The Alpha's Daughter (48 page)

“
You live here? With
him?”

“
What if I do? It’s his
place.” She dropped the pants and took another quick step toward
the porch and safety. She hated showing this guy her fear, but
she’d been in this place before; alone and at the mercy of a
strange man and she wasn’t pregnant then. “Rollie!”

Cob stopped, mouth open. The woman was
pregnant, belly swollen and about to pop. Rollie had a woman? A
young and beautiful woman. A pregnant woman. Shit! What’d the old
man do, win the lottery?

He raised his hands in a gesture of peace,
not wanting to frighten her any more than she obviously was. He
heard the door open. “I won’t…” hurt you, he started to say.

“
Damn right. You won’t do
squat. Stay right there, Mister.”

Rollie, looking older and a lot smaller than
Cob remembered, stood on the back porch holding a shotgun that
wavered vaguely in Cob’s direction.

The woman, now behind his uncle, reached for
the gun. “I got it, honey.”

“
The hell you do. It’s my
legs don’t work. I can shoot just fine.” He rested the barrel on
the rail.

Hands still in the air, Cob said quietly,
“Rollie, it’s me, Cob, your nephew,” he added, in case the old man
had lost his mind as well as the use of his legs. He stared at the
woman’s middle. Obviously other parts worked just fine.

“
The hell you say. Cob’s
dead. Been dead these last fourteen years.”

“
Then how the hell am I
standing here now?” Cob thought for a minute before he came up with
something the old man would understand. “Did they ever send you a
check?”

“
Don’t deal in checks.
It’s cash money or nothing. Anybody who knows me knows
that.”

Cob’s head dropped to his chest. He gave it
a quick shake and picked it up again. “You are as thick as the
soles on a banker’s shoes, Rollie Roper.” It was what his mother
said over and over when he was a boy.

Rollie took his finger off the trigger.
“Step on over here so’s I can get a good look at ya.”

Rollie handed the shotgun to Lorelei and
leaned over the rail to get a better look. The boy had been tall
and skinny when he left. This feller wasn’t as tall as Dewey
Tolliver, but he was twice as broad.

“
What was your Mama’s
name?”

“
Oh, for God’s sake.” Cob
started to lower his hands and then noticed how the woman held the
weapon. She looked a damn sight more competent that
Rollie.

“
My mother’s name was
Abigail. My father was Elijah. I was born in this house, or so I
was told, in the same damn bed as you were, though I hope to God it
wasn’t the same damn mattress. We came to live with you when I
wasn’t much more than a baby. You had an old hound you called Boner
that my mother hated though I didn’t understand at the time it was
the name she hated, not the dog. He lived under that porch you’re
standing on and you told me he would eat me alive if I dared leave
the house without you or my mother. I believed it, you old
bastard.”

Rollie slapped the rail. “I’ll be damned. I
thought you was dead. Got notice from the gov’ment.”

“
That I was wounded, not
dead. Didn’t you listen to what they said?” He started to drop his
hands again, stopped, looked at the woman and completed the move
when she nodded and lowered the weapon, though she didn’t put the
safety on when she cradled it across her arm.

“
Didn’t talk to ‘em. Saw
the car and the uniforms and knew why they were here. They don’t
send a car lessen you’re dead. You best come in since you ain’t.”
He turned, tottered, and was rescued from falling by the
woman.

“
Good to see you, too,”
Cob muttered as he went to retrieve his duffle.

When he entered the kitchen, Rollie was
sitting at the table and the woman was leaning over him, rubbing
his back and cooing something into his ear. There was an aluminum
walker next to the table. Rollie didn’t look good. Maybe she
thought she and the baby would inherit this house when the old man
died. She wasn’t wearing a ring. Still…

He heard Rollie blow his nose. The woman
leaned further in and kissed the top of his uncle’s head. “Thanks
for being there, honey. You’re my hero. I’m going out back to
finish hanging my wash.” She glared at Cob, but spoke to Rollie.
“You call if you need me.”

Cob moved out of the way as she passed. For
a woman ‘great with child’, she moved gracefully without the
waddling gait he’d noticed in other women in her state.

She stopped just past him and turned her
head. “Don’t upset him again,” she warned.

Upset Rollie? His uncle wasn’t the one held
at gunpoint, was he?

The screen door slammed behind her and he
turned his attention to Rollie.

“
Who the hell is
she?”