Chapter 2

We met with the assistant D.A. an hour before my arraignment. We sat in a cramped conference room down the hall from the courtroom. Other than a metal table and four folding chairs, the room could’ve been abandoned. It certainly needed a paint job and something other than fluorescent lighting. At least it wasn’t stuffy.

The assistant D.A., a short bald man in his thirties, shuffled through the papers he’d pulled out of a manila file. He looked up at us twice, both times frowning. After another two minutes of skimming the reports, he set them down and leaned back.

“So, Mr. Peterson,” he said, “I’m not sure I can accept your plea offer.”

My lawyer leaned forward. “Sir, why not? We’re offering to avoid the expense of a trial here. Mr. Peterson is no threat to the community.”

“But he is a repeat offender.”

“I wasn’t arrested the first time.”

“No,” the assistant D.A. agreed. “The officer gave you a warning because you were on your own property and agreed to quiet down.”

“Which I did.”

“Mmm hmm. But the second time you were arrested.”

“However, the charges were dropped,” my lawyer said.

“Because the restaurant owner felt sorry for you.”

I shrugged. He had.

“This time, well, Ms. Grayson does not feel sorry for you. She wants us to throw the book at you.”

I winced and hung my head.

“My client is prepared to apologize to her,” my lawyer said. “Formally, and in writing.”

“I’m not here to negotiate on her behalf.”

“So what are you offering?”

The assistant D.A. paused. I almost looked up, but I still burned with shame. Katie laid a comforting hand on my upper arm.

“Mr. Peterson pleads guilty to the soliciting charge and the disorderly conduct charge. We drop the assault charge. For soliciting, he goes on the sex offender registry. He pays a one thousand dollar fine and spends two nights in jail.”

Katie sucked in her breath.

“Let me confer with my client.”

I lifted my head. “No. We take it, but I don’t go on the sex offender’s registry.”

The assistant D.A. studied me. “Why?”

“Because I’m not a pervert.”

I once again hung my head, too embarrassed to even look Katie’s way.

We drove home in silence. I could sense Katie’s anger, simmering just beneath the surface, in the way she gripped the steering well and held her jaw stiff. She focused on the road and didn’t look my way at all. Not that I wanted her to.

I was surprisingly relaxed. Well, relieved. The certainty of what came next helped. I idly wondered what prison would be like, but I wouldn’t be there long enough for it to matter. And then it’d be over. I’d have paid my debts to society.

But Katie stewed.

And I couldn’t think of a thing to stay.

We pulled up to a stop light two-thirds of the way home when she couldn’t hold back anymore.

“It’s the photos, isn’t it?”

I sighed. “Yes.”

“You kept them.”

“I couldn’t exactly give them away.”

“You could’ve destroyed them. I thought you did.”

“Your mom didn’t want me to.” And I didn’t want to. They were ... exquisite. Beautiful, and extremely artistic.

“Where are they?”

I sighed. “The negatives or the prints?”

“Both.”

“The negatives are in my files. The prints are in an album in the bedroom.”

“The bedroom?” She gave me a sharp side glance.

“That’s where your mom put it.”

She fell quiet again. I sighed and leaned back as she drove a few more blocks.

“They’re not worth prison, you know.”

“I’d do more prison time if I were on the registry and they found them.”

“Then get rid of them.”

I stayed silent.

“Oh, come on, Dad!”

I took a deep breath. “They were important to your mother. Two days in prison is nothing.”

“Pfft!”

“I get out of prison and it’s over. Those registries are forever!”

Her grip on the steering wheel tightened, if that were possible. Fortunately, we were almost home. She waited until she’d pulled into the driveway and turned off the engine. Then she turned and glared at me.

“Get rid of them.”

“No.” I glared back.

She blinked first and looked away. A tear formed in her eye.

“I’ve already accepted the deal,” I said a bit more gently. “Getting rid of them now won’t change anything.”

She sighed and got out of the car.

Katie didn’t stay long. She fixed a salad she said I could eat for dinner, along with the brats in the fridge. We talked about her kids, my grandkids, as we did, carefully avoiding anything of importance. She was impatient to get back to her home before they got out of school and I was ready to have my own house to myself.

I waved to her from the porch as she drove off, and waited until her car disappeared at the end of the block. Then I promptly went up to my bedroom and the bookcase with all the photo albums.

I found the problematic one immediately. Caroline had labeled each of the albums and organized the entire bookcase by date. Well, the date of the last photo taken inside. I pulled it out, wiped the thin layer of dust off the cover, and then sat on my haunches. I needed to put it somewhere Katie couldn’t find it and take it. That would take some thought.

But first...

I cracked the album open. The first photo made me smile. Baby Katie, asleep in her mom’s lap. Caroline’s breasts, full with milk, hung heavy, but her smile was beatific. She looked like an angel, forever captured in black and white.

One-year-old Katie spilled out of her mom’s lap in the second photo. Still asleep, her mom’s expression was more amused exhaustion than pure joy.

I slowly flipped through the next several. All in black and white, all with both mother and daughter nude, they captured the toddler turning into the coltish girl. The lines began to appear in her mother’s face, and Caroline’s breasts sagged more and her hips grew, but that just made her more beautiful to me.

In the teen years, the ladies posed more side by side. Some years, I’d had them look at each other. Others, they both faced the camera. Most had playful smiles. Sometimes Caroline looked worn, though her eyes remained warm.

And then the final photo, shortly after Katie’s eighteenth birthday. They’d posed on the chaise, laying side by side, Caroline with one arm around her daughter. Katie had a far away look in her eyes. Caroline—Caroline just looked pleased.

I stared at the last nude photo I’d taken of my daughter. She’d become a beauty, and Jason was an idiot for letting her go.

I couldn’t let the album be destroyed. It was ... history. It was clearly art and not pornography. I’d never convince the religious moralists of that, though. Nude kids were automatically child porn as far as they were concerned.

Nobody but Caroline, Katie, and me had seen these photos. No one ever would. But I wasn’t ready to let them go.