Choices, p.31
Choices, page 31
Chapter 22
Nick knocked on the door of Charlie’s apartment a second time. After a moment, a call of “Come in already!” could be heard through the door.
He went in and followed the sound of Charlie’s voice to the baby’s room. Charlie glanced up at him but didn’t pause in the babble of baby talk he was using as he snapped the front of Joshie’s outfit closed. “Ooo’s an itty-bitty boy?” Charlie bent his knees, scooped the infant against his chest, and straightened, holding him carefully. “Are we all clean and dry and comfy now?”
“Dunno about you two, but I am,” Nick offered.
“You ignore Uncle Nicko.” Charlie turned and came toward him with a kind of bounce and sway to his step. “He’s not as funny as he thinks, is he, kiddo?”
Joshie opened his pink lips and made a sound like a sputtering cat.
Charlie brushed a kiss over the fine downy hair. “I knew you’d agree with me.”
“That was yes?”
Charlie said in a singsong voice, “That was ‘I’ve eaten and burped and peed and changed and I might go down for a nap if the big people don’t get me excited’ in baby-speak.”
Nick muttered, “Wouldn’t want that.” He backed up out of the doorway and Charlie brushed past him, walking a circuit through the apartment with that same swaying gait. His voice had gone low and soft, a deep murmur of sounds. Joshie gave another little squeak and then was quiet.
Nick was aware of a pang in his chest, watching his friend with the baby. There was something new and… maybe tender was the word for how Charlie held the kid and talked to him. The smile on Charlie’s face was unfamiliar and soft. It wasn’t even Charlie’s kid. If anything, Nick should have more of a connection because he was pretty damned sure Brian was the biological dad and yet, even with Lori jealously guarding him, Joshie had somehow become Charlie’s kid in a way he wasn’t Nick’s or even Brian’s.
Not that Nick wanted a baby. Of course not. His and Brian’s lives were complicated enough without a kid. Brian still got that worrisome spaced-out look, all tangled up in his Finding, when he spent too much time around Joshie. But in the last week, not wanting a kid had gone from of course not to some kind of low-key wistfulness.
“Has Lori let you tell your mom yet?” he asked, careful to keep his voice low
“Nope,” Charlie said in the same husky murmur he was giving the kid. “She still wants it to be a casual ‘my roommate had a baby’ thing, in a month or two.”
Joshie slept now, small eyes scrunched shut, fat cheeks working slightly. The thump of a truck hitting a pothole on the road outside made Charlie and Nick both wince, but the baby didn’t wake. Like a little pale angel. I bet Brian looked like that. Gonna make damned sure this kid has it easier than Brian did. He might not want to be a daddy, but he’d do anything to keep the world from hurting this kid.
Maybe he should cut Charlie out of the risky stuff completely. “Hey, Chuckie, d’you want me to go deal with the sheriff on my own, seeing as how you’re on kid duty?”
“Lori will be back in ten minutes. She barely lets me touch him when she’s here. Anyway, I think Joshie’s down for the count. I’m going to put him to bed.”
Nick sat at the kitchen table, listening with half his attention to Charlie settling the baby. After a few minutes, Charlie reappeared and placed a baby monitor on the counter. “There. Settled.” He lowered himself into the chair across from Nick. “Have you decided how much to tell Gannet?”
“I’m going to call and feel her out.” Nick tapped Gannet’s personal number and set the phone to speaker. The other end rang, long enough he thought he was going to voice mail, but at the last minute, the sheriff’s voice said, “Yeah? Rugo?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“What do you need? Make it fast. I’m busy.”
“I have some new information on the vandalism case.”
“I’ll pass you on to the officer in charge.”
“No, wait!” Nick said urgently. “You need to hear it yourself.”
“I know you’re caught up in this, but honestly, Rugo, I have higher priorities.”
“Higher than someone in your department being involved?”
Her voice went from distracted to icy. “No games. Who? Do you have hard evidence that will stand up in court? And I don’t mean drunken hints from Sam.”
Nick hesitated. For all he knew, McNaught might be standing next to her, listening. “Are you alone?”
“For the next twelve seconds, yeah.”
Not long enough to accuse her second-in-command, but maybe to lay the groundwork. “It’s not black-and-white proof but we recorded—”
“Stop. Do not implicate yourself in a crime. Was this a legal recording?”
“Yes.” Charlie’s part that we’ll give you.
“And it implicates a deputy?”
“The recording doesn’t, but we followed Sam there.”
“Dammit!” She hesitated. “Do you have any idea what this department went through to get clean? One deputy with a felony conviction, three pleading guilty to misdemeanors, seven gone, complete reorganization of Criminal Investigations. I even brought the state guys in on it, and that’s something no one ever wants to do. I’m still down five bodies because of how deep and slow I run my hiring checks. And you’re saying I still have a dirty cop?”
Nick swallowed. “I believe so.”
“Believe? Who?”
“Strong indications, no proof yet.” He dodged the second part of the question.
“Damn it, I have to go. Would you talk to Chief Deputy McNaught? I trust him completely.”
Nick flinched. “Not yet. No.” Clearly not the time to tell her he’s the problem.
“You know what? Bring me what you’ve got later. You’re not a cop. Time for you to back off and let us handle it.”
“I still have some other leads.”
“I don’t have time for this. Be smart. Sit tight and don’t break any laws. Don’t get anyone hurt. Don’t play Lone Ranger. We’ll talk again.” The line went silent before Nick could respond.
“Huh.” He stared at the phone for a moment, then pocketed it.
“What now?” Charlie asked. “We’ve got Sam, Reggie, McNaught, and that ex-deputy who dropped Sam off the other night, Noah.”
“And Reggie’s cousin Roy, yeah.”
“So minimum five, max unknown. With McNaught at the top.” Charlie shifted stiffly in the chair. “Are you sure you want to dig deeper on our own?”
“Yes!” Nick stared at him. “Isn’t arson enough reason for you?” Arson turned his stomach. The worst had been his rookie year. The smell, like a twisted barbecue, smoke and cooked meat and melted plastic sharpness. He didn’t want to smell that again. “And they’re shaking down Yasmin.”
“We’ve no authority. No resources. And I got the feeling your better half wasn’t happy one bit.”
The crack about Brian stung. “Well, you may want to step back, since we’re not real cops—” He bit off the comment at Charlie’s wince. He forced himself to look at Charlie’s crooked position, left elbow pressed to his ribs. Yeah, that was low. “Sorry. Anyhow, I’m definitely going to apply for one of those open slots Gannet says she has.” As soon as he could meet the requirements. He was going to be a cop again, to protect and serve. Someone good enough for Brian, not an unemployed handyman. He had a plan. “The last thing I want is to work under a dirty second-in-command.”
“And you need something to look sharp to her, after screwing up in Minneapolis.”
“No!” It was Nick’s turn to wince, but he probably deserved that, and there was more than a grain of truth to it. “Well, yeah, maybe. I want to be the one who breaks this open.” The rot extending into Gannet’s own department made that more urgent, if more… risky. “You don’t have to help.”
“Fuck off. Of course I’ll help. Can’t let you get into more trouble all by yourself.”
A sudden thin wail sounded in stereo, from the baby monitor and the bedroom down the hall. Charlie set a hand on the table to push to his feet, a flicker of discomfort passing over his face. Nick stood up quickly. “What does he need?”
Charlie raised an eyebrow, clearly debating whether to call Nick on the pity offer, but subsided in his chair as the baby’s pitch rose. “Sounds like he’s wide awake. You could go pick him up out of the crib for me.” He managed a twisted grin. “See if his diaper needs changing again.”
“Right.” Nick had lived in plenty of foster homes with babies. He wasn’t afraid of a dirty diaper.
The baby’s room was dim with the thin curtains drawn, but not dark. Nick bent over the crib where Joshie was now yelling his little lungs out, his face scrunched and red. Lifting carefully— he could hear Doc and Damon in stereo saying “support his head and neck” —he raised the wriggling infant and cradled him against his shoulder. Amazing, the volume that could come from something that weighed less than a cat.
“Shh. Hushhh.” He found himself swaying in an unconscious baby-holding rhythm. Joshie hiccupped, sniffled, and burped loudly. A wet trickle of milky spit-up hit Nick’s neck. Crap. But the baby went soft and relaxed and made a squeaky-cat noise that was way too cute.
“Yeah. Was that ‘I’m sorry, Uncle Nick’?” He cupped the downy back of Joshie’s head with his hand. “Apology accepted. Is that burp all you needed? Any yucky diaper bits?” He eased the baby down onto the changing table and took a quick feel and sniff. Yep, that was obvious. Ewww.
Keeping a hand on that impossibly tiny chest, he grabbed a baby wipe to scrub at his own neck. Josh stared up at him, blue eyes hazy and unfocused in the dim light. When the crying flush receded, his little face was pale as Brian’s milky skin. Nick ditched the wipe and brushed the baby’s damp cheek with his thumb, marveling at the satin softness.
“Shall we get you cleaned up, huh?”
Charlie called from the kitchen, “Do you need help?”
“Nah, I got this.” Diapers had to be in easy reach, right? He opened the cabinet underneath and bent to reach in, while keeping the baby in place. Diapers, yeah, and a cardboard box that fell out on his foot. Cheerios. Huh? Surely the kid was too young for those? He managed an awkward squat to pick up the box one-handed and stuff it back in.
Changing a baby came back to him, especially once he remembered that the padded table had a seatbelt. Good idea. Two hands helped. He even remembered to hold the used diaper over the little naked pee-pee so he didn’t end up with baby piss in his hair. Hah, foiled again, little monster.
A few minutes later, Joshie was clean, dry, and snapped back into that ridiculous cow-print outfit. Nick wiped his hands, unlatched the seatbelt and patted Josh’s chubby baby belly. Little fists waved aimlessly, then the baby stuffed one in his mouth and sucked with wet slurping sounds.
“Are you hungry? Should we go ask your daddy?” Nick scooped him up and carried him to the kitchen. “Hey, man, your kid’s trying to eat his fist. Don’t you feed him?”
Charlie looked up at them. “He just ate. Shouldn’t need more. Anyway, starving ’em keeps them lean and mean.”
Nick snorted. “Hey, what’s with the Cheerios in the changing table? They’ll be stale before he’s old enough for them. Even I know that.”
There was something sad in Charlie’s expression. “Those are Lori’s.”
“Oh. I guess. A snack to eat out of the box?”
“No, she, um, hoards food. Around the apartment. Does Brian do that too?”
“No.” Nick frowned. “I don’t think. Like what?”
“Boxes of cereal in cupboards. Cans of SpaghettiOs tucked away in the sock drawer. Crackers on the closet shelf.”
“Ah.” That rang a distant bell. “I roomed with a kid once.” What had his name been? Daniel? No, Darryl. “His mom was an addict. When she was broke or got the munchies, she’d eat up whatever was in the house and he’d have nothing. He hoarded food too, leftovers. They’d stink real bad after a few days.” Darryl had been a skinny, nervous kid, always looking like he expected to get smacked. Nick had stepped between him and the house mom a couple of times, claiming the mess was his. He’d forgotten that, hadn’t been in that house long. He hoped Darryl had done all right, after.
“Gross. I’m glad Lori sticks with closed containers.”
“You’d think years with Marston, eating steak off bone china, would’ve made her quit worrying.”
“Mm. I think all three of the Kerrs came out of that childhood more than a bit screwed up.”
“Brian’s not screwed up!” Nick paused, lowered his voice and backtracked. “Well, not anymore. Much.” Joshie gave a little cry and then whimpered around the fingers he’d stuffed back in his mouth. Nick rocked him. “Hush, baby.”
“Hand him here,” Charlie said, but the sound of the door opening made them both turn.
Lori came inside, a paper shopping bag in each hand. “I need to find somewhere cheaper for meat.”
Whether from hearing her voice or because Nick had stopped imitating a bouncy ride, Josh let out piercing cat-on-steroids cry. Lori set the grocery bags down on the floor and hurried over. “Here. Let me take him.”
“Gloves,” Charlie said as she reached out.
“Fuck.” She dug in her jacket pockets, pulled out a pair of fabric gloves and tugged them on. “Right.” She took the baby from Nick, with a quick glance at Charlie. “And don’t you say anything about my language.”
Nick handed Josh over, feeling a funny pang of loss as the baby’s small weight was lifted out of his arms, although the sudden end to the crying was a relief.
“Who me?” Charlie asked, as Lori rocked Joshie against her. “I think every boy should learn to swear from his mother.”
“Jerk.” But there wasn’t any real hostility in Lori’s voice and Charlie looked amused.
Nick had planned to ask how Lori was doing with her can’t-touch-the-baby thing, but the gloves were a pretty obvious sign. So was the way she tugged her collar up against her neck before shifting Josh higher on her shoulder. Crap.
He’d really hoped that Lori’s problems with the baby’s weird psychic field were wearing off, because then Brian’s might too. Brian said he was fine with being a distant, occasional uncle, but Nick had seen a wave of wistful sadness pass over Brian’s face when he talked about Joshie. Damn Marston to hell anyway. Hopefully the bastard was roasting over eternal flames.
He turned back to Charlie. “I’ll get out of your hair. Got some planning to do.”
“Wait.” Charlie got up slowly. “Let me get the groceries put away and I’ll come help you plot. God knows what you’d decide on without me.”
Nick laughed, at once warmed and a bit irritated. “I managed to do my job without you before.”
“And look how that turned out.” But Charlie’s tone held a touch of appeal in it. “C’mon. Share the fun.”
Nick sighed. He’d be glad of Charlie’s input, even if he wasn’t going to say so. He went and lifted both grocery bags to the counter so Charlie wouldn’t have to bend over. “Sure. Show me where the food goes.”
****
Brian rubbed his eyes and tried to focus on the row of word cards on the table in front of him. They were printed in a new font that was darker at the bottom than the top, and it did seem to help him keep the letters upright, but he still had to fight for every word. “Ti-ger.” He flipped the next card. “Is.” Easy word, next card. “Strip— ped— peed. Crap. Striped.” Obvious from context, which he’d almost forgotten in battling the letters. He looked up at Wendy, the teacher Dr. Murphy had located for him, his face hot.
“Good job.” She smiled and repeated, “‘The dog is spotted, but the tiger is striped.’ That’s a long sentence and you read it all.”
“Yeah. So slowly that I forgot the beginning by the time I came to the end.”
She clicked the mouse on her computer, and a recording of his voice came on, reciting that same sentence. That was him, actually reading clearly, aloud, doing well, until the garble at the end. Despite his frustration, he felt a flush of pride.
“Sounds good to me.” She stacked the cards in a pile. “Does the font help?”
“I think so. Yeah.” He hadn’t mixed up an M for a W yet today. “The letters stay put better.”
“So that’s a win. It’s called OpenDyslexic and you can put it on your computer to write with and convert documents into. If you want to bring a laptop next time, I can install it for you.”
“Mm. Thank you.” He rubbed his eyes.
“Headache?”
“No. I’m okay.”
“Some of the people I work with have major problems with headaches, even migraines, from reading. If you hurt, it’s a good time to stop and do something different. Don’t try to fight through the pain.”
“I’m okay. It’s just embarrassing.”
“Brian.” Wendy put a gentle hand on his arm. “Lots of people have dyslexia— more than you’d think. Yeah, yours is pretty significant, and you didn’t get help early on when you needed it, but none of that’s your fault.”
Brian nodded. Right. He knew that.
“Some of the things we tried today were useful, like the font. Some weren’t. I don’t think you’re going to benefit from colored lenses, for example.”
“But some people do?” He’d enjoyed the bit where she put up words in different colors and backgrounds, for the prettiness of it, but it hadn’t turned him into a genius.
“Sure. There’s a lot of kinds of dyslexia.”
“And if you know enough about mine, you might fix it.”
She shook her head. “Come on, Brian. You’re a smart guy. You know it’s not something we’ll fix.”
You’re a smart guy. He shouldn’t get pleasure out of hearing that, but it was such a relief now, to be Brian and not Bry and not feel like he had to squash down in that confining box. “What comes next?”
“I’ll go through your evaluation results. Then I’ll work out a personalized plan for you.”
