Free Off Season by Jean Stone

connections. If I tell her I’ll fill in for Lizette, she might be willing to help.”
    Ben folded his arms and leaned back on the bench. “So you will tell her about me—about my
delicate
situation.”
    She nodded. “I don’t know how much I’ll have to tell her. But unless we take control of this, it’s going to consume us. And unless you get the best lawyer there is, you—we—could be in big trouble.” Did he realize that, or did he believe that here on the island, all things worked out?
    She turned back to him. “And who knows. Maybewith the right connections, we can even turn this into something positive. Think about it, Ben. You’re not the only man in the world who’s been unjustly accused. We could bring to light the whole social problem. I know the judge said the case is off limits to the press, but rules can be bent if not broken. No one would have to know Mindy was the child involved, and you’d come across as the brave one, the
innocent
brave one.”
    Rubbing her arms briskly, she took a step forward. She wished he’d look at her. “Ben, honey, don’t you see? We have to do something. Look at us, hiding in our bedroom so Amy won’t hear us. And what about Carol Ann? You can’t even tell your own daughter what’s going on. This afternoon I wanted so much to share it with Rita. The fact that I can’t makes it more difficult.”
    He closed his eyes a moment. When he opened them again, they had narrowed. And his face had become pink, no, almost red. He stood up.
    “This is insane,” he said. “Think what you want, Jill, but do both of us a favor and don’t say that telling Addie Becker will make it realistic. I’m sorry this is difficult for you. I’m sorry I’ve asked you not to tell our children, and I’m grateful that you did not tell Rita.
    “I am sorry for all the problems this is causing you now and will cause you in the future. But have you forgotten how much it cost you to get rid of Addie? And do you think it would be easy for me to turn you back over to Mr. Celebrity? When from day one, I’ve worried that someday you’d regret the decision you made—to give it all up, to be here with me?
    “But whatever you do, Jill, don’t lie to yourself. I mean, do you really want to get me an ‘expert’ attorney? Or do you want Addie and her ‘connections’ because you want to be back there with them? Where reality never strikes home, and if it does, Addie’s experts can buy someone off or cover something up?”
    He stalked toward the door, then turned around. “And another thing. This isn’t a slant for one of your TV stories, Jill. Call me socially inept, I don’t care. But if you think I’m going to stand beside you on some kind of soapbox for the unjustly accused, you’re wrong.
    “And what about all those accusations that aren’t unjust? I’m not going to be a party to anything that would be misconstrued as mockery of the issue.
    “I am a man, goddammit. I have some pride. And in this
delicate
case, Mindy Ashenbach is nothing more than a sad, misguided child. You say you wouldn’t bring her into it, but how long would it be before everyone on the Vineyard figured it out? You’re a mother, Jill. Can’t you see that Mindy is as much of a victim as I am?”
    Turning back toward the door, he didn’t hesitate as he said, “Think about it, Jill. In the meantime, I’m going to bunk in with Charlie.”
    Ben wondered if he was losing his grip, or if he would before this was all over. If it ever was over.
    He stood in Charlie’s apartment above the tavern, in the room Charlie used as an office, and wondered how his life had suddenly become one big
if
.
    He looked down toward Dock Street, then up toward Main. The sky was pewter—a drizzly, grizzly pewter that veiled the white Edgartown houses and shops and made even the brightest autumn colors look like crap, which certainly was in keeping with the way he felt.
    He’d spent the night there on Charlie’s old pull-out