at her, and his eyes held hers. “It didn’t do any good. I had to do it anyway.” He began to speak into the phone as the operator answered.
She gazed at him while he spoke, watching the play of expressions on his face. Why couldn’t she take her eyes off him? He was just a guy. Yeah, good-looking and kind of… different, but that shouldn’t matter.
Why couldn’t she stop looking at him?
Grady Hospital
Three hours later
“They say Manuel is going to be all right, Eve.” Rosa’s face was wreathed in smiles as she hurried down the corridor to the waiting room, where she’d left Eve. “They said it was a minor bump, a possible concussion or something, but he’s going to be fine.”
“Great. When can we take him home?”
“When my papa comes. They won’t let him go with me. They say they need to ask him questions.” Her expression clouded. “He’s going to be mad at me. He said I could only keep the baby if he didn’t cause trouble.” She frowned. “And those doctors were asking me all kinds of funny questions. If I ever shook Manuel or maybe threw him in his bed when I got mad at him for crying.”
“You told him about Larazo and the others?”
She nodded. “But none of them were still there when the ambulance came. The police said none of the neighbors had seen anything.”
Of course they hadn’t, Eve thought bitterly. It would make them targets of Larazo and his gang. “Well, your papa will tell them how well you treat Manuel.”
“He’s never home. He works all the time. He might tell them he doesn’t know.” She moistened her lips. “And he doesn’t really want me to keep Manuel. He doesn’t like babies. They cry too much. But I know after Manuel gets a little older, he’ll like him much more.”
Providing Rosa got to keep her son, Eve thought. DEFACS sometimes yanked a kid at the first sign of abuse. Though she’d seen them give the child back with equal speed if their budget was cut.
But Rosa didn’t deserve this kind of hassle. She was a good mother and loved that baby. “Talk to your papa as soon as he gets here. Tell him what happened.”
Rosa nodded doubtfully. “But how can I prove it? They won’t believe me. They’ll say I made it up.”
“Tell them to ask me.”
“But you’re my friend.” She paused. “And you’re the same age as me. They won’t believe you, either.”
Eve knew that was true. Not only was she sixteen, but a check would show that her mother was on drugs. She’d be tarred with the same brush. “Then we’ll find another way to convince them. I’ll go to every apartment in the development and talk to the tenants. Someone will be willing to tell the cops the truth.”
“Will you do that?” Rosa’s face lit like a sunrise. “You’ll keep them from taking my baby?”
Eve gazed at her helplessly. Simple question from a simple, loving girl. But nothing was simple in the slums where they had been born and raised. Sometimes the people who were trying to help blundered and managed to destroy every chance of happiness. “I promise, they won’t take Manuel. If they do, we’ll get him back.”
Rosa gave her a hug and whirled. “I’ve got to go back to Manuel. They won’t let me stay in the same room with him without a nurse being there, but they said I could watch him through the window.”
Eve watched her running down the corridor. What were they afraid she’d do to her baby? Smother him? Anyone could see that she adored Manuel. It was a crazy world.
“Hi.” John Gallo was coming toward her from the direction of the elevators. “How’s the kid?”
“He’ll be okay,” she said curtly. “It’s a miracle. They could have killed him.”
“You look like you’re unraveling.” He went to the coffee machine. “Coffee? Or maybe, a Coke?”
She nodded. “Coffee. Black.” She sat back down. “And I’m not unraveling. What are you doing here?”
“I got to thinking about the kid.” He handed her the coffee. Then he went to the soft-drink machine and got a Coke for himself. “I don’t know how anyone drinks black coffee. It tastes like tar to me.”
“It was all my mother kept in the house when I was a kid.”
“You’re not much more than a kid now.”
“Sixteen.”
“That’s what I was afraid of. I was hoping for a little older.” He sat down beside her. “Eve, Rosa called you. Eve what?”
“Eve Duncan.” She took a drink of the coffee. It was strong and generally foul-tasting. She didn’t care. It was hot. “And why do you care how old I am? Are you making a pass at me?”
“No, you’ll know when I do.” He lifted his cup to his lips. “Just a comment. You’re still in high school?”
“I graduate next year. You?”
“I graduated over a year ago. I’ve been moving around the country and raising a little hell with a couple of buddies for the last year. Sort of a last hurrah before I go into the service.”
“You’re joining the Army?”
He nodded. “My parents are dead, and I don’t have money for college. I thought it was my best bet to get more education and move up in the world. The Army’s not a bad deal.” His lips tightened. “And I won’t be caught in the same trap that choked my folks to death. Minimum-wage jobs and kids they never wanted. You think that housing development you live in is bad? I moved down here from Milwaukee, and the place I lived was called the Bricks. We had a killing nearly every two months, and the cops never came near it without a backup.”
“Is that where you learned to- You broke Frank Martinelli’s arm.”
He shrugged. “I learned a little self-defense from living at the Bricks. But my uncle was a Ranger in the Army, and he taught me everything he knew. Uncle Ted is the reason I’m down here. He’s got a back problem, and he moved down here because the VA Hospital has some specialists in Atlanta. I wanted to get him settled before I checked in for basic training.”
“Self-defense?” Eve’s brows rose. “It didn’t look like self-defense to me. They didn’t have a chance.”
He smiled. “If I’d let them move first, it would have been self-defense. It’s all how you look at it.” His smile faded. “And they made me mad. I didn’t like what they were doing to you.”
“Neither did I.” She leaned back in the seat. “I was scared.”
“But you went running in after them anyway.”
“They were hurting the baby.” She lifted her hand and rubbed her neck. “No one has a right to hurt the helpless. Most of us can take care of ourselves. But you have to do something about it if they go after babies or animals or-”
“Is your neck hurting?”
“Aching. That bastard was jerking me backward by my hair.”
“I can help.” He put his Coke down and stood up. “Lean forward a little.”
She looked at him warily. “What?”
“I won’t hurt you.” He stood a little behind her. “My uncle taught me this, too. It helped when I got whiplash from an accident.” His hands were on the back of her neck. “It’s all in the thumbs…” His thumbs were digging into her neck in deep massage. “Relax.”
She couldn’t relax. Her flesh felt hot beneath his touch, and that heat was spreading out in waves throughout her body. The muscles of her stomach were clenching, and her breasts…
What the hell was happening to her?
She knew what was happening. She wasn’t ignorant. It just had never happened to her.
“You’re not relaxing,” he said softly.
“No.” But she didn’t want him to stop. “You’re not… helping me.”
“I’m not helping myself much, either.” His fingers never stopped moving, digging, pressing. “But I want to keep on touching you no matter how much it hurts.” He drew a deep breath, and his hands fell away from her. “I didn’t mean it to happen this way. I didn’t mean it to happen at all. Hell yes, I wanted to get my hands on you. I’ve wanted that ever since I saw you sitting on those steps at-” He dropped down in the chair next to her. “Sorry. I didn’t know you would-”
He didn’t know that she’d respond as she had done. She hadn’t known it would happen, either. That flash of sensuality had come like a bolt of lightning. Searing, melting, overpowering. She instinctively pushed the knowledge
