by Lucy Connors
“Will you help me? With Melinda?”
“I promise I’ll do my best, Victoria, but she has to want to get better, or it won’t work,” she warned.
“I think she does. I’m sure she does,” I said, but it was more out of wishful thinking than any degree of certainty. I wasn’t really sure what was in my sister’s mind these days, other than sadness, guilt, and confusion.
Gran patted my hand. “We’ll figure it out together. I wish you didn’t always carry the weight of the world on your shoulders.”
I didn’t know how to respond to that. Who else in my family would do it?
Time to broach an even tougher subject, even though she’d warned me not to do it. “Gran, I know you don’t want to talk about them, but I can’t count on anybody else to tell me the truth. Will you please tell me about the Rhodales.”
Gran inhaled sharply and sat down hard on the top porch step. “I told you that I don’t want to hear that name.”
“I know you told me that, but I’m tired of everybody warning me against them and nobody telling me why. I can’t exactly Google ‘what’s wrong with the Rhodales,’ and I don’t know who else to ask. What’s the big freaking deal?”
She gave me a look.
“It’s a long, horrible story, and I don’t care to go into it,” she said, and the slight quaver in her voice suddenly made me remember that she was nearly seventy years old.
“Why can’t you just let it go?” she asked.
I decided on the spot not to mention Mickey. I didn’t want to cause her any more distress beyond what my family had already dumped on her shoulders.
“All I’ve heard since I got here is how I should stay away from the Rhodale family. If you were me, would you be able to let it go?”
When she didn’t answer, I stood up and held out a hand to help her up. “Let’s get inside before you get chilled, okay?”
“I’m not a fragile old lady,” she snapped. “Sit down.”
Her tone of voice startled me into sitting down, fast.
“It’s not all that ancient. Sixty years ago, a Rhodale killed your great-grandfather. Burned him to death.”
“What? How did I not know that?”
“It doesn’t exactly come up in everyday conversation.”
“What happened?”
She took a deep breath. “He caught his wife and your grandfather’s father together. There was no proof he set the fire deliberately, so he never went to jail, but somehow his horse made it out of that barn alive, and they didn’t.” She stared off into the distance for several long seconds before continuing. “Your grandfather never got over his father’s death, and he raised Richard on stories of hatred and vengeance. So your father grew up hating that family with a kind of violence that isn’t normal—isn’t healthy—and it’s partially my fault for not stepping in to try to moderate all that feud talk. But the manure really hit the fan when that conniving bitch Anna Mae got between the boys—your dad and Jeremiah Rhodale— in high school.”
I’d never heard Gran swear before.
“The murder started a feud between our families?”
“The problems date back long before that barn burned to the ground, but I’m definitely not going into all of that. It’s stupid stuff, long since buried with the people who started it, and we’re all the better for it. Maybe someday I’ll pull out the trunks in the attic and let you see some clippings and things your grandfather kept after his grandfather died. Or maybe I’ll just burn the damn things.”
“Gran, I’m so sorry. We don’t have to—”
“Oh, no, young lady. You asked about Rhodales, so you’re going to listen to this. Your father was almost in a shootout with Jeremiah Rhodale over that horrible Anna Mae in high school. And now that awful man is the sheriff of Whitfield County, if you can believe it, even though his son Ethan is some kind of drug kingpin, freshly back from jail.”
“I didn’t know,” I whispered.
“Of course you didn’t,” she said, her tone softening. “How would you, growing up in the city? But now you do.”
She stood up and headed for the front door, but I stayed in the swing, stunned by what she’d told me.
Before going in, she paused and glanced back at me. “I know one of those Rhodale boys is in your high school. The one with the violence problem. Apparently he’s even more dangerous than his brother. You have to promise me that you’ll never, ever have anything to do with him.”
“But what if—”
“No. This feud has never brought any of us anything but heartache and despair, and I’m afraid we have more of the same in front of us, especially now that your father has moved back to Whitfield County. Please, no matter what, don’t do anything to start it up all over again.”
With that, she disappeared inside, leaving me alone with my very troubling thoughts. It seemed like I’d stepped off that plane from Connecticut and into an old western. I was part of an actual, historical feud. If Gran’s story was true, a Rhodale had murdered my great-grandfather.
I sat there for a long time with these new revelations spinning in my brain, and when my phone rang it startled me. I checked the display to see who was calling me so late.
Mickey Rhodale.
Chapter 16
Mickey
My hand tightened on my phone as I silently willed Victoria to pick up. I’d told her she’d be better off without me, and I’d meant it at the time, but the past week had been hell, especially without the physical exertion of football to distract me. I was going a little bit crazy thinking about her all the time. Unable to talk to her. Having to watch other guys hitting on her at school. She’d called and texted after the catastrophe of the football game, but I hadn’t been ready to talk to her, and now was probably too late.
Victoria finally answered her phone.
“Hi, Mickey,” she whispered, and the sound of her quiet voice in my ear sent a shiver down my neck. How could a simple “hi” be more powerful than any seductive come-on that other girls had tried out on me?
“I need to see you. I mean, I’d like to see you,” I said. I sounded like an idiot. She was going to dump my ass before we’d had our first date, and then she’d find some guy who had an actual, working brain.
“But you said—”
“I know what I said. I was a damn fool.”
Silence for a few beats.
“I’d like to see you, too, but . . . I’m getting a lot of pushback about you—well, about your family,” she said hesitantly. “I believe you, about protecting Caro. You know that I do. And it’s not the thing with your coach’s sister. I know you don’t have anything to do with Ethan’s drugs. But our dads hate each other from something in high school, and there’s even a story about a burning barn, and a feud . . .”
Her voice trailed off, as if maybe she was waiting for me to jump in and deny it.
“I know. I meant to tell you what I know about it, but I didn’t know how to find the right time to say ‘Hey, our families despise each other, want to go see a movie?’”
I heard the door slam open downstairs, which meant Pa was home and he was drunk. He never slammed the door when he was sober. Between him, Ethan, and Anna Mae, I was getting tangled more and more in the sticky web of past dramas, and I was sick of it all.
Screw them. Why should I give a shit about what a drunk, a drug dealer, or the drug dealer’s creepy mother thought about my friendships?
“Do you care about what a bunch of idiots on both sides of our families did in the past?” I asked. “Or are we going to live our own lives?”
Silence.
Just when I wondered if she’d hung up on me, her voice came back over the line. “We’re going to live our own lives. But only if you quit blowing hot and cold. It’s not worth risking a family upset if you’re going to push me away again.”
I realized I’d been holding my breath, and I let it out in a long, slow exhale. “I won’t. You have my word on that. Meet me after school tomorrow? Maybe, say, at the Whitfield County museum . . . just to get away from the gawkers.”
“Perfect. And, Mickey?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m glad you called.”
• • •
The next day lasted forever, since I knew I’d be meeting Victoria after school. I was walking around in a fog, not paying attention to much, so when final bell rang I nearly ran Melinda Whitfield down when I turned the corner to my locker. It wouldn’t have taken much to knock her over, so I was glad I’d managed to stop short. She’d wasted away to practically nothing since the first week of school.
She glanced around nervously, and I braced myself for a “leave my sister alone” lecture.
“So, hi. How are you? I think you have class with my sister,” she said, looking anywhere but at me and biting her thumbnail.
“Yeah, that’s right. I’m fine. How are you, Melinda?” It was the first time she’d ever spoken to me, and she was acting squirrelly.
Her eyes were wild, and she was biting her fingernails. Damn. So this was the “family stuff ” Victoria had been dealing with. I was no Ethan, but I could tell she was some kind of user.
“I need to . . . I mean, I want to buy . . .” She trailed off. Looked at me with naked desperation.
“Look, I can’t help you,” I said, shoving my books in the locker with a little more force than necessary. “My pa is the sheriff. I don’t do drugs, and I definitely don’t sell them, no matter what Coach or anybody else says.”
She blinked. “I don’t understand. Everybody told me that your brothers—”
“Well, everybody can go to hell. Whatever my brothers are into has nothing to do with me, so you can go find somebody else to feed your habit.”
Tears welled up in her eyes, and I suddenly felt like a monster. This was Victoria’s sister, after all.
“Look. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. You need to get help, Melinda. I know your sister is worried about you—”
“She told you? She told you that I killed Caleb?” She backed away from me and I stood very still, careful not to make any motions that she might perceive as threatening. She was maybe one stop away from Crazy Town, and I wasn’t going to be the conductor who drove her to the station.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Caleb Stuart? He died in a fire,” I said gently. “Melinda, let’s go find Victoria, and we can figure this out.”
“No! All I want is to get high, so I can forget his face, just for a little while,” she shouted. I realized everybody in the hallway was staring at us. “If you can’t help me, I’ll find somebody who can!”
She ran off down the hall before I could stop her.
Great. I’d just added another nail to the coffin of my reputation. The only thing worse would be if Victoria showed up. And of course when I turned around, there she was.
“Was that my sister?” She looked horrified.
“Yes. I think she wanted me to find weed for her, but I said no. I think she’s just embarrassed or something.”
“Oh my God . . . We have to stop her. When she’s embarrassed or ashamed, she gets self-destructive.” Victoria started running, and I was right behind her. When we hit the front door and ran outside, I stumbled to a halt, because Ethan—the last person I’d expected to see here at school—was leaning on the hood of his truck, which was parked in one of the visitor’s spaces.
Melinda was running down the sidewalk, and as she started to pass him, Ethan put out a hand to stop her. This was nothing but bad.
“What the hell is he doing here?” I groaned.
Victoria glanced back at me, wild-eyed. “Who is that guy?”
“That’s my brother,” I said grimly.
“What does your brother want with my sister?”
“Nothing good,” I muttered, heading toward them to stop whatever trouble he might be planning before it could happen.
Victoria cried out behind me, and I whirled around fast enough to see her fall, probably from taking the stairs too fast. I leapt toward her and caught her before she hit the cement, but it cost us time we didn’t have. When she got her feet underneath her again and we turned around, Melinda was already climbing in the passenger seat of Ethan’s truck.
“Ethan, no,” I shouted, but he laughed at me as he pulled out of the parking place, and then he paused and rolled his window down partway.
“I was actually here to talk to you, Mick, about that job. Isn’t that funny? Came to find my brother, and now I’ve got me my own Whitfield. Kind of hypocritical for you to argue with that, isn’t it?” He flashed a nasty grin at Victoria and took off.
“Let Melinda out. She’s messed up,” I yelled at him as he drove away, but Ethan just laughed at me again and sped up.
“We have to go after her,” Victoria said urgently, digging in her purse, probably for keys.
“You’re too upset to drive, and I know where he’s going,” I said grimly. “Give me the keys.”
“What?”
“Do you want to ride on the back of my bike in that skirt?”
She looked dazed for a second, but then her eyes narrowed and she handed me the keys. “Let’s go after them. Now.”
• • •
I knew he’d head for the compound, if for no other reason than to piss me off, so I took off on back roads to try for a shortcut. Maybe I could get there before he’d taken Melinda into the place and I had to deal with the guards.
“That’s your brother?” Victoria stared at the window, at her hands—anywhere but at me. “Nice guy.”
“He’s my half brother, and he’s twenty-two years old. I don’t have any control over what he does,” I said tersely. “But if you want to lump me in with the rest of the Rhodale bad guys, go ahead. Everybody else does.”
She sighed, and reached over to touch my arm. “I’m sorry. Of course you can’t control him, any more than I can control Melinda.”
My forearm burned where her fingers rested on my bare skin, and I wondered what would happen if I kissed her again. Spontaneous combustion?
“In some twisted way, he’s doing this to get back at me, so I kind of do feel responsible,” I admitted. “I refuse to follow orders, like my brother Jeb does, so Ethan gets back at me when he can.”
“What was he talking about, a job?” She turned to face me, and her beautiful green eyes suddenly seemed huge in her face.
“I don’t know. I’ve told him many times that I won’t get involved in his criminal business, but he keeps coming at me. Damn it.”
I wanted to punch the steering wheel or, better yet, Ethan’s face, but I was trying to keep it under control. Victoria was already worried enough and she had good reason, though I wasn’t going to tell her that and add to her fears. Ethan might pump Melinda full of drugs just for a sick, twisted joke. Meth wasn’t like other drugs. It only took one use to become addicted.
I took a curve too fast, and Victoria clutched at the door.
“What are you doing? Trying to get us killed?”
“Sorry.” I slowed down as we headed for a particularly tricky stretch of road. She was right.
“We’ll get her back,” I promised. “She’s going to be okay. I’m taking a shortcut.”
Victoria smiled a little, but she didn’t look convinced. I didn’t blame her. I wasn’t even sure Ethan would be headed in this direction, but I had no place else to try.
Chapter 17
Victoria
By the time we reached the outskirts of the wooded hills ten miles outside of town, I was visualizing all the horrible things Ethan could be doing to my sister right at that very minute, and I felt like I was going to throw up if Mickey didn’t slow down. Thankfully, he list
ened to me, and eased up on the gas at a hairpin turn.
We turned off the paved road onto a worn-out dirt track, and a couple of miles later, Mickey pulled up to a rickety looking metal gate. A man with a shotgun or rifle—I couldn’t tell—sat in a chair next to a dilapidated shack that might have served as a guardhouse.
“What is this? Some kind of creepy militia headquarters?”
Mickey flipped his middle finger at the guard, who returned the gesture. “No, not quite, but he has enough guns in there to start his own private army, I think. That’s why I wanted to catch him out here.”
I wanted to reach over and hold his hand, but I stopped myself. This thing between us—this attraction, or electricity, or craziness, whatever it was—kept leading to problems and drama and strife. There was no way I was going to let Melinda pay the price for my stupidity and defiance.
Mickey put the truck in park and held out his hand for mine, almost as if he’d been listening in on my thoughts. I met his deep, blue gaze and had the crazy thought that if I took his hand, I’d be saying yes to more than momentary comfort.
I’d be saying yes to him.
I placed my hand in his, trying to block the involuntary shiver that happened every time he touched me, but I couldn’t.
“It’s not just me, then?” he asked, his fingers tightening around mine.
He watched me so intently that I suddenly felt like I was falling down the rabbit hole. He was no drug dealer, but Mickey was dangerous in his own way. He’d caused me to throw off my safe, sane existence for a wild ride I didn’t have a clue how to handle.
“We’re missing the museum,” I said stupidly, and he grinned.
“I was really looking forward to the museum,” he said. “Especially the chance to get you alone and kiss you.”
My lips started tingling, and I found myself almost involuntarily leaning toward him.
The sound of Ethan’s truck coming up behind us smashed into the moment, and I was saved from having to think of an answer.
