Chapter Eleven

 

After the lawyer dropped him home, Micah slowly walked into his house feeling angry and bewildered. If he saw Deidra right now he would squeeze her skinny little neck until she couldn't speak. Then they would definitely have a real reason for locking him up.

He considered calling her in his agitation but he thought better of it. His lawyer had warned him, in the car on his way home, that any conversation between him and Deidra will have to be monitored and that he shouldn't call or contact her. The lawyer had hatched a plan to get her to confess and then force her to drop the charges, which of course could get her charged with falsifying a criminal report. Of course, her father would get her off that one, Micah thought resentfully.

Micah gritted his teeth. If he didn't have a lawyer, what would have happened to him? If he weren't Dr. Bancroft's son, he wouldn't be out of jail now, walking free. He was sure of that.

For the first time in a long time, he appreciated his father's position. From his youth he had been scoffing at his father's drive to excel and his constant absences from home, but now he was extremely grateful.

So grateful that when he heard a vehicle drive up near his door and he saw that it was his father's red Pajero he found himself glad to see him, and when he looked and saw his mother's concerned face in the front seat he opened the door quickly.

"Oh my baby." Celeste advanced toward him hurriedly. "Why did that evil girl accuse you of rape?"

Bancroft was leaning on the car; looking at him with a stormy expression on his face.

He looked over his mother's head at his father's frown and grimaced.

"I thought we had a deal," Bancroft said frankly, "you would pretend to go through with the marriage and then let her down gently after."

Celeste looked around at her husband fiercely. "What kind of subterfuge is that? I have been saying this for a long time. If Micah doesn't want to marry this girl he doesn't have to and he should not be forced to."

She hugged Micah again, and Micah hung on to his Mom. He was a foot taller than her but he loved his pocket-sized mother who wasn't afraid to stand up for him, despite his father's forceful personality.

Bancroft growled. "What did you do this time to tick off Deidra Durkheim?"

"I refused to have sex with her," Micah said drawing from his mother's clingy embrace and standing with his legs braced apart.

His father was actually angry with him!

"So why didn't you?" Bancroft asked. "You should have given the girl what she wanted."

"Ryan Bancroft!" Celeste exclaimed. "Are you implying that my son should have had sex with a girl just to save your presidency aspirations? That's wrong and ungodly. What's happening to you these days?"

Micah grinned. His father had visibly quailed when his wife chastised him.

"My presidency is at stake Celeste," Bancroft said feelingly. "In case you haven't realized it? There are three weeks left before the board confirms me as president, and so far, my school is getting out of hand. I have two rapes to deal with and now my own son is a suspect in a third. Now tell me, who would want to hire someone to run a school when his own child is a criminal?"

"I am not a criminal," Micah said stormily. "Well not yet. When I go back to work tomorrow somebody better keep Deidra Durkheim far away from me."

Bancroft sighed, his eyes dull with fatigue. "The assistant superintendent assures me that the rape cases on our campus are being worked on. The campus security chief has boosted security, but I tell you, never in all the years that I've been at Mount Faith have I had to handle so many major problems at once."

"Maybe you shouldn't be handling them," Celeste said, leaning onto a verandah post. "Maybe you should be doing something else."

"Don't be ridiculous Celeste!" Bancroft snapped. "I am exactly where I am because of a reason. God is working out my life according to his plan."

Celeste raised her eyebrows disbelievingly. "Your ambition has cost this family," Celeste said painfully. "Our children are all troubled in some way or the other. You were hardly around in their childhood years, Ryan. I had to be the one holding down the fort alone with five children."

"And when he was around, he was awful," Micah said, smugly intruding on his parent's familiar argument.

"Well four of them didn't turn out so bad," Bancroft said, squirming under Celeste's stare. "Adrian is finishing up his Masters in Anthropology and the government is giving him a grant to head up their research study on prostitution to help them decide if they should decriminalize it. That's a significant milestone."

Celeste looked heaven ward.

Micah grinned. "The good son is coming back to Jamaica? I wonder what happened to Cathy. You remember Cathy, Dad? The girl you said was too poor and classless for him when he was here five years ago?"

"Stop this Micah," Celeste said tiredly.

Bancroft was gritting his teeth and was visibly irritated.

"But Dad paid her off to leave Adrian alone," Micah said. "I think it nearly broke his heart. The poor thing went away to Harvard so fast after his first year at Mount Faith. I think he was crying in the airport when he found out what you'd done," Micah mocked Bancroft. "You screwed up his life."

"I did what was best," Bancroft said conclusively. "He was too young to be harboring those intense feelings for that girl."

Micah chuckled humorlessly. "And let's not forget that Kylie is so afraid of her shadow, and socially challenged, that even at twenty-one years old, she is constantly holed up in her room tinkering with computers because you basically kept her as a prisoner at home when she was younger. And Marcus is so relieved to be out from under your thumb that he only comes home on Easter holiday weekends…your precious famous son is avoiding you like the plague. This family is whack and it's your fault. Well, your only saving grace now is Jessica, the only child that can stand you. You should make sure that you preserve that relationship."

Celeste sighed. "Micah that's enough."

Bancroft was simmering silently. He knew that his family was imperfect. He had five children, six, if you count Taj, the son from his youthful mistake. They reminded him everyday that there were some things that you could fail at. Raising a family was one of them.

He looked at Micah. Some days he wished that his eldest son with his wife was born with a manual.

He snapped out of his reverie when Taj drove up to the yard and parked beside their car.

"Oh, you have company," Taj said, coming out of the car. "I was concerned about you when you left the station Micah. You looked really depressed."

"Celeste, Doctor Bancroft." He nodded at Bancroft and his wife. He always felt a little strange when he was around the two of them.

Bancroft nodded at him. "How is the psych center coming on?"

"Fine," Taj replied awkwardly. He had problems addressing Bancroft since he found out that he was his father.

Celeste he was easier with. She seemed to accept him without question and she came over to him giving him a light hug.

"You look a bit bigger. You have been eating well."

Taj smiled at her. She was an earth-mother kind of person—her face was beautiful and kind—one of those people you instantly liked.

"Well Anne has been feeding me dinner every evening this week."

Celeste smiled. "It's good that you are getting to know her better. She is probably making up for lost time."

Taj shrugged. "I am taking in this whole thing one day at a time."

Celeste patted his hand. "That's the best way to do it." She turned to Micah. "Honey, we are leaving now. I will call you later."

Micah nodded.

Bancroft looked at him and then shook his head and got into the car. "I am having a meeting with the police and the security chief tomorrow morning at ten," he said to Taj. "I think you should sit in. Your expertise might prove to be valuable."

"Okay," Taj said. He watched as they drove off and then turned to Micah. "You people looked tense."

"That's the Bancroft family for you," Micah said sitting down on his step sprawling out his legs. "Always has some undercurrents and tension. Why do you think I live up here? Living with my parents had been a constant electrical charge, if I'd continued it would've fried my brain."

Taj laughed and then he sobered up. "What are you going to do about Deidra?"

"Kill her!" Micah deadpanned.

"You are not a killer or a rapist."

Micah looked at him gratefully. "I really appreciate your belief in my innocence."

Taj shrugged. "I have a certain instinct for these things. Besides, I summed up the situation with the both of you the first time we met."

Micah nodded. "Thanks man. My lawyer said that we should record her admitting that I didn't rape her, and basically threaten her with the tape. Apparently, I have to do it early because her father is heading up here tomorrow some time."

Taj looked at him questioningly. "I am curious, why did you resist Deidra?"

Micah closed his eyes. "She's immature and doesn't know what she really wants. If I took advantage of that, it would go against every principle I hold dear. I have sisters, man… I think about that. I have a philosophy that it's better not to start something than to start it and can't quit. I wish I had applied that theory to so many things in my life.

Taj nodded contemplatively. They sat on the steps together after that, silently staring at the scenery.