Darker Than Desire

by Shiloh Walker

  David opened his mouth, but the sound of voices outside had him biting back the words.

  An aide came in and David lapsed into silence as she checked on Max. “I need to check your vitals. Would you like your guest—”

  “The boy is fine,” Max said, his voice sour.

  The woman’s sunny smile didn’t dim one bit, although her gaze seemed to bounce right off David. Like he wasn’t even there.

  Something else he’d gotten used to. He’d been the object of too much study over the past week or so. Although any time he went to meet a person’s gaze, too many would just look away.

  It had been just a little over a week ago when Max was shot, when David finally opened up about the secrets he’d kept hidden all these years. One week—and if there was a damn soul in town who hadn’t heard the news, David had yet to meet him.

  He could see it in their eyes, in the way they looked through him, around him … but rarely at him.

  Just like the pretty young aide taking Max’s blood pressure. “Looking good there, Max,” she said, her voice cheerful. She put two fingers on his wrist, counting his pulse and looked up. Once more, her gaze bounced right away from David.

  “Now … can I get you anything? More water? Another blanket? It’s getting cooler out.”

  “Only thing I want is some peace and quiet,” Max said, scowling at the wall. “Can’t find it nowhere.”

  “Just let me know if you need anything, Judge.” She nodded at him and then, for one brief moment, her gaze connected with David’s. “He’ll be needing some rest soon.”

  “I can damn well tell people when I need rest.” Max glared at her back as she headed out.

  “Wouldn’t hurt to get a little,” David said mildly.

  Max slid him a look that was faintly amused. “Unless I want people in and out of my door all day, I have to play the grouchy son of a bitch.”

  “It’s not a part you play if that’s who you are.”

  Max wheezed out a laugh only to groan and press a hand to his chest, his face tightening in pain.

  David didn’t ask him if he was okay. It was clear by the look on his face that Max was hurting. David waited until Max’s breathing leveled, until his hand lowered.

  Max was the one to break the silence. “I guess it’s safe to say you’ve given up on that old life altogether, judging by your clothes.”

  “It was never my life,” David replied, rising and moving to the window. The peace of it had been what he’d needed, for a very long time. Long, dark nights when he’d lain in a bed with absolutely no sound—no cars, no music, no sounds of the TV drifting in from somewhere else. He’d been able to listen to nothing, absolutely nothing. He’d fallen asleep to the sound of nothing … eventually.

  When there was utter silence, it made it that much easier to listen for the sound of footsteps. He’d hear them again. He’d believed that. For the longest time, he’d thought he’d hear somebody coming to drag him out of the bed. Even when he was no longer a skinny, scared kid, he’d still felt broken inside.

  He wondered if he’d ever stop listening in the night.

  The mornings had been bright and early, and loud.

  The opposite of mornings that he’d been used to. Diane Sutter had been a stringent supporter of the children are to be seen, not heard, rule and Peter had often been out of the house by the time David was up and moving. Breakfast had been a grim, quiet affair, where she had eaten a half a grapefruit and he had the other half along with a bowl of oatmeal. Never any deviation. In the Yoder house, he’d been fed so much food, he’d thought he’d explode from it—bacon, eggs, biscuits, homemade jams and gravies. And there was noise—prayers said over the morning food and people talking, laughing, discussing the jobs of the day and other things going on.

  “Is that why you’re running away from there so fast all of a sudden? You could have left at any time, but you chose now.”

  “I didn’t choose the time. The time was just…” He reached for the words and failed. “The time chose itself. I can’t hide away there while Lana deals with everything on her own. I can’t wait for Sorenson to come out there and bring his ugly questions. I owe Abraham more than that.”

  “He didn’t want you to feel like you owed him anything.” Max closed his eyes, his voice thick with weariness. A minute passed before he dragged his eyes open again. “You’re going to deal with some trouble now, boy. People know who you are now. I’ve had too many in and out of here, talking about you … and Lana.”

  “Fuck,” he muttered. Then he scowled. “I’m sorry, sir.”

  “Quit sirring me,” Max muttered.

  David looked back at him and their eyes met. Eyes, the same blue eyes.

  “Is that all they’re talking about?” he asked, almost dreading the answer.

  “For now. It’ll get worse before it gets better.”

  “I’m used to worse.” David braced a hand on the wall, staring out the square of a window instead of at the man behind him.

  “I guess you are. If you need a place to stay, you can take my house. Noah, he’s got the keys to the place. You ask him, tell him I said to give them to you. I won’t be going back there. No, I won’t.” His lids jerked around like he couldn’t stand to let them rest on any one thing. There was a picture of his Mary on the bedside table, and he took great care not to look there for even a second.

  Something pricked in David’s heart. It might have been sympathy. It had been so long since he’d felt anything real, anything beyond the burn of anger, beyond that endless apathy—other than the soul-stealing lust he felt for Sybil. But even without having the experience to really cue in on the emotion, he was almost certain it was sympathy. He’d bring the old woman back for Max, if he could.

  But there was nothing to be done for it and he had no words of comfort to offer. Instead, he just stared hard at Mary’s picture. He wondered what it would be like to love somebody that much, so that even the thought of returning to the home you’d shared was painful, all because that person would no longer be there.

  “She didn’t suffer,” he said, the words slipping out of him. He hadn’t realized he’d even intended to say anything. Turning his head, he met Max’s eyes. “The doctors said it was fast, that she felt no pain.”

  A halfhearted smile lit the old man’s face now. “I feel enough for us both, but that’s good. I … yeah, I know she went fast. I just wish I knew who did it so I could make them suffer, too, before I pass on.”

  “You’re out of danger.” David felt himself going cold as he sat there, listening to yet another who had always been there talking about death. So easy, so casual. “The doctors said you are strong. Strong enough to get through this.”

  “But do I care enough?”

  “You need to. I’m not done with you yet. I still need you.” More words that he hadn’t realized he was going to say. Floundering, he shoved up from the chair and started to pace.

  “You know things I need to know,” he said into the silence. “You have answers. I have questions. I want their names—”

  There was no sound, but something urged David into silence and he turned, once more looking at Max.

  Max said nothing, his gaze resting on David’s face, and after a moment he muttered, “I just wish all of you would leave me alone. You hear me? You let them kill my Mary; why can’t you—”

  There was a knock at the door.

  “Am I interrupting?”

  David turned his head and met Chief Sorenson’s placid eyes. “Actually, yes. You are. Why don’t you come back in, oh, say … fifty years?”

  * * *

  He was a sly piece of work.

  Just like the old man in the bed lying just beyond him.

  Max put on a good act, but that’s all it was, an act. He lay in that bed, putting up a frail, fretful face, and any time Sorenson or his top detective, Jensen Bell, pushed for more than a minute or two he started talking about his wife. Asking if they had any idea who had shot her,
why she was dead.

  Sorenson couldn’t even say it was a stalling tactic or misdirection.

  The old woman had been helpless, confused. Advanced Alzheimer’s had made her one of the most vulnerable victims Sorenson had ever had to stand for and it pissed him off.

  It pissed him off even more because he knew, as sure as he knew his own name, that Max knew something. Or he had answers. Not about Mary—he’d pull hell apart to find who had killed his wife—but there was information he withheld, nonetheless.

  “I’m afraid fifty years from now isn’t a good time for me,” Sorenson said easily, slipping into the room and pushing the door shut behind him. “I plan on having my butt tucked into a beach chair, somewhere down on Maui, and getting sunburnt every day. That’s my retirement plan, in … oh, maybe twenty-some years. Before that happens, though, I’d like to deal with whoever is terrorizing people in my town. That’s why I’d like to talk to Max, and you, Cai—I mean David.”

  David just smiled at him, but the smile was dead, just like his eyes.

  That man creeped him the hell out. Did David Sutter feel anything? Or had the ability to feel been destroyed, just like the boy he’d been had been destroyed?

  “I’m not much help, Chief,” David said, his eyes still empty. “I wasn’t there when Max or Miss Mary was shot. I didn’t show up until later. I promise you, if I had any idea who’d shoot a sweet old lady like Miss Mary, you wouldn’t have to look for me to help you out—I’d drag the motherfucker to you.”

  “Hmmm.” Assuming you didn’t finish the person off. Sorenson kept that behind his teeth, but he doubted he was far off. How he, or anybody else, had looked at this man and seen anybody remotely mild mannered or even tempered was a mystery.

  Shifting his attention from David to Max, Sorenson moved around the foot of the bed.

  Max glared at him, already settling into his ornery old codger routine. He did it well, too; Sorenson had to give him credit.

  “Why do I got to put up with this horseshit?” Max grumbled. “Nurses coming and going all hours of the night. People knocking on the damn door all day. All I want to do is sleep and you people keep showing up.”

  “Would you like us to find who shot you? Who shot Mary?”

  Max’s thick white brows dropped low over his eyes, the vivid blue gaze snapping. “You think you’re any closer than you were two days ago? If you are, then spill it. If you’re just here to nag me, then get your ass out.”

  “You don’t pull punches, do you, sir?”

  “At my age, I don’t see the point.”

  Running his tongue around the inside of his teeth, Sorenson debated. The old man just wouldn’t give. Wouldn’t back down. It was odd, Sorenson thought, looking from one to the other. He felt like he was staring at one big, impenetrable wall. Max was older but just as solid, just as unbreakable.

  He was likely fishing in the dark here, but hell. Sometimes that was what it took.

  “I did come down here to discuss a thing or two with you, sir. Things of a sensitive nature.” He flicked his gaze to David. “If you’d step outside…?”

  David went to rise.

  “Sit down, boy,” Max grumbled. “Whatever he has to say can’t be worth shit.”

  Sorenson rocked back on his heels. “I don’t think you want to discuss this with anybody else in here.”

  “Not like David’s going to tell people. If anybody can keep his mouth shut, it’s him. He’s done gone and proven that.” Something glittered in Max’s eyes. “Why don’t you just say what you want to say?”

  Ornery? Hell. Max wasn’t ornery. He was stubborn as the day was fucking long. Crossing his arms over his chest, Sorenson tried one more time. “Are you certain? Some things, even just rumors, can leave a mark.”

  “Why don’t you just get it done?” David said, his voice slapping at the air, hard and heavy. He shoved up and paced over to the window, staring outside at the steady flow of small-town traffic. “If you haven’t figured it out by now, once he’s made his mind up there’s no moving him.”

  “Is that a family trait?”

  Well, if Sorenson expected shock, he was destined to be disappointed.

  Max was staring at David, like his reaction was crucial.

  No. Necessary. Like he’d live or die, depending on how David reacted.

  David?

  As he turned and leaned against the window ledge, there was something of amusement on his face, the faintest grin lurking on his lips as he crossed his arms over his chest.

  “Is that what you call getting it done, Chief? If it is, I feel sorry for any female you might date. You probably hump her leg and call that a wild party.” He shoved off the ledge then and prowled across the floor, stopping five feet away, dark hair spilling into his eyes, his blue eyes bright, glinting, almost a mirror of the man lying on the bed. “Do you not know how to just ask what you’re asking or is it a cop thing?”

  “Fine. I’ll ask. I heard a … well, I can’t call it a rumor as it’s not really flying around town. But one of the women I spoke to, trying to nail down the events of twenty years ago, was Elsie Darby. Owns the B and B outside of town.”

  David just lifted a brow.

  Sorenson looked away from David, then, focusing on Max. “Elsie seems to recall a time, right before you and Miss Mary hooked up. You spent a few weekends with Hilda Pritchard. She left town not long after, came back while you were off serving in the army.”

  “Yes. That sounds about right.” Max just watched him.

  Damn the both of them. Neither of them was going to make it easy, were they?

  “She came back with a little girl, ended up having to move in with her father. He didn’t exactly make her life easy. Her life, or her daughter’s life. Word has it that Diane had a rough time of it.”

  “Yes.” Max sighed now, turning his head. “Yes, she did.” He looked back then, but not at Sorenson. His entire focus was locked on David. “I didn’t know. Not at first. Mary and I saw a preacher the summer I enlisted. Sometimes, I think the only thing that brought me back was knowing that she waited. Then I get back here and I see that little girl with my eyes … my eyes, and her granddaddy was so mean to her.” He ran a shaking hand across his eyes. “I told Miss Mary. We had no secrets. She was upset, as you can imagine. Then I talked to Hilda. Tried to see if we couldn’t just adopt Diane, but she wouldn’t hear of it. That little girl was the only happiness she had, she told me. She did let me give her money, but she banked it. All for Diane, keeping it away from her daddy, not telling anybody. She didn’t want anybody to know, though. I was a fool, not pushing harder, not trying harder. It took me years, though, to realize how much of a mistake it was, letting it go as I had.”

  David’s face was like stone, his gaze staring at nothing.

  “You knew,” Sorenson said softly.

  Slowly, the younger man lifted his head to meet Sorenson’s gaze. “I’ve got his eyes. I’ve got his hands. I’ve been in his house and I’ve seen pictures. As I got older, the resemblance got stronger. Figured it out a while back.” There were words unspoken in the back of his eyes, but no amount of pushing would get him to reveal any secret he wasn’t willing to share.

  Sorenson hadn’t even been sure. Just how this was connected to the mess he was trying to unravel he didn’t know, but he’d reached out, taking that blind stroke, hoping to catch something.

  Well. He had the truth.

  But not much else.

  Looking away from David, he said to Max, “It must have been hard on you, all of these years. Not knowing where your grandson was. Even as a boy, seeing him, but not being able to reach out to him the way you wanted, especially seeing as how you and Miss Mary couldn’t have kids. And it turns out he was here all along. Did you see it? He saw you in him, but didn’t you see him in you?”

  “I guess we all see what we expect to see.” Max met Sorenson’s eyes levelly. He didn’t bat a lash and his gaze was dead-on.

  He also lied through hi
s teeth. Sorenson would bet his badge on it. But what proof did he have?

  “I guess it burns some, looking back now. Seeing as how you lost twenty years with him. You never really had him for any time, but the past twenty years—”

  “You want to know what burns?” Max asked, his voice going hard as a diamond. “Want to know what hurts?”

  He shoved the blanket back, grimacing as he pulled himself up farther in the bed, shoving skinny legs ropy with muscle over the side so he could face Sorenson. “What burns is the fact that my daughter, a girl I helped bring into this world, grew up so twisted that she turned a blind eye to what was happening to her own son. My blood. What burns is that that the man who was supposed to protect my grandson was nothing more than a monster. What burns is that fact that all of that time, I didn’t know a thing. None of us did, because those snakes in the grass hid it. If I had known, no force on this earth could have kept me from helping my grandson, or any of those boys. But I didn’t know. Not until it was too late.”

  He paused to take a breath. “And now I—”

  David stepped forward, rested a hand on the old man’s shoulder while silently Sorenson cursed. Now you what? What had he been going to say?

  David crouched in front of his grandfather and the two of them stared at each other for a long, taut moment. “This is pointless,” David finally said. “Neither of us can undo what’s done. You can blame yourself. I can blame you. But it’s all wrong and we know it.”

  “Do we?” Max watched David. “If I’d fought Hilda harder, when I saw how she struggled, how bad her daddy was to her and Diane, could I have had that little girl with me? Maybe she would have had a chance to be … something better. She would have done better by you then.”

  Sorenson cleared his throat, awkward now, caught in a moment where he knew he didn’t belong.

  David rose, turning to look at him, arms crossing over a chest heavy with muscle, strong from years of hard labor. He looked nothing like the pictures of the skinny boy that had been passed around this town over the years. The resemblance to Max wasn’t overpowering—they had the same eyes, they had the same hands, and if somebody knew what Max had looked like fifty years ago they might see a similarity, but then again, maybe not.