Page 41 of Jason's Justice
“Shit,” Jason said quietly and wrapped his arms around her. “I’m so sorry.”
“Thank you. After getting over the shock, I did the only thing I could. I planned his funeral, they brought him home, he was laid to rest, and Katherine and I did what we could to get on with our life. By the time Katherine was seventeen, I met Larry Mason. It wasn’t anything spectacular. I know that sounds cruel and heartless, but now that I look back on it, I think it was more of a companionship that we turned into a marriage. He had his life, I had mine, though we lived in the same house. We had been married for only two years when we realized that we were nothing but friends. He moved out of my bedroom and into the spare room. We had a mutual agreement that though our marriage wasn’t open, but if we wanted to be with other people, keep it out of the house. I never hooked up with anyone, and I have no clue whether he did or not, and I didn’t care. Oh, and I didn’t take his last name, I kept the Miller name.” She sighed heavily, and rubbed her forehead.
“It was Larry who introduced Michael and Katherine. He was the one to encourage them to get together and date. I don’t know if the pressure was from George, or Larry. I may never know.”
“You can always ask him once he comes back to California for a trial.”
“Yeah, I think I will. I know we’re divorced now, but I think both Katherine and I need closure to sit down and talk with him. Maybe we can get over any lingering resentment or hang-ups we have about him. I know I never loved him as much as I thought. Like I mentioned a few minutes ago, it was more to get over my loneliness of missing Daniel that I married him.”
“I totally understand. Not that I’ve ever been married, but remember when I told you about that woman I was dating, who moved into my home, and tried to have the brand new kitchen redone?”
“Yes, what about her?”
“I had been in a long-term relationship with a woman for over three years prior to me meeting this woman. It’s not comparing apples to apples, but the relationship I had for those three years were also more of a convenience. We liked each other, the sex was good, but neither one of us wanted to give up our independence in order to get married or live together. Sure, we would stay at each other’s home on occasion, but not on a permanent basis. She was my date for any function I had to attend, and I was hers.”
“How did it end?” Ilsa asked, fascinated by his tale.
“I was trying a case and worked tons of overtime. I’m talking eighteen hours a day I was in the office researching, reading, planning, sort of like we are now with this Grayson case. During this time, there were about three functions I missed. She understood, because her job was just as stressful and important to her as mine was to me. That’s why I think we lasted as long as we did. Anyway, on the first event I missed, she met someone. She went stag, so did he. They met again weeks later at another missed event, then after the third one.” He shook his head andsmiled. His smile caused Ilsa’s insides to wake up and study the man intently.
“What happened?”
“She asked me if I could make time for her. It took a few days, but when I left the office one morning, after working for almost thirty-six hours straight mind you, I had her meet me at my house. She arrived two hours later, I had gone home, showered, changed, and was eating something Mrs. Hastings, my housekeeper had made the day before. When she arrived, I knew it was over, and I let her off the hook gently.”
“How?”
“When we went into the kitchen, so I could finish eating, I studied her. Neither of us said a thing until I finished. She immediately grabbed the dishes to rinse and put in the dishwasher. She never did that before. I had her sit down, took her hands in mine, looked into her eyes, and nodded once. I said that it was okay if she met someone. We knew that this relationship wasn’t going in the direction of marriage and kids. When she realized I wasn’t mad, she told me everything, and together we walked every room in my home to gather anything she left behind.”
He smiled and shook his head. “Three months before Hank Patterson came to see me in DC, she sent me a birth announcement for their third child. No malice, nothing mean, just an update of her life.”
“Wow, I don’t know if I should say I’m impressed or shocked by your reaction.”
“Don’t be shocked, be impressed.”
“Why?”
“Because through our entire relationship, we were friends with benefits. Looking back, I can now say that we gravitated toward one another because yes, we wanted to be with someone,but no, we didn’t want to settle down and have a marriage with kids.”
Ilsa studied him and cocked her head to the side when she saw something in his expression. “What is it?”
Jason sighed deeply, settled back into the corner of the couch, took her hand in his, and stared off into space before he started talking. His voice was a monotone with no feelings in his tone nor his expression, it was like he had checked out, and he was talking about someone else.
“I grew up in a toxic family. I know a lot of people say that, and I’m sure that’s true, but my parents were narcissistic assholes. I was child number four of seven. When I was thirteen, they forced me to work to bring in money for the home. Dad would work when the whim took him, Mom never worked a day in her life. She got pregnant for the oldest when she was seventeen. All of us kids are eighteen to twenty months apart.” He shook his head sadly. “Whenever I brought a paycheck home, they were there with their hands out. I was never even able to keep a dollar for myself. After about a year, my boss happened to bring me home on a payday. It had been raining for three days and my parents wouldn’t come and pick me up. He saw what they did. When I went back to work on Monday, this was on a Saturday, he asked me about it.”
“You told him the truth?”
“Yes, regardless of what they said or thought, I never lied. After that, my boss gave me a raise, however, my check still reflected the same amount, and anything from that raise went into a bank account in both our names with the stipulation that I couldn’t touch it until I turned eighteen. All through high school, I worked that job and was given substantial raises, they didn’t know about them.”
He smirked as he looked at her, and her stomach fluttered again. “He and his wife made sure I had something to eat onthe days I worked, my parents said they didn’t have enough food to feed me, what with the other kids. Oh, and in case you’re wondering, none of my older siblings worked. By the time I left for college, with the help of my boss and his wife, they were twenty, twenty-two, and twenty-four, or thereabouts. No college, no trade school, no job. They demanded our mother and sisters wait on them hand and foot. According to them, they were grooming my sisters what it’s like to be a stay-at-home mom and wife.”
Ilsa snorted a laugh and looked at him with wide eyes. “How would they know? If they wanted their sisters to be trained for a traditional household, then they needed to go out and earn the money while they stayed home.”
Jason grinned. “That’s what I told them, but they didn’t grasp of concept of what I was saying.” He shook his head sadly. “Fast forward to the day I left. Because I wore nothing but hand-me-downs, and they were in rags, I left for work like I usually did. It was raining, and I had to walk the three miles one way to work. However, my boss was sitting in the driveway to pick me up. Oh, in case I didn’t mention this, this all took place in Florida, and I worked in an orange grove. If the fruit wasn’t in season, I worked around the barns just to keep a job, and my parents off my back.”
He looked off into the distance with a small smile on his face as he took up the story again.
“That day my boss picked me up, I made sure I had everything I would want to take from home with me. It wasn’t much, but there was a photograph of my grandparents that I treasured. Other than that, I didn’t have anything. All my college applications I used my boss’s address. That’s where all the acceptance and rejections letters were sent. I filled out eight applications, and was only rejected by one. I was also given a full ride scholarship.”
“Wow, impressive.”
