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Luckily, his appointed attorney looked barely old enough to graduate law school, which Talon really liked. Young meant hungry to win cases. Less likely to be jaded and let things slide.
It didn’t take long for Evan to confirm what Talon suspected, even considering the time for Evan to answer most questions by writing the answers down. From the couple of incident reports Gael had unearthed for him concerning the store’s owner, Bennie Simpson had likely been beating his wife for years. Simpson had panicked when another customer had seen him grab Evan by the throat when he’d caught him slipping a doughnut into his pocket, and the customer had called the cops. Bennie had said Evan had assaulted his wife and he’d come into the store from the back room just in time to see it happen. He had to cover up his violent reaction and his wife’s fresh bruises were very convenient.
The story was so full of holes, it should have been laughed at and investigated, but Evan had a record and a scar.
So that was it.
Evan had emergency surgery scheduled for the next day as soon as the surgical team confirmed the presence of the tumor. The whole team was in the waiting room to hear the doc report they had gotten the whole tumor. Evan would need speech therapy, and he might remain deaf in one ear, but he was going to be okay. It took one hearing for a judge to reduce Evan’s sentence to time served and he was allowed to move into foster care.
And become family.
Talon visited him often, and so did Charles. Pete Docherty had promised him a bed as soon as the new wing was finished, but at the moment he was in a group foster home nearby. It wasn’t ideal since he was the only enhanced child, but he was managing.
Chapter Five
Three weeks after Elijah came home from the hospital, Talon and Finn were allowed to take all three older kids out for the day. Talon and Finn had both agreed they needed to concentrate on them first, and despite what Finn worried about, he wanted them to be a family, and never wanted the older ones to think they were just a means to an end. Asa had seemed ecstatic when he’d found out they had applied to be their foster parents. Henry hadn’t really commented, and Elijah had been silent other than agreeing when he’d been asked officially.
Finn completely understood. You couldn’t put a band-aid on years of disappointment and while Elijah seemed to cautiously trust them, he knew it was something that could take years. They had their fourth visit with Zuri scheduled for tomorrow, Sunday, so it would be a busy weekend.
They picked Elijah up from the group home first and Finn groaned when he saw his black eye. “What happened?”
“This fuckwit I know from school called Asa a—never mind,” Elijah muttered and nearly threw himself into the back of the car.
Finn didn’t ask for specifics, but knew it would have hurt. He also knew the conversation about Elijah using his fists to settle an argument was going to have to happen, but he gleefully decided Talon could handle that one. After all, co-parenting, right? He would do the night feeds with Zuri because that had suddenly become a thing again. Apparently, Zuri had decided she didn’t need anything other than an hour’s nap, her slightly frazzled foster-mom had told them last week.
Finn had already decided to ask for some leave if,when, they brought the kids home. They would need some time together in the first few days. Finn wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans. This was their first unsupervised visit. They’d also had to take a first-aid course supplemental to their regular one, because they’d found out Henry occasionally had seizures. It didn’t seem to happen often, and the doctors were investigating, but it meant no unsupervised bath time, for starters. Conscious of what Elijah had gone through, and while they didn’t think Clive had tried anything with Henry, they made sure there was going to be a shower for the boys to use. They couldn’t know for sure how much Henry had been affected yet, because Henry barely spoke, even to Elijah and Asa. It was hardly surprising, even without the threat of possible abuse, so that was another reason they were all treading very carefully.
Talon and Finn had talked about this day out a million times and changed their minds just as many, but in the end, they’d decided to go to Tampa Zoo, and meet Vance, Sam, Luis, Kai and Liam there. If their three showed any signs of getting overwhelmed they’d agreed on a code word with Vance for leaving.
Vance being Vance had called it Operation Rhinoceros since there was a new baby Rhino at the zoo, and they were all hoping to catch a glimpse.
The introduction with the boys didn’t go as smoothly as Finn had hoped because despite Liam being the peacekeeper, Kai and Elijah seemed to instantly dislike each other.
Vance and Finn sat on the grass with Elijah and Kai while the others went to get ice-cream. The two hadn’t stopped trying to one-up each other and Finn had told them if they didn’t stop it, the others would get ice-cream and they wouldn’t. Too late, Finn remembered that denying food to Elijah didn’t work. In fact, it might be a trigger, and he could have kicked himself. Vance took one look and lay back, closing his eyes, clearly leaving it to Finn.
Kai announced he was going to pee and since the restrooms were literally in front of them, Finn could hardly insist on accompanying him.
Vance opened his eyes though and kept watch. Finn could see the entrance and exit from where he was and told himself to calm down. After a moment, Elijah got up and followed him in. Finn practically wrung his hands. “Do you think I should follow him?” He didn’t want them to fight, and despite all the police forces doing their best, Clive Reynolds still hadn’t been caught. Finn kept waiting for him to appear. Something told him they hadn’t heard the last of him.
“Give it a minute,” Vance said evenly. Finn counted seconds in his head and just when he couldn’t stand it any longer, a boy Finn hadn’t seen before ran out of the entrance screaming for his dad, saying another boy had hit him.
Finn and Vance were on their feet instantly and running to the entrance. Elijah was standing protectively over Kai while a man was talking to them. He looked up as they walked in, and smiled, even though he took a long, assessing look at Vance. “This your son?”
“Yes,” Finn said distinctly and went to stand next to Elijah, giving him all his attention. “Are you okay?” Elijah didn’t reply but Finn’s heart sank at the defeated look in his eyes. The look that told Finn things were going to go south.
Vance looked Kai over and examined the red mark on his cheek. The man coughed and held out his hand—rather gutsily, in Finn’s opinion—to Vance. “I was in the stall and heard the boy that ran out call your son,” he nodded to Kai, “something rather unpleasant.”
“Retard,” Kai mumbled. Finn winced, knowing Kai’s lack of schooling was a very sore subject.
“Your son stayed remarkably calm and tried to ignore them.” Finn’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. Liam must be having a greater effect on him than he’d realized. “But at the same time, as I came out I saw the bully push your son into the mirror.” He gestured to Elijah. “His brother saw what happened and naturally defended him.” The man smiled at Elijah. “I teach boxing. You showed remarkable restraint even though you could have wiped the floor with him, and you’re light on your feet. You ever want to pay a visit to Ike’s Gym, we’re on Martin Luther King and North 26thstreet. Ask for Jacko.”
Kai shuffled his feet and glanced at Elijah. It was clear they both wanted to go. It was also quite telling that neither boy had corrected the man about them being brothers, even though they looked nothing like each other. Elijah took the card that the man offered him, glanced at Kai, then back at Jacko. “Can Kai come?”
Finn could have burst into tears right that moment. Who knew all it took was a common enemy for Elijah’s protective instincts to kick in?
When they’d all seen what they wanted to at the zoo, Finn called a halt because he didn’t want them getting overtired, Henry especially. When they were all in the car and driving home, Elijah leaned forward. He had his seatbelt on but clearly wanted to ask a question. Talon turned the radio down.
“Are we going back now?”
