Bounty (Colorado Mountain #7)

by Kristen Ashley

  Not Alec.

  Jeans, boots, wide leather belt, sports jacket that looked tailored for him (probably a present from Susie Shepherd) and a nice shirt.

  Alec was a big guy even when he was a kid, just kept growing and growing. Dad used to say if he didn’t stop his head would touch the clouds. Mom thought Alec and my brother Morrie were best friends because they were both the biggest kids in the class and it just grew from that. Morrie grew out as well as up, however. Alec just grew tall and broad but stayed lean. Alec was tight end to Morrie’s offensive lineman during high school, and in all things life. Morrie did the grunt work and never got the glory. Alec knew how to block and was really good at it but every once in a while he got the chance to shine.

  Alec’s dark hair was too long but he’d always worn it too long, even as a kid. But he’d done it then because his mother was such a shit mother. She never remembered to get it cut. My mom finally ended up taking Alec to the barber when she took Morrie. Later he kept it long just because he was Alec. It curled around his ears and neck now and, as with everything Alec, it looked a little wild.

  I stood there and watched silently as he made it to me and Marty, his eyes never leaving me. He didn’t even look at Angie.

  “Feb,” he said on a short nod.

  “Alec,” I replied.

  His eyes were a weird color; light brown with a hint of gold. His dad had the same eyes but his dad’s eyes weren’t exactly like Alec’s. Alec’s dad’s eyes were mean.

  Those eyes got hard as did his mouth when I called him Alec. They always did. Everyone called him Colt. Everyone. Even my mom and dad started calling him Colt after what happened years ago.

  Only his folks and I called him Alec anymore, not that he talked to his folks since his dad was in prison for the second time and his mom was never sober and he never spoke to her. Not that I talked much to him either.

  He hated it when I called him Alec but I didn’t call him Alec to be a bitch or anything, just that he was Alec to me, he always had been.

  “Colt,” Chris said, calling his attention and Alec looked his way.

  That was when he caught sight of Angie.

  I looked at her too and wished I hadn’t. I’d already seen enough, too much, so much I’d never forget.

  I’d gone to high school with Angie. We’d been friends once upon a time, good friends. You could say we still were, but not good ones.

  No, we weren’t anything anymore because now she was dead.

  Alec’s midsection came into my vision and cut off sight of Angie. I lifted my eyes to Alec’s face, which was still hard but now he was directing his hard look at Marty.

  “Why’s she out here?” he asked, sounding pissed-off.

  “What?” Marty asked back, sounding as usual, confused.

  “Jesus, Marty,” Alec muttered, still sounding pissed and his eyes cut to me. “Go inside, Feb.”

  I stared at him and didn’t move a muscle.

  “Feb, inside,” he repeated.

  I still stared at him.

  He took a step toward me and said low, “February.”

  My body jerked and I nodded. Inside would be good. Inside would be fucking awesome.

  I went inside, headed directly to Morrie and my office—Mom and Dad’s old office, the office Morrie and Alec and I practically grew up in—and coffee. I could still taste the vomit in the back of my mouth. I hadn’t actually puked but it had threatened.

  I was pouring a cup when Morrie came in.

  Alec was big but my brother was enormous. He was also demonstrative.

  He walked right up to me, took the coffee cup from my hand, plunked it down, yanked the coffeepot out of my other hand, slid it under the filter and then engulfed me in a hug.

  I should have started crying then, I suppose. But I didn’t.

  “You okay, Feb?” Morrie asked, and I nodded, my cheek sliding against his big, barrel chest.

  I wondered briefly why he was there. It wasn’t his turn to open, it was mine.

  My guess, Alec had called him.

  “Sis,” he whispered at my nod and I closed my eyes. He didn’t call me “sis” very often anymore. Hadn’t since we were kids. I missed it.

  Still, no tears came.

  “You want coffee?” I asked.

  Morrie pulled away and gave me a look.

  He didn’t like what he saw, I knew it but he still said, “Yeah.”

  I made him a cup and we were taking sips when Alec filled the doorframe.

  In the light I caught sight of the scar under his left eye. It was a little, puckered crescent moon, about the size of your thumbnail. I thought that was weird, it being that small, considering at the time it was made it bled a whole helluva lot.

  As it did anytime I saw it, it made flashbacks flood my brain. Flashbacks of Alec, sixteen years old and sitting silent on the toilet seat in my mom and dad’s bathroom and me, fourteen, standing there wiping the blood off his face with one of Mom’s wet washcloths. Morrie coming in, giving me ice, me wrapping it up and holding it to the gaping cut under Alec’s swelling eye. My dad walking in, taking in Alec, his bloodied face, his knuckles torn, bleeding and swollen, the way he held his body like if he moved it would be torture, and saying, “Police are going to your place, Colt, you’re going with me. Jackie and the kids to the hospital.”

  That was the first time my father called him Colt. He never addressed him as anything else since.

  “Jesus, what the fuck, Colt?” Morrie said upon seeing him. “Mom and Dad’s bar? Seriously? Who the fuck would do that?”

  Alec’s gaze flicked to Morrie and he shook his head.

  This was a good question, I thought. A dead body behind their bar? Crazy. My mom and dad were beloved in this town. So were their parents. So was Morrie.

  Me? I wasn’t sure. Maybe.

  Or at least, I once had been.

  “You called nine one one,” Alec said, and I looked at him though I didn’t quite meet his eyes.

  “Yeah.”

  “You found her?” Alec asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “What were you doing in the alley?”

  I stared at him not seeing, then said, “Darryl.”

  “Fuck. Fuckin’ Darryl,” Morrie muttered, now he sounded pissed.

  “Darryl?” Alec asked.

  “He never takes out the trash at night. I tell him, every night. Guy’s got nothin’ between his ears,” Morrie explained, telling the God’s honest truth about Darryl and pulling a hand through his thick hank of blond hair. “Leaves it at the back door and forgets. First person in in the morning, usually me or Feb, take it out.”

  This wasn’t exactly true. The first person in in the morning was usually me, not Morrie. Though, I had to admit, on occasion, namely my rare days off, it happened.

  “You on last night?” Alec asked me, and I shook my head.

  “Night off,” I told him.

  “I was on,” Morrie put in.

  Alec turned to Morrie. “Angie here?”

  Morrie nodded. “Dude, she’s always here.”

  This was true. Angie was a regular. She also regularly wore slut clothes and regularly got shitfaced and regularly picked up anyone who would fuck away whatever demons tortured her. Though obviously these efforts never lasted long because she was always back again, usually the next night. Angie wasn’t hard on the eyes if you didn’t look too close and see what her lifestyle was doing to her skin. There was no lack of choice for Angie.

  “She go home with someone?” Alec asked Morrie.

  Morrie moved his neck in that funny way he did when he was uncomfortable, like he was pulling at a too tight collar and tie, even though he was wearing a t-shirt with a zip-up hooded sweatshirt over it and his hand never moved.

  Then he said, “Cory.”

  “Fuckin’ hell,” Alec muttered and he could say that again.

  Cory’s wife Bethany was pregnant with their third child. Bethany was also a screamer. And Bethany was going to ha
ve a shit fit. It wasn’t the first time Cory strayed. Hell, Cory came on to me practically any time he got hammered enough to pull up the courage. It wasn’t the first time he dipped his wick in Angie either. This also wasn’t going to be the first time Bethany found out about Angie. Though it would be the first time Angie showed up the next morning dead in an alley and Cory would be involved in a murder investigation.

  “You see anyone last night? Unfamiliar? Give you a bad feeling?” Alec asked Morrie and I knew this was brother-speak.

  Alec would lay his career down on Morrie telling him he had a bad feeling about someone. Both of them could read people like books, something they could do forever. I’d never been able to lie successfully to either of them, not once, and I’d tried. It wasn’t surprising Alec became a cop. It was natural-born even if on the face of it, considering his parents and, well, how he used to be, you wouldn’t know it. It also wasn’t surprising Morrie took over the bar. Even in our town—which wasn’t huge but also wasn’t small—the clientele was regular. Still, trouble could happen, especially when the races were on and anyone could wander in. You had to be able to weed the good from the bad so you could lock down the bad before shit happened.

  “Nope, no one. Normal night at Jack and Jackie’s,” Morrie answered.

  Alec looked at me. “Where’s the trash?”

  I again stared and repeated, “The trash?”

  “You said you went out to the alley to take out the trash. Crime scene, far’s I can see, is unaltered. Where’s—?”

  Alec stopped talking because I started moving. I wasn’t thinking much of anything. I didn’t even know why I was moving.

  I plunked my coffee cup down, walked past Alec and went to the bar. The heavy panel was already up and over on its hinges where I guessed I’d put it when I went in to make the 911 call. I walked behind the bar and stared at the two huge bags of garbage that were sitting on the floor by the phone.

  I hadn’t even noticed I’d carried them back in and dropped them to make the call.

  I turned around and saw Alec was standing close, his eyes on the trash.

  “I just went to the door,” I told his throat, seeing his neck twist, his chin dipping down to look at me but my eyes didn’t move. “I just went to the door,” I repeated then my head jerked, my ear going toward my shoulder and I felt a weird pain in the back of my neck at the sudden movement. “I just went to the door,” I said again, for some stupid reason now whispering, “opened the door and saw her.”

  That’s when I cried.

  I didn’t feel anything, didn’t see anything, didn’t hear anything, didn’t taste the coffee in my mouth, just cried hard while my brain filled.

  I saw her. I saw Angie and all her blood and all her exposed parts. Parts I should never see. Parts with skin, parts without, all of it, all of her, lying lifeless in the alley by the dumpster.

  Then I heard Alec say, “I got her,” and I realized his arms were around me.

  I pulled away and stepped away. Distance with Alec, hell with anyone, but especially with Alec, was good.

  I swiped at my eyes, controlling the tears, not looking at him. “I’m okay.”

  There was silence for a while but Morrie moved in close to me. I could feel his bulk filling the long space behind the bar.

  “You gotta walk me through your morning,” Alec said and I didn’t want to but I lifted my eyes to his.

  “What?”

  “Walk me through your morning, Feb,” Alec repeated.

  “I came in to get ready to open—” I started.

  “Your full morning,” Alec interrupted.

  I felt my mouth open, my lips parting. I could feel the sensation of skin separating from skin like it was the first time I’d ever done it when I knew I’d done it before. It just didn’t feel like it then. It felt like the first time and it felt like my lips parted in slow motion.

  I wished I’d brought my coffee with me.

  “I woke up—”

  “What time?”

  I shook my head. “Normal time. Seven o’clock, seven thirty.”

  “You get up at seven thirty?” Morrie asked, like I had a screw loose.

  “Yeah.”

  “Shit, Feb, we own a bar,” Morrie stated. “How do you get up at seven thirty?”

  “I don’t know, I just do.” And I did. Even if I lay my head down at three thirty in the morning, I woke up between seven and seven thirty. It was a curse.

  “You woke up. What next?” Alec cut in giving Morrie a shut up look. I’d seen him do that a lot over the years. Usually Morrie didn’t shut up. This time he did.

  “I fed the cat—”

  “Did you do it alone?” Alec asked.

  I stared at him then said, “Feed the cat?”

  He shook his head but it was a rough motion, jerky. “Wake up.”

  I sucked in breath, not wanting to answer the question, not wanting Alec to have that information, either answer I could give. But knowing I had to, I nodded.

  He nodded his head, that motion was rough and jerky too. “What’d you do after you fed your cat?”

  “I did yoga.”

  Alec’s brows snapped together and now he was looking at me like I had a screw loose. “You do yoga?”

  “Well…yeah.”

  He looked away muttering, “Christ.”

  I didn’t know what was wrong with yoga but I didn’t ask. I wanted this to be done. In fact, I wanted the day to be done, the year, I wanted it to be a year from now when all this would be faded and a whole lot less real.

  “Like I was saying, I did yoga, took a shower and then walked to Meems’.”

  “Anyone see you walk to Meems’?” Alec asked.

  “What’s this about?” Morrie sounded like he was getting pissed.

  “Just let me ask the questions. It’ll be over and we can move on,” Alec answered.

  “Jessie,” I cut in, still on a mission to get my story out so this could be over and we could move on. “I walked to her place and then Jessie walked with me to Meems’.”

  Jessie Rourke and Mimi VanderWal were my best friends, had been since high school.

  “You and Jessie went to Meems’, what next?” Alec asked.

  “We hung out at Meems’, had coffee, a muffin, shot the shit, the same as every day,” I answered. And it was the same as every day, although sometimes Jessie didn’t come with and it was just me and my journals, or a book or the paper, and my cup of coffee and muffin at Meems’.

  I preferred when Jessie was there. Meems owned the joint and by the time I got there it was a crush so she didn’t have time to gab. She had a plaque that said “reserved” that she put on my table, though everyone knew it was my table and no one ever sat there in the mornings but me. She didn’t need the plaque, one of her kids carved into the table, “Feb’s Spot, sit here and die.” Meems’ kids were a bit wild but they were funny.

  “When’d you leave Meems’?” Alec asked.

  I shrugged. “Ten o’clock, probably around there. Came straight here.” Coming straight to J&J’s wasn’t far. It was two doors down from Mimi’s Coffee House. “I opened up, started the coffee going and went to the back hall to take out the trash I knew was probably there. It was there. I opened the door, grabbed the bags and—”

  I stopped and looked down at the garbage bags beside me. The rest didn’t need to be said.

  Alec’s voice came at me. “You see anything else, Feb?”

  I took in a breath because I needed it and I thought it was a big one but it felt shallow. My chest felt empty like I could breathe and breathe but there was not enough breath to fill it, never would be again and I looked at him.

  “Anything else? Anyone in the alley when you went out?”

  Morrie got closer to me, his arm sliding around my shoulders. “Jesus, Colt. What the fuck you sayin’?”

  “She’s warm,” Alec answered, his words were clipped, short, bitten off like he didn’t want to say them but he had to and he wanted th
em out of his mouth as fast as he could do it.

  “Warm?” I asked.

  I watched his teeth sink into his bottom lip. I knew why he did this. I’d seen him do it a lot in my life. He did it when he was seriously, seriously hacked off.

  “The body,” he said. “Angie.”

  “What?” Morrie asked.

  “She’s still warm,” Alec answered. “She’s not been dead long.”

  “Oh my God,” I whispered. That empty feeling in my chest started burning. The vomit rolled back up my throat and I had to swallow it down.

  “Are you fucking shitting me?” Morrie exploded.

  “You see anything, Feb? Hear anything? Any movement? Anything?” Alec pushed. He wanted answers but he was going about it quiet, gentle.

  “Jesus fucking Christ,” Morrie cursed.

  “Morrie, you aren’t helping,” Alec told him.

  “Fuck that, Colt. My sister opened the door to a fresh murder scene!” Morrie bellowed. “You’re sayin’ the guy coulda been out there?”

  I felt my muscles seize.

  Alec either saw it or sensed it and his voice went scary when he said, “Morrie, for fuck’s sake, you aren’t fucking helping.”

  Morrie and Alec may have been best friends since kindergarten but they fought, a lot. It was never pretty and it could get physical. It hadn’t happened in a while but, then again, nothing this big had happened in a while.

  “I didn’t see anything,” I said quickly and I didn’t. And, at that moment, I was glad I didn’t.

  I didn’t want whoever did that to Angie to get away with it and, if I saw something, I wouldn’t lie even though it would scare the shit out of me. But I didn’t see anything and this was a relief.

  I wasn’t a bad person. But I wasn’t a good person either. I didn’t do good things like Alec did. I was just a normal person, I kept myself to myself. I also had been a bartender my whole adult life and grew up in a bar, not to mention I now part-ran one. So I kept other things to myself too. It was a job hazard. Everyone told you everything when they were hammered. Shit you did not want to know.

  But I’d have done the right thing for Angie.

  I just hoped Alec knew that.

  He looked me direct in the eye and I let him. This went on awhile and was very uncomfortable. Not that I had anything to hide, just that these days anytime Alec stared me direct in the eye, it made me very uncomfortable. I’d been able to avoid it mostly for years, but now there it was.