Their Divine Doctor(Divine Creek Ranch 9)(33)
“Regina went to rehab and Roger went to jail and later prison, where he died. I joined Duke’s family and was never returned to Regina’s care. She never kicked her addiction and died of a heroin overdose. She’s buried in San Angelo.”
“I noticed that you refer to them all by their proper names.”
“I do that to make it easier to explain. I refer to Aunt Mary as Mom and Uncle Joe as Dad, the same as Duke. They insisted on it when we were little and we reaffirmed it when I got to be in middle school. I asked to go to a counselor and they took me and we hashed out issues I was having with being bullied at school. I was small for my age and an easy target. I told them then that I would always consider them my mother and father.”
Aunt Mary and Uncle Joe were his saving grace, taking a scared little kid and helping him to grow into a man. When he’d had struggles as a geeky teen, they’d gotten him the help he’d needed, and he knew deep down he owed them his life.
“What did you do about the bullying?”
“The counselor noticed how close Duke and I were, and she suggested that we take martial arts training or self-defense classes together. We learned how to defend ourselves and each other. It also helped me to build up some muscle mass. When bullies find out you’ll stand up to them they back off.”
“So you and Duke have been close since you were little bitty. Is that why you went into business together?”
Gage saw Duke smile at her question and grinned himself. “Actually, we kind of…backed into that. Ace and Kemp knew Mom and Dad. They were the ones who taught us how to defend ourselves. I think they got more than they bargained for with us. We hung around them as much as we could and learned from them and got interested in the field. Of course our specialty is really the technological end of special investigation but we’ve gotten in our fair share of interesting places, too.”
“I’ll bet you have. So you help Ace and Kemp?”
“As much as we can. Besides subcontracting for them we also have our own IT consulting business.”
“Which explains why you stay so busy. Which part of your job do you like best?”
Gage didn’t even have to think about the answer to that question. “Helping people who can’t defend themselves or don’t know how. Helping good people out of tough situations.”
The case Gage and Duke had been working on the week before came to mind. They were helping Ace and Kemp in a situation involving the father of a toddler who had just discovered that the little boy he’d always thought was his son actually had been fathered by another man. The biological father was currently in jail along with the boy’s mother for a vast array of charges.
Ace and Kemp’s future bride, Summer Heston, was indirectly involved with the case, which had placed her in a lot of danger at one point. The mother and biological father of the boy had been behind numerous attacks on her and her business. Duke and Gage were working with Ace and Kemp on the case and were hopeful that it might possibly never reach the court system. That all hinged on them discovering enough information to dissuade the extended family from choosing to pursue custody of the boy, who was better off with the man he knew as father.
Emma yawned sleepily and said, “We need heroes in this world.” A few seconds later she said, “Gage, if you ever need to talk to someone in the future about what happened to you, I have a friend, a counselor who is very good at listening. Just remember that, okay?”
“Sure, angel.”
Being bullied as a teen had dredged up all kinds of hurt and anger from his early trauma, and he’d benefited from counseling then. He didn’t discount the possibility that it might help in the future, too. Some wounds went deeper than humanly imaginable.
Emma wiggled around between them, finally got comfortable, and drifted off to sleep a few minutes later.
“She’s something, huh?” Duke whispered in the dark.
“Yeah.”
Chapter Nine
A couple of weeks later, in mid-September…
Emma shifted her yellow-and-black Aztek into park in front of Grace Warner’s house. She pulled up her planner on her smartphone and checked her to-do list. Duke and Gage had asked her in advance to make preparations for a night out on the town.
At first, she’d been filled with trepidation because that meant dressing up. Dressing up meant makeup. Dressing up and makeup generally involved high heels of some kind. The thought of having to put all that together made her cringe, but at least she had someone to go to. Several “someones,” in fact, but Grace was her go-to gal of choice for today. Plus, she had a baby gift to deliver and a little one to coo at.