Cracks in the Sidewalk(65)

Charles Francis McDermott.”

~

There was no longer any chance of sleep for JT. He stood and paced the room for several minutes thinking of how to handle this. When he heard Kelsey’s car pull into the garage, he tore the note into tiny pieces and flushed it down the toilet.

“Okay, Charlie,” he grumbled. “Start threatening me, and we’ll see who wins.” As far as JT was concerned nothing would louse up his relationship with Kelsey—including spending Sundays with Liz. He pulled on a pair of jeans and headed downstairs.

Kelsey stood in the kitchen pouring milk over a bowl of Cheerios. The expression on JT’s face softened as soon as he saw her. He crossed the room and folded her into his arms. This was the sort of woman he needed, a woman full of life, who stood straight and tall, a woman with the face of an angel and the lithe body of a teenager. He pressed his face into the nape of her neck and breathed in the scent of jasmine.

Before JT could take full advantage of the moment, David ran into the kitchen. “Bobby won’t give me back my race car!”

“So what?” JT said. “Let him play with it for a while.”

“But it’s mine.”

“Enough!” JT snapped. “Sit down and eat your breakfast.”

“Bobby’s not eating.”

“He will,” Kelsey cooed. “Come on, dumpling, it’s time for breakfast.”

Bobby did bear a strong resemblance to a dumpling in that he was squat, round, and dimpled. He came as a package with Kelsey. She might have looked like a teenager, but she was actually a twenty-one-year-old single mom struggling to make ends meet since she’d lost track of dumpling’s daddy.

~

“Don’t worry,” JT had assured her. “After Liz dies, we’ll get married.”

“Why not now?”

“Because a divorce costs. If I divorce Liz, she gets half of everything. If I wait for her to die, I keep it all.”

That conversation had taken place weeks ago, but Kelsey had little patience and kept asking how much longer it would take. Jeffrey didn’t want to lose Kelsey, so he’d gone to great lengths to placate her. First he’d given her Liz’s sapphire ring, then it was the Rolex, and after that a bracelet embellished with three solid gold Spanish doubloons.

~

With the bright red race car still clutched in his chubby little hand, Bobby scooted himself onto the chair closest to Kelsey and began stuffing Cheerios into his mouth. David, glowering at the car, snorted, “This ain’t fair.”

“Get used to it,” Kelsey said when JT went upstairs. “Bobby’s gonna be your brother.”

When JT returned with Kimberly and Christian, David asked, “Is it true, Daddy? Is Bobby gonna be my brother?”

“Well, yes, I suppose so,” JT answered nervously, “sooner or later.”

“It had better be sooner,” Kelsey said.

~

Later that morning, when Bobby and Christian had gone down for a nap, Kimberly and David were watching cartoons, and Kelsey was deep into the October issue of Vogue, JT slipped away. He went into his study, closed the door, and dialed Noreen Sarnoff’s number. The telephone rang six times, and eventually a recording answered.

“This is Jeffrey Caruthers,” he said after the beep. “I’ve got a problem. Call me back.”

~

When Noreen heard JT’s message later that afternoon, she cringed. She’d thought with the trial over and the court order executed, she’d heard the last of Jeffrey Caruthers. But he was back again with the sound of urgency in his voice.

JT’s name came at the top of the list of clients Noreen disliked. She debated about calling him or simply erasing the message. In the end her sense of ethics won out, and she dialed his number.

“What now?” she asked when he answered on the very first ring.

“Liz’s father is threatening me,” JT said. “Isn’t that illegal?”

“Threatening you?”

“Yeah, he says he’s gonna take me back to court.”

“For what?”

“Because I didn’t answer the telephone when Liz called.”

Noreen started putting the pieces together. “Exactly how many times did you not answer?”

“I don’t know exactly—”

“More than five?”

“Probably.”

“More than ten?”

“Maybe.”

“Did she leave messages?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you return her calls?”

“No, and I’m not going to.”

“Judge Brill’s ruling stated that you had to permit your wife to speak to the children three times a week. If you don’t, you’re in defiance of his order and Charles McDermott has every right to ask the court for sanctions.”

“What happens then?”

“You could be fined, spend time in jail, maybe even lose custody of the children.”

“That’s stupid,” JT said.

“No,” Noreen replied, “you’re stupid for defying the judge’s order.”

“So what do I have to do?”

“As soon as we hang up, call your wife and let her talk to those kids. And make certain you get them over there Sunday morning.”