Fathers and Sons (Harlequin Super Romance) Read Free Page B

body. Those fine bones came, no doubt, from his mother, good old Melba, she of the size-two dresses and the size-nothing shoes. But he had his father’s sapphire eyes. Suddenly Kate wanted to reach across the table and hug him.
    She was so startled by her impulse that she dropped her pen under the table in all the muck and had to bend over to get it. Under the table, Jason’s feet in their expensive running shoes—without either socks or laces for fear of a suicide attempt in his cell—were drumming in tiny dance patterns.
    When she had rearranged herself, she said, “All right, Jason, let’s get down to it. I’m asking you what happened. You’re sitting in jail without your shoelaces and obviously without a shower and accused of rape and murder. Unless this is an everyday occurrence in your life, I imagine you’d be anxious to tell me why you’re here.”
    “I didn’t do it.”
    No fear. Jason Canfield was stunned and angry, but he wasn’t afraid.
    “Okay. So who did?”
    He jerked in his chair and looked away. “How the hell should I know?”
    “All right,” Arnold said soothingly. “Since you have refused to give a statement to the authorities—good thinking, by the way...”
    “I watch ‘Homicide’ and ’N.Y.P.D. Blue,’” Jason said. “I know I’m not supposed to say squat to anybody without my lawyer.”
    “Thank God for television,” Arnold breathed. “We are, however, your lawyers, and we are now here. So take it from the top. What happened?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “All right,” Arnold said smoothly. “But according to witnesses, you did have a date with Waneath Talley Saturday night.”
    “Sure. I mean I’m home on Thanksgiving vacation, right? And Waneath and I have been dating since high school, right? So why wouldn’t I have a date with her? What’s the biggie?”
    “No biggie,” Kate said, “except that you had a screaming fight in front of some juke joint that was overheard by half the town. Then you drove off together still fighting, and nobody saw Waneath until her body was discovered by the side of the road the following morning.”
    “Well, somebody sure saw her after I did.”
    “Did you have sex?”
    “That’s none of your business.”
    Kate leaned back in her chair. She was becoming deeply ticked off at her client. Scratch that—her firm’s client. Stubborn as a mule. Just like his daddy. Must be something in the genes.
    At the thought of David, who was probably storming up and down the hall outside, she felt a flutter in her stomach. Sooner or later she’d have to face him again. Probably after she’d failed to secure bail for this truculent little jerk in front of her. She had a history of failure when it came to David. History did tend to repeat itself.
    “All right,” she said quietly. “I assume this means that you really want to spend the next twenty-five years of your life in Parchman Penitentiary which, from everything I hear, is the garden spot of the universe. Assuming they don’t execute you, that is.”
    “I didn’t do anything!” Jason wailed. And now there was fear. His face broke out in a sheen of sweat. His hands stopped playing Mozart and clenched tight to keep them from trembling. “She was alive when I left her.”
    “After you’d made love?”
    “Yes. Okay, yes.”
    “Where?”
    “In the back seat of my car, where else?” He’d recovered some of his truculence, but now Kate knew that it was an act. He really was a scared kid. With David’s eyes.
    “Always worked for me,” Arnold said.
    Kate glanced over at him in surprise. She couldn’t conceive of an Arnold young enough and wild enough to make love in the back seat of a car. He caught her glance, shrugged and grinned.
    “The D.A. is saying you raped her.”
    “Get real. I mean, we’d been messing around since the tenth grade. Why would I suddenly have to rape her? They got semen?”
    “You leave any?”
    “Nah. Always use a condom. Listen, I go to