“My water?” Myrt glanced at the younger woman seated to the side of the table.
“The herbs can be hard on the kidneys.” Young Tabitha went back to studying her nails, fingers curved over her palms as she ignored her grandmother’s narrowed look.
“Oh.” Myrt recognized the plants and herbs, naming them in her mind to help cement the memory. “And after a hundred and twelve days?” Not that she’d give anything a chance beyond the earliest indications, but it was always good to know the options. “Are there things to help bring on my period if it’s greatly delayed?”
“Nothin’ that won’t leave you sickened near to dyin’.” Old Tabitha sat back in her chair, creating space between her and Myrtle. “And nothin’ certain to any of this. You may not start your womanly cycles again for a space of months. Sometimes it’s better to let nature take its course.”
Those plants had been readily available in Kentucky. Sometimes reaped from the woods, the folds of land on the sides of the mountain offering up secret hoards. At times taken from cultivated flower gardens in town, Myrt creeping around the edges of yards in the dark, hands gathering up her dress as a sling to hold the treasures securely.
She had no idea what she might find in Florida.
A loud thumping echoed through the house, and Myrt stiffened, a sense of unease washing over her. Someone banged at the front door, demanding a response, the cadence setting up an echoing racket in her chest as her heart thundered fast.
The pounding continued, even with Vanna’s called greeting of “Just a minute” to tide over whoever it was. If anything, the knocking increased in speed and force, the fist attacking the surface of the door.
“Can I help—oh!”
Vanna’s pained cry had Myrt out the door and at the top of the stairs in a flash, in time to see Ian Sallabrook rock to a stop in the middle of the dining room. He’d left Vanna cast to the side, one hand cradling her other wrist.
“Where is she?” His bellowed demand woke the children sleeping up the hallway from where Myrt stood, and as the first tiny cry lifted to the heavens, his gaze turned upwards and landed on her. “Girl, get down here, now.”
Her feet had grown roots, tangling with the carpet on the floor, holding her in place. Everything else faded away except him and his reddened face, cheeks mottled purple with rage. His top lip lifted in a sneer, exposing his long, yellowed teeth. His lips moved, and she read the words, not able to hear anything over the fast beat of her heart echoing in her head. “I said get down here now. You’re gonna regret this, girl.”
He jerked backwards, whirling around, and time sped up again, sounds rushing to her ears in a wave.
Bane had a hand wrapped tightly around Sallabrook’s arm and was dragging him towards the door. Sallabrook futilely tried to fight him, but the younger, stronger man never flinched at the weak blows aimed his direction. Then they were outside, the screen door tapping gently into place.
“Vanna, are you okay?” Sharon called, as she firmly moved Myrt to the side and descended the stairs, Josh in her arms and Kitten trailing behind. A hand slipped into Myrt’s, and she looked down to see Cade at her side, staring up at her. The little girl rubbed Myrt’s knuckles against her own cheek, then tugged her hand, leading her down the stairs one tread at a time.
Vanna was seated in the kitchen by the time they made it downstairs, a bag of frozen vegetables wrapped in a towel and placed on her wrist. She had Josh in her lap, Kitten standing at her side. Myrt saw the top of Sharon’s head dart past the window outside and understood she’d gone out the back door and was headed around to the front where Sallabrook continued to shout.
“I’m so sorry.” Myrt let Cade’s unwavering grip lead her to a chair near Vanna and maneuver her around to sit.
Vanna looked up, her gaze filled with compassion as she cradled Josh to her body, his cheek nestled against her bosom. “Oh, honey. His problem isn’t yours. Not as long as I’m around.” She shook her wrist free of the makeshift ice bag and flexed her fingers, pulling them into a tight fist with a fierce smile stretching her lips. “You’re my family and this is your house. He’s got no call to come barging in like that.”
The front screen door opened and closed, and the inside door latched into place with a force that was just this side of a slam. Myrt twisted in sudden fear that somehow Sallabrook had overwhelmed Bane and Sharon and was now in the house to complete whatever mission he’d imagined for himself. Instead, she saw Sharon’s head thrown back in laughter and Bane grinning widely, a pleased expression on his face. His gaze settled on Myrt and he sobered, coming straight to her while Sharon made her way to Vanna.
“You okay?” His hand replaced Cade’s, the little girl giving Myrt’s arm a soft pat as she moved away. Bane crouched in front of her, chin lifted slightly as he looked up into her face. “He didn’t scare you, did he?”
“Why is he here?” She hadn’t known the tears were close until she tried to talk, her throat closing unexpectedly around the words so she had to force them out hoarsely. “Why would he come here? How did he find me?”
“He wouldn’t say. It’s a long way from Kentucky to here, though, so him showing up on Vanna’s doorstep was not random.” Bane leaned closer, the nearest he’d been to Myrt since the first day he’d been in the house.
She’d successfully avoided him since then, rising early to fix breakfast, then heading into the garden before the day’s heat gained teeth. After her self-assigned chores were complete, she’d found other ways to stay clear of the man, taking Cade on nature walks in the surrounding woods, spreading a blanket under the trees to hang out with Kitten or Josh, watching all three kids and the dogs play in the nearby creek—there were a thousand opportunities to avoid someone living under the same roof if a body was determined. Now, the scent she’d decided was simply Bane curled around her, bringing her heart rate down a notch. His thumb swept side to side on the back of her hand, across and back, across and back. An innocent touch, but one that threatened to unsettle her, the rough glide a promise of how it would feel if he touched her elsewhere.
Stop your dreamin’ about wants and wishes, woman. She needed to focus, because the next few minutes would set the course for the rest of her life. Sallabrook had found her, which meant she couldn’t stay here. Not if he might be back. What if one of the children had answered the door instead of Vanna, or if it had been tiny Sharon? What if he’d hurt Vanna more than a sprained wrist? Myrt would never forgive herself if that man harmed the slightest hair on the heads of any of these people she’d come to love like family. More than family. She didn’t try to shy away from the knowledge that Vanna and Sharon, and even Bane, treated her better than her own father had. I can’t let anything happen to them.
“Vanna.” Suddenly aware this might be her last chance to touch him, Myrt clutched at Bane’s hand as she turned to the woman who meant so much to her, a mother figure she hadn’t known she needed, a friend and confidante. “I’m gonna have to go.” Hotness trickled down her cheek, splashing to the back of her hand, swept away by Bane’s persistent touch. “I never meant to bring you harm.”
Her stomach rolled and then rebelled. Frantic yanking freed her hand, and she covered her mouth, barely making it to the garbage can in time. She retched again and again, coming up for air finally to find the kitchen empty of everyone except her—and Bane. He stood close by, wet washrag in hand, a glass of water on the counter nearby.
“She’s not going to let you leave.” He gripped Myrt’s elbow gently and steered her back towards the chair, helping her sit. His bottom lip bowed up in a sorrowful expression. “Vanna Mom’s hurt you’d even suggest such.” The first touch of the washrag against her chin was gentle, tentative, but he gained confidence the longer she didn’t fight him. He folded the fabric, then used the clean side to wipe up her temples and across her forehead, drawing it down along her hairline and the back of her neck. “I told her it was shock talking, and she agreed. She and Sharon are upstairs getting the kidd
os back into nap mode. And maybe trying to give you a little privacy.” Half turned away, he ran water over the washrag, then wrung it out and turned off the tap. Bane captured her hand and carefully cleaned her forearm, then between her fingers before moving to her other arm. “I promised her I’d watch over you.”
“Why did he come lookin’ for me?” She knew the venomous look on Sallabrook’s face hadn’t been her imagination. He hated her more today than he ever had, probably because she’d inconvenienced him.
“Man claimed a lot of things.” Bane repeated the process with the washrag, this time leaving the wrung-out fabric draped over the faucet. He claimed a chair at the table, angling it so he faced Myrt. “Most of which I know for a fact wasn’t true.”
“Like what?” Myrt hated the way her voice wavered like an old lady’s, touching on different octaves for each sound.
“Said you were his wife.”
She lifted a hand and scrubbed across her forehead, pinching the bridge of her nose between two fingers. The refreshing feel that had come with Bane’s tender ministrations fled, and her stomach clenched in a dire threat. “I am.”
“He have a judge or a clergyman officiate?” Bane’s tone was hard, but when she chanced a glance at him, the expression on his face was soft, tender.
“Well, no. But I’d been with him for a long time when I finally got the nerve to leave.”
“Did you live with him in a state other than Kentucky for any time?” She shook her head side to side. “Myrt, if there weren’t any papers, then you’re not his wife. He’s not anything to you. Kentucky doesn’t recognize common-law marriages. Hasn’t for more than a hundred years.” Bane ducked his chin, bringing his face closer to hers. Enunciating deliberately, he told her, “He is nothing to you.”
“He told me a bunch of times.” She forced herself to hold his gaze. “He’s got rights.”
Bane’s head was swinging back and forth before she finished. “I looked it up. Looked all of it up. He doesn’t have any rights.” His gaze hardened. “Not with anything to do with you. You’re your own person, Myrt, and he can’t come in here demanding anything.”
“What did you tell him outside?”
“Told him to get back in his goddamned truck and haul his ass back to whatever hole in the hill he’d crawled out of. Informed him that he’d injured someone near and dear to a man he likely had heard of, gave him that name, and then watched as he turned as green as you were a few minutes ago.” Bane’s steady gaze gave her an anchor, and she locked hers with his. That bottom lip bowed up again, and she had an instant to notice the cleft that appeared in his chin. “I told him he was barkin’ after the wrong woman, because from what I could see, you had a future waitin’ for you out here that didn’t involve him.”
And just that fast, any swell of emotion fled, leaving her hollowed out and frightened. She’d been struggling to figure out a way to pay Vanna back but kept running up against the fistful of deficits she held in her hands. A wealth of cannots not even balanced by a single can. Focus on the present issue. “And he left? Without arguing? That doesn’t seem like him.”
“No, it took a couple more words to get him to vacate, but once I had his attention the right way, well, he trotted his happy ass off fast enough. Sure seems like a man who’s used to gettin’ whatever he wants, regardless of the cost to anyone else.”
“Fair enough description of him.”
“What is he to you?”
“Daddy gave me to him years ago.” Bane’s cheeks lost all color, going from ruddy and high with emotion to pale and shocked in a single breath. She hadn’t been so careless with her words even with Vanna. Gotta keep my head. “I was his helpmeet.”
Angling his chin away, Bane stared over her shoulder. His mouth opened and closed, then he roughly cleared his throat. He blinked twice, each taking a long time for his lashes to sweep down and up, then looked at her again, eyes burning hot. “Your daddy gave you to him?”
“Don’t tell Vanna.” Her whisper scarcely stirred the air. “Please.”
“I need to understand.” He ignored her request and scooted his chair closer. “Help me understand, Myrtle.”
“My momma died. She married Daddy after his other wives had passed on. Her daddy, he told her it was the best offer she’d get. She’d been up in Lexington, goin’ to school. She was smart and…and knew stuff. All kinds of stuff. I was her first, then she had seven more. Enough kids to put her dreams of going back to school to sleep. When she got sick, towards the end of things she made me promise I wouldn’t stay. The older kids were all flyin’ the coop, marryin’ or takin’ jobs in other towns. I had one older sister left at home, Marian. Momma said my daddy’d never part with her.” Myrt realized her words were tripping over themselves to get out of her mouth, coming so fast they slurred into each other. She focused on the sweep of Bane’s thumb, the glide as steady and dependable as time itself. “Mr. Sallabrook’s wife had died. Daddy sold me to him for the price of a tractor. He wanted someone—a woman someone—to cook and clean, do chores. That kind of stuff.”
“And other stuff, too, right? He wouldn’t be so angry if he’d only lost his slave labor.” Bane’s fingers tightened around hers, not painfully, but as if telling her she was safe talking to him. “It was more than just that.”
“He’s the preacher. It wasn’t proper for us to live together. But yeah…other stuff, too.”
“Preacher my ass,” Bane muttered under his breath, then sighed heavily as she ducked her chin. “Sorry, Myrt. I’ll put a leash on my mouth for ya.”
“It’s okay, Bane. I’m not offended.” Her shying away hadn’t been criticism but embarrassment. She met his gaze, holding it for a moment before angling her eyes down, breaking the shaky connection between them. I can’t look at him and tell him even the smallest of things. “It wasn’t bad at first. He was patient with me learnin’ everything he liked. Dealing with all the things his wife had let go, seein’ as she was sick for so long. Took me probably two years to figure out how to get the house and barn like he wanted them. Once it was right, it was easier to keep it like that.”
“Two years? How many years were you with him?”
She angled her head to the side, not wanting to see pity in Bane’s expression when she admitted how long she’d been captive to Sallabrook. “A few.”
He gripped her chin between a finger and thumb, bringing her head around to face him. “Don’t hide from me, Myrt. You don’t have anything to be ashamed of.”
“That’s what Mr. Truck told me, too. He said what people do to us is their responsibility, not ours. Not mine.” She shrugged and tugged her chin free of his hold. “Easy to say, harder to do.”
Bane snorted, and she chanced a glance at him in time to see amusement on his face. It was so at odds with their conversation that she couldn’t look away. He grinned, then muttered, “Mister Truck, like it’s a title. Gonna razz him about that, for sure.” The smile fell away, and he stared at her. “Regardless, he’s right. Like I said, you got nothin’ to be ashamed of, Myrt.”
“It only got bad the last couple of years.” Tired of trying to hold his gaze, she dropped her chin, wrapping one arm around her waist. Her other hand was still held and controlled by Bane, and she didn’t want to examine her reasoning for leaving it where it was. “Seemed like once he got mad at me, he couldn’t find his way back from the brink.” She blinked back tears. “He’s right to be mad, though. I stole a bunch of money from him.”
His fingers made that reassuring squeeze again, and Myrt’s heart skipped a beat. “How much money?”
“Nearly two hundred dollars.” She angled away from Bane, her arm sticking out to the side and behind her. She was as far away from him as her arm would reach but still couldn’t bring herself to break their connection. “He could probably put me in jail.”
“Myrt, that’s not even enough for small claims court. Plus, any lawyer worth his salt would argue it was the smallest of payments for years of work. If
he comes back, I’ll give him the money out of my wallet. I’ll give it and never miss it; that’s how small an amount it is.” He put pressure on her hand, trying to get her to turn and face him, but she stubbornly refused. “Myrtle, look at me, darlin’.”
It was the affectionate name that did it for her. Myrt slowly swiveled to face him, rocking her head to the side so she could see him out of one eye.
“Man like him, wanting to own a woman, he’s no man at all. I’m gonna take care of you, Myrtle, and make damn sure he’ll never hurt you again.”
She could tell from Bane’s expression he utterly believed what he’d said.
If only she could be so certain.
Chapter Six
Bane
He stood at the edge of the ditch, staring down at the remains of Vanna’s mailbox.
“Well?”
The demanding bark in his ear was from Truck, a man frustrated he was a couple hundred miles away and unable to return home while this was going on.
“Looks like a baseball bat.” He scanned for snakes and other varmints, then stepped down into the ditch to retrieve the warped metal. “The wood post is snapped clean off. I’ll pick up another box and post today.”
“Don’t bother. I’m getting her a goddamned PO Box. I’ll be making that call the minute we hang up. Won’t even give her a say in this one. Roadside mailbox is vulnerable to more than just drive-by smashings.” The sigh Truck heaved out said a lot more than the man was willing to share. Either the RWMC as a whole had other issues, or he was expecting things to be on high alert at home for some reason more than a disgruntled backwoods hillbilly using a baseball bat as a dick enhancer. “Just clean up the mess for my ole lady, brother. That’s good enough. Appreciate everything you’re doing.”
“You got it.” The call disconnected, and Bane shoved the phone into his pocket, bending to scoop up the rest of the broken post. As he shifted the flattened mailbox in his hands, something rattled inside it, and he tossed it up into the yard, climbing out of the ditch slowly while keeping a wary gaze on the metal. Nothing crawled out of it, so he gave it a nudge with his boot. “Probably nothing. If it were a snake or other nasty hitchhiker, it wouldn’t have rattled.”
In Search of Solace (Rebel Wayfarers MC) Page 6