Song of the Surf (Pacific Shores Book 3) by Lynnette Bonner Page A

find his hand trembling again, and set it back down.
    Jalen eyed him speculatively. “You ready to talk about it?”
    Justus shoved his dessert and coffee away from the edge of the table and rested his face in his palms. “Not now, Jalen. There will be time enough for reality after the wedding. I don't want to ruin this day for Reece and Marie.”
    Jalen snorted. “The truth is you’ve helped more boys over the years than you could count if you wracked your brain for a month, and you’re letting one boy’s poor choices make you question all the good you've done over the past eight years. They were terrible choices – horrendous choices – yes. But they were his choices, not yours.”
    The familiar spout of horror and frustration that had been riding close to the surface lately threatened to erupt in a geyser of anger. But he clenched his teeth and managed to hold his silence.
    Mrs. McAllister had turned the corner onto their street, her taillights jittering in a shorted-out flicker that felt oddly appropriate for the circumstances.
    Justus had thought through the gamut of possibilities, and by the time he pulled into the McAllister's garbage-littered driveway, he'd convinced himself that since Mrs. McAllister had driven all the way to his place to get him nothing could be too terribly wrong.
    He clambered from his car at the end of the drive. It was a cold miserable night. Pacific Northwest rain hung in a thick cloud of mist, the kind that soaked through even the hardiest of rain jackets and clung to skin with damp clammy claws.
    He huddled into his collar and felt relieved to see that Mrs. McAllister seemed calmer as she waited for him in the weak beam of the streetlight at the end of the walk. Treyvon had an old girlfriend who’d brought nothing but trouble into his life. Justus fully expected to find that Treyvon had fallen back in with the wrong crowd, done something stupid, and gotten himself beat up for it.
    So when Mrs. McAllister led him through the kitchen’s back door and he saw Helene lying in a congealing puddle of blood on the chipped yellowed tiles, shock threw his hands to his head.
    Trey sat huddled in one corner of the kitchen, his arms wrapped around his ears. A black hole with crumbling edges marred the plaster above his head. He was rocking back and forth like a little boy who needed soothing and didn’t even look up when they entered.
    Justus’s hand trembled as he reached for his phone. He knew by the staring eyes before he even bent and touched the pulse point in her throat throat that Helene was dead. But the stillness beneath her cold skin confirmed it.
    Treyvon finally glanced up with wide, wild eyes. “I didn't mean it, Mr. Teague. I didn't mean to hit her so hard.”
    Justus had no words. He swallowed down bile as he tapped in 911 with a shaky finger.
    Mrs. McAllister turned from where she’d set her purse on the cluttered counter. Her gaze fastened on the phone in his hand. “No!” She lurched at him, almost knocking the phone free. “You can't turn him in! You can't turn in my boy!” She clawed at his arm. “I done got you so’s you’d help him! My Trey didn't mean it! He didn’t!”
    “This is 911, what is your emergency?”
    Justus held up one arm to fend off the crazed mother who was still punching and clawing and hitting.
    “I-I need to report a…death,” he called over the commotion.
    “Sir, can you tell me your address?” Rapid-fire typing sounded in the background.
    Justus felt like every thought had to be pulled from a miry bog. Mrs. McAllister was kicking him now and scratching at him as he held her at arm’s length from the phone. “Uh, give me a minute…” He tried to grab Mrs. McAllister’s hands without success, and grunted when one of her fists connected with his ribs. “Mrs. McAllister, stop! What's your house number?”
    The woman only screeched and clawed. “Gimme that phone! You can't turn in my boy. He done turned eighteen. This will be the end