Stay away from anyone else involved in the situation that landed you here and start using your head.”
It was good advice. People always had good advice for me, if only I was wired to take it.
This time around I was determined not to let my father down, so I nodded. “Thank you, Your Honor.”
Quaid put his hand on my arm and turned me so that I was facing him. “Your dad is going to post bail and then pick you up from the jail. It’s going to take the rest of the afternoon to process you out. I’ll give you a couple days to settle in at your dad’s and get your head on straight, then we need to have a strategy meeting. The State is going to have a plea bargain on my desk sometime this week and I need to know where we’re going with all of this.”
I scowled at him and shook his hand off my arm. “I’m not taking a plea bargain, Counselor. I’m not guilty.”
He heaved a sigh at me and gave me a look like I was being ridiculous. Before he could say anything else, a man, large enough to block out the rest of the room, was between us. I was pulled into a barrel chest with my face buried in a beard that was as much of a legend in Denver as the man that wore it.
I never wanted to hug my dad so badly in my life. As soon as his tree-trunk-like arms folded around me, I couldn’t hold it together anymore. Tears started leaking through my closed lids and my lashes weren’t strong enough to stem the flow. My shoulders shook and my cuffed hands curled desperately into his faded Harley-Davidson shirt.
“I’m so sorry, Daddy.” I wasn’t sure how the words made it out over the lump in my throat as one of his massive paws curled around the back of my head and pulled me closer.
“I know you are, Sprite, but we gotta get to a place where you don’t have to be sorry like this any more.”
“I know.” I breathed the words out and pulled away as someone cleared their throat. My dad dropped his hand onto my shoulder as the bailiff inclined his head towards the doors that led to the prisoner holding area.
“You can have her back in a bit, sir. But right now she has to come with me.”
My dad practically growled at the man, which made him fall back a step. He released me after giving my shoulder a squeeze and a kiss on the top of my head. I let the bailiff take my arm and peeked around my dad’s broad frame so I could see my mom. She could only meet my eyes for a moment and when she did I saw the heartbreak and disappointment clouding her gaze.
“Thanks for coming, Mom. I’m so sorry for all of this.” The bailiff started to guide me away as Quaid ushered my dad back to the part of the courtroom reserved for the families and audience.
“Saying you’re sorry and actually being sorry are two very different things, Avett.” She got to her feet as my dad reached for her hand with a hard look on his face. She shook her head at me, and even though I could barely hear her because she spoke as they were calling the case after mine, her words hit their mark.
“Sorry” rolled off my tongue so easily and frequently that the words hardly held any meaning anymore. This time around I needed to actually be sorry for what I had done, even if what I had done was nothing. I had a lot to prove, a lot to make up for, and my track record for doing the right thing was shit. I didn’t want my mom to barely be able to look at me. I didn’t want my father to have to borrow against his retirement to bail me out of jail. Say
ing sorry wasn’t enough; this time around, I was actually going to have to change.
I went back into what the bailiff referred to as the “pen” and took my place between the murderer and the drug dealer. They both turned to me with envy and annoyance in their eyes. I was going home at the end of the day; they were going back behind bars.
The druggie lifted her eyebrows at me and stuck her tongue out, licking her dried lips. I cringed involuntarily, which had her giving me a crooked smile that showed all of her yellow and chipped teeth. “That guy representing you is hot. How much does he charge an hour? Are you fucking him? I would fuck him. I bet he’s expensive and good in bed. That hard-ass judge denied us all bail, except for you.”
I felt my eyes widen and I looked at the woman on the other side of me; she seemed as interested in my answers as the drug dealer.
I cleared my throat and shifted uneasily on the hard wooden bench. “I didn’t pay for him, so I don’t know how much he charges, and no, I’m not sleeping with him. I only met him yesterday.” Which didn’t explain why everything inside of me turned gooey and warm when he unleashed that grin of his. Or why I instantly felt better when his elbow briefly touched mine. It was a totally inappropriate reaction seeing as the man was a decade older than me, noticeably from a different background and social class than I came from, and had only ever seen me in jailbird orange while he was trying to keep my ass out of the slammer. My hormones must have missed the memo that the rest of me was in deep shit and Quaid Jackson was the guy holding the shovel to dig me out.
“I would fuck him.” This from the possible murderer on my other side. I wondered if Quaid knew that the entire female criminal population of Denver considered him fuckable.
I clicked the metal snapped around my wrists together to distract myself and muttered, “I don’t think we’re exactly his type.”
I imagined guys like Quaid preferred women that didn’t know what real handcuffs felt like when they were used for their intended purposes, and I couldn’t see him getting all hot and bothered over a chick with pink hair, even if mine was quickly fading and turning more rose colored as my natural dark brown took over at the crown.
“Girl, I’m every guy’s type if the price is right.” The druggie licked her lips again and I wanted to curl in a ball and make myself as small as possible to get away from both of them and the way they were talking about my attorney. I didn’t like it. Furthermore, I really didn’t like that I didn’t like it.
Luckily, there were only a couple of cases left and soon enough we were all being herded into the van and heading towards the jail. I was dreading having to sit behind bars again, but instead of taking me back to the cell with the scorned spouse, I found myself in a room similar to the one I had spoken to Quaid in the day after my arrest. The clothes I was wearing the night of the robbery were brought to me and I was told to change and sit tight.
I happily shed the jumpsuit and scrambled back into my own clothes. I never thought torn jeans, a stretched-out cotton T-shirt, and battered Vans could feel like the most expensive evening gown with designer heels. It wasn’t haute couture, but man, did it feel luxurious compared to the scratchy jailhouse jumpsuit. There was even a hair tie in my pocket, so I wrestled my thick and colorful hair up into a messy top knot, then did what I was told to do and sat tight.
It was only a few hours, but it felt like days. I counted the tiles on the floor, memorized the pattern in which the flickering fluorescent light above my head was going to flash, and I had plenty of time to go over every single fuckup I had made on my way to this point. The right thing was always there, always right in front of me screaming, “Pick me! Pick me!” and I was always the defiant moron that ignored the best option and went chasing after my downfall. Now that I had officially caught it, I could confidently say it wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. Falling meant I had to land eventually. The falling was scary and endless, but the landing … that was where things really got rough. That was what left a mark.
I should have known the second I met Jared that he was no good. There was no reason for him to pursue me. I was a recent college dropout, didn’t have my own place, had no job; too much Netflix and junk food had left my tiny frame far rounder and curvier than most twenty-year-old dudes chased after. I needed my dad to come save me when my last boyfriend ditched me, so I knew there was nothing about me that screamed, “She’s a good catch.” Even with all those marks against me in the girlfriend material department, Jared had pursued me relentlessly.
At first he was sweet and charming. His low-key, stoner vibe worked for me, so did the fact that no one seemed to like him. The more my dad glowered and grumbled about Jared, the more attracted to him I became. My dad was my hero, my idol, my best friend, but the more he disapproved of the men in my life, the more determined I was to hold on to them. It hurt to do that, but the hurt was what I was after. Eventually, Jared and I were sleeping together and I was spending more and more time at his place, even as it became clear he enjoyed more than the occasional marijuana high. I convinced myself Jared was a recreational drug user, that he liked to dabble, but it was a lie, one that I couldn’t even tell myself with a straight face as time went on.
I begged Dad for a job at the bar because I needed space away from the drugs and the abuse. Right there, I should have been smart enough to walk away from the man and the situation, but I couldn’t and I wouldn’t. Jared loved having me work at the bar. It meant free food and booze, and whenever he was short when he had to pay his dealer, he thought it meant an easy place to snatch some cash. I hated stealing. It made me feel dirty and ugly, but I hated having to explain a black eye and a fat lip even more. I didn’t have the words to try and justify why I stayed. I sure as hell didn’t have the words to describe why I froze and did nothing the night of the robbery.
Eventually, after what felt like eons and eons left alone with my own sour thoughts, a uniformed cop showed up and told me to follow him. I stopped at a desk and was told to fill out a bunch of paperwork. I signed it all without reading it, then took a sealed plastic bag that was pushed my way; it was filled with my belongings from the night of my arrest. My cell phone, as well as my purse, were in the bag, so I took them both out, turning to see my father getting to his feet from where he was sitting in a small plastic chair.
Without a word, I hurled myself at him and wrapped my arms around his waist. He squeezed me back and I felt him rest his furry cheek on the top of my head, squishing my bun down. I inhaled his very-dad scent, which always reminded me of his bike and his bar, letting his familiarity and strength prop me up under the weight of everything pressing down on me.
“You ready to go home, Sprite?”
I hugged him as hard as I could, making a silent promise to myself that I would never put him in the position of having to rescue me from myself again.
“Yeah, Dad. I’m very ready to go home.” It was, after all, where my heart, as battered and bruised as it may have been, always was.
CHAPTER 4
Quaid
I was late getting back to my office after court because I’d had a meeting with the district attorney’s office that ran long. It happened all the time, but today I found myself irrationally annoyed at the hitch in my schedule and seriously resentful of the wasted thirty minutes that Avett had to spend sitting outside my office while my assistant gave her the side eye from behind her computer. It had been three days since our last encounter in the courthouse, and even though I would never admit anything out loud, she had been on my mind a lot. Her—not her case. That, coupled with the fact that I immediately noticed jailhouse orange didn’t do her any favors, and that she was even cuter, even more innocent and fresh looking in her normal street wear, made me approach her more abruptly, even harsher, than I tended to be with my clients.
I jerked my head in the direction of my office door without a hello and didn’t look to see if she was following me when I asked, “Where’s your dad? I thought he was sticking by your si
de through all of this?” I sounded like a dick. I was acting like a dick. I could tell when I rounded my desk and finally turned to look at her that she was very aware of the fact that I was in a mood.
She crossed her arms over her chest, a chest that was ample, round, and far more plush than I would have imagined considering her small stature. And even though I shouldn’t have, I had imagined a whole hell of a lot about her over the last few days. Those curves and valleys she possessed were far too enticing and appealing. I was annoyed that I had noticed and was having a hard time landing my gaze on any part of her I didn’t appreciate in an entirely unprofessional way. She was more than a handful in a lot of ways and a couple of them had my dick twitching inappropriately. The prison jumpsuit had swallowed her up and what it had been hiding was a curvy little figure currently radiating with as much repressed attitude as I was freely throwing at her.
I shouldn’t be noticing her curves, or the way her dark eyebrows snapped into a fierce V over the top of her nose. She was just a kid in the grand scheme of life, but more than that, she was a client. It was my job to help her, to keep her out of jail, not to be enthralled by the irritated pucker of her mouth or entranced by the way her cheeks flushed to the same rosy pink as her hair as she visibly battled for the proper way to respond to my shitty greeting and overall asshole-ish demeanor. I shouldn’t like the way she bristled and stiffened but I did.
“Dad wanted to come, but I’m working towards proving that I am capable of doing something right in this lifetime. He’ll hold my hand forever if I let him, and frankly, I don’t want him to be involved in this mess any more than he already is.” She leaned back in the chair and continued to scowl at me. “You’re going to offer some kind of plea deal that will seem reasonable and make sense because it will make all of this go away. Dad will encourage me to listen to your advice. He will tell me we’re paying for you to look out for my best interest.” She shook her head and wrapped her arms tighter around herself like she was giving herself a hug. “And he might be right, but I didn’t help Jared rob the bar. I wasn’t his accomplice or his accessory. I didn’t aid or abet him in anything, so I’m not going to take a deal. Me not taking a deal would probably make my dad worry about what was going to happen to me. I’ve put him through enough.” She finally broke eye contact and looked down at the lush Berber carpet below her sneakered feet. “It might not be the right thing to do, but I’m used to that.”