Carla Cassidy - Once Forbidden...

He cleaned up the dinner dishes, then realized his father had fallen asleep—or passed out—in his easy chair. Some things never change, Jerrod thought as he helped his father from the chair to the bedroom.

His father had been a drunk since the day Jerrod’s mother had walked out on them. Jerrod had been seven, and he’d watched his father crawl into the bottom of a bottle and never crawl out.

He’d hoped things would change in the years he’d been gone. He’d written his father often, sent money on a regular basis and hoped the man would find the strength to build a life for himself. Instead, Mack had merely continued to mourn for a woman long gone and a love that hadn’t lasted.

“You shouldn’t have come back here, boy,” Mack muttered as Jerrod covered him with the sheet. “This place will suck the life from you. You should have stayed away.”

Jerrod started to reply, then realized Mack had fallen back asleep. He left the bedroom, fixed himself a glass of iced tea, then stepped out the front door and into the simmering evening air.

The old wicker chair on the porch gave a familiar creak as he sank into it. He sipped his tea, his gaze focused on the trailer across the way. At one time it had been where Erin McCall and her mother had lived. During the time Jerrod had been away, Erin had surprised everyone. She’d finally made her way out of the trailer park by marrying Richard Kramer, one of the most affluent businessmen in town.

Jerrod had received a wedding announcement from Erin, along with a chatty letter telling him she’d finally found happiness. And now she was facing life in prison for the murder of her husband. What on earth had happened?

He took a long swallow of his tea and smiled as a dusty old Ford pulled up in front of the place. He set his glass down on the porch and stood as an old man climbed out of the car.

“Uncle Cyrus.” He greeted the man with a warm embrace.

“I go away for a week and return to find my favorite nephew has finally come back home where he belongs.”

Jerrod motioned to the wicker chair across from where he’d been sitting. “Want something to drink? Some tea or lemonade?”

Cyrus shook his head and eased himself down into the chair. “Nah, I’m fine. How you doing, boy? You look good.”

“Thanks.”

“You seen Johnna Delaney yet?”

Jerrod laughed dryly. “You never were one to waste time or mince words, Uncle Cyrus.”

Cyrus McCain was the only person on earth who knew everything that had happened between Jerrod and Johnna so many years ago. It had been with Cyrus’s help that Jerrod had left the trailer park, Inferno and Johnna behind.

“I’m seventy years old, boy. I don’t have time to mince words.”

Jerrod leaned back in his chair and picked up his tea. “Yeah, I’ve seen her.” A vision of Johnna filled his mind.

For a moment he remembered her as he’d known her nine years ago. Then her hair had been long and thick and her eyes had been a soft ash-gray, which only hardened when she spoke of her father, Adam.

Today there had been no hint of softness about her. Her hair was almost boyishly short, and yet the style emphasized the sharp angles of her face, the fullness of her lower lip and the beauty of her eyes—eyes that no longer held any softness or vulnerability.

“She looks good,” he finally said.

Cyrus nodded. “She’s got that strong Delaney bone structure. I imagine she’ll always be quite an attractive woman.”

Jerrod frowned. “Have you heard about Erin?”

“I stopped in at the diner for some supper on my way back into town, and the whole place was buzzing with the news.” Cyrus shook his head. “Somebody should have seen that marriage was a train wreck waiting to happen. Everyone in town knew Richard beat the hell out of Erin on a regular basis. I suppose she just decided to give it right back to him.”

Jerrod took a sip of his now tepid tea. “She says she didn’t kill him.”

Cyrus raised a white eyebrow. “And I’m a fairy princess,” he said.

Jerrod ignored him. “I asked Johnna to defend Erin today.”

Cyrus stared at him in disbelief. “Tell me you’re kidding.”

“No, no kidding. Erin wants her.”

“Did she tell you to kiss her—”

“She told me no,” Jerrod said before Cyrus could finish.

“What did you expect her to say? You cheated on Johnna with Erin.”

Jerrod’s stomach knotted and a wave of guilt swept through him. Guilt that the years had done nothing to assuage. After years of soul-searching he’d thought he’d finally learned to forgive himself, but apparently it wasn’t total absolution. “That was a long time ago.”

“Matters of the heart don’t know nothin’ about time,” Cyrus observed. “Your dad is a perfect example of that. The wound is still as fresh today as it was that Saturday morning when your ma left him.”

“My father is a fool,” Jerrod said with a touch of harshness. “No woman is worth that kind of suffering.”

Cyrus said nothing. For a few moments the two men simply sat in comfortable silence. As Jerrod gazed at the man who was his father’s older brother, a burst of affection swept through him.

There had been many times when Jerrod had wondered what might have become of him if not for Cyrus’s presence in his life. It had been Cyrus who had listened to Jerrod’s tales of woe as he’d been growing up, Cyrus who had helped ease the absence of his mother. And Cyrus who had, on the night Jerrod had left Inferno, shoved a handful of money and a Dallas address into his pocket and told him to make something of himself.

And he had. Although the last thing he would have believed when he’d left Inferno so long ago was that he’d eventually become a minister, that was exactly what he’d become.

“I’d better get on home,” Cyrus said as he rose from the chair. “I’ve spent the better part of the day driving home from the cabin, and these old bones are telling me it’s time for a hot shower and my bed.”

Jerrod stood, as well, and walked his uncle to his car. Again the two men embraced. “Thanks, Uncle Cyrus.”

“For what?”

Jerrod smiled. “For everything.”

Cyrus waved his hands in dismissal of Jerrod’s gratitude. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said as he climbed into the car.

A moment later Jerrod watched the old Ford disappear from sight. He returned to the porch, watching as the night shadows claimed the last of the sun.

Again his thoughts turned to Johnna.

He had betrayed her nine years ago and he’d lived every day of the time since regretting it. But she had betrayed him, too.

She’d allowed him to believe it didn’t matter where he came from, that it didn’t matter that she was a have and he was a have-not. She’d told him she loved him, but her parting words to him had revealed the truth.

He couldn’t be certain of the forces that had brought him back to Inferno, but he steadfastly refused to believe one of those forces was any lingering feeling for Johnna Delaney.

The only thing he wanted from her was help for Erin. They had played at love once, but both of them had broken the rules. He didn’t intend to play the game with her again.

“Johnna was running late. Susan Boskow’s shoplifting trial had ended at five. The accused had received a sentence of probation and the promise that in the future if she found herself unable to feed her children, she’d reach out to the variety of agencies available for help.

Johnna’s brother’s wedding was set to take place at five, and she hurried from the courthouse, running down the street toward the tiny Methodist Church where Mark Delaney and his intended bride had chosen to be married.