Blood and Bone

by Dawn Brown

  With the roof closed, she opened the car door, got out and started toward the convenience store/gas station/garage.

  How did places like this stay open? Alone on a deserted stretch of highway, the yellowed white paint on brick, and the faded sign mounted above the door with the words “Pump and Buy”—except the first P had vanished and the sign read “ump and Buy”—certainly gave the impression finding the placed boarded up and abandoned wasn’t that far off.

  Warm wind stirred the leaves in the forest rising up behind the squat garage. A patch of dandelions growing through the stones on the gravel parking lot bowed under the invisible pressure.

  An odd sense of isolation wrapped around her, fueling her already-keyed-up nerves. Was anyone even here? Or was this some kind of setup?

  She thinned her lips and tried to will her beating heart back to a normal pace. After last night, she’d been edgy, looking at every man who glanced her way as a potential attacker, wondering if he was the one who’d smashed her window and threatened her.

  She hated the nerves jittering beneath her skin like frayed live wires. Hated jumping at shadows like a frightened child. Hated the men who had left her feeling this way.

  Her gaze shifted to a rusted silver hatchback parked next to a navy pickup at the side of the store. The place wasn’t entirely deserted, but the realization did little to ease her apprehension.

  Shayne opened the steel-and-glass door, and an electronic chime announced her arrival as she stepped inside the small convenience store. Though, store seemed somewhat lofty for the one rack of potato chips, another for candy, and a fridge with pop and energy drinks. Shelves of cigarettes hidden by gray metal shutters and a rack of newspapers rounded out the -ump and Buy’s inventory.

  The stink of mothballs and motor oil filled the hot air inside. Her stomach gave a small lurch in protest. Ugh. She hated the smell of mothballs. A rotating fan at the far end of the counter blew the stale air into her face, and she bit back the urge to gag.

  A woman sitting behind the counter and flipping through a gossip rag looked up. Her dull brown gaze met Shayne’s and she stared, a scowl etched into her worn features. The fan turned and blew her frizzy brown hair up like a strange parody of the flying nun.

  “I’m looking for Sam Anderson,” Shayne said.

  The woman snorted and dropped her gaze back to the paper on the counter. “They always are.”

  Shayne managed not to roll her eyes, but couldn’t quite mask the irritation in her voice. “We have an appointment. Do you know where I can find him?”

  “Through there.” The woman nodded at a closed the door to the left, her gaze never leaving the colorful pages before her.

  “Thanks.”

  Shayne pulled the door open and stepped inside the dimly lit garage. A tall, dark-haired man fiddled with something—a motor maybe, she’d never been mechanical—at a long workbench. His messy black hair fell across his forehead as he worked, his gaze intent on whatever it was he was doing. As the door clicked closed behind her, he didn’t look up.

  Sweat trickled down Shayne’s back. The day’s heat intensified inside the small space despite the gritty film of dirt on the windows filtering the sunlight from outside. To her left, a battered pickup truck on the lift hovered over the stained, cracked cement floor. The scent of motor oil and old gasoline hung so thick in the air she could almost taste it.

  Better than mothballs, though.

  “What do you want?” The man’s voice made her jump.

  With a deep breath, she squared her shoulders. “Sam Anderson?”

  Bright gray eyes—like his father’s, his brother’s—held hers. “Yeah.”

  No, not like Des. Where Des’s eyes glinted with humor or promises of things she needed to stop thinking about, Sam’s were flat, cold. A glower curled his mouth and he tightened his grip on the wrench in his hand. She could easily imagine him yelling through her smashed window…bludgeoning her with that wrench.

  Shit, pull it together. She swallowed hard, the sensation like rubbing sandpaper on the back of her throat, and forced her feet forward, extending her hand. “I’m Shayne Reynolds. We spoke on the phone.”

  “I know who you are,” he told her. He ignored her hand and set down the wrench. A wave of relief swept through her and her knees trembled. She locked them.

  “Is there somewhere we can sit and talk?”

  He shook his head. “Ask me what you want to know, and make it quick.”

  If he didn’t have time to be interviewed, why the hell did he have her drive all the way out here? She bit back the question, forcing a smile and digging her recorder out of her purse. “I hope you don’t mind?”

  She moved closer to him and set the player on the workbench. The faint hum of a car speeding by seeped through the cement walls. A sign of life just outside the door.

  “I’d like to ask you about your father.”

  “Do it, already.” He lifted his gaze, those eyes all but glowing within the long, straight lines of his face. The angles and planes gave him an almost-predatory look, his dark, curly hair wild and unkempt. Like his father’s. She could easily imagine Robert with the same hard-assed attitude thirty years ago.

  Maybe that had been what had drawn Gwen in the first place. Some women liked the bad-boy type. Shayne hadn’t been foolish enough to get seriously involved with a guy like that since high school.

  No, instead you married Mr. Perfect who threw you aside like a defective appliance once he realized you had a faulty uterus.

  Travis might have been a jerk, but that didn’t mean she should hook up with the first lousy real-estate-agent-in-a-bad-Hawaiian-shirt she met. Even if he did turn her to mush with long, slow kisses.

  Her face heated and she shoved thoughts of Des aside. “What was your father like? What do you remember about him?”

  Sam picked up the wrench again, and her heart leaped in her chest, only to settle when he turned his attention back to the motor. “Do you want me to tell you he was abusive? That he hit me and my mom?”

  “Did he?”

  “Nope. He was all right. He used to read to me. Took me fishing. Brought me here. Taught me about cars.”

  “This was his garage?”

  For a moment, the taut lines of Sam’s face softened and she caught a slight resemblance to Des. “Yeah. I apprenticed here with Dad’s partner. Bought him out about ten years ago.”

  Despite his flat tone, his words held a hint of sentimentality. Des could barely refer to Anderson by name, and never as his father. Sam still called him Dad. He must have felt some affection for the man.

  “How was your father with your mother?”

  He jerked a shoulder. “They fought a lot.”

  “Do you remember about what?”

  “Shit. Nothing. Everything. They were both miserable. It was no secret they had to get married because he’d knocked her up. Toward the end, I think they hated each other.”

  Some men never learned, it seemed. After all, twelve years later Anderson would find himself married to Gwen for the same reason. Christ, had he never heard of a condom?

  “Did you notice a change in him once he met Gwen?”

  “I might have if I’d seen him. But he was a little too busy with his new family.”

  “How did your mother react when he left?”

  He rolled his eyes. “How the hell do you think she reacted? She might not have felt a damned thing for him, but do you think she wanted to be out on her own with a kid to take care of?”

  Finding oneself replaced in one’s marriage was a scenario with which she was sadly all too familiar with. “Didn’t your father offer any kind of support?”

  “Sure, but he was raising three other kids. He only made so much money. There wasn’t a lot to spread around.”

  Shayne frowned. “But Gwen had money of her own.”

  He snorted. “Not once the old woman cut her off. And her first husband didn’t have anything to do with those kids.”

 
Financial tension, blended families, a new baby. The couple would have been under tremendous stress. A recipe for disaster with the wrong man. “Do you remember anything from the night of the murders?”

  His tinkering with the engine ceased. “Not the night of the murders, but the next day when word about what had happened started to spread. Mom got scared. She packed us up and took off to my aunt’s. She never came back.”

  An odd shiver raced over her skin and the hair at the back of her neck prickled. “Did she ever tell you what had frightened her?”

  He shook his head. “Never, but for awhile, until my dad confessed, I wondered if she might have been the one, you know?”

  “Was she still angry, even two years later?” Would she still be angry with Travis in two years? God, she hoped not. She didn’t want to wind up bitter.

  “Not about his leaving. She had a man she was seeing and was leaving me alone a lot at night. I was almost thirteen and fine by myself, but Dad started making noises about wanting me to go live with him.”

  The first decent thing she’d heard Anderson had done. “Were you worried she was angry enough that she might have hurt Gwen?”

  “Yeah, it was stupid, but I was a kid.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  He leaned back against the workbench, his brows drawing together and his mouth curling into a perplexed smile. “He confessed.”

  “Of course.” She nodded. “Would you have wanted to live with your father?”

  “No, I hated him. Hated Gwen. Hated all of them. There was no way in hell I would have lived there.” He spoke with an oddly casual tone that seemed out of place given the seriousness of his words. “Ended up being a good thing in the long run. If I’d been living there, I might have wound up dead too.”

  Chapter Ten

  “After their mother’s murder, the surviving children were taken by their maternal grandmother and shielded from the media frenzy that followed. No one suspected the fine line between life and death both children walked daily.”

  —excerpt from Blood and Bone by Shayne Reynolds

  Des stood on the curb in front of the realty office and waved at the young couple as their car drove away, a stiff smile pulling at his mouth until his cheeks hurt. Once they were out of sight, he dropped his arm to his side.

  Shit, that was painful. He hated showing houses to indecisive people who couldn’t match what they wanted with what they could afford. Actually, he hated showing houses period. To anyone. In fact, he hated everything to do with houses. At this point, when he left Dark Water, he’d move into a tent.

  At least now there was a light at the end of his tunnel. Of course, he had to screw Shayne over to get there. A lousy, sick sensation rolled over him.

  But he wasn’t helping Heddi to get out of paying back the money his sister owed. He wanted to protect Shayne. He didn’t want Tic anywhere near her. He would never have taken Heddi’s offer if not for Tic.

  Why then did he feel like the biggest sack of shit there ever was?

  Would he feel better if he wasn’t escaping from under Heddi’s thumb too? Maybe. But he just didn’t have the strength of character to turn her down.

  With a sigh, he went inside, but, as soon as he hit the lobby, he froze. His Aunt Vivian was leaning over Heather’s desk, the hem of her slip peeking out from under her dark pink skirt.

  “I want to know where the hell he is.” Vivian’s shrill voice set his teeth on edge. “You think I don’t know you cover for him? You’re probably sleeping with him too.”

  Her words slurred slightly, and Des took a tentative step back toward the door.

  “That’s not true, Mrs. Grey. I don’t know where your husband is. I’ve tried calling, but his phone is off.” Heather’s voice hitched and Des stopped his retreat. Crap. He made his way to the desk.

  Heather’s glassy gaze fell on him and she pointed. “There’s Des. Maybe he knows where Mr. Grey is.”

  Vivian spun around too quickly and teetered on her glossy black heels. For a second, she pitched sideways. Des reached out, ready to grab her and keep her from hitting the ground, but she caught her balance and steadied herself.

  Some of her dry blonde hair stuck out oddly on one side. Her black satin blouse gapped between her breasts, buttons threatening to pop. Her dark eyes narrowed and pinned him where he stood. “You wouldn’t tell me, anyway.”

  “I don’t know where he is either, Vivian.” A wave of exhaustion swept over him. God, he couldn’t wait to get away from these people. They were like vampires, sucking the life out him, draining him until only a withered husk of who he once was, or who he might have been, remained.

  “What else are you going to say? You Greys are all the same. You stick together.”

  Denying he was a Grey danced on the tip of his tongue, but that left Anderson, and he didn’t want to claim that name either.

  “Everyone knows what you’ve been doing, or should I say who?” Vivian chuckled at her own bad pun. “God, you’re disgusting.”

  He didn’t argue with her. He actually agreed with his aunt, even if she was way off in her reasoning. Sleeping with Shayne wouldn’t have made him disgusting. Lying to her and sabotaging her work on the other hand… Christ, he’d dug himself a deep hole this time, and he had no idea how to climb out.

  “It’s genetic, you know?” Vivian’s words broke into his thoughts. “The way you all spread yourselves around. None of you can keep it in your pants. Even your dear mother, and you’re living proof.”

  Des rolled his eyes and started away from the woman’s bitter tirade. Under Heddi’s tyrannical rule, he’d lived his whole life hearing how he’d been responsible for his mother’s death, how his unfortunate conception brought about his saintly mother’s downfall. He’d hardened himself to his parents years ago. Nothing Vivian could say bothered him anymore.

  “You know what?” Vivian followed. The clatter of her high heels as she scurried after him was like a small, yipping dog’s nails on the wood. “As awful as your mother and Ian were, even your thief sister, you take the cake. How can you sleep with that woman knowing what she is?”

  He rounded on his aunt, a wave of fury washing through him. Not because of what she’d said about him, but what she’d said about Shayne. This so-called family of his took delight in exploiting each other’s weaknesses and fears. They lied and manipulated, used each other up for no other purpose but to destroy. Shayne had been honest and fair. She’d been kind to him. Yet in the end, he’d sided with the poison blood pumping through his veins.

  He took a step forward, narrowed his eyes, and Vivian stumbled back, her skin whitening beneath the thick layer of makeup.

  “Why do you stay with him, Vivian?” Des asked, his voice low and hard even to his own ears. He didn’t give her a chance to respond. “Is it the money? The name? My God, look at what he’s turned you into. A miserable, bitter woman who people avoid like they do a telemarketer.”

  She blinked rapidly, opened her mouth as if to respond, then snapped it shut again.

  “You keep asking where the hell he is, like you’re hoping to catch him in the act, but what would you do if you did? You’re right, we all know he’s screwing around on you, but you do too. Hell, you did catch him two years ago, and nothing changed. Do us all a favor, either leave him or shut up.”

  Des turned to head into his office and nearly collided with Kate. She stood, arms crossed and lips pursed. He waited for his cousin to let him have it for telling her mother off. Instead, Kate looked past him and spoke to Vivian.

  “Wait for me in the car. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

  “Yes, I will,” Vivian replied. With his back to her, Des couldn’t see her expression, but ice laced her stiff voice.

  As he moved around Kate and into his office, she turned and followed.

  “That wasn’t very nice,” Kate said, shutting the door behind her.

  Des snorted, holding himself rigid against the twinge of guilt twisting low in his
gut. “Yeah, you think that was bad? You should have heard the first part of the conversation. What were you doing in my office?”

  “Leaving you a note.” Kate plucked a scrap of paper from his desk and crumpled it into a ball. “I wasn’t sure when you’d be back. How did the showings go, by the way? Any offers?”

  He shook his head.

  She snorted. “Surprise, surprise. I guess it’s a good thing you took Heddi up on her deal.”

  Kate knew. The question was, how much? She didn’t elaborate, though. She’d played Heddi’s games for so long she’d adopted a few of their grandmother’s techniques. Still, using them on him was a wasted effort.

  He dropped into the chair behind his desk, leaned back and met Kate’s hard gaze. When he didn’t speak, she continued. “I’ve spoken to Heddi about your assignment. She wants me to arrange the payouts. You’re to report to me with the contact names. Given my involvement with this office, we should be able to meet here fairly regularly without attracting suspicion. Does the writer already trust you enough to tell you what you need to know?”

  He shook his head. “No, but she will.”

  Speaking the words out loud turned his stomach. Could he actually do this? Betray her? Look her in the eye and lie? What choice did he have? He could destroy her work, or Tic could destroy her. Yeah, he could lie if it meant keeping that psycho away from her.

  “Did Heddi deal with Tic?”

  Kate shrugged. “I think she was planning to send Hudson to speak with him this afternoon.”

  Planning and doing weren’t the same thing. Des would go see the man himself and make sure Heddi had done whatever was necessary to call him off.

  “Is that it?” He wanted Kate to go and leave him alone with his self-loathing.

  “I guess.” She studied him with narrowed green eyes. “I don’t know what you’re so pissy about. You’re getting what you want. You’ll be out of here and away from Heddi, with Julia in the clear until the next time she screws up and you have to fix things.”