Forever Promised (13 page)

Deacon took two steps on the tarmac, gave a slight leap to one of the better-packed spots of dirt on the side of the road, and then leaped again back to the twelve inches of blacktop on the right of the white line. Behind him, he heard Shane and Jon swearing to themselves as they grappled with the holes in the dilapidated country road, while he continued to dodge. He hoped by the time they were done with this stretch, they’d be ready to drop it.

“He’s evading us,” Jon puffed conversationally to Shane, and Shane grunted.

“I would too.”

“What do you want me to say?” Deacon asked, relieved when the road evened out. “That I want a baby? Apparently it’s the worst-kept secret in Levee Oaks. That I’m excited about Benny popping one out for me since it’s so convenient and all?” He let a little acid drip from his voice then, hoping to shame the whole rest of the world into minding its own business, thank you very much. “No. It’s not going to happen. I don’t want anybody putting themselves out for me,
especially
not Benny, who is going to love this child and then have to give it up, and that’s not fair to ask of her!” With the last word, he forgot to watch where he was going and set his foot down on the edge of the blacktop, where there was a good six-inch gap between the pavement and the dirt. He rolled his ankle, went sprawling sideways, and banged his elbow on a buried piece of granite as he went down. The world stopped spinning and he found himself staring up at a peacefully hot August blue sky, surrounded by tall grass, and wishing he could just stay there and let the rest of this bullshit go away.

Shane and Jon intruded on his vision, though, and he grimaced.

“Did you get all that out of your system?” Jon asked dryly. “Is your rant over? Do you feel justified now?”

“Shut up.”

“I was going to ask if he was okay!” Shane said, reproof in his voice.

From his vantage point on the ground, Deacon saw Jon raise his chin and look their earnest friend straight in the eyes.

“Of course he’s not okay,” Jon said flatly. “He’s bleeding and we’re going to have to carry him home, and he’s probably agonizing in his little soul about all the reasons he doesn’t get the thing he wants most in the world.”

“I can probably stand on my own,” Deacon said thoughtfully, waiting for the dull red throb in his ankle to recede to see how bad it really was. “And don’t either of you forget, I
have
the one thing I want most in the world. I have
two
of them. And the fact that I’m lying here in the dust counting my appendages is the reason you don’t ask God for too fucking much, do you both understand me?
Fuck!
”

Jon’s sigh sounded long-suffering and heavy. “The ankle’s killing you, isn’t it.”

“Shut up.” Because he’d just given it a tentative roll, and the dull red throb had gone sharp and black at the edges and his tetchy stomach had threatened to heave. He had rocks digging into his back and some of the grass he was lying on was stained with oil, and he was pretty sure he saw a used condom in the trash over to his right.

“Would you like some help up, Deacon?” Shane asked considerately, and Deacon managed a smile at him.

“I think that’s a fucking awesome idea.” He raised his nonbleeding arm. “Can you give me a hand—
up!
”

Shane was a big guy. He was almost as tall as Crick, and his shoulders were wide, and he worked steady and long, helping the kids do the jobs around Promise House, things like working on cars and landscaping and working with Deacon at the horse ranch. He ignored Deacon’s outstretched arms, squatted down, and thrust one arm under Deacon’s knees and the other under his shoulder, and then slowly stood up again, Deacon in his arms like a damsel in distress.

Deacon closed his eyes, surrounded by a big sweaty man who was not his mate but who had just done what probably every alpha male in the history of all species anywhere had always dreamed of doing.

“I hate you just a little,” he muttered, and to his relief, Shane grinned.

“Yeah, I know you do. I couldn’t do it if you ate like you should.”

“I hate you too,” Jon said conversationally. “And if my wife never finds out about this, I’d be a happy man.” Amy weighed about ninety-five pounds soaking wet and Jon probably couldn’t pick her up. Deacon just
bet
Jon would like to keep this sort of strength a secret. It was
embarrassing.

Shane winked at Jon and then moved gingerly to a place where the ground was even. Deacon was relieved to feel a shake in his muscles, because being carried home like this would probably get his man card revoked forever. “Would you like me to set you down, princess, or should I put you on my back?”

Jon died—disintegrated into laughter, fell into a helpless, giggling heap into the dust—and Deacon eyed him sourly.

“Set me down,” he told Shane. “And then let me hobble home while he stays here to get mauled by the next flatbed that passes.” It was eight in the morning and they’d seen three cars, but that didn’t mean Deacon wasn’t hopeful.

Shane set him on his feet carefully, and Deacon gingerly put his foot down and tried to apply a little bit of weight… and went toppling forward until Shane caught him again. Deacon sighed and then leaned against his friend. He looked off into the distance, where Jon’s house sat about a half a mile away. He looked behind him and saw Jon hauling himself off the ground with an insufferable smirk on his face, and then about a quarter of a mile behind Jon, he saw….

“Who’s that?” he said, squinting.

Jon turned around and shrugged. “Random teenage girl, smoking,” he said, then grimaced. “God, Shane, let’s go before she starts a fire or something.”

“I don’t get people who do that,” Shane said, bearing much of Deacon’s weight as easily as Deacon hefted a bale of hay.

“Smoke?” Jon asked, and Shane shook his head.

“No. Smoke
and
exercise. I mean, doesn’t that just confuse the hell out of your lungs?”

“She’s a teenage girl,” Jon said, drawing along Deacon’s other side. “Her whole body’s confused.”

“You would know this because…,” Deacon baited. Deacon had lived with a pregnant fourteen-year old—he didn’t doubt it for a moment.

“Dated ’em, known ’em, am doomed to one,” Jon said shortly, and Deacon grinned quietly. Jon’s answers were worth the question, even if you knew what they were before he said them. “Now move it, Cochise. That girl is gaining on us!”

Deacon grunted and took a giant one-legged hop, trusting Jon and Shane would both support him as he landed. They did, and the three of them made decent time for being a man down, but still, as they neared Jon’s house, a stray breeze caught the smell of tobacco, and they heard her footsteps behind them. There was a pause and a crunch of gravel, and Deacon assumed she was grinding out the butt, and then she drew abreast of them.

She was a pretty girl, Deacon thought as she stepped around Jon, although she was already getting bitter creases at her mouth and eyes. She had a gamine little face and thick reddish hair, and eyes that were wide in the middle and narrow on the end in a familiar shape, and even, in the faded blue, an almost familiar color.

“Missy?” he asked, knowing he’d feel stupid if this passing resemblance made him take the wrong guess. But the girl stopped and turned around, squinting at the three of them.

“Deacon?” she asked, her voice half-hopeful, half-hostile. “Deacon Winters?”

Deacon nodded, then grimaced. “How’re you doing, sweetheart? Benny and Crick haven’t heard from you in ages.”

Missy scowled. “Like they cared!”

Wonderful. “Yeah—” Deacon paused while Jon and Shane helped him hop. “—they cared! We send you birthday presents, Christmas presents—hell, a letter a month and random gifts. They’ve gone in the post. Don’t tell me you didn’t get that shit!”

There was a quiet moment, and Missy’s “I’m a tough bitch” veneer cracked for a moment. “Did you send me a pink Minnie Mouse polo shirt one time?” she asked out of the blue.

Deacon narrowed his eyes. “Yeah. Last year. We went to Disneyland. Benny bought you guys presents. Why?”

Missy let out a little chuffed breath. “Best Christmas gift I ever got. Figures they didn’t get it for me.” She took three deep breaths and then scowled at him again. “Tell them thank you,” she said, half-angry, half-sad.

Deacon blinked. “Thank you? That’s all you got? Hell, we’re two miles from our house—by the time you get to where you’re going, you’ll have passed it! Stop in and tell them hi!”

“Why? So they can tell Bob and Melanie where I am?” she sneered.

Deacon and Shane met eyes for a moment. “That’s unlikely,” Deacon said, standing securely on the one good foot and depending on Shane to hold him up if he went over. “The last time we had anything to say to them, I put Bob in the hospital.”

Missy squinted at him for a moment, and Deacon realized that was about five years ago, and she must have been, what? Ten, eleven years old then?

“You… how did you do that?” she asked, and Jon snorted softly.

“Does it matter, sweetheart? Fact is, you can be safe with Crick and Benny if you want.”

Missy’s shoulders rounded, and while she ignored Jon, the look she sent Deacon was both speculative and hunted. “No,” she said ungraciously. “I’m heading for a place by yours, Promise House. Guy running it is supposed to be a total fag pushover, but he’ll put you up for a while so’s you can find your feet.”

Deacon knew his eyes had gone big, and he was torn between asking her why she wasn’t living with her folks anymore and defending his friend, the big doofus who had just offered to carry him two miles.

Jon was choking on his tongue when Shane solved the dilemma for both of them. “Yeah, sure. Promise House is down there, take a left at the cross street, a right at the next one, and you’ll see the big wrought iron archway. Don’t forget to ask for Mickey. He’ll be thrilled to help you.”

That made Jon shut up right quick, and Deacon too. “Should I tell Crick and your sister where you went?”

Suddenly Missy narrowed her eyes. “Wait a minute. Aren’t you a fag too?”

Well, among other things, she didn’t have her sister’s quick mind. “I married your brother, Missy. What do you think?”

Now it was Missy’s turn to get big eyes. “Oh yeah. Hell. God, I’m dumb. You’re not going to tell the other guy, are you? ’Cause I
really
want a place to sleep tonight that I don’t got to put out to get!”

“Don’t say it,” Jon muttered, and Deacon looked at him wryly. No, no, of course not. Deacon would be the last person to suggest to her that just because they were supposed to be gay didn’t mean they knew each other.

Besides, it would be kind of moot since the guy in charge of Promise House was the one hauling Deacon’s bacon through the weeds.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Deacon said quietly back. He looked at her again and for a moment felt a stab of might’ves. Before Crick had come home, when Benny was barely sixteen, Deacon had still been trying to take care of Missy and Crystal in Crick’s absence. Missy had been ten the spring Crick had come back, and the last Deacon had really seen of her had been when he and Benny had collected them from their house in the middle of the last big flood. Step-Bob hadn’t been doing anything useful, and Deacon had a plan, so the girls had gone up east to higher ground, and Deacon, Benny, Jon, and Drew had tried to defend The Pulpit.

When Amy had come back, the girls had gone to stay with their grandma, and who knew how long
that
lasted? Crick and Benny had sent them things religiously, and even though Crick hadn’t had much hope, Benny had harbored some faith that Bob and Melanie Coats were such bad parents that at some point
one of the girls would spot the package before the grown-ups did. It was a good plan, Deacon had thought then. Now he realized the only flaw in the plan was that it relied on the girls being as smart as their sister.

“Missy, how’s Crystal?”

Missy shrugged. “I don’t know. She ran off and got married before she finished high school. Some Mex guy. Mom and Bob didn’t think much of that, so she ain’t been back.”

Deacon grimaced. One of Bob’s biggest grudges against Crick was that his father had been Hispanic. Well now, wasn’t that a nice finger in the face of the old man? But not the sanest way to choose a domestic partner, that was for sure.

“Nice,” he said, and not even
he
could tell exactly what he meant by it. “So, uhm, yeah. Follow Shane’s directions and ask for Kimmy—”

“I thought he said Mickey?”

“I’m doing you a favor, and when you get there and meet Mikhail, whom you should
never
call Mickey, you will see why.” By mutual consent, he, Jon, and Shane all took a giant step forward in hopes of maybe reestablishing their former rhythm.

The girl gaped after him—her mouth opened wide, and looking over his shoulder, Deacon got a view of crooked, uncared-for teeth, and he tried hard not to ponder on a family that could afford her cigarettes but no dental work.

“Is that all you got?” she asked helplessly, her voice trailing off, and Deacon was going to do it, going to take the extra step and offer her the ride once they got to Jon’s house, but Shane jumped in front of him, and for a fag pushover, he sounded surprisingly firm.

“You show us you can get to Promise House and work hard, and we’ll show you a clean bed and a safe place to stay.”

“Work?” the girl said, sounding dumbstruck. “No one said I’d have to work!”

“Don’t answer her,” Shane muttered as they walked away, although Deacon had hit his ankle then and he was more concerned with not losing his manly nut and making a sound like a wounded moose.

“Why not?” Jon asked for him. “I’d like to answer her right in the—”

“Yeah, I know you would. I’ve seen this kid—this
kind
of kid. Everybody got hit in her family but her, and when everyone else took off, she realized she needed to get out of there too. She’s going to be manipulative and entitled and unpleasant until she figures out that the world doesn’t owe her any favors. Once she gets over that, we’ll see if she doesn’t have a future.”