Anna DeStefano - The Prodigal's Return

Jennifer.

He no longer felt anything for her most of all.

“There’s nothing I can say to change your mind?” the lawyer asked.

“You knew the answer to that before you called.” Neal squeezed his eyes shut.

“Yeah. Guess I did.” The pause that followed conjured up a picture of Buford kicking back in his own beaten-up chair. “Don’t hold it against an old man for trying. Can’t help it if I think it would do both you and your daddy some good if you made your peace before it’s too late.”

Before it’s too late…

Warning bells stopped tickling and began clamoring at the back of Neal’s mind. He was being played by a crafty attorney, but it didn’t seem to matter.

“I’d better let you get back to it.” The master manipulator sighed. “I hear you’re busting judicial balls in Atlanta. If your daddy only knew what you’ve been up to with your mama’s money, he’d bust a gut—”

“Buford,” Neal said through clenched teeth, biting down hard on a curse. He never cursed. He never lost his cool. To the world he now ruled, he was buttoned-down, spiffed-up professionalism at its best—with just enough of the hardness he hid deep edging through, to keep people conveniently off balance at work, and happy to leave him to his privacy everywhere else.

“Yeah?” The lawyer’s faceless reply was hope at its gotcha best.

Neal stared at the folders sprawled across his desk. Paperwork representing the lives of people he barely knew who’d turned to him for help because they’d exhausted all other possibilities. He was their last hope. Atlanta’s prince of saving lost causes. All of them but his own.

Damn it!

“Give me the name of my father’s doctor,” he heard himself say.

“Doc Harden’s the only one your daddy would ever go to.” Neal could hear the sly smile that warmed each Southern-tinged word. “But even if Doc knows something, I’m not sure he’d talk it over with you. He certainly wouldn’t with me, the closed-mouth son of a gun. Whatever’s going on, someone’s pretty much going to have to bust your daddy’s door down to get to the bottom of it.”

“I’ll make a few calls, that’s it,” Neal said. The phone slamming into its cradle cut off Buford’s next sentence.

Just a few calls, that was all. One to the doctor, one to his father. Simple enough, and he’d be done. Except contacting his old man would result in the kind of backlash no one wanted, him least of all.

He’d had his reasons for shutting down. Shutting the world out. Damn good ones. And his old man had bailed, too. If Nathan was lonely now, it was by choice, same as Neal. And alone suited Neal just fine.

The arguments were solid. Logical. Best for everyone.

So why did he suddenly feel like a class-A bastard for allowing the silence between him and his old man to drag on for seven years?

Whatever it takes, that had been his mantra in prison. He’d been a vulnerable kid who hadn’t a clue what he’d set himself up for. A pretty boy, and everything his father had feared would happen had come at him like a demented welcome party as soon as he’d been placed in general population. He’d learned fast to do and say and fight however he’d had to, until the filthy predators with filthy hands, and the memories screaming how much he had lost, finally let him be.

In a matter of months, the pretty boy had died and the man he was never meant to be had taken the kid’s place.

A man rumored to have no emotions, no fear. Only here he was, turning chicken-shit at the thought of making a couple of phone calls to check on the father he supposedly hadn’t cared about for years.

Rivermist, Georgia

JENN GARDNER nearly ran over the old man before she saw him wandering down the middle of the road. Screeching to a halt mere inches away, she tracked his unsteady, weaving journey across North Street.

“Critter,” he yelled into the evening’s darkness. “Where the heck did you get off to this time? Crrritterrrr…”

She glanced at the clock on her ancient Civic’s dashboard. She’d only been back in Rivermist for three months, and she hadn’t yet gotten acclimated to how early things shut down in small Southern towns. By nine-thirty, most of Rivermist was already in bed, or at least at home in their pajamas. But there was still enough intermittent traffic on the road that the bum she’d almost made roadkill might walk headfirst into oncoming traffic if he weren’t careful.

Since he looked about a fifth-of-scotch past sober, careful seemed a long shot.

Grateful she was alone—that she’d just dropped her six-year-old, Mandy, off at a sleepover—she locked her doors and lowered her window enough to talk through the crack.

“Sir, do you need some help?” she asked, pulling alongside him.

“Gotta find Critter,” he mumbled, walking right past her in his search for what sounded like a lost pet.

Something in his voice, something about his threadbare plaid coat, seemed oddly familiar.

That in itself was nothing new. Déjà-vu moments lurked behind every corner of this place she’d sworn as a teenager never to return to.

So why was she rolling forward, lowering the window a little more?

“Are you looking for your dog, mister?”

“No, damn it. Got no use for dogs. Crritterrr…” he groused, stumbling into her fender, then shuffling off again.

Got no use for dogs.

The phrase churned up more unwanted memories. Another man, sitting on a porch swing, had said exactly the same thing to her when she was a little girl. He’d been holding a cat named—

“Critter?” she said out loud. “Mr. Cain?”

It was hard to tell, looking through the darkness and the unkempt hair that partially hid his face. But as she drove closer and set the hand brake, the resemblance was unmistakable.

“Mr. Cain!” She rolled the window the rest of the way down and grabbed him by the arm. Good Lord. “Mr. Cain, Critter’s been dead for over ten years.”

“What?” He rounded on her. Bleary, bloodshot eyes glared. “Who are you, and what the hell do you know about my Critter?”

“It’s me. Jennifer Gardner.”

The man who used to jokingly refer to her as his daughter didn’t recognize her. Little wonder. His and her father’s friendship hadn’t survived the first year after Neal’s sentencing. It was as if he hadn’t been able to look at her anymore, or spend time in her home, with her parents. With anyone, really.

“I was there when you and Neal buried Critter, remember?” she prompted.

“What?” A tear trickled down his cheek, breaking her heart. “Critter’s dead?”

She pulled to the shoulder and got out. Hurried to his side, the frigid night air blasting away at the lingering warmth from the Honda’s rattling heater. “It’s freezing out here. Why don’t I take you home? You’ll feel better in the morning.”

“No!” From the smell of his breath, beer had been his best friend tonight, not scotch. He wiped his eyes and looked wildly about. “I’ve got to find Critter.”

She steadied him as he stumbled, steering him toward the car. “Why don’t we check your house? Critter’s probably waiting at the back door, wondering why you’re not there to let her in.”

“You think so?” Hope spread like sunshine across his face, pushing away the sick pallor of too much alcohol and years of dissipation. “You think she went home?”

“I bet she’s there now, crying for her dinner. Why don’t we get her some milk?” Jenn opened the passenger door and turned him until he fell backward into the car. He cursed when he bumped his head on the way down.

“Critter loves milk. That’s what Wanda started giving her when she was just a kitten. Critter was always Wanda’s cat.” His voice roughened, and his tears made a return appearance at the mention of his long-dead wife. “I’ve gotta take care of her. I promised Wanda.”