FLOWERS and CAGES (11 page)

Out of the shadows stepped two men. As they flanked Collier, Dalton thought that if those thugs were his friends, Dalton was next in line to the British throne. There was no doubt who they were. Hired muscle. It was their job to make certain Collier didn't muss a single strand of his perfectly styled hair.

"Typical," Dalton spat. "You beat your wife. Why not? She can't fight back. I bet your daddy fixed all those fancy boxing matches of yours. He knew you couldn't win a fair fight. And so does everyone else."

Taunting Collier into losing his cool turned out to be easier than Dalton expected. Apparently, that daddy dig hit close to home.

"You think you can take me down? Give it your best shot."

"Mr. Langley," one of the bruisers put a hand on Collier's arm. "I don't think this is a good idea."

Shaking him off, Collier snarled, "You aren't paid to think, Wilcox. I'm warning you, if you want to keep your job, do not interfere. Understood?"

Wilcox and the other man exchanged looks. With identical shrugs, they stepped back.

His entire life, if he wanted something, Dalton had to fight for it. Sometimes with his fists. Sometimes with his brains. Either way, his skills were honed by years of hard living—something Collier would never understand. Where Dalton came from, he didn't survive unless he learned to fight dirty. With one or two blows, he could have ended the fight before it began. However, that would have been too easy. Collier thought he would win because he was socially, intellectually, and physically the better man. Dalton didn't give a shit about society. When it came to brains and brawn, he was about to teach Collier a lesson he would never forget.

Collier put up his fists as though waiting for the opening bell. Mistake number one. The Marquis of Queensbury had no place in this fight. Dalton easily dodged the first punch, countering with one of his own to Collier's mid-section. He followed with a quick jab to his chin, and Collier hit the ground like a ton of bricks.

"Fucking glass jaw," Wilcox muttered.

Disappointed that it was over so quickly, Dalton turned away in disgust. He wanted to do some damage, but he didn't hit a man who was down for the count.

"Do you want me to take you someplace?" Dalton asked a weeping Bonnie. He didn't know who her tears were for, and he didn't care. All Dalton wanted was to get out of this crazy town as quickly as possible.

"Where would I go?" Bonnie asked, genuinely puzzled. "Collier is my husband. I live with him."

Dalton wasn't surprised by Bonnie's answer. She hadn't left Collier before. Why would tonight be any different? He gave her an option. She turned him down. It was no longer any of his business.

"Watch out!"

Instinct and quick reflexes were all that saved Dalton from a smashed skull. He dove to his right, before rolling to his feet. As it was, Collier managed to clip Dalton's shoulder with the fist-sized rock.

"You got lucky, asshole. You won't take me down again."

"This won't end well." Slightly crouched, Dalton waited for Collier to make his move. "Walk away while you still can."

"Hey, punk. Are you feeling lucky? Because that's the only way you're getting past me again."

Dalton didn't know if Collier had purposely paraphrased Clint Eastwood. Time wasn't on his side, or he would have called the idiot out. But Collier chose that moment to swing. Dalton went low, swung his foot around, and took the other man's legs out from under him. The air knocked out of him, he lay on his back gasping for air.

Dalton was pissed off by the entire situation—especially Bonnie who was enjoying the fight way too much for a woman who just minutes earlier had been a weeping, cowering, traumatized mess. Her eyes seemed to glow with a sick kind of excitement. He didn't know what the hell was going on there.

Dusting off his jeans, Dalton winced. Damn, his shoulder had taken a harder hit than he realized. All he could think was that it better not fuck up his drumming. He had already put Collier and Bonnie in his rearview mirror. As far as Dalton was concerned, it was over. Case closed.

Unfortunately, Collier had other ideas. Humiliated. Taken down by a man he viewed as inferior in every way. He needed to vent his frustration and rise from his humiliation. Reaching for the only weapon he had, Collier slung the rock at Dalton.

Dalton wheeled around seconds after the rock sailed past his head. "Are you fucking kidding me?"

Seeing red, Dalton lost every ounce of cool he possessed. It was the moment that changed his young life forever.

PRESENT DAY

"I BEAT THE shit out of him. I like to think I would have stopped at that, but I'll never know for sure. Collier's muscle men pulled me off before I could do permanent damage."

"Do you honestly think you would have killed him?" Colleen asked. She sat with her arms wrapped around her pulled-in knees, her cheek resting on top.

"Maybe."

"That is total bullshit." Colleen didn't move, but her eyes narrowed. "You had your chance to take him out. Twice. You barely did more than dirty his rich-boy clothes. The third time you vented. It's understandable. But murder? Please."

"My fists punching the smug expression off Collier's face felt damn good."

"I'll bet." Colleen shook her head. "I know Collier. I'm afraid the smug came back. Tenfold."

"He came to court. Everyday. Smirking."

"You were railroaded."

"I was guilty."

Colleen turned her head until she looked out on the lake.

"Money can do so much good—in the right hands. Collier's father used his to make certain you paid for his son's crime." She frowned. "It's like a slight of hand trick. The magician draws the attention of his audience one way, distracting from what is really happening. That is what Judge Langley did."

"I was the distraction?"

"Exactly. Collier beat his wife. He started the fight. When you tried to walk away, he found a way to keep it going. In a world not ruled by Langley power and money, you wouldn't have been charged, let alone convicted. I read the newspaper stories. They played up the fact that you didn't have a scratch on you while Collier looked like he had been hit by a large, fast-moving truck."

Dalton remembered. His lawyer had tried his best to counter the accusations, but the three witnesses backed up Collier's side of the story. It was his word against theirs. When Bonnie took the stand, she claimed Dalton had beaten her because she refused to sleep with him.

"By the end of that trial, Collier and Bonnie came off as the perfect couple. You were the evil outsider trying to destroy their love." Colleen made a gagging sound. "When I read that, I almost lost my dinner."

"How do you know it wasn't the truth?"

"Living in Midas all these years, I know Collier's and Bonnie's reputations."

"Ah." Dalton was deciding how to take that when Colleen laughed.

"Did you expect me to proclaim my absolute faith in you? We've known each other for less than forty-eight hours, Dalton. I think you are a good guy. But I don't
know
it."

The good guy label was tough for Dalton. He wanted to do the right thing. He lived his life in a way he hoped would have made his mentor—Silas Freed—proud. However,
good
equated boring. He pictured a rocking chair and Saturday nights watching PBS and drinking hot cocoa. Someday. Maybe. Not now. He certainly didn't want Colleen to think of him that way.

As if reading his mind, Colleen met his gaze. What he saw took his breath away. That was not the look a woman gave a man she found boring.

"You are sexy as hell, Dalton Shaw. I don't have to know you to sleep with you. Or trust you. However…"

"Yes?" As far as Dalton was concerned, Colleen could have stopped with
sexy as hell
.

"When we sleep together—"

"When, not if?"

"When we sleep together," Colleen continued as though he hadn't interrupted. "I want to trust you enough to let go completely."

"How do we get there?"

"Tell me something nobody else knows."

There wasn't much to tell. Ryder, Ashe, and Zoe knew him inside and out. Long hours together on the road with nothing to do but talk. They shared so much of themselves. Nobody knew him better. But everyone had their secrets. Little things they kept to themselves. Dalton had a few. There was one—exactly the kind of thing Colleen meant. It wasn't an earthshaking revelation. It wouldn't destroy him if it hit the press. Only one other person knew, and he was dead. If he told Colleen.

"I would never tell another soul."

Dalton had no reason to believe Colleen. Yet, for some reason, he did. Meeting her emerald gaze, he felt something indefinable pass between them. It was a moment, so brief it might not have happened. Dalton felt it and so did Colleen. He kept his eyes locked with hers.

"My first night in the state penitentiary. After the lights were out. When I knew without a doubt, this was my new reality. I cried myself to sleep."

Silently, Colleen closed the distance between them, taking him in her arms. Dalton saw the sheen of tears in her eyes.

"I survived."

"Yes, you did." Colleen brushed her lips across his cheek. "But it's wrong that you had to."

COLLEEN SOMETIMES WONDERED if her feelings about Midas and the people who lived there were unjustly skewed in a negative manner. When her mother remarried—for the first time—moving them from Kansas, Colleen had not been happy. Kansas hadn't been perfect, but leaving meant breaking with friends she had known all her life. Starting over. Her mindset hadn't been the best.

Arizona wasn't a bad place. It boasted the Grand Canyon, for Christ's sake. But they didn't settle in Phoenix. Or Albuquerque. Or any place resembling civilization. For a girl just entering her teens, it felt like a barren desert. Socially, Colleen found her niche. Academically, she did fine. But she never shook the idea that there was something not quite right about Midas.

After listening to Dalton's story, Colleen would never again question that feeling. Judge Manfred T. Langley had used his fortune, his undue influence, and his oppressive power to cover up for his worthless son. In the process, he blithely did his best to ruin a life. It was never about Dalton. He could have been anyone. The goal was to maintain the family's lustrous public image. Collier was proof positive that it was all a money-fortified veneer.

Colleen couldn't help but wonder how Judge Langley continued to clean up his son's messes. It had to be a full-time job—for more than one person. Their world was small, but social media made it difficult to keep anything secret. Perhaps Collier had settled down. Colleen doubted it. More likely, he made his mistakes close to home, where Daddy continued to sweep them away.

After taking another quick swim, Colleen and Dalton had headed back to Midas. On the drive back, he mentioned the dinner invitation from Tolliver Cline.

"Do you know the family?"

"I knew Tolliver's daughter—a little. Rita was a year ahead of me in school. I have a nodding acquaintance with the rest of the family."

"I thought everybody hung out in small towns."

"This is Midas, not Mayberry, Dalton. The divides are deep and rarely crossed. Tolliver runs a very successful landscaping business. The northsiders keep him busy. And from what I understand, well compensated. In fact, I didn't think he did any of the physical labor anymore. He has a big crew that takes care of that."

"Tol seemed like a nice guy. Friendly."

"I suppose it depends on who you are. My mother does his wife's hair. I work on the family's transportation. But we do not socialize."

"It's that bad?"

Dalton looked surprised. Colleen had to remind herself that he was an outsider. It was hard to grasp the way things worked when he hadn't lived here as long as she had.

"Most residents wouldn't call it good or bad. It just is."

"What do you call it?"

"Massively screwed up." Colleen turned the T-Bird onto her street. "My mother likes Midas. As she puts it, every town has its little quirks."

"Your mother has an interesting way of looking at things."

"Tell me about it." Like Midas, her mother was hard to explain. "I love her, but I will never understand her. Naturally, that goes both ways. We've learned to live with our differences. Mostly."

"Families are tricky."

"You still haven't heard from your brother-in-law?"

While they swam, Dalton had given Colleen an overview of why he was in Midas. She had always wished for a sibling. Now, she wondered if she had been the lucky one. The life of an only child could be lonely, but there was nobody to surprise her with a knife in the back. Tricky. And terrifyingly treacherous.

Dalton glanced at his phone, then sighed. "It doesn't make any sense. If I didn't know any better, I would think Maggie hadn't passed on my message."

Colleen didn't want to open a bigger rift between brother and sister, but she had to ask. "Is that a possibility?"

"Not long ago, I would have said no. Maggie is too fond of the money I send her every month. But now—after speaking to her—I don't know."

Pulling to a stop outside her apartment building, Colleen grabbed her bag from the backseat.

"I say screw the two of them. But I don't have the history or the blood ties."

Dalton ran a hand through his short, dark hair. "That whole blood is thicker than water thing? In my case, it's pretty much bullshit."

"It's sad, I know. But you're lucky. You found your real family."

If she were ever lucky enough to meet the members of Dalton's band, Colleen would have her little fangirl moment. Then, she would thank them. They had been there at the critical times in Dalton's life. When he was young and needed something solid to anchor himself. Through the lean years when they could have let ego and petty arguments tear them apart.

When it all could have fallen apart, they stood by him. The trial. His time in prison. According to Dalton, they visited every week. Sometimes together, sometimes individually.
Every week
. Without fail. When he was paroled, his place with the band was there just as promised. Colleen had always admired their music. Now,
The Ryder Hart Band
was more than four people standing on a stage. Because of Dalton, they were real people. Good and admirable.