“No, I . . .” He turned in the seat and stared at Brett. “Are you Brett Crawford? The Brett Crawford?”
“I am Brett Crawford—not sure how the the got tagged on there, but yes.” Brett appeared to be studying the boy. “Have we met?”
“No. I mean, No, sir. But I go to Regional High. Everyone knows about Brett Crawford. I mean, you. My coach—Coach Riley—has talked about you.”
“Jason Riley’s an old friend of mine.”
“He told us about how you were all-state football in your junior and senior years and got a full scholarship to Ohio State to play ’cause you were the best linebacker in New England. And you got drafted by the pros. You played for Seattle, but he said everyone was hoping you’d go to the Patriots.”
Brett smiled. “Yeah, especially my dad.”
“Your picture’s in the glass case in the school lobby,” Dylan said. He looked as if he was torn between terror and hero worship. For those few seconds, hero worship won. Then the gravity of his situation brought the fear back to his eyes.
“I talked to Coach Riley tonight.” Brett kept his voice low and steady.
“Oh, no. You told him . . . oh, no.” Dylan covered his face with his hands, and his shoulders began to shake. “He’s going to throw me off the team. I’ll get kicked out of school.”
Brett grabbed one of the folding chairs from the children’s section and opened it so he could sit between Dylan and the door. Liddy didn’t think Dylan was going to run, but Brett was apparently not willing to take that chance.
Liddy handed a box of tissues to Dylan.
“Take a minute, Dylan,” Brett said softly.
Dylan nodded.
“So I want to tell you what Coach Riley told me tonight.” Brett leaned one arm on the desk and turned his body toward Dylan in a friendly, nonthreatening way. “He told me you were the best third baseman he’s ever coached, and you’ve been scouted by several top colleges as well as a few pro teams. He also said you were going to graduate at the top of your class. Probably number two. Congratulations on all that.”
“Thanks,” Dylan mumbled. “None of that’s going to mean anything if I have a record for breaking and entering.”
“Well, technically, you didn’t break in,” Liddy pointed out.
“I stayed upstairs,” he said, though he knew she’d already figured that out and had shared the information with the chief. “But honestly, I wasn’t going to do anything bad. I just needed a safe place to stay.”
“Okay, back up.” Liddy held up both hands, palms out, gesturing for him to stop there. “Take a deep breath—then tell us how that came about.”
One deep breath later, he began. “My mom and dad went to prison over the summer. They and my father’s brother robbed a liquor store, and my uncle shot someone, and they all went to prison for a long time.” His face red with shame, he nervously glanced first at Brett, then Liddy, as if waiting for judgment. When none came, he continued. “I couldn’t pay the rent on the apartment, but even if I could, I wouldn’t have stayed there. Everyone knows what my parents did. I don’t want to go into foster care, so I made up a story about my grandmother wanting me to come and live with her. I forged her name on the papers they sent home from school.”
“Margaret Linden.” Liddy tossed the name out. “Is that really your grandmother’s name?”
He nodded.
“But she doesn’t live in Wyndham Beach,” Liddy said.
“No, ma’am. She lives in New Hampshire,” he admitted. “But I didn’t want to go live with her because I didn’t want to leave school. I’m doing really well, and I need scholarships, or I won’t be able to go to college.”
“You could go right to the pros,” Brett pointed out.
Dylan shook his head. “My dad never graduated from high school, so he could never get a good job because he didn’t have an education.” He shook his head again. “No way am I not getting a degree. I don’t know everything, but I know you can’t bet on playing for a pro team. Too many things can happen.”
He looked at Brett. “You played ball for a while, but then you got hurt, and you couldn’t play anymore. It can happen to anyone. There’s no guarantee I’d even make it in the pros. I need to go to college. Coach Riley said I could get enough financial aid to go to a big-time school.” Tears filled his eyes again. “Now I’ll be lucky to graduate from Regional.”
“Why would you say that?”
“Aren’t you going to put me in juvie?”
Brett ignored the question. “Finish your story. How you ended up homeless and sleeping in the attic of Mrs. Bryant’s bookshop.”
“I needed a place to stay. I’d been at the library to work on a paper, and it was late by the time I finished. I had to leave, and I walked down to the marina, but there were people milling around outside. People from the restaurant.”
“Mimi’s,” Liddy said.
“Whatever. So I couldn’t hang around there, and I didn’t know what to do. The harbor is right there, and I thought maybe I should just . . .” He stopped and sniffed.
Liddy knew exactly what he’d thought about doing, and it sent a fireball to her heart and ice up her spine.
“Don’t ever,” she whispered. “Don’t ever think that. Find someone to talk to. There are people who care about you. You will find someone who’ll help, I promise you. Nothing is ever so absolute you can’t find a way out. At the time it might seem like the easy way, but there’s no coming back, Dylan. It’s one and done. No college. No baseball.”
Brett reached across the desk and squeezed her hand. An old friend, he’d been the one Liddy had called after they’d found Jess. He knew what she was thinking.
“I know. Going away for college, playing baseball and maybe making it to the pros someday—that’s what’s been keeping me going.” He looked at Brett as if he wanted to plead with him to let him go, but he knew that wasn’t going to happen.
“Go on, Dylan.” Brett gave Liddy’s hand another squeeze before releasing it.
“So anyway, I saw the back door of this place was open.” Dylan’s eyes were fixed on the floor.
“That must have been when we were painting, before we opened,” Liddy said.
Dylan nodded. “There was a woman in here painting. She works here now.”
“Grace,” Liddy said.
“Yeah. That’s what I’ve heard people call her. Anyway, I peeked inside, and the steps were right there, so I ran up to the top floor. It was nice and quiet and safe, so I stayed up there that night. Next day I hopped the bus to school at the corner. I’d taken some blankets when I left the apartment and stashed them in my locker, so after school, I put them in my backpack and brought them here. I took them upstairs to make a bed on the floor.”
“I have about a million questions. Like, how are you doing laundry and how are you eating?” She remembered the pizza and pushed the box toward him. “I bought this to lure you down here, so you might as well eat it.”
“’Cause you don’t like pepperoni.” He looked across the desk and almost smiled. “I heard Grace say it.”