Chapter Four

Knox

Evelyn rested the rest of the day, for which I felt more relief than I had a right to. She should have stayed in the hospital, but I didn't have the right to push that kind of care on her. The kids seemed to adjust quickly. Aneshya was upset the day immediately after the fire, but it seemed to be more that she'd lost some things important to her than missing her father. It was puzzling. I knew they had a very relaxed relationship, but I had no idea it was this spartan.

"Danny's never home." Dad stood beside me. Lemon, Apple and Cecelia had showed up too, keeping Evelyn company while Luke, Aneshya, and a girl of nine or ten named Effie play in the backyard. A week had passed, and the kids were acting like normal kids. Well, except for Luke, who was twelve going on forty. "He'd show up from time to time, giving Evie and the kids some excuse about how he had to travel for work but never brought home money. He never took care of them. Everything the kids have, Evelyn provided. Even the apartment was paid for by her."

"What the fuck was my brother doing?" It was more a musing than a question I expected an actual answer to. My brother had always been a selfish bastard, but this was next level.

"I'll be honest, Knox. I've worried over Danny since before you disappeared."

"You and Mom both. He was always into something… expensive."

Dad snorted. "No shit. The woman he was with at the hospital, the woman who claims to be his wife of fifteen years? She owns the building. I've seen her there, but she didn't really pay attention to the people around her." He shook his head. "We're all kind of beneath her notice. Probably how Danny was able to live a double life so effectively with the mother of his children being in the same building."

"Evelyn was too busy trying to keep a roof over her family's head and food on the table to question him much. His actual wife couldn't imagine he'd have an affair with a woman she sees as second-class compared to both of them."

"Yep. I'm not sure what Danny's goal was, but my guess is he's lost both women."

"You heard from him?"

I barked out a laugh. "No. Doubt I will, even if he knew how to contact me. I figured you'd be the one he'd reach out to."

"No. Danny and I haven't seen eye to eye in several years. I thought he was just a workaholic. Until I found out Evie had been the one paying all the bills. Making sure the kids got to their extracurricular activities. She was basically a single mom with Danny poking his head in every now and then to say hello. You notice how Aneshya shrugged off not having her dad here after we all moved?"

"Yeah. They're not used to him being here, so they don't miss him in their lives that much." The more I learned about everything going on, the less I liked it.

"What about you?"

My dad glanced at me sharply. "What about me?"

"You got my pension. Death benefits. All my personal possessions. Why did you make it look like you'd sold this place? Why move to that apartment building?"

"I moved there to protect my family. Because, at the time, the memories here were too much." There was a pause as he cleared his throat before he continued. "And…" He scrubbed a hand over his face with a sigh. "Because Danny was going through money like hell wouldn't have it. After he took out all those loans on the house and property, once I got them all paid off with your death benefits, I told him I'd sold the house. That I was broke. All I had was my social security check. He didn't know about anything I got from you. I've been putting all that into savings for the kids. Figured they'd need something for college or whatever they wanted to do after high school. I keep the fridge and cupboards stocked with food. Evelyn pretends not to notice, but she always has me over for dinner and makes reheatable breakfasts and lunches for me. She also cleans my apartment when I'm not looking." He sounded and looked disgruntled, but I saw the affection he had for Evelyn. I figured he let her because my dad knew Evelyn wouldn't want him doing so much for her without her repaying him. Since she was on a limited budget, that was how she did it. "Hadn't expected you to have me listed as an actual dependent and not just a beneficiary, though. How'd you make that happen?"

"It wasn't easy, believe me. I had to pull some strings and threaten more than a few bureaucrats to make it happen. But when I heard you'd moved out of the house, I figured Danny was up to his old shit."

"Danny never stopped his old shit. I think he spends everything he makes. Well, that's assuming he even had some kind of job. He was pretty good at moving around the building without being seen where he wasn't supposed to be. My guess is he's mooching off his wife's bank account and either stays in the penthouse with her or in Evelyn's apartment. I doubt he's ever had a serious job."

"How the hell did he keep all this secret? I had the best people I know looking into you and never once did they turn up that Danny was married."

"Good Goddamn question. I lived next door to the kid for over a decade and had no fuckin' clue, Knox." Dad shook his head slightly. I knew the feeling, and I wasn't as close to Danny as our father was. "Makes me wonder what else he has going on."

"What happens now?" I asked the question, but I knew. No way Danny stayed away too long.

Dad crossed his hands over his chest. "Don't give a fuck. Figured we'll find out the second Danny turns up. And he will turn up."

"Wanting money."

"Oh, it won't be as obvious as that. He'll worm his way in, making everyone feel sorry for him. Like he's the victim who's being kept from his children. He'll apologize and tell Evelyn how much he loves her. He'll pretend to be involved with his kids, but all the while he'll be scheming and planning the next big thing. And siphoning Evelyn's bank account if she's not careful."

"What?" I barked out the question harsher than I'd meant to. I'd been going with the ebb and flow of the conversation, but I hadn't been expecting that.

"Oh, I think you heard me, Knox. Last time Danny spent any quality time with Evelyn, when he left to go on a ‘business trip,' she didn't have money to buy groceries. She spent three hours on the phone with the bank trying to figure out what had happened. There was a five-hundred-dollar ATM withdrawal she swore she didn't make. Her PIN number was used, so she couldn't get the money back. I'm positive it was Danny's doing."

"That fucker left her without a way to care for herself or her children? Is that what you're tellin' me?"

"Yeah, Knox. That's exactly what he did. Evie would never say, but I'm pretty sure that wasn't the first time. That's when I started keeping an eye on her food supply and making sure she was stocked."

"Danny takin' her money stops now."

"Yeah?" Dad turned to me, raising an eyebrow. "How you gonna enforce that?"

"By keepin' Danny away from her."

"Easier said than done. Asshole or not, Danny's still those kids' father."

I sighed. "Yeah. Huge-ass problem there." I had an idea about that, but I'd have to involve Grim Road even more than I already had. I suppose it was time to test Lemon's claim that we always took care of family.

Luke, Aneshya, and Effie were having a ball playing with the stuff Lemon and the girls brought over. Somewhere, she'd managed to score a set of Yard Darts that had to be at least forty years old. Lemon, Apple, and Cecilia were all sitting with Evelyn, chatting away and keeping a close eye on the kids playing with lethal weapons but otherwise didn't seem concerned.

Evelyn flicked her gaze in my direction before ducking her head. She glanced up at me a couple times before turning away and watching the kids again. All the while, the other women kept a running conversation going. Evelyn smiled and nodded in the appropriate places, but I could tell her heart wasn't in it. Every once in a while, her gaze would meet mine, but she never tried to maintain it.

"She's interested in you, Knox." My dad spoke softly. I glanced in his direction briefly to find him smiling.

"She's keeping an eye on the strange man who claims to be her lover's brother. She doesn't know me. She's afraid of me."

"She's afraid of liking you. I've seen her watching you when she thinks you're not looking."

"Probably because I look exactly like Danny, and it's freaking her out."

Dad snorted. "Only twice as big."

"You're proving my point, old man."

"Maybe. But that woman is still interested whether she thinks it's a good idea or not." Dad grabbed my shoulder and squeezed. "Look. I've gotten close to Evie over the years. She's a good woman. An even better mother. I'm not saying you should do anything you don't want to do, but I think you're interested in her too."

"Dad, I've known her for a solid week. Most of that I've spent watching from a distance. Besides, I have no idea how long I'll be able to be in her life. I'm still a soldier. I have to leave the country when we have a job. Which is all something I can't talk about. But she'd be trading one absent man for another, and I'd never do that to her."

"So? Quit. Simple."

"Dad --"

"I'm serious, Knox. I have no idea what you've been doing the last fourteen years, but you're back now. We're all your family, Evie included. A man --"

"-- takes care of his family." I repeated the words with him. It was something Dad had drilled into me and Danny growing up. I'd taken it to heart. My brother… hadn't. "I get it, Dad. But there are things you don't know that I can't explain. I'm back now. But I'm not exactly in a position to quit. When I disappeared, when I died, that put me in the lifer category with what I do. I'm only here now because we've had some changes recently in our… dynamics. I had to cut ties with you and Danny, but I did my best to make sure you had everything you needed."

"Did you know about Evelyn?"

I winced and shrugged. "I knew of her. Knew she was living with Danny and that they had two kids. Didn't want to look too closely at anyone because it only made me want to come home that much more." I turned to meet my dad's gaze head-on. "I'm sorry I wasn't there when Mom died."

"I basically lost you and Elinor at the same time." I'd never seen my dad show strong emotion before. Now, I'd seen it twice. Anger at my brother when he backhanded the younger man at the hospital. Now, a deep, abiding sorrow. His eyes glistened, but he didn't let the tears fall, blinking them back. "We both knew why you went into the military. You sent us most of your pay every month. You knew Danny was bleeding us dry, and you fixed the problem the best way you knew how."

"No, I didn't. Shoulda killed him. That might have pissed off Mom, but it would have kept him from taking advantage of you guys."

"Your mother would never have forgiven you if you had." He gave me a steady look. Mom might not have, but he would've.

I snorted. "Yeah, she would've. Maybe not for a long time, but she would've."

"After she turned you into the authorities herself? Sure." Dad grinned. "She'd have even come to visit you in prison every weekend and Thanksgiving, Christmas, and maybe even Easter."

"Easter is always on a weekend."

Dad shrugged. "Easter too, then."

We held each other's gaze for several seconds before we both broke down and chuckled. Yeah. Mom would have forgiven me, but she'd have seen to it I paid for my crimes. And never looked at me the same way again. Just like with Danny. We might do things she morally objected to with everything in her being, but we were still her sons.

"Elinor would be proud of the man you've become, Knox." He grinned. "She'd call you Denver, though. Not Knox."

"Why the fuck did she name me after a fuckin' city in Colorado?"

Dad really did laugh then. "She didn't and you know it."

"I never liked her brother, you know."

"She didn't either."

"Then why --"

"Because he was her baby brother. She'd promised him when she and I got married that she'd name her firstborn after him."

"And Mom never went back on her word."

"Exactly."

I turned back to the yard. And Evelyn. She was so beautiful and caring I couldn't wrap my mind around how my brother had treated her so badly. Or why she'd put up with him treating her that way.

Dad and I stood in companionable silence for a long time. Finally, I spoke, not looking at my father. "She'd have called me Knox."

"She'd have called you Knox."