Raleigh only nodded in a See, I told you way. Dammit, she couldn’t argue.
“I’ll make some calls tomorrow,” Mia said.
“My half of this house is going to my attorney’s costs if this goes to trial.” Defeat saturated his voice. “But first we have to sell it.”
“It’ll work out.” Mia knew he didn’t believe her. Not that she could blame him. Her optimism sounded forced to her ears.
Cody started crying. “I’m sorry, Raleigh.”
“It’s not your fault. Dad’s murder had nothing to do with you, okay? Or what happened.”
Cody nodded, but he looked about as convinced as Raleigh did.
Rose scribbled furiously, name after name, with some motive or another after the dash. Finally, she slammed the pen down. “Lookit. At least twenty names. Come on, Cody. We’re going to the sheriff’s office. You can stay in the car,” she added at his terrified look. “I’m just going to run this in.”
After some hugs and more hollow reassurances, the two left. Raleigh stared at nothing for a few moments, his mouth in a tight line. Finally, he met Mia’s gaze. “I wish he hadn’t told you.”
“I’ll never say a word. Or…are you worried about what I think of you?”
“I didn’t want anyone to know.” He dropped onto the couch and rubbed his hand over his face. “Especially you.”
She sank beside him, her hand on his arm. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know.” He let his hand drop, but his gaze was still somewhere to the left of her. “But it messes with your head. When your own dad says it’s okay, but it doesn’t feel okay. And then…it does feel good, on a physical level, anyway, but you’re all conflicted because you know in your soul it’s wrong. He started when I was ten. The ‘magic age of enlightenment,’ he called it. When I was ready to be a man, and he was the one to teach me.”
“Sick son of a bitch.” Rage and sympathy roiled through her.
“At first, I was excited that he was going to spend time with me, because he rarely focused on me. It wasn’t penetration, just…other stuff. He always emphasized how this would help me with girls, so I could pleasure them the way he did and instruct them on how to pleasure me. After a year, I couldn’t take it anymore.” He finally flicked his gaze to her. “I told him never to touch me again.”
She stroked his arm. “That was strong of you. Brave for an eleven-year-old.”
“I threatened to tell the police, but he said they’d send me to live with strangers. That foster care was a lot worse than he would ever be. I’d heard stories. Saw fictionalized scenarios in movies. So we made a deal. I wouldn’t tell the police, and he wouldn’t touch me ever again.”
She leaned closer now, her cheek against his arm, fingers tightening around him. “That’s why you moved out on your own so young.”
“Partly. He never touched me, but I knew he wanted to. Sometimes he’d try to get me to admit that it felt good. Other times he’d cry and beg my forgiveness, saying how screwed up he was. I asked him once if he ever touched other kids, and he swore he didn’t. He hadn’t meant to do what he did, but talking about sexuality brought back memories of when he was a kid. Of his father.” Raleigh shuddered. “His drinking got worse. He was drowning in his shame, but at least he was totally ignoring me. He hooked up with every woman he could. I couldn’t live there watching his self-destruction. George, he knew things weren’t good at home. That’s why he let me move into the trailer in exchange for watching the property. He saved me from sleeping outside.”
“Thank God for George,” she whispered. “You never told anyone?”
“It was a secret that made me feel dirty. When Cody was born, I worried. Just before he was about to turn ten—the ‘magic age of enlightenment’—I had to warn Rose.”
“Oh, baby.” She climbed onto his lap now, facing him. “That must have been hard.”
He gave her a quick nod. “Turns out she’d been abused the same way. She understood. And she promised to protect him. I knew she would.”
“You warned Cody, too.”
“I told him no one should ever touch him down there or ask him to touch their private parts. Even someone he knew really well. Like Dad, I threw out, as an example. After it happened, when he came to me, I told him Dad had done it to me, too. I knew what he was going through. I said he could talk to me about it anytime he needed to, but he did what I did—stuffed it down and pretended it wasn’t there. I guess I didn’t set a very good example.” He dragged his gaze to hers. “Now you know all my secrets.”
“You think that makes a difference? You think I want you any less?”
“I wish you would.”
She leaned forward and kissed him. Soft and sweet. “Sorry, but I think it makes me love you even more. It makes me understand how much you’ve gone through, too, and it amazes me that you turned out to be the man you are. I’m very lucky to have you in my life.”
His chin trembled as his eyes took her in. He brushed his hand over her hair. “The problem is that my life is cursed. And sooner or later it’s going to rub off on you again. It already has once. I think it’s foolish to tempt fate twice.”
“You said you needed me.”
“I did?”
“Yes, you said you needed my support.”
“Specifically, your emails. Your calls. Then I said I wanted you to leave.”
“But you don’t want me to leave.” She rubbed her knuckles over his heart. “There’s a part of you that wants me to stay and stand by you no matter what. Then there’s the part—the unselfish part that proves what a good man you are—that wants to protect me. I appreciate that, I really do. But there is no part of me that would feel right leaving you.”
“What about your job? That’s been your dream for years. They’re not going to be especially understanding about postponing your start date because your felon boyfriend is under arrest for murder.”
She found a smile despite his words. “So you consider yourself my boyfriend?”
“Mia, don’t get stuck on the details.”
“I told them a close friend was in trouble, and that I needed to help.”
“Told? As in past tense?”
She gestured toward her phone, sitting next to her purse. “A little while ago.” She wasn’t going to say that they couldn’t extend her start date. They were shorthanded, and if she couldn’t begin on their agreed-upon date they would contact another candidate. Sure, it had been hard to tell them to do that. “That dream was part of my safe, comfortable life plan. In familiar surroundings, not far from my parents. At the heart of it, I want to help others who are going through what I did, cancer or burns. My real dream is to embrace life. Love.”
“Dammit, Mia. You—”
She kissed him harder this time, just to shut him up. He surprised her by hungrily kissing her back. Desperately. “Love me, Raleigh.” She tugged at his shirt, and he tore it off. He pulled off her shirt, her bra, and kept kissing her as she wriggled out of her pants.
Their naked bodies came together, hot flesh to flesh, grinding together. Blindly, they touched and gripped and grasped, as though the force of a tornado were tearing them apart. If they didn’t hold on, didn’t connect deeply, they would be torn apart.
“Love me,” she pleaded, meaning the physical act and not the emotion this time.
He dug inside his duffel bag and shoved the condom over himself, then returned to her. He spread her legs, teased his fingers over her wet folds and then slid one inside her. She wrapped her hand over his cock and drew him close. Desperate to have him fill her. She gasped as he impaled her.
“I do need you,” he whispered, his words raw. “It’s not fair to you, but I do.”
“Life isn’t fair. Not all the time. So we grab each good moment that we can and hold on tight.”
He drove hard, and she felt his need, his fear that he wouldn’t see her again, in each desperate thrust. She met him, hip to hip, fingers digging into his back. Needing to hold on to him, to never l
et him go.
His mouth slammed down over hers, devouring her as though she were his last meal. She bit his lower lip, shocked to taste blood when they kissed again. They’d never made love like this, hard and rough. The ferocity clawed at her, wild and reckless, and shot crazy heat straight to her heart.
He cried out her name with his release, and she followed him. Unable to speak, but repeating his name mentally like a chant. She couldn’t lose him. Not again. She felt the same as she did before she went to the doctor for her follow-ups. Holding on to life in case the news wasn’t good. Knowing two words—”It’s back”—could spin her right into battle again. She was in a different battle this time, but it was every bit as important that she win. That they win.
It took a while to come down. To breathe normally.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered as he shifted so that they were side by side. “I shouldn’t have taken you like that.”
“Are you kidding me? That was incredibly…real. Wild and raw. I took you as hard as you took me.” She drew her fingers down his face, rubbing away the blood on his lip. “There are a lot of things in life that aren’t fair, Raleigh. But loving each other is one of the things that’s right and good. We aren’t losing that.”
Chapter 16
Mia and Raleigh found their way to the bed sometime during the night. Though in a sleepy frame of mind, they’d discussed going out to the deck again, but Raleigh had a good point: the news of his arrest would be out, and reporters might be skulking around.
She woke alone, afraid he’d left. The bathroom door was ajar, the light off. After throwing on a robe, she nearly ran out to the living room—no Raleigh—and then the kitchen. She stopped, taking a breath when she spotted him leaning against the counter gazing out the window, looking at nothing in particular. She guessed he was a thousand miles away. Or perhaps at the lake where the truck was found.
She came up behind him, sliding her arms around his waist. “Penny for your thoughts?”
“Just trying to think of anyone who could have wanted my father dead that Rose might have missed. I didn’t have much to do with him in the last few years, so I don’t know what he was up to. Once in a while, the bartender at Shady’s called me to haul his ass out of there. And I did, but more for the bartender, who’s an old friend from high school, than for my father. I should talk to him.”
“Did you come up with any suspects?”
“Only me. Sullivan didn’t tell me time of death. It may be hard to tell with the condition of the body.”
“Did you see it?”
“He showed me pictures, hoping for some kind of reaction. Guilt, maybe?” He lifted a shoulder. “All he got was shock. I hated the man, but that was a gruesome way to die.”
She poured two glasses of orange juice and handed him one. “We only know when he disappeared.”
“Or the last time anyone saw him. When was he missed? He could have been lying low at his trailer for a day or more before he was killed.” He swigged half his glass, shaking his head. “I’d like to think the sheriff’s office will be running that down, but I doubt it.”
“Then we can.”
He winced, then touched his lip where it was cut.
“I bit you,” she said. “I should feel ashamed, but I don’t. We needed to blow off steam.”
He leveled a sly look at her. “Next time it’s my turn to bite. And scratch.” He turned to show her the nail marks on his upper back.
She traced the marks. “Look what I did to you!” God, she’d been an animal! “Okay, maybe I do feel a little ashamed.”
“No, don’t. It made me crazy. It was all I could do to hold back. I didn’t want to hurt you.”
“Don’t hold back, Raleigh. Never hold back.”
She pushed off her robe and snaked her arms around his waist, looking up at him. “Brand me. I want to feel you, too.” She drew her fingers down his bare chest, though not hard enough to break skin.
He did the same down her back. “I don’t have nails.”
“Then use your teeth.”
He tilted her head and lifted her hair. His teeth scraped the skin, pinching where he nipped the flesh between her neck and shoulder.
“Harder.”
He pulled back. “I can’t. I can’t hurt you.”
No way was this man a murderer.
“It’s okay, Raleigh. You’re imprinted on me anyway. My body. My soul.”
He trailed his hands down her back, squeezing her ass and pulling her hard against his body. She melted against him. How had she lived without him all these years?
His phone rang from the counter. With a reluctant sigh, he released her and picked it up. “Yeah…oh. Sorry about that…no, that’s all right. I understand.” He disconnected and dropped the phone back on the counter. “That was Peter at the garage. A couple of customers called to see if I’m working today. They’re uncomfortable. He thought I should take a few days off until this passes.” He braced his hands on the counter.
She came up behind him, pressing her cheek against his back. “It will pass. Why don’t we eat and see what we can find out?”
An hour later, they were at the Three Oaks Mobile Home Park. Raleigh parked in front of a white structure that was badly in need of washing.
“Is this where you lived?” she asked, watching the shadows in his eyes.
“The last few years I was with him. Before that it was a van. Or someone’s couch. Their back porch.”
“God, Raleigh. Have you ever told anyone about your life?”
“It’s not something I tell the chicks, to impress them.” He gave her a wink that soothed her troubled heart. “Doesn’t work as well as the ex-con thing.”
“Well, I’m impressed. Again, that you came out so well.” But he didn’t see it that way. She remembered how he’d wanted more for Cody than turning out like him.
The door on the home next to Hank’s opened, and a woman who had to be in her fifties stepped down the metal stairs. A cigarette dangled from her mouth, and her robe was at least a year past its life span, the edges fraying.
She squinted. “Raleigh, that you? My contacts aren’t in yet.”
“Yes, ma’am, it’s me.”
“Always so polite.” She descended the last step and walked over. “Heard about your dad.”
“Raleigh didn’t do it,” Mia blurted out.
“Lola, this is Mia. My girlfriend.” Raleigh gave her a secret smile. “Lola lived here when I did.”
Lola took her in with what looked like a predatory gleam. “Hmm, pretty and protective. Sweet. Nice to meet you, Mia.”
Mia nodded. “Likewise.”
“Look, even if you did off him, you probably had good reason. He was a scumbag of the highest order.”
Raleigh flicked his gaze to his father’s home, then back to Lola. “Has someone from the sheriff’s office been by to question you?”
“They asked me a few things. Did I hear any fighting going on a year or so ago? Had you been around? There’s a lot of fighting, and if you’re smart you ignore it.” This she said to Mia. “We mind our own business round here. I told ’em I hadn’t seen you in years. Your daddy, he complained that you wouldn’t loan him any money. That was when he was trying to hit me up for some. Wah, wah, wah, like I gave a shit.” She took a puff of her cigarette and blew smoke out the side of her mouth, along with the word “Asshole.”
“Do you remember the last time you saw him?”
Lola crossed one arm over her stomach and planted her other elbow on it. She seemed to be contemplating as she sucked in another lungful of smoke. “You know, it was May something. Or early June. He was asking for money to buy his kid a birthday present. I was disgusted that he was using you as an excuse to slime money off me. I told him to suck a big—well, I demurred.” She gave Mia a wink. “Love that word, ‘demurred.’ “
“Did he say it was for me?” Raleigh asked. “My birthday’s in October.”
“No, he didn’t. So it was probab
ly his other kid. Didn’t see him around as much. He always freaked me out when I did, though. Looks so much like you, I thought I’d gone back in time.”
Raleigh herded her back to the subject at hand. “So it was that day, when he asked for money. Did he leave the park?”
“Yeah, after he tried the usuals round here. Every woman he ever screwed and then screwed. The man either has—had—a shit pile for a memory or he thought we were all stupid. He tore out of here. I can’t say for sure, but I don’t think he came back after that. Ever.” She shrugged, and the robe slid off her bony shoulder. “I didn’t really think much of it.”
“I guess you wouldn’t.”
“The police checked the mobile home. Took his computer, a few boxes of stuff.”
“Maybe they’ll find a threatening email,” Mia said. “Or evidence of drug dealing or something.”
“If they bother to look,” Raleigh said. “Thanks, Lola.”
They tried to talk with a couple of others who Raleigh said lived there when he had. They weren’t quite as forthcoming as Lola, or as friendly.
She and Raleigh said nothing until they got back into the car and headed out of the park.
He draped his hand over the top of the steering wheel. “It appears that he was killed that night or maybe early the next morning. Which, unfortunately, keeps me at the number-one-suspect place.”
“But that’s given what we know that the police don’t.”
“What if they question Cody? He is Hank’s son, after all. And what if he cracks?”
“He won’t. He’s too afraid of losing you.”
“That’s the problem, Mia. His fear will give him away.” Raleigh’s phone rang again, and he glanced at the screen. “It’s Grace.”
“Maybe there’s some good news.”
He didn’t look hopeful when he answered, and his expression only dimmed from there. “All right, we’ll meet you out there.” He gave her directions to his cabin. When he hung up, he said, “The sheriff obtained a search warrant for my place. They’re probably already out there. Grace said they ‘accidentally’ didn’t notify her right away.”
“Yeah, right.”
Falling Fast (Falling Fast #1) Page 21
