His First Choice (22 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY

L
ACEY
LOVED
J
EM
. She hadn't come right out and told him so, but she'd admitted the truth when Kacey had asked, and again when Kacey told their parents about the man in Lacey's life.

Kacey thought Lacey was sabotaging herself again—borrowing trouble where there might not be any in her concern over Tressa's hold over Jem. But Kacey had spent the past ten years working in a world of pretense, not dealing with victims of domestic violence as Lacey had.

She knew the signs. Impartial or not, she could run through a checklist. Jem had every sign of being a victim other than physical bruises.

Being without him on the Fourth intensified her worry. Not out of jealousy—she knew by now that he did not enjoy his ex-wife's company—but because he hadn't been able to tell Tressa that he wanted to take Levi away for the holiday.

He'd explained it all to her. How Tressa was all alone. How holidays—times when everyone else went off to be with family—were hardest for her. How she was doing so well and he couldn't risk setting her back. For Levi's sake.

She'd read between the lines, too. But had been unable to tell Jem what she really thought. He'd only deny the truth.

Because if he could see it, he'd be doing something about it.

Trouble was, he thought he saw it clearly. And he thought he was the only one who truly knew Tressa, truly understood her. The only one who could help her get through this.

But he thought that way because she'd made him do so. To keep him on her hook. He didn't see that part.

By the end of July, Lacey was almost willing to pretend she didn't see the truth, either. They'd had an idyllic few weeks since her return from San Diego. She and Jem and Levi had dinner together every single night. She'd even spent a couple of nights at his place during the week.

He'd picked her up in his truck and driven her home in the morning. She didn't like that aspect of it so much, fearing that he was placating Tressa by making sure there were no unfamiliar cars in front of his house or in his driveway all night. But, as Kacey continued to tell her, she could just be borrowing trouble.

They'd had a near-miss when Levi had mentioned Lacey during one of his supervised visits with Tressa. Sydney had been there and told Jem, who told Lacey about it. Tressa knew that Levi was to receive counseling anytime he appeared to be struggling. She'd just assumed that Lacey was his counselor, since she'd been his initial caseworker. Sydney hadn't disabused her of the idea.

The level of Jem's relief had given Lacey serious pause in the midst of a seriously happy day at the beach. She'd paused again when he'd mentioned that Tressa and Amelia were in San Francisco for the weekend, visiting Amelia's brother. She'd been thrilled when, with Kacey in LA for a movie premiere she had to attend that weekend, he'd suggested a day at the beach for the three of them—him, Lacey and Levi—thinking he was finally ready to quit coddling Tressa by hiding upsetting things from her, that he was moving toward the idea of he and Lacey and Levi becoming a family publicly as well as at home.

She'd been wrong.

Just as he was wrong in his apparent assessment that anger management meant someone else managing anything that could cause anger.

She didn't pause, however, when, that night, after Levi was bathed and in bed asleep, Jem reached for her hand and pulled her down the hall to his room. Their love life was unyieldingly happy. She couldn't get enough of him.

And couldn't get enough of how much he wanted her.

“The room should be finished this week,” he told her as he shut the bedroom door behind them. Levi's monitor, on the bedside table, would alert them if he was disturbed. “I'll begin mudding and sanding tomorrow.”

He'd taken that day, Saturday, to go to the beach and would be spending Sunday at her house working while she and Levi went grocery shopping and made dinner.

He'd spent the previous weekend running electric, putting in outlet boxes and hanging drywall—among other, more private things, anytime Levi had been otherwise occupied. The little boy had been watching a lot of television. But only on weekends, and only in spurts, after playing at the park, building puzzles or teaching Lacey how to piece together track for his unending car collection.

“So...I was thinking...” He held her to him with a hand on her backside, rubbing the front of his shorts against the front of hers. “Maybe we ought to start thinking about, you know, moving some things around.”

She'd purchased new furniture. He knew that, since he'd told her when to have it delivered. “What things?”

“Like, maybe a toothbrush here and a toothbrush there...”

They already had toothbrushes at each other's houses. She'd bought one for Levi, too. Just like the one he had at Jem's house.

She stared at Jem, not breathing as easily as she had been. Was he asking her to marry him?

She'd expected him to wait until Tressa had improved before they took their relationship to the next level. And marriage...that was a long way off.

“I was just thinking that maybe we should bring some of your clothes here, and some of mine to your house. And...Levi's, too. Once I'm done working, I won't need to be over there every day, and I don't want to get out of the habit of spending our weekends together.”

He wasn't proposing. Okay. Feeling disappointed was natural. But she hadn't been expecting to talk about marriage. Wasn't sure she was ready to do so. Not until he could be honest with Tressa.

“You aren't saying anything,” he said.

“I'm not sure what to say. I didn't think we were spending all of our free time together because you were working on my house. I thought we were doing it because we're on the way to joining our lives in some kind of permanent fashion...”

Oh, God. Had
she
just mentioned marriage? She hadn't meant it that way.

Now he wasn't saying anything. And wasn't rubbing himself against her anymore, either. Probably trying to figure out how to tend to her feelings and keep her away from Tressa at the same time.

She'd tried to talk to him about telling Tressa the truth. Once. He'd told her he wanted nothing more and would do so as soon as he could.

“Anyway, I was just taking for granted that we'd continue to spend our free time together.” She tried to salvage the conversation. She wasn't rushing him.

Didn't want him to feel pressured by her. He had enough pressure in his life.

She also didn't want to marry him until he was ready, and had to face the fact that he might never be. No matter what Kacey said...

“Did you hear that?” Jem stepped away from her, toward the closed bedroom door.

She hadn't heard anything.

“It sounded like a car door.”

Tressa was in San Francisco. She hated that his ex-wife was her first thought. His anxiety was rubbing off on her.

It wasn't healthy. Or right.

“Probably just a neighbor.”

She was talking to his back. And slowed her step behind him when she heard the doorbell ring.

She wanted to go out there. To stand next to him as he greeted whoever was dropping by after ten o'clock on a Saturday night. If someone needed help...

But she didn't. She cowered in the hallway instead. Because she figured that was what he'd have asked her to do.

Just in case.

“You're screwing someone!” She heard the words even before she heard the door open. Which meant Tressa was screaming at him through the door. “Amelia told me, so don't you dare stand there and try to deny it, Jem Bridges. All this time, you and me and Levi, us being a family again, you having my back, and all the time going around behind my back and...”

Lacey started to shake and closed Levi's bedroom door, glad that the little boy could sleep through a drive home and being put back to bed. He'd probably make it through this, too, if they were lucky.

What was she thinking? He'd probably learned to sleep soundly because the first couple of years of his life had been spent living with episodes like the one going on out front.

Odd, though, that the last time Tressa had shown up, wanting to see Levi, Jem had put his ex-wife off with the excuse that if she went in Levi's room, he'd wake up. As if Tressa didn't know how soundly her son slept?

“Damn you!” Something slammed against the storm door Jem had yet to open. Glass shattered.

“Where's Amelia?”

Lacey's mouth fell open. That was all Jem had to say? Glass had just shattered and he asked after Tressa's friend?

“I left her in San Francisco. She actually took me there to propose to me.” Tressa was screaming loudly enough for the neighbors to hear.

Would it be wrong to pray that one of them called the police?

“I'm sorry that wasn't what you wanted, Tress.”

It was like being backstage for the filming of one of Kacey's episodes. Only, you knew that was fake...and therefore safe.

“I mean, if a girl's going to be proposed to, she at least needs some warning that the relationship is moving to an entirely different level.”

“I'm sure she thought she was doing something nice...”

“She
knows
me,” Tressa said. “She knows that I need to be wooed into anything new. And then when I told her that I couldn't think about getting hooked up with someone else while you and I were... Well, she knows that you're first for me. I'd told her that from the very beginning. But she acts all hurt and then tells me the truth. That she's seen you around town with some blonde. And saw Levi at the beach with her, too...”

Another slam. Something against metal. “How could you, Jem? You let some whore take my son to the beach? Where other people could see them out together? I'm going to sue your ass. Both of your asses.”

“Calm down, Tress.” Jem's tone was...normal sounding. “I'm sorry you found out about Lacey like that, but...”

“Lacey? As in Levi's
caseworker
? You're seeing our son's caseworker? I'm going to sue her, Jem. Oh, is she mine. She'll be out of a job before I'm done with her...”

Wanting to find a bathroom, afraid she might throw up, Lacey stood rooted to the wall, trembling. She hadn't done anything wrong. But she
had
started out as a caseworker to this family.

The investigation was closed when she ran into Jem and Levi again at the beach, and she hadn't been anywhere near it since she'd been seeing Jem socially.

But the woman could make things look bad for her. Really bad. She could have a mark on her reputation. And...

She had to trust Jem. He'd take care of this. He'd see what Tressa was doing to her...

“Let's talk about this, Tress. You know you don't want to do any of those things.”

“Are you really seeing her, Jem?”

“It's not what you think.”

“What?”

“Amelia didn't see Levi at the beach with Lacey. She saw him at the beach with her twin sister.”

“There's two of them?”

He was siccing Tressa on Kacey, too?

“Are you screwing them both?”

“You don't want to do this, Tress. Think of your classes. Of Levi.”

Think of her classes? Of Levi? She needed to be thinking about what she was going to tell the police as soon as they were called.

“I thought we were going to be a family again.”

“We'll always be family.”
What?
“You're Levi's mother.”

Lacey's heart fell, hard, even as she recognized what he was doing.

“I broke your glass.”

“You were going for the door handle and missed. Is your hand okay?” He was doing what any man would do when danger appeared at his front door, defusing the situation in the only way he knew how, in order to protect his family.

Problem was, Jem's way only enabled Tressa. Giving her more power, not taking it away.

There'd been a pause. And then “Yeah. The cut's not that deep.”

“Let me take a look at it.” Another pause. “You're right. You got lucky.”

“I'm sorry.” She sounded it. She was calmer, too, because Jem was giving her what she needed.

“Don't worry about it. I'll have a new piece in there by morning.” That was it?
Don't worry about breaking the glass in my front door with your hand when you came barging in after ten o'clock at night, uninvited, at a house you've been told to stay away from? Don't
worry
about it?

“So...this woman...Lacey... You're not...like...”

“I told you, Amelia misunderstood.”

He was lying because it was the only way he knew how to get rid of her. Once she was gone, they'd call the police. And then, finally, this whole nightmare would end.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

J
EM
CLEANED
UP
the glass as soon as Tressa's car pulled slowly away down the street.

He'd have to deal with her in the morning, like he'd promised. But for now, the storm was averted.

He'd managed to put out another fire.

And was damned tired of the life he'd been dealt.

“What are you doing?” Lacey had appeared at the end of the hall. He'd hoped that she'd stayed in the bedroom. Maybe even had jumped in the shower, where she wouldn't have heard a word of what had been said.

Her face looked calm. She had to at least have missed the part about Tressa suing her. So there
was
a God.

He'd had the thought before.

Maybe it would serve him well to remember it more often.

“Just cleaning up. Tressa reached for the door handle and put her hand through the glass.”

“She pounded the glass, Jem.” Her words were calm. No emotion, or accusation. Yet they stopped him cold.

“You don't know how Tressa gets when she's caught up in her drama. She's clumsy. Believe me, I've seen it before. She just missed the door handle.”

Lacey's mouth fell open. “You really believe that, don't you?”

“Of course I believe it! I know it. I've been living with this kind of thing all my life.”

“Right. First JoAnne and then Tressa.”

But not Lacey. Thank God again. If ever there was a time that a woman would be pushed into losing control, it would be now. And she was standing there watching him. Not screaming.

“You need to leave that as it is,” she said, coming closer and taking the broom and dustpan from him. “It's evidence.”

“Evidence? Of what?” Hadn't she heard a thing he'd said? This was Tressa at her worst. When she was upset, she was careless. “Don't you get it?” He looked at her. “She found out we're seeing each other, and now she's over it. I have to tell you, it went a lot better than I'd feared it might.”

Her jaw dropped again. “You thought this went well?”

“Are you kidding? She was out of here in five. I've had nights it took hours to talk her down. I have to tell you, those classes are really making a difference.”

He wanted to believe they were. And wanted her to believe it, too. He wanted her to quit looking at him like that.

To get over the past few minutes and get on to what really mattered. Her. Him. Together.

They'd just crossed a major hurdle to making their lives together official. Give Tressa a few months to get used to the idea, and maybe accept Amelia's proposal—he'd suspected for a long time now that they were lovers—and they'd be home free.

“You have to call the police, Jem,” Lacey said. “If not for yourself, for me. Because if you think she's going to leave this alone, you're wrong. If it was just you, then yes, I would believe it. Because she has you where she wants you and she has to give you your way where she can to keep you there. But me... I'm a threat to it all. She has to get rid of me. Period. Or have her whole world come tumbling down.”

“It's just talk, Lace. I swear. You need to trust me on this.”

“You've asked her repeatedly not to come to this house. Yet she continues to show up.”

“Only when she's beside herself upset...”

“And isn't it for just that reason that you don't want her here? So that you don't have to live under the constant threat of dealing with her drama?”

Into each life a little rain must fall.
He remembered the quotation from his childhood. His grandmother Lillie said it every time anything upset any of them.

He was tired. Needed to lie down. Hold Lacey and sleep it off. “Please, Lace. I took care of it. She's gone. Just let it go?”

“You led her to believe that there's nothing between us...”

He was sorry as hell she'd heard that. “She knows I didn't deny that there was. I'm just giving her time to adjust to the idea. It's the way things work with her.”

“You seriously aren't going to call the police?”

“Of course not. That would just set everything back. Way back.”

“You need to get a restraining order, Jem. You'd be granted one immediately just for what happened here tonight.”

“I'm telling you she didn't mean to break the window. And even if she did, she'd say she was going for the door handle, and how are you going to prove she wasn't?” He'd been through this so many times it was old hat to him. But he had to slow down and understand that it was all new to Lacey.

Tressa could be...alarming...at first.

“I'm not talking about the window. You've told her repeatedly to stay away from your house. She didn't. That's grounds for a restraining order.”

One thing he knew was how to be patient. “She wouldn't abide by it, Lacey. The best way to deal with Tressa is to handle her exactly as I'm doing. You'll see. She'll get used to the idea of me and you just like she got used to the idea of the divorce. And Levi living with me.”

“You went through this each time?”

Now she was getting it. He almost smiled. “Yes.”

“And you never even called the police?”

“Of course not.”

“Well, this is the last time, Jem. Or I'm out of your life.”

He wasn't sure he'd heard her right. Lacey? Threatening him? She hadn't even raised her voice.

“You are a victim of domestic abuse, Jem. I've been waiting for you to see that, just like you finally did with Levi, but you don't get it. The woman comes here, puts her fist through your door, screams loud enough for the entire neighborhood to hear, threatens to sue you and then to ruin my career—which she can do, you know, just by spouting her trash in the right places, or at least put doubt on my spotlessly clean record—and you plan to stand there and let her get away with it?”

“You don't understand...” The words just kept repeating themselves in his mind, overriding anything she might have to say. “You don't understand...”

“I'm not asking you to crucify her, Jem. I'm asking you to think of yourself. Of Levi. Of our future. You need to call the police. Even if you don't want to file a restraining order, at least there's evidence of what happened here tonight, of her threats, so that if she does try something, we've got protection.”

“But...”

“I need this, Jem,” she said. That look of hers...it sank into him. As deep as he went. “I need you to call the police. For me. That way if she does try to threaten my career, I'll have the means to protect myself.”

“She could go to jail...”

“If she does, it would only be for one night.”

And that one night would unleash a hurricane...

“You don't understand, Lacey.”

“I do understand, Jem. And I'm telling you. This isn't negotiable. I need you to call the police, or I have to end my association with you.”

“You're threatening me.” Tressa was a master at it.

“No, I'm telling you you've put me in a position where I have to make a choice. If you can't stand behind me, protect me, then I have to go.”

One thing he'd learned, well, at the hands of his sister and Tressa, was that the minute he gave in to a threat, he gave up himself. He pulled his keys out of his pocket.

“Take my truck. I'll be by for it in the morning.”

He expected her to pretend to go. Even to collect her purse and head out the door. When his truck started, he gave her marks for trying.

It wasn't until his truck had been gone for more than an hour that he realized the truth. She wasn't coming back.

* * *

L
ACEY
HAD
THREE
weeks of vacation coming to her. On Sunday, when she was already on her way to Beverly Hills, she made an emergency call to arrange to have the next week off. She'd had to get out of town and home to Kacey. Had to have some distance from the worst night of her life. To figure out where to find the rest of her life.

She knew she was running and admitted it fully. To herself. To Kacey.

Her sister, for once, didn't tell Lacey to look on the bright side. Her words “He actually chose to put her first over you?” still rang in Lacey's mind.

She wasn't overreacting, or feeling sorry for herself. Living in the past, or being paranoid. She was facing the truth.

Jem had put Tressa's needs over hers. And his own.

“I know why,” she told Kacey later that night as the sisters sat on Kacey's balcony with a bottle of wine on the table between them. “It's because I don't make waves. I get mad, but I get over it. And everyone who knows me knows that.”

Kacey's silence didn't hit her at first. Until it hung there, between them, for more than five minutes. She glanced over to see tears sliding slowly down her twin's face.

“What? Oh, my gosh, Kacey, are you in pain? What's going on?”

Shaking her head, Kacey looked over at her. “You're right.”

“What? That you're hurt?” Ready to call an ambulance, she knelt at Kacey's feet. She couldn't lose her. Kacey was her rock. Her foundation. Her...other self.

“Don't you dare kneel at my feet,” Kacey said, pulling Lacey up and directing her back to her chair. She knelt then, at Lacey's feet. “You're right that you're easy to disappoint, Lacey. To take advantage of. Because your mad is so...not ugly. You get quiet. That's it. And then you get over it and life goes on. That's why you got passed over and I got chosen, don't you see? Even with Mom and Dad. Because I made a stink. I made noise. I made it hard for people to pass me up.”

“So what are you saying? That I should make more of a stink?”

“No! I think you're perfect.” Kacey ran a hand along Lacey's cheek and Lacey turned her head, placing her lips in her sister's palm. “Don't ever change,” Kacey said. “The world needs more yous. More kindness. Understanding. More selflessness. And the rest of us...we need to protect you from our own selfishness.”

She was talking nonsense, of course. And yet...her words struck a chord. Hadn't she had a similar thought about Jem? About Tressa taking advantage of his goodness?

Tressa the noisemaker, the one who would create hell if she didn't get her way. While Lacey...she'd understand. Be steadfast in her kindness. Get quiet. And get over it.

Except that she hadn't.

She'd gotten out. For the first time in her life.

She walked out on the one person who truly loved her above all others. Forever. When he'd needed her most.

* * *

J
EM
DIDN
'
T
CALL
Tressa Sunday morning. He called Lacey. And when she didn't answer, he went by her house. His truck was out front right where he'd told her to leave it. He'd told her he'd bring a second set of keys when he came to pick it up.

He pretended that all was well. With Levi by his side, he mudded Lacey's birthday-gift room. She'd be back. She was as steadfast as the sun that set each night. And when she showed up, he'd be there.

He had a key to her home, just like she had a key to his.

He cooked dinner from the leftovers in her fridge and put his son into her bed. And sometime after midnight, he joined him there.

Tressa had left sixteen voice-mail messages and sent him eighty-two texts. He didn't respond to any of them.

On Monday morning, after dropping Levi at day care, but before going to work, he called Kacey. And almost dropped the phone in relief when she answered. She was still talking to him.

Boy, was she talking to him.

She told him, in no uncertain terms, that he didn't deserve her sister. And that Lacey had taken a week's vacation. He was told to leave her alone.

He knew, in Lacey's world, exactly what that meant. Leave her alone. Do not call her. Do not attempt to see her. Or to contact her in any way.

To do otherwise could mean a restraining order.

On Monday, Tressa left fourteen voice mails. And sent ninety texts. He spent Monday night in Lacey's bed again. Levi slept in Kacey's room.

On Tuesday, Jem dropped Levi off at preschool and went to see Sydney. They talked for a long time. When he left her office, he had a name: Brett Ackerman, the founder of a local shelter for abused women. A man who'd been a victim of domestic violence himself.

He and Levi had dinner with Brett and his wife, Ella, while their infant child slept in a bassinet nearby. In a few short hours his life changed forever.

He saw himself, a young self, in some of the childhood feelings Brett described. He heard Lacey in Ella's words.

He spent Tuesday night in Lacey's bed, with Levi right there beside him.

On Wednesday, right after he dropped Levi at day care—with a request to Mara, who'd always had a special affinity with Levi, to keep his son close to her that day—Jem called the police. He called victim witness—a public service that provided support for victims of domestic violence who needed to obtain restraining orders. And he went to court.

By Wednesday night, he had a restraining order against Tressa Bridges, with Levi as a named victim. He spent Wednesday night at home in his own bed.

He woke Sunday morning to banging on his front door. Gut instantly tight, he flew out of bed.

It took him a second to realize that it couldn't be his ex-wife. She'd had a visit from the police the day before, telling her she'd go to jail if she came within twenty-five feet of either Jem or Levi, their home or any of their property. The one thing Tressa feared, more than anything else, was going to jail.

Hoping to God it was Lacey, breaking out of her shell and that eager to see him—maybe having heard from Sydney that he'd finally seen the light and done the right thing—he raced down the hall in his cotton pajama bottoms.