WILLIAM SPENT THE next while trying not to think. In a rote manner, he went through his responsibilities with the teenagers, fixed a couple things around Victory Cottage. When he ran out of things to occupy himself, he contacted Mary and asked if she needed him to do anything else.
He’d expected her to put him to work fixing up things around her store. Instead, she suggested he start to do a few repairs on the Blue House. She also suggested that he ought to get Paul, Trey and Drew to help him.
He didn’t have it in him to call the other men, but he whistled to Xena. They trudged over to the Blue House together so William could look things over.
To his surprise, he found evidence of a squatter there. Not a messy, partying or drugged-up squatter, but someone who washed his dishes and folded his sleeping bag and, evidently, used the shower.
He was pondering all of it when Xena barked, and then Sunny walked through the door, Muffin following behind her. He was surprised, but genuinely glad to see her. He hadn’t talked to her since the boating disaster.
The two dogs greeted each other, tails wagging.
“I’m glad to see you’re okay,” he said, then looked at her closely. She had the swollen eyes of someone who’d spent a lot of time crying. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” She was clearly lying. Listlessly, she wandered over to the sleeping bag and duffel, knelt and started looking through it.
Xena walked over to her hesitantly and sniffed her shoe, then nudged her hand. Sunny rubbed the dog’s head, absently, and then Muffin pushed her way in, obviously looking for her share of attention.
“So...what are you doing here?” He walked around looking at the window frames. He was guessing the loose screen on one of them was how someone had broken in.
She didn’t look at him. “I know who this stuff belongs to,” she said. “I’m going to take it to him.”
He frowned, considering what she’d said. Why would Sunny know a squatter? “Is it a kid?”
“My age.”
“Is it the kid you were boating with?”
She nodded.
“Where is he now?”
She cleared her throat. “He’s at his parents’ place. I heard. I haven’t talked to him.”
It sounded like there was a story there. “Look, Sunny, I don’t want to get all into your business, but it sounds like someone’s in some trouble. You, or someone else.”
She lifted one shoulder. “I don’t know.” Then suddenly, she turned around and faced him and scooped Xena into her lap. “He says his parents are bad news, but they’re really rich. He lives all the way over on the other side of Pleasant Shores, and I’m sure he’s mad at me, if he even has time to think about me, because I outed him about where he was. Or at least, dragging him along on that trip outed him.”
“But his parents must have been searching for him. If he was missing, you’d think everyone in town would be looking for him. Look how they all came out to help when you were in trouble.”
“He told his parents he was staying with a friend, and they didn’t check into it.” She sank down onto the floor and urged Muffin to sit beside her. “They don’t care about him.”
William couldn’t believe that. “Any parent of a sixteen-year-old would confirm it with the other kid’s parents before letting him stay for, what, several weeks? Unless something is really wrong.”
“Then I think something’s really wrong. He comes to school and everything, or he did, but his parents don’t seem to be in the picture.”
“I wonder why they showed up when you guys had the boating issue?”
She shook her head. “Didn’t want everyone to know what bad parents they are? By the way,” she added, “thank you for what you did. You pretty much saved our lives.”
Funny she’d look at it that way. That was a kid’s perspective. “I just helped. Your mom did most of it.”
“That’s not what she said.” She studied him shrewdly. “How come you and her aren’t getting together as much anymore? And how come you’re hanging with your ex-wife?”
All that seemed like a lifetime ago. “To answer your last question first, my ex is troubled,” he said. “She was between men, so she came looking for me. She doesn’t feel right unless a man is taking care of her and fawning over her.”
“Yuck,” Sunny said.
“I agree. And I’m done doing it. So now she’s gone, but I think your mom misinterpreted what she saw.”
Sunny rolled her eyes. “Ya think? You were holding hands with her.”
“Trying to get rid of her.”
“Maybe tell Mom that.”
“I tried. She won’t listen. And anyway...” He shook his head. “I’m not what she, or what you guys, need. Better if I stay away.”
“I will never understand men.” Sunny started gathering up the boy’s things.
“So, you’re going to haul all that stuff across town on foot?”
She shrugged. “What choice do I have? I’m not supposed to even be here. I can only leave the house if I’m working.”
He frowned. “Did you tell your mom you were working?”
She wrinkled her nose and nodded. “Yeah. Said we were training the dogs.”
“Then that’s what we have to do.” He didn’t want to undermine Bisky’s discipline. “And then I’ll drive you home, and we can swing by your friend’s house on the way, see what’s what.”
“You’d do that for me?”
He shrugged. “Yeah. Besides, Xena needs the training. Look how she noticed when you were upset and came to comfort you. She’ll be a great therapy dog, but only with training.”
He had the feeling that Sunny needed to get involved in something positive, anyway. Maybe this would be that thing.
And God help him, if he could see Bisky, even from a distance, it would be worth it.
“NO, MUFFIN!” SUNNY clenched her fists, frustrated, then took a couple of deep breaths to calm down before kneeling in front of her dog to rub its head and comfort her.
Halfway into their training session, things weren’t going well. It didn’t help that Sunny felt totally distracted. She kept checking her phone to see if Caden had answered. She checked again now, for the tenth time. He hadn’t.
William had taken Xena off to the side of the yard and was commanding her to sit, then rewarding her each time she did. He looked up at Sunny and grinned. “I’m practically a dog whisperer now, huh?”
“Right.” She couldn’t help smiling, too. William was a pretty good guy. Didn’t think he knew everything like most men, and was willing to listen to a teenager. Of course, he’d been a dad.
Sunny tried to imagine how her mom would react if she herself died, and the whole thing was so awful that she pushed it out of her mind. Last night, although Mom had been mad at her, she’d mostly hugged on Sunny. She’d even cried a little, which Mom never did.
Sunny had always taken it for granted that she was the center of her mother’s universe. Now, she thought about the flip side to that kind of love: what if a parent lost a child?
What if a child lost a parent? What if Mom had gone overboard yesterday?
William strolled over, Xena at his side, and Sunny’s eyes widened. “She’s heeling!”
“Yeah. I watched that video you sent me, and I’ve been working with her. She can sit and heel pretty good.” He knelt and rubbed the dog’s sides.
“That’s really good. Let’s see if she can sit while Muffin walks by. And then we’ll trade places.”
The first time, Muffin got excited and lunged, and Xena cowered.
“Again, but farther apart,” Sunny said, and they put about eight feet between the dogs. The lunge and the cowering were both much reduced, and the third time they tried, it went perfectly.
“Now it’s just a matter of moving a little closer, slowly,” Sunny said. “We’ll see if we can make it work five times, a step or two closer, and then end on a success.”
“You’re pretty good at this, you know?” William said.
Sunny looked at him quickly to see if he meant it or was faking, but his expression looked sincere. They got the dogs to make successful passes in front of each other at six feet, the sitting dog holding position and the walking dog staying calm.
“We did it!” She high-fived him. “Let’s stop there.” She sank down onto the ground cross-legged and checked her phone. Nothing from Caden, and nothing from Venus or Kaitlyn, either. She bit her lip. She was happy about training dogs, for sure, but she really wanted her friends to like her again.
“What’s wrong, no answer?” William asked.
“Caden hasn’t answered, and that scares me. And my girlfriends are mad at me.”
“I’m a good listener,” he said, “or I used to be. What’s up with your girlfriends?”
She hesitated. He’d lost his daughter. Would talking to Sunny about her problems kick up old wounds?
On the other hand, he’d offered, and she had no one else to talk to. “Can you keep a secret?”
“Unless it puts you at risk, sure.”
“It doesn’t. That trip we took, me and Caden? I was trying to play detective, find out from my friend Venus’s mom what she knew about the abused dogs, since she’s like this graphic design artist, and she did pictures of dogs like ours.”
“Abused ones?” William’s head jerked around and he stared at her.
She shrugged. “I thought so, but now I’m not sure. Anyway, she and her boyfriend got upset that Venus let us see her art, because she’s gotten threatened for doing it. She doesn’t want anyone to know where she is, but Venus told us. And then I insulted her by asking about abused dogs. Anyway, she made Venus come and live with her on Teaberry Island, which is absolutely not where she wants to be. And if she gets harassed again, they’ll probably have to move somewhere else.”
William was sitting on the step now, drawing in the dirt with a stick. When she stopped talking, he looked up at her. “That’s not good,” he said, “but has Venus ever done anything that made her mom mad?”
“Like sneaked out at night without permission? Yeah.” Sunny smiled, remembering the time when they’d gone after some guys who were teasing Kaitlyn.
Kaitlyn. “Anyway, my friend Kaitlyn, she blames me for all of it. Says I’m too bossy—which I am—and that I took Caden on the boat and didn’t tell them about it because I have the hots for him.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Do you?”
She blew out an exasperated snort. “I don’t know. I like him, but I’m not the type to rush into the whole boyfriend thing. Anyway, he’s got too much on his plate to think about a girlfriend. Like his parents.” She frowned and checked her phone. “He hasn’t answered me yet. I’m worried he’s in trouble.”
“Then let’s go over there.” He stood and held out a hand to pull her up, and a moment later, they and both dogs were in his car, Xena in the back seat and Muffin in the front. They headed for Caden’s side of the peninsula.
Sunny’s heart pounded. She had Caden’s stuff in the trunk of William’s car, but should she get it out and take it to his door? Was there anything incriminating in it that his parents would find? Would he want his stuff, or would he want her to leave it alone?
When William, following her directions, pulled into the Shoreline Estates development of expensive new homes, he glanced over at her. “Pretty fancy,” he said.
“I know. I’ve never even been over here before.” She checked the address she’d found in an online school directory. “That one up there. With the pillars.”
He pulled up and stopped his car. “I can go up with you or not.”
“It’s okay.” How would she explain William? Caden would probably just be mad she’d gotten someone else involved. Now her stomach churned with all the things that could go wrong.
She grabbed his duffel from the trunk and walked up to the massive front porch, feeling like she was going to throw up. Really, she just wanted to run home and hide in her bed, hide behind her mom. She half turned, then straightened her spine and drew in a deep breath. You have to help him. You can do this. Fingers shaking, she rang the bell.
A woman who looked about Mom’s age, but with perfect, unlined skin, neat chin-length hair and tourist clothes came to the door. “Yes?”
“I... I’m here for Caden,” she said. “Are you his mom?”
“I am. But Caden can’t come out.” She glanced at the wide, polished-wood staircase behind her.
“Is he okay?”
She was opening her mouth, eyes concerned, when a voice came from behind her. “Who is it, Pauline?”
A moment later, Caden’s dad was there. He was a handsome man; even Sunny could see that, comparing him to the dads she knew. Hair in a stylish short cut, with only a little gray; athletic build, nothing like the paunchy fathers of some of her friends; a square jaw like a movie star.
And blue eyes that were as cold as ice.
He tilted his head to one side. “You’re the girl who was in the boat with Caden yesterday, correct?”
She nodded and swallowed. She wasn’t sure why this guy terrified her so much, but she could clearly see why Caden hadn’t wanted to live here with him.
Not only that, but she feared she might have made things worse for him by coming here. “I, um, I’ll come back later,” she said.
She kept glancing behind him at the staircase, hoping Caden would appear, but there was no sound from above. For all she knew, this cold dude had hacked up his son into a million pieces and thrown him into the bay. Or sent him to reform school.
What was for sure: he hadn’t questioned Caden’s lie that he was staying with a friend during all the weeks he’d been at the Blue House.
And she was suddenly sure she didn’t want to give Caden his stuff back. She wanted him to be able to escape and go back to his hideout ASAP.
She turned to leave, trying to conceal the duffel with her body.
“What’s that? Is that something of Caden’s?” Caden’s dad opened the screen door and stepped outside.
“Um, no, it’s nothing.” What if there was something incriminating in the duffel, pot or a diary or porn?
“I’ll take it,” he said, and took another step toward her.
She stepped back.
And felt a hand on her shoulder, the slightest squeeze.
“I’m William Gross, how are you?” He held out his hand to Caden’s dad and took the duffel from her. There was no threat in his voice, but Caden’s dad stepped back anyway. Compared to William, he looked small.
“We were hoping we could get Caden to join in a program for teenagers I’m running,” William said.
They were?
“We don’t need anything like that.” Caden’s dad’s mouth twisted into a slight sneer. “Truth to tell, he’s in trouble for the stunt he pulled yesterday.”
“It’s not for fun,” William said. “It’s making the kids work on local projects.”
Caden’s dad was opening his mouth, obviously about to say no.
“My mom put me in it as a punishment,” Sunny blurted out. Which wasn’t a complete lie; Mom had threatened her with that several times. “It’s gardening and helping babysit little kids and building retaining walls, stuff like that. It’s really hard.” She held her breath.
There was a sound behind Caden’s parents. Caden, creeping down the stairs. He was moving slowly, strangely. She glanced at William.
He’d noticed, too. “I have to report to the high school up the coast, as well as their school—” he gestured to Sunny and Caden “—every student I invite and the parents’ response. Part of the grant’s requirements. They’re going to interview some of the people whose parents say no, just to find out more about how to make the program effective.”
“It’s after school Tuesdays and Thursdays,” Sunny offered. “Caden’s coming to school tomorrow, right?”
Then they both stood looking at Caden’s parents.
“It might be a good punishment for him,” Caden’s mom said timidly.
Caden’s father’s eyes narrowed and he turned and looked at Caden. “You’re doing a work program with the dock kids,” he said.
Caden nodded. He looked past his parents to her, but his expression was unreadable.
A phone dinged, Caden’s father’s. He pulled it out and looked at it. “Figure out the details,” he ordered his wife, and stalked toward the back of the house.
Caden crept up the stairs again. And as William gave the time and place to Caden’s mom, Sunny slipped down to the car and put his things back in, hoping she hadn’t just made things even worse for her friend.