The Great Escape (Wynette, Texas #7)(70)

“I’m all over that.” Panda started the engine.

He handled the boat as easily as he handled everything except human relationships. The wind had calmed, the sky had cleared, and the stars were just beginning to come out. He goosed the throttle when they hit open water and headed toward the point that divided them from the town harbor. As they rounded it, they were met with a flotilla of pleasure boats waiting for the show to start, their lights bobbing like fireflies above the water. Some of the boats flew yacht club burgees; others displayed patriotic pennants.

When they were just inside the harbor—close enough to see the show but away from the other boats—Panda turned the bow into the current, set the anchor, and cut the engine. In the sudden silence, laughter and music drifted across the water.

Temple grabbed a cushion and crawled to the bow, leaving them alone.





Chapter Sixteen




THE FIRST OF THE FIREWORKS exploded above them, an umbrella of red and violet. Lucy rested her head against the back of the bench seat that ran across the stern of the boat. Panda did the same, and they watched in surprisingly comfortable silence. “What you did today with little Sophie was pretty great,” Lucy eventually said as a shell of stars withered above them.

She felt him shrug. “You’re a good swimmer. If I hadn’t been there, you’d have gone in.”

She liked how certain he sounded. She glanced over at him and watched a trio of silver comets shimmer in his eyes. “The surf was rough. I don’t think I could have pulled her out.”

“You’d have done what you had to,” he said curtly, and then, “People need to watch their kids better.”

The sharp edge to his voice seemed unwarranted. “Children move fast,” she said. “Hard for any parent to watch them every second.” Sailboat spars jingled in the silence between booms, and water slapped the boat’s hull. “You understand kids. I guess that surprised me.”

He crossed his ankles. Purple palms dropped a trail of stars, and orange peonies unfolded. “You can’t be a cop and not deal with kids.”

“A lot of gang stuff?”

“Gangs. Neglect. Abuse. You name it.”

She’d seen a lot of troubled kids through her work, although she suspected not as many as he had. It was odd. She was so accustomed to regarding Panda as an alien being that she’d never thought about what they might have in common. “Sophie didn’t want to let you go.”

A silver weeping willow glittered against the dark night. “Cute kid.”

Blame it on the night, the fireworks, the emotional aftermath from what could have been a terrible tragedy, because her next words came out unplanned. “You’ll make a great dad someday.”

A short harsh laugh. “Never going to happen.”

“You’ll change your mind when you find the right woman.” She was sounding too sentimental, and Viper came to her rescue. “You’ll know her when you see her. Opposable thumbs. Not too choosy.”

“Nope.” He smiled. “One of many good things about modern science.”

“What do you mean?”

“Vasectomy. The medical profession’s gift to guys like me.”

A fusillade of explosions split the air. This was so wrong. She’d seen him today with the kids, witnessed what a natural he was. He should never have done something so permanent. “Don’t you think you’re too young to make that kind of decision?”

“When it comes to kids, I’m a hundred years old.”

She’d been involved with child advocacy too long not to know what cops faced, and in the dim light she thought he looked haunted. “I saw too many dead bodies,” he said. “Not just teens but infants—five-year-old kids who hadn’t lost their baby teeth. Kids blown up, missing limbs.” She cocked her head. “I saw parents on the worst day of their lives,” he went on, “and I’ve promised myself I’ll never have to go through that. Best decision I ever made. It’s hard to do your job when you wake up every night in a cold sweat.”

“You saw worst-case scenarios. What about the millions of kids who grow up just fine?”

“What about the ones who don’t?”

“Nothing in life comes with a guarantee.”

“Wrong. A snip here, a snip there. It’s a damn good guarantee.”

The sky lit up with the grand finale, the bangs, crackles, and whistles ending their conversation. She respected people who understood themselves well enough to know they wouldn’t make good parents, but instinct told her that wasn’t the case with Panda.

Her Lucy-ness was getting in her way again. This had nothing to do with her, other than serving as an omen, a harsh reminder that a lot of men felt the way Panda did about fatherhood, and despite what she’d done to Ted, she still wanted to get married and have children. What if she fell in love with a man like Panda who didn’t want to be a father? One of so many variables she wouldn’t be facing if she hadn’t bolted from that Texas church.

Temple scrambled back from the bow to join them, and they headed home. Panda stayed behind on the boat, so Lucy and Temple walked up to the house together. “There’s something about fireworks,” Temple said as they reached the top of the stairs. “They make me sad. That’s weird, right?”