Lucky. Jennifer Greene

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СКАЧАТЬ he’d accidentally come across one of these mysterious lawsuits when he’d been researching a separate story for the newspaper, and then couldn’t shake his curiosity. Every question led to another dropped ash—a lit ash—and no one else seemed aware there was an incendiary pile of embers in the forest.

      In itself, the increase in lawsuits didn’t necessarily mean beans, because everybody sued for everything today. People especially freaked when something happened to a baby—what parent didn’t suffer a rage of pain when their kid didn’t come out normal? Although Jake was no longer a practicing lawyer, he knew the system. Knew how lawsuits worked.

      He’d already told himself not to get so stirred up. What looked like a Teton could still end up an anthill. But it smelled wrong, this sudden burst of lawsuits—and this sudden burst of serious health problems for babies, especially when the affected hospitals had longstanding excellent reputations.

      Momentarily a woman’s face pounced in his mind. Kasey. Graham Crandall’s wife. Crandall was one of those starched-spine controlling types—a silver-tongued snob, Jake had always thought, the kind of guy who’d give you the shirt off his back—as long as you gave him a medal for doing it. There was no trouble between them, no bad history. Jake didn’t care about him one way or another, even back in the years when he’d hung with the Grosse Pointe crowd.

      But it had been a shock to meet Crandall’s wife. Coming out of the hospital that night, he’d only seen a woman in labor—she was crying. Who wouldn’t? About to give birth to a watermelon? Yet her face kept popping in his mind. The short, rusty-blond hair. The freckled nose and sunburned cheeks.

      She wasn’t elegant or beautiful or anything like the women Jake associated with Crandall. Instead, there was a radiance about her, a glow from the inside, a natural joyful spirit. The wide mouth was built for laughter; her eyes were bluer than sky.

      Pretty ridiculous, to remember all those details of a woman he didn’t know from Adam—and a woman who was married, besides. Jake figured he must have had that lightning-pull toward her for the obvious reason. It had momentarily scared him, to realize she was going into that hospital to have a baby—the same hospital where he’d been researching the lawsuits.

      Now, though, he sighed impatiently and turned back to his papers. Kasey was none of his business. Hell, even these lawsuits weren’t. For two years, he’d tried his best to just put one foot in front of the other, pay his bills, make it through each day, be grateful that the half-assed weekly paper had been willing to give him a job. Even the research on these hospitals he was doing on the q.t., his own time.

      Jake had done an outstanding job of screwing up his life. Now he was trying to run from trouble at Olympic speed. He figured there was a limit to how many mistakes a guy could make before any hope of self-respect was obliterated for good.

      The instant he heard the front door slam, he looked up, and immediately hurled his briefcase into the back seat. Quick as a blink, he forgot all about lawsuits and strangers’ babies. His focus lasered on the boy hiking toward the car. Just looking at Danny made him feel a sharp ache in his gut.

      At fifteen, Danny had the look of the high school stud. The thick dark hair and broody dark eyes drew the girls—always had, always would. The broad shoulders and no-butt and long muscular legs added to the kid’s good looks. The cutoffs hanging so low they hinted at what he was most proud of, the cocky posture, the I-own-the-world bad-boy swagger…oh yeah, the girls went for him.

      Jake should know. He’d looked just like the kid at fifteen. But there were differences.

      Last week Danny’s hair had been straggly and shoulder-length; this week it had colored streaks. The kid’s scowl was as old as a bad habit and his eyes were angry—all the time angry, it seemed. The swagger wasn’t assumed for the sake of impressing the girls, but because Danny was ready to take on anyone who looked at him sideways.

      Jake understood a lot about attitude. What knifed him in the gut, though, was knowing that his son’s bad attitude was his fault.

      The boy yanked open the driver’s door and hurled his long skinny body in the driver’s seat. “You’re late.”

      Not only was Jake ten minutes early, but he’d been waiting. Still, he didn’t comment. If Danny hadn’t started the conversation with a challenge, Jake would probably have had a heart attack from shock. “You brought your permit? And you told your mom that you’re going out with me?”

      “Like I need to be treated like a five-year-old.” Danny fussed with the key, the dials, then muttered, “If I had any choice—just so we both know where we stand—I’d rather be anywhere but here.”

      That about said it all. Danny wanted to drive so badly that he was even willing to spend time with his dad—and then, only because no one else wanted to practice-drive with him. Even his mother valued her life too much to take the risk.

      “I suppose you’re in a hurry.” Danny used his favorite world-weary tone as he started the car.

      “Nope. I’ve got as much time as you want—although I assume your mom wants you back by dinner.”

      “Yeah. Maybe. Can I go on the expressway today?”

      Maybe Churchill thought there was nothing to fear but fear itself, but the image of Danny on a Detroit expressway at rush hour was enough to make bile rise up Jake’s throat in abject terror. The kid had just gotten his practice license. The last time he’d tried to do something as basic as making a right turn, he’d climbed over a curb. “I think you probably need to get a little more comfortable with the stick shift before we take on the expressway.”

      “That’s what you said last week.” Danny shoved the stick in reverse, made the gear scream in pain, and then stalled out when he let up the clutch too fast. Red shot up his throat. “That wasn’t my fault,” he said furiously. “It’s this old heap of a car. It’s so old it doesn’t respond to anything.”

      It was going to be one of their better times, Jake thought. Of course, as they aimed toward Lakeshore, the test questions began. Can I play the radio. Can I drive by Julie Rossiter’s house. Can I this, can I that.

      As far as Jake could tell, all the questions were designed to elicit a no, at which point Danny would instantly respond with a look of anger and disgust. Jake knew the game. He did his absolute best to say yes to any request that wasn’t definably life-threatening. Sure, Danny could drive by the girl’s house. Sure, he could play the radio—any station and at any volume he wanted. Jake encouraged him to drive exactly as he would be driving later, when he was alone, so he could see how distractions affected his concentration.

      “Oh, yeah? Does that mean I can smoke while I drive?”

      “No.” Jake didn’t elaborate, knowing how a lecture on smoking would be received. Besides, just then his right foot jammed on the imaginary brake and his pulse pumped adrenaline faster than a belching well. No, they hadn’t hit that red Lincoln going through the intersection. No, scraping the tire against the curb wouldn’t kill them. No, braking so fast they were both thrown forward didn’t mean either of them was going to end up hospitalized.

      “I’m going to be sixteen in another seven months,” Danny said, as he turned on Vernier.

      “I know.” Jake resisted holding his hand over his heart. Suburban driving wasn’t too bad, but Vernier eventually turned into Eight Mile. Eight Mile was a Real Road. The kind that tons of people actually used. Some of them might not realize how close they were to imminent death.

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