Impulsively, she rounded the desk and gave him a hug. “I know you are. I’m lucky to have you.”
He smiled at the sudden show of affection. “Yes, you are. And don’t you forget it!” His eyes twinkled. “Now go, and let an old man concentrate on his work.”
She smiled, feeling a bit lighter, and made her way out of the small but well-appointed office, waving to her mom, who worked part-time as the receptionist and was on the phone discussing appointment times with someone. She really was lucky to have such a close family. Some of her friends thought it was a bit odd that she didn’t mind spending her days with not one but both of her parents, but they got along well and so far it hadn’t been a problem. She liked them, and although her sister, Mollie, had butted heads with them on a regular basis, Dani had been fortunate enough to always have a good relationship with them. Working in the guardian ad litem program, seeing how many people didn’t get to grow up with a loving family, had led her to a new appreciation of her own circumstances.
Kevin might look up to her, but she found she was equally inspired by him and his ability to hold on to hope despite his circumstances. He’d lost his mother a year ago to an opioid overdose, after she’d been prescribed the medication for a back injury. He’d never known his father, and when he ended up in the foster-care system it was discovered the man that had sired him was in prison, serving out a twenty-year sentence. Once in the system Kevin had bounced around from one temporary placement to another before ending up with the Cunninghams. Senior citizens, they had been fostering kids for nearly a decade, ever since their son had moved to California for a job in the tech industry. They’d missed having family, and foster care had given them an outlet for the love they were eager to share.
In many ways, it was the perfect placement for a grieving boy like Kevin, but as wonderful as the Cunninghams were, they were getting on in age, and Dani suspected that keeping up with an active little boy was taking its toll. What he really needed was his parents, but they were gone and the chances of a boy his age being adopted were slim from what the caseworker had told her. The whole thing just sucked. But dwelling on it wasn’t doing Kevin or her mood any good. She needed to snap out of her funk if she was going to do right by her clients and get any work done today at all.
On a whim, she crossed the street and turned left instead of right. The big trail that wound through the park would take her only a little out of her way, and the extra sunshine and fresh air would be worth the lost time. Turning east off of Lighthouse Avenue, Paradise Isle’s version of Main Street, she walked the two blocks to Pelican Park and felt her spirits lift. Dozens of children were playing a chaotic game of dodgeball on the big green field near the entrance. Peals of laughter alternated with shrieks of indignation as the kids scrambled in the thick grass. On the other side of the trail squirrels played their own games, fighting over acorns and chasing each other through the tree boughs.
Continuing down the paved path, she passed the basketball court, empty now but sure to be bustling once the high school let out, and then the baseball fields. A group of kids, maybe late-elementary or early-middle-school-aged, were playing a pick-up game on the closest diamond. She squinted, shading her eyes from the sun. Were these the boys Kevin had been trying to impress? Had they teased him for not being able to afford his own bat, or had he just imagined their judgment? He hadn’t wanted to give details and she hadn’t pushed. In the end, it didn’t really matter.
Pushing on, the playground finally came into view. It was situated near the far entrance of the park and had been rebuilt recently. Gone was the scorching hot metal slide she remembered from her youth along with the rest of the old equipment—it had all been replaced with more colorful, and no doubt safer, modern play equipment. Domes of red and blue shaded the ladders and slides, offering protection from the tropical sun. Benches full of watchful parents circled the perimeter, giving wearied moms and dads a chance to socialize a bit while keeping an eye on rambunctious little ones. That part of the scene, at least, was similar to what she remembered. Her mom had often sat on those same benches after walking to the park with Dani and Mollie. On the weekends her father had come, too, often taking the whole family for ice cream afterward.
Smiling at the memory, she was almost to the park gates when the sound of crying stopped her. Glancing back, she saw a little girl with blond pigtails, no more than five years old, sobbing hysterically at the foot of the swing set. Standing over her was a man, one with an oddly familiar build, his back toward her. Without thought, her feet started moving in their direction, the little girl’s cries spurring her on. Rounding a bench, she was about to offer assistance when she realized why the man looked familiar. It was the toy-store owner from the trial! What was he doing here—harassing random preschoolers?
“Haven’t you upset enough children today?” He looked up, and again she was hit by that feeling of unease that she’d felt in the courtroom, like her skin was suddenly a size too tight. Ignoring the feeling, and him, she looked down to the girl, who had stopped crying at Dani’s interruption. “Are you okay, honey? Is he bothering you?”
“I’m okay. Daddy was just kissing my boo-boo.” She pointed to a slightly skinned knee. “My sister, Amy, is the one that was bothering me.” She glared back toward the swings, where an equally adorable and nearly identical girl glared back at her. “She pushed my swing too hard and I felled off.”
Dani did a double take, looking from one angelic face to the other, then slowly turned back to the man in the middle of it all. “Your daddy?”
Tyler Jackson, the coldhearted man who had pressed charges against a nine-year-old boy and then testified against him in court, was a father?
* * *
Tyler helped Adelaide, the younger and more dramatic of his twins, up off the ground. “It’s barely a scratch, you’ll be fine. Now go play—we’ve got to head back soon. And Amy,” he said, shifting his attention to the other girl, who was trying and failing to look innocent of all wrongdoing, “be nice to your sister. I’ll be watching.”
“Okaaay!” she huffed, clearly offended at his implication that she needed watching. Full of sass, that one was. Between her newfound bossiness and her sister’s histrionics, he was starting to feel like he’d never get the hang of this single-parenting thing. Just as soon as he thought he had them figured out, they grew and changed and confused him all over again. Where were the sweet little girls that had cooed at him from their cribs? Of course, those days hadn’t been easy, either; raising infant twins never was. But at least he’d had help then. Jennifer, his late wife, had done the bulk of the caregiving, leaving him to enjoy the fun parts of fatherhood.
But Jennifer had been gone for two years now, taken by ovarian cancer faster than he could have imagined. And he was going to have to fill her shoes along with his own, no matter how hard it was. Often the weight of the responsibility felt like it might crush him, but the girls were still the two best things in his life, and he was a smart enough man to know that he was luckier than most.
“You have kids?”
He turned back to face the woman that had approached Adelaide when she’d been crying. She looked familiar, and it hit him. She had been in the courtroom today, sitting with the boy he’d caught shoplifting. Maybe she was a relative? He extended a hand, falling back on the manners his grandmother had ingrained in him. “I do. Name’s Tyler Jackson, and those little munchkins are Amy and Adelaide. I’m sorry if they upset you. They normally get along pretty well but you know how siblings can be.”
She ignored his hand and stared up at him. She was probably a good six inches shorter than him, and less than half his weight, but if she noticed the size difference she didn’t let on. Instead, she stabbed a finger into his chest and lit into him like an angry mother hen. “I know exactly who you are, Mr. Jackson. You’re the man that tried to get a confused little boy, an orphan no less, put behind bars over a measly baseball bat. That’s who you are!”
He