“You think you’re indispensable or something?” Julia shrugged as if this wasn’t a big deal, but Tanner knew better. “We’ll get someone else to help us get the clinic ready for business.”
“I know what your budget’s like and you were counting on me,” Zach lamented. “And we can’t have Piper working in a zone that might have asbestos. Jules, really, I’m so sorry.”
“I’ll help” Tanner offered. It was the last thing he wanted to do, to be caught in a work zone with midwives and doctors and pregnant women, but they should be done with the work before too many young mothers came around. “I’m decent with a hammer and I like fixing things. And it’s not bragging to say I’m better than your brother.”
Zach started to protest, but Tanner stopped him. “Save your breath. If I’d been between the kids and that alley, the second kid wouldn’t have gone that way and you’d be doing paperwork right now. As it is, Chalmers is doing paperwork and I’m...” He took a deep breath. “Going to help build walls for a women’s health clinic in a crime-riddled strip mall.”
“Not necessary,” Julia said coolly. “But thank you. I’m sure I’ll have plenty of help, and didn’t we confirm last night that accidents happen to everyone? No one’s fault, then or now.” Her expression said she didn’t need his help or like his attitude. But he knew what he needed to do.
“I will help, it’s useless to argue,” Tanner offered mildly. “And who’s got your boys and little Jackson if you’re all here?”
“My mother.” Piper kissed Zach’s cheek as the doctor returned with papers to sign. “She’s having the time of her life, and she can’t wait to be a grandma again.”
Tanner had had enough talk of babies and clinics. He’d been so happy to get the call-in today, glad to push thoughts of this anniversary aside, but that was hard when pregnancy chatter surrounded him. He took a step backward. “Zach, I’m heading out to help Chalmers. I’ll do whatever you need, and again, I’m sorry, man.”
Zach waved him off. Tanner started to head toward Julia, but her expression said their conversation was over.
It wasn’t over, it had barely begun, and he had every intention of helping with her women’s health center. Why it had to be in his patrol area was a quirk of fate he didn’t need, but out of his control.
He strode out the door, determined. Like it or not, Zach had gotten hurt because he’d messed up. Now he’d help pick up the slack his mistake had caused. Whether Julia liked it or not.
Julia stopped by her house on the way home from the hospital. The emergency enclosure firm had battened down the hatches and the firefighters had removed the tree and secured the electric lines, but it would be weeks before her house was habitable. She hurried upstairs, grabbed clothing and toiletries she’d need for herself and the boys, then saw the message light flashing on her landline as she descended the stairs.
She hit the message code. The unexpected tones of her ex-husband’s voice made her chest ache. “Ignoring me, Julia? Doing what you do best, hiding your head in the sand to avoid reality? Well here’s the deal, Martin and Connor are my kids as much as yours, and if I have to go to a judge to enforce my visitation rights, I’ll do it. Don’t make me bring you to court, Julia. Call me and set up a time for me to have my sons. We’ll meet somewhere in the middle.”
Julia’s heart froze solid, the phone in her hand.
Meet in the middle?
Did Vic expect her to drive halfway to Ithaca and hand Martin and Connor over to him after he’d spent the past two years ignoring them?
Not gonna happen.
Ice pulsed through her veins as she smacked down the phone. The sound of his voice was antagonistic, and condescending, as if distancing herself from his affairs was an over-reaction on her part.
She paced the long living room, examining her options.
Vic had visitation rights, but he’d never bothered to use them. He’d shrugged off her moving to Kirkwood Lake two years ago, and other than the infrequent child support checks, he’d stayed out of their lives.
Until now.
Why now?
She didn’t have a clue. Her head hurt but she wasn’t about to take one of those pain pills and cloud her thinking.
The phone rang.
She jumped, stared at the caller ID and heaved a sigh of relief when her father’s number flashed. “Hey, Dad.”
“Hey yourself. You okay? I thought you just had to grab a few things. Need me to come around that way?”
“No, but thanks. I’m fine.”
“You don’t sound fine, Jules.” Her father wasn’t the kind of guy anyone fooled for long. “You sound like you’re ready to pop someone in the jaw.”
Her father knew her well.
“Is your head hurting? Do you need me to drive you back here?”
“No, nothing like that.” She paused, then blew out a breath. “Vic called.”
Marty Harrison growled. “He hasn’t contacted you in over a year.”
“Almost eighteen months, and that was to explain why he couldn’t take the boys for their two-week summer visit because he was too busy finishing up his course work to become a school administrator.”
“I remember. What does he want?”
“He wants the boys over spring break. And he says he wants his one weekend a month like the court promised.”
“Now? After all this time? Why?”
Julia had no answers. Only more questions. “I don’t know.”
Her father breathed deeply, then offered typical Marty Harrison wisdom. “Well, we know he wants something. Vic is nothing if not predictable, but there’s no sense worrying about it tonight. You need to sleep and we’ll tackle this tomorrow. Let him stew on it overnight, Jules.”
“Which means we both stew on it.”
“Trials of parenthood, honey. No one said it would be easy.”
True, but then no one warned her that her good-looking, high school teacher husband would stray outside their marriage. Call her naive, but being raised in the Harrison house, good men didn’t do things like that. Which meant she’d either placed her trust foolishly...
Put a check in the yes column on that one!
Or she wasn’t as slim or attractive as she’d been when they dated nine years before.
Another check in the yes column, with a helping of self-recrimination poured on top, like chocolate glaze on a doughnut.
“And stop beating yourself up, Julia. That’s not how I raised you.”
“My spunk’s on low tonight, Dad. It’s been a rough forty-eight hours.”
“You escaped two car wrecks and a falling tree with nothing more than a couple of cuts, bruises and bangs. Pretty positive result in my book, kid.”
She laughed because he was absolutely right. “Two of which were not my fault, of course.”
“And neither was the broken marriage,” Marty told her bluntly. “We’ll figure this out in the morning. I love you, honey.”
“Love you back. I’ll be at your place in a few minutes.”
She