Dark Paradise (61 page)

"You don't want me busting your lover's face?"

"He's not my-"

"Save your breath. I know what he's after." He turned around in an

unsteady circle, raising his arms to gesture to all visible trappings of

Bryce's wealth, a bitter smirk twisting his lips. "Mr. Rich Sonofabitch.

He gets you, he gets a chunk of the Stars and Bars and a nice young

piece of ass all in one." He leaned into her face and gave her a blast

of Jack Daniel's fumes. "Helluva deal, huh, Sam?"

Samantha felt as if he had physically knocked her off balance. She

felt as if she were tipping backward, her whole world rolling off its

axis, and she threw herself at Will to save herself and to strike out at

him all in one move. Her fists slammed against his chest.

"You bastard!
 
How dare you say that to me!
 
After all you've done,

after all the women!" She choked on the rage and the hurt. Tears brimmed

up and spilled down her cheeks in a torrent, smearing her freshly

applied mascara. "After all you've done to hurt me!"

"Hurt you?" Will managed a caustic laugh as he tried to rub the sting

out of his cheek. "Yeah, you look like you're hurting, baby. Dressed up

like a goddamn fifty dollar whore, sitting around drinkin' champagne

with all your famous friends-"

"That's enough, Rafferty," Bryce said, circling around to stand behind

Samantha. Blood leaked from a cut inside his lower lip. He fingered a

tooth and winced; the cap had come loose.

Will sneered at him. "What you gonna do, rich boy? Tell Sam here to kick

my butt for you?
 
You sure as hell can't do it. You just fuck people over

with your money."

Marilee moved into his field of vision. She was frowning at him. He

hadn't expected to see her here. He really didn't know what he had

expected as he'd roared up the mountain in Tucker's old truck. The haze

from the Jack Daniel's had obscured everything but impulse. Most of the

day was a vague memory shimmering like a mirage in his brain: Sam gone

when he'd stumbled into the house to see her, to try to tell her - what?

That he loved her?
 
That he was scared of loving her?
 
Didn't matter,

she wasn't there, wasn't at the Moose . . . Bryce, that bastard, giving

her things, making her want things.....
 
Pure damn wonder he made it up

the mountain.....
 
Should have crashed . . . wished he had crashed . . .

"Will-" Marilee stepped closer and put a hand on his arm. He jerked

away, snarling, feinting toward Bryce and laughing when Bryce dragged

Samantha back two steps with him in retreat.

"You want my wife?
 
Take my wife!" he shouted, desperation twisting

inside him like a whirlpool. "Take my wife, pleeeeeeze!
 
Hell, I never

wanted one in the first place!"

Samantha gasped as if he'd reached out and cut her.

Sobbing, she broke away from Bryce's hold and ran into the house. Bryce

shook his head in disgust.

"You're pathetic, Rafferty."

Will held his hands up and pretended to be afraid.

"Oooooh!
 
You nailed me that time!
 
Have mercy!"

Bryce glared at him. Beyond reckless, Will jumped at him, coming within

inches of Bryce's nose with a jab.

"Come on, jerk," Will taunted, jabbing again. "Give me the satisfaction.

Fight back, city boy. Let's see what you got besides money."

Marilee watched him weave a little as he shuffled. He seemed to be

having trouble focusing, as if he might be seeing multiple Bryces. She

took another half step toward him and raised a hand. "Come on, Will.

You've done enough damage."

Yeah, Willie-boy, you're the screw-up. Fuck up again.

It's what you do best. Anger and frustration and fear rushed through him

like a fire, and he launched himself at Bryce with a wild cry.

Bryce caught him in the nose with a right cross. The bone gave way with

a sharp snap and blood gushed down like water from a fire hose. Will

staggered sideways, stunned and surprised. Bryce gave him no time to

regain what faculties he had. With Samantha out of sight, he grabbed a

chair from poolside and swung it like a baseball bat, catching his

adversary in the ribs with one blow and in the side of the knee with a

second.

At first contact with the chair Will doubled over as a pair of ribs

cracked. The second strike forced his knee to buckle inward sharply and

he felt something tear. He went down on the flagstone in a bloody,

groaning heap.

Bryce kicked him once in the belly for a final touch, the toe of his

boot driving deep, driving up a good measure of whiskey and the

indistinguishable remains of his lunch.

"Get off my property, Rafferty," Bryce said coldly.

Then he turned and walked away.

Shaken by the violence of Bryce's attack, Marilee dropped down on her

knees beside Will and laid a shaking hand on his shoulder. "Can you get

up?"

"Maybe." He looked up at her - all three of her - and tried to grin through

the blood and the vomit. "But you got lousy timin', Marilee."

Marilee frowned at him. "Come on, hotshot. I'll give you a ride - to the

hospital."

The housekeeper rushed out onto the terrace, followed by a pair of ranch

hands. Bryce nodded from the hands to Will.

"Get him out of here. Morton, drive that piece of junk he calls a truck

into town. I don't want it cluttering up my driveway."

Marilee's head came up sharply. Morton. She pushed herself to her feet

and stepped back on wobbly legs. Kendall Morton. Pigpen grown up and

gone bad. He wore a dirty plaid shirt with the tails hanging out and the

sleeves cut off to reveal an array of tattoos on his sinewy arms. His

round face twisted in an ugly grimace as he hauled Will, flashing teeth

that were varying shades of yellow and brown.

Kendall Morton hadn't vanished at all. He was working for Evan Bryce.

Oh Christ, what next?

"You gonna give me a lecture, Marilee?" Will mumbled through the wad of

blood-soaked tissues he held beneath his broken nose. He sat in the

passenger seat, doubled over and listing heavily to the left in a vain

attempt to relieve the pain in his ribs.

Marilee pulled her gaze off the rearview mirror and shot him a look.

"Why should I waste my breath?
 
You're too drunk to listen. I doubt

you'd listen anyway. You seem to have a handicap in the area of

listening. Maybe you should have the doctor check the connection between

your ears and your brain."

He started to chuckle weakly, but groaned instead as one of the Honda's

wheels dipped into a pothole.
 
Marilee winced in sympathy and eased off

the gas. But the sympathy took a backseat to her anger and to her fear.

Those two fermented inside her like sour mash with a good dose of

frustration compounding the process.

She was beginning to understand why J.D. was so hard on Will. Will's

insistence on being a repeat offender in the drunk, disorderly, and

stupid category was enough to make her want to shake him. And she had

known him only a matter of days; J.D. had put up with a lifetime of

Will's shit.

She'd had the nerve to preach to J.D. about compassion and tolerance.

Maybe Will didn't deserve compassion. Maybe what he really needed was a

kick in the butt.

Maybe she should have been dragging him behind her car instead of

letting him bleed all over the upholstery.

Her head began to pound as she chanced another glance in the mirror.

Kendall Morton followed her in the truck Will had been driving. Another

hand brought up the rear of their little motorcade in one of Bryce's

ranch trucks.

What the hell was Morton doing working for Bryce?

Or had he really been working for Bryce all along?
 
Her brain buzzed

with the possibilities.

In the emergency room Dr. Larimer looked from Will to Marilee and back

again with an expression of extreme displeasure. He apparently preferred

to see a variety of patients instead of the same cracked noggins and

busted faces day in and day out. When Marilee asked if they got a

discount for being frequent casualties, his only reply was a grunt.

"Bet he cracks 'em up in the doctor's lounge," Will said, trying to grin

despite the novocaine Larimer had injected around his smashed nose.

The doctor had been called into the next examination room to deal with a

more urgent case. Marilee sat on a straight chair and looked up at Will,

humor beyond her where Will was concerned. His eyes were clearer than

they had been. He might have been close to sober; it was difficult to

tell.

"You know, I can't begin to guess what you were thinking, coming up to

Bryce's place that way-"

"Thinking?
 
What's that?"

"-But it was so unbelievably stupid I can't even find words to describe

it."

He scowled at her, his eyes tearing from the novocaine.

"Will," Marilee said, pressing her hands on her knees and leaning toward

him. "Bryce doesn't screw around. He plays for keeps. You piss him off,

there's no telling what he might do. The guy's got more money than God,

and I really don't think he was hanging around when they passed out

consciences. He has the power to ruin the Stars and Bars."

"Yeah, well, that's J.D.'s problem now, not mine."

She ground her teeth and stood up. "I'd hate to guess which one of you

has the hardest head," she grumbled, dragging a hand back through her

hair. "Okay, forget Bryce. What about Samantha?
 
Where the hell do you

get off raking her over the coals?"

"It's none of your business, Marilee," he mumbled, staring down as he

rubbed a bloodstain on his jeans with his thumb. "Just drop it. You

don't know anything about me and Sam."

"I know that if I were your wife, my running around with another man

would be the least of your worries, because I would have taken a club to

you by now."

He raised his head an inch, petulance shining in his watering eyes and

turning down the corners of his mouth. "Back off, Marilee. I got

problems enough. I don't need you chewing my tail. I don't need it."

"No," she said, shaking her head. She hauled her purse up off the floor

and looped the strap over her shoulder, then started for the door, fed

up to the back teeth with Rafferty men. With one hand on the knob she

turned back and gave him a hard look. "What you need is to grow up."

J.D. leaned ahead in the saddle a little as his horse surged to the top

of the knoll at the blue rock. He reined the gelding in and sat for a

moment with a hand braced against the pommel, listening, watching,

waiting. Sarge turned his head from side to side in a lazy arc, ears

flicking at the sounds of birds.

Del considered the blue rock the lower boundary of his territory. He

maintained a diligent vigil over his space, patrolling the perimeter all

hours of the day and night.

He would have been ashamed of having J.D. know that.

The thought weighed heavy in J.D.'s heart. Del didn't want to be a

burden on the family. He saw himself as an embarrassment, less than a

whole man because of the state of his mind. He lived up here year-round

in part to hide himself - the ugly skeleton in the family closet. He

worked the summer cow camp to redeem himself.

What else might he do for redemption?

Memories of bits of conversations swirled and bobbed in J.D.'s belly

like backed-up sewage. Del's crazy talk about his guns, the things he

let slip about what he thought he saw up there at night, the way he had

mistaken Marilee for Lucy. And he kicked himself mercilessly for the

things he had said himself over the course of the last year. He had

sounded off to Del about the outsiders pressing in on Rafferty land. He

had vented his spleen about Lucy more than once. He had used his uncle

as a sounding board, as if Del were too far gone to form his own

opinions, never once thinking there might be a danger in it.

Christ, if Del had taken all that talk to heart, he might have seen

killing Lucy as a noble cause. One act of violence could have pulled him

off that narrow, crumbling ledge into the void.

J.D. didn't want it to be true. Even considering the possibility seemed

a betrayal. But he couldn't keep the questions from forming or the

possible answers from taking shape. Nor could he simply insulate the

Stars and Bars from the outside world, as badly as he wanted to.

There was no escaping society or its ambitions. They would have to fight

and adapt to survive. He was responsible for the ranch and everyone on

it, for their wellbeing and for their actions.

Responsible.

Will's battered, angry face came to mind and threatened to pull him down

another rough road, but the sharp crack of a rifle farther up the

mountain shattered the image. Heart sinking lower, J.D. nudged his horse

back into motion and continued on up the trail.

There was no sign of Del at the camp. No dogs ran out to greet him. The

buckskin mare was gone out of the string in the corral. J.D. tied his

horse to a rail and loosened his cinch, his gaze scanning the area the

whole time for signs that Del had gone off the deep end. There were

none. The place was immaculate as always. The snake curled in its cage

nailed to the side of the cabin. That was hardly normal, but it was

vintage Del, not out of what was ordinary for him. One of the first

things his uncle had done when he moved up here was nail that cage to

the cabin and stick a rattler in it.

Some unworthy part of his brain urged J.D. to go into the cabin and look

around, but he flatly refused. Del's cabin was sacrosanct; no one went

in without his invitation. J.D. had always respected his uncle's

privacy. He wouldn't step over that line now.

He sat himself down on a bench in the shade alongside the equipment shed

to wait. If Will hadn't gone, they would have been moving the herd that

day. There wouldn't have been time or energy to ponder questions of

accountability and loyalty. But Will had gone. You gave him the boot,

J.D. Your own brother. And now he sat waiting to question his uncle

about the possibility of his involvement in two deaths. What kind of

loyalty was that?
 
Which of his obligations held the upper hand - to do

what was legally right?
 
morally right?
 
right in his own mind?
 
If he

pledged allegiance to the family, then how could he turn his back on

Will or his suspicions on Del?

If the land came first, then was he really no better than Bryce?

He dropped his head in his hands and blew a breath out, wishing he could

just snap his fingers and make it all disappear. A wish from his

childhood, from the days when Tom had first taken up with Sondra, and

the days when he had been blamed for Will's mistakes or punished for

some minor crime against the brother he had never wanted.

Damn foolish waste of time, wishing for things. Time, like most other

factors, was not on his side. A man had to play the hand life dealt him.

That was that. No whining, no slacking, no wishing for better cards.

From somewhere down the dark corridor of wooded trail that led to the

north, a hound sent up an excited howl. Then Del's black-and-tan coon

dog came bounding into the yard, long ears tottering behind him like

banners. J.D. stayed where he was, looking idly down the trail. Seconds

later Del burst from the thick growth east of the path. His buckskin

horse exploded out of the woods like a demon erupting from another

dimension, her ears pinned flat, nostrils flaring bright pink in her

dark muzzle. They came into the yard at a gallop, Del standing in the

stirrups, a rifle butt pressed back into his shoulder and J.D. in his

sights.

"Jesus, Del!" J.D. shouted, vaulting up off the bench.

Recognition struck an awful spark behind Del's eyes, beneath the metal

plate that was heavy on his brain and charged with an evil current of

electricity. He dropped the rifle out of position and reined the mare

hard left.

God damn, he'd nearly shot J.D.!
 
He had nearly let the monsters inside

him push him into pulling the trigger.

His legs were as rubbery as sapling trees as he stepped down off his

horse. He gripped his rifle by the fore end of the stock to keep his

hand from shaking.

"What the hell-" J.D. bit back the worst of what he wanted to say. Are

you crazy?
 
Have you lost your mind?

He could see the shame in his uncle's downcast eyes as he turned away to

tie his horse to the corral railing.

His heart was running at a hard clip. The adrenaline that had burst

through him ebbed now and his body shuddered as it receded. "You got the

drop on me, pard. Guess I should have radioed ahead I was coming."

Del didn't comment. He flipped a rein around one of the rails. The mare

had her head up and was still dancing a little from the excitement. The

rest of the string abandoned J.D.'s sorrel and trotted over to their

companion with their tails raised and eyes bright. Del focused on the

Ruger 77, ejecting the brass-cased loads into his hand like peas from a

pod.

"I heard a shot when I was down at the blue rock. That you?"

"Could be."

"What'd you get?"

"Nothin'."

Hot, J.D. narrowed his eyes. "Not like you to waste a shot Del."

Del turned away from him and slid the rifle into the
 
scabbard on

his saddle. "Too far out," he mumbled. "Didn't have a clear line."

"What was it?"

Del swallowed hard and rubbed his scar with his fingertips. He'd seen a

tiger. He couldn't say he'd thought Tigers didn't come out in the

daylight. He shook his head and winced at the ache of his brain sloshing

against the sides of his skull. No, dammit, J.D. didn't know about the

tigers. He couldn't talk about the tigers - same way he couldn't about the

blondes dancing in the moon light.

"Del?"

"Cat," he said. "Don't want cougars around with the cattle coming up."

"Mmm. Well, we'll be a little late bringing the herd," J.D. said,

falling into step beside his uncle. Del's three dogs stood, hopeful of

an invitation, in front of the cabin door. Their master growled at them

and swung a hand, sending the trio scrambling away with their tails

between their legs. "A week, maybe."

Del didn't ask why. He was glad though. He didn't want the cattle up

here now. He wanted the blondes gone first. The women and their

familiars. He wished he could decide what to do about them. He wished he

had the courage to do something, the sense to know what was right.

The rattlesnake raised its head and hissed at them. Del didn't spare it

a glance. He went into the cabin, to a shelf in the kitchen, and pulled

out two cans of Dr. Pepper.

J.D. eased down on one of the chairs at the table and Sipped on his

while Del paced the room like a caged animal, rubbing his scar. The

cabin was neat as a pin, as clean as every single rifle on the gun

racks. The smell of Shooter's Choice bore solvent served as an air

freshener.

"You didn't happen to be down on the Little Snake over by the Boxed

Circle yesterday, did you?" J.D. asked casually.

Del jumped as if he'd been hit with a switch. "No no - . ." he mumbled,

his eyes on his rifles at the end of the room. "No." He stopped suddenly

and stared hard at J.D., the gray of his eyes seeming to glow like

polished pewter in the filtered light that came through muslin at the

windows. "You didn't bring that blond woman, did you?"

J.D. bit back a sigh. "No."

"I don't want her here. She's trouble." He shook a finger at his nephew.

"You mind my words, J.D."

J.D. wasn't sure whether Del meant Lucy or Marilee. He wasn't sure Del

knew the difference. He told himself he should have listened sooner in

either case. "Never mind about her, Del. You leave her be, you hear?
 

I can handle her. There's no need for you to concern yourself."

"Don't you trust her," Del growled. "I don't trust none of them blondes.

They're all trouble."

"Well, that's a fact," J.D. mumbled to himself. He took another sip of

Dr. Pepper and braced himself for the rest of the conversation. "I found

Miller Daggrepont dead in the Little Snake yesterday. Guess he had a

heart attack. Thought you might have seen him out there fishing."

He sipped on the warm Dr. Pepper absently, his gaze trained on his

uncle's face, looking for any sign of recognition . . . or guilt. His

own guilt ate away at him, bubbling in with the warm pop to gnaw at his

stomach lining.

"Did you see anything, Del?"

I saw a tiger on the mountain. I saw the corpses in the moonlight. Crazy

things. Del felt his throat trying to close up, like one of the ghosts

had hold of his windpipe. He tried to gulp a swig of Dr. Pepper. Half of

it ran out the dead side of his mouth and spilled onto his shirt.

"I-I saw a cat, that's all," he mumbled, wiping the stain with his

handkerchief. "Don't want cats up here with the cattle coming."

He thought he might have already said that, but he couldn't be sure.

Beneath the plate his brain was buzzing like a swarm of mosquitoes. He

couldn't remember the last time he'd slept more than two hours, he

couldn't remember sleeping without the dark dreams. It was important for

him to stay awake now, he told himself. He had to help guard the ranch.

He had to make sure the blondes didn't steal it, or the city idiots, or

the men who ruled the dog-boys.

"Del," J.D. drew a long breath in. "I have to ask you if you saw anything back

when that woman was shot." He searched painfully for the most diplomatic

words he could find . Del had his problems, but he had his pride too.

"Is there anything about that deal you might want to tell me?"

Del stared hard at his guns, his broken mouth opening and closing like a

fish's. His eyes gleamed with unshed tears and the dark light of a

thousand nightmares. J.D. felt as if something inside his chest were

being crushed.

Loyalties and obligations pressed against one another and pushed and

pushed. The pressure Weighed on him like lead as he stood and crossed

the room.

"Del?
 
Do you have something to say about that?" he murmured, staring at

the rifles and shotguns with their oiled barrels and polished stocks.

"You don't
 
want cats on the mountain when the cattle come up."