Dead End Road

by Lori Whitwam

  Chapter Nineteen

  Seth

  Seth put the bag and his guitar in the back of Joey’s car, then slumped in the passenger seat. He thought he might be sick, and breathed deeply until the feeling subsided.

  “Man, what the…”

  “Not now, Joey. I’ll talk about it when we get to your room, but not yet.” He was still so raw he knew he’d break down if he tried to explain. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t let Joey see this side of him. But he felt like if he fell apart now he would shatter so completely he’d never get himself together again.

  Joey drove, casting frequent, troubled looks his way, but he respected Seth’s request and didn’t say anything.

  They pulled into the motel parking lot, and Seth grabbed the bag and guitar from the car and carried them upstairs while Joey unlocked the room. Once inside, Seth carefully placed his things on the floor by the closet and headed straight for the half-full bottle of Wild Turkey he spied on the dresser. He unwrapped a cup from a small molded plastic tray, sloshed a generous serving into it, and drank. It burned like hell, but he didn’t care. He stood by the window, staring out at nothing.

  Joey came up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. “Okay, man, I can’t wait it out anymore. Tell me what happened.”

  “I left.”

  “I figured that out, Einstein. But the only reason you better be here is because she kicked you out. In which case you need to give her time to cool down. Then I’m taking you back so you can throw yourself on the ground and beg her to forgive you for whatever dumbass thing you did. After that, you start kissing her feet, then move north and don’t stop till you get to her earrings.” He crossed the room and flopped on his bed and leaned back against the headboard.

  Seth drained the cup and poured a refill before sitting on the other bed, facing Joey. “You saw what happened today. That son of a bitch was there again. He tried to poison Abby’s dog, which tells me he was planning to come back.” He took another deep swallow of Wild Turkey. It didn’t burn as much going down this time. He hoped he could get numb enough to get through tonight.

  “Yeah, and now Abby’s there alone. Brilliant fucking move.”

  “No, Joey, there’s more.” He pulled the crumpled sheet of paper from his pocket and flung it at his friend and waited as he read it. Joey’s face paled, and he put the message on the table between the beds. “It’s me he wants. Sure, if Abby’s around when he finally catches up to me, he’d hurt her to make it worse. But he’s not going to go after her unless she’s with me.” He closed his eyes for a few seconds and waited for a wave of nausea to pass. “You remember how he was during the trial. He loves the spotlight. He was always talking to anybody with a microphone. He wants the drama, and if I’m not there to be the audience, he’ll leave her alone.”

  Joey reached for a bottle of water on the bed table, opened it, and handed it to Seth. “Slow down on the booze, man. You need to think.”

  “I don’t want to think. Thinking sucks.”

  “You have no choice. You fucked up royally, and you’re going to have to be sober to fix it.”

  “What is there to fix? I had to leave! If I stay and something happens to her, Purcell not only wins, he gets the bonus prize too. If I can hurt a little now and know she’s still alive because I found a way to do it, that’s how it’s gotta be.”

  “You don’t get it, do you? It’s not only about you anymore. It hasn’t been about you since Abby ran over Cujo.” Joey faced Seth across the space between the beds. “You’ve been part of a band all your life. When does one of us make decisions for everybody else?”

  Seth shrugged. “Never.”

  “And you, my friend, are no longer a solo act. You’re part of a duo, and you just made one fucking whopper of a decision all on your own and dropped it right in Abby’s lap. How do you think it made her feel?”

  Sometimes Joey made too damned much sense. Seth started to worry about what would happen if he was wrong, but he forced the possibility from his mind. “I don’t believe Purcell will go after her if I’m not there. The farther away I am, the safer she is. In case he isn’t watching the road to Abby’s house, or however he’s kept track of me, we should go over to the Shamrock. Let people see I’m there and not at the lake.” Plus, they probably had more Wild Turkey.

  “That is not the fucking point!”

  “What could be more important than keeping her from getting hurt?” He flung the half-empty bottle of water at the dresser. It impacted the edge with a heavy, dull sound and ricocheted across the room, splashing water in all directions.

  “You don’t think she’s hurt now? Look, Drew Purcell might or might not take it in his head to go after her even if you’re not there. Based on the note, he probably won’t, but he might. But it’s a one hundred percent certainty Abby is hurting like hell right now.”

  Seth stood and began pacing. “I’d rather have her upset now than dead later.”

  “You think she’s upset? You’re upset if Taco Bell is out of guacamole. I know how things are between you two. I’ve known you forever, and I can read you like a book. But right now I’m wondering if I’ve been wrong, and you’re actually the biggest fucking idiot I’ve ever met.” He stood and grabbed Seth’s arm, forcing him to turn to look at him. “You. Left. Her.”

  “I know it,” Seth snapped. “I told her I was coming back as soon as they caught Purcell.”

  “And how does that help her? What if Purcell shows up here tonight and blows your brains out? She’ll never see you again, and she’ll always wonder if it would’ve turned out differently if you’d stayed there with her. If she’d been strong enough to make you stay. You say you left so she’d be safe and you wouldn’t have to deal with it if she died because you were there. But hey, ass-jack, what if you get killed because you left? Because that’s how she’ll see it. And she has to live with it.”

  “Nothing will happen, and they’ll catch Purcell. Then I can go back.”

  “You think it’d be simple? Think about what Abby’s been through. Look what happened when people left her. Her ex-husband, her dad. All that shit when what she thought, what she wanted, didn’t fucking matter. And everybody knows how musicians are. They blow into town, break a bunch of hearts, and blow back out again. She doesn’t believe it now, but she might start to. As far as she’s concerned, gone is gone, and people don’t come back.”

  Seth sat on the bed again, his knees suddenly weak. Was that really what he’d done? Had he made Abby think he didn’t respect her courage and strength? Had he just become one more person who’d left her? He put his head in his hands. “Joey, she’d be better off if I don’t go back. I never should’ve thought she could be happy with somebody like me.” He threaded his fingers through his hair and gripped tightly, trying to pull the right answer out by the roots. “Oh, holy fucking hell. I have to figure out what to do.”

  “Well, don’t think too long, because by my calculations if you’re going to fix this, which I strongly advise, I have to get you back out there in about the next fifty-one minutes. Then we have to hope she lets you in.”

  Seth stretched out on the bed and stared at the ceiling, paying unnecessary attention to a badly patched water stain in the corner. “Joey, I’m fucked. Whatever I do, I’m going to lose her.”

  “Wrong. You’re both at risk from Purcell. You might be the main target, but it’s better if you’re together, watching each other’s backs. Or fronts. Whatever. And don’t give me a song and dance about not being good enough for her. She loves you. At the moment, I’m not sure why, but it’s her decision.” Joey picked up the now-empty water bottle from the floor, filled it in the bathroom, and handed it to Seth. “Drink this, man, all of it.” Joey watched until Seth drained half the bottle. “Now, the way I see it, you have one chance to pull this out of the fire.”

  “I don’t want to hurt her. And I can’t let her get hurt because of me, either.”

  “Shut your mouth and listen. Let’s say this plays
out the way you tried to set it up. You leave, Purcell comes after you, gets caught, and you go back to Abby. You’re thinking it’s happily ever after, but your head is up your ass. First of all, I’d be real surprised if she let you anywhere near her, because you took the trust she put in you and threw it in her face. Even if she took you back, it wouldn’t be the same. She’d never trust you the way she did before.”

  “This isn’t sounding too good so far, Joe.”

  “I’m not done. That was the way you were trying to play it. And you’re right, it’s not good. But it was the best you could’ve hoped for, because you didn’t think it through.” He sat on the edge of his bed and leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, and stared until Seth gave him his full attention. “You have to go back to her, and you have to do it as quick as I can haul your sorry ass out there. Right now she’s still working this through. I bet she’s a total wreck, but it’s not real to her yet. If you let her get to the point where it’s real, it’s too late. You have to tell her you made a gigantic mistake, you’re sorry you panicked and went all caveman, and whatever happens till they catch this guy, you’ll get through it together. Then you hope like you never hoped before in your life she loves you enough to forgive you for what you did to her.”

  Seth scrubbed his hands over his face. “What if she’s not there? I told her to go to her mom’s.”

  “She’s there.” Joey sounded certain.

  “What if her mom’s with her, or Molly?”

  “Molly’s with Marsh. I dropped him off at her house when we took her home. She’s bringing him back later or tomorrow or whenever they can pry themselves apart. And Abby isn’t going to call Marilyn. Eventually, but not tonight.” Joey shook his head. “No, she’s alone, and she’s doing a lot of thinking.”

  Seth lay there, stunned. The thought of Abby sitting alone, probably hating him, tore something loose deep inside. Had he really screwed everything up so badly, when all he’d wanted to do was protect her? And was Joey right, and there was still some hope of undoing the damage? “How’d you get so smart?”

  Joey cracked his first smile since Seth had gotten in the car. He held up his left hand and pointed to his wedding ring. “Caroline.”

  Seth dragged his fingers through his hair and tried to organize his thoughts. Maybe the Wild Turkey hadn’t been such a great idea after all, though it sure had seemed like it at the time. He chugged the rest of the water and swung his legs over the side of the bed. He needed to get the blood flowing and burn off the alcohol. He stalked back and forth across the room for a while, drinking another bottle of water, and ran the whole range of scenarios through his mind.

  He was glad Joey waited quietly by the window, letting him work things out. His friend had seen him deal with problems plenty of times, though none as critical as this, and he knew when to stop talking and let Seth think.

  There were no guarantees he’d still have Abby in his life, no matter what he did. She could refuse to take him back, whether it was tonight or months from now, whenever the threat of Drew Purcell was behind them. Or there was still the sickening thought Purcell could kill her to completely destroy Seth before ending his life. He felt the risk was elevated the closer she was to him, but he also recognized the need to make decisions and face uncertainty together.

  The only absolutely sure thing was if he left Abby, even if it was to keep her safe, he’d lose her forever.

  “Joey, take me back to her.”

  * * *

  Abby

  The late afternoon sun shifted toward early evening. Abby hadn’t looked at the clock when Seth left, so she wasn’t sure how long he’d been gone. Was it an hour? Two? She knew it was a mistake to try to answer that question. If she started counting hours, what would happen when those hours turned to days? She wouldn’t even think about longer increments of time.

  The bottle of wine she’d brought with her to the living room was empty. It had started out half-full. There was another bottle in the kitchen, but she didn’t have the energy to uncork it. Sitting still was the way to go. Dilbert had gotten up a few times to drink more water and he hadn’t vomited again, so she’d give him some food soon. But not just yet.

  She had asked Seth not to leave, and he left anyway. She’d stopped just short of begging, or maybe she did beg. She guessed it depended on your definition. Now she might never see him again. He could be killed before they caught the man who had targeted him or he could change his mind about being with her. He might find, once he’d spent some time away, he had merely been caught up in the heightened emotion of a crazy situation, and coming back to her no longer felt important.

  He was still all around her. She breathed in his scent on the cushions behind her, and she knew what would happen if she went to lie on his side of the bed. She would be wrapped in his memory, but alone. She couldn’t sleep there tonight. Tomorrow, well, she’d have to see. There were probably strands of his hair on the pillow, and she wondered if he’d forgotten any of his clothes in her hamper.

  He was here, yet he wasn’t. He might never be here again, and she had no way to know. There wasn’t a calendar she could mark, like families who sent their loved ones off for military deployment. They didn’t know if their people were ever coming back, either, but at least they had a date by which to expect them home, if they were coming at all.

  She hadn’t done anything wrong, but perhaps she should have done something differently. Seth had asked her to let go of the safety line to which she’d clung for years, and she had been too frightened. Should she have pushed aside her fears and said yes right away? Or should she have refused outright? Had the way she’d handled it made her seem uncertain or weak? Was that why he didn’t trust her to stand by him while he faced the most serious crisis of his life?

  She didn’t feel rage. She didn’t think she had it in her anymore. There had been plenty of rage before, when David left. She’d also cursed the Fates when her father died, and when she’d lost the baby she hadn’t known existed. She’d burned out the rage while working on her house. She helped Clancy and Butch, and every nail she pounded into place released some of the gnawing anger and took her that much closer to building her new life.

  When all the rage was gone, she never bothered to fill it with anything else. The emptiness was peaceful in its own way. So that was what she’d do now. When she was able to think about getting off the couch, she’d go back to what worked before. She would write, sometimes she would see her mother and her friends, and she’d write some more. Some people said writing was a lonely profession, but she didn’t think so. She was comfortable in the world she created.

  Dilbert removed his head from her lap and climbed down to get another drink. She sat forward to follow his progress around the end of the couch, and something on the floor caught her eye. Against the leg of the coffee table, almost lost in the pattern of the rug, was a guitar pick. The Dead End Road logo was clearly visible on the side she could see. The side hidden from her view would have the imprinted signature of the pick’s owner, and she hoped it was Marshall’s.

  She shouldn’t look, but she wouldn’t be able to stop staring at it until she did. She reached down with chilled fingers and lifted the guitar pick from the floor. She held it for a moment, unable to breathe. At last, she opened her hand and turned the pick over. Seth’s signature. It was his. This very afternoon he’d probably used this pick to play one of the songs they’d written together, and the irony of the thought threatened to destroy her.

  She sat back on the couch and drew up her legs. Wrapping her arms around her knees, she clutched the pick so tightly it bit into her fingers as she let hot, silent tears bathe her face. Dilbert jumped back onto the couch and nudged her elbow. She draped her arm around the dog, the pick still in her other hand. She stayed there until the tears stopped, but she made no move to get up.

  Abby continued to sit there, forcing herself back into the empty place where things didn’t hurt so much. She knew how to do this. She’d done
it before.

  Dilbert abruptly jumped off the couch and began pacing from the hallway, to the French doors, and back again, whining softly. Fear prickled her spine. What had attracted the dog’s attention? Had she locked the doors? Probably not. She’d planned to check them when she fed Dilbert. Eventually. Besides, what difference did it make? If someone wanted in badly enough, all they had to do was knock out a panel in the French doors and open the latch.

  She was about to go lock both doors when she heard a car pull into the driveway. It didn’t have the distinctive sound of her mother’s Volkswagen. Maybe it was the Nygaards stopping by on their way home. She didn’t imagine someone coming to kill her would park right in her driveway, but perhaps she should be more concerned than she was.

  The slam of a door was followed by the sound of the car pulling out of the driveway and heading back the way it came. Abby felt a flutter of hope in her chest, but smothered it. Hope only led to disappointment, and she couldn’t bear any more.

  Dilbert whirled in circles at the entrance to the hallway then stood, his tail wagging and his front feet prancing with excitement. Abby heard the door open, and ordered her mind to be still. Don’t jump to conclusions. Don’t hope.

  At the sound of footsteps, she lowered her eyes because, dammit, she did have some hope after all. By turning away, she could delay the disappointment for a few more precious instants. The footsteps stopped, and she steeled herself and looked.

  Seth stood at the end of the hall, holding the canvas bag and his guitar case. She almost had to turn away from the intensity of his gaze. The lines of his face were harsh, and the rims of his eyes were red and swollen. He looked as rough as she felt.

  He put down the bag and guitar case, never taking his eyes from hers. He approached cautiously, as if he expected her to bolt. He sank to his knees in front of her, his hands hovering uncertainly. She lowered her legs from their drawn-up position, placing her feet on the floor, and he put his hands on the couch on either side of her and bowed his head. His hair brushed her legs, but he didn’t quite touch her himself. It seemed like he wasn’t sure whether she would permit it. Should she?