Friction (32 page)

“I just want you to know that I’m not backing down from my fight to keep my granddaughter.”

“See you in court.”

“And you won’t have
her
on your side.”

Holly, to whom Joe had been referring, stepped forward. “Please don’t talk around me, Mr. Gilroy. If you have something to say to me, I’m right here.”

“You made a deal with me. Don’t forget that.”

“I haven’t forgotten it. Crawford is aware of it. When I take the stand, I’ll testify to the truth.”

“You will,
he
won’t.”

“Crawford wouldn’t lie under oath.”

“He’s been lying under oath since we started this mess. He’s living a lie.”

Crawford noticed the triumphant gleam in his father-in-law’s eyes, and in that instant, in that moment of raw clarity, realization struck. “Jesus.” His head dropped forward until his chin almost touched his chest. He pressed his hands against his temples.

“Crawford?” Speaking his name with obvious concern, Holly placed her hand in the center of his back. “What? What is it?”

He lowered his hands, raised his head, and walked slowly toward Joe, searching his eyes, and reading in them the fact of the matter. “You know.” He delved deeper into Joe’s indomitable gaze. “You’ve always known, haven’t you. It was your silver bullet.”

No longer looking so self-satisfied, the older man said querulously, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, yes you do,” Crawford said softly. “When were you going to use it, Joe? When no other options were left open to you?”

“What are the two of you talking about?” Grace asked.

Crawford said, “You want to tell her, Joe?”

The older man made a dismissive gesture. “He’s talking nonsense.”

“No, it makes perfect sense,” Crawford said. “Until just now, you didn’t know that
I
knew. You’ve been waiting for just the right moment to spring it on me.”

“Knew what?” Grace asked with increasing impatience.

Joe looked over at her, and his jowls relaxed. The fire in his eyes dimmed. He looked like a commander who’d been trapped in his own well-set ambush.

Grace said, “Joe? What?”

But when her husband didn’t say anything, Crawford gave her a sad smile, then looked into Holly’s eyes. “I’m not Georgia’s father.”

H
olly’s lips parted in disbelief.

Grace covered her cheek as though she’d been struck.

Joe walked over to the recliner and sat down heavily.

Crawford addressed Holly. “Under oath, I never referred to her as my daughter. You can check court transcripts. I never even refer to her that way in conversation. Other people do, and I never correct them, so technically, I guess that’s lying, because I didn’t father her.”

“How long have you known?”

“Since she was a year old. Beth told me the morning I left that last time for Halcon. She didn’t want me to go. I insisted that I had to, that I had a job to finish. The argument turned ugly. She wanted to hurt me in the worst possible way. And she did.”

Grace, openly crying now, covered her mouth to hold back a sob.

“Who was the father?” Holly asked.

“Nine months, give or take a week, before Georgia was born, I was supposed to have come home for a weekend. At the last minute, something came up, I had to stay in West Texas. Beth was furious. She rounded up a few girlfriends and they went out. Got a little crazy. She met this guy at a bar and slept with him to punish me. Two weekends later, when I did come home, we had lots of makeup sex, so I had no reason to think the baby wasn’t mine. Beth chose her moment to tell me.”

“Which is why I question it,” Holly said. “Maybe she made all that up, just to try to keep you from going after Fuentes.”

Crawford looked over at his father-in-law, and, feeling the weight of Crawford’s stare, he said, “It’s true.”

“And you’ve kept this from me?” Grace said.

“Beth came to me in confidence,” he said defensively. “She found out she was further along in the pregnancy than she was supposed to be, realized what had happened, panicked. She came to me asking what she should do. She was upset with herself. Mortified, actually. She didn’t want it to destroy her marriage. She wanted
you
,” he said to Crawford, “so I advised her never to tell you. Until now, I didn’t know she had.”

Crawford said, “She claimed she’d never seen the guy before that night, and never saw him after. Didn’t even remember his name. Is that true?”

Joe gave a curt nod. “It was a classic one-night stand.”

That relaxed the tension that had been gripping Crawford for days. “I hoped she was being truthful about that. This past week, there were times when I wondered if Otterman had been the man.”

“Oh, Crawford.” Holly reached for his hand and squeezed it hard.

“Actually, that’s what I feared most. My biggest relief wasn’t seeing him dead, but learning that he had nothing to do with Beth, nothing to do with Georgia.” His voice cracked when he spoke her name. “I ventured a lot of guesses about Otterman, but that was the worst of them. I don’t know how I would have borne knowing that… Well, it doesn’t matter now.”

He walked over to where Grace was sitting and hunkered down in front of her, covering her tightly clasped hands with his. “Don’t ever think badly of Beth. I had made her unhappy. She made one misstep. She loved Georgia. She loved me. I know she did.

“Just a few days after that quarrel, she got the call that I’d been wounded. Maybe she felt like she’d jinxed me, caused me to get shot, something. I think that’s why she was trying so hard to get to me that night. She wanted to make things right between us.”

“Would you have forgiven her?”

“Yes. I have forgiven her. Because I loved her, too. As for Georgia, she became mine when the doctor handed her to me seconds after she was born. I couldn’t love her more if I had fathered her.”

Joe stood up. “But you didn’t. She’s our blood, not yours. So many times, I’ve wanted to hit you with the truth. I hate that you denied me that pleasure.”

“
I
didn’t.” Crawford came to his feet and faced him. “Beth did.”

“You thought it was your secret to keep, and you’ve kept it.”

“To protect Beth from being scorned. By you and Grace, by anyone.”

“Who do you think you’re kidding?” Joe sneered. “You sat on it because you know that this gives us a stronger claim to Georgia.”

Crawford was determined not to let the conversation spin out of control. Besides, he was too weak and weary to fight another fight. Quietly, but emphatically, he said, “Believe what you will, Joe. I kept Beth’s secret because I didn’t want the truth to reflect badly on her. I also wanted to protect Georgia from any kind of cruel backlash.” He paused for a beat, then added, “What you do with it is entirely up to you.”

The older man’s expression and body language remained unyielding.

Crawford picked up the sack containing his shirt and reclaimed Holly’s hand. They left the room together, went down the hall, and out the front door, where he stopped to face her.

“Now do you understand why I said I couldn’t have you? I meant everything I said in there about wanting to protect Beth and Georgia. But Joe’s right. I also knew that if the truth about her parentage became known, I was sunk. So, yeah, I lived the lie. It didn’t bother me, not in the least. Till I met you. You’re grafted to the truth. Your lifework is to seek the truth. Living that lie suddenly mattered. And it mattered huge.”

She had listened intently, and when he finished, she said, “I do understand the dilemma you faced. But let’s not talk about it anymore tonight. I just want to hold you.” She wrapped her arms around his waist, then flinched away from him and brought her hand from behind his back. It was stained red. “Crawford, this is fresh blood!”

He gave a sheepish shrug. “Some of it was mine.”

“Ready?”

“Yes, Daddy.”

“Keep your eyes covered till I tell you.”

He guided Georgia down the hallway to the open door of her bedroom, positioned her, then said, “Okay, you can look!”

She lowered her hands and began to squeal as she hopped up and down. “That’s gonna be my bed?”

“It’s all yours. This is your room from now on.”

She turned and hugged him around the knees. “Thank you, Daddy! This is the best surprise ever!”

He returned her hug, then nudged her into the room. “Go check it out.”

She went directly to the ballet slippers and tutu.

He had replicated everything that had been destroyed. The vandalism was attributed to Pat Connor. That was only one bit of the wealth of information supplied by the surviving bodyguard as part of his plea bargain.

From him they also learned that Chuck Otterman, by working for several companies over many years, had created a complicated relay system of weapons trafficking that might otherwise have taken years to discover, and even longer to unsnarl and prosecute the participants. The guard also identified the roughnecks who played active roles in that sideline, and exonerated those who were clueless to it.

Many of Otterman’s local weapons suppliers were busted by a joint task force of officers from several agencies, state and federal, including Harry and Sessions out of Houston, and Crawford out of his office in Prentiss. As it turned out, cousins of even the tightest clans would rat each other out. It was surprising how cooperative they became when faced with felony charges. And Harry’s six-shooter.

Holly joined him at the door of Georgia’s bedroom, setting her pink suitcase just inside it. “I think she likes it.”

“How can you tell?” he asked, smiling over Georgia’s enthusiastic
ooh
s and
aah
s as she moved from one treasure to another.

“The trunk of my car is packed with stuff. Where are you going to put it all?”

“We’ll find room. Maybe she’ll cull some of it.” He placed his arm around Holly’s shoulders and kissed her brow. “Thanks for doing that, by the way.”

He’d accepted her offer to pick up Georgia at the Gilroys’ house and deliver her and her belongings to his. “It wasn’t too bad.”

“Joe?”

“Coolly polite. Grace got teary-eyed, but she was smiling and enthusiastic for Georgia’s sake. It helps that she’ll be keeping her after school every day.”

He had told his in-laws that he would get Georgia to school each morning, but that he needed someone to pick her up and watch her until he got home from work. When he asked Grace if she would be interested, she had wept and gratefully accepted the proposal.

“It’s a good arrangement,” he said to Holly now.

“It was kind of you.”

“I know how hard it was for them to give her up. Seeing them every day will help Georgia with the transition, too.”

The restraining order had been revoked. That hearing had never taken place. When the custody hearing was rescheduled with another judge, Joe didn’t use his silver bullet. Crawford figured Grace had forbidden it. He also reasoned that Joe, who’d had ample opportunities to confront him with the truth, hadn’t because, he, too, had wanted to protect Beth and Georgia from any hint of scandal.

However, true to his word, Joe hadn’t given up without a fight. He argued against Crawford’s ability to parent Georgia as well as he and Grace did.

Holly had been subpoenaed, and had truthfully testified to his losing his temper and assaulting his father-in-law. But during cross examination, Bill Moore had made certain that the judge heard from her the extenuating circumstances that explained and justified his behavior that day in the park.

The judge took it all under advisement, and, after three tortuous days, Bill Moore called Crawford. “You got her. Congratulations. Don’t fuck up.”

Heart bursting, he said, “For this call, you can bill me double.”

“Don’t think I won’t.”

Watching Georgia now, testing out the bed by bouncing on it, he asked Holly, “Why do you think the judge ruled in my favor?”

“He was won over when you said there was a big difference between a father and a daddy. You’d had a father. You wanted to be Georgia’s daddy.” She hesitated, then said softly, “I went by his grave yesterday and left flowers.”

“How’d you know where it was?”

“I checked at the cemetery office.”

She had wanted to be at the burial service, but Crawford wouldn’t hear of it, saying her attendance would raise eyebrows and beg explanations.

Only a handful of people attended the graveside service. Crawford notified his mother in California. She sent her condolences and a scrawny spray of flowers. A few men from the sawmill came, and one of Conrad’s legal colleagues from back in the day. Harry and Sessions surprised Crawford by driving up from Houston for it. Neal and Nugent were there, Nugent fidgeting.

Throat tight, he said to Holly now, “You wouldn’t think I’d miss him, but I do. He was never around, but I knew he was
there
. I grieve him, and all because of those last few seconds of his life. He hugged me. We smiled at each other. I don’t recall that happening since I wasn’t much older than Georgia is now.”

“He died doing something for you, and that was important to him. I think you need to hear what he told me that night.”

She related their conversation. “He ended by saying he would be proud for Georgia to know him as he was in his heyday.”

Crawford, his voice gruff with emotion, said, “I’ll tell her about him, when she’s older and can understand, and I can figure out a way to say it all. I’m not very good at stuff like that.”

“That is so untrue. Chet’s eulogy was beautiful.”

He’d served as a pallbearer and, at Mrs. Barker’s request, he’d delivered a brief but heartfelt tribute.

“Will you ever tell Georgia about her parentage?”

He replied without hesitation. “Definitely. At the very least she should know that she has the medical and genetic history of only one parent. I’ll tell her when she’s old enough to understand all the implications.”

“The most important one being how much you love her. When Beth told you she wasn’t your baby, you could have rejected her.”

“Not a chance in hell. I know what it’s like to have parents wash their hands of you. I vowed then that Georgia was never going to feel like she’d been discarded.”

“That’s why she’ll love you so much.”

“She’s crazy about you.”

“Is she?”

“Holly said this, Holly said that. Where is Holly’s house? Can Holly come with us?” He looked down at her. “Honestly, I’m a little jealous.”

For weeks leading up to the custody hearing, his life had been as he’d predicted—consumed by the fallout from the Otterman denouement. He and Holly had talked daily, sometimes several times a day, but had refrained from seeing each other. Each was still under close public scrutiny. He’d been far more concerned for her than for himself.

“I won’t let you lose the election because of your association with me.”

But once the custody ruling had been made, restrictions no longer applied. They began appearing in public together. When this was slyly remarked upon by Greg Sanders, Marilyn issued the statement she’d prepared for the eventuality. It described their “growing friendship” as “one happy outcome of the crisis situation they had shared and survived.”

She’d been retained to see Holly through the election, on the condition that Crawford and Georgia not be exploited. So far, she was abiding by that condition.

“I spoke to the governor today,” Holly told him now.

“What did he have to say?”

“Nothing about me. All about you. He wants to meet you.”

Crawford looked down at her skeptically.

“I’m serious. He called you a favorite son of Texas. Asked if your gunshot wound—”  She stopped and glared up at him.

“I knew it was only a flesh wound.”

“No, you didn’t.”

“I had stuff to do that night before going to the hospital.”

Still looking put out with him over his self-diagnosis, which had cost him a loss of blood and the threat of serious infection, she said, “Governor Hutchins wants to shake your hand. He stands solidly behind his decision to appoint me.”

“You’re a shoo-in.”

“If Sanders beats me, I’ll start a practice here in Prentiss.”

“You’ll win. You have the PD’s endorsement.”

They’d made their peace with Neal Lester. Neal had cornered Crawford one day in a corridor of the courthouse and manfully apologized for letting personal feelings get in the way of the investigation. “I screwed up.”