Speeding Ch. 11

Reid walked through the front door nine minutes after disconnecting the call. Vaguely registering the great time he'd made driving all over town, he took one look at Annie's face and nearly lost it.

"Who?" he demanded, eyes hot with fury.

Shaken by the anger on her father's face, Annie half-hid herself behind Kendall before answering. "I said the F word," she explained. "She's never hit me before."

"I don't care." He moved toward the most important women in his life, desperately trying to keep his voice in check. "Annie, sweetheart, I don't care what you said, that doesn't give her the right to slap you." He grabbed his daughter's hand, closing it inside his own. "You are mine—ours, as was pointed out to me just yesterday—and you're not going back."

"I... We were arguing about you." Blonde curls flying, Annie elaborated, "I told her I wanted to live with you. I yelled at her, saying you were my father, and I could live here if I wanted and then she slapped me." She twisted a curl in her fingers. "I know I shouldn't have said the F word, but she made me so mad!"

Kendall spoke, sensing Reid needed a moment to compose himself. "Honey, there's no good excuse for her to hit you."

"Is that really the first time?" Reid asked.

Annie nodded. "Yes."

"Did she ever hit your Mom?" Kendall asked.

"My Mom?" Annie scowled. "I don't know." She shrugged. "Maybe. We didn't really talk much."

"I'm so sorry, sweetheart."

"After a while, I didn't even listen when she did talk—all she did was lie."

Setting aside the seething anger directed at his former mother-in-law, Reid saw an opening. "When did you last talk to your mom?"

Her slight shoulders lifted in another shrug before she answered. "Right before school started."

"What'd she say?"

"The same old stuff. She loved me and would come home and take me back." She shook her head. "She always told me that kind of crap. I stopped believing her before I stopped believing in Santa." Fat tears rolled down her narrow face. "She was never coming back. She didn't care."

Kendall pulled the girl close. "She promised a lot of things that weren't true, but she was telling the truth about Reid."

That brought a small smile. "A cop for a dad and a junkie for a mom."

Thankful she didn't name her mother a hooker, Reid pressed on. "She told you she was coming home back in September?"

"I guess, yeah."

"And your grandparents were okay with that?" Kendall asked.

"I dunno. She never told the truth. Why would they think she meant it? She never meant it. She never meant anything. How could she mean she loved us if she was in Sheridan getting high? How could she mean she loved me if she didn't tell you about me? I'm glad she's dead." Sobbing at the end of her tirade, Annie pressed her face into Kendall's side. "I'm sorry."

Kendall smoothed her hand over Annie's curls. "It's okay. We're here, and we love you."

"You do?"

"You bet we do. You're ours, little girl. Forever," Reid reassured his daughter. As much as he wanted to push for more information about Amy, he new Annie was shaky at best. Tomorrow they would see Marjorie Statham about custody. He hadn't planned on taking Annie with them, but she wasn't leaving his sight until he had things straightened out with the Shaws. There was no way she was going back to that house after being slapped in the face.

~*~

"Shouldn't I go to school?" Annie asked Reid the following morning.

"While I think school is important, you're not going today," Reid answered without turning away from the coffee pot.

"But—wait, why am I arguing about going to school?" Annie cut off her own protests. Instead, she sat down at the table, cereal bowl in hand. "What are we doing today?"

"Keeping you," Kendall answered as she turned the corner from the hallway into the kitchen. "We're going to see a lawyer, then we're going to your grandparent's house."

At Annie's gasp, Reid chuckled. "My parents, sweetheart."

"Do you think they'll like me?"

"Of course they will!" Kendall assured.

"No school and more grandparents. I'm not sure if I should be happy or not."

"You'll love them. Now, eat your breakfast—we have to leave in ten minutes," Reid directed. He almost laughed at the cozy domestic picture they made, but thought better of it. He would laugh when it was permanent. Until then, he would guard his family as fiercely as he could.

~*~

"You're Annie's father, but just found out a few weeks ago?" Marjorie asked reading from her notes.

Kendall nodded, and Reid answered, "Yes. When her mother and I divorced, I believed Annie was the product of an affair." He paused. "We even had DNA testing once she was born proving I wasn't her father."

The attorney's eyes widened. "What changed? How was it determined that test twelve years ago was incorrect?"

"My mother lied about everything. Everything," Annie interjected. "She told me he was my father, and although I shouldn't have, I believed her." She twisted a curl between her fingers as she told her story. "When he came to tell my grandfather my mother was dead, I went to find him."

Kendall laid a hand on Annie's knee. "You were right."

"I wish I'd known all that time. I wish—" Reid cut himself off. "It doesn't matter now. What matters is we know now, and we're going to keep you."

"Well, this is complicated," Marjorie started.

"Not that complicated," Reid said as he scrolled through pictures on his phone. "Yesterday Beverly Shaw slapped my daughter across the face." He slid the phone across the desk, the hand-print on Annie's face evident even on the small screen.

Marjorie's dark eyes widened again, her cocoa skin losing a little bit of color. "Sole custody, then?"

"Yes." Have gave Kendall a look full of promise. "Kendall and I want full custody."

"You realize judges prefer awarding custody to married couples," she began, stopping when Kendall held up her left hand, her diamond flashing in the morning light. "Okay, then. When are you two marrying?"

Kendall answered before Reid could open his mouth. "As soon as possible."

Swallowing, Reid turned to Kendall. "I want to give you the wedding you deserve, baby."

"The wedding isn't nearly as important as the marriage." She squeezed Annie's knee. "And the family we will be."

"When I asked you to marry me, I didn't know—"

She smiled at her fiance and his daughter. "I know you didn't, and it doesn't matter. I love you both."

Marjorie had been quiet during the entire exchange, her hand flying as she scribbled notes on her yellow pad. "Just because judges tend to prefer married couples, you don't have to rush anything. You are in a committed relationship, with a biological parent, and two incomes." She looked up from her notes. "I assume you are both psychologically stable?"

"Whatever testing you need, we'll be there," Reid assured.

"I'll file the paperwork for formal custody. Until then, I will put in for emergency custody hearing and emergency interim custody."

~*~

After a quick stop at the station to check in with Jason, they made their way to Roger and Helen Caufield's cottage in Tyler.

"I'm not ready for this," Annie whispered.

"Sure you are," Kendall promised with a smile. "Your grandparents are wonderful."

She made a face. "It's just weird. I mean, I knew I wanted a Dad. But I didn't think about more grandparents or," she faltered, "or, you."

"C'mon, ladies, let's go inside before Mom comes looking for us," Reid said as he opened Kendall's door. Chuckling he added, "Will I have to pull you out this time, too?"

Kendall laughed at his question. "No, I like your parents. It's Annie who's worried this time."

"They'll love you, kiddo. Mom cooked a feast, so if we don't go in soon, she'll come out and drag us in."

"They'll love you, and then next month we have to go to Atlanta for your uncle's wedding. Tons of family will be running around there." Kendall flashed a grin at Reid. "Maybe we'll be married before then, too, and I'll be your stepmom."

Annie's mouth opened but nothing came out.

"Are you okay with that?" Reid asked.

Finally finding her voice, Annie marveled, "A real family."

"I wish you'd known us from the beginning, but since I can't go back in time, we'll have to take what we can get." He gestured to the house. "Now, get in there before your grandmother sends out a search party."

~*~

"I'm so sorry we didn't know we had a grandbaby out there, Annie. I wish we had known." Helen couldn't help but stare at her granddaughter. She looked so much like Amy had at that age, although she had the Caufield eyes. "You are such a pretty girl."

This was a grandmother who acted like she thought grandmother's should act. "Thank you."

"I hope y'all brought your appetites," Roger said as he walked to the table with a steaming pot, "your Mom made stew."

Helen followed behind her husband with a basket. "And biscuits."

A broad smile broke Reid's face. "My favorite of all time, beef stew and biscuits."

"Your brother and Madelyn might be the chefs in the family, but I can still make a mean stew."

"And pie. She made apple pie, too."

"I wanna live here," Annie exclaimed at the mention of her absolute favorite thing in the world.

Kendall was smiling when she said, "Nope. You're living with us, and that's final."

"Your cooking is okay, too," she replied with a laugh.

"Get used to it," Reid said with a chuckle. "I can do a lot of things, but cooking isn't one of them."

"Pish posh, boy. I taught you how to cook," Helen chided.

"Yeah, well.... It worked better on Ryder than me."

"Good thing you found yourself a pretty girl, then," Roger told him.

"A very good thing, indeed."

The meal went well, Roger and Helen asking Annie about school, and boys, and everything except the elephant in the room. No one was touching the subject of her mother's death, nor the treatment she'd received under the care of the Shaws. Instead, they focused on the good, and the future.

"This is the best apple pie in the whole world!" Annie exclaimed.

"I think this is the best thing I have ever had in my mouth," Kendall agreed with a wink at Reid. Maybe it wasn't the best thing ever in her mouth, but a close second. "Please explain why we're not here all the time?"

"Now, that's a question for your man, there," Roger answered. "He's always busy," he began, realizing too late what it meant for Reid to be busy. "But, now that you know the secret of Helen's pie, can we count on you and Annie to come over for Sunday dinners, even without the boy?"

"You better believe it," Kendall answered. "We'll be here so often, you'll get sick of us."

"Never gonna happen," Helen promised.

Annie was thrown for a loop by this family of hers. Her grandparents really seemed to like her father and Kendall, and didn't order them around, or yell at them. They treated them like, well, like adults. And they were so... Warm. And friendly, and loving to her, yet they'd known her for a few hours. She liked it.

They had settled into a lively game of Pictionary—girls vs boys—when a loud banging on the door pulled their attention. Banging and yelling. Reid jumped from the couch, his face instantly changing from relaxed to alert.

"Give her back, Caufield!" Beverly Shaw screamed, her face red and blotchy through the sidelight. Reid let her rant and instead of opening the door, he pulled out his phone.

"Jase? Beverly Shaw is screaming and pounding on my parent's door."

"Your parents live in Tyler. What do you want me to do?"

Shit, he'd forgotten he was out of jurisdiction. Why'd his parents have to leave Aylesford? "It's a small town bordering us, surely we have a contact."

Jason contemplated for a second. "Call Chatham Cavendish."

Who? "What kind of name is that?" The screaming was getting louder and he expected Tyler PD to roll up anytime now no matter who he called. "Whatever, give me his number."

The phone was ringing through to Cavendish when Beverly went from screaming to throwing things. He shot a look over his shoulder at his family and found them all huddled together.

"She wants to take me back," Annie whispered. "I don't want to go back."

"She's not getting you, honey," Kendall promised.

Roger hugged them tighter. "Let the woman go psycho out there. No one will question custody then."

A rock came crashing through the front window, "You can't take her!" following in it's wake.

"Don't make me pull my gun, Beverly," Reid warned. "She's my daughter, and this is my parent's house. You need to leave."

"No. I need to take Annie home. She has to be home when the Reverend gets there." Calmer now, Beverly dropped to the stoop. "I promised I would put everything back as it should be."

Not ready to leave the relative safety of the house, and hoping Tyler PD would show up any minute, he strove to keep her talking. "You don't like having things out of place?" He hadn't noticed an OCD tendency, but he wasn't a psychologist.

"She belongs at home. You stole her."

"She's a child, not a laptop. I didn't steal her—you hit her and drove her away."

"You stole Amy!" She was back to screaming now, the momentary calm gone. "You took her away, made her change!"

"I didn't make her change, Beverly. If anything I didn't want her to change. You cut her off when we married. She wanted to go to school and you wouldn't let her use her college fund."

"She defied us! She was supposed to go to Julliard, she was supposed to dance on Broadway!" Beverly shouted. "Instead she married the likes of you."

Where the hell was the police? "The likes of me?" he echoed. "I'm not the one who cheated, I'm not the junkie, I'm not the one who hid a child from her father for almost thirteen years."

Another rock came hurtling through the front window, narrowly missing smashing the glass-topped coffee table to bits. "I hated her!"

This was new. Good lord, why wasn't he hearing sirens? Were there only two cops in this town? Time for a different tact. "She loved you despite herself," he replied as calmly as possible. "She wanted nothing more than to make you proud, even after you disowned her. She was lonely, and when I was away she filled her time with meaningless men."

"And drugs!" Beverly added, her voice rising to a possession-quality scream. "She was perfect until you! Annie was perfect until you! Give her back! Let me make her perfect again!"

"She's perfect the way she is. She's staying with me."

"No!" she wailed.

Finally, he heard sirens. It might be the longest response time in history, but he'd never heard a happier sound.

~*~

"Please tell me you booked her," Reid asked Lieutenant Chatham Cavindish after Beverly was ushered away and into a cruiser by two officers.

"We're booking her on destruction of property, but it's a misdemeanor. I don't expect her to stay," the older man replied. "She accused you of kidnapping."

"My own daughter? If you check with the courts, we have been granted emergency custody."

"Already done. I spoke with ACA Cassidy Everett who assured me all the paperwork was in order and Judge King signed off."

"Is your family okay?" Cavindish asked, concern etched into his features. "Jason said you were worried about your daughter."

"How do you know Jason, anyway?" He had never heard of a Chatham Cavindish, and surely his partner would have told him about someone with such a name. He sounded like he should be in a Sherlock Holmes book, not policing the streets of tiny Tyler.

A grimace alighted the older man's face. "He's my brother-in-law. I married his older sister, Genevieve almost ten years ago."

Reid tried to failed to cover his shock. "Ten years? He's never once mentioned he has a cop brother-in-law, let alone an older sister."

Cavindish shook his head. "We're not close. Never have been, really. Gen is twelve years older than Jason, and only his half-sister. She was out of the house before Jason was six, and they never spend any time together. I'm surprised he told you to call me."

"Desperate times and all that," Reid remarked.

"Glad I could help," Cavindish replied. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. "Tell him to call, or better yet, visit. Gen misses him."

"Why doesn't she call him?"

"Ignore is an easy button to hit when your estranged sister calls." Switching gears, he spoke of the problem at hand, "This incident was relayed to Ms. Everett. I don't anticipate there being a problem with your custody hearing now."

"I agree. I think I might have the missing pieces to my murder case as well."

"Murder? In Aylesford?"

He nodded. "My ex, Beverly's daughter, Annie's mother."

"You're thinking the batshit crazy Ms. Shaw did it." It wasn't a question.

"The more I hear, the more I agree with Jason. He had a hunch a while ago, knew we needed to focus on Beverly."

"That's Jason for you. Going with his gut."

"He was right."

"We'll see."

~*~