Tempted Again (8 page)

Marissa nodded, trying to look confident even as a little voice in her head was shouting “Danger Ahead!”

“Good.” Roz smiled and turned her attention to a pile of papers on her desk. “I’m glad we got that settled.”

Marissa knew when she’d been dismissed. She headed out of the office, her mind swirling with any number of ways this entire project could go wrong.

She ruthlessly cut those doomsday thoughts off at the knees. She could do this. She’d just bragged to Connor that she wasn’t going to change any of her plans because of him. This was her chance to prove that. Or it was her chance to get rid of him…

No, she knew he’d never surrender his program and let her begin hers instead. She’d have to collaborate. And
if she was being honest, he’d had some good results with his ideas. Not great, but good.

She was determined to be professional enough to work with him, no matter how difficult that might be. She could and
would
do this. She had no choice.

Chapter Five

The
minute Connor walked in the library, he was confronted by an angry female glaring at him. He’d just left a senior center full of angry females. He didn’t need more aggravation.

“You keep doing that and you’ll get wrinkles,” he said.

She glared harder and growled, “I hate you.”

Hearing laughter behind him, Connor turned to find Marissa standing there with a smile on her face. “Charming the ladies, are you?”

The five-year-old little girl who’d proclaimed her hatred for him stomped off to where her mother stood beside the circulation desk, horrified by her child’s behavior.

“I’m sorry, Sheriff,” the mom said in a harried voice. “She’s having a bad day today.”

He smiled. “No need to apologize. Bad days happen to all of us at one time or another.”

He sure as hell was having one today. He refused to let that get him down. He could handle bad days with one arm tied behind his back. He couldn’t handle the memories of the kids back in Chicago that he hadn’t been able to save. Especially Hosea.

Connor clamped that line of thought shut and focused his attention on Marissa. “I assume you heard about the plan to merge our programs.”

She nodded.

“So how do we get out of this? I’m open to suggestions.”

“What do you mean, ‘get out of this’?” She frowned. “There is no getting out of it.”

“I don’t need you butting into my program.”

“Ditto.”

“So how do we fix this? How about you let me keep doing what I’m doing and just make a show on the surface of being involved,” he said.

“You are delusional.”

“I didn’t expect you to agree. Not right off the bat. But once you’ve interacted with these kids you’ll back off.”

“What makes you think that?” She didn’t bother telling him she’d already met a half-dozen kids and had enlisted their input in her program. She sensed from the way that Connor had marched into the library that he was carrying a chip on his shoulder the size of a boulder.

“You’re a librarian.”

“Your point being?”

“These kids are tough. You’re not going to turn them around by sticking a bunch of books in their hands.
What are you going to do, have them read Dickens or Shakespeare?”

“Shakespeare knew a thing or two about gang violence. The Capulets versus the Montagues. And don’t try telling me we don’t have gangs in Hopeful. Gangs are everywhere.”

“I know how to reach these kids. You don’t.”

“How do you know?” she countered.

“You have no experience.”

“Yes, I do. At my former library I created a number of programs for at-risk teens.”

His expression clearly indicated he wasn’t the least bit impressed by her statement.

“If there’s no way out and we’re forced to work together then we need to set some ground rules.”

“I agree,” she said. “I’ve already made up a list.” She led him to the reference desk, where she’d left her file, and opened it up. “Here.”

“No.” Connor refused to take the pages she handed him. “You don’t get to make up the list. That’s my job. I do that.”

Marissa pointed to the paper. “See rule number one. It says I make up the list.”

“That’s wrong.”

“I suggest you direct your attention to rule number two. When you don’t agree with me, you may say so but not by stating I’m wrong or stupid or any other derogatory comments.”

“Telling you that you’re wrong is not derogatory,” he said. “It’s simply a stating of fact.”

“No, it’s not a fact. It’s merely your opinion.” Seeing the attention they were garnering, she said, “I suggest
that we continue this discussion in one of the empty conference rooms.”

“How about your office?”

“I don’t have an office. I have a small cubicle, where we can be overheard.” At times it felt more like a partitioned prairie dog enclosure where every so often people popped their heads up to see over the wall.

“A conference room then.”

As they entered the room, she realized it was in effect a glass fishbowl that provided little privacy aside from preventing them from being overheard because the door closed. Anyone walking by would see them talking.

Which was okay. There was no problem with that. She had to get out of the mind-set she had from her time dating him in high school when her parents had warned her about the dangers of going out with a college boy.

The warnings had started from her mother the instant Marissa turned thirteen. The idea had no appeal to her at that age. But when she’d first met Connor at the pizza place, she’d instantly felt the connection. A glance from him meant more that she could have imagined.

She’d worked hard to keep their time together a secret from her friends and family. Even her co-workers didn’t realize that things had turned intimate with Connor. Marissa had really gotten into the whole secret rendezvous thing.

But those days were long over and she needed to remind herself of that fact. “If this is going to work we need to pool our resources,” she told Connor in a very professional voice.

“Or you could just step aside and let me do my work as I’ve been doing for several years now,” he suggested.

“I’ve been working with at-risk kids for a number of years as well.”

“Doing what? Telling them to read a book?”

Anger crept into her voice. “You are so full of it! Why are you so threatened?”

He stared at her in disbelief. “Me? Threatened? By you?”

She nodded.

“That’s funny. But I don’t have time for humor.”

“Your sense of humor used to be one of your strong suits.”

“That was a long time ago,” he said flatly.

“I asked around. People still think you have a good sense of humor and a commonsense attitude.”

“See? That’s what I’m saying. I have common sense.”

“You just said you don’t have time for humor.”

“I take this part of my job seriously.”

“So do I.” She paused to give him an I’m-not-backing-down look. “That’s something we can agree on. We both take working with at-risk kids seriously.”

“Yeah but our approaches are totally different.”

“You believe in tough love “

“I believe in showing them that the risks they take now have consequences. For example, they try huffing and they could die. The very first time. The kids don’t get the potential risks, including brain damage and death. Huffing is breathing fumes from household products to get high,” he added for her benefit.

“I know what huffing is. One in five kids will abuse inhalants by the eighth grade. The library is working with local schools and high schools to educate students and parents about the signs and dangers of inhalant abuse.”

“Great. You keep working on that and stay out of my way.”

“I wish I could stay out of your way and that you’d stay out of mine. But we’re stuck here so we have to make do. Getting back to the rules, number three is important. Before I introduce you to my group of kids, I want your assurance that you are not going to intimidate them.”

He crossed his arms across his chest and just glared at her.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. That look. Don’t use it on them.”

“It’s very effective,” he growled.

“That voice doesn’t work either.”

“What are you talking about? It works damn fine.”

“I want them to know we care what happens to them.”

“I want more than that. I want
them
to care what happens to them.”

“Well, of course I want that too,” she countered angrily. “But that’s not going to happen by scaring them.”

“Sure it will.”

“There are more effective ways to reach kids,” she said.

“Yeah, right. With books?”

“You have an attitude problem!”

“So what are you going to do about it?” he drawled. “Have me journal my feelings? Hug a teddy bear?”

“What a great idea.” She noticed a bear in the corner left over from a children’s program discussion they’d had earlier in the day. “Here you go.” She went over to grab it before handing it to him. “Hug it.”

“Is that a dare?”

“Absolutely. I dare you to hug that bear.”

He took it from her, twisted its arm and tossed it back.

“You call that a hug?” she scoffed.

“I don’t do my best work with teddy bears.”

“That’s obvious.”

“You already know from our time together how I hug,” he said.

“That topic of discussion is off limits.”

“So is me hugging a teddy bear where anyone can see.”

“What are you afraid of?” she said.

“Not teddy bears, that’s for damn sure.”

“I think you’ll learn a lot from observing the group’s interaction.”

“I plan on doing more that just observing.”

“Then we have a problem,” she said.

“You’re just now noticing that?”

No, she’d known she’d have a problem with him the second she identified him at the traffic stop. But she didn’t think she’d ever have to work this closely with him. Maybe she should have thought of that when she’d sent in that grant program request. Usually it took months and months or even a year or longer for something like that to get going. How was she supposed to guess that it would be approved so quickly or that it would come with strings tying her to Connor?

No, she couldn’t have anticipated that. The question now was how was she going to work with him?

“Have you read the grant program proposal that I wrote up?” she asked.

“No.”

“Then I suggest you do so. I read your previous year’s
proposal. If you have a new one, I’d be more than happy to read it.”

“Why bother? We both know that you won’t approve of it.”

“I might surprise you.”

“You already have,” he said.

His look was no longer intimidating but it made her heart thump nervously. The kids weren’t the only ones at risk with this project. So was she. Big-time.

*  *  *

Marissa first met fifteen-year-old Jose Martinez her second day on the job. “So you’re the one who punked the parade,” he’d said. “You don’t look like a troublemaker.”

She’d been able to tell by the way he’d said it and by the way he was dressed that he considered himself to be a troublemaker.

“Nice T-shirt,” she’d said.

He’d appeared surprised by her comment.

“Are they characters from a graphic novel?” she’d asked.

“Yeah. From
my
graphic novel.”

“You did the artwork?”

He’d nodded defiantly.

“You’re good. We’re starting a teen group.” She had yet to come up with a catchy name for it. “Our first program is going to focus on graphic novels. You should come Wednesday after school.” She’d handed him a flyer she’d done up earlier that day.

He’d reluctantly taken it before walking away.

“You should stay away from that one,” an older man had come up beside her to say. “I’m Chester Flint, by the
way. President of the library board. Since you’re new around here, you don’t know that Jose has spent time in juvenile hall for spray-painting graffiti like he wears on his T-shirts.”

“He’s got talent.”

Chester had looked at her as if she were a few pancakes short of a stack. “Talent? His only talent is for getting into trouble. We don’t want his type here.”

“ ‘His type’? You mean because he’s Hispanic?”

“I am not a racist. And I’m offended by your inference that I am.”

Nice going, she’d told herself. Only on the job two days and already you’re in a fight with the president of the library board. Not smart. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

He’d looked down his nose at her. “You’d do well to watch your step.”

She’d nodded her agreement at his words. “I’m still learning the ropes here.”

He’d relaxed his posture. “In time you’ll understand what is expected of you.” He’d nodded at her before walking away.

Marissa hadn’t given up on the idea, however, and Jose did show up. The rest of the group had been recommended to attend by Karen Griffith, the high school counselor who’d called Marissa smart and perky. “These kids are at risk and I think you can help them,” Karen had said in a phone conversation.