by J. R. Ward
I.e., don't get so worried about keeping your things safe that you end up putting them on a raft that floats away from you.
She knew what the next page said, and she could feel herself easing up, sure as if she were the little chocolate Lab: She was a happily-ever-after person at heart, and as always, the puppy reunited with his bone made her feel like everything had been worth it.
She was just taking the drawing over to her display table when her phone rang. Jogging over to get it, she hoped it was Duke checking in. Maybe she was up to having him come over, after all.
"Hello?" she said.
"Hey."
Cait caught her disappointment before it came out in her voice. "Oh, G.B., hi."
"Listen ... I've got to tell you something."
The sound of his voice was all wrong, the words tight and awkward, nothing like the smooth cadence he usually sported.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm really sorry to do this."
He certainly sounded like it. "G.B., what's--"
"Did Duke ever tell you about his family?"
She frowned. "He said he didn't have any."
"That's a lie, Cait." There was a long pause. "I'm his brother."
Cait backed up blindly, putting out a hand for her work chair. When she ran into it, she sat down--more like fell down.
"I'm sorry. I ..." Had she heard that right?
He certainly hadn't stuttered--
Oh, crap, she thought. That was why, back in the beginning, she'd kept thinking she'd seen Duke somewhere before: He and G.B. did look alike. They weren't identical, but they were close, very close. Why hadn't the similarity occurred to her before now?
"Oh ... God."
"There's more, though." G.B. cursed. "There's so much more he hasn't told you. Look, you don't have to be with me, that's not why I'm calling. But I like you, I honestly like you, and I know for certain you do not belong with him."
With a sense that the world was spinning around her, she held on to the corner of her desk. Dimly, she noticed that in the background of the connection, there was a lot of chattering, as if he were in a public place.
"Cait, I want you to come out and see something. You deserve to know the truth--he's not who you think he is."
Abruptly, she thought of all those silences she and Duke had shared. She'd assumed that what he'd said was true--that he wasn't good at talking. It sure as hell fit his macho, tough-guy persona. But had there been another reason?
"Cait, just see for yourself. Then you can make up your own mind. Come now, though, I don't know how much longer he's going to be here."
After G.B. gave her a location and she'd hung up, she found that she couldn't breathe. But she was clear on one thing. As memories from that nightmare with Thom began to replay in her mind, the need to have some solid footing, even if it hurt, drove her to get her purse, go out to her SUV, and head over to where G.B. had told her to meet him.
Fifteen minutes later, she pulled up to the Caldwell Galleria, and she almost forgot to lock up the Lexus as she strode over to the entryway of the food court. Going in through the revolving center doors, she looked around, expecting to see G.B., or Duke, or somebody.
There were a lot of people, but none she recognized.
Walking down past a display of pearl necklaces and engagement rings, she kept going, oily scents of stir-fry, French fries, and doughnut holes making her absently wonder how many calories she was breathing in. Where was--
Cait stopped dead.
About fifty tables were set up in the center of it all, red and yellow plastic trays full of logo'd food covering the tiny tops, all kinds of teenagers and parents and little kids stuffing their faces. And in the midst of them?
Duke.
And he wasn't alone. He was sitting across from a carbon copy of himself, the young boy showing all the promise of the same height and strength of his father.
It was Duke's son.
That was the only explanation.
Didn't have any family here, huh.
Her first impulse was to march over and get into his face--but she wasn't going to do that in front of the child. Nope. Duke had more than earned a lashing, but his son did not deserve to see any of that.
Spinning around, Cait slammed face-first into a twelve-foot-tall biker, the bearded guy catching her in the nick of time, or she would have landed on her face.
"You okay there, lady?" he asked in a Southern baritone.
"Yes, yes, I'm sorry, yes, please, thank you."
Scrambling out of the mall, she rushed into the fresh air, and quickly located the trash bins on either side of the entrance ... because there was a good chance she was going to throw up the leftover lasagna she'd had when she'd gotten home from the funeral.
"Oh ... God..."
Abruptly, she thought of her last conversation with Thom, the one that had revealed a truth that made things easier, not harder, to live with.
This shit with Duke in there?
It was so much worse than Thom falling in love with the woman he would later spend the rest of his life with. That had hurt, yes, but at least that particular ex of hers had proven to be the good guy she'd always believed him to be.
No family, she thought bitterly as she went out to her car. Duke must have a very different definition of the word.
Getting in, she slammed the door and gripped the wheel, and blinked hard--although whether that was from hurt or anger, she didn't know. Wrapping her arms around her stomach, she couldn't believe she'd invited that liar over to her house ... welcomed him into her bed ... woken up next to him just this morning with all kinds of delusions of intimacy...
Snagging her phone from her bag, she went into recent calls and hit the one that was at the top.
G.B. answered on the second ring. "Are you okay?"
"I don't think so ... actually, no, I'm really, totally not."
"Cait--" His voice broke. "Cait, I'm really sorry. If I'd known you were seeing him, I would have told you. He's evil ... he's an evil guy."
Holding the phone up to her ear, she didn't fully focus on the parking lot in front of her, or the sun that was just about to set behind the JCPenney up ahead, or the couple who were walking hand in hand in front of her.
"G.B., I need to know something," she said in a dull tone.
"Anything."
"I need to know where he lives."
She was absolutely going to confront him, but it was going to be in person, not over the phone. She wanted the satisfaction of seeing his reaction when he found out that he'd been caught in his lies.
"Where am I ... where ... am I..."
As Cait heard the words leave her lips, she thought ... God, she'd said the same thing the night this had all started. Instead of being in search of a hair salon, though, she was out in the boonies, driving along rural roads that were not marked, in search of a farm.
Didn't exactly narrow things in this kind of neighborhood--
Cait slammed on the brakes, the Lexus grabbing onto the pavement and stopping just before a turnoff that had a mailbox reading, RR 1924, next to it.
Swallowing hard, she wondered if she was really going to go through with this--namely, wait for Duke to get home and confront him in person.
The decision was made once and for all as she thought of G.B.'s expression when Duke had come out of nowhere at the grave site. G.B. had been shocked not just because she'd been seeing someone else--but rather because he'd known what it meant; he'd known the man she'd been fooled by.
Someone capable of lying about whether or not he had a kid? A brother who was alive and well?
Nothing was out of bounds.
She turned in and started down the dirt path, going past acres of shorn cornfields that would no doubt imminently be turned over for planting season. The farmhouse that first appeared was quite large, a brick construction of sturdy, ageless style. She went by it, as she'd been told to do, and kept on the road, eventually coming up to a squat ranch that had a d
ecade-old car parked off to one side and a picnic table underneath a pine tree on the other.
Stopping right in front, she got out and looked around. Then she marched up to the windowless door and knocked.
Heart pounding, she had no idea who was going to answer the--
The stench of pot smoke that greeted her was enough to make her cough. And sure enough, as she looked past the skinny, happy-looking guy between the jambs, she saw two different bongs, a plastic bag full of weed, and enough lighters to start a bonfire on a pitted coffee table.
Annnnnnnnnnnnnd he did drugs.
What a fucking winner.
"Hi," the man said. "Are you Cathy?"
Like he'd expected someone by that name.
"No." Anger sharpened her tone. "Does Duke Phillips live here?"
"Yup, this is his place and I'm his roommate--what can I do you for?"
Lies, drugs, and a roomie.
You know what, she thought. This was bullcrap. Duke didn't deserve some confrontation. The best thing she could do, the only thing she should do, was take care of herself.
Cait just shook her head. "Nothing, actually."
As she pivoted away, he said, "You here to see Duke? He's due home any minute. You want to wait? I've got some cold pizza."
"No, thank you."
"Who should I tell him was here?"
"Nobody. I just took a wrong turn, but I'm going to fix that."
Cait went back for her SUV, and was rather proud of herself. No tears. No sobbing. No hysterics.
She did, however, feel like the stupidest woman alive--
"Wait! Hold on!"
She closed her eyes as she put her hand on her door. "Yes?"
The guy came loping over. "Seriously. You came here to see Duke, right? I mean, no one comes out here without a reason."
Cait cocked a brow. "Actually, fine. You can tell him that the joke's up. His brother told me all about him, and I've just come from the mall, where I saw Duke with his son. So he's not to call or come by to see me ever again." She opened her door and hopped into her seat. "Oh, and you can throw in a 'fuck off' in there somewhere while you're at it."
As she started her engine, the pothead backed off with his palms up, like he was afraid she might mow him down in her bid to get back to civilization.
Clearly, he hadn't smoked out all his brain cells.
Chapter
Fifty-four
When Duke pulled his truck up in front of the Appaloosa Way condo, he put things in park, but didn't cut the engine.
Nicole had been entirely too grateful when he'd called her on the way home from work and offered to take the kid out for a mall crawl and a talking-to. And maybe because of that, he didn't want to go inside even though she wasn't due home from her shift for another couple of hours.
Some lines, he didn't want to cross.
Others ... might be okay.
He looked across the seat. The boy was sitting there like a bump on a log, lanky arms linked across his pigeon chest, his long hair in his face.
"So do we understand each other," Duke said grimly.
"What," came the grousing response. "Like you takin' me out for a burger's gonna make me--"
Duke reached across and clamped a hard hand on the kid's shoulder. As Tony's wide eyes swung to his, he dropped his voice. "You're gonna stop bullying that kid, are we clear? I hear anything more about you picking on him? The next visit will not be about an early fucking dinner."
Tony narrowed his eyes. "I can do what I--"
"Not while I'm around, you can't."
"You're not my father!"
"Well, there's no one else stepping up, so it looks like you're stuck with me." Duke put his face in close. "No more. Do you hear me--whatever the hell is wrong in your own life, you do not take it out on some poor son of a bitch in your class."
The kid's momentary flash-in-the-pan aggression didn't last in the face of a grown man getting up in his grille. But Duke wanted this to be about more than ripping Tony a new one.
He sat back. "Look, I know I haven't been around much, but I was wondering if maybe you and me, we could start getting together. My night job doesn't start until late, and you're just fucking around here in the afternoon. No reason we shouldn't kick some hours together."
Wow. Parental figure of the year over here, dropping the f-bomb. Whatever. He'd never done this before.
After a period of silence, Tony glanced over. Looked away.
Looked back.
The suspicion and mistrust were a ball buster, they really were. But like the kid hadn't earned the right to be cautious?
"You're a bouncer, right?" Tony asked.
"Yeah."
"Do you beat people up at work?"
"Only when they deserve it."
"Cool..."
"Not really. Dealing with stupid, drunk people is no way to make a living." Duke shook his head. "I wanted to be a doctor, actually. Now, that is cool."
"Why aren't you one?"
Because your mother and I were...
Fuck that. "I quit college."
"Why?"
"I was a pussy." Yeeeeeeah, he probably shouldn't be using that kind of language around the kid, but the truth was the truth. "I didn't even apply to medical school. I pulled out two credits shy of what I needed to graduate. Biggest mistake I ever made."
His head had been too fucked to keep going, although in retrospect, he knew that was more about the evil that his brother was than anything he'd felt for Nicole: The concept that he'd shared a womb with someone capable of such casual cruelty had crippled him, shut him down ... essentially infected him.
A chance meeting with Cait seemed to be turning that around, though.
And now he was going to try doing the same to Tony.
Trickle-down wasn't just about economics.
"Monday," he said. "Five p.m. Be in your gym shorts with a towel and a bottle of water on you. We're going to go play basketball. Deal?"
Tony narrowed those eyes again. But after a moment, he nodded. "Okay."
Duke nodded back. And stayed around to watch the kid walk to the door and disappear inside.
Before he could even put his truck in drive again, his phone went off--for the third time. Answering the call, he barked, "Rolly, what the hell is your problem?"
"You had a visitor."
Duke rolled his eyes. "Oh, for fuck's sake, do not tell me you're dropping acid again. The last time, you were convinced Bob Barker was staging an intervention."
"Okay, that was just a bad trip."
"Yeah, because you didn't listen to Mr. Price Is Right and put up your damn bong--"
"It was a woman. She was talking all weird, something about your brother? And, um..."
A blast of cold fear cleared his head and then some. "What. Rolly, what did she say?"
"Something about seeing you with your son?"
Duke exhaled in a rush, a swift pain hitting him in the gut sure as if he'd been kicked by a steel-toed boot. "When did she come by?"
"'Bout an hour ago? That's why I've been calling you. You never have visitors, and she looked pretty upset--"
"I gotta go. Bye."
Stomping on the accelerator, he skidded out as he turned around and flashed down to the exit of the development.
"Jesus fucking Christ," he bit out as he called a number he'd never expected to dial.
Five rings later, like the phone's owner wasn't in any goddamn hurry, a voice drawled, "Hellllllo."
"You fucking asshole."
"I'm sorry, who is this?" G.B. mocked.
"You know exactly who it is. What the fuck are you doing?"
"God, how rude are you, my dearest, darling, long-lost brother? We don't speak for how many years, and you don't even ask how I'm doing before you--"
"Do not try to play me. I know what you are, and I know what you're capable of." He'd just evidently forgotten that--why the hell hadn't it dawned on him that his brother was a liar, too? "Leave Cait out of this.
"
"Oh, but see, I can't do that. You were the one who brought her into it."
"You don't even know her!"
"And neither do you--or should I say, neither will you. Duke, you've just got to understand something--you can't keep women from me. Didn't work with Nicole, not going to work with this new one."
Duke's hand cranked down so hard on his cell that it let out a long beep, like it was going into cardiac arrest. "Listen to me. You stay the fuck away from her--"
"Not your call. And do yourself a favor. Don't try to win her back--you don't have a chance."
"We'll see about that."
He hung up the phone and then threw the thing at the dash. Slamming his hands into the wheel, he clenched his teeth around the scream in his throat. He knew better than to try to talk to his brother--back in the early days, he'd given that enough shots to last twelve lifetimes.
No talking. No reasoning.
The only thing he could potentially work with was Cait.
"Shit!"
Steaming across town, he pulled into her neighborhood going Nascar fast, but slowed down--because running over some kid or somebody's dog over was not going to help the situation. And as he came up to her house, he was sorely relieved to see her car in the driveway.
Now, if he could just get her to answer the door.
Jumping out of his truck, he jogged up to the front entrance. Just as he was about to push the doorbell, he frowned and looked over his shoulder.
He could have sworn someone was standing right behind him. The presence wasn't aggressive, though. Quite the contrary; it was almost like, after all these years of going it alone ... he'd picked up a guardian angel or something.
Whatever, he thought as he punched the bell's button.
"Please answer the door," he prayed as he hit the thing again.
Cait was sitting at her desk, getting nothing done, when she heard a ding-dong go off at the front of her house.
She checked her phone. No calls. But she had a feeling who it was. The question was then ... what did she do about it.
Ding-donnnnng.
Getting up, she brought her bottle of water with her for no other reason than she wanted something for her hands to do. And as she closed in on the door, she thought, Well, she had wanted to see his face when she told him what she thought of him...
Now was her chance.
Opening the way up, she stood strong and stared right into Duke's face. "You really think there's anything you can say that I want to hear right now?"
"Can we do this inside?"
"No, here is good. You're not going to be here long."
