Dark Paradise (51 page)

jeans. After a quick shower, she dressed in a pair of old black

leggings, crew socks, and hiking boots. She pulled a T-shirt over her

head with the words BO KNOWS YOUR SISTER stamped across the front in

black, and completed the ensemble with a man-size denim shirt with the

sleeves rolled up half a dozen times. She tried to clamp her hair back

with a big silver barrette, but the mane was too much for it. The clasp

gave way and launched the barrette across the room like a missile.

She went down to the dining room, scanning the faces for Drew. Kevin sat

alone at a table near the kitchen door, going over paperwork while he

sipped coffee. Marilee wound her way to the table and pulled out the

chair across from him.

"Didn't your mother ever tell you not to do homework at the breakfast

table?
 
You'll ruin your posture."

He glanced up at her and grinned. Automatically, he came halfway to his

feet, even though she had already seated herself. "No, I never heard

that one. The big one around my house was 'Don't run with a pencil in

your hand-' "

"You'll put your eye out," they finished in unison.

Marilee laughed. "I think my mother's real fear was the social stigma of

a daughter with an eye patch. There are so few designers who consider it

an acceptable fashion accessory."

Kevin snagged a passing waiter for coffee. "Breakfast?"

"No, thanks," she said halfheartedly, eyeing the plump golden blueberry

muffin he had yet to touch. "I had a doughnut."

"Have some fruit at least." He nudged a chilled bowl heaped with melon

slices and fresh berries in her direction.

Marilee picked out a chunk of cantaloupe with a fork and nipped off a

corner.

"How are you feeling?" Kevin asked, concern tugging his brows into that

worried-puppy look he wore so well.

"I'm fine."

"We still feel terrible, you know."

She gave him a wry smile. "I could share my painkillers with you."

"Seriously. This place is our home. The idea of someone breaking in and

hurting a guest is just appalling. It's a violation."

"Have you heard anything from Quinn about catching the guy?"

He shook his head. "Doesn't look likely. It would be a different story

if he had stolen something he could be caught in possession of or trying

to pawn or sell."

"My family would be gratified to hear I'm finally suffering for my lack

of material greed." She snagged a blueberry on a fork tine and popped it

in her mouth. "I'd just like to know if he expected to find something.

Lucy mentioned a book in her final letter to me. I haven't been able to

find it."

"What kind of book would be worth attacking someone for?"

She shrugged, not wanting to go into the whole mess with Kevin.

Something told her he hadn't been privy to Lucy's schemes; he was too

inherently sweet. On the other hand, she was willing to bet his partner

knew more than he was saying.

"Is Drew around?"

"No," Kevin said shortly, dropping his gaze as he cracked open his

muffin. Steam billowed up from its interior in a fragrant cloud. By

contrast, the air temperature around him seemed to drop by ten degrees.

His smile was nowhere in sight. "He's off communing with nature.

"Fishing or something. I haven't seen him this morning at all."

"Oh." Marilee nibbled her lower lip, her attention split between the

muffin and Kevin's sudden change of mood.

"Is anything wrong?"

He sighed, staring blankly down at his plate. "No. Nothing. Why did

you want to see him?"

"Nothing major. We were just talking about Lucy the other night. I

thought maybe we could finish the discussion over coffee."

"Oh, well, he'll be back eventually. Five at the latest. The trio starts

playing in the lounge at seven." He brightened hopefully as he looked up

at her. "Will you be joining them?"

"Oh, I don't know-"

"Come on," he cajoled. "You're not stage shy. It'd be great to hear you

sing again."

"Maybe. We'll see."

She checked her watch and stood, leaning over to pinch a bite of muffin.

"Gotta go," she said, popping the morsel into her mouth. She wiggled her

fingers at him and backed away as he laughed.

Most of the morning was spent chauffeuring Will around town. From the

hospital they went to Chuck's Auto Body to procure the services of a tow

truck. From Chuck's they went to Big Sky Insurance to report the bad

news. After being told his coverage would probably be canceled because

of his driving record, he had Marilee drive out to Cheyenne Used Car

Corral on the outskirts of town, where he proceeded to try to weasel a

loaner out of his good friend Big Ed Twofeathers. Big Ed told him to

take a hike.

At the Gas N' Go Will bought a pair of cheap sunglasses to replace the

ones he'd lost in the wreck. They both bought greasy pizza slices and

Barq's root beer and ate lunch at a picnic table with a view of the

diesel pumps, then climbed back in the Honda and headed for the ranch.

Depressed and drowsy from the painkillers, Will nodded off on the drive

out to the Stars and Bars. Marilee stuck Shawn Colvin in the tape deck

and let her mind wander with the flow of the music, turning the facts

and clues and questions over like playing cards in a mental game of

solitaire. Her chain of thought was momentarily disrupted as they passed

the site of Will's wreck.

The truck had gone off the road in the middle of a tricky curve.

Luckily, the embankment wasn't steep, or he would almost certainly have

been killed. Marilee thought it was a wonder he wasn't killed as it was.

The pickup looked like a toy that had been stomped on by an irate giant.

It lay on its side, crumpled and twisted.

Will woke as they rolled in through the gate at the ranch. From behind

the dark lenses of his new mirror sunglasses, he did a quick scan for

any sign of J.D. The longer he could put off a confrontation, the

better. Zip trotted down from the house porch to bark at them. He could

see Chaske at the end of the barn, trimming the hooves of a blocky bay

gelding. J.D. was nowhere to be seen.

"Thanks for the lift, Marilee," he said, popping open his door. He gave

her a pained, weary smile. "You're a pal."

"Yeah." She slid her sunglasses down on her nose and looked at him over

the rims. "Remember that the next time you climb behind the wheel with a

buzz on."

He didn't promise he wouldn't do it again. He'd made enough promises he

couldn't keep.

As he climbed out of the Honda, the front door of the house swung open

and Tucker and J.D. came out onto the porch. Tucker's eyes bugged out at

the sight of him.

He had thrown his tattered, bloody shirt in the hospital trash and

sweet-talked a nurse into giving him the top half of a set of green

surgical scrubs. But even with the sunglasses there was no disguising

the fact that he was beat up. A row of neat stitches marched across his

forehead. His lower lip was puffed up like a porn queen's. A bruise

darkened his left cheekbone to the color of a rotting peach.

"Boy, you look like you stuck your head in a cotton sack full of

wildcats!" the old man declared, hobbling down the porch steps. "Judas!"

He turned his head and shot a stream of tobacco juice into the dirt.

"Your mama wouldn't know you from red meat!
 
What the hell happened?"

Will squirmed, feeling like a bug under a microscope.

Tucker was up close, scrutinizing his face, but far more piercing was

J.D.'s gaze, which came all the way down from the porch. The shit was

about to hit the fan. He could feel it the same as a radical shift in

air pressure before a storm.

"Finally wrapped that truck around a tree, didn't you?" J.D. said

tightly, slowly descending the steps.

Will forced a sour grin. "Close, but no stogie. Rolled it sideways

down a hill." He spread his arms. "As you can see, I survived, but

thanks so much for expressing your concern, brother."

J.D. shook his head, angry with Will, but angrier with himself for the

belated fear that came on his brother's behalf. After all the bad blood

that had passed between them, they still shared the same father. Will

was a Rafferty and he had nearly gotten himself killed. J.D. wished he

didn't have to care. It hurt too much to care. Not for the first time,

he wished he were an only child.

"Jesus. I ought to finish the job," he snarled. "Of all the stupid,

shit-for-brains-"

"I don't need a lecture, J.D."

"No?
 
What do you need, Will?
 
You need some pretty young thing to hold

your hand and give you sympathy? You might try your wife."

That galled him almost as bad as caring about Will - caring that Will

was with Marilee. The jealousy was like a live wire inside him, like a

coiled snake, and he resented it mightily.

Marilee climbed out of the Honda and leaned on the roof. "Lighten up,

J.D. I just gave him a ride home from the hospital."

"Well, that's right neighborly of you, Marilee," he drawled

sarcastically.

"Jesus Christ, J.D.," Will snapped. "Leave her out of this. It's me

you're pissed at."

"You're damn right I'm pissed. We've got cattle to move up the mountain

tomorrow and you're in no shape to get on a horse. How the hell am I

supposed to pay for an extra hand when every nickel you haven't gambled

away is tied up in trying to keep this place?
 
And what about the doctor

bills and the towing bill and the repair bill?
 
Did any of those

thoughts once cross your pickled mind while you were weaving down the

road on a full tank of Jack Daniel's?"

"No, J.D., they didn't," Will said bitterly. He curled his hands into

fists at his sides and leaned toward his brother. "Maybe I've got other

things on my mind besides this goddanm ranch. Did you ever think of

that? Maybe I'm sick of being tied to it. Maybe I don't give a flying fuck

what happens to it!"

Tucker shifted nervously from foot to foot. His weathered old face

screwed up into a look of sick apprehension. "Now, boys, maybe this

ain't the time-"

"Maybe the time's passed," J.D. said, his voice a deadly whisper.

Will felt as though his mirror glasses offered him no protection at all

from J.D.'s penetrating gaze. As always, his brother could see right

through them, right into his own weak soul. He didn't measure up. Never

had. Never would. No point in trying. No point in staying.

He met J.D.'s hard, cold gaze unflinching, and his childhood and youth

passed before his mind's eye - him tagging after J.D., the fights, the

uneasy truces, the rare moments of camaraderie. They were brothers, but

J.D. had never forgiven him for being born and he never would. Half

brothers. The tag made him feel like half a man. Half as good. He felt

something inside him shrivel and die. Hope. What a sad, sorry feeling.

"I'll go pack a bag," he said softly.

Tucker swore under his breath and tried to catch up as Will started for

the house. Will raised a hand to ward him off and the old man faltered

to a stop, looking helpless and angry. He wheeled on J.D., sputtering.

"Damnation, if you don't have a head harder than a new brick wall!"

"Save your breath, old man."

J.D. turned and walked away from him, toward the corrals. He willed

himself not to look at Marilee, but he couldn't hold himself to it. He

cut a glance at her as she stood beside her car.
 
Her eyes were stormy,

her stare direct. Displeasure curved her ripe little mouth. Guilt

snapped at him. He kicked it away. To hell with Marilee Jennings. To

hell with Will. He didn't need either one of them.

Marilee told herself to get in the car and drive away. She had enough

problems of her own without adding the burden of someone else's sibling

rivalry to the load. But she couldn't seem to make herself leave. Will,

for all his flaws, was a friend. J.D., in spite of many things, was her

lover. She couldn't just stand back and watch them tear their

brotherhood apart. She knew only too well how irreparable damage like

that could be.

Swearing at herself under her breath, she trotted after him. "J.D.-"

"Stay out of it, Marilee." He kept on walking, his long strides forcing

her to jog beside him. "It's none of your goddamn business."

"He could have been killed in that accident."

"It would have served him right."

"Damn you, Rafferty, stop it!" she snapped, slugging him in the arm as

hard as she could, succeeding in making him turn and face her. "Stop

pretending nothing and no one matters to you except this ranch."

"Nothing does," he growled.

"That's a lie and you know it! If you were such a bastard, you wouldn't

keep on hundred-year-old ranch hands and an uncle whose mind went around

the bend twenty years ago."

"That's duty."

"That's caring. It's the same thing. And you care about Will too."

"What the hell do you know about what I feel or don't feel?" he

demanded, furious that she had managed to strike a raw nerve. "You think

going to bed with me makes you an expert?
 
Jesus, if I'd known you were

gonna be this much trouble, I've kept my pants zipped."

Scowling blackly, he started once again for the corrals, where half a

dozen horses stared over the fence with their ears pricked in interest.

Marilee went after him, calling herself seven kinds of a fool.

"I could say the same thing, you know," she pointed out. "You're never

going to win any prizes for charm, and I sure as hell didn't come to

Montana to get stuck in the middle of a family feud."

"Then butt the hell out."

"It's too late to pretend we don't know each other."

She wanted to say it was too late to pretend they didn't care, but she

knew that would be asking for a kick in the teeth. She'd had enough pain

to last her. "All I'm saying is, Will is the only brother you've got,

J.D. Yes, he's screwed up, but he's not a lost cause. He needs help. You

could drop the tough-guy act for ten minutes and show a little

compassion."

"You want compassion?" he sneered. "Go see a priest. It's not an act,

Marilee. I'm exactly what I appear to be." He spread his arms wide.

"Nothing up my sleeves. No trick mirrors. You think I'm a hardcase and

you don't like it?
 
Tough shit. Go find yourself another cowboy to screw.

There's plenty around for the time being. Shit, you like my brother so well,

maybe you'd rather be fucking him too."

Marilee blinked hard and jerked back as if he'd slapped her. He may as

well have. Tears flooded her eyes. She refused to let them fall. "Jesus,

you can be the most obnoxious son of a bitch!"

"If you don't like it, leave. Nobody's gonna stop you, city girl."

"Fine," she whispered, her voice trembling too badly to manage anything

more. With a violently shaking hand she swept an errant chunk of hair

behind her ear. "I'm out of here. And don't bother coming down to Lucy's

place again. I don't need you either."

"Good. I've got better things to do. Call me when you decide to sell the

place."

Fighting the tears, she started for her car, a blurry white blob across

the yard, but she pulled up and turned to face him again, shaking her

head. "You're so busy protecting what you own, you don't even see that

you're losing everything that's really important. I feel sorry for you,

Rafferty. You'll end up with this land and nothing else."

"That's all that matters," J.D. said, but Marilee had already turned

away from him and was stalking back to her car, her hiking boots

scuffing on the dirt and rock as she went.

He stood there and watched her drive away, stubbornly ignoring the ache

in his chest. She couldn't matter to him. He couldn't let her. She

wouldn't stay in his life.

In another week or two she would tire of the rustic life and head back

to California, and he would still be here, working the ranch and

fighting to preserve his way of life from extinction. He couldn't let

anything intrude on that.

As he turned back toward the corral, the word martyr rang in his head and

left a bitter, metallic taste in his mouth. He spat in the dirt and

climbed through the bars of the fence to catch a horse.

How she got down from the Stars and Bars without crashing into a tree

was beyond her. A miracle. As if such things existed. Angry and hurt

beyond all reason, Marilee jumped out of the Honda and headed for the

barn. Urgency pushed her to a jog, then she was sprinting into the dark

interior and out the side door. Clyde raised his head from dozing and

brayed at her. She kept on going to the llama pen and over the gate. She

ran into the pasture until her knees threatened to give out and her

lungs were on fire, then she fell down into the deep grass and lay

there, sobbing.

She wasn't even sure why she was crying. Because Rafferty had hurt her

feelings?
 
He could have made a living at that, the bone-headed clod.

Because she hurt for Will, for what the two brothers were losing?

Because her friend was dead?
 
Because she wanted a cigarette so badly,

she would have gotten down on her hands and knees in the gutter to

scrounge for butts?
 
All of those reasons and more.

She lay in the grass and cried until she couldn't cry anymore, then she

just lay there. The sun shone down, as warm and yellow as melted butter

amid popcorn clouds.

A breeze fanned the grass and brought the scents of earth and

wildflowers. Opening her eyes, Marilee watched them bow to the

breeze-delicate violets, blue bells just starting to open, windflowers

with their thick, hairy stems and showy blooms. Their beauty calmed her,

their simplicity soothed her. A bumblebee buzzed lazily from blossom to

blossom, oblivious of the human world and all its selfmade agonies.

Maybe J.D. was right in giving his heart to this land.

She could have given hers too. She felt a part of it, nourished by its

beauty and its strength. Turning onto her back, she gazed up at the sky.

It really was bigger here. A huge sheet of electric blue, stretching on

forever. There were moments like this one, when she felt more at home

here than she ever had anywhere. That sense of belonging had nothing to

do with birthright. It had to do with things deeper than circumstance,

with matters of the soul.

A llama nose descended on her, small and furry, twitching inquisitively

as it brushed her cheek. Smiling, Marilee sat up and reached out to

stroke the baby's neck.

This one was brown from the shoulders back with a white front half and

splotches of brown on his face, as if God had been forced to abandon the

paint job to go on to more pressing matters.

"I'll call you Parfait," she announced, startled at the hoarseness of

her voice.

The llama's long ears moved from angle to angle like semaphore flags. A

brown spot on her muzzle made her look as if she were smiling crookedly.

Half a dozen of her older relatives stood a few feet away, studying

Marilee with their luxurious sloe eyes. They hummed softly to one

another.

Marilee curled her legs beneath her and stood slowly, worried that she

might frighten them away. They just looked at her, chewing their grass

and violets, their expressions gentle and wise. They were beyond the

petty cruelty humans inflicted on one another. It didn't matter to them

that she'd fallen in love with a man who was both hero and villain. The

scope of their simple world was so much greater. They held the secret to

inner peace and looked on her with gentle pity for her ignorance.

They offered solace in the form of company, understanding in their quiet

manner.

She spent the afternoon with them, resolutely ignoring the various

messes in which her life had become entangled. She mingled with the

llamas, petting them and scratching them, talking with them about the

greater meaning of life. For a few hours nothing else was important. She

pretended she had stepped through a portal into a place of calm and

reason. She let the llamas take the tension away, let the sun recharge

her soul. Then, as the sun began its descent toward the mountains to the

west, she stepped back into the real world of people and trouble and the

mysteries of llama feed.