Ryan held Rafael on one hip. He looked at Emily, at Cage. And then he looked at the little boy.
“Hey, Rafael,” he said, tears in his eyes. He ran his hand over the boy’s head. So soft. Rafael buried his head against Ryan’s shoulder, and sniffled. Ryan pulled him in tight.
“It will be OK,” he promised.
Chapter 2
5 p.m. Tuesday, Eyewitness Newsroom — Emily Andersen acknowledged to herself that Ryan Matthews was probably the most beautiful man she’d ever seen, in real life, or on the screen. He was six feet tall, classically proportioned and had perfect features with amazing blue eyes. His brown hair was soft, and so was his beard, although she had to admit that the year he’d worn it as a circle beard, he’d been really hot.
Truth was, he was a hunk. She’d seen him covered up like he was now in a long-sleeved rugby T and khaki’s, and she’d seen him stripped down to a pair of shorts playing frisbee in the park with all his tats showing, and he never failed to draw the eye of every woman and not just a few men in the vicinity.
He oozed sex. Emily had decided the day they met four years ago she would never give into that allure and become one of the parade of people in and out of his bed. And in and out of the green room here. And the Crow’s Nest. And the fire escape. And God knows where all he’d been. She routinely sprayed down the couches because she liked being able to sit on them without thinking about what might have happened there. Because that was gross.
But now, looking at Ryan holding his son, she thought he had never looked more appealing. Rafael looked like Ryan. The same eye shape, the same perfect features, the same full lower lip. He was just done in brown, to Ryan’s fairer colors.
“He looks like you,” she said out loud. “Only like a sepia version.”
Cage choked, laughing. “I don’t think that would be considered a racially sensitive way to say it,” he said.
She shrugged.
“What am I going to do?” Ryan repeated.
Emily sighed. “See the hill, take the hill, time?” she asked, her motto for let’s get down to business.
Ryan nodded.
“Then as I see it, you need to answer three questions,” she said, looking him in the eyes and holding his gaze.
“One: what do you want? Really. What do you want? I’ve known you for four years, and I’m not sure what that is.”
Ryan wasn’t sure either.
Emily continued, “Two: what’s best for Rafael? Short term and long term?
“And three: how do we find and help Teresa?”
Ryan tipped his head to one side as he considered those questions. Then he nodded. “I can go with those,” he agreed. “Got any answers?”
“I do,” Cage said, surprising them. “Sarah and I are going to dinner with my parents to talk about J.J. They’re releasing him tomorrow. Why don’t the two of you — three of you — join us? Dad and Mom will have useful ideas. And if, you wanted, they’d probably take Rafael in. They’re putting J.J. up in my old room. Still got a couple of more vacant bedrooms.”
Emily noted that Ryan tightened his grip on Rafael at the idea of giving him up — even temporarily to people he knew. Good, she thought.
“How is J.J. doing?” she asked. Their youngest aspiring videographer J.J. Jones had tried to commit suicide two days ago in the men’s bathroom here. Sarah had found him, and somehow managed to hold him up — a woman who couldn’t walk without crutches — until Cage came in and rescued them.
Emily was furious with J.J.’s father. He was a Portland police officer and at the protests Saturday night he had apparently shot J.J. with non-lethal ammo — shot his own son! She couldn’t fathom that. Her home life hadn’t been perfect, but still! J.J. kept repeating he wouldn’t go home. Well, no kidding. So, Cage had called his father, the Rev. Clyde Washington, and asked for help. And Rev. Washington had stepped in to help.
Sarah had paid a price for saving J.J. Emily glanced out at the editing pod where she was working. “How is she doing?” she asked.
Cage looked out at Sarah as well. “That is the strongest-willed woman I have ever met,” he said. “Goddamn, she held J.J. up for a half-hour! He’s a 130-pound kid. It would be a challenge for me even.” He shook his head.
Emily doubted that. She’d seen Cage work out. He was ripped. But she understood his admiration.
“Is she staying with you still?” Ryan asked.
“Yeah, her doc has her on some strong meds that apparently have some weird side effects, so she can’t live by herself for a while,” Cage said. “And she can’t use her crutches — her sticks, as she’d say — until the muscles in her back and shoulders calm down. You wouldn’t know it to look at her, but she’s in serious pain.”
“Should she even be working?” Emily asked anxiously. She’d known the woman for barely a week, but she’d become a friend. She shied away from thinking about the details of what friendship might include. Later. Time for that later. She knew a day of reckoning was coming — or at least a lunch of reckoning. This crisis might actually derail that conversation, she thought. A silver lining.
Cage shrugged. “You’re welcome to have that discussion with her,” he said. “Sarah said she was coming in to work today, and I said yes, ma’am.”
Emily giggled. And both men smiled at her.
“So, dinner?” Cage said. “Mom’s putting food on the table at 6 p.m.”
“That’s not going to give her much notice,” Emily demurred. “And I should probably stay in the newsroom, if you all are gone.”
“I need you, Em,” Ryan said. “Please? Miguel is out there and so is Will. Let them try running things for an evening. We’ve got to start looking to the future.”
Emily considered that. Will Bristol was
