Mrs. Evans was watching the news when Kendra joined her on the couch. The mother patted her daughter's hair.
"How're you doing, sweetheart?"
"Okay. I'm just bored. I want to get back to work."
The older woman smiled. "I know I said it before, but I'm so proud of you. The woman you've become, from excelling at the firm to sticking to your guns...You reminded me how to be strong."
Kendra hugged her. "Thank you, mom. How's dad?"
Mrs. Evans shook her head with a resigned sigh. "Still not talking to me. He leaves for work before I get up, and he's slept in the basement the past week. He's hurt. And a jackass. Let's change the subject," she brightened. "Have you heard from Keith?"
Kendra nodded. "Really briefly. He just called to let me know when he made it in town, and then a few nights ago. He's been different since the night him and dad talked."
"Different how?"
Kendra blushed. She didn't want to say she and Keith hadn't fully made love since that night. From the look her mother gave, chances were she already knew. "Distracted. No, I take that back. He's been crazy focused, just not on me. I don't know. Maybe it's nothing. I just want to get back in my groove. That's where my head is."
"I'm sure. Hey Kenny, I got a call from the police department today. They'll be sending a patrol car around a few nights a week to watch the house, said it's related to your case."
Kendra sat up straight. "Do they think there could be some retaliation?"
"Sure sounds that way," Maria replied. "What I want to know is how they even knew you were home."
Two familiar mug shots flashed on the TV screen, catching Kendra's attention, and she turned to focus on the broadcast. "Mom? I think it might be a moot point now."
++++++++++
Keith spent the next week preparing a place fit for Kendra. He rented a beautiful historic 3-bedroom in Beacon Hill and paid rent upfront for a year to offset his lack of credit. He had no possessions worth holding onto, so he didn't bother going back to clear out his rented room. He just called Raul and told him to take whatever he wanted. Movers brought Kendra's possessions over, which he lovingly unpacked. He contacted Millville High and enrolled in the two online courses needed to complete his high school diploma and simultaneously enrolled in community college. At night, he settled into a huge new bed, the only furniture in the house that didn't come from Kendra's place, and sifted through her box of letters.
He tried, at first, to make himself wait, to put them in chronological order so that he could go through them methodically, but found he preferred to randomly select them to read. It gave him a strange kind of peace to fall asleep surrounded with piles of her letters each night. The letters weren't always rosy. Sometimes, Kendra had written him in anger, demanding to know why he'd taken such drastic measures, or why he never wrote back to her. She blamed him, it was clear, for separating them. Sometimes she wrote about the guys she was dating. She never gave much detail, but he couldn't help the uptick in his body temperature at these missives. A sense of loneliness was ever-present, something he could relate to because he'd felt it himself. Keith often cried, or paused in his reading to press a letter to his lips. He wondered how different he'd have been if he'd had this lifeline to her love while incarcerated. Instead he'd become hard, calculating, which was how he'd survived. But now, he craved to reopen those parts of himself he'd walled off. He wanted to weave the disjointed strands of his life into something that made sense, a stronger, smarter version of himself that would make everything he'd been through worth it. Make him someone worthy to stand beside her.
Out on the streets, all looked clear. Cody and Bam's murder got a few mentions on the news, but police were busy with a dozen suspects. Any number of people wanted those rats dead. Finally he felt safe to call Kendra about coming back to the city.
"Will you move in with me? You said not to ask while we were in bed. Well, you're not in bed anymore." Keith tried to keep the tension out of his voice. He realized his 'surprise' was a bit stalkerish, especially if she said no.
"What about my lease? It's not up for four months."
"I can take care of that," he replied. "I don't want to go another day without you. Just say yes."
At the need in his voice, Kendra's breath hitched—she'd missed him, too. And not just the mind-blowing sex; she'd missed his smart mouth, and the sense of security his presence provided. He was the towering shadow she could always rely on.
"Yes."
Keith whooped in joy and gave her the new address. "I'll take care of everything," he promised.
++++
Kendra walked back into the law offices of Kent, Stavros and Burn, breathing deeply. A short, swarthy, distinguished older man waited by her office.
"It's good to have you back," Michael Stavros clapped her on the back. "It hasn't been the same without you."
Kendra smiled at her mentor. "Four weeks and you're falling apart?" she joked. "So what's the scoop since I've been gone?"
Michael's eyes twinkled as he filled her in on the gossip on their clients and the office, but Kendra was distracted by Niall passing by. He stiffened visibly and though she knew he'd heard her voice, sped up as he walked past her open door. Michael, who missed very little, drew his eyebrows together.
"Having trouble with your hero?"
"Who called him that?"
