Returning Pride (9 page)

Allison knew Brenda was a stay-at-home mom. Actually, Allison had hardly seen her since school. When she’d seen her in the store a few times, she noticed how quiet she was. She’d changed so much since high school. She used to be the outgoing head cheerleader, but now had become a timid mouse of a woman.

She was thinking about them as she walked out of the school building just as the sun was setting. She was half way to her car when she heard a door slam and turned to watch Kevin storm out of his truck.

“You’ve got some nerve,” he said, as he stopped right in front on her. “Just who do you think you are?”

“Hello, Kevin.” She tried for her best teacher voice, one she’d recently learned.

“If you think I’ve been hitting my kids, you should have come to me first. I would have told you to go to hell.” His breath reeked of alcohol.

Looking around, she realized they were alone in the almost empty parking lot.

“Now you have Brenda and I trying to explain everything to the law. You know how Robert is; he thinks he owns the damn town.” He leaned closer and she tried to hold her breath through the stench.

“I think this is a matter you’d be better off talking to CPS about.” She took a step back and bumped into her car door. Her keys were in her hands and for a second she thought she could use them in case she had to protect herself. Kevin still had an athletic build, but now he had a beer gut on him as well. He was shorter than she was, but outweighed her by about eighty pounds.

“You’ve always been a busybody. Now you’ve taken my wife and kids away,” Upon her empty look he continued. “Oh, you didn’t know that Brenda left me last night. Because of you, she’s claiming I abused her and the kids. The damn state’s given her full custody of my kids and I’m left high and dry.” He leaned forward as she cringed against her car door.

“Maybe that’s just what you wanted. To get me all to yourself?” His eyes raked up and down her simple tan slacks and blue top. She kept trying to pull back as he continued. “I remember you in school. Yeah, that tight little body of yours.” He ran his eyes down her again. “Still looks tight. Maybe I should have paid more attention to you instead.” He leaned against the car door, his hands on either side of her. His breath hitting her face full force.

“If you think I want anything to….”

“Oh, I know you’d like it honey. If I remember right, you always did like the jocks. I bet I could make you scream.” He leaned back a little as he heard a car approaching. The car turned and started coming their way.

“I will make you scream.” With these words he stormed off, got in his truck, and peeled out of the parking lot, leaving Allison leaning against her door, shaking.

When she did get in her car several minutes later, she sat there with the doors locked and her head against the steering wheel. Then when she started to drive, she ended up in the Golden Oar’s parking lot instead of in front of her house. Walking in before she could change her mind, she headed for the bar area.

Sitting at the bar, she ordered herself a vodka cranberry and waited for the waiter to tell Iian she was there. Sure enough, not two minutes after her drink was set in front of her, he came strolling across the room with one of his sexy smiles on. Did he practice smiling in front of the mirror? Or did it just come naturally?

All she could thing was, he sure knew how to walk. His long legs ate up the ground. He’d gotten a hair cut since the last time she’d seen him. It was still longer than most men, but just above his collar now. She’d always been jealous of the thick black curly mass. She’d always wanted to run her hands through it, enjoying the feel. His white shirt and black pants looked neat and clean and she wondered how he could cook all day and still look fresh.

He came to a stop in front of her.

“Hello,” he said and signed along.

“Hi, I’m just having a drink after a stressful day.” She held up and shook her almost empty glass.

“What’s wrong? The kids giving you trouble?” he signed while taking the seat next to hers.

“No, the parents.” she left it short and vague. Knowing the news would have been all over the small town by now. She didn’t think she wanted to be the one to spread the fact that it was because of her that a man’s children and wife had been taken away from him.

Smiling over at him, and said, “How’s your day going?” She sipped the last of her drink. “How’s your sister? I’ve been meaning to stop by and tell her thanks for the cinnamon rolls she dropped off the other morning.”

“Lacey’s huge,” he smiled, “and annoying. She keeps trying to show up for work. I keep sending her home. I have to tell her it’s doctor’s orders,” he shifted his weight on the seat.

Just then one of the wait staff came over and informed him he was needed in the back room.

“Give me just a moment,” he signed.

“Sure, I’ve got time.”

“
Do you want another drink?” the bartender asked.

Allison looked at the thin balding man behind the counter and decided why not. She ordered another drink and crossed her legs and watched the room full of people.

Looking around, she studied the art and thought of her own art career. She enjoyed her first year in California. It had been hard work and she’d thrived with the attention it had brought her.

People came from all over the world to see it, some even plunking down thousands of dollars to own it. Then she’d had an art show in New York and everything had changed. She was no longer a small, no-named artist from smalls-ville Oregon.

She was Allison Adams, the next big “it” in the art world. Her pieces started selling for hundreds of thousands and it seemed she was in such high demand, she couldn’t focus on where her art came from anymore. It was like her well had dried up. At the end of her second year in California, she’d only thought of one thing. Coming home.

Ric had persuaded her to apply for an art school in Paris. She’d always wanted to go to Paris, but to study under some of the best names in the art world was a different matter.

She didn’t think that any amount of study would bring the passion back into her art. Looking around the room at the art that hung on the walls of the family restaurant, she felt a twinge in her chest. Her creative mind was starting to whirl back to life. She could feel it like the blood rushing from your head when you stood up too fast.

Setting down her almost-full glass, she tossed down some cash and started to leave.

Iian reached her just before she reached the front doors.

“
Going so soon?” he asked.

“Yes, I’ve got to check on my mother. Thanks for the talk.” She kissed his cheek and walked out, leaving him questioning what was going on with her.

When she drove up and parked in front of the house, she had a half dozen thoughts in her head about what she would paint. Never had the desire to paint been so strong before. She likened it to roaming a desert for years and suddenly stumbling upon an ocean.

She took the front porch stairs two at a time and came to a dead stop in front of the door.

There, sitting on her mother’s beloved “Welcome” mat, sat what could only be described as a skinned animal. She’d been raised with cats that always liked to deliver their dead prey for show-and-tell. This animal didn’t look like something had gotten to it. It looked like someone had done this.

She could see her mother on the other side of the large glass windows. She was vacuuming the living room while singing a song in a loud, off-key voice.

Whoever had left the poor skinned animal there, had meant it for her to see. Her mind raced to Kevin. Would he have done something like this to scare her?

Turning around, she looked up and down the quiet street. She didn’t see or hear anyone. There were no other cars parked along the road that didn’t belong there. Setting her purse and bag down, she went around to the side of the house where they kept their trash can. She took the lid off, scooped up the carcass with her mother’s favorite mat, and placed them inside the trash can. Then she took the can to the curb, thankful that tomorrow was trash collection day.

After heading inside, she realized that her desire to paint had faded.

Since school, Iian had been playing basketball with a group of friends at the Boys and Girls Club twice a week. He liked the physical activity. But today he needed it to get his mind off Allison and what he wanted to do to her.

When he’d first learned she was going to teach middle school art, he’d had a new fantasy involving her, where he sat in a small desk with her at the chalk board. She wore a small, tight skirt, a button up white top that was too tight. The buttons were ready to burst over her chest. Her hair had been up in a loose bun. His mind continued on that thought until he was pushed by someone and almost landed on his butt.

As he was getting his ass handed to him by his friends, he wondered why he continued to show up every week. He was sore from working on the house and from sleeping on a couch that was a foot too small for his six-and-a-half foot frame. But as he was fouled for the hundredth time by one of his best friends who didn’t understand the term “
friendly game
”, he thought he was going crazy. He had bruises in places he didn’t care to ice later. Of course, he knew how to play against his friends. He played the same way they did: fouling whenever he could. He was hot, sweaty, bruised and, to top it all off, he still couldn’t get Ally out of his mind.

Aaron had joined the game several years back before he and Lacey had been married. Deciding he was a good match, they had quickly teamed up and been deemed the “dynamic duo” by everyone else.

He was just about to take a pass from his brother-in-law when he felt that familiar tingle on the back of his neck. It was more out of reflex that his head turned towards her. He remembers seeing her standing by the opened doors in a white, flowing sun dress, then everything went white. Later he would try to convince himself that it was the ball hitting his head at one hundred miles per hour and not the way the sun had shone through her white skirt so that he could make out the outline of her long thin legs. He could have sworn the sun beamed around her golden hair and when it glowed, he heard angels singing. But he wasn’t a pussy and didn’t think things like that. Plus, he was deaf, so he couldn’t have heard if there had been angels singing or not.

No, he thought as he laid on the hard gym floor, it was just the pass to the temple that had his head spinning.

“Oh, no! Are you alright?” She was bending over him, her cheeks pink and her blue eyes full of concern.

Aaron, the doctor in the room, stood back and laughed at his brother-in-law. First there had been concern. After all it was a head injury that had caused Iian so much pain in his life. But seeing the man sprawled on the floor, bare chested and ogling the concerned woman who all but had his head in her lap, he stepped back, along with the rest of his buddies. After all, Iian’s scans and tests had come back clean. His brother-in-law was in perfect health.

“Aaron Stevens, you should know better than to throw a ball that hard at someone’s head. How long have you been playing the sport anyway? And you call yourself a doctor!” She turned back to Iian, who hadn’t tried to move off the floor.