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being away from Springvale. I’d bet my badge she’s off hooking up with some punk-ass dude she doesn’t want me to know about.”
    Gabi’s a good kid. After being sheltered in a small town and overprotected by Papa T until his death seven months ago, she’s acting out her loss through a little rebellion. I think about my own secret romance and say, “Maybe Gabi wouldn’t sneak around if you’d ease up and stop intimidating every guy she brings here.”
    “Like that’s gonna happen. If they can’t handle an older brother protecting his baby sister, then they’re not worth their salt.”
    “Gabi’s not a baby,” I say. “She’s almost eighteen.”
    “Yeah, and I know what I was up to at eighteen.”
    And I know what I was up to. With Dee. And the thirty-five-minute drive from her downtown office to the suburbs in snarling rush hour traffic gave me too much time to recall the intense history we share and the potent feelings attached to it.
    For all of Dee’s prickly exterior, beneath it I found an irresistible vulnerability. Out of self-preservation, she played it tough and indifferent, but Dee’s feelings ran deep. Unlike any girl I knew, she looked past the cool jock image I put on for the small town to see. She looked straight into my soul and understood me better than anyone.
    “Come on back,” Victor says, saving me from another descent into the past.
    I blank my mind to the memories and follow him to the rear of the house, deliciously scented with spicy meat sauce.
    “Mick!” Isabelle stops layering the tortillas to rush toward me. “I thought I heard your voice.” Her pretty smile is bright, but the semicircles beneath her eyes are more pronounced than they were three days ago.
    “Hey, Bells.” I catch her up in a bear hug, giving her an extra squeeze. I pray I’ve done the right thing, because I’m about to rip open a Pandora’s box.
    “Coke?” Victor asks me, his head in the fridge; oblivious to what’s in store.
    “Sure.” I remove my jacket and drape it over the back of the chair. Then I sit, running my hand through my hair. It’s opportune that Dwayde and Gabi aren’t home. I need to do this now. Before I share a meal with them.
    Victor flips the lids off the Coke bottles and slides one across the kitchen table. He lowers his long, wiry body to straddle the opposite chair and eyeballs me. After thirty years, we’re more brothers than friends, and he can read me well. “What’s on your mind, Mick?”
    I take a swig of cola, wishing that it were something stronger. My gaze moves from Victor, his narrowed eyes set in his probing cop expression, to Isabelle, preparing the meal, and then back to Victor. I struggle with how best to phrase it, but no amount of sugarcoating is going to make this go down easy. Better to just get it said, I decide, and blurt out my confession without preamble: “I went to see Deeana today about taking the case.”
    Everything goes still.
    As if in freeze frame, the bottle angling toward Victor’s mouth stops midway. Isabelle’s hand pauses on the oven door handle, and for one countless moment the quiet is deafening. I can hear only the erratic beats of my heart.
    Then things go back into motion. Isabelle turns toward me and Victor slams his bottle down on the table with enough force to rattle the salt and pepper shakers. “Christ! I made it clear that I didn’t want her representing Dwayde.” Each word is threaded through clenched teeth.
    “You did, but Dee’s the best choice,” I argue in my defense and begin ticking off the reasons on my fingers. “She comes highly recommended by your lawyer and Dwayde’s social worker. She has the credentials and experience. Her practice is exclusively custody and guardianship cases, so she knows all the legal ins and outs. I was at her office, Victor. I saw the drawings and thank you cards from kids posted on the wall.
    “You know Dee’s background. Helping children is more than just a job to her.