by Jan Freed
He strode over and leaned one hip against the counter. “There’s something you love more. Someone you love more. What happened between you and Alec, Laura?”
Her hands grew still. What happened?
She’d wanted to exorcise his demons, to free him of the past and be a part of his future. Instead, he’d used suspicion and distrust as shields. She knew that now. Knew that as long as Alec thought himself unworthy of her love, he wouldn’t accept it. So she’d refused to torture them both by sticking out the remainder of their contract term.
Laura raised her face and met Scott’s compassionate gaze. “You know me. It’s all or nothing. I gambled and lost.”
Suddenly she felt as fragile as a Chinese lantern in a storm. One more word, one more sympathetic look, and she’d shred into tiny pieces and scatter in the wind. Turning off the tap, she wiped her hands on a towel and cleared her throat. “I’ll be out in the garden if you need me.” Knowing he’d seen her weeding just after breakfast, she avoided Scott’s eyes.
After a long pause, he relented. “Sure, runt. I’ll tell Dad when he gets up. Take all the time you want.”
Slipping out the door, Laura stood on the back stoop, squinted at the noonday sun and swallowed a miserable chuckle. Time. Take all you want, he’d said.
As if she coveted the stuff. As if each minute didn’t crawl past, each hour didn’t yawn ahead. As if each day she didn’t wonder how she’d get through the next.
As if each night she didn’t hope she wouldn’t.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“COULD I SEE your driver’s license, sir?”
Alec passed his wallet through the truck’s open window and controlled his urge to squirm. Damn, he hated mirrored sunglasses. They gave him the creeps. He stared at his own grim-faced reflection in the other man’s shiny silver lenses and waited.
“Very good, Mr. McDonald. Would you step out of the truck now, please?” The man moved aside, his gray short-sleeved uniform neat and crisp, despite the withering heat. A .357 magnum rested on one hip.
With persuasion like that, Alec sure as hell wasn’t going to argue. He opened the door, slid out and watched his Chevy systematically searched for weapons.
Apparently finished, the young man turned, his stern features and shielded eyes reinforcing the impression of an emotionless android. “That should do it, sir. The gate house is straight ahead.” Holding the cab door open, he motioned for Alec to climb in, then slammed the door shut. “Have a nice visit.”
“Yeah.” Alec rolled up the window, started the engine and drove slowly up the narrow road. Have a nice visit. What a joke! As if this were some sort of resort hotel, instead of a state penitentiary.
He could turn back now, before it was too late. Everyone thought he was still in San Antonio pitching a new account. Brenda Lee had practically shoved him out the door yesterday morning in her haste to be rid of him. Not that he blamed her. He’d been insufferable since Laura left.
No one, least of all Alec, had fully appreciated her contribution to the agency until she was gone. Buzzing from office to office, she’d boosted morale and pollinated ideas that blossomed into some of the finest creative work he’d ever seen. Without Laura, work was flat, but bearable.
It was his personal life he couldn’t tolerate.
Clenching the steering wheel, he kept his foot on the gas pedal by sheer force of will. He’d been a martyr and a coward long enough. Perhaps after today, he could be the man Laura deserved.
Pulling up at the gate house, he again rolled down the window and provided information to the guard on duty. Five minutes later he’d been cleared to enter the compound. Stomach churning like an outboard motor, he parked the truck and slid out. As a child, confronting his father had often made him nauseous. Age hadn’t improved the sensation one whit.
His legs moved him toward the entrance gate as if they belonged to someone else. Inside the towering picket guardhouse, a shadowed figure waved. Seconds later, an angry electronic buzz jolted Alec’s heart.
A chain-link gate slowly opened. The sally port enclosure, fifteen feet high and topped with a double spool of razor wire, sat waiting to trap him within. Taking a deep breath, he walked through and stopped. What would his father say after all these years? Would he apologize for making his family’s life a living hell? Would he retract the words that haunted Alec to this day?
And what in God’s name would he say to his father?
The second buzzer broke his speculation. He moved through the gate and headed for the only bricked structure in the complex. All other buildings were of the metal warehouse variety. One of these functional cheerless dormitories housed Jonathan McDonald. By contrast, Alec’s plush Georgian home seemed palatial—exactly the sort of house his father would both covet and sneer at.
Which is exactly why you bought it, pal.
Alec shook off the disturbing thought and entered the one-story office building. Stale chilled air hit his perspiring skin. Shivering, he studied the typical institutional waiting area. A soft-drink machine, two green vinyl chairs and a plastic laminated end table huddled on dingy white linoleum squares. An ivy, gasping for water, drooped over a chipped yellow pot on the table.
A stocky middle-aged woman dressed in a guard’s uniform entered from a hallway on his left. Her hard hazel eyes, devoid of all makeup, studied him without interest. She looked entirely capable of subduing any convict who crossed her path.
“You Alec McDonald?”
He dug into his pocket for his roll of Tums. “Yes.”
“You’ll need a visitation slip.” She glanced at the paper in her hand, did a double take, then read it more closely. “Well, if that don’t beat all. Johnny-boy has a visitor. I didn’t think the old man had any family—still living, that is.”
Alec winced. Where were those antacids? Pulling out a handful of change, he sifted through for stray tablets.
Oblivious, she gestured to a doorway on the far end of the waiting area. “Take this slip into the chain room. Eddie’ll fix you right up.”
Alec dropped the coins back in his pocket and reached for the computer printout, startled when she clutched his wrist with the grip of a stevedore.
“That there Johnny is mean as they come. Can’t quit fighting long enough to make parole. He gives you any lip, you call Eddie now, hear?”
“Thanks. I’ll do that.” Much to Alec’s relief, she seemed satisfied and released his wrist. He felt her eyes on his back all the way across the waiting area.
Some twenty visitation slots dissected the large rectangular “chain room.” Unlike TV-show versions, there were neither telephones nor privacy partitions at each slot. A Plexiglas and wire-screen barrier separated inmates from visitors. Eight conversations were in progress at the moment. Scanning the visitors, Alec guessed there were four wives and/or lady friends, three mothers and a possible lawyer.
Handing his slip to Eddie, Alec grimaced at the trembling paper. He was shaking like a woman, damn it. No, like the sixteen-year-old kid he’d been the last time he saw his old man.
“Have a seat at number eleven, Mr. McDonald. It will take a few minutes to get your father.” The brawny guard motioned to a spot between a bleached blonde smacking her gum and a well-dressed man with a briefcase.
Nodding, Alec pulled out the folding metal chair at slot eleven and sat down. God, this was worse than he’d imagined. Good thing he could sit, because his legs wouldn’t have held out much longer. His muscles ached from repressing his shivers. His gaze wandered.
After ten minutes, he’d memorized the sign warning visitors to supervise small children, the six soft-drink brands offered in the vending machine and the many flaws of Sue Ann’s stingy mother-in-law who wouldn’t fork over rent money but could afford weekly manicures. He’d just tuned in to the lawyer’s conversation on his right when a door opened on the prisoner’s side.
Jonathan McDonald walked through and stared straight at Alec. For one burning moment, their gazes locked as each s
tudied the changes seventeen years had wrought in the other. Surprise and grudging respect flashed in his father’s eyes before hostility nudged them aside. Raising one eyebrow at his son, he deliberately turned his back.
Alec released his pent-up breath. The physical changes in his father stunned him. Despite the baggy white prison garb and silver hair, he seemed leaner and younger at age fifty-one than the bloated thirty-four-year-old alcoholic etched in Alec’s memory. Years of forced sobriety and prison fare had improved Jonathan’s appearance. His belligerent attitude, however, was all too familiar.
Alec’s stomach picked up the cues and roiled automatically, instinctively.
After logging in his name and inmate number with the guard, Jonathan turned and sauntered forward, his black lace-up work boots scuffing the linoleum. Pulling out a chair, he sat down and crossed his arms.
“Well, well, well. If it ain’t my loving son,” he sneered, pronouncing the last word like an obscenity. “Makes me feel all warm and cozy, you visitin’ your old pop like this. Leastways, it would have...seventeen years ago.”
How could Alec have forgotten the contemptuous tone that had always made him want to snap and snarl? “As I recall, you said you never wanted to see my ugly snitch’s face again.”
“Yeah, well, your testifying against me kind of stuck in my craw for a few years. But bein’ a generous man, I forgave you. Anyhow, you ain’t so ugly now that you’re all growed up.”
Deep blue eyes, the legacy of all McDonald men, squinted at Alec in lazy appraisal. “You’re bigger’n I thought you’d be. Spittin’ image of me, too. Don’t say I never gave you nothin’, boy.” He laughed softly, revealing even white teeth that somehow appeared sinister. “Bet that face gets you laid free.”
Alec fought back sick panic. He did indeed bear an uncanny resemblance to the man in front of him. Booze and forty pounds must have distorted the similarities before. “I may look like you, but that’s all we have in common.”
“That’s what your mama used to say. She thought you hung the moon, sure enough. Always braggin’ about how smart you were, how perfect.” He lowered his voice conspiratorially. “But we know different, don’t we, son?”
Alec stared, mesmerized by the unholy gleam in his father’s eyes. Jonathan McDonald could smell fear a mile away. Alec prayed his staccato heartbeats weren’t audible through the Plexiglas. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know all about you, hotshot. You were written up in the Houston Business Journal last year. Some joker put the article on my bunk. Let’s see if I got this straight.” He cocked his head and stroked his chin. “You coasted through college on a scholarship, got a cush job, dipped the boss’s daughter and knocked her up. Married her, reorganized her daddy’s company, fired a lot of deadbeats and dumped a loyal client for a bigger one.”
Alec’s hands slowly clenched and unclenched.
“Along the way, you divorced the little woman and then abandoned your brat, too.” He raised a mocking brow. “Your mama’s probably turnin’ in her grave right now. She always did think you were better ‘n me. Better ‘n me, ha! You’re exactly like me. I got the mark to prove it.” Jonathan leaned forward, parted his cropped hair and revealed a pink jagged scar. “Remember this? You damn near split my head like a pumpkin with that wrench. Would’ve done it, too, if you’d had any meat on your bones.”
Alec’s nausea increased at the images flickering like flames in his mind. Pounding fists, maddened blue eyes, battered flesh, heartrending terror and blood...so much blood. The helpless rage of a teenage boy swelled in his breast. His fingers itched for a wrench.
“I should’ve killed you that day,” Alec said low in his throat.
Jonathan’s face lit with triumph. “Blood lust, that’s what we got, son, you ‘n me. Once you’ve felt it, ain’t nothin’ any better. Not booze. Not sex. Nothin’. Look at you, for chrissake. You’re ready to bust through this glass and tear me apart.”
Shaking with the effort, Alec kept his fists in his lap. You’re nothing like your father! You’re good and loving and honorable. Laura’s passionate assurance rang through his fevered mind.
“Why’d your fancy wife divorce you, boy? Get a little too rough with her, maybe?” Jonathan cackled knowingly.
I know you won’t hurt me. Just as surely as I know Susan’s injury was an accident. The throaty feminine voice soothed Alec’s fury, pulling him back into rational territory.
“Only reason you’re not in this shithole with me is money. That and luck.”
Alec shook his head, as if awakening from a bad dream.
Jonathan sniffed. “Yep, if I’d had me a fancy degree and a fancy job, things woulda turned out different. I’d be on top of the heap now, too.”
“No, you wouldn’t,” Alec heard himself say.
Jonathan’s double take was almost comical. “The hell you say.” He thrust out his chin.
A rather weak chin, Alec noticed for the first time. Details registered fast and furious. The petulant mouth, the flicker of insecurity in narrowed eyes, the soured expression of a petty mean-spirited soul. Seen through the eyes of an adult, this was the face of a bully—not the all-powerful man he remembered.
His voice strengthened with conviction. “You would have looked for the easy way to success and blamed everyone else for your inadequacies. Once a loser, always a loser. Nothing you do or say will change that, Pop.”
Jonathan’s reddened face heightened the silver color of his hair. Gripping the laminated ledge with both hands, he lowered his voice to a biting hiss. “You wise-ass punk! I’d like to hear you say that on this side of the wall. Just wait until I’m outta here, boy. You and yours better look to your backs, ‘cause I’ll be comin’.”
Conversations flowed around them, undeterred by the drama being played out between father and son. Alec was glad of the noise. He leaned forward to within inches of the glass and looked his father in the eye. “I’m only going to say this once, so listen carefully, old man. If you ever come near me or my family, I’ll split your head open without blinking. You understand me, Pop?”
“You ain’t got the guts.”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve got a lot of meat on my bones now. And unlike you, I prefer going up against someone my own size rather than women and children.” How had he thought he could hurt Laura or Jason, no matter what the provocation? The very idea made him sick. But protecting them from harm... “Believe me, I’d split you open and laugh doing it.”
Jonathan’s gaze widened, then faltered.
Sweet liberating triumph swept through Alec as he realized his father not only believed him, but was afraid. The powerful mystical monster was in reality a pathetic cowardly bully, unworthy of stealing another moment of Alec’s time or thoughts.
At long last he was free!
Recovering his bravado, Jonathan leaned back and sneered. “Go on, then. Go back to your big house and rich friends. It don’t change what you are, boy, and that’s trash. Always have been and always will be. We’re two of a kind, you ‘n me, and don’t tell me no different. You always were—”
Alec scraped back his chair and rose, interrupting the venomous flow. “Shut up, Pop. I have it on the best authority—I’m nothing at all like you.”
It wasn’t the first time Jonathan spewed obscenities at his son’s back.
But it was the first time Alec smiled as he walked away.
* * *
LAURA STUMBLED toward the barn door. Damn, damn, damn! She would not cry. Not again. She’d watered the garden yesterday with enough tears to ensure a bumper crop of vegetables.
The interior of the barn welcomed her like a dear friend. She clutched the lopsided paper heart against her breast, closed her eyes and inhaled the distinctive scent of new-mown hay, warm horses and ammonia-sharp urine. Knees trembling, she let the dusky embrace soothe her as it had when she was a child.
Evelyn had found the handmade card in Jason’s room and mailed it to Laura with a
note. The child had not been himself since she’d left. Would she please call or write soon to let Jason know she wasn’t mad at him?
Laura opened her eyes and held out the card. He’d misspelled everything, including her name. But he’d labored over the letters without help, cut and colored the paper heart with earnest six-year-old fingers. “I luv u lora” merged into a hopeless blur before her eyes.
He thought she was mad at him. A choked sob racked her body.
Fleetwood nickered her distress from a nearby stall. The mare had a sixth sense where her owner’s mood was concerned. Laura had raised the Appaloosa from a foal. Leaving her had been almost as hard for Laura as leaving the two men she loved, although periodic visits home had kept the bond alive.
Slipping the card inside her jeans back pocket, Laura backhanded the tears from her face. She plucked Fleetwood’s worn halter from the hook beside her stall, unlatched the door and slipped inside. “Hello, girl. Worried about me?”
Fleetwood whuffled softly, nudged Laura’s neck with prickly muzzle whiskers and blasted warm moist breath against her sensitive skin.
She managed a shaky smile. “I love you too, girl.”
As well mannered as ever, the mare lowered her head for the halter and followed Laura meekly into the main corridor. Scott’s Arabian stud, Twister, whinnied from the barn’s largest box stall. When Laura ignored him on her way back from the tack room, he slammed his back hooves against the cedar boards with an explosive double crack.
“Men,” she muttered. “Always throwing their weight around.”
Minutes later she swung into the saddle and broke free of the barn. Space. She needed space. Scott had been right about her hating domestic chores. She felt smothered in the small clapboard house—but she would die before admitting such petty feelings. She’d had a shot at her dream and blown it. The least she could do was help Scott and her father salvage theirs.
