Love Lifted Me (5 page)

She sighed. She had to speak her heart. She had to continue to kick fear to the curb. “Yes, Max, I want to be married to you.”

Five

Monday morning Max sat on the back porch drinking his coffee, staring out at the summer grass. The breeze coming down from the ridge blew cool and clean.

After his intense talk with Jade Thursday night, Max had suggested they just have fun on the weekend. Play. Laugh. Forget about lies and infidelity, death and panic.

Jade jumped in with both feet. It was the first real hope he had for them. She even remembered to stand on their first stepping-stone—prayer.

They were loaded into Max's car when she smacked her hand on his and said, “Pray first.”

He grinned at the memory. They played hard three straight days with Asa. At Laurel Park, Asa showed Max his routine on the playground. What was it?

First the slide, then the horses. After that, the sandbox and finally the swing. Something like that.

Asa was a routine kid. Smart Jade had picked up on that and established Asa's days so he knew what to expect and when.

He was in love with his son. In love with his wife. In love with his life. The only thing this weekend lacked was an intimate encounter with Jade.

Give her time, Max. Go slow
.

He did manage to steal a peck on Jade's forehead—but nothing more.

He sipped his coffee, surprised when his phone pinged from his pocket. Chevy Buchholz, the man he met his last night in Texas, was texting him.

Still interested in u coming out, Max
.

Yeah, well, the man was crazy.

“There you are,” Jade said, stepping onto the porch. Max's heart jumped. Her summer skirt flitted about her knees and the scoop in her top accented all the right parts.

“You look gorgeous,” he said.

“Thank you.” She smiled. At him. “I'm heading to the Blue. Do you want me to take Asa or leave him here with you?”

Oh, right. Dad duty
. Max stood. “I guess . . . leave him. Yeah. What time does he go to school?”

“Eleven, but Max, I can take him with me. I've been doing it since I got home from Prairie City. What are you doing today?”

“I thought I'd run down to the office, talk to Clarence, get back into it. Maybe start full-time next week. Now that I'm home, I realize how long I've been away.” Not a bad thing, in the big picture, but his dereliction of duty was weighing on him.

It was his family's law firm. And leading it would be his responsibility now that his dad sat on the state supreme court.

“Are you ready to go back?”

“As I'll ever be, yeah.” He walked toward the kitchen. His coffee had gotten cold. “I'll take Asa to school, then go down to the city.”

“You sure?”

“Don't make it sound like I'm doing you a favor or that I'm being put out. I'm home and I'll parent-up.” He'd planned to talk to Jade about adoption when the time was right.

She briefed Max on Asa's morning routine and left for the Blue without kissing him good-bye. Max watched her go down the walk and disappear around the edge of the garage.

Fun was one thing. Intimate trust another.

The clock rounded toward noon by the time Max entered Benson Law and rode the elevator up ten floors to Clarence Clemmons's office.

The senior and managing partner of the firm resided in the office once occupied by Max's dad, Rebel: the office Max would soon occupy.

“Ah, the prodigal comes home.” Clarence rose when Max entered his office unannounced and shook his hand with a firm grip. “Didn't expect to see you today. You remember Bradford Trusdale.” Clarence motioned to the man reclining in the wingback chair.

Max ignored Clarence's little daggers.
The prodigal comes home
.
Does he remember?

Max shook Brad's hand. “Good to see you. How are things at Trusdale Industries?” Bradford Trusdale's business alone was a line item in the firm's annual budget.

“Great, thanks to Benson Law. Keeping our heads above water in this economy.” Brad commanded the room when he spoke. “I should be asking how things are with you.”

“Good, thanks.” Early on, Max had developed a policy to keep his personal life separate from his business. Brad didn't need any more details.

“Max, Brad and I were in a meeting,” Clarence said. “Can I get with you later today? We can check my schedule with Gina.”

“Don't put off Max on my account, Clarence. We have nothing pressing here.” Bradford stood, tucking his fine-weave dress shirt into the waist of his tailored slacks.

“If you're sure.” Clarence walked the CEO of Trusdale Industries to the door, sealing their conversation in murmured tones.

“So, Max, how are you?” Clarence said, his cordial tone gone. “Rehab treat you right?”

“It was good, Clarence. Successful.” Max took a seat. The room's hot, stale air clung to his skin. In Texas, his work space had been the open plains. It made the opulent, high-rise office feel like a sweatbox. “Everything okay with Bradford?”

“Yeah, nothing we can't work out over drinks.” Clarence displayed his capped smile as he walked to the back of his desk. “Bradford's got a couple of stockholders giving him some trouble.”

“Brad isn't used to trouble. His way or the highway.”

“He does have a way of getting what he wants.” Clarence sat down and leaned back in his seat. “Firm's doing great, Max. Profits per partner were up another 2 percent. The associates . . .”

He prattled. Max listened. Mostly he picked through his conflicting feelings. Being in the office felt like home. He was in familiar territory. He was good at the law. He knew the law.

But there was an opportunity . . . a wild, crazy opportunity that he found himself considering more and more. Would Jade go for it? Could he even do the job? It was one thing to head up junior football; it was another to take on a high school team.

“. . . which brings me to you.”

“Me?” Max sat forward, a blip of
somethin's-up
on his radar.

“I'm putting you on probation,” Clarence said without hesitation.

“Probation?” Max slid to the edge of his seat, the fine threads of his Armani slacks gripping around his knees. The fabric felt odd against his skin. He'd grown accustomed to the tough rub of denim. “What are you talking about?”

“The executive partners and I think you need time to prove yourself. After all, we've seen the results of your rehab before.” He got up and walked around to the front of the desk. “It didn't stick.”

“Executive partners? I'm an executive partner.” Max stood. “What are you up to, Clarence?”

“Guarding this firm. You're an executive partner on hiatus, off to rehab. The rest of us—Don, Seamus, Larry, and I—decided it was best for the firm if you had a probationary period. We're not willing to risk our careers again for your habit.”

“Clarence, I've
been
on probation. Self-imposed. What do you think the Outpost trek was about? To get free. To figure out why I popped pills. I'm not going to go down that road again.” The execs had tried and condemned him without a chance to plead his case.

“Maybe you did well out in the middle of nowhere, miles from anyone, experts watching over you. But you're home. Back on familiar territory with all your drug suppliers a mere phone call away.”

“You do know Dad and I can outvote the partners.”

“You used to, yes. But with Rebel on the state supreme court, divested of all his interest, and you on leave, the execs pull rank. You know that, Max.”

Yeah, he did. Funny, he'd anticipated resistance from Jade, but not from Clarence and Benson Law.

“If you were in my shoes, Max, you'd do the same thing. Besides, every time you fall off the wagon, the rest of us have to scramble. I had to placate some of the partners this time. If you don't stay clean, the firm will suffer. Can't have resentful partners. I'm not going to let you loose in this firm until I'm convinced you're not shopping docs and popping pills.”

So it boiled down to this. He'd put his life on hold—career, marriage, and fatherhood—to confront his demons, enduring hard days and lonely nights with only the stench of cow manure and his own soul to keep him company.

Axel had warned him. Restitution came with a heavy price tag.

“Never known you to be silent in a fight, Max.” Clarence's low laugh didn't disguise his callous tone.

“Just thinking,” Max said. “I wrote the Code of Conduct policy. Wrote the partner agreement and I've violated my own rules. Forging prescriptions is a class D felony. Grounds for dismissal.”

“I wanted Reb to put you on probation years ago.” Clarence crossed his ankles in a relaxed manner. He'd bested the boss's son. “Fire you, even. You broke the law, Max, and when the heir to the firm screws up, the whole firm is implicated. Reb stood for it because you were his son.”

Max waited for Clarence to end his speech with, “There's a new sheriff in town and I'm cleaning up this place.”

“It's a little late to pull the ace out of your sleeve, Clarence. If you wanted me out of the way, you should've done it when I was addicted and actually forging prescriptions.”

“I'm looking out for this firm, its tradition, and its reputation.”

“How long is probation?” Max made his way to the door.

“Ninety days. Three short months. You can still come to work, help research, advise the associates. Some clients have missed you on the golf course.”

“I'll see you in ninety days, Clarence.”

“Suit yourself.”

At the elevator, Max punched the Down button, glancing back at Clarence's office. What was he supposed to do with this? He fumed at Clarence's arrogance. But he was right, Max would've done the same thing. Dad should've fired or suspended him on his first offense. But he didn't, and all roads led to where Max stood now.

The elevator doors opened and Max stepped in. The only question he had about this journey was which direction to take now.

Six

“Yes, may I speak to Taylor Branch, please?” Jade doodled on the sticky note where she'd jotted Taylor's work number.

Between the shock of Taylor's news and being in a hurry to pick up Asa that day, Jade had forgotten to get the woman's number. So this morning she'd Googled Rice's obituary for the name of her California firm.

“This is Taylor Branch.”

“Taylor, it's Jade Benson.” Silence. “Hello?”

“Why'd you call me?” she whispered tight and low into the phone.

“Because I need proof. Your word is not enough.”

Taylor exhaled. “I don't have any proof, Jade. Just what I know. Trust me, it's true.”

“Trust you? I don't even know you. I need proof that Rice actually told you this, or better yet, proof of who Asa's father really is. I can't go to Max with, ‘Hey, a friend of Rice's said so.' ”

“Look, I don't care if you tell your husband. I just wanted someone else to know.”

“What about the biological father? Where's he?”

“I told you, he lives in Denver. Rice met him skiing and they had a longdistance thing for six months.”

“You're sure he wanted nothing to do with Asa?”

“When Rice first got pregnant, he walked. I didn't know her then, but she told me all of this after she had Asa. We'd become pretty good friends and I think she needed someone to talk to, you know?”

“So, the father doesn't know that Rice . . . passed away?”

“I don't know. He came around after Asa was born, got all mushy for a day or two, took a paternity test to prove his devotion to Rice and Asa, but he didn't stick around long enough for the results. Rice said there was no way she was letting that deadbeat's name go on her son's birth certificate, so she named Max as the father. Rice checked the paternity results a few months later and sure enough, deadbeat was the dad. But by then he was long gone. She called him and told him Max was the father and that was that.”

Jade pressed her fingers against her forehead. She didn't need a headache today. “So the father—what's his name?”

“Landon.”

“He never requested the lab results?”

“I have no idea, Jade. When Rice told him Max was on the birth certificate, she said he was relieved. Glad to be off the hook. Landon was young, like twenty-six, good-looking, cocky, just starting a career in finance. Traveled a lot. He wasn't ready to move to California and be Asa's daddy.”

“So where are the paternity results? Do you have the name of the lab?” Jade reached for a pen and her yellow sticky pad.

“No, I don't know, maybe . . .” Taylor sighed. “Even if I knew the lab, they're not going to give the results to you. But Rice's parents asked me to go through her things after the funeral. I have a file cabinet of bills and receipts, tax forms, stuff like that. I thought Asa might like to have them some day. A part of his mom's life he'll never know otherwise. I haven't gone through them but I can.”