Full Contact by Tara Taylor Quinn

was glad for the protection. Even if she didn’t need it.

CHAPTER NINE
    J AY RECOGNIZED THE NUMBER on his phone Monday evening and answered immediately.
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œJay, I haven’t heard from you,” Kelsey said.
    He hadn’t heard from her once in the twelve years his son had been alive—not even a birth announcement—and now all of a sudden there was a rush? “I know.”
    â€œYou’re not running out on us, Jay. Not again.”
    â€œI didn’t run out on anyone before,” he reminded her. He’d been the one left in the cold. Not one of the families who had opened their homes to him had had any qualms about letting him take the fall for them.
    â€œYou know what I mean.”
    No, he really didn’t.
    â€œYou turned traitor. You’re the one who made the call that sent you to prison. You did it to yourself and had no right taking everyone else down with you.”
    Yes, because saving a drugged girl from life-altering devastation was not the right thing to do.
    â€œWas there a point to this call, Kelsey? I’m in Arizona. I told you I would be in touch soon and I will be.”
    â€œCole cut school twice last week. He’s back on pot. I’m certain of it.”
    Maybe if they didn’t give the kid enough money tobuy the stuff, or maybe monitored his friends a little better, they wouldn’t have this problem. But what did he know? He had no skills with this parenting thing.
    â€œYou said he was being tested regularly.”
    â€œHe is.”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œThe last two tests were clean, but after each test he’s had this smirk on his face—the one that tells me he’s up to something. I think he’s found a way to manipulate his drug tests.”
    â€œYou sure you aren’t paranoid because you know what you got away with when you were growing up?” Jay couldn’t resist the taunt. It helped take away the sting of concern for the son he’d never met. Despite all they’d done, Kelsey and her crowd had all turned out all right.
    â€œI’m sure, Jay. None of us ever ended up in jail.”
    No, but not because they hadn’t committed the crimes that would have put them there.
    â€œYou have to do something. Cole’s out of control and we can’t handle him anymore.”
    â€œI have some things to clear up,” he said. “I told you I’d be in touch and I will be.”
    â€œWhen?”
    â€œSoon.”
    â€œ Soon is not good enough.”
    He wasn’t sure he was going to be good enough, either. Hell, the last thing a troubled kid needed was a guy who had no clue what to do with him. If Cole was already riding on the edge, he couldn’t afford a parental screwup. He couldn’t afford to trust—or need—a guy who wasn’t capable of being around for the long haul.A guy who made a habit of moving rather than dealing with women who wanted more from him than sex.
    Jay could tell Kelsey that. He could say no. Tell her to find someone else to help her kid.
    If he were some other guy, maybe he could. But whether he was father material or not, Cole was his son.
    â€œSoon is going to have to be good enough,” he finally said. “It’s all I’ve got.”
    Â 
    J AY TOOK E LLEN OUT AGAIN on Tuesday. During the early-morning hours at her request. Early morning was good for him. He had things to think about as he rode. He focused on upcoming appointments, clients at Big Spirits and, when that wasn’t enough to distract him from an awareness of the female body behind him, he thought about his father. He’d been searching for a week—perusing every document he could find—and he was no closer to locating the bastard than he’d been before he started looking.
    If he didn’t turn up some clue soon, he was going to have to ask Sheriff Richards for help. Though Jay hated to ask anyone in this town for anything, he