Bound by Honor Read Free Page A

barely six months later. He was stuck with Beverly the Beauty.”
    â€œHow are my parents?” Sally asked. It was the first time she’d mentioned either of her parents in a long while, She’d lost touch with them since the divorce that had shattered her life.
    â€œYour father spends most of his time at work while Beverly goes the party route every night and spends every penny he makes. Your mother is separated from her second husband and living in Nassau.” Jessica shifted on the bed. “You don’t ever hear from your parents, do you?”
    â€œI don’t resent them as much as I did. But I never felt that they loved me,” she said abruptly. “That’s why I felt it was better we went our separate ways.”
    â€œThey were children when they married and had you,” the other woman said. “Not really mature enough for the responsibility. They resented it, too. That’s why you spent so much time with me during the first five years you were alive.” Jessica smiled. “I hated it when you went back home.”
    â€œWhy did you and Hank wait so long to have a child of your own?” Sally asked.
    Jessica flushed. “It wasn’t…convenient, with Hank overseas so much. Did you get that tire replaced?” she added, almost as if she were desperate to change the subject.
    â€œYou and Mr. Scott!” Sally exploded, diverted. “How did you know it was bald?”
    â€œBecause Eb phoned me before you got home and told me to remind you to get it replaced,” Jessica chuckled.
    â€œI suppose he has a cell phone in his truck.”
    â€œAmong other things,” Jessica replied with a smile. “He isn’t like the men you knew in college or even when you started teaching. Eb is an alpha male,” she said quietly. “He isn’t politically correct, and he doesn’t even pretend to conform. In some ways, he’s very old-fashioned.”
    â€œI don’t feel that way about him anymore,” Sally said firmly.
    â€œI’m sorry,” Jessica replied gently. “He’s been alone most of his life. He needs to be loved.”
    Sally picked at a cuticle, chipping the clear varnish on her short, neat fingernails. “Does he have family?”
    â€œNot anymore. His mother died when he was very young, and his father was career military. He grew up in the army, you might say. His father was not a gentle sort of man. He died in combat when Eb was in his twenties. There wasn’t any other family.”
    â€œYou said once that you always saw Ebenezer with beautiful women at social events,” Sally recalled with a touch of envy.
    â€œHe pays for dressing, and he attracts women. But he’s careful about his infrequent liaisons. He told me once that he guessed he’d never find a woman who could share the life he leads. He still has enemies who’d like to see him dead,” she added.
    â€œLike this drug lord?”
    â€œYes. Manuel Lopez is a law unto himself. He has millions, and he owns politicians, law enforcement people, even judges,” Jessica said irritably. “That’s why we were never able to shut him down. Then I was told that a confidant of his wanted to give me information, names and documents that would warrant arresting Lopez on charges of drug trafficking. But I wasn’t careful enough. I overlooked one little thing, and Lopez’s attorneys used it in a petition for a retrial. They got him out. He’s on the loose pending retrial and out for vengeance against his comrade. He’ll do anything to get the name of the person who sold him out. Anything at all.”
    Sally let her breath out through pursed lips. “So we’re all under the gun.”
    â€œExactly. I used to be a crack shot, but without my vision, I’m useless. Eb will have a plan by tomorrow.” Her face was solemn as she stared in the general direction of her niece’s voice.