Ties That Bind (17 page)

Dray shook back hair she hadn’t bothered to comb. “So, did you sleep with her?”

“Technically, yes.”

Dray was sure she could hear her heart breaking. She didn’t know why she was so shocked, and hurt, by the confirmation. She’d been up all night wondering where he was, what he was doing. “I’m moving out.” She set her coffee down on the counter and brushed past him.

“Not so fast.” He grabbed her arm. “If you want to leave after I clarify this, fine, but I won’t have you storming out on false pretenses.”

“False pretenses? You cheated on Kate, too, didn’t you? Why did I think you wouldn’t do it to me?”

He recoiled back as if he’d been slapped. “Only once, and there were reasons.”

“Reasons that I don’t know because you never talk to me about things.”

“It’s hard for me to open up, Dray.”

“You seem to open up just fine to your ex-wife.

Sighing, he drew her to a chair. “Sit, please. I won’t let you go thinking what you do.”

Hating herself for capitulating, she sat across from him at the table. She picked up a napkin and twisted it at the edges while he talked.

“I spent the night with Kate because she was attacked in the parking garage.” He told her the entire story. Briefly, as if he was arguing someone else’s case. Passion was there, but not emotion.

“Are you saying you stayed in the same bed with her and nothing happened?”

“I’m saying exactly that.”

“And you expect me to believe that?”

He was offended. “I’ve never lied to you. It’s the truth.”

“You’ve never lied to me? Okay, then tell me the truth about this. Do you still have feelings for Kate?”

“What kind of feelings?”

“Don’t hedge, Reese. Don’t play lawyer with me. Are you still in love with Kate?”

“I’ve always cared about her. Even after we divorced.”

“You’re mincing words. Let me be clearer, Counselor. Are you having renewed feelings for her, the kind you had before things went bad?”

He took in a deep breath. His green eyes darkened with something that looked like fear. “Yes, I am.”

Tears misted her eyes. Tracked down her cheeks.

“Oh, honey, don’t cry. It doesn’t mean what you think.”

“You don’t want a relationship with her? Like you had?”

“It doesn’t matter what I want, Dray. It only matters what I do. I can’t control the feelings I have for Kate, but I can control what I do with them.” He drew in a breath. “Our relationship almost destroyed us, and our daughter. I won’t let that happen again.”

“Then you don’t want me to leave?”

“Lord, no. That would be the worst thing you could do now. I need you to keep…” His voice trailed off.

Briefly, she closed her eyes. “Do you have any idea how insulting what you just said is? And how hurtful.”

“That came out wrong.” He raked a hand through his hair. “Look, I’m exhausted. I’m not saying what I mean. I don’t want you to leave me. Unless you’re too uncomfortable with what I said.”

“I hate what you said, and didn’t say.”

“I’m sorry.”

Dray watched Reese. He seemed to be telling the truth. If she ignored the innuendo that her leaving would throw him into Kate’s arms, she could believe that he was telling the truth. God, she’d always hated women who chose to believe what they wanted instead of what was staring at them in the face.

How on earth had she become one of them?

PROPPED UP IN her pillows with the April sunshine streaming in through the blinds, and the still-crisp air tickling her skin, Kate sipped her coffee and watched the man across her bedroom. From his seat on the couch, Reese drank from his own Starbucks cup, which he’d bought for both of them this morning. He seemed to tamp down a grin. “You took this better than I thought you would.”

“After Tyler called my doctor, and you called Judge Larkin, I’d have a right to be furious at both of you.”

“If you won’t take care of yourself, we will.”

We. Uh-oh. That didn’t sound good. Still, she appreciated all Reese had done last night. And the fact that, since she was off work for two days, he’d cleared his schedule as much as possible so they could delve into the mountain-size pile of prison records they’d obtained from Longshore. Best to concentrate on that. But something needed to be said first.

“Reese?” Her voice had turned soft and feminine. He glanced up sharply from the papers he was scanning. “Thanks for all you did last night.”

A smile turned up the corners of his mouth. The green knit polo shirt he wore with khaki chinos deepened the color of his eyes, which warmed when his gaze landed on her. “You’re welcome. Scared the shit out of me, though, when I was on the phone and heard you scream in that garage, for God’s sake.”

“I’m sorry I scared you.

“I’m sorry somebody assaulted you.”

“But I meant that I’m grateful for what you did in the aftermath—taking me home, and staying all night.”

“I was worried about you.”

“I know. And I appreciate it.” She sighed. “You always took good care of me. “

“Back at ya, sweetheart.”

Sweetheart. Second uh-oh. Time to get their minds away from what was between them. She picked up papers which were duplicates of his. “We should go over at these.”

“You sure you’re up to it?” He studied her bruises. “You’re pretty banged up.”

She touched her face. “Does it look awful?”

“Bad enough. The doctor said in two days it’ll be a lot better.” Anger lit his eyes. “I could kill the bastard for doing that to you. Whoever he was.”

“The police are on it. Did you call Chase Sanders?”

“Yep, this morning. He’s going to stop by here this afternoon. I hope that’s okay.”

“Of course it is.”

Reese swallowed hard. “I called Sofie but her phone’s off again.”

“Oh, Reese, no, we can’t tell Sofie about this.”

He nodded to the morning paper. “Have to. It’s in there. Something about beleaguered judge haunted by her past.”

“Great.” She laid her head against the pillows.

He got up, crossed to the bed and dropped down on the edge. He seemed so big sitting there, his wide shoulders straining against the knit of his shirt. And he smelled so male, like he always had in the morning. Way too naturally, he grasped her hand in his. “We’ll get through this, Katie. I promise.”

She gave him a weak grin.

“Maybe you should rest some more. I can start reviewing the files myself.”

“No, our minds always worked better together. You have an insight and I run with it. We cover more ground that way.”

“All right.” He checked his watch—a new one that she didn’t recognize. At one time, she knew everything about him. But now, he had a life very separate from her. “We’ve got a couple of hours until lunch. We’ll see how it goes.”

Before he stood, he leaned over and brushed his knuckles down her uninjured cheek. “At least it’s better between us.”

She grasped his wrist. “I know. I’m glad.”

As he went back to the couch, though she meant what she said, she also worried that this truce of sorts would push them somewhere they didn’t want to go. Tyler had concerns, which he voiced before he left this morning. She’d awoken to find him there, and not happy about Reese having spent the night. After the debacle in her office yesterday, things were clearly going downhill with him. Kate imagined Dray grilled Reese when he returned after spending the night, too. She’d give anything to know what he said to Dray, but kept herself from asking—for both their sakes.

His feet propped up on a hassock, Reese put on his glasses and picked up a file. “How do we do this?”

“Just plunge in, I guess.” She opened a full folder. “Holy hell, look at the paperwork.” There was a hefty stack, about two thirds the size of a ream of computer paper.

“We’ll have to organize it to make any headway.” He leafed through the material. “You take the first half. I’ll take the second. After we group it, we’ll comb through each one.”

An hour later, having read their sections, without a word spoken, Reese said, “I’m ready.”

“I am, too.”

“I’ll write. “ He stood and crossed to the window, where he’d set up an easel he’d brought from the office. On it was a hanging pad about two feet by four feet; he’d also brought markers. This was the way they worked best.

Reese wrote: Unit Team Orientation. He reviewed aloud that each inmate, upon arrival, was scheduled into a team consisting of a unit manager, case manager and corrections counselor. After the initial orientation, the team met with each inmate on their unit every six months. “Then there’s disciplinary reports, called Incident Reports. Visitor lists and videos—we don’t have the tapes, though. Phone call list, mail received and medical records.” He looked over at her. “That’s all I have.”

He recorded her input as she gave it to him. “I’ve got her activities: recreation, hobbies, religious and other organizations she joined. Counseling visits. Library books checked out. Commissary reports. And forms called Call Outs—mandatory appointments; Cop Outs—request forms; and Counts—a roll call of sorts taken several times a day.” Kate reached out for the bottle of water on the side of the bed. “Can you imagine living like this? It would kill me to live under such scrutiny.”

“I know. You love the outdoors so much.”

She grinned, remembering the camping trips they took before Sofie was born. They’d loved to sleep under the stars. It seemed like a lifetime ago.

“Okay,” he said, studying the board. “Her Unit Team. The prison orientation is first. Three documents were prepared,” which he recorded on the board. “Judgment and Commitment, Inmate Financial Responsibility Program, and Sentence Computation.” They scanned the forms for the salient points, without even discussing how to do this. Old patterns apparently never died. “Looks like our girl got off to a bang. She’d challenged the sentence computation and claimed she had no financial restitution to make because she was put in Longshore for parole violation.”

Kate narrowed her eyes on the paper. “They didn’t let the latter go, though. She was forced to make restitution for the bribery that she didn’t finish paying in Tallahassee.”

Reese recorded the information.

“Interesting, isn’t it?” Kate noted. “Her family had the money to pay back what she stole. Yet she balked. Hell, why’d she steal in the first place?”

“For the thrill of it all.” Reese glanced down. “She won on the sentence computation. They were off a whole fourteen days. Didn’t count travel time.”

“I imagine fourteen days is a lifetime behind bars.”

“Hmm. Here’s her job—prison laundry initially, but she got into the library somehow. Must have had some pull for the cushier job. She was assigned quarters with Lena Parks, right away. There’s a list of clothing she was given. “

Cocking her head, Kate thought back. “Clothing? I think I saw a complaint about her having too much underwear.”

“You’re kidding. “

Kate leafed through. “Nope, it’s under ‘Shots—the disciplinary incidents’.” She read further. “Usually those kinds of complaints aren’t written up, but hers was.”

“Probably pissed off a guard one too many times.

“The guard who wrote her up is Nell Sorenson.”

“A picture’s already starting to form, isn’t it?”

He nodded. “Uh-huh. Anything else on the Unit Team?”

“No. Bingham was supposed to meet with them the week after she died to assess her first six months, but obviously, she didn’t make it to the meeting; there’s no summary of her progress or lack of it. We’ll have to do everything ourselves.”

“Lucky us.”

“What’s next?” she asked. “Logically?”

“Let’s do the Incident Reports. You read them and I’ll write up here on the easel.”

“For someone incarcerated only six months, she has a hell of a lot disciplinary referrals.”

By noon they’d listed Anna Bingham’s disciplinary record. Even writing small, Reese filled the whole easel with her screw-ups. Listed were major and minor infractions. Reese picked up a bottle of water and drank, while he and Kate studied the list. Commissary infractions abounded: making a stink after she signed a receipt for goods; apparently it was a big no-no to accept what you ordered and then complain the order wasn’t right. Contraband found in home-cooked meals: only certain items were available at the commissary; if food was cooked with other stuff, it was black market. If you got caught, you were written up.

Reese said, “She liked the black market. She was reported for possessing steaks, marijuana, hiring somebody to paint her cell and do her ironing. Some hooch. Everything’s available, I guess, for a cost. Oh, and she got caught for gambling on football. Looks like she was into sports.”

Reese continued to read the list and check with the file papers. “She had a violation of medical status conditions—seems she was put on medical confinement and left the area. Oh, man, six or seven altercations with the guards. Sorenson’s name is here a lot. Missing counts.” She shook her head. “Little Anna was one busy girl.”

“I’m surprised they kept her in medium security.”

“There aren’t a lot of high-security prisons for women. I read some stats. Only seven percent of all prisoners are female, so they group security levels together more for them than for men.”

Reese put down his marker and raised his arms over his head and flexed his back to stretch. He seemed tall and very imposing. Until his stomach growled. “Guess I’m hungry. Let’s eat and talk about the meaning of this part, before we go on. “

“I agree.” Kate started to get out of bed. She’d managed to shower this morning and had put on a black warm-up suit with peach accents. When she bent over to put on sneaks, though, she got dizzy. Reese was beside her in seconds. “Here, let me do this.”

“I can tie my own shoes,” she said dryly.

Batting her hands away, he knelt in front of her. “I used to do it.” He picked up a sneaker. “When you were pregnant with Sof.”

“I couldn’t bend over that far at the end.”

He glanced up. His color was high this morning, even though he couldn’t have slept much. “I loved how you looked at that stage.”

“I know you did. It’s what got me through those last few weeks.”