No One But You (Silver Springs #2)(103)

Dawson winked at her, but he didn’t get a chance to say anything. This time his phone was ringing.

He pulled it out of his pocket and tensed as he saw the caller ID: Stanley DeWitt. He was out of time on his promise to bring Angela home. She’d been calling him crying the past few days, telling him seven was seven and asking him to come pick her up. He had a difficult time getting through those calls because he didn’t know what to tell her. The state was taking its sweet time, even though he’d called Robin Strauss to let her know how hard the wait was on his sister and that the delay was forcing him to break a promise.

“Is it Angela?” Sadie asked.

He nodded.

“Here, let me take Jayden so you can talk to her.”

Dawson let Jayden go to his mother as he sat on the edge of the bed and pushed the Talk button. “Hello?”

“You did it!” She spoke so loud he had to pull the phone away from his ear by a few centimeters. “You did it, Dawson, just like I knew you would. Megan says I can come home.” Someone spoke in the background, trying to calm her. “But only if I wait till Tuesday,” she added. “Not seven days. And not till Christmas. Just till Tuesday.”

That was still five days, but she seemed pleased, so he didn’t point that out. He wasn’t quite sure whether to believe her in the first place. “Are you certain of that?” he asked.

“Talk to Megan!”

The phone transferred and Megan came on the line.

“Is what Angela just told me true?” he asked.

“It is.” He could hear the warmth in her voice. “The paperwork came through this morning. I’m sure they’ll be calling to let you know once we get it back to them, but from what I saw, she’s set to be released into your custody early next week.”

“Wow.” He felt such relief he didn’t know what to say. He’d just come through another hard-fought battle—and won. First his freedom, then his sister’s. “That’s great.”

“You’ll be able to come get her, right?”

“Of course. I’ll be there as soon as she can leave.”

“Great. We’ll let you know when, exactly, we can release her on Tuesday.”

Sadie was standing in the doorway with Jayden, watching as he hit the End button.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I guess Ms. Strauss has finished her investigation.”

“And?”

“Angela’s coming home.”

She put Jayden down and crossed over to him. “That’s wonderful, Dawson. I’m so happy for you,” she said and, resting her hands on his shoulders, kissed his forehead.

He looked up at her in surprise. This was the first time she’d shown him any affection in front of her son. To him, that was significant. It also reminded him that he wasn’t done fighting. Maybe he’d secured his freedom and Angela’s, and was making strides toward finding the man who’d murdered his folks, but he still had to force Sly to let go of Sadie and Jayden. Then, even though he wouldn’t have his parents, he would have taken care of all the family he had left.





27


Sly couldn’t believe that Sadie had had the nerve to bring his boss—the chief of police, no less—to his house as some sort of enforcer this morning. He’d been fuming about it all day, could hardly think about anything else. It was amazing how, now that she had a little help, she believed she’d gained the upper hand. But she didn’t know him very well if she thought he’d ever let her get away with how she was behaving. He’d set her straight, couldn’t wait for the right opportunity to do exactly that. He’d been racking his brain all day, trying to figure out how best to accomplish it, but he hadn’t figured it out quite yet. He’d tried to put her at a disadvantage by telling her he planned to take Jayden for the weekend, but she’d actually seemed relieved. He hated the idea that having him sit home and babysit would only enable her to devote every minute of her time to Dawson...

The thought of that conversation made him even angrier, especially when he paired that with what she’d said to him in Lolita’s. She claimed she was finally enjoying sex—only, with someone else.

As Sly drove slowly down the main drag of Silver Springs, he eyed the citizens and drivers he saw on the road with an especially critical eye. The mood he was in, no one was getting away with anything.

He spotted a sleek red sports car pulling out of the gas station and recognized it as belonging to Monty Tremaine, a student this year at New Horizons, and flipped on his lights. Monty hadn’t done anything wrong that he could see, but Sly had never liked him. He’d run into him a time or two at the bowling alley, didn’t feel as if Monty had the proper respect for authority. The boy was too full of himself, too proud of his own status. Most of the students at the boys ranch didn’t even have a car while they were in Silver Springs, but Monty’s father was a movie exec in LA and had lots of dough. Monty’s convertible BMW cost far more than any car a kid should own. What had he ever done to earn anything, except give his parents enough trouble that they’d finally resorted to sending him to a school devoted to behavior control?

Once Monty spotted Sly’s cruiser and the lights flashing behind him, he pulled over at the edge of town. He was on his way back to the school, Sly decided, was headed in that direction. “That’s it, you little bastard. You’d better pull over.”