Emilie Rose - A Better Man

“Routine delivery. Mrs. Lee exaggerated as usual.” Her boss/friend hitched a hip on the counter, parking a butt cheek on the files and effectively ending the shuffling. “And don’t ignore the question. Who is Roth Sterling? How do you know him? And what is he to you?”

Piper had exceeded her fib quota for the year with Roth. She could not look Madison in the eye and lie. “We dated when I was eighteen. It was a long time ago.”

“Will you be dating him again?”

“No.” Piper winced at her sharp tone, and sure enough, Madison’s hiked eyebrows said she’d picked up on it.

“So you’re saying he’s available?”

Ba-boom, ba-boom, ba-boom. Piper’s heart slammed against her rib cage then lodged in her throat. “He says he’s single.”

“That’s not what I asked, Piper. I don’t have to tell you how limited the selection of eligible men is around here. At least your father parades potential dates in front of you.”

Her father. Roth’s story had Piper so conflicted. There was no way her rule-following father could have done as Roth said. Her father would never deliberately hurt her or break the law. She believed that with every fiber of her being.

But Roth had sounded so convincing. She ached to confide in Madison and ask her opinion. But Piper said nothing. She couldn’t risk it. The person she needed to talk to was her father.

“Each of the men Dad brings home has been screened more thoroughly than an FBI candidate. They’re so squeaky clean they don’t even have dirty thoughts.”

“Hmm. Sounds like you have a penchant for bad boys. And I think Chief Sterling might be one. He has an edge that’s kind of sexy.”

Piper remained mute. The less she said the better. Roth had definitely been a bad boy and he’d abandoned her.

But was he a liar? He had to be.

Madison sighed. “I remember the last time I had sex. Do you?”

“Do I remember the last time you had sex?”

“Funny girl. I know you too well for playing dumb to fool me. I’m saying we’re both overdue for someone to satisfy our biological urges. I don’t think you’ve hooked up with anyone in the five years I’ve known you.”

“Neither have you.”

“No, I haven’t.” The sad tinge of her voice reminded Piper how little she knew about Madison’s life before Quincey. She knew her friend had been married and suffered a miscarriage. But that was it. Madison didn’t like to talk about the reasons she’d relocated from a busy suburb of Atlanta to a sleepy Southern town. But that was okay because then Piper could keep her secrets without feeling guilty.

Madison rose. “I might be ready for something…temporary. Scorching hot and brief. That’s what I need. How about you? Is Roth going to be the one who breaks your drought?”

Adrenaline shot through Piper’s veins. “Absolutely not.”

“Why? Is he a jerk? Did he cheat on you with another woman? Another man?”

Piper nearly choked on a shocked laugh. “You are awful. He didn’t cheat on me.” He did something worse. He made me love him then he left us. “If you want him, he’s yours.”

“Hmm. I’ll think about it. He definitely has the tall, dark and handsome thing going for him.”

Piper’s stomach churned and she realized this would be one of those sour grapes situations from the fables she’d read to Josh. She didn’t want Roth, but she couldn’t handle a ringside seat watching him sweep another woman off her feet either.

* * *

PIPER MADE A BEELINE for her father’s immediately after work. She had to know who had lied. Roth or Lou. She was almost certain it was the former, but that twinge of doubt had nagged her all afternoon and turned her into such a clumsy idiot that even Madison had started looking at her funny.

Piper whipped the Jeep into the driveway of the house where she’d grown up and leaped from the vehicle.

Her father stepped onto the porch. “Piper, this is a surprise.”

He didn’t look like a man with dark secrets.

She stalked up the sidewalk. “I had lunch with Roth Sterling today.”

He stiffened and his welcoming smile faded. But that didn’t prove anything. He’d always hated Roth.

“He didn’t waste any time looking you up.”

“Did you coerce him into joining the Marines?”

His hesitation made goose bumps rise on Piper’s skin. No. Please no.

“Now, baby—”

“I’m not a baby. I’m thirty years old. And I deserve the truth. Did you threaten to send him to jail if he didn’t enlist, then drive him to the recruitment office and stand over him until he signed the forms?”

“He had a choice.”

“Did you pressure him with threats against his mother?”

“I did it for your own good, Piper. That boy was headed to the same place as his daddy—prison.”

Oh. My. God. Roth hadn’t lied. A tremor started deep inside and worked its way to her extremities as the magnitude of his confession overwhelmed her.

“You knew he didn’t steal and wreck Gus’s car, didn’t you?”

“I need a beer. Want one?” He disappeared through the front door. The screen door slapped behind him like a gunshot making her jump.

Piper’s feet seemed glued to the porch. She forced them into action and followed him, anger and betrayal vying for supremacy. “You knew, didn’t you?”

Her father yanked open the refrigerator, pulled out a beer and popped the top. He took a long drink then lowered the can and wiped his mouth. “No matter what you claimed, evidence indicated him and he didn’t deny it.”

Her thoughts and emotions churned like floodwaters oversetting everything she thought she’d known, everything she’d believed to be fact. She’d believed Roth had betrayed her. But so had her father, the man she loved and trusted more than anyone.

What else had he lied about? Did she dare trust anything he’d told her? It was too much to take in.

“What happened to innocent until proved guilty?”

“Now, Piper—”

“What happened to the truth and your sworn duty to uphold the law?”

“That boy needed discipline. I knew the military would set him straight.”

“What if he’d refused to sign? Would you have prosecuted an innocent man?”

“Piper—”

“Just how far over the line were you willing to go, Daddy?”

“It wasn’t like that. I knew he’d sign the contract to protect his mama. She couldn’t survive without the money he’d send her if he drew a military paycheck. Land poor, that’s what she was. All that Roth land and she couldn’t sell it for dirt. Market’s changed now. We have new folk coming into town and property’s worth something, but back then…” He shook his head.

Piper wanted to slap his beer out of his hand, and violence had never been her thing. “Don’t change the subject. The real estate market has nothing to do with your lies. To me. To Roth. To the rest of the force. To Quincey. You betrayed your badge.”

He blanched and a spark of concern skipped through her. She probably shouldn’t upset him, given his heart condition. But damn it, he’d deliberately driven away the man she loved, the father of her baby.

“Let me tell you something, little lady. I have never done anything detrimental to this town or this badge. I gave Sterling a chance to break the mold and become something better than his no-good daddy. And apparently he has if the sonofabitch has stolen my job.”

His selfishness blew her away. How could he honestly believe he’d done the right thing? No wonder her mother had left him.

Did her mother know? Was she in on this, too?

Piper’s eyes and chest burned. “Do not try to make out like you had his best interest at heart. I don’t buy it for one minute.”