Woodrose Mountain (28 page)

“I don’t…” she began, then stopped, fumbling for words.

“You
have
to.” Laura was at once pleading and arrogant. “He’s seventeen years old. He’ll be eighteen in six months. Since he pleaded guilty in adult court, they could send him to an adult prison. He won’t survive it! If you speak on his behalf, perhaps the judge will consider leniency.”

Leniency. Was that really what was called for here? Layla Parker was dead and, despite all the progress Taryn had made, Evie had no doubt that the girl would be impacted in some ways by the accident for the remainder of her life.

“I’m not sure that’s likely, Laura,” she said, trying to be as gentle as possible. “What Charlie did was very wrong. Don’t you think he deserves punishment?”

Laura’s hands trembled a little and Evie was startled by the strain in her eyes. “My son has made terrible mistakes, yes. But he’s trying. You see that, right? He’s helping you with that girl, isn’t he?”

That girl,
as if Taryn were simply a nameless inconvenience. What did that make Layla? she wondered. “Yes. Charlie has been very patient with Taryn and she seems to enjoy having him come. I would have to say his visits have been helpful.”

“I wasn’t happy when he started to visit her. I didn’t think it was good for him, being involved with her again. On some level, I still believe I was right. If he hadn’t had that firsthand exposure to her, he would never have pleaded guilty to the charges against him, especially over the objections of his father and his attorneys.”

Evie tended to agree with her. She hadn’t brought it up with Brodie that night at her apartment, but she was certain Charlie’s time with Taryn had given him a true understanding of the extent of her injuries and the long rehabilitation road she still faced. Evie remembered what she’d said to him that night when he had stood on the other side of the garden gate to ask if he could visit Taryn again.

You won’t be able to hide from it, Charlie. You will know that every frustration, every single exercise she has to do, every painful muscle spasm I have to put her through, is because of you.

“I do have to say, though,” Laura went on, “that Charlie has been…different these last few weeks. I can’t explain it. He’s not as restless, not as high-strung.”

She thought of his desperation on Woodrose Mountain that early morning and her vague, unsettled fear that he had intended to harm himself that day. “Sometimes a person simply needs a purpose. Maybe helping Taryn provided that for him and showed him that reaching outside himself to help someone else can give a peace you simply can’t find anywhere else.”

The words seem to clog in her throat as the truth smacked into her like that weight Taryn had thrown.

She was the world’s biggest hypocrite. She had retreated deep into herself, had fought ever helping anyone. She had subconsciously decided protecting herself was more important than risking pain by choosing to let others close to her.

Oh, she might have done superficial things like help paint an older lady’s fence during the Giving Hope day Claire had organized earlier in the summer, or sitting at art fairs all summer to raise money for the scholarship fund in Layla’s name, but she had been very careful to keep that part of herself separate.

For the last two years since Cassie died, she had turned away from the very thing she had always known was the answer to that elusive serenity—losing herself in helping other people.

She
had needed a purpose, too. Oh, she loved working with beads and always would, creating something lovely out of disparate elements. But did that really compare to actually helping someone live a more fulfilling life?

Across from her, Laura fidgeted with the pliers on the table, opening and closing them at random intervals as if she were snapping at ghosts. “For the last year he’s nearly flunked out of school, but now he’s talking about paying his debt to society and finishing his last year of high school and then trying to go to college. He wants to go into medicine now. He told me that. He wants to be a doctor or a physical therapist like you.”

She wasn’t a physical therapist anymore, Evie wanted to automatically correct, but those words tasted like chalk, too. No, she might not be a practicing physical therapist but she couldn’t run away from what was in her heart. Working with Taryn had only reinforced how much she loved it.

“So will you do it?” Laura asked.

She had no idea how to answer. She couldn’t betray Brodie—and she knew that if she spoke to urge leniency, he would see it as nothing else but disloyalty. On the other hand, she wasn’t sure a harsh punishment was the best option for the boy.

Finally she sighed. “Laura, the only thing I will do is speak to the judge about Charlie coming to work with Taryn and explain what he did while he was there. I will not take any position either way as to whether that should affect his sentencing. I can’t argue for leniency, only provide information. I want you to be perfectly clear on that.”

The other woman’s mouth compressed into a line as if holding back her arguments. “I suppose that will have to be enough, won’t it? I’ll inform our attorneys. We will need you to attend the hearing on Friday afternoon at one. I’ll have your name added to the list,” she said, just as if she were extending some elite invitation to a swanky society event.

What had she just agreed to do? Evie fretted as she let Laura out of the store and set the security system behind her. So much for her calm, relaxing, productive evening. Now she was going to worry all night about how she could convince Brodie that speaking out about the help Charlie had given Taryn—help Brodie hadn’t sought or wanted in the first place—wasn’t a complete betrayal.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

H
E
OUGHT
TO
BE
SHOT
for ever thinking this idea had any semblance of sanity attached to it.

His stomach muscles were taut with tension as Brodie pushed Taryn’s wheelchair out of the elevator to the courthouse floor where Charlie Beaumont’s hearing was set. He wanted nothing so much as to turn right around and go back downstairs, out the door and up the hill to their house, away from what he very much worried would be a complete disaster.

The wooden floors of the old courthouse that had once played host to horse rustlers and claim jumpers seemed to echo with each step he took toward the courtroom and his head pounded in unison.

In contrast to his own apprehension, Taryn was calm and composed. She rode with her hands folded neatly in her lap and looked around with interest at the high ceilings and the old-fashioned moldings around the doorframes.

He wasn’t being biased about it when he thought she looked lovely. Her hair, growing out now from where they’d had to shave it during her numerous operations, was pulled back from her face with a beaded headband his mother had fashioned. Her features looked delicate and pretty and she had even applied her own makeup, with the help of Stephanie Kramer.

If not for the ever-present wheelchair, she would look like the high school cheerleader she had once been.

Pride for her and the young woman she was becoming burned in his chest. She had more courage and grace than most women twice her age. That didn’t mean he thought she was at all ready for the coming ordeal.

“You don’t have to do this, kid.”

“I want to.” Her voice was clear and firm, with no trace of hesitation.

He still wanted to tuck her away, take her somewhere safe. How could any responsible father allow her to go through this? He stopped outside the door, fiercely wishing he could put his foot down and forbid this. She was still a minor. As her parent, he was well within his legal rights to put a stop to something he couldn’t support.

But Evie was right. Taryn had earned the right to make her own choice about this. She had traveled a long, hard road these last nearly five months and had miles yet to go. If she really wanted it—and she had made it abundantly clear the last week that she did—he couldn’t deny her.

That didn’t mean he had to like it.

With a heavy sigh, Brodie pushed her through the open doorway. Immediately the buzz of conversation inside the room from onlookers waiting for the judge to appear seemed to cut off in midflow. Yeah. Taryn’s appearance, wheelchair and all, created just the stir he’d expected.

The courtroom was packed. Since the district attorney’s office had chosen to file charges in adult court because of the severity of the incident, the hearing was open and plenty of people in town seemed to feel they had a vested interest in the outcome. Many did. Several of the business owners who had been robbed in the initial crime spree had shown up. Maura McKnight-Parker and several members of her family were seated in one entire row.

Much to his surprise, he suddenly spotted Evie seated near the aisle on one of the benches near the back. She gave him a tentative smile and slid over to make room for him.

Since he knew she wasn’t the voyeuristic type, as he imagined many of the onlookers to be, he assumed she must be here to provide moral support for Taryn. Just seeing her—lovely and cool and surprisingly constrained in a navy blazer and plain white-silk blouse, seemed to calm him.

He didn’t understand it but he was deeply grateful anyway. He needed a little calm if he was going to make it through this without dragging Taryn back through the doors.

After he parked the wheelchair in the wide aisle, he sat down in the space she had cleared for him. The scent of her, sweet and clean and indefinably Evie, stirred softly in the air and he was fiercely happy to see her.

He knew it made no sense. The tenderness of those kisses the other night seemed a lifetime ago, though he had relived those moments over and over. He had wanted to call her a dozen times while he was in California meeting with suppliers, just to hear her calm voice of reason. He’d even dialed the number a couple of times but had ended the calls before they could go through, hating that he felt like a stupid, unsure teenager around her.

She had made it clear she didn’t want to take the risk of being involved with him and he needed to respect that, as difficult as he found it. “Thank you for coming,” he said, when the silence between them had stretched out far too long.

She shifted and looked down at her hands. “Don’t thank me yet, Brodie.”

“Why not?”

Before she could answer, the generalized buzz in the courtroom cut off again as Laura and William Beaumont entered the courtroom, along with their son and the team of attorneys Brodie had seen at every court appearance.

The Beaumonts looked like a unit, solid and unbreakable. Charlie, far from being happy to see Taryn, frowned fiercely in their direction.

Brodie did his best to analyze that reaction as the Beaumonts moved toward the front of the courtroom. Mrs. Beaumont stopped when she reached their aisle. She looked aristocratically bored by the whole proceeding, though Brodie thought he saw a shadow of nerves in her eyes.

“I wasn’t sure you would come,” she said. He thought for a moment she was talking to him, then realized her comments were directed toward Evie.

“I said I would,” Evie answered rather stiffly.

“Thank you,” Laura murmured, then moved up to sit beside her husband and son.

He frowned. “Why is she thanking you?” he asked. “Why are you here?”

She met his gaze, her fingers curled in her lap. “I’ve been asked to make a statement about Charlie.”

For a moment he could only stare, a mix of hurt and anger and a deep sense of betrayal settling in his gut. She wasn’t here to support him and Taryn. She was here to speak for Charlie
freaking
Beaumont. That warm calm that had washed over him at the sight of her was now lost in the sucking whirlpool of his anger. “And you agreed?”

She seemed to be steeling herself for his fury, as if she had fully expected it. Of course she must have. Yet she was going to do it anyway and that hurt more than anything else.

“Yes,” she said simply.

“You and your damn bleeding heart. It’s bad enough you’ve convinced me to let Taryn speak today. Now you’re going to get up there and talk about how he’s just some poor, misunderstood kid with a heart of gold who’s filled with remorse and has suffered enough. That little punk you think is some kind of damn angel took my daughter’s future.”

“Wrong. She still has a future,” Evie said quietly. “A very bright one, in part because that
little punk
helped her believe in it again.”

He wanted to yell and curse and generally vent this hot, jumbled mess of emotions in him, but before he could, the bailiff stepped to the front of the courtroom.

“All rise for the Honorable Judge Kawa.”

Everyone in the courtroom except Taryn stood up and then Ivy Kawa walked in, slight of stature but tougher than any Wild West judge who had ever sat on that bench.

He knew her socially, of course. At heart, Hope’s Crossing was really a small town, despite the sometimes overwhelming tourist numbers. Theirs was only a casual relationship, though. If he remembered correctly, her husband golfed with William Beaumont. He doubted Judge Kawa would let that sway her opinion on Charlie’s sentencing either way.

The judge’s instructions to the courtroom were terse as she explained that the purpose of the hearing was to ascertain proper placement for Charlie after his guilty plea of the week before. “No dramatics and no hysterics. This is a legal proceeding.”

Taryn fidgeted a little in her wheelchair. “If you change your mind just say the word, honey,” he said in a low voice. “We don’t have to be here.”

“I won’t.”

“I’m just saying, if you do.” Though he didn’t look at her, he was aware of Evie seated beside him, tense and silent and the hot ache of betrayal in his gut.

* * *

S
HE
BADLY
WANTED
TO
touch him—a hand on his arm or even a shoulder nudge. Anything.

He wouldn’t appreciate it, she knew. With the anger she could still feel radiating from him, she didn’t want to think how he might respond if she tried, so she kept her hands carefully folded on her lap while she listened to several business owners read their impact statements about the crime spree Charlie had been involved with the night before the accident.

Mike Payson from Mike’s Bikes talked about the loss of business he had sustained and the generalized feeling of invasion.

Claire spoke about the accident and the strain of her injuries and how Macy and Owen still tensed every time they had to drive up Silver Strike Canyon for any reason.

Through it all, Evie wondered how she could possibly withdraw her name from those speaking and sneak away. She was still trying to come up with a way when, after about forty minutes of testimony, the bailiff called out her name.

Nerves fluttered inside her as she rose to take her place behind the podium set up at the front of the courtroom. At least she wouldn’t have to sit in the witness box for this.

“Please state your full name and occupation for the record,” Judge Kawa instructed.

Evie drew a deep breath. “My name is Evaline Marie Blanchard. I am a…” She paused here for only an instant. “I am a licensed physical therapist,” she said firmly. “For the last month I have been working one-on-one setting up an intensive rehabilitation program for Taryn Thorne in her home.”

“And you have a statement on behalf of the defendant?” the judge asked.

“No,” she said and was vaguely aware of the low stir of surprise in the courtroom. “When I was asked to make a statement, I clearly indicated I was only willing to provide information about my dealings with the defendant over the last month and allow the court to interpret that information, not offer my opinion as to proper sentencing.”

“Proceed,” the judge said, a furrow of confusion between her eyebrows.

Evie clutched the paper with the few short paragraphs she had agonized over for the last two days. “Several weeks ago I encountered Charlie Beaumont on a hiking trail in the mountains. In the course of our conversation, he discovered I had been working with Taryn Thorne and he expressed concern for her condition. Believing Taryn might find interaction with young people motivational to her therapy—and knowing Charlie and Taryn were friends prior to the accident—I invited him to visit her. This was without the knowledge or approval of her father, let me add, and was a completely unilateral decision on my part. Taryn seemed to enjoy his visit and she responded better to her regular therapy than she had done previously. When Charlie asked if he could return another day, I agreed, though I had reservations as to whether it would be beneficial.”

She looked up and found Maura watching her with eyes that were solemn but dry. Brodie was looking somewhere over her shoulder, not at her, and her insides clenched with regret. Too late to get out of this now. She was stuck, like it or not.

She cleared her throat, anxious only to finish now. “Over the past three weeks, Charlie has become a regular visitor during Taryn’s therapy sessions. He visits as often as four times a week, for an hour at a time. To my great surprise, he has displayed remarkable calm and patience with her and Taryn has made great progress in that time. She can stand for longer periods of time, she is taking more steps on her own and her core strength has improved. Whether that is because of Charlie, I cannot and will not say. Thank you.”

Brief and to the point, without embellishment or elaboration. She had told Laura she would only relay the information about Charlie’s visits to Taryn, not color it with her opinion. She had to hope she had accomplished her goal. Whether the judge would give any weight to the information was now out of her hands.

She left the podium, more than a little tempted to push through the doors and keep walking out of the courtroom. That would be cowardly, though, and she couldn’t leave before she heard what Taryn wanted so strongly to say.

She would have vastly preferred finding another seat, but every spot in the courtroom seemed full except where she had been sitting before, next to Brodie.

With no small degree of reluctance, she returned to her seat and felt the heat of his disapproval like a sunlamp beating down on her.

She wanted to tell him she was sorry but the impulse itself annoyed her. She hadn’t done anything so terribly egregious, only presented the basic facts about what had transpired the last three weeks in therapy. None of it was a lie. If he still couldn’t accept how much Charlie had helped with Taryn’s therapy, that was his problem, not hers.

After one of Charlie’s Sunday-school teachers gushed on and on about what a good boy he was and his high school soccer coach spoke about how hard he worked for the team, it was Taryn’s turn.

Beside Evie, Brodie seemed to brace himself. Despite everything, she again wanted badly to touch him, to offer some sort of physical encouragement, but she didn’t have the chance, even if she had been able to find the nerve. He rose and pushed his daughter’s wheelchair to the front of the courtroom, then set the brake so that Taryn could laboriously pull herself to her feet.