After You Were Gone

by Alexis Harrington

  “And so—what are we going to do?” she grumped.

  “I don’t think you’ll like it.” He looked up. “Juli, maybe we should go away.”

  “I can’t do that. I have payments to make and I don’t have any spare time.”

  “No, I mean leave. Leave town. For good.”

  She stared at him. “Leave Gila Rock? You’re damned right I don’t like it. Where would we go?”

  “I don’t know—anywhere.”

  She pulled her hand away. “But I can’t do that! Everything I own is tied up here, this place, the farm. I owe money on them both and they’re all I have. And I’ve never worked at anything else.”

  “You’re in the retail business now,” he pointed out, cracking the seal on the whiskey cap. He scrounged around the desktop and found an empty coffee cup, then poured a drink for himself.

  “Because it’s mine and I had no choice. Would you let your family run you out of town?”

  He held the cup out to her, but she shook her head. “My only real tie here is you. You’re the reason I came back—you know that. I couldn’t get us away from here when we were younger, but I can now.”

  Julianne didn’t feel one bit better than she had when he’d walked in. Distraught, she fiddled with a pile of receipts and grouped them with a paper clip she found. “Mitchell, you have no obligations or responsibilities. I do. The idea of letting those bastards chase me out of my home—” She threw the gathered receipts on the desk and jumped up from the chair. “I won’t let that happen! Are you going to run?”

  He took a drink and pressed light fingertips to his forehead. “I don’t see it as running, Juli,” he said quietly. “I see it as leaving trouble behind and getting on with our lives. Think about what they’ve done—what they might be capable of. We should just go.”

  “Mitchell.” She crossed her arms over her chest, and suddenly years of suppressed resentment and disappointment came roaring out. “A while ago you asked me if I’d ever wanted to do something that made me feel good about myself. Then you explained what baseball meant to you. Well, someone has been telling me what to do most of my life. My father saddled me with his dream of carrying on the tradition of the pig farm, even though I didn’t want it. And before he died, he saddled me with a husband I didn’t love to supervise me. They claimed they knew what was best for me and nothing I said could change their minds. Now, no father, half brother, husband, your brothers, whoever, are going to make me feel like I can’t stand on my own two feet and accomplish something in this world. I have my store and I’m going to make a go of it. I love you and I want you to stay here with me, but I can’t and won’t force you.” She paced a couple of steps, then turned to look at him. An icy wave of uncertainty washed through her. “So is that what you’re going to do? Get on with your life? Leave me here with the trouble the other Tuckers are causing?”

  “We both have to go,” he stressed.

  “The night the window was broken you told me that they’re nobodies, and not to let them spook me. You told me to stand fast.”

  “Yeah, and I think I was wrong to say that. Now Lindgren is a problem, too, and I can’t be with you twenty-four hours a day.”

  “I think the police will get him.”

  He propped the coffee cup on his knee. “Huh. Like they’ve caught Darcy and Cherry?”

  “I really think they will.” She drew a deep breath and blew it out impatiently. “I don’t want to leave. I’m determined and no one is going to get the better of me.”

  Bolting the last whiskey in the cup, he exhaled. “You can punch a cash register anywhere. There’s nothing high and holy about where you do it.”

  Her brows shot up. “Is that what you think I do? Punch a cash register?” She unfolded her arms and dropped them to her sides, fists clenched. “I’m not just a shop girl here. I run a business! I thought you understood that.”

  He got to his feet, and she saw his frown. “I don’t know why you think you have to prove that you’re tougher than those nobodies! I get that—you’re a strong woman and you don’t need anyone. You’ve told me that. But I’m not going to argue about it and I don’t want to fight with them. I’m sick of having to battle the whole world, I just want peace.”

  Lifting her chin to keep it from trembling, she said, “I can’t stop you if you decide to go. Just like I couldn’t make you change your mind about marrying me years ago. But if you go now I will think much less of you.” It hurt her to say it, as much as she could see it hurt him to hear it. The sting of her words was plain on his face. Oh, Mitchell—she loved him so desperately. Why couldn’t he see her side of things? It occurred to her that just about every one of her adversaries wanted to be rid of her. That she even had adversaries was alarming to her. It was also a lonely, frightening realization.

  He got to his feet and headed toward the door. “I’m tired and I’m done. Just give it some thought, will you?”

  She set her jaw. “I will, but I don’t like it. At all.”

  He considered her for a moment, as if trying to see into her mind. “I thought I knew what you want. Maybe I got that wrong, too.”

  “And what do you think I want?”

  “To be safe, and start life over again with me.” He gripped the doorknob. “I didn’t know that means staying here no matter what.”

  She groped around for a response. “I do want a life with you. And I’m sure in six or eight months’ time, everything will settle down here. The sheriff can’t let your brothers harass me forever. If I can hold out, can’t you?”

  He sighed. “Julianne, I’ve spent years waiting for things to ‘settle down.’ I marked off twenty-five hundred days on calendars. That really changes the way a person sees things.”

  She couldn’t think of an answer to that.

  “I’ll be around for a while if you change your mind.”

  Then he was gone, and she stared at the closed door, angry and hurt.

  Julianne dragged through the days, trying to bury herself in work to keep her mind busy and away from thoughts about Mitchell. Working was easy. Work came in a never-ending supply. Her thoughts were a different matter. She didn’t think he really saw her side of things, even though he expected her to see his.

  His absence dug a deep hole in her soul and kept her awake at night.

  Early one morning before opening, she worked on inventory. No matter how she tried to concentrate on the shipping list she was studying in the back office, he wouldn’t leave her alone. She craved the solace she felt around him, his energy and heat, the sound of his voice, the sense of completeness. Damn him, she thought, as she plowed through sheets of bubble wrap and packing peanuts. Once or twice she’d seen him drive past, but he hadn’t stopped. Fine. That was just fine with her.

  Frustrated, she flung a handful of packing peanuts toward the floor. It was a singularly unsatisfying way to vent. Half of the foam objects only fluttered away from her fingers, and the other half clung to her with a static charge. Slamming a door would be better.

  She pulled a stack of ceramic coasters from the box. Why did he think that she could just walk away from the only security and source of pride she had? It was a snap for him; he had nothing here. The farm and Bickham’s represented the sum total of her life’s work. They represented personal success and her ability to jump over every rock that had been thrown in her path.

  Mitchell said he was tired of fighting the world. So was she—he’d been right about that—but it didn’t mean she’d give up.

  Mitchell lay propped up against the headboard in his room at the Satellite Motel, pillows jammed behind his back. He held a week-old copy of USA Today open in front of him, trying to read an article that once again flogged the case for bringing a major league baseball team to San Antonio. He’d started the same paragraph three times before he realized he wasn’t really concentrating on the subject. For a moment, the print blurred on the page. He saw himself standing at bat in an imaginary stadium under a sticky-sweet midafternoo
n sun. Sixty feet away the pitcher stared him down, wound up, and fired a white, round rocket at him. But it would all be good. In the stands, his beautiful Julianne rose from her seat, her light hair gleaming in the sun like a candle. He swung and felt the crack of the ball when he struck it. It arced, clear and pure, over left field to bounce off the railing on the upper deck.

  Look, Juli, I did it. I made it because of you . . .

  The soundtrack from The Natural kicked in, and he dropped the bat to take the bases, the home run hero of the day.

  He wasn’t really part of this daydream, and neither was Julianne. When he’d left her the other night, he’d been so tired and fed up he’d really considered driving out of Gila Rock on his own. But he just couldn’t manage that.

  He’d driven by Bickham’s with every intention of stopping. He’d lost his nerve both times. Strange that he could ask for her pardon for killing Wes but couldn’t make himself apologize for not understanding why business somewhere else was different from her shop here. On the other hand, she didn’t seem to get that a better life could be theirs in another place, where no one knew them or their histories.

  What did it matter what town they lived in if they were together? They’d be rid of the nightmare tangle of people’s memories, of his relatives, of these small-town cops with their small-town minds. Why did she think she had to prove herself to anyone?

  A sharp knock on the door startled him out of his reverie. The maid had already been here today, so who the hell was that? These days, anything was possible. He slid off the bed and looked through the peephole. He sighed when he discovered the tall, dark-haired guy standing in front of it. Wary but hoping for the best, he opened the door.

  “James,” Mitchell acknowledged his youngest brother. “I didn’t expect to see you again so soon.” He and James, dark-haired and green-eyed, favored their mother. Darcy was a lanky, unfortunate knock-off of Earl in his younger days.

  His brother stood with his hands jammed into his pockets and fidgeted a bit. “Yeah, well—you know how it can get over there.” He tilted his head in the general direction of the arroyo where the single-wide stood.

  “I do.”

  James peered at his bruises. “Wow, Darcy really did a number on your face. Is anything broken?”

  “No, just my patience with him.”

  “Look, I don’t feel right about the way things ended the night you came by. You always took care of us when Earl wasn’t around and now, well, I don’t see any of that old feud shit quite the same way now. Um, can we talk?”

  Mitchell stood aside. “Sure, come on in.”

  James glanced into the room and gave him a quick once-over. “How about if I buy you a beer at Lupe’s?”

  Mitchell considered him. He hated to even think about it, but he couldn’t help wondering whether this was some kind of setup. Just as he pictured the baseball diamond, it was even easier to imagine the possibility of Darcy or one of Cherry’s admirers jumping him, with Earl egging them on. He hadn’t survived seven years of incarceration by being careless. He backed up and grabbed his boots, then pulled them on. “Okay, even better. I have an errand to run a little later so I’ll follow you over there in the Buick.”

  “Sounds fine.” James turned from the doorway to walk back to his truck.

  Mitchell grabbed his keys and closed the door behind him.

  He wondered whether he really knew anyone anymore.

  They walked into Lupe’s together, but that didn’t catch much notice from the few guys whiling away their afternoon in the roadhouse’s dark-paneled confines. In the kitchen, Lupe could be heard arguing with her current cook in a firestorm of angry Spanish. George Strait promised anyone listening that he’d be in “Amarillo by Morning.” So it was just a typical day here.

  Mitchell and James sat on the red-vinyl upholstered stools at the far end of the bar, away from two old farts who were watching a bullfight on ESPN. Lupe emerged from kitchen combat long enough to sell them a pitcher of Lone Star and hand over two glasses.

  After some awkward preliminary chitchat, Mitchell said, “I know you didn’t meet me here to yap about the weather.”

  James put his elbows on the bar with his shoulders hunched. “Was that stuff you told us about Earl really true? That whole revenge thing was about some woman from years ago? Just because she chose Boyce over Earl?”

  “In the end it doesn’t sound like she chose either one of them. Or if she did, I didn’t get the impression that Boyce was interested. I couldn’t tell from what I saw. He told Julianne’s mother it all happened before they met and got married. But yeah, that’s about the size of things.”

  James stared at the beer mug between his hands, as if pondering some great problem. “Damn. It doesn’t seem like that was worth all the trouble we went through.”

  “It wasn’t.”

  “But Darcy won’t let go of it. If anything, he’s more pissed off than before.”

  Mitchell shook his head. “I still don’t understand why any of you would want to waste your time on something like that. And Darcy, you’d think it was his girlfriend who ditched him. I just don’t get him. Sometimes I have the feeling he’s not firing on all eight cylinders.”

  James glanced off to the side and rubbed the back of his neck. “I get that. I really get that. For what it’s worth, I wasn’t as stoked up to keep that thing going all this time. I just went along to get along. But I’m done. I’m just done.”

  “Yeah?”

  “It was never my fight. I should have left a long time ago. But Darcy”—he turned to face his brother—“there’s something you should know about him.”

  “What, he hates me now? I’m not surprised.”

  “Yeah, he probably does, but I think he hates everyone, including himself.” His brother drained his glass and took a breath. “Here’s the thing. You remember that night the Emerson barn burned down . . .”

  Mitchell made a disgusted sound. “I’m not likely to forget that, James. I might not remember the whole night, but I sure as hell know what happened afterward.”

  “But Mitch, what you don’t know—” He closed his eyes for a moment as if seeking strength. Or courage. “Mitch, you didn’t start that fire. Darcy did it. You were already passed out.” He gabbled the words in a rush.

  Mitchell stared at his brother. The sound of the jukebox faded to a dull mumble. The cheering crowd at the Mexico bullring washed away. In Mitchell’s mind, all he heard was the slow, warning clang of a single bell, like a death knell. He jerked upright, as if he’d been poked with a hot wire. His hands turned cold, and his heart mule-kicked his ribs. “What . . . what are you saying, James?”

  Don’t kill the messenger.

  Don’t kill the messenger.

  His brother’s face faded to a sickly white, and fear flashed through his eyes, but he plowed on. “You passed out before any of the gas was poured, before Darcy sparked that damned Zippo lighter of his. He left me with you and snuck around to the barn. He came back a minute later and he was laughing to himself like he’d just heard the best joke in the world. Then he looked at you laying there and said he’d have to do this job himself. And that’s when it happened.” A gleam of sweat shone on James’s forehead, even though Lupe kept this place as cold as a meat locker. “He started sloshing that gasoline out of the can.” He broke off.

  “And? And?”

  “I tried to stop him, but he punched me.” He pointed at his left brow, which sagged a bit lower than the right, something Mitchell hadn’t noticed until just now. “He broke this bone in my face and I could barely see.” He pulled in a hitched breath. “He started that fire. I watched him light it, and—and I know he saw Wes Emerson in that barn before he set it.”

  Jesus Christ. Holy Jesus Christ! Blistering, white-hot rage filled Mitchell—a mammoth rage he’d never known before. “He knew Wes was in there? A man who never did anything to him? He killed him in cold blood! And I took the blame for that fire because I thought I was guilty. I
thought I was protecting both of you, and that asshole Darcy threw me under the bus?” He glared at James. “Why the hell didn’t you say something? Do something? You let me go to prison for a crime that Darcy committed! You let him get away with killing Wesley Emerson!”

  James swallowed, forcing his Adam’s apple up and down, but he kept his seat. “He told me he’d kill me if I said anything. I believed him. I still do—he would have killed me. But after the other night I knew I had to tell you about it. A lot of bad things have been done just because Earl got dumped by an old girlfriend, a really stupid reason.” He shook his head. “It’s too much. Too damned much. I wanted to tell you here, in a public place, in case you blew up.” He leaned closer. “Darcy is dangerous, Mitch. He’s crazy. I think he’s going to kill someone else, and I’d bet he doesn’t care who.”

  A quick hodgepodge of images and old memories flew through Mitchell’s memory. Cell doors, a burned man in his arms, loneliness, a courtroom, a young widow’s bitter wrath, metal bars, Darcy’s hard-lined face with a cigarette sticking out of it. One thought rose to the surface of the morass, struggling past fury and resentment and pain: he was innocent. He hadn’t killed Wes. He hadn’t even started the fire that claimed him.

  Mitchell couldn’t sit here another second. If he did, he’d punch James himself. This news was too much to absorb while knocking back a beer as if it were any old day in the world. “I have to get out of here.”

  “What are you going to do?” Now his brother looked just plain scared and younger than twenty-four. “God, don’t tell Darcy about this yet, okay? I found a place of my own, and Earl and Darcy don’t know about it yet. Just give me a chance to get out of that trailer before you say anything.”

  “I’ll give you twenty-four hours.” He jabbed a finger at James. “But you’re going to tell the cops about this. If you don’t, and right away, I will. You might find yourself in a load of trouble, James. With them and with me, and I’ll make the threat of Darcy look like a playground fight.”