This Good Man. Janice Kay Johnson

short, harsh laugh. “No.” He’d been with the Hales for a year or more before he felt anything close to that for them. “You’re saying I need to prove myself to Caleb.”

      “I’m saying that he’s testing you. He’s pushing you away to see if you’ll go.” She leaned forward a little, as if to underline the urgency of what she was saying. She exuded such intensity, he couldn’t have looked away from her if someone wearing a ski mask had walked in with a gun and told the cashier to stick ’em up. “What you have to do is refuse to go,” she said. “He needs to see you digging in for him. By fighting for custody of him, if necessary, or only by giving him an ear and a refuge.”

      An ear and a refuge. Wasn’t that what he’d been trying to offer? He couldn’t be Caleb’s home, although he thought he’d provided an even better one. He was giving everything he could. Pushing himself into places he’d never gone.

      “He’s testing me,” he said slowly.

      “Without having met him, I can’t say for sure, but that’s my guess.”

      “It fits,” he admitted. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

      There was more, of course; Caleb had wanted his big brother to wade in with fists flying to rescue him. Eventually, he’d see that this way was better. Safer.

      A thought crept into Reid’s head, a follow-up to things he’d been brooding about anyway. Okay, it was possible he had, without realizing it, come to love Paula and Roger, but...would they actually love Caleb? Did they love all the kids they took in? Some of them? None? Certainly, back then Reid hadn’t thought of the word in association with them. His mother was the only person he’d ever been sure loved him—or known he loved, despite the limitations on her love.

      Whatever Paula and Roger gave was enough for me.

      He was stunned by the voice that whispered, Was it?

      No, that was ridiculous. Sure, what kid wouldn’t rather have a normal family? Mom, Dad, sister, brother, cat and dog. The cynic in him thought, Fresh-baked cookies when I came in the door from school, gentle lectures when my grades dropped, a parent in the stands at every football and basketball game. A father who talked openly to me and laid a comforting hand on my shoulder while he listened when I told him my worries. A warm-hearted TV-sitcom childhood. If they existed, he hadn’t seen one up close and personal. Some of his friends seemed to have it good, but who knew what went on behind closed doors? Shame had kept him from telling any of those friends his father beat the shit out of him on a regular basis. He’d never said, My father killed my mother and got away with it. So they might have been keeping quiet for the same reason. Once he became a cop, stable, loving families weren’t the ones he saw.

      But that’s what I wanted.

      That’s what Caleb wants.

      A sound escaped him, one even he didn’t know how to label. Glimpsing Anna’s startled expression, he snapped his guard back into place. She’d seen too much already. He knew better than to lay himself out naked like this.

      “That helps,” he said, sounding easy, but for a residual roughness in his voice. “Thank you.”

      She studied him long enough to make him sweat, but he playfully snitched a French fry from her tray, since his were gone, and then stirred the last of his float before peeling off the lid and drinking it.

      “You’re welcome,” she said and swatted at his hand when he reached for another French fry. “Hey!”

      “You’re not eating them.”

      She wrinkled her nose at him. “My eyes were bigger than my stomach.”

      She’d hardly made a dent in the fries and half her root-beer float was left. No wonder she stayed skinny.

      Delicate.

      They chatted for a few more minutes. He made a concerted effort, though he needed desperately to be moving, to be alone. He didn’t want her to know how he felt, especially since, as usual, he didn’t know what he did feel.

      “I was kidding. Here, you can have the rest of these.” She offered the fries, but he shook his head.

      “I’ve had enough.”

      “I should get home,” she said, her expression completely unrevealing.

      They bused their table, then walked out together. The other diners had long since left. The parking lot was dark and empty; the only remaining vehicles besides their own were parked toward the back of the building and probably belonged to employees. He wanted to kiss her good-night—and yet he didn’t want to. Or didn’t dare.

      More to be confused about. He felt some of the same panic he had when he’d admitted to Paula that he both wanted and didn’t want to take Caleb home.

      Even if he’d formed the impulse, Anna unlocked her Toyota and hopped in too quickly to have given him the chance to act on it. “Good night, Reid,” she said, slammed her door and started the engine immediately. She was backing out before he’d circled around to the driver’s side of his own vehicle.

      Because she didn’t want to start anything with him? Or because he’d had his chance and blown it?

      Or—most unwelcome possibility of all—because she’d read him all too accurately and knew a man running scared when she saw one?

      He swore under his breath and told himself it really would be better to keep his distance.