Dylan's Redemption (3 page)

“How about I take you to dinner?”

“Oh sure, come here and turn my life upside down, and then just take me to dinner like nothing’s happened.” She pretend pouted.

“Come on. We’ll catch up. I’ll make you laugh and maybe get a glimpse of that elusive smile of yours,” he teased, still holding her lightly in a comfortable embrace.

She gave him a smile as fake as a pink flamingo lawn ornament. “Not tonight. I need to make some calls. I have to make funeral arrangements. Lord knows, Brian hasn’t done it. He doesn’t have the money.”

“If I know you, you’ll do a hell of a lot more than plan a funeral.”

She hid a smile and the plans forming in her mind to get her brother moving down the straight and narrow. She’d already pulled herself out of the pit of despair. She could do the same for Brian. No way she would let her niece or nephew grow up with a drunk for a father.

Chapter Two

T
HURSDAY NIGHT AT
his cousin’s bar, McBride’s, was busy and raucous. Rowdy men and women crowded the place, looking for a good time. The music blared, the drinks flowed. People danced, laughed, and occasionally got into a squabble or two. Mostly, they had a whole lot of fun.

Brody and Rain had certainly changed the locals’ dive bar into a place everyone loved to gather. Some nights, Dylan walked in to check things out and make sure the crowd stayed friendly and no one started a fight. Tonight, he searched for a particular patron. Someone he hadn’t seen in quite a long time. If he wasn’t mistaken, someone who’d been avoiding him at all costs, since he came home nearly two years ago.

With his back to the bar, he scanned the room. Only the bartender worked behind him, and he tracked him with his peripheral vision. An old and safe habit of watching his back. It had saved him many times in the military, and he’d never gotten out of the practice, even while he served on the Atlanta Police Department, working the streets for two years. Unhappy living in the city, he’d wanted to move back to his hometown, where you knew your neighbors and they knew you.

Small-town living lent itself to a quieter life and certainly less violent crimes in general. Fallbrook had its share of drug dealers, robbers, and domestic abuse, though murders were few and far between.

He hated the domestic abuse cases. He couldn’t stand to see women in the direst of circumstances and think they had no one to turn to in their time of need. Even when they did call the police, they often didn’t press charges because they were too afraid and too used to making excuses for the person who abused them. A vicious cycle, one few women broke away from.

He’d seen the kind of damage a fist could do to someone’s ribs or back or legs. Abusers, in many circumstances, avoided the head because it wasn’t easy to hide that kind of damage. Stick to the body and limbs, where clothes hid the injury. Sick tactics an abuser used to hide his behavior, so he could keep doling out the punishment.

That first call left him ill and consumed with visions of Jessie as a young girl always covered in bruises and forever chasing after him to get away from her old man. He’d often thought she just wanted to hang out with him and her brother, Brian. Now, he knew the truth. She’d been looking for a protector. She’d chosen him, and he’d failed her.

He’d heard all the rumors about Jessie’s disappearance, and all the speculation about her murder, and wished he’d known all those years ago about her father abusing her. Unfortunately, he didn’t figure it out until he joined the military and met a guy with fading bruises that matched the ones he’d seen on Jessie’s back and ribs. That disturbing enlightenment came too late for him to help Jessie. To this day he couldn’t forgive himself for not seeing what was right in front of him, for not protecting her. For not knowing in time to save her from her father’s murderous hands.

He’d dedicated his life to protecting others, but it wasn’t enough to assuage his guilt.

I wish I could just disappear.
That ominous statement she made on prom night still haunted him.

All anyone knew for sure is one day about a week after Dylan left town himself, people started noticing Jessie’s absence. The sheriff brought Buddy and Brian in for questioning. Buddy claimed a drunken blackout with no recollection of the night in question. He couldn’t account for the blood seen on his shirt or his black eye. The sheriff at the time released them. Lack of evidence. From that day on, they remained silent, despite many inquiries, and Dylan trying his best over the last months to nail Buddy to the wall for something, anything he could use to get Buddy to talk and tell him where he buried Jessie. The man refused to speak to him. Even threatened to file charges for harassment. Dylan refused to stop looking for the one answer he needed to know. Where was Jessie? She deserved a proper burial. He needed to tell her how sorry he was for everything and give her the goodbye he’d been too afraid to say to her when he left for the military.

Dylan spotted his quarry across the room nursing a beer and a shot at a small booth on the far wall. Brian sat alone with three empty shots lined up next to his beer. Dylan didn’t think he’d stop with shot number four, not after finding out about his father’s death.

Maybe the booze would loosen his tongue and he’d finally talk about what happened to Jessie.

“Mind if I join you?”

Brian looked up through bleary eyes and scanned Dylan from his black Stetson, down his sheriff’s shirt and badge, to his black jeans and boots. Dylan noted his vision halted just that extra second on the gun at his hip. He hoped Brian hadn’t sunk so far into despair that he thought better to suck on a gun barrel than a beer bottle.

“Have a seat. I’m celebrating. How’s about I buy you a drink,
Sheriff.
We’ll have ourselves a toast. Good riddance, and thank you, God. The devil came to take Buddy Thompson home to burn.”

Although Brian slurred his words, and they were more than a little slow in coming, Dylan heard him loud and clear. He was glad of the old man’s demise.

Dylan took a seat and pulled off his Stetson and set it on the table beside him. The waitress came by and offered him a hot cup of coffee. He accepted it gratefully and dismissed her wide smile and the flirty gesture as she swung her hair over her shoulder. He kept his gaze on Brian and waited while the waitress paused in hopes of gaining his attention. She left pouting, and he didn’t give her a second thought.

Women threw themselves at him all the time because of his looks and dangerous job, and sometimes they figured out he was wealthy to boot. His wealth was no secret to any woman living in Fallbrook. From the minute he’d settled into his new house out near his cousins, Brody and Owen, he’d been every single woman’s favorite target. And a few married ones too. His cousins’ wives even tried to set him up a time or two, but he’d avoided their snares.

Dismissing his personal problems with the opposite sex, he addressed the problem sitting across from him. “You’ve been avoiding me since I moved back, Brian. Why?”

“I didn’t have a need for the sheriff.” Brian picked up his shot, draining it in one long swallow with a wince and a heavy exhalation

“You’ve been too busy drowning in a bottle to take a minute to say hello to an old friend.” Dylan’s sarcasm made Brian’s head snap up and his eyes flare. Dylan thought he saw a spark of his old friend in there somewhere, and it was a welcome sight.

“Some friend you turned out to be. You took off without so much as a goodbye, and you expect me to come running when you suddenly decide to come home.”

“You were the only one who knew I’d planned to leave after graduation.”

“I didn’t know you’d show up at the prom with my sister. I didn’t know you’d leave three days later after avoiding her and me all that time. Hell, we hadn’t even taken off our caps and gowns and you’d already left the gym, never to be seen again. Jessie disappeared five days later. In eight days, I lost my best friend and my sister. Now, you show up and want a hello. I’d rather she was sitting here. Maybe then, instead of ‘hello,’ I could say ‘I’m sorry.’” He raised his beer in a silent toast to the heavens. “I’m so damn sorry, Jessie girl.” He took a deep swallow.

Dylan wanted to steer the conversation in this direction, but seeing Brian look up to heaven made his insides go cold. She’d never been far from his mind in all these years. He had to know what really happened to Jessie.

Dylan avoided her for those three days after the prom because she’d scared the hell out of him. She’d given herself to him so completely and so freely, he’d lost his damn heart to her that night. If he saw her before he left, he wouldn’t have left her. And he had to go. He had to get out from under his parents’ expectations and demands, the plan they’d mapped out for his life without his consent or happiness in mind. Jessie had paid the price for his choices. Some people believed Jessie left town brokenhearted over him. Others told stories he didn’t want to think about. Rumors abounded, but the circumstantial evidence all pointed to one thing. Buddy killed her. He wanted the facts from Brian, because without Buddy only Brian knew the truth. At least, Dylan hoped he knew what really happened.

“What did Buddy do to Jessie, Brian?” He didn’t want to push too hard. Brian was drunk and sunk deep in a mire of misery.

“Well now. That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Maybe the old man buried her in the woods, or dumped her in the quarry lake. Maybe he put her in the foundation of one of the houses, buried her under a mound of cement, and smoothed it out with no one the wiser. Maybe . . .”

“Stop it.” Dylan banged his fist on the table, making the shot glasses jump. “I don’t want to hear what you think happened.” He’d heard enough wild, gruesome speculation from everyone in town. “Tell me what you know.”

“Look at you, wearing the sheriff’s uniform. What the hell does it matter now if anyone knows what happened that night?” Brian slumped in the booth seat, his face a mask of misery.

Fortifying himself with another swig of beer, his eyes locked on Dylan. “What I know? Hell, I don’t know anything. Not for sure. If he did kill her that night, then I hope he’s burning in hell and she was the welcoming committee.” Brian shook his head and took another swallow of beer.

Everything stopped. Dylan couldn’t breathe, his chest so tight his heart stopped beating. If Brian wasn’t sure she died, then . . . No. He couldn’t let himself think the impossible. Everything pointed to her death. He couldn’t find a trace of her anywhere.

“She probably had a beeline straight to heaven. Did you know he’d pick a fight with her just to see if she’d fire and flash, or if she’d back down?”

“I never knew Jessie to back down from anything.” Dylan remembered the girl he knew as a child and loved one night. The kind of person who planted her feet and met any challenge head on. Jessie fought hard for herself and what she wanted and put her whole heart into everything she did. Like loving him.

“That’s just it. Something came into his eyes when he went after her. Like he hoped, just once, she’d back down. Let him win. Oh, he was drunk enough to delude himself into thinking he won in the end, but deep down, he knew.”

“What happened that night?”

“Who the hell knows?” Brian took another swallow of beer and focused on a crack in the table. “We came home from a jobsite. He’d worked her hard that day. I think she framed an entire room. By herself, no less. He just kept picking at her. Wouldn’t let up.”

Brian took a swallow and lost himself staring at the table. “She was in the kitchen, scrounging for something to eat. The old man knocked the cupboard door shut, flipped her around, and slammed her up against the wall with his forearm braced across her throat. He got right in her face and her eyes were huge. And then she did something odd.”

“What?”

“She smiled.”

Dylan studied Brian, noting the sheen in his eyes that had nothing to do with the booze.

“She’d been miserable since the day you left. I don’t know what happened between you two at the prom, but I know something changed about her. When she realized you were gone for good, she barely spoke. That night, when the old man went after her, she smiled, like she felt as if for once she deserved it, welcomed it. He backhanded that smile right off her face. Split her lip. I can still see the spurt of blood and the trail it left down her chin.”

Dylan winced. He didn’t want to think about what she’d endured that night, or all the other nights. What he hadn’t known then about her situation, he sure as hell knew now. Brian confirmed all his worst fears. She’d borne the brunt of her father’s anger, and Brian witnessed it all.

“What did you do?” Anger and sadness choked off his words.

Brian drained the rest of his beer. He stared down at the scratch on the table for a long minute. Tears filled his eyes. “Nothing I could do. If I said anything, tried to stop him, he only hit her harder. More. When we were young, I tried, but he’d shove me out the door and lock me out and he’d beat the hell out of her every time I screamed for him to stop.” Brian went quiet, lost in the past. “Jessie would yell for me to go, stay out of it. Run, so he didn’t turn on me too.

“That night, Jessie’s bleeding from the mouth, the old man turns to me and says, ‘Get out.’ Jessie stares at me, her eyes pleading for me to leave. So I did.”

“You left her there, you fucking bastard.” Dylan didn’t hide his outrage.

Brian shot forward and pounded his fists on the table. “What did you want me to do?”

“Save her.”

“Every time I’d tried he hurt her worse. I felt the fury in him that night. I didn’t want to leave her, but I didn’t want to be the cause of her getting hurt worse if I stayed.” Brian fell back in his seat, the drunken grogginess returning to his eyes. “Walking out that door is the hardest thing I’ve done, but living with the guilt of knowing what happened after I left eats away at me every second of every day.”

You deserve it.
And so did Dylan for that matter.

“I spent most of that night at the high school bleachers, planning a new future. I’d take classes in the fall at the junior college. I’d get away from the old man and make something of myself. Maybe start my own business. I had it all planned out. I’d never have to watch him hurt her again. I’d get away from him and the guilt I carried every time I looked at her, knowing what I didn’t do. Then, I went home.”