Cal stopped at the window and flicked back the drape before turning to pace again. His caged energy filled the small, austere bedroom and seemed to creep inside her as well.
“Rod wants favors only a circuit court judge can grant,” he answered. “Nothing you need to worry about.”
“Don’t patronize me. And you’ll be sorry—my father isn’t corrupt.”
Judge Adair was notorious for speaking out and standing up against graft scandal and the overwhelming number of gang-led rackets in Chicago.
“Believe what you want.” Cal fished inside his breast pocket for his cigarette case. “You’ve been hiding in the attic of that house too long to know the truth about your pop.”
He lit his cigarette, and a cloud of white smoke billowed in front of his face. Fern made her hands into fists.
“You’re wrong.” Her voice trembled.
“No, I’m not.”
She gathered a breath and released her fists. She hated herself in that moment. Her father was a decent, upstanding man. He’d been appointed as a judge more than a dozen years ago and had a sterling reputation in the courts. No one doubted his integrity, least of all Fern.
Until right then.
Until hearing the bored confidence of this criminal’s tone.
She hiked her chin, trying to look as though she could not care less. “And you think he can be bought using lurid photographs of me?” Laughter unexpectedly slipped up her throat. “Maybe he’llwantthem in the papers. Maybe then my mother’s ridiculous dinners will be overrun with potential suitors.”
She slapped a hand over her mouth, smothering her laughter. This wasn’t funny, not at all. Cal certainly wasn’t smiling.
“If those pictures reach the newsroom of theAmerican, they’ll run for days, front page,” he said.
Her irrational amusement floundered. The soggy, heavy memories of the last few hours flooded back. He was right. The papers would milk every last sensational drop out of those pictures, with their rabid reporters writing whatever sob story they could about her to attract sales. From there, her father—the whole family—would be tainted. Linked with bootleggers, criminals, vice. A shadow would be cast over the judge’s reputation. Fern touched the side of her still-aching head. Her hair had come loose. Her fingers trembled as they searched the strands for stray pins and combs.
“That photographer was waiting on the off chance that you could convince me to come back here with you willingly, wasn’t he?”
He watched Fern silently as she shook out the pins and combs, her hair falling in unkempt coils around her shoulders. Her hands shook too severely right then to manage restyling it, so she gathered the hair accessoriesin her palm. Her head ached as it struggled to piece together things that didn’t make sense. Was he supposed to have charmed her at dinner? Seduced her into leaving with him?
“But you didn’t. You didn’t even try,” she said aloud as the bits and pieces arranged themselves in her throbbing head. “You pushed me away.”
He’d all but told her to shove off. Either because he disagreed with his brother’s plan and had another of his own, or because he’d taken a good look at Fern and…
Shame burned her cheeks. Then, sick anger. What did she care what this horrible man thought? He’d shucked her out of her dress and positioned her scantily clad body in God only knew what awful ways.
“I want to go home.”
Fern expected him to say no, that Rodney wanted her to stay here. To her surprise, Cal nodded tightly, his hands still in his pants pockets. He went for the door. Her numb feet stumbled after him. She didn’t notice that he’d stopped and turned until she nearly collided with him. His dark eyes, a few shades lighter than his brother’s, were fixed on her.
“If Rodney ever shows at your place, don’t go anywhere with him.” Cal’s lips hardly moved. A rustle of blankets would have been louder. “He’s unpredictable. I try to keep an eye on him, but…” Cal’s eyes drifted to her hips and waist. “When he wants something, I can’t always stop him.”
A spring of heat opened in the center of Fern’s chest. It climbed her neck and squeezed, and short on air, she just nodded.
Cal stood aside for her to exit first, just like a gentleman might. She knew better, however.
There were no gentlemen under this roof.
On the quiet drive back to South Woodlawn, Fern wedged herself as close to the passenger side door as possible. This auto was different from the one Francis had been driving. It was a light-colored Roadster, the single seat upholstered in soft cloth. She wondered why Cal hadn’t driven it to the dinner earlier, but she also didn’t care enough to ask.
The wide expanse of seat between them helped fuel the silence. He didn’t attempt conversation, either. When he pulled along the curb across from Fern’s home, the moonlight glinted off the darkened windows of the house. She’d been so anxious to get home, certain that her parents were pacing the halls, wondering where she’d gone. Her father might have even phoned his friends on the police force. But the house looked asleep. Unbothered and uncaring. For now.
The photographs.Fern cringed, imagining what they would look like. A sick twist cinched her stomach.
Cal slouched in his seat, fingers tapping the steering wheel. “I shouldn’t sit out here much longer.”
