Darkling I Listen (39 page)

Ruth greeted them
at
the
door,
her expression harried, and led them down a dark corridor. She glanced
at
Alyson. "Look, Sweetie, I don't know what happened between the two of you, ain't none of my business, but you better know up front that he ain't exactly gonna do handstands in excitement over seein' you. We can just be grateful this place has been dead because of the weather. He
come
in lookin' to fight an' get laid. If he came in here a month ago propositionin' me like he done today, I would of thought I died and went to heaven, but after seein' him look at you the way he done the other night, I figure I might be good for a lot of things, but I ain't good at rebounds, even if it is with Mr. Hollywood. Didn't help that he kept callin' me Alyson."

Reaching the office door, she slid the key into the lock, gave it a twist, and stepped back. "You're on your own, ladies. Good luck."

Mildred stepped forward. "Me first. I'm real good
at
ducking."

She eased the door open and cautiously stepped in. Alyson followed.

Brandon
sat in
Clyde
's chair behind a massive oak desk. With his feet propped on the desk and crossed at the ankles, he smoked with one hand and held a glass of Chivas in the other. Alyson wasn't certain what she expected, but it wasn't this. He appeared perfectly normal, and she almost allowed herself to relax. It was the narrowing of his eyes when he saw her that stopped her in her tracks.

Mildred held up both hands. "We don't want any trouble,
Brandon
. We're simply here to help."

"Do I look like I need help?" His voice oozed a deep
East Texas
drawl and dripped with sarcasm.

Mildred looked
at
Alyson and rolled her eyes. "Now there's a loaded question for you." She cleared her throat. "The weather sucks big time. Ice and snow. You don't want to wreck that pretty car, so we came to give you a ride home."

"Liar." He laughed and smoked. "I keep telling myself I have to fire you, Mildred. Then you remind me that no one else will represent me. Then I tell myself I don't need an agent anyway, because I'd rather cut off both balls than go back to
Hollywood
. I'm sick to my stomach of getting ripped apart by producers and directors and agents—all a lot of parasites who can't survive without us, but always take great delight in beating us up. Oh, and let's not forget the tabloids. My, my, that was always fun, wasn't it?
B. C. Arrested on DUI Charges, B. C. Fired from Reiner Project, B. C. Drunk Again on Set,
B
. C. Murders Porn Queen During S&M Sexcapades.
That was my favorite, I think. No, on second thought, my favorite was
B. C. Sex-Fest with Mongolian Gay Midgets;
my head was superimposed on a three-foot-tall dwarf whose entire body was covered with penis tattoos. Let me think, the reporter on that one wouldn't have been Farrington, would it?"

"No it would not," Alyson
piped up, even though Mildred turned a warning eye on her and shook her head.

Mildred smiled. "We're simply trying to help,
Brandon
. You obviously can't drive in your condition."

"I'd rather crawl in a box with two pissed-off rattlesnakes than leave here with either of you."

"The management wants to close this place. They want to go home while they can still get home. They can't close as long as you're here. You're a reasonable man, Brandon. You can understand their concern—"

"You're patronizing me, Mildred." He cut his eyes to Alyson. Suddenly the temperature in the room felt zero degrees. His words seemed to hang in the air like frozen vapor. "I really hate to be patronized. I rank that right up there with being used and lied to by people who are supposed to love me."

Alyson stepped forward, her gaze locked on
Brandon
's, which continued to smolder. "Henry's very concerned about you, Brandon."

"You stay away from my uncle, Miz Farrington. I don't give a damn about what you do to me, but when you bother my family—"

"Henry is confronting this sorry situation with a reasonable mind. I spoke with him. He's hurt, but he isn't angry. He's worried about you and wants you home safe. I told him I'd find you and take you home. So here I am."

"Go to hell."

Alyson turned to Mildred. "Leave. I'll handle this my own way."

Mildred scoffed. "Look, you don't have a clue—"

"I'm not afraid of him, Mildred." A lie, of course. She hardly relished a repeat of that afternoon's fit of temper, but aside from her wounded pride, she'd walked away physically unscathed … but then again, he hadn't been intoxicated. Judging by the nearly empty Chivas bottle on the desk, and the fact that he hadn't had a drink in over four years, he was probably beyond intoxicated. His being conscious astounded her.

"He's crazy when he's smashed," Mildred whispered. "Don't let this calm facade fool you. The least thing can set him off."

"He won't hurt me. Go." She caught Mildred's shoulders and turned her toward the door. "Go."

Mildred walked to the door, stopped, and looked back, her expression deeply concerned. "I'll be outside if you need me." She stepped outside and closed the door.

Alyson turned back to
Brandon
. A flush warmed her cheeks as he took a deep drink of Chivas, watching her over the tip of the glass. She could see the effects of the booze now.
A sheen
of perspiration covered his face despite the cold room. She moved toward him cautiously.

"I'm wondering how Henry is going to take your drinking again," she said.

"Don't get sanctimonious with me. You make a living off humiliating people. Destroying marriages, reputations, careers."

"I never ran a story that wasn't true—"

"My personal life is nobody's business!" he shouted so loudly she flinched.

"You're absolutely right." She shrugged. "I'm sorry. If I could take it back, I would. I'm not proud of what I did to you. Truth is
,
it's haunted me for years."

He barked a laugh, then took a deep drag of his cigarette and shook his head. "Like I'm supposed to believe that. You're training a goddamn Nikon on me from up in a god
damn tree, and I'm supposed to believe that."

"We occasionally do things out of desperation that we're not proud of." She pointed to the Chivas bottle. "Take that, for instance. I bet you're already regretting your decision to come here. If you could undo it, you would."

Looking away,
Brandon
pressed the glass against his forehead, as if the condensation would cool his hot brow.

"I don't think Henry is going to take the news of your drinking again nearly as well as he took the news that my coming to Ticky Creek was to land the story of a lifetime and not to help you write your autobiography. My objective has changed since I came to love you and Henry, but there's no changing the fact that you're an alcoholic, and you've just blown four years of sobriety. You have every right to want to hurt me, but you have no right or reason to destroy Henry."

Alyson sat on the edge of the desk.
Brandon
regarded her with a disturbing lack of emotion, which frightened her more than the possibility that he might take a swing at her. She removed the glass from his hand—he resisted for an instant, then released it—and set it aside. She took a deep breath. "I got my story the night you confessed you were, with Cara's consent, molested by Ralph Reilly. If a story's all I wanted, would I still be here?"

He stared, his eyes as cold and hard as sapphires.

"Have you even stopped to think what I've been through? The fear and guilt and confusion I've suffered over the last days when I imagined yours and Henry's reactions to the news I was a tabloid writer? Not just any tabloid writer, but the writer who broke the story of your alcoholism? I can sit here and apologize for the story,
Brandon
, but the bottom line is, if it hadn't been me, it would have been someone else. Would the story have been more legitimate and palatable coming from Barbara Walters or Dan Rather? Because, believe me, if Walter Cronkite had been standing in that police station the night they hauled your butt in for DUI, you better believe the story would have shown up on the six o'clock news."

Still, nothing.

"We have to leave this place. I'm going to take you back to the motel. I know you don't want Henry to see you like this. You can sleep it off in my room. Go home in the morning. At that point, if you never want to see me again, I'll leave Ticky Creek."

A flicker of some emotion passed over his face.

"Is that what you want?" she asked, doing her best to keep the pain from her voice. "Do you want me
to
get out of your life,
Brandon
?"

As if rousing from his trance, he blinked, and the coldness of his eyes became two blue flames. His jaw worked and his hands clenched. "I loved you," he said in a hoarse, vibrating whisper. "I don't think you know what that means. I've never let myself love anyone like that. I never trusted anyone like I trusted you. I told you things I've never shared with another human being. And all the while you were compiling my dirty little secrets, not for the autobiography you were supposedly here to help me write, but for some tabloid article—"

"Forget the
Gazette,
Brandon
. It's history." She forced a smile. "I began questioning whether I could go through with it the morning I sat across from you at the Dime
A
Cup and saw the pain in your eyes when I presented you with
Hollywood
Hellion.
I should have left Ticky Creek then. Maybe I'd already fallen in love with you a little. I simply couldn't walk away." She held her hand out to him. "Please."

He glanced
at
her hand, and his brows drew together. For the first time he appeared confused. Inebriation made his eyelids heavy, and when he spoke again, the angry words sounded slurred. "I don't think I can do that, Cupcake." His gaze slid back to hers. "When I was in prison, I made a vow that I'd never allow a woman
to
use me again. Or to hurt me. I was doing fine until you came here, screwing up my head with your beautiful eyes and incredible mouth."

He stood. As Alyson slid off the desk, he grabbed her arm and drew her close, saying through his teeth, "I've never hit a woman. Thought about it. Known a few who deserved it. Part of me wants to beat the hell out of you. The other part wants to spread you over this desk and climb between your legs one last time. Maybe being inside you again would obliterate this anger and remind me why I should forgive the lies. But maybe I'm afraid of finding out that even that was a lie. Maybe you won't feel so good in my arms. Or maybe you'll taste as sweet or smell so damn alluring that I lose all common sense and fall in love with a stranger. What I'd do to you wouldn't remotely resemble the love we once made, Miz Farrington."

His hand fell away. His eyes closed. He swayed.

*

As
Brandon
slept like the dead in her bed, Alyson called
Henry. "He's fine," she assured him. "He's
…
resting."

"I'd like to talk to him, Al."

She glanced toward the bed. "He's sleeping. He's exhausted. I'll have him call you just as soon as he wakes up. I promise."

Henry remained silent. She wanted to hang up the phone, cut the connection before he outright asked her if
Brandon
had been drinking. Then she realized that he already knew.

Finally he said, "I'm glad you're with him. He needs you. You're good for him. He knows that.
Brandon
can be stubborn and temperamental, but he's not stupid. He knows a good thing when he sees it. Tomorrow
…
when his head is clear again, you'll work out your differences. You'll come home, where you belong."

Tears rose to her eyes. "Home sounds good, Henry."

"Goodnight, Al. Give him a kiss for me. And tell him I love him. Please."

Wiping her eyes, she nodded. "I'll tell him."

Sitting in a chair, the television on but muted, Alyson watched
Brandon
sleep. A pain had centered behind her eyes that made her temples ache. She shivered with cold, thought of turning up the heat, then decided against it. From experience, she knew that heat only exacerbated the effects of a hangover. Then she reminded herself that what
Brandon
would feel upon waking up could hardly be compared with a simple hangover.

But worse, he'd now have one more cross to bear. First Henry and Bernie, then Anticipating. His disappointment over her
Gazette
association. Now the booze. She'd known enough alcoholics to realize that the consequences of this tumble from sobriety came with more than just the reawakening of his body's hunger for the drink. There would be depression and guilt. A sense of failure. A loss of hope. He'd search for the relief from those emotions in a bottle, and the cycle would begin again.

At just after two in the morning,
Brandon
opened his eyes. Alyson hurried to his side, stroked his brow, which felt damp with sweat. "Where the hell
am
I?" he slurred.