Free All Due Respect by Vicki Hinze Page B

in his eyes.
    Yet how could she avoid it? What could she tell him?
    Anything—except the truth. She would have to lie.
    To Seth? To Seth, whose laughter gave you strength when you had none and you needed it to survive? You’re going to lie to Seth?
    Her stomach heaved.
    The vigil had started.
    SETH stood on the porch, outside the front door. “I know it’s late, Camden, but I want to see him.”
    “Damn it, Holt, he’s asleep.” Camden scratched his head, shrugged a robe-clad shoulder. “So was I.”
    Seth resisted an urge to sigh. “Look, I thought we had an understanding about this.”
    “Understanding? I call it blackmail.”
    “And I call your bruising Jeff a felony,” Seth countered. “You can let me peek in on him, or I call the cops and complain and they’ll check on him—every two hours. Your choice.”
    Cinching the belt on his blue robe, Camden frowned, opened the door, and then led Seth upstairs to Jeff’s room.
    It was spotless. Toys shelved against the wall, nothing tossed on the carpeted floor. Even his lunch box had been placed on his desk chair. Weird for a six-year-old boy. And Jeff lay on a twin bed, scrunched up under a quilted crimson bedspread with BAMA stamped in white lettering all over it.
    Camden stayed in the hallway.
    Jeff opened his eyes. “Dr. Seth.”
    “Hey, buddy.” Seth smiled into Jeff’s droopy eyes. “Sorry I woke you.”
    “I wasn’t sleeping,” he whispered, glancing at the door to make sure they were alone.
    “Pretending, huh?”
    Jeff nodded against the pillow. “Dad said you forgot me, but I knew you didn’t.” He reached out from under the covers and patted Seth’s chest. “I knew the truth in here.”
    Jeff had remembered what Seth had told him. His heart swelled and the boy snagged the whole thing. “I’d never forget you,” Seth said, knowing it was true. Before Jeff could ask, Seth added, “That’s a promise.”
    “Cuz we’re buddies.” Jeff flung himself into Seth’s arms, then hugged him hard.
    So this was what hugging a kid was like. The soapy-kid smell, the tiny arms stretching to reach and fasten around your neck. The sense of total trust. Damn, but it rattled a man. Deep. Seth patted Jeff’s back, his own throat thick. “Yeah. We’re buddies.”
    “I love you, Dr. Seth.”
    Tears burned the back of Seth’s nose, stung his eyes. Since he was six, he had waited to hear those words come his way—without sex being a factor and it being hormones talking—and they never had. Not until now. Not until Jeff.
    Seth blinked hard, and hugged gently. Jeff made him feel protective, but the boy also pulled at something softer in Seth that he wasn’t sure how to tag. Still, he understood what it meant at gut level. He’d go to the wall and scale it or tear it down for this kid. Anywhere, anytime. Go up against anyone. And yet giving Jeff the words wouldn’t be easy. Doing something alien never comes easy. But the boy needed the words—and, Seth realized, he needed to give them.
    Still, just thinking about saying it had his chest in a vise, his throat stuffed with sandpaper, and his gut full of concrete. But determined, he squeezed his eyes shut, and took the plunge. “I love you, too, Jeff.”
    DURING the night the phone rang.
    Fingering her way across the nightstand, Julia peeked
    out from under the cold washcloth and lifted the receiver. “Hello.” She sounded half-dead. She felt worse.
    “Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Not from me, sugar.” The man’s grated whisper disintegrated into an eerie warning. “You should know better than to even try.”
    Oh, God. Terror ripped through her veins. Julia flung the receiver onto the sheets and stared at it as if it were a hissing rattier. Hearing his sardonic laughter through the receiver, she grabbed the phone and slammed it on its hook, jerked the plug out of the wall, and then slung it down on the carpeted floor. It bounced and settled with a dull thunk.
    Tears blurred her eyes, stole