“Y’all happen to see Jud after your prizefight? He dropped Caleb off at the ER,” Lane said. “I haven’t seen him since.”
Gabe shook his head. “Nope. But I signed for his delivery this afternoon at Meggie’s.”
“I haven’t seen him either,” I said. “Why were you at the house?”
Gabe stood and set his hands on my shoulders. He pushed me to the front door. “Let’s go.”
* * *
“We’ll be quick,” I told Gabe the next morning. He drove Deliah and me to the drugstore before he had to be at work. Meggie agreed to let Deliah stay home from school when she claimed she had cramps. I prayed Gabe would stay outside and listen to music or read the book he was carrying around.
“There’s like fifty million brands here. You pick one,” Deliah said inside the store. “I’ve only been a woman for twelve hours. I’m so over it.”
“Read the boxes,” I told her as I pointed to a section. “Those right there.”
I moved to the next aisle and picked up a bottle of Tylenol. I planned to share the pain relievers with Deliah. Even though I ditched my sling, my wrist was still sore. The bell on the door jingled behind me and I held my breath. Gabe walked in. I watched him head directly to his sister and stop.
“Aw jeez,” he snickered when he figured out what she was buying. “Pretend I wasn’t here.”
I watched his hat bounce above the drugstore shelf. He cornered the aisle and stared at me with his sleepy hazels.
“I need a fix.”
“I was going to get you some candy,” I told him. Then I whispered, “Maybe you could get something for your sister.”
He scowled. “What for?”
“Because—you know why. It’s a special day for her. Usually fathers say something nice or take their daughters to lunch to cheer them up.”
“Do I look like her father, Av’ry?”
“No. Well, actually yes, a lot like him. But you know he’s not going to help her with this.”
He lifted his hat and scratched his head. “Nobody gave me candy or took me out.”
“I hope nobody gave you candy because this didn’t happen to you. Can you be serious for once?”
Gabe’s attention turned to the parking lot. He drew his gaze through the front window and then sprinted out the door. I didn’t get to ask what candy he wanted.
Deliah opened a copy of the Williston Herald while we stood in line ahead of two HalRem workers who were buying chewing tobacco and potato chips. I was proud of myself for ignoring their unsolicited remarks. I was more interested in finding out what made Gabe bolt from the store. Then I noticed Deliah’s pale complexion. She folded the paper and pointed to an article. I glanced away to swipe Meggie’s credit card just as the headline caught my attention. Hunt Barrett had conspired to murder while behind bars. The words contract kill stood out in bold. Deliah’s expression filled with panic.
Gabe honked the horn.
I followed his sister through the exit. When we cleared the doorway, she coiled over and threw up on the pavement.
* * *
I offered to make Deliah toast. She said she wasn’t hungry. Eventually, she fell asleep on the couch in Lane’s living room while Molly flipped between the local news and a talk show. I wanted to see if there was mention of Hunt Barrett on the news. I held Eli while Meggie folded laundry on the coffee table.
The baby fidgeted in my lap when the garage door opened with a screech.
“Lane needs to grease that door,” she said as Eli woke up and cried.
Emmie mimicked her nephew and joined in from her playpen.
Molly lifted Eli out of my arms when the boys called me into the kitchen.
“Did you bring us lunch? Is that why you’re back?” I asked.
Lane pushed past his brother and set a grocery bag on the counter.
“Where is she?” Gabe asked. He was wearing a black cowboy hat.
I bit my lip hard and admired the image for a moment. “Who?”
“Mona Deliah,” he answered annoyed. He was hiding a bouquet of flowers behind his back.
“No way. Oh my god, Gabe. She’s going to die.” I tugged his sleeve so he would show me.
“Don’t go ruinin’ it,” he drawled when I let go.
Lane unloaded the bag and slid a card across the counter for Gabe to sign. He tossed him a pen, and I watched Gabe scribble his name with his left hand.
“This is going to make her so happy,” I told them.
“Don’t expect us to do this every month.”
Lane opened a bakery box for me to approve the cake. “Congrats on your news.” I read the frosting while I tried not to laugh. They were really trying. “It’s great.”
“Sometimes I don’t know who you boys are and sometimes you act mature beyond your age,” Meggie said humorously after they presented the gifts. Their sister didn’t give them the reaction they were expecting, but we all knew deep down she was thrilled to have the attention.
“I love what you did,” I told Gabe. I sat on his lap while he gobbled his grilled cheese sandwich.
“So what was that this morning? Is she sick?” he asked after he downed a can of ginger ale and pounded a burp out of his chest.
I leaned away even though he covered his mouth. “I don’t know. First she was showing me something in the newspaper after you took off, and then she turned green in front of my eyes. Why did you run outside?”
“Brigg Barrett drove by. I think he’s tailing me. I saw him in the school parking lot the other day when I was picking Deliah up. He’s got too much time on his hands. I need to fix that.”
“You should tell your father.”
“Nah. I’ll handle him myself.”
“You really should tell him. There’s a story about Hunt Barrett in the newspaper. He’s threatening people. He conspired to murder someone.”
Gabe made a dismissive face. “He’s in prison. He can’t do anything to anybody.”
“We gotta hit the road. Time is moolah,” Lane interrupted. He walked up to the table and slapped the cowboy hat off Gabe’s head. Then he winked at me. “The sooner we work, the sooner I bring him back tonight.”
I grabbed Gabe’s jacket off a hook, and he bumped me into the alcove at the back door behind the refrigerator.
“Please tell your father about Barrett.”
“That’s not a conversation I’m having,” he said as he ran his hands into my hair and held my head still. His fresh strawberry gum was about to be mine. “Forget what you read. He’s not our problem.”
“The article upset Deliah. If it mentions your father, it is your problem.”
“Fine. I’ll read the paper, but I ain’t talking to the lieutenant.”
“Fine, Gabe,” I said. “Where did you get this hat? I love it.”
“I bet you do.” The side of his lip kinked adorably, and then his lips contacted mine for a mere second before the kitchen door flew open and smacked his back. Gabe’s eyes told me he wanted to shove his brother back out the door.
“Y’all need me to draw you a map to the bedrooms?” Caleb made eyes at me.
I clutched Gabe’s arm and pulled him against me so he would let his brother go by.
* * *
Gabe opened the glove box and pushed his books inside after I climbed in the truck. He waited for me on Lane’s street. Since the news of Hunt Barrett’s inside job spread through the media, Mr. Halden had been returning to Lane’s every night. He and Meggie were eating a late dinner by candlelight. I gave them their space and waited in the doorway. Mr. Halden was holding Meggie’s hand across the table. Lane took Molly and his sister out for pizza. The babies were asleep.
“Is this from your lawyer?” I picked up an oversize envelope off the floor mat.
“Shove it back in there. It’s for Judson if he ever shows his face.”
“What did you find out about the papers from Tessa? Did they have to do with your mother’s will?”
“Lane’s still l
ooking into it.”
Gabe turned on the overhead light. The glove box wouldn’t stay shut when he slammed it. There were too many speeding tickets and paperbacks.
I flipped over the envelope. “Why is your uncle getting mail from the vital records office in Memphis?”
“He’s a sleuth. He’s probably working a case for the lieutenant.”
“Do you know that for a fact? Do you have proof? It came to your uncle not your father.” I glared at Judson’s name above Meggie’s address.
“When did you become Detective Ross?”
I swallowed against my dry throat. If only he knew the speculating I had been doing. “There’s something I should tell you.”
He leaned back and made a phony surprised face. “You’re pregnant?”
I rolled my eyes. “Can you wait ten years before you say that again? I think we should open this. I don’t think he’s working for your father. Have you even seen them in the same room together? Your uncle avoids him like you do.”
Gabe lifted a bag of candy from his door pocket. “If it’s got to do with my mom—they got no right to anything that’s hers. Go ahead. Open it.”
I didn’t tell him I expected it would have to do with Deliah and not his mother when he leaned over to see what it said. His breath smelled of licorice.
“I heard Judson on the phone. He gave an address to the other person. I thought it was Tessa’s street. He was being secretive.”
I read silently and then looked up.
“Why would your uncle need a copy of Deliah’s birth certificate? This says they’re denying his request.”
“How do you know he was being secretive?”
“I was hiding in Meggie’s closet listening to his conversation,” I replied.
“He’s probably trying to get info for the lieutenant. You heard Meggie say Deliah didn’t have all of her papers for school. There you go.”
“This says only a parent or the person mentioned on the certificate can request a copy. He would know this if he was a real detective.”
Gabe blew a breath out his nose. “He’s a real one, last I knew.”
“There’s more,” I said. “Before the accident—in the school parking lot—the reporter asked us about Brigg Barrett and a paternity matter.”
I turned and stared at Lane’s house. It occurred to me I was wrong about his mother’s message. She was writing to Mr. Barrett. Maybe I didn’t want to see it. Maybe I was doing everything to convince myself Gabe’s mother tried to save her family.
He twisted his features. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
I looked down at the envelope.
“She’s got his eyes. She looks just like us. She’s full Halden,” he assured.
“Deliah looks like you, but maybe it’s your mother’s side you’re seeing. Maybe you see what you want to see.”
“She has our eyes, Av’ry. Halden eyes.” He raised his voice and slapped his hands on the steering wheel.
I straightened my back against the seat. I didn’t mean to rile him into a foul mood.
“Keep this to yourself. In no way can it get out that you think Brigg is her dad. The reporters would love to catch you saying that.” He ran his fingers down his face and sighed. “I hate the lieutenant for what he did to us and my sister, but this is crap. Nobody’s gonna believe it.”
“It’s not just me and the reporters. I think Deliah suspects it too. She read that article about Hunt Barrett and freaked out. Maybe Brigg Barrett knows he’s her father and that’s why he’s following her around.”
“She’s not related to that snake.”
“But Gabe, your mom had a thing with his father.”
“That family has been trying to ruin mine for as long as I’ve been alive. I’ve got the scar to prove it. Hunt Barrett killed my brother, for chrissake!”
How could I forget how Hunt’s men stabbed Gabe? I slid the paper back in the envelope and resealed the sticky flap. I felt like a fool.
“I’m sorry I upset you.”
“Keep this to yourself, alright? The lieutenant would go postal if any of that got out about his wife two-timing him with Barrett.”
“Okay,” I mumbled.
“I’m serious, Av’ry.”
“I said okay.”
“Man, this screws up everything.”
I closed my eyes and set my head on his shoulder. He didn’t touch me. I cursed myself for opening a can of worms. Things were hard enough for Gabe and his father.
When he cut the engine, I sat up. The coop was lit up by a floodlight. He parked on Meggie’s road beside a HalRem water tanker.
“I thought we were going home,” I said.
“We did.”
“You moved the trailer today? Does it have electricity and water?”
“Just relax with the questions and let me take you there.”
We walked a path of wet grass to the field behind the coop. He had a flashlight in one hand, my elbow in his other hand. I could hardly see the outline of his cowboy hat as the coop’s light blinded me.
I stubbed my boot on his heel when he stopped walking. I grabbed his arm for steadiness and smelled smoke just as the image of a campfire came into view.
“Howdy, lover boy—lover girl,” said Gabe’s uncle. He was squatting in front of a fire pit, poking at logs. “Well, ain’t you hot stuff in the hat.”
Gabe didn’t respond. He gave me a look that let me know he thought I bought the hat.
“It was from you?” I asked his uncle.
“Sure thing, missy. Now where’s my mail?” He stood up and tossed the stick into the flames.
“In the truck. I’ll fetch it,” Gabe replied.
Judson motioned for me to sit down. There was a ring of logs around the fire. I glanced at the trailer. I wanted to run to it.
“We thought you left town.”
“Briefly,” he said. “Now I need that letter.”
I turned my head. He was watching me, scrutinizing my mannerisms. I wondered how good he was at reading body language. I was too tired to fake him out.
“I don’t mean to put a damper on your plans, darling. Seemed like a fine night for a bonfire with the snow melting and all.”
He sat on a log and ran a hand down his ponytail.
“There’s a room for you at Lane’s. Meggie wouldn’t let Mr. Halden buy out a hotel. She said there were already too many homeless workers in town because of him.”
He glanced up from under the rim of his hat. “You mean y’all aren’t gonna invite me into your honeymoon suite?”
The blood rushed out of my face.
“Relax. I’ve got a room in town. Gonna cost me. But believe me when I say I’d rather get my forty winks on a charbroiled sofa than crash at your bungalow.”
I released my breath while I tried to disguise my relief.
“Is there something else on your mind?” he asked.
I wiped my hands on my knees and sat up tall.
“Back when I was sick...I caught you in my room…in Deliah’s room. What were you doing in Meggie’s attic?”
“I’d imagine this piece of information has had your knickers in a bunch.”
“What were you doing in her dresser? Are you going to answer me before Gabe comes back?”
He scratched his scruffy chin and crossed his ankles. There was something about him that made me pause.
“I like your spunk. But no.”
“You’re not going to answer? Then I’ll tell.”
He uncrossed his boots and crossed them the other way.
“You’ll just crush them,” he said.
“You’re serious?”
“Serious as the business end of a shotgun. This ain’t your territory.”
I didn’t have an opportunity to respond. Gabe snuck into our space and then circled the bonfire to hand his uncle the envelope.
Judson examined the item and drew his eyes up to his nephew’s face.
“We opened it,” Gabe told him
and walked back to me. I wished he hadn’t said we.
His uncle laughed at his boldness. “Was the canary tasty?”
I stood and fixed my jeans. “I’m going to bed.”
“Av’ry, wait,” Gabe called after me. By the time I got to the trailer steps, he caught me. “Don’t go in.”
“Why?” I wiggled the doorknob. “Gabe, just unlock it, please?”
He pulled out his keys and covered my eyes with his hand while he fiddled with the lock.
The light turned on as he uncovered my eyes and revealed a leather sofa, a coffee table, and a kitchen table with two chairs. A bookshelf stood on the back wall.
“You robbed a furniture store?”
He flopped down on the sofa.
“I wasn’t expecting this. You bought pillows and a TV? That must have been some first paycheck.”
I caught the spiraling throw pillow after it left his hand. He almost made me forget about Judson.
“Check out the boudoir,” he drawled. I had a hard time taking my eyes off of him.
“Wow. Is that real?”
Gabe jumped up and slithered past me. He pulled me onto the bed, on top of him, and then rolled us over so we were face-to-face.
“I thought you’d like this.” He used a boot to kick the footboard as he tapped the headboard with his knuckles.
“You picked out all of the bedding? It’s like a bed from a soap opera. My parents don’t even have anything like this.”
Gabe rolled to his back and stretched out his arms. “I watched soap operas with the housekeeper for years. I say we recreate a scene right now. You know what to do.”
I swatted his stomach and pictured him as a little boy sitting on a kitchen stool, dunking his cookies in milk, absorbed in As the World Turns.
“Do you ever think about anything else?”
He ran his hand down my ponytail and tugged. He turned to his side and dropped his heavy leg on my hip. “Nope.”
“Your uncle’s outside.”
“And that’s where he’ll stay.”
* * *
“Thanks for not teasing her,” I told Gabe after he pulled into Lane’s driveway. Deliah jumped out and ran into the house. “I love your hardhat, by the way.” I held it on my lap along with a stack of computer printouts. I ran my finger over his name.
Stubborn Truth (The Stubborn Series Book 3) Page 19
