by Sandra Brown
Neal snickered. “You ought to have a talk with your old lady, Hutch. Set her straight on a few things. Feeling sorry for queers the way she does, maybe she should have moved out to San Francisco like Lamar did.
“You know,” he continued, “that should have been my first clue. First he moves out of the house we shared, then he got all fired up about going to California as soon as we graduated. Who in their right mind would want to live among all those freaks unless you were one of them? I should have known then he was a faggot.”
Donna Dee opened her mouth to speak, but Hutch shot her a warning glance and asked, “Is there any of that clam dip left, honey?”
Resentfully she flounced from the room and went into the kitchen. She was frequently short-tempered. Lately she’d been on a tear about moving to a larger house. They had bought this one after returning from Hutch’s stint in Hawaii. It wasn’t much better than the one they’d had on base, but it was all they could afford.
Besides, Donna Dee only used the house—among a number of other things—as an excuse for her bad moods. Hutch ignored the racket of clattering dishes and banging cabinet doors coming from the kitchen and freshened his guest’s drink.
Neal was still on the subject of Lamar Griffith’s recent demise. “You know that disease he died of—what’s it called?”
“AIDS,” Donna Dee said as she rejoined them, bearing a tray of dip and chips.
“My daddy says that only queers can get it. It comes from fucking each other in the ass. How’s that for a way to go?”
Hutch dug into the dip. Most of his football muscle had turned to flab and collected around his middle, but he continued to feed his athlete’s appetite. “The paper said he died of pneumonia,” he mumbled around a mouthful.
“That’s what Myrajane wants everybody to believe,” Neal said. “She didn’t even have Lamar buried here in the Cowan plot she’s so damned proud of. He was cremated out in California. The pile of ashes probably wasn’t this high,” he said, indicating a space of about two inches with his hands. “I heard he didn’t weigh a hundred pounds at the end.”
He laughed. “Christ, can you imagine what the funeral was like? It must have been a sideshow—a bunch of fairies sitting around sniveling. “Oh, dear me, I don’t know what I’ll do without my precious Lamar,’ ” Neal said in a singsong falsetto.
Donna Dee shot to her feet. “You are, and always have been, a prick, Neal Patchett. Excuse me.” She left the room again. Seconds later, they heard the bedroom door slam.
Neal rolled his tongue in one cheek. “Your old lady’s a barrel of laughs, Hutch.”
Hutch glanced in the direction of Donna Dee’s angry exit. “I’ve been having to work some overtime, and she doesn’t enjoy being alone at night.”
The only job Hutch could find when he mustered out of the navy was at the soybean plant. Donna Dee resented his working for the Patchetts, although he didn’t want to tell Neal that. Going back to college had never been considered. Even if he had the money, he lacked the initiative.
Donna Dee was working as a receptionist in a gynecologist’s office. One of the benefits was that she got free treatment and advice. They’d been married almost ten years, yet she had still failed to conceive. She fought her barrenness with a fanaticism that bewildered Hutch.
Over the years he had tried to reason with her about it. “You don’t understand!” she would scream at him. “If we don’t have a baby, then there’s no reason for us to be together.” He failed to see the logic in that, but didn’t pursue the argument because it always resulted in a fight that left him feeling rotten. He figured it was a female hormonal thing that men weren’t equipped to understand. His own mother had suffered from the same malady because she had wanted more kids.
At least once a week, Donna Dee came home from work with an article about a new reproductive technique for infertile couples. Invariably, the revolutionary method of fertilization would involve him in some demeaning and embarrassing way.
Either they would screw until his balls ached, or he’d have to jack off in a plastic bag, or she would walk around with a thermometer in her mouth, and when the time was right, she would say, “Now,” and he’d have to perform whether it was the middle of the night or during Sunday lunch. Once she had even caught him while he was taking a crap and had knocked on the bathroom door, saying, “Don’t bother pulling your pants back on. It’s time.” He thought her tactics hardly romantic.
Hutch supposed he shouldn’t be judgmental of her obsession. He wasn’t the one who was malfunctioning. His sperm count was fine. Every doctor they had consulted had said the same thing: Donna Dee couldn’t make a baby. But Donna Dee was damned and determined to make one. It was as though she had to prove to the world, to him, and to herself that she could. What he feared was that her baby mania had something to do with the Jade Sperry incident. He didn’t want to know for certain that guilt was Donna Dee’s propellant, so he had never suggested it.
Neal drained his glass of bourbon and set it on the edge of the coffee table. “You married too early, Hutch. Didn’t I tell you so? But you wouldn’t listen. Now you’re stuck at home with a wife who’s got a burr up her ass, and I’m still out catting around.” He smacked his lips with satisfaction. “A different pussy every night.” Leaning forward, he lowered his voice. “Come along with me tonight. We’ll raise some hell, just like old times. I can’t think of a more befitting send-off for our pal Lamar.”
“No, thanks. I promised Donna Dee we’d go to the picture show.”
“Too bad.” With a sigh, Neal got up and sauntered to the door. Hutch ambled after him. “By the way,” Neal said, “my old man told me to ask after your mama. How’s she doing?”
“As well as can be expected. She finally sold the house and got her a smaller place. She does a lot of work at the church, filling time, you know, since she doesn’t have Daddy to take care of.”
A year earlier, Sheriff Fritz Jolly had been investigating a burned-out building when a beam collapsed. The fall had broken his hip. He was hospitalized for months. Even after returning home, he never regained his original strength and developed one complication after another until he died of an infection.
“Tell her my daddy said that if she needs anything to holler.”
“Thanks, Neal. I’ll give her the message. She’ll appreciate it.”
“Looking after her is the least he can do. Your daddy did a lot of favors for mine. You know…” He reached out and tapped the pocket of Hutch’s shirt. “It never hurts to have an open-minded man in the sheriff’s department. How well do you like working in the factory?”
“It stinks like shit.”
Neal chuckled and lightly socked Hutch on the shoulder. “Let me see what I can do.”
Hutch grabbed Neal’s sleeve as he tried to leave. “What do you mean?”
Neal removed Hutch’s hand. “Better go see to your old lady. Apologize for your prick of a friend. I’ve never run across a woman yet who didn’t cream over an apology.”
Hutch shook his large, rusty head like an irritated dog. “Tell me what you meant about my job at the plant.”
Neal frowned as though he were reluctant to impart a secret. Lowering his voice, he said, “It’s time somebody did some creative thinking for you, Hutch. The sheriff who took office after your daddy died is so tight-assed, he squeaks when he walks. My daddy thinks the department needs some new blood. Now do you see what I’m getting at?”
“Me?” Hutch said, lowering his voice to match Neal’s conspiratorial tone.
Neal smiled broadly. “Think how tickled your grieving mama would be if you followed in your daddy’s footsteps.”
“I applied for a deputy’s position when I left the navy. They weren’t hiring.”
Neal placed his hands on his hips and shook his head as though annoyed with a dim-witted child. “Your problem is that you’ve got no faith, Hutch. Have the Patchetts ever failed to do something we wanted to do? A word here, a word there—we
can make things happen.”
“Having a better job would sure make things here at home a lot easier.” Hutch glanced toward the back of the house, where Donna Dee was sulking. “I’d do just about anything to get into the sheriff’s department.”
Neal gave him a sly smile and slapped him lightly on the cheek. “That’s what we’re counting on, Hutch. That’s what we’re counting on.”
* * *
Ivan was relaxing in his den with a glass of Jack Daniels when Neal got home. He strolled in and headed straight for the liquor cabinet. Maintaining the suspense, he fixed himself a drink.
Ivan, having enough of it, tossed aside his newspaper and asked, “Well, did he go for it?”
“Daddy, he swallowed the bait like a starving catfish.”
Ivan’s palm struck the armrest of the leather sofa. “Damn! That’s good news. I can’t wait to personally boot out the bastard that’s in there now. We’ll have to take it slow, of course. Hutch’ll start out as a deputy and work his way up. Let’s say a year, eighteen months at most, and we ought to be sitting pretty as far as local law enforcement goes.”
Neal saluted his father with his glass. “You might be old, but you’ve still got a few tricks up your sleeve.”
“Old, hell,” Ivan bellowed. “I can still outmaneuver, outdrink, and outfornicate men twenty years younger than me.”
“Maybe some men twenty years younger than you,” Neal smirked.
Ivan glared at him. “Listen to me, boy. As far as the drinking and whoring go, you seem to be doing all right. But don’t forget the maneuvering. You don’t spend enough time working. You’ve got to put work before whiskey and women, or you’re sunk before you even venture into the water.”
“I work,” Neal said sullenly. “I went to the plant three days this week.”
“And spent the other four wearing out the tread on the tires of that new car I bought you.”
“What good does it do me to put in an appearance at the factory? You’re still the boss. And you shoot down every idea I come up with.”
Looking disgruntled, Ivan thrust out his empty glass. “Get me another whiskey.” Neal did as he was told, but he didn’t do it graciously.
Ivan sipped his fresh drink. “For the time being, I see no need to spend money on improving or expanding the business. But I have been giving our future a lot of thought lately and have decided it’s time you got married.”
Neal was caught raising his highball glass to his mouth. He froze, leveling his eyes on his father. “You decided what?”
“It’s time you got married.”
“Go screw yourself.”
“I won’t have that sass from you,” Ivan thundered, pounding the armrest with his fist. “Right now all you’re fit for is driving fast, drinking hard, and running with loose women.” Ivan aimed his blunt index finger at his son. “If you want to be respected and feared, the first step is to get married.”
“What makes you think I want a whining wife hanging around my neck? That kind of life is for dumb sons of bitches like Hutch. I like my life the way it is.”
“Then I guess you’re not bothered by the gossip about Lamar and you.”
Neal’s reaction was prickly and swift. “What gossip?”
Now that he was assured of Neal’s attention, Ivan leaned back against the sofa cushions in a more relaxed posture. “Y’all ran around together ever since you were kids. Folks are going to find it hard to believe that you didn’t know he was queer.” Ivan peered at his son from beneath his brows. “I’m kinda wondering about that myself.”
“Get on with it, old man,” Neal said in a dangerous tone.
“Y’all did live together, alone. Now that Lamar’s perversion has become public knowledge, it’s just a matter of time before folks start speculating about you.”
Neal’s anger was evident only through his eyes, which had narrowed to slits. “Anybody who would think me queer has to be crazy. There are at least a hundred women within the city limits of this town alone who know damn good and well I’m straight. You’re just blowing smoke so I’ll bend to your will.”
Ivan’s voice remained calm. “You told me yourself that Lamar had women while y’all were at college. Folks might assume your philandering is just a cover-up, too.” He took a sip of his drink, but his calculating eyes never strayed from Neal.
“That boy of Myrajane’s was more fucked up than Hogan’s goat. I don’t want folks to say the same about my boy.” He nodded sagely. “A wife would nip the gossip in the bud. It’d be even better if a baby came along nine months after the wedding.” Drawing a deep, contented breath, he gazed around the room. “I’m gonna hate like hell to die, boy. I don’t want to give up a single thing that belongs to me.” His shrewd eyes swung back to his son. “I could go a lot more gracefully if I knew that I was leaving behind a dynasty.”
He turned the full force of his malevolence onto his son. “The only thing that’s standing between me and a guarantee of immortality is you. The very least you can do is go to work on making a son and heir.”
“God knows I’ve had plenty of experience.”
Ivan took Neal’s droll comment as concession. He picked up the society section of The Post and Courier from Charleston, which he’d been reading when Neal came in. He thrust it at Neal. The first page was covered with photos of young ladies in frilly white dresses.
“This season’s crop of debutantes,” Ivan said tersely. “Choose one.”
* * *
Marla Sue Pickens was perfect: blond, blue-eyed, and Baptist. Her mother’s pedigree was impeccable. Her daddy and his business partner had stockpiled a fortune by making pipe from scrap metal. Ivan liked the blend of gentility and crass commercialism in her background.
Marla Sue was the third child and only daughter. Her elder brother was heir apparent to the metal-pipe business. The other brother was a physician, practicing in Charleston.
As for Marla Sue herself, she was an even-tempered young woman who took for granted her family’s affluence and her natural prettiness. She was currently enrolled in Bryn Mawr, but she had no ambitions beyond making a good marriage, being a gracious hostess, and breeding another generation of South Carolinians as flawless as herself.
This blueprint for her future was derived not so much from vanity as naïveté, because, for all her pseudo-sophistication, Marla Sue wasn’t very bright. Ivan regarded this, too, as an asset. He heartily approved Neal’s choice, which had been based solely upon physical appearance. Marla Sue unwittingly cooperated by falling in love with Neal the night they met.
A socially prominent acquaintance in Charleston owed Ivan a favor. “I’ll consider the debt canceled if you can finagle an invitation for me and my boy to one of those debutante shindigs.”
For the first half of the evening the Patchetts observed from the sidelines. Marla Sue wasn’t difficult to pick out. She shone like the strand of diamonds around her slender, aristocratic neck. Feeling high on champagne and optimism, Ivan clapped Neal on the back as they watched Marla Sue waltz past with her current partner. “Well, boy, what do you think?”
Neal gave the girl the heavy-lidded once-over that had melted scruples previously frozen solid. “She’s got zero tits.”
“Hell, boy! As soon as she says, ‘I do,’ you can buy her a set of big ones.”
Neal asked Marla Sue to dance and exercised the charm he was famous for. She fell for every calculated syllable of flattery. She simpered and blushed and believed him whole-heartedly when he humbly said, “I’d love to call you sometime, but I know you’re probably too busy to talk to a hick from Palmetto like me.”
“Oh, no, I’m not!” she declared with breathless sincerity. Then, lowering her eyes and softening her voice until it was scarcely audible, she added, “I mean, if you want to, I’d love to hear from you sometime, Neal.”
“I’m too old for you.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. Not at all. Ten years is nothing.”
The next day she
received two dozen white roses, followed up by a telephone call. They made a date for lunch. After the lunch date, he didn’t call her for a week. “All a part of the program,” he reassured Ivan, who was impatient over the calculated delay.
Neal’s strategy proved effective. Marla Sue was tearfully glad finally to hear from him and invited him to have Sunday dinner in Charleston with her family. Neal was on his best behavior, responding deferentially to her father’s questions. He flattered Marla Sue’s mother and sisters-in-law until they were putty in his hands.
It was all he could do to keep a straight face. His old man was right—there was nothing quite as satisfying as manipulating people. Except possibly sex, and he was getting none of that from Marla Sue.
Ivan had ordered him not to lay an improper hand on her. “That girl’s got her cherry sure as hell. You leave it alone until the wedding night.”
“Do you think I’m dense?” Neal asked resentfully. “She believes I respect her too much to bed her before we’re married. It makes her giddy to think she exercises that kind of control over me.”
To relieve the tension the courtship was placing on his sex life, he turned to a woman in Palmetto who had an insatiable sexual appetite and a husband whose job required him to travel.
Neal saw Marla Sue as much as her schooling allowed. His long-distance telephone bill was atrocious, and he spent a fortune on flowers. The investments paid off, however. He was invited to spend a whole weekend in Charleston with her. Armed with a three-carat diamond and an unassuming demeanor, he asked her to honor him by becoming his wife. As expected, she said yes immediately.
The wedding was predicted to be the social event of the year. One thing Neal couldn’t manipulate was the mother of the bride, who wanted to do everything according to Emily Post. By the time the wedding weekend arrived, he was ready to be done with the whole affair and get on with his life.
He and Ivan moved to a Charleston hotel for the duration of the nuptial festivities, which commenced on Friday at a luncheon given in honor of the bride and groom at the home of the bride’s maternal grandparents.
