Lee McClain - The Soldier's Secret Child

But for some reason, it disconcerted her now, and she stepped away.

Something flashed in Vito’s eyes and he cleared his throat. “Look, tomorrow Charlie has a visit with his birth mom up in Raystown. Let me take you to lunch. We can talk about Nonna and the possibility of Charlie and me staying here. Or more likely, how to break it to Nonna that we won’t be staying here.”

She’d planned to spend the next afternoon cleaning up and recovering from the wedding. “That’ll work.”

“The Chatterbox? Noon?” His voice was strictly businesslike.

“Where else?” She wondered why he’d gone chilly on her. “I’m looking forward to catching up.”

And she was. Sort of.

* * *

The next morning, Vito pulled his truck into the parking lot at the Supervised Visitation Center and glanced into the backseat of the extended cab. Yes, a storm was brewing.

“Why do I have to do this?” Charlie mumbled. “Am I going back to live with her?”

“No.” He twisted farther around to get more comfortable. “We talked about this. Your mom loves you, but she can’t do a good job taking care of you, and you need to have a forever home.” He’d practically memorized the words from the foster parenting handbook, and it was a good thing. Because apparently, Charlie needed to hear them a bunch of times.

“Then why do I have to visit? I wanted to play basketball with Xavier, that kid from the wedding yesterday. He said maybe I could come over.”

Vito pulled up another memorized phrase and forced cheer into his voice. “It’s important for you to have a relationship with your mom. Important for you and for her.”

The whole situation was awful for a kid, and Krystal, Charlie’s mother, wasn’t easy to deal with. She’d neglected Charlie, and worse, exposed him to danger—mostly from her poorly chosen boyfriends—way too many times.

Someone who hurt a kid ought to be in prison, in Vito’s mind, at the very least. But he had to keep reminding himself that Krystal was sick.

“You’ll have fun with your mom,” he said. “I think you guys are going to go out for lunch in a little while and maybe over to the lake afterward.”

“That doesn’t sound fun.” Charlie crossed his arms and looked out the window, making no move to get out of the car.

Vito looked that way, too, and saw Krystal getting out of the passenger side of a late-model SUV. Maybe things were looking up for her. He’d only met her a few times, but she’d been driving a car noticeably on its last legs.

The SUV roared off, passing them, with a balding, bearded, forty-something guy at the wheel. Vito looked back at Charlie in time to see the boy cringe. “What’s wrong, buddy?” he asked. “Do you know that guy?”

Charlie nodded but didn’t say anything.

Krystal strolled over to the back stoop of the Center, smoking a cigarette. Vito wished for a similarly easy way to calm his nerves.

He wished he knew how to be a father. He’d only had Charlie full-time for a month, most of which they’d spent in Cleveland, closing down Vito’s previous life, getting ready to move home. Charlie had been well and truly welcomed by the Cleveland branch of Vito’s family, though everyone had agreed on waiting to tell Nonna about Charlie until the foster care situation was definite. If everything went well, he’d be able to adopt Charlie after another six months and be the boy’s permanent, real father.

Learning how to parent well would take a lifetime.

Vito got out of the car. The small, wire-supported trees around the brand-new building were trying their best, sporting a few green leaves. A robin hopped along the bare ground, poking for worms, and more birds chirped overhead. It was a nice summer day, and Vito was half tempted to get back in the truck and drive away, take Charlie to the lake himself.

But that wasn’t the agreement he’d made. He opened the passenger door and Charlie got out. His glance in his mother’s direction was urgent and hungry.

Of course. This visit was important. No matter what parents did, kids always wanted to love them.

Vito forced a spring into his step as they approached the building and Krystal. “Hey,” he greeted her, and tried the door.

“It’s locked, genius.” Krystal drew harder on her cigarette. She hadn’t glanced at or touched Charlie, who’d stopped a few steps short of the little porch.

Looking at the two of them, Vito’s heart about broke. He considered his big, extended family up in Cleveland, the hugs, the cheek pinches, the loud greetings. He had it good, always had. He squatted beside Charlie and cast about for conversation. “Charlie’s been doing great,” he said to Krystal, not that she’d asked. “Going to sign him up for summer softball.”

“Nice for you. I never could afford it.” She looked at Charlie then, and her face softened. “Hey, kid. You got tall in the past couple months.”

Vito was so close to Charlie that he could sense the boy’s urge to run to his mom as well as the fear that pinned him to Vito’s side.

The fear worried him.

But Charlie would be safe. This was a supervised visit, if the caseworker ever got here.

“You were Gerry’s buddy,” Krystal said suddenly. “Did you know about me, or did he just talk about her?”

What was Vito supposed to say to that, especially in front of Charlie? The boy needed to think highly of his father, to remember that he’d died a hero’s death, not that he’d lived a terribly flawed life. “It’s better we focus on now,” he said to Krystal, nodding his head sideways, subtly, at Charlie.

She snorted, but dropped the subject, turning away to respond to her buzzing phone.

Focus on now. He needed to take his own advice. Except he had to think about the future and make plans, to consider the possibility of him and Charlie staying with the her—Lacey—that Krystal was mad about. Which would be a really rotten idea, now that the ramifications of it all came to him.

He wasn’t sure how much Krystal knew about Lacey and Gerry, what kind of promises Gerry might have made to her. From what he’d been able to figure out, Krystal hadn’t known that Gerry was married, at least not at first. No wonder she was angry. Problem was, she’d likely pass that anger on to Charlie. She didn’t seem like a person who had a very good filter.

And if she talked to Charlie about Lacey, and Charlie was living at Lacey’s boardinghouse, the boy could get all mixed up inside.

If Gerry were still alive, Vito would strangle him. The jerk hadn’t been married to Lacey for a year before he’d started stepping out on her.

Krystal put her phone away, lit another cigarette and sat down on the edge of the stoop. She beckoned to Charlie. “Come on, sit by me. You scared?”

Charlie hesitated, then walked over and sat gingerly beside her. When she put her arm around him, though, he turned into her and hugged her suddenly and hard, and grief tightened her face.

Vito stepped back to give them some space and covertly studied Krystal. He didn’t understand Gerry. The man had had Lacey as a wife—gorgeous, sweet Lacey—and he’d cheated on her with Krystal. Who, admittedly, had a stellar figure and long black hair. She’d probably been beautiful back then. But now the hair was disheveled. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, her skin pitted with some kind of scars. Vito wasn’t sure what all she was addicted to, but the drugs had obviously taken their toll.

It looked like she’d stayed sober to visit with Charlie today, knowing she’d have to submit to a drug test. Maybe she’d had to stay clean a couple of days. That would put any addict into a bad mood.

Even before she’d been an addict, Krystal couldn’t have compared to Lacey.

A battered subcompact pulled into the parking lot and jolted to a halt, its muffler obviously failing. The driver-side door flew open and the short, curly-haired caseworker got out. After pulling an overstuffed briefcase and a couple of bags from her car, she bustled over to them.