by Nora Roberts
“Go back to sleep, Cousin Lulu. I’ll handle him.”
Wild-eyed, Dwayne burst out of Tucker’s room. “Doesn’t anybody sleep in their own bed anymore? Get your gun, boy. We’ve got trouble.”
“The only trouble here is the beer you’ve been slopping down in McGreedy’s.” Della grabbed his arm and tried to haul him to his own room. “What you need’s a face full of ice to cool you off.”
Dwayne shook her off and rushed to Tucker. “I don’t know how much time we have. They’re going to lynch Toby March.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the Bonny boys and a bunch of their asshole friends going after Toby right this holy minute with a rope.”
“Oh, Christ.” Tucker saw Caroline come to the doorway, clutching her robe at her throat. “Wait for me,” he said.
“I’m going with you.” Della was halfway down the hall in her red-feathered peignoir before Tucker stopped her.
“You’re staying right here. I don’t have time to argue with you. Call Burke. Tell him fireworks are starting ahead of schedule.”
Della stood as they clattered down the steps. She bristled until the feathers rustled.
“There are only two of them,” Caroline said from behind her. “If Burke doesn’t get there with help, it’ll be only Tucker and Dwayne.”
Cousin Lulu examined her nails. “I can still shoot Lincoln’s face off a one-cent piece at five yards.”
Della turned back, nodded. “Get some pants on.”
Toby rolled over in bed when their old mutt Custer began to bark. “Damn dog,” he muttered.
“ ’S your turn,” Winnie said sleepily.
“How do you figure?”
“I’m the one who got up every night to nurse two babies.” She opened her eyes and smiled at him in the moonlight. “Just like I’m going to get up with this next one in about six more months.”
Toby skimmed a hand over her still-flat tummy. “Guess it’s only fair I deal with the dog.”
“Get me a glass of that orange soda pop while you’re up.” She patted his bare butt before he pulled on his undershorts. “A pregnant woman’s got cravings.”
“You sure did have them a couple hours ago.”
That earned him a giggle and another slap. Toby stumbled, yawning, out of the room.
He saw the reflection of the fire in the front room window, that glitter of gold and red on the glass that made his heart sink and his blood boil.
He bit back an oath, hoping to get rid of the obscenity on the lawn before any of his family could be hurt by it. He was a man of deep faith and did his best to love his fellow man. But in his heart was a cold hate for whoever had lit the cross on his land.
He pushed open his door, stepped out on his porch. And found a gun poked into his naked belly.
“It’s Judgment Day, nigger.” Billy T.’s lips spread in a grin. “We just come by to send you to hell.” Enjoying the power, he jabbed with the rifle barrel. “Toby March, you’ve been tried and convicted for the rape and murder of Darleen Talbot, Edda Lou Hatinger, Francie Logan, and Arnette Gantry.”
“You’re crazy.” Toby could barely get the words through his lips. The dog was quiet now, and he could see old Custer crumpled on the grass—dead or stunned. Rage came quickly, then he saw the rope John Thomas Bonny and Wood Palmer were swinging over the branch of a gnarled oak. Fear followed. “I never killed nobody.”
“Listen to this, boys.” Billy T. gave a cackle while his eyes staved dark and flat on Toby’s. “He says he didn’t do it.”
Even through terror, Toby recognized that they were all piss-yourself drunk. That only made them more dangerous.
One of the others leaned on his shotgun and brought a pint of Black Velvet to his lips. “Might as well hang him for a liar, too.”
“His neck’ll stretch just the same. You nigger boys can dance, can’t you?” Billy T. grinned until his eyes turned to slits. “You’re going to do some dancing tonight. Why, your feet ain’t even going to touch the ground. When you finish dancing, we’re going to burn your place to the ground.”
Fear turned Toby’s bowels to ice. They would kill him. He could see that in their eyes. He would fight them, and he would lose. But he couldn’t lose his family as well.
He shoved the rifle, felt the bullet sear his rib cage as it exploded. “Winnie!” He shouted in despair and terror. “Run. Get the children and run!” As he clutched at his wounded side, Billy T. brought the rifle butt down in his face.
“Coulda killed him.” On a nervous giggle, Billy T. wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. “Coulda blown a hole in his belly, but that’s not the way. We’re gonna hang him,” he yelled to the others. “Drag him on over.”
He saw the woman rush out, shotgun blasting. In her terror, Winnie fired wide. Billy T. backhanded her and knocked the gun clear. “Lookie here.” He snatched the struggling woman around the waist. “She’s going to protect her man.” When she clawed at him, he struck her again so that she fell dazed to the porch. “Hold on to her, Woody. Truss her up. When that cocksucker wakes up, we’ll show him how it feels to have his woman raped.”
“I ain’t raping no woman,” Wood muttered, already having doubts about the whole night’s work.
“Then you can watch, too.” Billy T. reached down and yanked Winnie down the steps by the hair. “Take hold of her, goddammit. John Thomas, you go in and bring those nigger kids out here. They got a lesson to learn.”
Winnie began to scream, one keening wail after another. She kicked and bit and clawed as Wood bound her hands behind her back.
There was a shout from the house, a curse and a crash. John Thomas staggered back out to the doorway, his shoulder seeping blood. “He cut me.” Holding out one bloody hand, he stumbled to his knees. “The little fucker cut me.”
“Christ almighty, can’t even handle a kid.” Billy T. walked over to examine his brother’s wound. “You’re bleeding like a stuck pig. One of Y’all bind this up. Keep an eye on the house. That boy comes out, do what you have to do.” Near where the cross burned, Toby began to groan and stir. “I’m going to do this myself. For Darleen.” He leaned over. One of Toby’s eyes had swollen shut, but there was fear in the other. Billy T. fed on it.
It was power. He tasted it and found it heady. All his life he’d been second rate. Now he was about to do something important, even heroic. No one would ever look at him the same way again.
“I’m going to put this noose around your neck, boy.” He reached up and snagged it. Dragging Toby to a kneeling position, he pulled the loop of rope around Toby’s neck. “I’m going to tug it nice and tight.” He slid the knot down until it pressed evilly against flesh. “But we’re not going to string you yet. First I’m going to do to your wife what you did to those white women.” He grinned as Toby fought against the rope and gag. “Only I bet I can make her like it. And when she’s yelling for more, we’re going to hang you.”
“I don’t hold with raping no woman,” Wood said, firmly this time. Snarling, Billy T. whirled, bringing the gun up with him.
“You just shut the fuck up, then. It ain’t rape, it’s justice.”
“I can’t stop this bleeding.”
Billy T. glanced over to where one of the men tried to staunch the wound on his brother’s shoulder. “Well then, let him bleed for a goddamn minute. Won’t kill him.” He was losing them. He could feel it in the way the men were shifting their feet, shifting their eyes away from the woman who lay bleeding on the ground.
He set his gun down and unbuckled his belt. He was already hard at the idea of taking a woman by force. Once they saw how it was, what kind of man he was, they’d be behind him again.
“Somebody’s coming, Billy.”
“Probably that Will. Always was a day late and a dollar short.”
He stepped over to Winnie, straddled her. He hooked a hand in the bodice of her nightgown when the car fishtailed to a halt, kicking dust as rifl
e fire split the air.
“I got this pointed right at your balls, Billy T.” Tucker stepped out of the car, skin twitching at the idea of having guns aimed at him. “It’s got more of a kick than I do, I guarantee.”
“This ain’t your concern.” Billy T. straightened, cursing himself for setting his weapon aside. “We come out here to do what should have been done already.”
“Yeah, burning crosses is your style. Like killing an unarmed man.” He saw the blood on Winnie’s face and was sickened. “Hitting women. It takes a lot of guts to come out here, what, six of you against one man, a woman, and a couple of kids.”
“This nigger’s been killing our women.”
Tucker merely lifted a brow. “For all I know, you’ve been doing it.”
“We’re hanging us a killer tonight. You think you can stop us? You and your drunken brother?” He hauled Winnie up in front of him and took two backward steps to reach his gun. “Seems to me there’s six of us and two of you.”
Another set of headlights sliced the dark, and Della’s Olds cruised to a halt. Three women stepped out with rifles.
“Remind me to give them all hell later,” Tucker muttered to Dwayne. “Looks like the odds just changed,” he said to Billy T. “Evened up quite a bit.”
“You think we’re worried about a bunch of women?”
To show her feelings about that, Della let off a shot that plowed the earth between Wood’s feet. “Y’all know I can shoot. And these two ladies here, well, they’re liable to get lucky. Caroline, you aim that Winchester at that asshole bleeding by the porch. He ain’t liable to be moving around too much, so you should get a clean shot.”
Caroline swallowed, then shouldered the rifle.
“Fuck this.” Wood tossed down his gun. “I ain’t shooting at no women any more than I’d be raping one.”
“Then you might want to step out of the line of fire,” Tucker advised him. “Looks like it’s five to five.” His lips curved as he heard the siren. “And that’s about to change. Now, if I were you, Billy T., I’d set that woman down, real gentle like. Otherwise, my finger’s going to slip and I’m going to blow a hole through your brother.”
“Jesus Christ, Billy, put her down.” John Thomas scrambled back against the steps.
Billy T. licked his lips. “Maybe I’ll put one through you.”
“I expect you could. But since you can’t work that rifle one-handed, you’ll have to put her down just the same. Then we’ll take our chances.”
“Put her down, Billy,” Wood said quietly. “The gun, too. This is crazy business here.” He turned to the others. “This is crazy business.”
In agreement, they tossed down their guns.
“You’re standing alone now,” Tucker pointed out. “You can die alone, too. Doesn’t make a damn bit of difference to me.”
In disgust, Billy T. dropped Winnie to the ground, where she began to sob and crawl toward her husband. After tossing his gun aside, he started to walk toward his car.
“I’d stand where you are,” Tucker said quietly.
“You won’t shoot me in the back.”
Tucker squeezed off a round that shattered the windshield. “The hell I wouldn’t.”
“Go ahead and do it,” Cousin Lulu suggested. “Save the taxpayers money.”
“That’s enough.” Caroline wiped sweaty hands on her jeans and hurried over to Winnie. “There’s nothing to worry about now.”
“My babies.”
“I’ll go to them in just a minute.” She fought the knot loose from Winnie’s wrists, hoping to free her before the children saw it. But they were already racing out of the house, Jim still carrying the butcher knife stained with John Thomas’s blood, and the little girl tripping over the hem of her nightgown.
“Here now.” Caroline dragged the noose over Toby’s head. Her vision wavered with tears as she took the bloody knife to cut his bonds. “You’re hurt.” Her fingers came away wet as she touched his side. “Somebody call the doctor.”
“We’ll get him to the hospital.” Tucker knelt down. Burke and Carl were already reading Billy T. and the others their rights. “What do you say, Toby? Up to a ride?”
He was holding his family, his good eye leaking tears as he gathered them close. “Guess I could stir myself.” He tried a wan smile while Winnie wept against his chest. “You driving?”
“You bet.”
“We’ll get there fast anyway.”
“There you go. Dwayne, give me a hand here. Della, you take the kids on down to Sweetwater. Caroline.” Tucker looked around as she stood and walked away. “Where are you going?”
She didn’t look back. “To get a hose and put out this obscenity.”
chapter 26
Screams shimmied on the hot air. High pitched howls echoed, chased by shrieks of wild laughter. Colored lights flashed and blinked and whirled, turning the fallow Eustis Field into a fantasy of motion.
The carnival had come to Innocence.
People readily dug out their spare change to be caught by the Octopus, whirled by the Zipper, and scrambled by the Round-Up.
Kids went racing by, their shouts and squeals rising above the piping calliope music, their fingers sticky with cotton candy, their cheeks puffed out with corn dogs or stuffed with fried dough. Teenagers scrambled to impress one another by knocking down bottles, ringing bells, or—in the words of one daredevil—riding the Scrambler till they puked.
Many of the older set settled for bingo at a quarter a card. Others touched by gambling fever lost their paychecks trying to outsmart the Wheel of Fortune.
To anyone traveling over Old Longstreet Bridge, it would look like an ordinary summer carnival on the outskirts of an ordinary small, southern town. The lights and the echo of that calliope might bring a tug of nostalgia to the travelers as they passed by.
But for Caroline, the magic wasn’t working.
“I don’t know why I let you talk me into coming here.”
Tucker swung his arm over her shoulders. “Because you can’t resist my fatal southern charm.”
She stopped to watch hopefuls pitching coins at glassware that could be had at any respectable yard sale for half the price. “It doesn’t seem right, with everything that’s happened.”
“I don’t see what a night at a carnival’s going to change. Unless it’s to make you smile a little.”
“Darleen’s going to be buried on Tuesday.”
“She’s going to be buried Tuesday whether you’re here tonight or not.”
“Everything that happened last night—”
“Has been taken care of,” he finished. “Billy T. and his asshole friends are in jail. Doc says Toby and Winnie are doing just fine. And look here.” He pointed to where Cy and Jim were squished together in a cup of the Scrambler, eyes wide, mouths open in laughing howls as they were spun in mad circles. “Those two are smart enough to grab a little fun when it’s offered.”
Tucker pressed a kiss to her hair and continued to walk. “You know why we call this Eustis Field?”
“No.” A smile ghosted around her lips. “But I’m sure you’re about to tell me.”
“Well, Cousin Eustis—actually, he’d have been an uncle, but there’re so many greats in there it gets confusing—he wasn’t what you’d call a tolerant man. He ran Sweetwater from 1842 until 1856, and it prospered. Not just the cotton. He had six children—legitimately—and about a dozen more on the other side of the sheets. Word was he liked to try out the female slaves when they came of age. That age being about thirteen, fourteen.”
“That’s despicable. You named a field for him?”
“I’m not finished.” He paused to light half a cigarette. “Now, Eustis, he wasn’t what you’d call an admirable man. It didn’t bother him at all to sell off his own children—the dark-skinned ones. His wife was a papist, a devoted one, who used to beg him to repent his sins and save his soul from a fiery hell. But Eustis just kept doing what came naturally to him.”
“Naturally?”
“To him,” Tucker said. Behind him, a bell clanged as some hotshot proved his strength and impressed his girl into rapturous squeals. “One day a young female slave took off. She had the baby Eustis had fathered with her. Eustis didn’t tolerate runaways. No indeed. He set out the men and the dogs, and rode out himself to hunt her down. He was riding across this field when he shouted out that he’d spotted her. She wouldn’t have had much of a chance with him on horseback and a whip in his hand. Then his horse reared. Nobody knows why—might’ve been spooked by a snake or rabbit. Or maybe it was that fiery hell reaching out to grab old Eustis. But he broke his neck.” Tucker took a last drag on his cigarette, then flung it away. “Right about there, where that Ferris wheel’s standing. Seems fitting somehow, don’t you think? That all these people, black and white—maybe some with a dribble or two of Eustis Longstreet’s blood—should be kicking up their heels on this field where he met his Maker.”
She leaned her head against his shoulder. “What happened to the girl, and her baby?”
“Funny thing about that. Nobody else saw them. Not that day or any day after.”
She took a deep breath of candy-scented air. “I’d like a ride on the Ferris wheel.”
“Wouldn’t mind it myself. Afterward, how’d you like me to win you one of those black velvet paintings of Elvis?”
Laughing, she hooked an arm around his waist. “Words fail me.”
“Don’t you want to play some bingo, Cousin Lulu?” Ever hopeful, Dwayne pressed a hand to his jittery stomach.
“What the hell do I want to sit around putting beans on a card for?” Lulu stomped up to the ticket booth to buy another roll. “We only been on the Round-Up once, and missed the Scrambler altogether. That Crack the Whip’s worth another go or two.” She stuffed the tickets in the pocket of her army surplus slacks. “You’re looking a might green, boy. Indigestion?”
He swallowed gamely. “You could call it that.”
“Shouldn’t have eaten all that fried dough before we took a spin. Best thing to do is bring it up, empty your stomach.” She grinned. “A round on the Scrambler’ll take care of that.”