The Return of Caine O'Halloran

by JoAnn Ross

  For the next few hours, Caine bought beer after beer for his hometown fans and congratulated himself on having the good sense to return to a place where a guy didn't have to throw a four-seam fastball ninety-five miles an hour to prove himself a num.

  Much, much later, the door to the bar opened.

  Bottles, glasses and mugs were slowly lowered to tables as every man in The Log Cabin stared at Harmon Olson, back from delivering his load of logs. Standing beside him was his brother Kirk.

  Looking at Hannon, Caine was sorry to see that his memory hadn't been playing tricks on him. The elder Olson boy was every bit as big as he'd remembered. And Kirk, unbelievably, was even bigger.

  The Olson brothers were forest-hardened males who, like so many of the men in the bar, had come into manhood wrestling with behemoths of timber twenty times their weight. Hannon s torso had thickened with age, but his muscles still bulged like boulders beneath the red-and-black plaid sleeves of his shirt, and his arms were the size of smoked hams.

  His hands possessed long thick fingers that could encircle a man's throat with the same deliberate ease they circled an ax handle. Beneath a gray 195Qs-style crew cut, Harmon's eyes looked like hard gray stones; his beard resembled steel wool.

  His baby brother Kirk's hair was still blond and curly; his face was reddened from working outside. His beefy hands were curled at his sides into enormous loose fists and he looked every bit as dangerous as his Viking ancestors.

  "That your damn Ferrari, O'Halloran?" Harmon's rough loud voice reminded Caine of the bugling of a bull elk in mating season.

  "Guilty."

  Caine pushed off the stool with a sigh. He'd always considered himself a lover, not a fighter, and he usually managed to talk his way out of altercations. Unfortunately, neither Harmon nor Kirk looked as if they'd dropped into The Log Cabin for afternoon conversation.

  "You near caused me to roll my new truck," Harmon growled. He began rolling up his sleeves, revealing rock-hard forearms. A bluish purple tattoo had been etched into the dark flesh below his right elbow; of what, Caine couldn't quite tell.

  "You know, I'm really sorry about that, Harmon," Caine said with an ingratiating smile.

  The Olson brothers walked toward him, mayhem on their minds and faces. Behind him, Caine heard chair legs scraping against the sawdust-covered floor as onlookers hurried to get out of the way.

  "You made my brother get gravel dings in his new paint," Kirk said, appearing unmoved by Caine's famous smile.

  "And damned impolite of me it was, too," Caine agreed.

  He knew Harmon's fury had little to do with a few paint dings. What had him all uptight was the fact that he felt he'd been made to look like a coward in front of his entire town.

  Caine finally saw what Harmon had tattooed on his arm. It was an amazingly accurate facsimile of a Peter-bilt log truck.

  Not an encouraging sign.

  "So, naturally, I have every intention of paying for any damage I may have—"

  He was reaching into the back pocket of his jeans for his wallet, when Harmon let out a roar, lowered his gray head and charged like an enraged buffalo, butting an unprepared Caine in the gut.

  The air whooshed out of Caine's body. "D-dammit, H-H-Harmon," he gasped. "We c-c-can w-work this out."

  He saw a burly fist coming and ducked just in time. Caine heard the air whiz past his ear. "I take it that's a n-no."

  Someone—Kirk probably, since Harmon was standing in front of him—hit Caine a thunderous blow on the side of his head. As he lurched around on wobbly legs, Caine managed to get the heel of his hand under Harmon' s pug nose and rammed upward.

  When Harmon cried out in pain, Kirk grabbed a handful of Caine's hair and sent him sprawling. He skidded across the floor, coming up the way he used to pull out of a slide.

  By now the entire room was in motion. Johnny Duggan left his stool as if ejected from it, with Joe Bob and Tom and Dana Anderson right behind. Other men followed.

  Some, due to family loyalty along with a few others envious of Caine's fame, sided with the Olson boys. The others remained loyally in Caine OTialloran's camp.

  Caine, on the floor with his face in the sawdust, felt a steel-toed boot slam into his ribs. Flashbulbs exploded in his head behind his eyes, and his stomach roiled.

  Enraged, he staggered to his feet, and while the Anderson brothers kept Kirk occupied, Caine slugged away at Harmon, resorting to the boxing techniques he'd learned in college.

  Right jab, left cross. Right jab, left cross. Hannon suddenly lurched. Watching him fall to the ground, Caine had a perverse urge to call out "Timber!"

  "All right, goddammit, that's enough!"

  Oley took out the shotgun he kept beneath the bar for just such occasions and fired it into the air. Loaded with blank shells, it managed to silence the room without causing undue damage to the smoke-covered ceiling.

  "You boys have had your fun. Nqw why don't you just sit down and get back to drinkin' before I have to start writin' out bills for broken furniture."

  Harmon staggered to his feet. Caine, braced against the bar, held his fists up in front of him, Joe Sullivan-style.

  To Caine's surprise, Harmon thrust out a bruised hand. "I'm willin' to call a truce if you are."

  Immensely grateful for the furious giant's abrupt about-face, Caine accepted the gesture of reconciliation. As he reached out to shake Harmon's outstretched hand, Kirk hit Caine with something a great deal larger and heavier than a fist.

  A red haze covered Caine's eyes, a gong reverberated inside his head. And then he went down.

  When he opened his eyes again, his mouth was full of sawdust and his head was swimming.

  "Caine? You okay?" The man's voice sounded as if it were coming from the bottom of the sea. "Dammit, boy, answer me," Joe Bob urged.

  Caine pushed himself up onto his hands and knees. He stayed that way, his head hanging like a winded horse for a long time, trying not to embarrass himself by throwing up.

  Johnny Duggan squatted down beside him. When he put his broad hand on Caine's shoulder, Caine flinched. "Want me to go for the doctor?" Johnny asked.

  "No." Caine closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. When he opened them again, he could focus a little more clearly. His shirt was wet and he reeked of whiskey. "I'm okay."

  He crawled over to a nearby table, grabbed hold of a heavy oak chair and slowly pulled himself upright. The sea of faces staring at him blurred for a minute.

  Caine inhaled again, which cleared his vision, but made his chest feel as if it were on fire. Glancing around the bar, he saw, with relief, that the Olson boys were gone.

  "What happened to the gorillas?"

  "After Kirk sucker-hit you with that bottle, Oley threatened to call the sheriff. That's when they decided they had other things to do," Joe Bob explained.

  The bottle explained why he smelled like a drunk coming off a three-week-long bender, Caine decided. He tentatively felt his mouth with his left hand. It was swollen and his lip was cut, but no teeth appeared to be loose. And his nose, thankfully, seemed to be okay, too.

  "You know, Caine, you are whiter them new snow," Tom Anderson said.

  "Not to mention your pretty face lookin' like Joe Bob's catcher's mitt," his brother Dana added. "And you're swaying on your feet like an old-growth hemlock about to fall. Come on, hotshot," he said, taking hold of Caine's arm. "Let's get you over to the clinic."

  "You've got a clinic here now?" Caine was grateful for that bit of news. The way his stomach was churning, he didn't think he could take driving down those twisting mountain switchbacks to the hospital at Port Angeles. "Since when?"

  "Since Nora came back from the Bronx six months ago and opened one up in Gram's old house," Tom answered.

  Propped up by the Anderson brothers, Caine had been making his way, painful step by painful step, toward the door. At this latest bulletin, he stopped in his tracks. "I don't think this is a very good idea, guys."

  "Try looking
in a mirror and telling us that," Tom advised.

  "You don't have to worry about a thing," Johnny Duggan assured Caine. "The girl turned out to be a right fine doctor. Fixed up my yella-jacket stings just fine. Should be able to patch you up without any trouble at all."

  "I'm fine," Caine said, trying to ignore the flames licking at the inside of his chest. "All I need is a stiff drink and a little rest."

  "You need to be checked out," Dana corrected. Under his breath, he added, "Don't worry, Caine. From what we can tell, Nora's put the past behind her."

  If that was true, Caine wondered what the chances of his ex-wife passing on her secret might be. Not good. Since despite her brother's optimistic assertion, Caine couldn't forget her pale face and ice-cold eyes when she'd told him that she'd never—ever!—forgive him for their son's death.

  "I still don't think..His head fogged again; he took another breath to dear it. "Aw, hell."

  Dana Anderson watched the color fade from Caine's battered face, saw the pain in his eyes and made his decision. "You're going to have to face her sometime, Caine," he said, pushing open the door. "Might as well get it over with."

  3

  IT HAD BEEN A LONG DAY. Twenty minutes after her last patient had departed, an exhausted Nora was getting ready to close the office when the clinic door opened, and there, standing in the doorway, haloed by a blaze of light from the setting sun behind him, was Caine O'Halloran.

  His handsome face had been badly battered, his upper lip was split open and his right eye was surrounded by puffy flesh the color of ripe blueberries. He was weaving in the doorway, braced on either side by two rugged blond men she knew too well.

  How dare her brothers go drinking with Caine! And then, to have the unmitigated gall to bring him here, expecting her to patch him up after whatever drunken brawl he'd gotten into this time, was really pushing their luck!

  Although his right eye was swollen almost completely shut, the left was as blue as a morning glory and gleamed with a devilish masculinity that long ago—in another world, at another time—had possessed the power to thrill her.

  Caine's split lip curved in a boyish grin that Nora knew had coaxed more than his share of women into sharing intimate favors.

  "I sure hope you weren't planning to close up shop early, Doc," he greeted her in his deep, bedroom voice. "Because you just got yourself another patient."

  It was as if time had spun backward, and Caine and her brothers were boys again. Having gone through their wild years together, the unholy trio had gotten in more than their share of fights. They'd always emerged, bloody but not bowed, grinning with the sheer satisfaction of having stuck up for one of their own.

  "Dana Anderson, I thought you'd grown up." Nora turned on him, not yet prepared to confront Caine. "And exactly how do you plan to explain that black eye to Karin?" she asked Tom hotly.

  He shrugged, looking sheepish. "I don't suppose you'd be willing to back me up if I told her that I got hit with the wrong end of a two-by-four."

  "You're right. I wouldn't." Nora turned her back and walked into the examining room.

  The three men exchanged an uneasy look, then followed.

  "But it wouldn't do you any good even if I was willing to lie," she continued as she opened a small refrigerator and took out a cold pack, "since by breakfast tomorrow, everyone in town will know that the Anderson boys were out brawling with that hellion, Caine OTialloran.

  "Here." She tossed the gelled pack to her brother. "Put this on that eye. It'll be ugly as sin by morning, but that should help keep the swelling down."

  She took her other brother's hands and frowned as she looked at his skinned knuckles. "This is going to hurt for at least a week," she predicted.

  "You don't have to sound so pleased about it," Tom complained.

  "It's only what you deserve for fighting. And at your age!"

  "You saying we should have let the Olson boys kill Caine?"

  "I'm saying that responsible men—intelligent adult males with wives and children—don't get into brawls in bars."

  She shot Caine a cool, disapproving glance, really looking at him for the first time since the men had entered the clinic.

  "I'm not surprised that you're involved in this." Her voice reminded Caine of the ice on a melting glacier— cold and dangerous. "One day back in town and you're already in trouble."

  "Harmon swung the first punch, Nora," Dana said.

  She arched a blond brow. "And I wonder whatever could have provoked him? Could it be, perhaps, that some hotshot jock with an IQ smaller than his neck size practically killed Harmon by playing chicken in a Ferrari in some misguided attempt to live up to his stupid macho image?"

  "Ouch," Caine objected. "What the hell ever happened to Osier's creed—the part about a doctor judging not, but meting out hospitality to all alike?"

  Sir William Osier had been a famous clinician in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. Enthusiastic about his theories concerning the emotional and social responsibilities of a physician, Nora had quoted from his essays to Caine. At the time, he'd been so busy rubbing some foul-smelling grease on his damn glove, she hadn't thought he'd heard a word she'd said.

  "I'm amazed you remember that." Surprise took a bit of the furious wind out of her sails.

  "Oh, I remember everything about those days, Nora," Caine answered quietly.

  An uncomfortable silence fell over the room. "Well," Dana said with forced enthusiasm, "now that Caine's in your expert hands, little sister, I guess I'll get back to work."

  "And I promised Karin I'd stop and pick up some milk and bread on the way home," Tom said.

  Caine grinned, then flinched when it hurt his split lip. "Chickens."

  Dana didn't deny it. "Cluck, cluck," he said instead. "Don't be too rough on him, Nora. Those Olsons have always fought dirty."

  "Kirk hit Caine on the back of the head with a whiskey bottle when he was shaking hands with Harmon," Tom added.

  "I suppose that explains why you smell like a distillery," Nora said, wrinkling her nose with obvious distaste.

  "Take good care of him, sis," Dana said when Caine didn't answer.

  Tom seconded the request and then they were gone, leaving Nora and Caine alone in a room that suddenly seemed too small for comfort.

  "Well, I suppose we may as well get this over with," Nora said with a decided lack of enthusiasm. "Wait here while I get some ice for that eye."

  "I'd rather have a cold pack like the one you gave Dana."

  "Tough. We had a run on cold packs today. That was my last one."

  She left the room, expecting Caine to remain where he was. Instead, he followed her to the kitchen where, in the old days, he and Tom and Dana and sometimes a young, bespectacled Nora—who'd usually had her nose stuck in a book—had sat around the table, eating cookies and drinking milk from Blossom, Anna Anderson's black-and-white cow.

  Rosy red strawberries still bloomed on the cream wallpaper, shiny copper pans continued to hang from a wrought-iron rack over the island butcher-block table.

  The long pine trestle table was the same, although now, instead of plates of cookies and glasses of milk, its scarred and nicked surface was covered with medical books, suggesting that Nora still read while she ate. The ladder-back chairs that he remembered bang dark blue had been repainted a bright apple green; one was missing.

  "I can almost smell bread and cookies baking," he said.

  "Things change," Nora replied as she filled an ice pack with cubes from the double-door refrigerator-freezer.

  "Tell me about it," he muttered. "I was honestly sorry when I got the letter from Dana telling me about your grandmother's stroke. She was a terrific lady. I liked her a lot."

  "Gram always liked you, too." Her curt tone indicated that she couldn't imagine why.

  "Dana also said something about your parents having turned into gypsies."

  "The day after Dad retired and turned the mill over to Tom, he came home with a motor
home. Two weeks later, he and Mom hit the road.

  "That was a year ago and they haven't settled down anywhere for more than six weeks. In fact, I got a cadi from them last week from someplace called Tortilla Flats, Arizona. They were on their way to Yellowstone Park through Monument Valley."

  "I guess they're making up for lost time. I can't remember your dad ever taking a day off, let alone a vacation." Caine rubbed his chin, dark with the stubble of several days' growth of beard, thoughtfully. "Except for the day Dylan was bom." And the day he'd died, Caine recalled grimly.

  It was bad enough having Caine back in Tribulation. She damn well didn't want to discuss her child with the man.

  "Here." Nora shoved the ice pack at him. "If you're finished strolling down memory lane, I'd like to examine you."

  Caine followed her, with uncharacteristic meekness, back down the hall to what had been her grandmother's front parlor.

  Now designed for efficiency, rather than comfort, the formerly cozy room was dominated by an examining table, covered with fresh paper from a continuous roll. There was a short, wheeled, dark brown upholstered stool, a white pedestal sink and a small writing table. Beside the table was the ladder-back chair missing from the kitchen.

  Instead of the fragrant potpourri Anna Anderson had made from the colorful blooms in her backyard rose garden, the room smelled vaguely of disinfectant and rubbing alcohol.

  Beside the writing table, Anna's oak china cabinet, handmade by her husband, Oscar, had been turned into a supply cabinet. Behind the glass doors, the old crab-apple-decorated plates had been replaced with boxes of dressings, plastic gloves, hypodermic syringes and shiny stainless-steel instruments.

  A window looked out on Anna's rose garden and the woods; between the slats of the unfamiliar miniblinds, Caine saw a family of deer grazing, their brown and gray coats almost blending into the foliage behind them.

  "Nora, look."

  Surprised by his soft tone, she turned and glanced out the window. Her lips curved into a gentle, unconscious smile.

  "They come every day about this time. Last Friday was the first day they brought the babies."