Page 56 of Back To Our Beginning

“Ah, darn it. You’re in love with him.”

I dropped my head. “Maybe,” I mumbled.

“Don’t look so sad. He’s back, and he looks as into you as you are into him.”

“Yeah, but he’s still in the Marines. He has to go back in ten days.”

“Ah. That sucks.”

I gave a big sigh. “Tell me about it. Now get out of my chair.”

Irene got up. “So, what are you going to do?”

“I’m taking it one day at a time.”

She squeezed my shoulder. “If you need someone to talk to, you call me. Okay?”

I nodded, then sat down. I really wished we hadn’t talked. I had been doing really well before our conversation. Actually, I’d been flying high after making love to Beau this morning. Now I was depressed.

Get over it, Avery!

I squeezed my eyes shut for a few seconds and forced myself to smile. Then I opened my eyes, took my files from my satchel, and started to get to work.

* * *

It was just after lunch when one of the assistant district attorneys called me.

“Maddie?”

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“It’s Oliver, from the D.A.’s office.”

I frowned. “I take it this is not good news.”

“Nope, it isn’t. Bruce Forrester made bail.”

I frowned again, trying to place who Bruce Forrester was. Then I remembered. “He’s the asshole who came at me with a frying pan, right? He was beating on his girlfriend and her six-year-old son.”

“One and the same,” Oliver confirmed.

“What was the judge thinking, offering him bail?”

“Bruce said all the beatings on the boy were from his mom. As for threatening you with a frying pan, he said it was in self-defense because you had a baseball bat.”

“Softball bat,” I corrected.

“Whatever. That was his story, so the judge gave him a fifteen-thousand-dollar bail, and some bail bondsman took it when he put up fifteen hundred.”

“Dammit!”

Tomorrow was my day to do home inspections. I had called into the Pattersons and had heard nothing but good things about how well Eli was doing, but I intended to see for myself tomorrow. There were other situations that didn’t sound nearly as good, that I would have to check out, so I saved that for last. End the day on a high note.

“Do you know how Colleen is doing?” I asked the A.D.A.

“Colleen?”

“She’s the girlfriend and Eli’s mom. I’m pretty sure she went into rehab…again.”