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Chapter 30
SHANE
Ah, the lovely Kealy. Poor thing hightailed it out of Rand’s like her ass was on fire or something.
I’d wanted to chase after her. So had Marlon and Rand. But Cross—maybe because he was a father, I don’t really know—insisted we let her go. She had to ‘do her thing’, as he put it.
Americans have the strangest sayings.
I didn’t know what would happen with our girl. I mean, she said she wanted out.
But was that what she really wanted? It was hard for me to fathom running away from love. It seemed there was so little of it in the world that when it came your way, you needed to cherish it like a baby.
But, each to his—or her—own. I’d gotten some news earlier that day that had nearly pushed thoughts of Kealy from my mind.
Nearly, but not completely.
I’d finished a photo shoot just in time to head down to the community center for the day’s basketball practice. There were times I didn’t feel like making the trek, but the minute I saw those kids’ faces, my energy came rushing back, and the hour we had together flew by.
“Mr. Mooney!” one of the more enthusiastic kids yelled as I entered the gym. The kids loved the center so much, and our team, that they often came early and just hung out while they waited for practice time. “Mrs. Hill needs to see you in the office,” he added.
“Okay, guys,” I said to a chorus of oooh, Mr. Mooney’s in trouble, “start with your warm up drill. I’ll be right back.” I jogged across the gym floor to the office of the director, a motherly woman I’d come to adore.
“Shane,” she said, pointing to a chair, “how are you, honey?”
“I’m well, I am. And how’s my favorite girl?” I asked.
She threw her head back and laughed loudly enough to shake the room. I loved that about her.
“I’m better now that you’re here,” she laughed.
“The kids told me you wanted to see me?”
Her smiling face turned serious, and she nodded, flipping through some papers on her desk. She pulled a business card from under the mess on her desk and thrust it at me.
New York Police Department
“What do they want?” I asked, turning it over in my fingers.
She folded her hands onto her desk. “Honey, it looks like they caught the guys who attacked you.”
For a moment, the room spun, and I grabbed onto the arms of the chair I’d sat in. Hold on, buddy. My mouth went dry, as the day of the mugging came rushing back to me like it had just happened.
“Really?” I said, swallowing hard.
“Call this detective. Looks like they are bringing your guys to justice.” She looked at me, and for a moment, I could see the tired in her eyes. It reminded me of the tired in my mother’s eyes—the look of a woman who does for everyone else before she thinks of herself.
I looked the card over and stuck it in my back pocket.
“I’ll call him after practice. The kids are waiting,” I said.
“Okay, baby. I hope this isn’t throwing you off. It’s a good thing, you know. They won’t be able to do this to anybody else.”
I had to admit, I went through basketball practice with the kids like a robot on autopilot. Mrs. Hill’s words had thrown me off, not that it was her intention. They would have thrown anyone off. As much as I loved the kids, waiting one more hour before I could get in touch with the detectives was like torture.
When they were finally gone, and I’d spent as little time chatting with the parents as was possible without being rude—especially toward some of the moms who liked to make it abundantly clear that they were single and available. I climbed to the highest row in the bleachers and dialed the detective who’d been working on my case since the attack happened.
He answered after one ring.
“Hi, it’s Shane Mooney. You came by the community center earlier today?”
“Right, Mr. Mooney. Thank you for getting back to me so fast. I have some good news for ya. Turns out we got all the guys who attacked you. Your beating was caught on video camera as you know, and it just took us a bit of time to get someone in the neighborhood to tell us where the find the young men. They’re all in custody now.”
Holy shit.
“Geez. I don’t know what to say. I thought news like this would feel like a relief but I am just kind of numb,” I said.
“That’s to be expected, Mr. Mooney. You went through a terrible thing.”
I took a deep breath. “What are the next steps?”
“You need to come in and ID the guys.”
“Okay,” I said. I was short on words, unusual for me.
“Mr. Mooney, this is very positive. Those were bad young men, and hopefully they’ll be put away for a long time. They don’t deserve to be on the street.”
“Right. Thank you, Officer.”
I’d been waiting for that moment for so long that it was almost a let down. Actually, it was a let down. I’d expected to feel a certain level of satisfaction, on a revenge sort of scale. But instead, I just felt sad. The kids who’d attacked me, well, their lives were essentially over.
But one positive thing I could do was make sure none of the kids on my basketball team ever turned to that type of crime.
That’s why I was doing the coaching—and I hadn’t even realized it. Basketball, and those beautiful ten-year-olds’ faces, were healing me.
I wasn’t doing shit for them. They were doing it all for me.
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