The ghost vanished, still grinning, but its disappearance wasn’t the relief it should have been. Brett had been safe from Jake Creed’s shade during the daylight, as long as he was sober, but he’d just seen him, and it wasn’t much past noon—was it?
He leaned sideways in the booth seat, ‘til he could see the beer-sign clock on the far wall. It had a lightup bear holding a can of brew in one paw on it, and the wire hands said five minutes to three.
Briana Grant appeared in Jake’s seat in the next moment, looking all sexy and soft and female. She looked down her nose at Brett, like he stank or something, and then blip, she was gone.
Brett’s benumbed brain groped for a memory that slithered away from him like wet soap in the bottom of a bathtub. Logan Creed. He’d seen Creed with Briana’s boys, in the Mexican restaurant at the casino.
Holy shit.
No wonder Briana had turned him down when he’d asked her to the drivein on Friday night. She was boinking the local hotshot.
Brett took a big gulp from his beer mug, hoping to steady himself.
He’d gone straight to Briana’s place, after she’d cut him dead in the parking lot at the casino that morning—or had he? Sometimes, he got things he did mixed up with things he’d only thought about doing.
He took another taste of the beer, just a cautious sip this time. Had to make it last, he reminded himself. Freida refused to buy the stuff, stingy bitch; she had wine sometimes, but he always found it, and he’d finished off the last of her supply after he got back from Briana’s.
If he’d gone to Briana’s.
He shoved both hands into his hair.
Think.
Yes. He’d been there. The back door had been unlocked, and he’d gone inside, planning to move things around a bit, that was all. Give her a little jolt when she got home.
But an old black dog had come at him, first thing—hadn’t even barked a warning, like a dog ought to do. He’d turned and hotfooted it for the Corolla, with that hound snarling and nipping at his ass.
“Hello, Brett,” a familiar voice said, interrupting Brett’s struggle to sort the real from the imaginary.
Brett blinked, looked up, saw Sheriff Floyd Book sitting across from him. At first, he thought he was imagining it, like before, when old Jake was there, and after him, Briana.
A few beats passed before Brett understood that the sheriff was flesh and blood.
“I ain’t done nothin’,” he said immediately.
Book smiled. Took off his hat and set it on the seat beside him, nodded his gratitude when Sally Jo, the barmaid, brought him the usual, a cola with extra ice. Sally Jo looked at Brett like she was scared of him, and scuttled back behind the bar as soon as she’d delivered Book’s beverage.
“Thought I’d give you a ride over to Freida’s,” Book said easily. “You’re in no shape to drive, it appears to me.”
Rage swelled inside Brett, fit to burst him wide open. “Sally Jo call you and tell you I was drunk?” he rasped.
“Don’t you go blaming Sally Jo for my coming here,” Book said, after taking a sip of his cola. Must have gone down good, since he closed his eyes for a moment, like he was savoring the taste or something. “Under state law, she’s partly responsible if you get into an accident on the way home.”
“I ain’t gonna get in no accident,” Brett said.
Book sighed. He was tired of his job, everybody knew that. Tired of Stillwater Springs, and probably tired of his crippled wife, too.
And Brett was tired of him.
Things would just go from bad to worse, though, if Jim Huntinghorse won the special election.
“You talk like a hillbilly. You need a shower and a shave. And those clothes… well. Those clothes.” The sheriff interlaced his fingers, studied Brett thoughtfully. “Once, your name meant something in this town. What happened?”
Brett merely snorted. Book knew damn well what happened. The old man had died, leaving the company books in a tangle—turned out he’d had a whole nuther family squirreled away in Missoula—and then Jake Creed had gotten himself killed up in the woods on a fine summer day, just like this one. And after that, “Brett Turlow” meant fuck-all in Stillwater Springs and everywhere else.
“I’ll finish my drink,” Book said affably, as though they were two friends having a nice chat, “and give you a lift over to Freida’s. You can hike back for the Corolla later on.”
“I am not drunk,” Brett said. “And I didn’t cut that logging chain and turn all that timber loose on Jake Creed, neither.”
“Nobody said you did,” the sheriff replied easily. He seemed loose, like his joint sockets were lubricated with motor oil, and Brett knew there was a younger, sharper man behind Book’s eyes than most people ever guessed.
“Everybody thinks I did,” Brett lamented. “Same as.”
The sheriff glanced at Brett’s beer, like he might take it away, hand it off to Sally Jo to be dumped down the drain back of the bar. So Brett grabbed it and chugged it right down.
Book just waited and watched.
He’d been doing it for years.
Waiting. Watching. Eyeballs peeled for a wrong move.
“Something has been eating at you all this time,” the sheriff remarked. “That’s for sure.”
“You headed up the investigation yourself,” Brett reminded him. “There was no proof that I killed Jake Creed.”
Book leaned forward slightly on the booth seat, his hands still interlaced. “He was rolling in the hay with your girlfriend, as I remember.”
“He ‘rolled in the hay’ with everybody’s girlfriend,” Brett said. Now, after downing what was left of his beer, his words were slurred, and there was a great, hollow ache expanding inside him—the knowledge that there wouldn’t be more anytime soon. “And Jake didn’t just screw girlfriends,” he added. “He stuck it to plenty of other men’s wives, too.”
Let the sheriff chew on that one. Cocky old son of a bitch. Did he think Brett didn’t know about him and Freida? They’d almost run away together, once. Kicked off the traces, the both of them, and left town for good.
Would have done it, too, if Book’s wife hadn’t crashed her car into a bridge piling one snowy night and put herself in a wheelchair.
“You cut that chain,” Book said quietly.
“I didn’t,” Brett said.
Another sigh, deep and heavy with the suffering of the ages. “You’ve finished your beer.” Book reached for his hat, put it on and stood, leaving his cola unfinished. “Let’s go,” he said. “I’ve got things to do.”
Brett went because he had no other choice, but he did so grudgingly.
The squad car was parked outside, where everybody could see it. Worse, there was a computer monitor on the front seat, so Brett had to sit in the back, like he was under arrest or something.
He seethed, sitting back there. Folks walking by on the sidewalk looked his way, and got those smart-ass smirks on their faces.
Brett sat as low as he could.
“Buckle up,” the sheriff said. “Wouldn’t want you getting hurt or anything.”
Brett buckled up.
And Jake Creed appeared beside him, his normal bloody, grinning self.
Brett closed his eyes to shut him out, and suddenly he was back on the mountain again, up there in the lonesome woods. He hadn’t cut that logging chain, but he hadn’t fastened it right, either. Had intended to come back to it, after a taking a quick piss in the brush.
He’d nearly wet himself, when he heard the thunder of those rolling logs. Actually felt the ground shake as he ran back toward the loaded truck, fumbling to zip up his pants as he stumbled along.
Any other man but Jake Creed would have been screaming, from fear if not from pain, but when Brett got there, he saw the bastard looking up at him between the gaps, grinning.
Brett had sworn a blue streak, danced around, this way and that, unable to stand still.
“Get somebody,” Creed had said calmly.
Jake Creed had been haunting him ever since.
And now Logan would, too.
That was the real reason he’d come back, Brett decided. It figured.
THE DOG COULDN’T WALK. When Logan set Wanda on the ground, in front of his house, she made a puddle in the dirt and gazed up at him in helpless apology.
He looked into the truck, saw Briana was still sitting woodenly in the passenger seat, staring straight through the windshield.
“Stay here with your mother,” he told Josh quietly. “I’ll come back for her in a couple of minutes.”
Standing beside him, Josh didn’t move. Logan knew his instructions probably hadn’t penetrated. “Did the bear hurt Wanda?” the boy asked, his voice so small that Logan barely heard him.
Logan laid a hand on Josh’s shoulder. “I don’t think so,” he said. “She’s just scared.”
Josh bit his lower lip, the way Logan had seen Briana do. Nodded his head. It wasn’t hard to follow his line of thinking—first Alec had been hurt, and now his mother and his dog had come face-to-face with a bear. It was an uncertain world.
Anything could happen—to his mother, to his dog. Loving a person or an animal, needing them, didn’t guarantee their safety.
Logan squeezed Josh’s shoulder. He knew the feeling.
Jake’s face bloomed in his mind, lying there in his hospital bed.
Shake it off, he heard the old man say, way in the back of his brain.
So he stooped and gathered Wanda up as gently as he could. Started for the house. Snooks and Sidekick jumped out of the truck and followed, and when he set the stillshuddering Lab in the middle of the kitchen floor, they sniffed at her, but otherwise kept their distance.
He went back for Briana—met her walking toward the house, Alec on one side of her, Josh on the other. They held her elbows solicitously, like little men.
She blinked when she saw Logan, stopped as though surprised to find herself standing in his yard. It was a good sign—she was coming out of it now.
Getting her bearings.
In the truck, she’d been practically catatonic, merely shaking her head while both boys pelted her with questions. Had she tried grinning at the bear? Did it have babies? Did she think it would have eaten her and Wanda both if they hadn’t come across the field at top speed, with the horn honking?
Now, she seemed to be settling into herself, as if she’d been traveling outside her body.
Her skin felt clammy when Logan took her hand. He was tempted to carry her into the house, the way he had when she was wearing those teetery shoes, but she wouldn’t want the fuss. She’d bristle, he knew, and tell him to keep his hands to himself, that she could walk just fine on her own, thank you very much.
So he stood back.
Led the way through the front door, on into the kitchen.
Once inside, Alec and Josh scuffled over the shared cell phone; Alec got it and ran, slamming out the back door into the yard. Josh didn’t give chase, but sat down hard on the floor and wrapped a consoling arm around Wanda. She nuzzled him and licked his face. Sidekick and Snooks, completing the picture, were curled up on the old rug in front of the stove.
Logan ignored the boys and the dogs, and eased Briana into a chair at the table. What did you give a person who’d just had a close call with a bear? He’d have wanted a stiff shot of whiskey—did want one, in fact—but the female mind worked differently.
Tea, he thought.
Trouble was, he didn’t have any on hand.
So he started a pot of coffee.
“Thank you,” Briana said, like someone just hauled up out of a very deep, very dark well.
“Alec took the cell phone,” Josh complained. “Bet he calls Dad.”
Briana looked at the boy, nodded. “Bet he does,” she agreed. She still didn’t sound like herself, but her color was coming back. “Take Wanda outside,” she told Josh. “If you don’t, she’ll be afraid to leave the house from now on.”
Josh nodded, and half dragged poor Wanda to the door, out onto the porch.
Logan was still fiddling with the coffeepot.
Snooks and Sidekick followed Wanda’s trail to the door, and he let them out.
“Vance will come,” Briana said, in the same musing tone she might have used to remark on some small, subtle change in an otherwise familiar landscape. “For the boys, I mean.”
Logan paused in the act of getting out the two coffee cups he owned. “Is that all right with you?”
Briana didn’t shrug, but it was as if she had. “He’s their father,” she said. “He has rights.”
Logan imagined Briana, the two boys and the dog stranded outside Wal-Mart in a strange town, with no money and nowhere to go. Saw all of them, watching Vance’s taillights disappear into the night. He wished he’d been there, instead of Dylan.
Which was just plain useless thinking, and probably wouldn’t have made a difference, anyhow. Two years ago, when Briana had been dumped, he’d still been trying to make it work with Laurie.
“Yeah,” he said, with gravel in his voice. “He has rights.”
“Can I stay?” Briana asked.
It was a moment before Logan registered what she’d said. “Stay?” he echoed.
“Here. With you. Just for tonight.”
He crossed to her, crouched in front of her chair, took her hands. “You’re pretty shook up right now,” he told her. “Not thinking straight.”
She laughed, even as tears filled her eyes.
“I was so scared,” she said. And she leaned forward, and let her head rest on his shoulder, and Logan knew, sure as his dear old dad would have voted for a yellow dog before casting his ballot for a Republican, that Briana Grant was different from any other woman he’d ever known.
He patted her back. His knees were cramping up, but he was damned if he’d move. “I know,” he said. “And that just shows you have good sense.”
“I actually grinned at that bear,” she confessed, the words cracking a little, muffled by his shirt and his shoulder.
Logan chuckled at the image, but it was a raw, shaky sound. He’d been scared, too. More scared than he would admit. “It’s over,” he reminded her—and himself. “It’s over and you’re okay.”
She lifted her head off his shoulder, looked down into his face. Shook her head. “I’m not okay,” she said. “I was strong before, and I’ll be strong again, but right now, I need—”
Logan stood. “You don’t know what you need, Briana,” he said, because he had to put some distance between them, both verbally and physically. If the boys hadn’t been right outside, he might have taken her straight to his bed. “You’re in shock.”
“Maybe so,” she agreed, watching him as he retreated to the coffeepot. After that, she lapsed into a silence.
The boys came back in, bringing the dogs with them, and Logan made sandwiches, poured kibble into bowls. Set a mug of hot coffee in front of Briana.
Vance and Heather arrived, summoned via cell phone by Alec, as Josh had predicted. They only stayed a few minutes, then shooed the boys to the van and drove off, as hurriedly as if they expected that bear to track those kids right to Logan’s kitchen and chew the flesh off their bones.
“May I stay?” Briana asked again, as soon as they were gone.
“Yes,” Logan said. He did take her to his bed then, but it was different than he’d imagined. He straightened the covers, laid her down, pulled her shoes off and covered her with the bedspread.
She looked up at him, confused.
Wanda padded in, and he hoisted the dog onto the bed.
Woman. Dog.
No room for him.
“Rest awhile,” he told her.
She closed her eyes.
He left the room, nearly tripping over Snooks and Sidekick in the doorway. Shut the door.
In the hallway, he shoved a hand through his hair.
He wanted Briana Grant. She was vulnerable right now, and that was exactly why he was taking his horny self back to the kitchen until she’d rested up a little, gotten over the whole bear incident.
Of course, it was more than the bear. Logan knew that. She was still reeling from Alec’s accident the night before. There was only so much one woman could take without buckling under the strain.
So, he went back to the kitchen. Got out the Our Family album and looked at all the pictures again.
He looked at Jake.
He looked at his mother.
He looked at himself as a baby.
He ate another sandwich, and made one for Briana, in case she woke up hungry.
Twilight came, and he went outside to feed the horses, taking the dogs with him.
When he got back, Briana was sitting at the kitchen table, wearing one of his T-shirts and eating the sandwich he’d built for her earlier. She’d showered and unwound her hair from its braid, and it burned like golden fire around her face and shoulders, tumbled down her back, nearly to her waist.
Logan’s heart stopped, started again.
He stood clogging up the doorway, him and the dogs, unable to move.
Briana nodded to the album, still open on the table. Idly gave Wanda a corner of her sandwich as she spoke. “Is that you in those pictures?” she asked, as though it were a normal thing for her to be sitting in his kitchen, practically naked, with her hair loose and shiny and damp.
What would it smell like, all that hair? What would it feel like, flowing between his fingers?
“Some of them,” he said, and he didn’t sound like himself. But he did move out of the doorway, mainly because the dogs were pushing at him from behind, wanting in.
“If you don’t want to make love to me,” Briana said, “I’ll understand.”
“Oh, I want to make love to you,” Logan answered, “but since I’m pretty sure you’re not in your right mind, I probably won’t.”
She just looked at him, one eyebrow slightly raised.
Montana Creeds: Logan Page 18
