Yours and Mine (Freshman Forty #2) Read online

  Yours and Mine

  Christine Duval

  Copyright © 2017 by Christine Duval

  Yours and Mine is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Contents

  Also by Christine Duval

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  About the Author

  Also by Christine Duval

  Positively Mine

  It is four weeks into her freshman year of college, and Laurel’s first test was unexpected. Discovering she’s pregnant isn’t exactly what she had planned for her first semester, and while she intends to tell her emotionally-distant father, being away at school makes it all too easy to hide.

  An imperfect heroine plagued by bad choices and isolated during what should be the best time of her life, readers are sure to identify with Laurel as she confronts teen pregnancy, in secret.

  For Bruce

  Chapter 1

  I hear the door creak open and Ava slips into the shadows of my room. I lie still and watch as she removes her shirt, then her shorts, then her bra. I wonder if I should tell her I’m awake or let her think she’s surprising me, which she likes to do. I remain silent.

  “Danny,” she whispers and slides under the sheets, “wake up.” She rubs her lips against my ear and her hand down my chest. “Come on, Danny. It’s only midnight. Wake up.”

  I open my eyes, and as soon as I do, she climbs on top of me.

  She leans forward and her long black hair falls around my face. “Did you miss me?” she murmurs. Then she kisses me, her tongue reaching the furthest part of my throat, and my mouth starts tingling with the bitter taste of cocaine. I push her off.

  Her eyes are wide with confusion in the dim moonlight that splinters through the blind. “What’s wrong?”

  “You’re high again.”

  “I’m not.”

  “I can taste the coke, Ava. What’d you do, lick the tray?”

  She touches my arm. “I needed a little pick me up. I’ve been on my feet all day.”

  “You can’t kiss me after you’ve done coke, Ava. The Coast Guard does random drug testing. Even the tracest amount and I could lose my license.”

  She pouts like she cares. “I’m sorry, sweetie. I forgot. I just miss you.”

  I rub my temple and look toward the window. Sure, maybe right now when she has no one else to bang. Actually, considering it’s already the end of June, I’m surprised she hasn’t found her summer sugar daddy yet. Usually by now she’s being carted off to parties in the Hamptons on some Wall Street jerk’s boat after her shift is up. But the girls at the bar are getting younger. At twenty-seven Ava’s starting to find the competition stiffer, no matter how hot a body she has. You gotta love the East End of Long Island. It’s the only place – short of LA maybe – where someone can be considered washed up at twenty-seven.

  Ava slides her hand into my shorts and gets my attention. “We don’t have to kiss, you know,” she whispers, and she works her way down my chest with her mouth. As much as I want to resist, old habits die hard. At least that’s my justification for why I’ve let this go on for as long as it has. I shift my weight and am on top of her, grabbing for her underwear. Ava is the only girl I’ve ever met who needs zero foreplay.

  She moans. “This is what I needed tonight, baby.” She grabs for my face and tries to kiss me again. I avoid her advance by turning her over, and just as I’m about to get somewhere, she murmurs, “Your phone.”

  “What?” I say breathlessly in her ear.

  “Your phone. It’s vibrating.” She reaches in the sheets and pulls out my Android. When she looks at the caller ID, she sighs. “It’s your fucking brother.” Then she pushes me off, gets out of bed, and starts putting on her clothes.

  I don’t even have to say hello. Joe’s voice is hurried and nervous. “Dad’s at the police station. He was pulled over for a DUI a couple hours ago.”

  “A DUI?” I watch as Ava stomps to my bedroom door, then into the living room and out the front, leaving the screen to slam in the hollow night. I shake my head and focus. “They impounded his car last month. How’d he get a DUI?”

  “He took Old Ellis’s car. Just drove off with it without telling her.”

  “Mrs. Ellis?” I can feel the blood pulsing through the vein in my temple. The start of another headache. “Isn’t she like ninety years old?”

  “Maybe, but she’s sharp enough to know when her car’s missing from her driveway.”

  “Jesus.” I close my eyes as my head throbs. “This is his fourth DUI.”

  “Meet me there?”

  “What’s the point? We won’t be able to do anything.”

  “Jack’s on duty right now and he told me Dad will likely be transferred over to County before breakfast. I want to get more information before they wagon him off.” Jack is Joe’s best friend from high school, a recent police academy grad who usually works the graveyard shift.

  I pull my bare feet over the side of the bed and rest them on the splintered floor. “I’ll see you there.”

  ***

  My father is snoring in the holding cell of the miniscule police station that’s housed in an old bungalow on the edge of town. He’s, as usual, alone. This building is just an adjunct to the main precinct in Southold, with one cell reserved for the local drunks, the disorderly conducts, the kid selling a bag of weed on the corner. In my dad’s case these days, it’s his second home.

  “Hi, Jack,” I say to the police officer standing behind the reception desk. In his blue uniform he cleans up pretty well considering he barely managed to get through high school eight years ago.

  He looks up from the paperwork he’s filling out and shakes his head. Then he nods towards my father. I roll my eyes in return.

  “Is Joe here?” I ask.

  “Right behind you.” My older brother wields the glass door open, not even bothering to look in the direction of the cell. His blue eyes are intense.

  “Give it to us straight, Jack. What’re we looking at?”

  Jack bites down on the pen he’s holding. “It’s not good.” He sighs. “Not even talking about the stolen vehicle, this is his fourth DUI in less than six years. That alone is a class D felony with a minimum of a year in prison and a max of seven. Adding the theft into the mix, I’d say he’s going to be looking at closer to somewhere in the middle and that’s if you get a generous judge.”

  I breathe deep and push down the unease that wells in my chest. It never ends with him.

  “So potenti
ally three to four years?” I ask.

  My brother’s jaw drops. “He didn’t hurt anyone, did he?”

  “No, but that doesn’t matter.” Jack shrugs his shoulders. “The laws are tough. Even if his neighbor doesn’t press charges, no judge will overlook the fact he stole a car and then drove it drunk. His blood alcohol level was more than twice the legal limit.”

  “He’s going to need a lawyer,” I say to Joe, who stares down at his feet.

  With his ash blond hair and pale skin, he embodies the one part Irish that was my grandmother’s contribution to the otherwise dominant Italian gene pool that runs through our family.

  His face flushes. “He can’t afford one. And neither can any of us.”

  “There’s Janie’s husband,” I offer up.

  “Mom would never allow it,” Joe says. “We can’t even ask.”

  Janie is my mom’s first cousin. And since mom left dad, Janie’s let her live in an apartment over the garage on the mega estate she and her lawyer husband own in Southold.

  I nod.

  Jack’s eyes fall. He knows all too well our financial situation, watching our family spiral out of control as my father battled his demons. “The court will appoint one. I’ll see if I can put a few calls in to get him a good public defender.”

  My father snorts and chokes on his saliva, and all three of us look towards the cell, expecting to see him stirring awake. But he slips right back into a rhythmic breathing pattern.

  “So when’s that homeland security program starting?” Jack changes the subject and turns to me. “I’ve heard good things about it.”

  “Not until September.” I shift my body so I am no longer looking towards my pathetic excuse for a father. “But the classes are mostly online, so I’ll rarely have to schlep to Riverhead. And I can keep my job at the marina.”

  “What will you do with a degree in homeland security? You think it’ll be worth five years of school?”

  “I hope. There’s a marine task force in Riverhead I could work for. Or I could work with the Coast Guard. No one knows the inlets around here better than I do. They offered a pretty sweet scholarship, too.”

  “Good for you, Danny.”

  “Yeah. Dan’s the one shining light in this messed up family.” Joe slaps my back.

  My shoulders flinch at this remark. If I’m the shining light, we’re all pretty much fucked.

  “Will you call me and let me know what’s happening in the morning?” Joe asks, pushing me towards the door.

  “I’ll do my best to see what I can find out before my shift is up.” Jack clicks on a mouse and starts typing into a computer. “You two should get some sleep.”

  Chapter 2

  When we reach our cars in the parking lot, Joe looks through his keychain. “You still have a key to Dad’s place?” he asks. “I don’t think I do anymore.”

  I haven’t been to my father’s house in months because he won’t allow any of us to go inside. From what I can tell, he barely does himself, preferring to sleep on a mattress in the screened porch facing the bay or in his fishing boat that he dry-docked on the lawn in the side yard.

  “Why?”

  “I want to go over there.”

  “Now?”

  “May as well.”

  “To do what?”

  “To see what other shit he’s messed up in.”

  I study my brother’s face for an answer before I ask, “What do you mean?”

  “They pulled him over tonight coming from Orient Point.”

  “So?”

  “There’s no bars out there. He was coming off the ferry. From Connecticut.”

  “Why Connecticut?”

  “The casinos maybe. Free booze.”

  I shake my head. “He won’t like us rifling through his stuff.”

  “He doesn’t have a choice now, does he?” He opens his car door. “Let’s go.”

  Greenport’s a small town on the tip of Long Island, and being as late as it is, the streets are deserted.

  We pull into the rocky drive of his little rancher on a quiet inlet that spikes out onto the Peconic Bay. It’s not much of a house, but it has a sweet view. On the water and built by my grandfather. Three generations have lived here.

  It used to be nice enough – no real luxuries to speak of – but comfortable. It was built as a summer place. But my mom and dad winterized it and it’s where we lived until all hell broke loose.

  We push the screen door onto the porch and my brother throws me a look that says “what are we getting into?” The house was already falling apart when my mother left earlier this year. I can’t imagine what it looks like now.

  The door that leads to the living room is locked and he’s got a towel draped over the window so we can’t see inside. After putting the key into the flimsy lock, I say, “Ready?”

  We know it can’t be good. And it’s not.

  The living room looks like a crack den. There are holes in the walls, blankets and sheets covering all the windows, and garbage is everywhere. “Jesus, Dad,” Joe mumbles.

  The charcoal grill is smack in the middle of the living room, and judging by the soot on the ceiling, it looks like this is where he does his cooking now, too. I shake my head.

  I walk into the kitchen and Joe follows. It’s no wonder he has to use the grill. Dirty dishes and pots are piled high in both sinks and on top of the stove. What was once a white tile floor is now gray and grimy. There are papers and unopened bills spread out on the counter. In the refrigerator, there’s nothing but a six pack of Bud, a jar of olives, and a bottle of ketchup.

  Opening the pantry closet, I reach for the garbage bags and a bucket. I hand Joe the bags. “You pick up. I’ll follow you with a mop.” And we take to cleaning up the filth.

  When we get the place looking somewhat inhabitable and the grill back outside on the patio where it belongs, the sun is coming up over the water and it is almost time for me to go to work.

  Joe takes the unpaid bills and shoves them inside his shirt. “I’ll look at these after I’ve had a chance to sleep.”

  “At least you can get some. I’ve got an all-day fishing trip with a bachelor party from Brooklyn.”

  Joe squeezes my shoulder. “Get your Starbucks fill now.”

  “Text me when you hear something,” I say, squinting at the sunrise.

  Chapter 3

  At 3:30 p.m., after a fishing trip from hell, I motor the boat back into the marina. Despite my reminders to puke off the side of the boat, all six of my hungover passengers manage to stick me with a mess thanks to choppy seas and bad aim.

  Once they’ve paid their bill and tipped me a lousy twenty dollars, we part ways. As soon as they speed off in their Escalade, I hear someone call my name.

  I look over to see a hot girl in jean shorts and a tank top. I have to do a double take when I realize it’s Laurel Harris, or rather, the ice princess, as I’ve dubbed her since she blew me off last summer. She’s standing about ten yards away and pushing a baby stroller. I haven’t seen this girl in almost a year.

  She’s put on some weight, in the right places. It looks good on her. And though a part of me could just as easily turn my back and continue cleaning the boat after the way she treated me, I’m curious to find out what she wants.

  Laurel is the only girl I’ve ever spent time with who isn’t a local. Normally I don’t have the patience for the pretentious brats who come out here to their summer houses, driving their parents’ expensive cars and throwing their money around.

  But she was different. I’ve never been able to figure her out. And I always thought I had this girl thing down…blow some smoke up their ass, pretend like you give a shit about what they have to say, and then reap the rewards in the form of a hand job.

  This one though…she wasn’t like other girls. She had money but wasn’t showy about it. She even took a full-time waitressing job when she didn’t need to. And over the past couple summers we became friends. At least, I thought we did until
we got together and then I never heard from her again.

  She closes the distance between us at a snail’s pace and there is a weird look in her eyes. I break the ice by reaching down and grabbing the baby’s foot. “Is this the newest Harris?”

  All the color disappears from Laurel’s face. Something is up, but I continue. “I heard your dad had gotten married and they were expecting a baby. Crazy, huh?”

  Her expression is so bleak, I wonder if something happened to her dad, which would suck because she already lost her mom in a car wreck a few years back.

  “Is everything okay?”

  She doesn’t say anything and stares out at the bay. Then finally she blurts, “Listen, do you…have some time to talk?”

  “Well, I’ve got to clean up the Cruiser. Six jerks insisted on going out to Gardiners Bay and then lost their lunch in the choppy water–”

  She interrupts my ramble. “Could you come over to my dad’s later…when you’re done?”

  “Uh. Yeah, I guess.”

  She takes a deep breath. “Great.”

  She looks like she’s seen a ghost.

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  ***

  I put the car into gear even though I’m tempted to get on the ferry line and head back to Greenport for some sleep rather than go to Laurel’s place. I’ve now been awake for thirty-six hours straight and my body is beginning to feel disconnected from my brain. If she were any other girl, I’d be out of here.

  Her dad’s house sits high on a bluff in Shelter Island Heights, probably the most exclusive neighborhood on the island. I wind up the hill past the old Victorians on Prospect Avenue and reach the circular driveway of his supermodern home that doesn’t fit in with the other houses in the neighborhood. Putting my car into park, I can see Laurel pacing in the living room of the almost entirely glass house. A knot forms in my stomach. I don’t like feeling off my guard around anyone, least of all a girl. But this one has always managed to do just that. I reach into the glove compartment and pull out a bottle of Advil, swallowing three pills without water, and then head for the front door.