Page 55 of Heart of a Hero

“I do like her. Very much.”

“Then… don’t you want her around us? Me and Grandpa?”

It hit Mark how the situation looked to his son—a woman he liked but hadn’t had around Benji other than a quick introduction after the running practice. “I do want you to spend time with her. She and her girls. It’s just that things are difficult now. I have a lot of work, and she’s involved in work, and…” His words died out, not knowing how to explain more to a ten-year-old.

“Do you think she wants to meet me?”

He dipped his head to hold his son’s gaze. “I know she does. Unfortunately, a case I was involved with also affected her work, and we haven’t spent time together this week.”

“Once you solve the case, then we can meet? I really like Laura and Olivia when they say ‘hi’ at practice. The other boys think I’m cool to know the older girls.”

Benji’s voice gave evidence to how much he wanted to spend time with Karen and the girls.God knows, I also want to.Seeing the anxious expression on Benji’s face, Mark was filled with determination. “As soon as we can, we’ll figure out a time to get us all together. Okay?”

Benji’s face transformed into a huge smile. “Good!” He slid down under the covers and closed his eyes with a smile still on his face.

Mark’s heart squeezed in his chest with the desire to give his son something he wanted so badly. After his dad had gone to bed, Mark pulled his phone from his pocket and remembered his conversation with Colt today. Since he was no longer on the burglary case, at least for now, there was no impediment to dating Karen.

“Don’t let a good woman like Karen get away because of this case. Brad will work it with Sam, and you’ll work on your other cases with Aaron when Brad needs to be involved in the burglaries. It’s not like there isn’t enough work to go around,” Colt said.

Quickly dialing, he hoped she would answer. After one ring, she picked up, and he breathed a sigh of relief that she wasn’t still ghosting him.

“Hey, Mark.”

Her voice was soft but with no emotion he could define. Wincing, he asked, “Hey. Is this a bad time?”

“No. The girls are watching TV before heading to bed. It’s some historical mini-series that appears to be all the rage. I watched some just to make sure it was appropriate.”

“Was it?” he asked, attempting humor but not knowing how it would be reciprocated.

She chuckled, and he loved the sound, grateful to have it back in his life. “I’m not certain I know what is appropriate anymore. Olivia has her own interests, but a part of being twelve wants to desperately do whatever her fourteen-year-old sister is doing. The show had kissing and indicated more, but no nudity. God, I can’t believe how grown-up the girls are, yet I still want to protect them from growing up too soon.” She groaned. “And here I am blabbing.”

“No, don’t stop. I love hearing about you and the girls.” He didn’t care if that made him sound desperate—he fucking was and didn’t mind her knowing it.

“Tell me about your day.”

Encouraged that she asked about him, he let out a soft sigh of relief and decided to cut to the heart of their problem. “I talked to Colt. He said that with me not being on the burglary case, there is no reason we can’t date.”

She hesitated. “It still feels weird, Mark. I still feel like I’m a suspect, and you’ll be watching everything I say.”

The heaviness that had lifted off his chest was now pressing again. “I admit this is uncharted territory for me,” he admitted. “In fact, all of this is. You’re the first woman I’ve been in a relationship with, and I don’t want this to stop. I’ve been happier with you in my life over the last couple of weeks than in a long time. I had convinced myself that if all I had from here on out were Benji, that would be fine. But just being with you has made me feel like there’s more out there in life for me.”

There was a moment of silence, and she spoke softly. “Me too. That’s exactly how I feel.”

He cleared his throat and plunged ahead. “My day was good. After I talked to Colt, Aaron and I worked on another case. We also spent some time with a couple of the county's drug task force. I got home on time and had dinner with Benji and Dad. Benji and I went over his homework and watched some TV.Now, he and Dad have just headed to bed. After I said my good nights to them, I wanted to call you.” He chuckled, but the sound was rough to his ears. “I realize that doesn’t sound like a very interesting day, but I just wanted to share it with you.”

“I’m glad you did. Not every day has to be guns blazing and high-speed car chases,” she said softly.

“Yeah. We don’t have a lot of those. Although, I have to admit, we’re having more and more. But yeah, um… days are good with me having someone to share them with at the end is even better.”

“I agree. It is nice to have someone to share things with.” She hesitated, then said, “Speaking of sharing, I checked on my patient today who has the two neighbor kids always around. They were at his house again, so I looked for signs of abuse and didn’t see any. I chatted with them, and they only mentioned how their mom works nights, and that she and her boyfriend argued a lot. But no physicality toward the kids. I talked to my friend at CPS, and she said I can file a report but without anything else to go on other than they like to eat at the neighbor’s house, there’s not much that can be done. But they could go in and do an assessment. I just wasn’t sure. My patient thinks the mom drinks, and I wonder what job she has that requires her to work all night. The boyfriend gives me the willies?—”

Mark was instantly on alert. “How so?”

“I’ve only met him a couple of times, but… I don’t really know how to describe it. I just feel uncomfortable.” She sighed. “I’d love to be able to help the kids more, but the last thing I want to do is bring the wrath of that guy down on them.”

“What’s the address? I can run him through our system.”

“It’s the mom’s place, so I doubt he’s on the lease.”

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