on the side window in the living room.
No you won’t. He wouldn’t break anything he’d have to fix, because he never fixed anything.
Lexi snuck into the kitchen, praying Ben would stay where he was. He’d already tried the back door, but she’d gotten there before him. She was always faster than Fat Ben. If she could get to the garage without him seeing, she’d call Jake and tell him to meet her at Echo Park. Moving like a cat, with no more sound than Pansy’s paws made on grass, she grabbed her backpack off the table and darted out the door. Once outside, she ran like a track star, down the sidewalk and to the alley. The garage door was wide open.
Forcing her fingers not to shake, she punched in Jake’s number. He sounded more scared than she was when he answered. “Lex, you okay? Are the police there?”
“Not yet. I got another idea. Meet me by the lion at Echo.”
“No, Lex. Stay put until—”
“I’m on my way.” She tossed the phone behind a pile of flowerpots. Another one of Ben’s get-rich-quick schemes—“Aloe plants. They’ll sell like hotcakes.” She dumped her shoes and clothes behind the garbage cans and set her open pack on the floor. “Get in.”
Pansy obeyed. She loved bike rides. Weird cat. She didn’t know they were riding for her life. Lexi kissed the silky place between Pansy’s ears. “You’ll be okay.”
She was always faster than Fat Ben.
He didn’t have what it took to be a dad.
Jake’s hand cramped on the shift knob. Deciding at the last second not to challenge the grace of the yellow light, he mashed the brake pedal. His truck tires hit the crosswalk as the light changed.
Red lights. That’s what his life had turned into since his sister died. One long, exasperating stoplight after another. Abigail, if you’re looking down on all this, you gotta know I’m trying. But she couldn’t be watching. Tears weren’t allowed up there.
He stared at the Wendy’s sign. You CAN’T FAKE REAL, it said. The slogan resonated in a deep place inside him. If only people came with labels declaring them real or artificial. His brother-in-law should have come with a warning on his bloated side: People-using, cat-hating, toxic blob of humanity. Approach with caution.
Or don’t approach at all. He’d tried to warn Abby, but she was lonely and exhausted from being both parents to two spitfire kids after their dad bailed. He’d tried to warn her about that first one, too: immature, self-absorbed, irresponsible jerk. “I sure know how to pick ’em,” she’d said the first time she landed in the hospital with a bleeding ulcer.
The red eye blinked green and he sped into town, keeping the needle a safe seven over the speed limit. He turned right into Echo Park and put the truck in neutral. He jumped out and sprinted over to the drinking fountain—a huge, openmouthed yellow lion. Water squirted from its tonsils when a little girl who looked to be about eight turned the handle.
If Lexi were still that age, he’d know how to deal with her. The little girl ran off and he leaned on the lion’s mane, remembering the scary thrill of sticking his head in that immense mouth when he was a kid. He’d never been too sure the thing wouldn’t come alive.
Shading his eyes, he scanned the sidewalk along Milwaukee Avenue until he saw her. Pedaling her little pink bike over the tracks and across the bridge with all she had in her, blond hair flapping on bare shoulders. She needed a bigger bike. So did Adam. They needed a lot of things he was ready, willing, but not able to provide. He waved and she smiled. Man, the girl was resilient.
“Jake! You gotta take Pansy.” She skidded to a stop on the blacktop, laid the bike down, and ran up the bank to him. “Ben threw her and kicked her and…” Skinny arms wrapped around his chest and he hugged her, and the cat.
“Did Ben follow you?”
“Are you kidding? He’s too slow.”
And you’re too cocky. His greatest fear was that someday she wouldn’t outmaneuver Ben Madsen’s temper. “Tell me what happened.” He led her to a park bench facing the playground. She took off the backpack and sat down with it on her lap. Jake waited while she caught her breath.
“Ben was sleeping on the couch when I got home from track.” The cat’s head stuck out through an opening under the flap, and she nuzzled her