Frail Blood

by Jo Robertson

  Damn it! A surge of energy pushed into her legs and she executed another blow, higher this time, and her aim proved true. The man grunted, cursed vilely, and tumbled at her feet.

  "Don't let her get away!" The female voice behind the light rose to the keening howl of a banshee, panic heavy behind the command.

  Emma froze for the moment, trying to put a face to the voice in the blackness. Then she rose and edged to her right. The light swung crazily like a drunken porter's lamp, back and forth from the man who now crouched on all fours and Emma who ducked below the line of light.

  "Papa! Where is she?"

  Phoebe, then. But the knowledge only raised more questions in Emma's mind. Phoebe and her father? None of it made sense.

  In the second of inaction she took to contemplate the significance of daughter and father kidnapping her, Machado recovered enough to grab her ankle. She tripped and fell, landing on her palms and badly battered knees. She kicked out again, but missed, and felt his powerful hand crawl up her leg to gain greater purchase.

  God, he was so strong!

  "Phoebe," he yelled, "stop her!"

  "With what?"

  "Anything, you stupid cow! Hit her with the lantern!"

  "But – the oil –

  "Damn the oil! I'm injured. I can't hold her much longer."

  A moment later the lantern crashed down on Emma's head and the acrid odor of petroleum-based kerosene filled her nostrils, nearly taking her breath away. The glass lamp shattered and the liquid ran down the side of her head and her cheeks as she staggered to disengage her leg from Machado's massive grip.

  Too late! In a moment he was upon her, as she blinked to keep the kerosene from damaging her left eye, and pinned her to the cement floor.

  "You fucking bitch," he growled. "You'll pay for that!"

  With a single blow, he cuffed her head and she felt herself slip away, his massive weight pinning her face down, the pungent smell of the spilt kerosene taking her last breath. She felt herself being hauled to her feet, blood dripping from her head to mingle with the odor of the oil, and swung over broad, beefy shoulders, her heft easy for her captor in spite of her height.

  As she bounced over his shoulder, she drifted in and out of consciousness. Up the stairs he carried her until he reached the top step where he threw her onto the cold linoleum floor. She couldn't hold back a groan as her bruised muscles connected with the floor.

  Lighter steps followed as Emma tried to lift her battered head to see Phoebe Machado come in view. She lumbered up the stairs, the broken kerosene lamp still gripped in one hand.

  Why Phoebe? Emma was certain the woman did not murder her brother. From what Aaron had told her, the sister loved Joe as if he were her own child. Why then should Phoebe wish to do violence against Emma? She hadn't trusted the woman from the beginning, but she hadn't believed her capable of such violence.

  "I told you not to bring them here," Phoebe said.

  Them. So the body in the trunk must belong to Mrs. Machado. But why? Why would either of them wish Frances Machado harm?

  "Don't be daft, gel. We couldn't take care of them at the big house." Mr. Machado's ugly, florid face blocked Emma's view as he bent to peer into her face. "There's only enough room for Frances in the trunk."

  "I don't like this Papa," Phoebe complained. "Someone will find out about Joseph ... and Aaron."

  "We took care of him, remember?" Machado placated his daughter while a sliver of impatience wormed into his voice.

  What did he mean? Had they harmed Aaron in some way?

  "I hope he didn't suffer, Papa." Phoebe's voice quavered. "None of this was Aaron's fault, any more than it was Joseph's."

  "Shut up, Phoebe," Machado snarled. "We have to decide how to get rid of this one before someone comes looking for her."

  "What about Mama? How shall we explain her disappearance?"

  "The bitch got what she deserved."

  Emma tilted her head to view the woman who'd put the shards of the lamp aside and was attempting to wipe her hands on her skirt. "I know Mama didn't love Joseph," she puzzled, "but I don't understand why she would kill him."

  She sank onto the floor as if the memory over Joseph's death overcame her all at once. "Why did she wait all these years if she hated him so much? She could've done it so much easier when he was a baby."

  "Judas Priest, Phoebe, you sound pathetic." Machado lifted Emma by the heels and dragged her into a nearby room, empty except for a filthy tick mattress by a window. He hauled her onto it as she fought the urge to sneeze.

  "Who knows the evil workings of a decadent mind like your mother's. For God's sake, she seduced her own son! She was capable of anything."

  Emma groaned as her head connected with the wall when Machado nudged her with his foot like a sack of potatoes. She lay quietly, biting her lip to keep from crying out and drawing attention to herself. Trying to work out the puzzle in her mind.

  Phoebe was correct. Frances wouldn't have killed Joseph now – after all these years. Emma had seen the woman in court. She'd been broken, as if life had battered her down to a shadow of what she once was. She couldn't have summoned the energy to kill a fly, let alone her son, no matter how abhorrent his existence was to her. No matter what an awful reminder his face brought to her.

  If she'd intended to kill her son, she would've done so long ago, smothered him as a baby. Or caused a fall as a toddler.

  Aaron had told Emma that he confessed everything to Joseph, every detail about his life at the hands of a sickly twisted mother, including the birth of Joseph, and Aaron's abandonment of him. Had he also told his father? Had Joseph, Sr., been the person to take advantage of the discarded weapon the night Alma Bentley shot Joe?

  And what role did Phoebe play in this appalling scenario? Had she killed her mother? Or was the father also to blame for that obscenity?

  "This one's caused me a lot of trouble," Machado grunted, planting another swift kick to her side.

  Emma bit her lip so hard she tasted blood, but kept her eyes closed and prayed he'd leave her alone for the moment.

  Thankfully he left her there and returned to the crude eating area which held a battered table and two benches on either side. This must have been the farm workers' housing, although it looked deserted now.

  She heard their voices rising louder from the other room as she raised her head to look around, searching for a weapon of some kind, anything that would enable her escape.

  Escape! She bit back an hysterical sob. Every muscle in her body ached with the battering it'd taken, her jaw felt unhinged, likely broken, and her nails, palms, and knees were torn and bloody. Even if she managed to escape this room, she wouldn't be able to outrun her crazed guards in her condition.

  Emma had no doubt that both father and daughter hovered at the brink of madness and she'd be their next victim.

  Chapter 30

  "And thus I clothe my naked villainy with odd old ends stol'n out of holy writ, and seem a saint, when most I play the devil " – King Richard III

  The boy Jacob continued to insist that Emma and Miss Phoebe had gone there – he pointed in the general direction of the orchard in back of the rose garden. Finally, Malachi dragged him by the arm, and he and Stephen walked the boy through the garden and into the orchard.

  "Where?" Malachi held back the scream that threatened to leap from his throat like a rabid dog attacking an innocent.

  "T – th – there," the boy stuttered.

  "Show us," Stephen commanded.

  Malachi shoved the boy from behind and he took off running as fast as he could, zigzagging through the neat rows of peach trees, now stark and bare during the winter season. Malachi sprinted after him, easily gaining until they burst through the grove some half mile farther. Stephen panted some hundreds of yards behind him.

  In the distance Malachi saw it – a broken-down, untended shack, probably housing for the migrant workers that came up from Mexico during the harvest to pick the apricots and peache
s. An air of desertion and desolation lay around the building. Likely it hadn't been used in years.

  He turned the boy around and pushed him back to the safety of the trees. "Run!" he whispered. "Go back to the Machado mansion and ride a horse into town. Get Sheriff Butler."

  The boy's eyes turned wide as saucers and he froze, his face pale, his bottom lip quivering.

  Malachi repeated his instructions."Go! Now!" he urged.

  The boy took off into the trees just as Stephen huffed up, pistol in his hand. "Are you armed, Stephen?"

  "Goddamn right I am." Emma's uncle waved a weapon in his hand, glowering like Roosevelt charging up San Juan.

  "Good." Malachi set his lips in a hard, determined line. "Let's go then."

  And pray God they weren't too late.

  #

  Hard as Emma looked, she found no piece of broken furniture or object from which she might fashion a weapon. The voices in the other room faded to low murmurs even as she strained to hear what they planned to do with her now.

  Suddenly silence descended. Father and daughter had ceased their conspiring, their voices no longer wafted from the other room like angry wasps, and the house took on the settled air of inaction. Had they left her here alone? Why would they prolong her death and risk being found out?

  Death, she had no doubt, was what they intended for her even though she wasn't sure why they'd attacked her without provocation. Aaron Machado must have alerted them to her visit and what he'd confessed. They must see her as another chance that their sordid family history would come to light.

  She lay silently, thinking of her options, trying to ignore the pain that surged through her side – likely a broken rib – and ease the bruised muscles where Machado had dumped her on the floor. In her condition there was no way she could outrun or overpower the two of them, but she could rely on her wits.

  She would not succumb to the designs of these filthy beasts. Struggling into a sitting position, she gasped as a sharp pain jolted through her side – definitely a broken rib.

  Without warning Phoebe Machado appeared in the doorway, a ghostly specter with her black hair straggling wildly from its neat bun, her eyes glittering with manic emotion. Her pale features were carved in stone and her voice implacable when she spoke.

  "You were foolish to visit Aaron, Emma. And even more foolish to come to our house. Why couldn't you leave well enough alone?"

  Emma ignored the question and breathed shallowly to ease the pain in her side. "Where has your father gone?"

  Phoebe glanced over her shoulder. "To dig a grave."

  Her toneless and casual words about the inevitability of Emma's death forged an icy stream of panic down Emma's spine. She must keep the woman talking, buy time, and try to reach the humanity that might still exist inside her deteriorating mind. The kindness that prompted her to care for and love her brother.

  "Why is your father planning to kill me?" Emma braced her back against the wall, each breath like a vise ripping through her battered side.

  Phoebe's dead voice rivaled her dead eyes. "Because you know about Joseph."

  "Joseph is dead, Phoebe. What can any of that matter now?"

  The woman's face twisted into an ugly caricature of her father's florid features. "His reputation must be protected!"

  Emma softened her voice as if speaking to a skittish mare. "But what of you, Phoebe? What of your reputation if you are caught – as you surely must be – for this heinous act?"

  Phoebe's bottom lip trembled like a chastened child. "Papa said ... "

  Emma reached a hand behind her, almost gasping aloud at the agonizing twist to her torso as she attempted to gain a finger hold on the window sill behind her. "What of Aaron? I'm not the only one who could make public your family secret."

  "Oh, no, Papa took care of that. He went to Bakersfield and ... Aaron won't be causing any more trouble." She frowned from some deranged part of her brain. "Don't you think Aaron's caused enough trouble?"

  My God, what had Mr. Machado done to Aaron? "What of your mother culpability? Surely, she's to blame as much as Aaron."

  "Oh, yes! Dear mama," she spat out the words. "Well, she's paid too." The woman giggled like a child and clapped her hand over her mouth. She lowered her voice and whispered, "Mama's downstairs, you know."

  Even though Emma had suspected as much, the thought of Mrs. Machado's death at the hands of her own family chilled her to the marrow. "What your mother did was shameful, Phoebe, but you are to be commended for taking care of your baby brother."

  "Yes, but Joseph's dead now too." Her face took on a hard, mean cast, the pupils dilated, brows knitted to black slashes of anger. "The bitch killed him."

  Emma's fingers reached the ledge of the window. She tried to lever herself up. "It's true that Alma shot Joseph, Phoebe, but that was not the shot that killed him."

  "I know that, goose." Phoebe's face darkened with contempt. "Mama killed him."

  What? Phoebe seemed convinced that her mother had fired the fatal shot. "Did you see your mama shoot Joseph?"

  Phoebe reached into the kitchen area, pulled a chair into the room, and sat down heavily. For a moment Emma thought she wouldn't answer as she appeared to ponder the question as if reaching an important decision.

  "No, I was at Group," Phoebe said slowly.

  "Who told you then?"

  "Papa. He came home early from his poker game and found Mama standing over Joseph's body." She pulled a strand of hair from her shoulder and examined it with interest. "He said she finally snapped and killed the hideous abnormality. That's what she called Joseph – a hideous abnormality."

  Emma had no doubt that Mr. Machado had woven a complicated lie for his daughter. But she was certain if Mrs. Machado had wanted Joseph dead, she would've killed him years ago. "I find it hard to believe your mother waited so many years to do Joseph harm."

  Uncertainty flitted across Phoebe's features, but then she merely shrugged and stared at Emma with a blank look. Emma had finally managed to pull herself nearly upright and propped herself against the window sash, but Phoebe hardly appeared to notice.

  Emma tried another tactic, keeping her voice low and confidential. "Is your father violent?"

  She knew by the rapid blinking of Phoebe's eyes and the twist of her mouth that the truth lay there – in Mr. Machado's propensity for violence. "Does he hurt you, Phoebe?"

  No answer.

  "What happened when your father discovered who Joseph's father really is?"

  Dead quiet in the nearly-empty room.

  "Did he confront your mother? Threaten Aaron?"

  Phoebe opened her mouth to speak when without warning the malevolent form of Mr. Machado appeared behind her in the doorway. She jumped and shrank back against the door jamb, knocking the chair over, while Machado glared at Emma.

  "What the fuck are you doing?" As the question seemed to be addressed to both women, Emma remained silent.

  "Papa, I – "

  "Jesus Christ, girl, are you a blithering idiot?" Machado shoved at his daughter and advanced toward Emma.

  Now she could see that he held a heavy shovel in one hand and a small pistol in the other. "Ask him Phoebe," Emma cried around Machado's bulk. "Ask your father what really happened the night Joseph died."

  "What the – ?" Machado's face turned the livid purple of an overripe eggplant.

  "Papa, what's she talking about?" Phoebe asked.

  "Shut your yap, girl," Machado growled, advancing toward Emma with murderous intent.

  Emma scuttled sideways and spoke rapidly. "Your mother took a sleeping potion the night Joseph died, Phoebe. That's why she didn't attend Group with you. Laudanum. The doctor has a record of the purchase."

  She spoke rapidly, afraid that Machado would permanently silence her at any moment. "She couldn't have shot Joseph. She was drugged too heavily."

  "Laudanum?" Phoebe repeated the single word as if her muddled mind couldn't grasp the word's meaning.

  "Be quiet, Ph
oebe. This bitch is trying to save herself, that's all," the father snarled.

  "Ask him, Phoebe," Emma ordered. "When your mother discovered Joseph's body that night, she could barely stand. She was so addled that she sat there all night with his body, not moving, doing nothing."

  "Papa?" Phoebe asked, her voice a pitiful whine.

  Emma lunged away from the window and circled round Phoebe as fast as her injuries would allow.

  "Goddamn you," shouted Machado, grabbing for Emma's wrist as she passed by. But the woman's bulk blocked Machado's reach.

  "Step aside, Phoebe. We have to take care of this business right away," her father cajoled. "The authorities will come soon. We can talk about Joseph later."

  Emma felt the rigidity of Phoebe's back and shoulders, the spread of her feet, planted like twin oak trees to confront her father. She'd likely never gone contrary to his wishes in her life.

  "Tell me now, Papa."

  As she advanced several steps toward Machado, Phoebe appeared deadly calm, like the eye of a hurricane, but Emma knew at any moment the whole situation could whirl them away into the eyewall's violent edges. For an interminable length of time, the three of them froze in a grotesque tableau of hatred, fear, and passion.

  Then Emma shoved with all her might at Phoebe's broad back. The woman tumbled into her father and both of them crashed to the floor in a torrent of fumbling and curses, their limbs tangling into a Gordian knot.

  Emma limped from the room as fast as her wounds would allow. She tripped on the torn linoleum, leapt to her feet, and felt a wave of nausea pass over her. Biting back a groan as the pain pummeled her side, she hobbled through the open door into a wide expanse of trees and brush a hundred yards ahead of her.

  Tears streamed down her face. Even uninjured, she'd never outrun him, but handicapped as she was, she'd need to hide. Machado would guess she'd head for the protection of the trees, so instead she turned left and crouched low as she made her way around the ramshackle hut.

  After a moment she heard the thundering footsteps of Machado clambering down the several wooden steps from the house. Silence for a moment. Where would he go?