by S. J. Drum
“Son of a bitch!” Dez growled, furious. Dalton’s stomach clenched, bile rushing toward his throat with the knowledge of what must have made his friend so angry.
With a rough hand, Dalton scrubbed his mouth, then pulled his hand away to stare at the rose-colored glossy evidence of his earlier mistake.
“You son of a bitch!” Abigail yelled, repeated Dez’s sentiment. “Why? Why did you even bother with Lucy if you wanted to keep fucking Rachel? You knew Lucy was fragile.”
Dalton fisted his gloss-smeared palm and slammed his fist onto the table. After turning away, he stomped to the sink and washed his hands with a violent intensity on par with his feelings about the entire incident. Abigail continued to rant as he let the hot water scald his skin, removing all traces of Rachel’s lip gloss. He shut off the tap and looked over his shoulder when he heard Jed speak.
“Babe, put it down.”
Abigail had snatched a heavy wooden sculpture of a rock-‘n’-roll style cowboy boot off a nearby shelf and now held it with both hands at shoulder height like she was wielding a baseball bat. “No. I’m gonna knock this stupid motherfucker over the head until he comes to his senses.”
Dalton turned around slowly, knowing Abigail really would try to bash him over the head if she was pissed enough, which she was.
Jed released a loud, put-upon sigh before wrapping one arm around his fiancée’s waist, pulling her back to his chest, and using his other arm to retrieve the wooden Dalton-basher before placing the statue back on the shelf. “Babe, Rachel is a conniving bitch, which it looks like our boy here is just now realizing. Let’s hear his explanation. If afterward you’re still pissed, I’ll beat the shit out of him myself.” He placed a kiss on her temple then looked toward Dalton.
The heavy ball of guilt coiling and snaking through his chest told Dalton he wasn’t going to come out looking like a hero when he relayed his story. Still, he wouldn’t lie.
“I went to the Elegance Suppliedoffice to see Harris, not Rachel.” Dalton settled his gaze on Dez. “We ordered the right marble tile for the job but that’s not what was shipped. When I called the office, Rachel told me I needed to speak with Harris in person since it was such an expensive mistake.” He laughed without humor. “I should have known something was up. When I got there, Harris wasn’t there, Rachel made her play, I fell for it for about five seconds, kissed her back, then realized the tongue in my mouth wasn’t Lucy’s and I wanted nothing to do with it. I set Rachel straight, for good, hopefully. She dropped the bomb that Ross was in town and I got the hell out of there. Now it’s now. So, yeah, I did wrong, but it wasn’t planned and it didn’t get far before I realized I was about to make a major fucking mistake.”
Abigail huffed, uncrossed her arms and leaned back against Jed’s chest.
Dalton felt a grin tug at his lips. “Still want to bash me with that ugly-ass statue?”
“Well, I didn’t, but then you had to insult my style, which everyone knows is awesome, so now I’m reconsidering.”
Jed’s shoulders shook as he tried to contain his laughter.
“I’m happy I don’t have reason to remove your nuts and make a necklace of them for Lucy, but the fact is she’s still gone and Ross is still here in Clifton. I’ve got eyes on him now, 24/7, his cop skills got nothing on my guys. He won’t know he’s being watched and he won’t take so much as a piss without me knowing.”
Another feeling altogether rose up inside Dalton. The sharp tang of jealousy he felt at Dez’s interference and interest in Lucy was unexpected. He studied Dez, trying to determine his motivation for going to so much trouble for a woman he barely knew. Dez met and held his stare.
“Lucy remembered something,” Jed said, ending the staring contest. “Ross Vance is a psychopath. The sick fuck took pictures when he hurt her. She said he set up quite the little photo shoot when he left those burn marks on her. He keeps the pictures in a box and Lucy knows where it is. She’s driving back to Cincinnati to get the evidence she needs to put him away or at the very least, keep her from being locked away in a psych ward by those assholes she calls parents.”
Dalton was moving toward the door before Jed finished speaking but was stopped when Dez moved around the table and placed a firm hand on Dalton’s shoulder. “Wait.”
Dalton shook his head. “I’ve got to find her. I don’t want her walking into that house alone. She could be walking into a trap, and besides, I need to explain about Rachel.”
“My man, she’s got a head start and she’s determined to do this on her own. You don’t think we begged her to take one of us with her?” Now it was Dez who shook his head. “I don’t like it either but I’ve got confirmation Ross is in Clifton so this might be her best chance to get that box and bury a few of those demons that were born inside that house. If someone is waiting at the house to grab her, which I doubt, you won’t make it there till they’re gone anyway. If that happens, the best place you could be is near Ross because he’ll lead us straight to her.”
Dalton’s heart pounded and his breathing was labored enough to make his nostrils flare with effort. Just thinking about someone grabbing his Lucy made him want to tear the world apart in order to get to her side.
A soft, feminine hand landed on his arm as Dez moved back. Abigail looked up at him, her eyes filled with concern. “She needs time and I think this is something she wants, needs, to face on her own. The waiting sucks but it’s our best bet. She said she’d be back tonight. You need to give her the freedom she’s never had, to make mistakes or prove to herself she’s strong enough to face her life. Our girl is trying to put herself back together. It hurts like hell, but we’ve got to give her room to grow.” A devilish glint flashed in her dark eyes and twin dimples popped on her round cheeks. “Besides, if anything happens to her, Dez’s guys will grab Mr. Vance, we’ll string him up inside Jed’s barn and Jed will give him a couple of free piercings. I’m thinking a Jacob’s Ladder would be a good start,” she continued, speaking of the procedure where several barbells were pierced through the penis in a row to create a ladder effect. “Of course, once a person has his dick pierced too many times, it’s pretty damn useless, so we’d have to be careful. I’m thinking a few hundred shiny accents to his manhood should soften him up, figuratively and literally.”
Dalton began to relax as the others joined in the torture fantasy.
“I can wire a battery pack to those lovely piercings and shock the shit out of him whenever he says something we don’t like.” Leave it to Dez to bring something electrical into it.
Jed slung an arm around Abigail. “And Abbey here can give the ’ol boy a few free tattoos. Mighty generous, my woman. He left permanent marks on Lucy, it’s only fair we share the love. Maybe a tramp stamp on his back that says ‘Free Rides, Line Starts Here’. I hear cops have a tough time in prison, but that should help.”
The bell over the front door of Hart’s Ink sounded and the group inside Abbey’s studio dispersed as she went to greet her next client.
Dalton asked Dez to keep him updated on Ross’ movements via text and took off for the job site he’d visited earlier, figuring hours of hard physical labor in the scorching summer heat would be the only way he’d survive the wait until Lucy’s return.
* * * * *
Lucy pulled her car to a halt atop the same cracked cement driveway where she’d parked hundreds of times before but hoped never to again. She sat frozen behind the wheel, peering through the windshield at the line of neglected flowers along the walkway leading to the front door of the house that’d once been her own personal hell. The ticking of the engine and the sound of her breathing seemed to overwhelm the small space.
It’d begun to rain when she’d crossed the city limit line into Cincinnati and was now trickling a steady stream of misty wet drops. She had the odd thought that she was glad she kept her car clean and free of old food wrappers and the other detritus which could be found taking up floor space in most vehicles. It was nice to breathe in th
e scent of wet ozone and fresh rain instead of stale trash.
You’re stalling…
While Lucy was relatively sure Ross was still in Clifton and far away from this house, she couldn’t afford the risk of sitting around wasting time. With a hand she refused to acknowledge was shaking, she removed the keys from the ignition and opened the door. After scanning the neighboring homes, the street and sidewalk, she stepped outside. She narrowed her gaze on the house closest to Ross’ and a flicker of anger began and grew inside her veins.
Why should she care if someone saw her going inside a house she no longer lived in? What were they going to do? Sure as hell not intervene. No, they’d mind their own damn business just like they did every other time… “Assholes,” she muttered, head held high as she strode up the walkway to the front door.
She flipped through her key ring, instinct telling her Ross would not have changed the locks after she left. He was too arrogant, both about her eventual return and the probability of a break-in. Her old key slipped inside the lock with ease and though she didn’t know why she’d kept it, she was glad now that she hadn’t thrown it into the river along with her wedding band.
The heavy door opened inward and Lucy braced herself for stepping inside by taking one last lungful of clean rain scented air. As she moved to stand in the middle of the living room, the first room she came to, she looked around and wasn’t all that surprised to find not much had changed. There was an accumulation of dust on surfaces she would have been beaten for not cleaning on a daily basis and the carpet looked as though it hadn’t been swept in weeks, but the place was otherwise free of clutter.
Wanting to get out as quickly as possible, Lucy turned and jogged down the short hallway to the bedroom she used to share with Ross. The door was closed and when she laid her hand upon it, a terrible sense of dread filled her core. She pushed it open and stepped inside to find herself facing a sturdy four-poster bed which still haunted her dreams.
This room, the bedroom, pulsed with more malevolent energy and memories than anywhere else inside the small house.
As a child, Lucy had once visited the Alamo in Texas. She remembered standing on the spot where so many lives had been cut short and feeling as though the stain of violence and death still clung to the ground. The harsh essence of such a traumatic event still lingering in the atmosphere, making the air thick enough to press against her senses and warn of danger, even though the war was long over.
Lucy felt the same way standing inside her old bedroom as she had standing in the center of an old battleground. She knew it was only in her head, but the air seemed somehow oily and sharp at the same time, threatening to slide its black energy over her pale skin, wrap her up in memories until all her old wounds were reopened.
She ran a fingertip over the tattoo on her thigh revealed by her denim shorts to ground herself and remember she wasn’t stuck here anymore. This room was no longer her prison, she’d made it out alive.
Trying to swallow past the lump of fear, new and old, which had lodged in her throat was impossible and saliva began to gather under her tongue like it had a tendency to do right before she found herself puking up her guts from the flu. Refusing to leave any more of herself inside this den of evil, even it was only her vomit in a toilet, she ran to the closet, jerked open the door and stood on tiptoe to reach the large box on the top shelf.
The barest inch out of her reach, she used the tip of her middle finger to nudge the box farther over the edge until its weight shifted and the box tilted down, ready to plunge to the floor and scatter its secrets over her feet. Before that could happen, she snatched the box out of the air, fumbled for a heartbeat, then clutched the box to her chest, careful to keep the lid on tight. Whatever was inside this box, Lucy didn’t want to see it, not inside this house, not inside this bedroom.
She took enough time to shut the closet door, hoping her trespassing would go unnoticed until it was too late. She didn’t stop at the front door and glance behind her, didn’t offer a last look at the home she’d once thought she would spend the rest of her life in. There was nothing left in this place Lucy felt the least bit nostalgic about. Nothing that wasn’t tainted by violence and fear and evil. After locking the front door, she jogged to her car, set the box on the passenger seat, started her car and backed out of the drive, squealing the tires in her haste to leave this place behind.
Lucy’s pulse pounded and sweat beaded on her upper lip. At the stop sign at the end of the street, she placed a hand on the top of the box that held evidence of her greatest shame, evidence which could, in the right hands, expose the dark truth of her life, upset the Good ’Ol Boy network at the police station in her old suburb of Cincinnati and get Ross Vance out of her life for good.
She made it outside of town before she had to pull her car to the side of the road. Adrenaline and emotional overload forced her out of the car, into the ditch and onto her knees where she emptied the contents of her stomach until all that was left was dry heaves and determination.
Once Lucy was back inside the car, she felt cleansed and new in the way one felt only after a good hard cry or a poison-expelling vomit session. After turning her cell phone back on, she ignored all the notices of messages and missed calls, too exhausted to deal with Dalton and her most likely unrequited feelings for the big jerk. Instead, she thumbed through her contacts until she found Abigail’s number and placed the call.
“Lucy? Oh, thank God! Are you okay? Did you make it? Did you find the pictures? When are you coming back?”
Abigail’s urgent voice and endless questions forced a burst of laughter out of Lucy. In the background, Lucy heard Jed’s rumbling voice say “babe” in the tone he used only when speaking to Abbey.
“What?” Abigail snapped, the sound muffled as if she’d placed a hand over the receiver.
“Abbey, I’m fine,” Lucy said into the phone, hoping to get the feisty woman’s attention. “I’ve got the box but I haven’t opened it. I just…can’t. Not alone.”
“Lucy,” Abigail said, her tone heavy with sympathy.
“Text me directions to your house and I’ll come straight there. It’ll be late, but I’ll come straight there.” She paused. “That is, if you’re still okay with me staying there. I don’t have to. I can find somewhere else. I should find somewhere else. I don’t want to drag you in—”
Abigail interrupted her babbling. “You’re staying with us, damn it, and don’t even think about staying anywhere else. I’ll text you directions. Drive safe.”
“Okay.” Lucy whispered her reply, then ended the call and maneuvered her car back onto the road.
Chapter Seventeen
The long gravel driveway leading to Jed and Abigail’s house was shrouded in the kind of darkness only seen after the hour of midnight but long before the sun begins to rise. Lucy had never been afraid of the dark, knowing there were more worrisome things to dedicate fear to than the natural order of night and day. Tonight, she was also too tired after the twelve-hour round trip drive and the stress of her day to feel emotional about the fact she was pulling her car up to Jed’s instead of Dalton’s.
Her eyes drooped closed and she jerked her chin up, blinking hard in an attempt to stay conscious long enough to park. Wrecking her car a hundred feet from her destination, after everything else that had happened today, would put a nice brown bow on the shitastic mess which was her life at the moment.
Once she’d parked and turned the engine off, she twisted in her seat to retrieve the box. She paused, eyebrows drawn together in thought, and studied the item in her passenger seat. Such an innocuous bit of cardboard yet it potentially held her darkest secrets and biggest chance at ultimate freedom. It was larger than an average shoe box and she had a fleeting thought that it must have once held a pair of cowboy boots, and she’d never once seen Ross wear a pair of boots. The box no longer held any identifying signs of what its original purpose might have been. It’d long since been painted over in a matte black. Lucy shiver
ed, imagining Ross hunched over the wooden workbench in his garage, painting this bit of cardboard in preparation for its newly designated job of holding Lucy’s shame and heartache.
Shaking her head, she grabbed the box, climbed out of the car and headed up the steps to Jed and Abigail’s porch. Standing on the porch, light reflected off of something next to the substantial barn situated a short walk from the house. Squinting into the dark, she recognized Dez’s motorcycle parked in the shadow of the barn.
She felt a rush of warmth in her chest at the thought Dez might have stayed here waiting for her even though it was past midnight and he surely had to work in the morning. She liked Dez. He was proving to be a good friend and a trustworthy man. If only he made her heart speed and her breath catch like Dalton.
Putting the thought away for later, she raised her fist and knocked on the screen door. Before she had time to lower her fist, the inner door was thrown open to reveal Abigail dressed in capri-length lounge pants and a sporty racerback tank top. The sight made Lucy smile. She should have known Abbey wasn’t the negligee and silk robe type.
Abbey pushed the screen open and pulled Lucy inside with a firm hand on Lucy’s elbow. Lucy was yanked into a bear hug, the box trapped against her chest.
“Thank Christ,” Abbey whispered.
“Um, yeah. It’s good to see you too.” Lucy cleared her throat, uncomfortable with such affection.
Abbey backed away far enough to see Lucy’s face, her eyes searching Lucy’s. “Are you back?” Abbey asked.
What a strange question. Lucy tilted her head to the side but didn’t reply, wondering if perhaps Abbey was as delirious with the need for sleep as she was. “I’m standing here so I guess the answer is yes.”
Abigail’s eyes narrowed. “What do you think of Dalton?”
Caught off guard by the random question, Lucy snorted an unladylike laugh. “Right now I think he’s a lying dickbag. Why do you ask?”
