by Webb, Peggy
“Mrs. Bellafontaine, I’m sorry that this happened. Let’s put it behind us, if not for our sakes, for Ruth’s sake.”
“That’s three times you’ve mentioned my daughter’s name. If you weren’t such a puritan, I’d say you had the hots for her. You wouldn’t be the first man.” Margaret Anne swiveled to study him in the faint glow coming from the lights outside the compound. “You do have the hots for her!”
He didn’t even bother to deny it. He knew her secret and she knew his. Her language was a crude description of a connection he had considered metaphysical, but Margaret Anne, who had let herself be pawed in the jungle like an animal, had seen the animal in him, had seen the desire that burned through him every time he looked at Ruth, thought of Ruth, spoke of Ruth. Perhaps he’d better examine the truth. Perhaps he was the one who needed to fly out of Africa and never return.
Margaret Anne held her torn bodice over her breasts and reached for the door.
“Don’t bother helping me out. I think we’ve already established that I’m no lady ... and you’re no gentleman.”
He waited under the dim lights until she was safely inside. There was no need to hurry now. He knew what he would find in the jungle.
Chapter 47
The sky was pale gray with an opalescence it always took on just before the sun made its appearance. Ruth had been awake for two hours and couldn’t stand the waiting anymore. She tiptoed from the bedroom and put the coffee on to perk. The smell braced her for the task ahead.
She knew it wouldn’t be easy. She also knew it would be best if she sought professional help. There were intervention groups, support groups, all sorts of groups trained to deal with alcoholics. Somehow the word seemed too harsh for dear, sweet Malone ... and the remedies. It would be best if she could change him with gentle persuasion.
And what about herself? How was she going to change the way she felt when she looked at his brother?
She must put Brett out of her mind, out of her heart. And she would. It was the only way her marriage would survive.
She poured herself some coffee and sat at the table, nursing the cup. The kitchen door swung open.
“Ruth! I have to talk to you.” Her mother stood poised in the doorway.
The cup tipped over, and the hot brown liquid ran down the side of the table. Ruth jumped out of the way, then grabbed a cloth and began to swab at the stain.
“Are you planning to ignore me, Ruth?”
Was she? If she’d been thirteen, she’d have run to her room and slammed the door. But she was no longer thirteen.
“Why did you come here, Margaret Anne?”
“Do I have to have a reason to come and tell my own daughter good-bye?”
“We said good-bye last night.”
“No. You said good-bye. I said, ‘Until we meet again.’ I’ve decided it’s time to meet again. I walked two miles to see you.” Margaret Anne pulled out a chair and sat at the table. “Are you going to offer me a cup of coffee, or has Africa completely robbed you of every social grace I struggled so hard to teach you?”
Ruth poured the coffee, but she didn’t sit down.
“I thought you had a plane to catch.”
“I thought marriage would change you, but no—you’re still the smart-mouthed girl you were back home in Mississippi.”
Ruth kept her silence. She didn’t intend to get into an argument with her mother. What good would it do? Nothing had changed between them, nor would ever change.
“I should never have allowed you to get out of hand. Look where it’s led you—straight into the bosom of a family with no more manners than a pack of jackals.”
“The Cordays are a fine family, respected worldwide.”
“Pity they don’t extend that same respect to their in-laws.”
“Malone has treated you with nothing but kindness.”
“I’m not talking about Malone. It’s Brett I’m talking about. Mr. High-and-Mighty himself.”
“Don’t you dare make slurs about Brett. He’s one of the finest men I’ve ever known!”
Margaret Anne shoved her coffee aside and stood, gripping the edge of the table.
“Talk about your husband and you barely blink an eyelash, but say anything about that bastard Brett and you get fighting mad. Why is that?”
“Leave. I won’t listen to any of your ugly accusations.”
Margaret Anne had truly intended only to say good-bye to her daughter one last time. Properly. As a mother should. She’d even harbored the faint hope that a quiet mother-daughter talk that Ruth had so studiously avoided the entire week would set everything right between them. But Ruth knew just how to get under her skin, knew just which buttons to push. By damn, she’d pushed the wrong one now. Margaret Anne was going to give her more than she’d bargained for.
“You want to know about ugly accusations? Well, I’ll tell you about ugly accusations. Ask Brett Corday what right he had to come sneaking up behind me in the jungle and preach to me about besmirching the almighty Corday name. Ask him who he was protecting when he ordered me back to the compound. His brother ... or his brother’s wife?”
Ruth’s white-knuckled grip on the kitchen counter told Margaret Anne she’d scored.
“What were you doing in the jungle?”
“As if you didn’t already know.”
“What were you doing, Mother?”
“What I do best.”
Margaret Anne didn’t even look back when she made her exit. The only way to survive was never to look back.
Ruth thought she was going to be sick. She wrapped her arms around herself and stood in the middle of the kitchen floor heaving.
Suddenly the rage she’d suppressed for years boiled to the surface. She grabbed her mother’s coffee cup and threw it against the wall. It shattered with a satisfying smash. Brown liquid stained the wall and spattered onto Ruth’s clothes. She threw her own cup, then another and another. There wasn’t enough china in the house to satisfy her thirst for destruction, not enough china in the world.
If somebody didn’t stop her, she was going to rip the whole house apart.
“Malone,” she screamed, racing toward the bedroom.
He lay on his back, so deep in his alcoholic slumber that it would have taken a circus parade with brass band and six elephants to wake him.
Standing in the same room with her husband, Ruth felt totally alone, just as she’d felt alone in the Big House in New Orleans with Max. The terrible emptiness spread through her so that she felt as if she were disappearing, piece by piece. Soon she’d be nothing more than a shadow, someone who could pass unnoticed through a crowd. Unless she got help. Unless she turned to the one person who could help her.
o0o
There was carnage everywhere. The giant body of the male silverback lay in the clearing in a pool of his own blood, headless and handless. Two of his wives lay six feet away, slain senselessly. The surviving gorillas in Petey’s group wandered between the bodies, pausing occasionally to squat and watch, as if vigilance would bring their leader and his favorite wives back from the dead.
Rage almost obscured Brett’s vision, but he pushed it aside. The important thing was to assess the damage, then take steps to ensure that the remaining gorillas were safe.
He counted the survivors, missed two young ones clinging high in the trees, then counted once more. Three gorillas dead. Two missing. Maymay and JoGina. Mere babies.
He searched for the young gorillas, being careful to stay far back from the young males. Already Johnny Jumpup was making noises of dominance. If he could establish himself quickly as leader, the remaining females would stay rather than migrate to another male, and the group would remain intact.
This slaughter was more than a routine poaching mission. Poachers took the heads for trophies, the hands for ashtrays. They didn’t steal the babies, for quick profit was their motive, and selling young gorillas on the black market was too complicated, too much trouble.
The first t
hing he had to do was notify Joseph and Malone. The next thing, bury the bodies.
As he headed back to his own vehicle, a bone-chilling scream ricocheted through him.
“Brett!”
His heart almost stopped. He’d know that voice anywhere.
Ruth called his name once more; then suddenly she burst through the clearing, her clothes ripped and torn by the merciless jungle growth and her face wet with tears.
“Ruth ...”
She raced blindly toward him, arms wide-open, saying his name over and over.
He didn’t stop to think, didn’t take time to question; he merely opened his arms and took her in. She cuddled against him like a child, sobbing so hard, her shoulders shook. He wove his hands into her soft hair and cradled her head.
For the moment it didn’t matter what had brought her to him, only that she had come. Ruth, whose control was as tight as his own, had come to him for comfort.
He soothed her with his voice and hands.
“I’m here, Ruth,” he crooned. “I’m here.”
She clung to him, her fingernails digging through his shirt into his skin. He’d have marks. Blessed marks. Evidence that she trusted him enough to cry in his arms, to be completely vulnerable with him.
“It’s all broken,” she whispered.
“What’s broken?”
“All of it. I broke all of it.”
She was incoherent, shivering, close to shock.
He wrapped his arms around her and pressed her close. Body heat, he told himself, knowing better—knowing he did it for himself.
“Shhh, it’s all right,” he said, knowing it wasn’t. Knowing that nothing would be all right for them, ever. “It’s all right, my love.”
“It’s broken. All broken.”
He could say all the endearments he’d wanted to say, and she wouldn’t hear. He could touch her freely and she wouldn’t know. Desperate with hunger, he pressed his lips against her cheek.
“Shhh, it’s all right. I’ll fix it for you. I’ll fix it, my darling.”
“Yes ... please,” she whispered. “Only you. Always you.”
For one magical moment she was his. He was the man she sought, the man she wanted, the man she trusted. Only him. Always him.
He could kiss her and she wouldn’t turn away. The knowledge coursed through him as heady and intoxicating as new wine.
“Ruth,” he whispered. “My sweet Ruth.”
He cradled her face in his palms, drinking her in with his good eye. She didn’t pull back, didn’t deny the truth. She was his, had been his from the moment she’d arrived in the Virungas, had been his from the beginning of time.
His lips brushed her hair, her eyelids, her cheeks. Her lips were close, tempting. He knew how they would feel under his lips, knew how they would taste, had known since the moment he saw her step out of the Jeep with his brother. .
She wove her hands through his hair. One small movement, even one as small as a cat’s whisker, and his lips would be touching hers.
Ruth longed for his kiss. Would it be so wrong? A brief, cathartic joining, a temporary respite from pain?
She slid her tongue over her bottom lip, catching tears ... and magic. For one fleeting moment her tongue touched his bottom lip. His breath whistled sharply through his lungs.
Don’t move, she silently pleaded. Don’t go away.
As if he could read her mind, he stayed close, holding her ... merely holding her. She’d waited all her life for a man whose arms were a haven, a man who could hear the truth without judging.
Through her mist of tears she saw the eye patch, saw the beloved planes of his face, the dark shadow of his beard, the thick wild hair that defied taming, that always looked as if he’d come down from the top of his mountain in the midst of a windstorm. All those things anchored her, softened the rage, lessened the horror of her mother’s latest betrayal. And Ruth knew she could survive. Once more she could pick up the pieces and go on. Because of Brett.
She let the tears pour down her face, unchecked.
“Brett ... I want so much.”
“I know. So do I.”
They both knew what she wanted. What he wanted.
A miracle.
He circled his fingers on her face, slowly, gently, as if he were memorizing her. She would do anything in the world to have him ... anything except betray his brother.
“Ruth.” Brett leaned back from her, and she knew he wouldn’t kiss her. Not then. Not ever. “Do you want to tell me why you’re crying?”
“My mother ... you found her ...”
“How did you know?”
“She told me.” She’d never heard Brett use any language not suitable for Sunday school—until that moment.
“I should have warned her,” he said. “I should have made her promise never to tell you.”
“I’m so ashamed.”
“Hush.” He held her hard against his chest. “You have nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing. Do you hear?”
“Yes, I hear.”
“Do you believe?”
“When you say it, it feels like the truth.”
Fragile as the wings of a dragonfly, she held on to trust, as she grasped the front of his shirt and indulged in a crying jag.
“It’s all right, Ruth. Cry it out.” He smoothed her hair and thanked whatever fates had smiled kindly that she had come to him.
But even as he thanked the fates, he wondered that Malone had let Ruth leave in such a state. What was wrong with his brother? Didn’t he know how to deal with anybody’s pain except his own?
As if she’d read his thoughts, Ruth lifted her head. With the back of her hand she wiped her tears away.
“I shouldn’t have come here ... to you ... like this.” She swiped at her tears once more, and he pulled out a handkerchief.
“Here. Let me.”
It was one last opportunity to touch her without guilt. Holding her chin in one hand, he wiped her tearstained cheeks.
“I don’t want Malone to know about Margaret Anne.”
“He’ll never know. No one will know. I took care of that.”
“He was sleeping when I left. It’s a miracle the china didn’t wake him up.”
“The china?”
“I threw it against the wall and broke it. I hope it’s not a family heirloom.”
Brett rammed the handkerchief into his pocket, furious at his brother. How could he sleep through shattering china unless he was drunk?
“It’s discount-store special. Don’t you worry about the china.”
There were far greater things to worry about. Things she hadn’t seen yet. Now that she was coherent, he maneuvered her back toward her Jeep. She glanced over her shoulder, then pressed her hand over her mouth.
“Oh, my God. How could this have happened?”
“Poachers.” It was the simplest explanation.
“We can’t just leave them here.”
“I’ll come back and deal with this.”
“I can help you.”
“No.” She got that stubborn look that told him she wasn’t about to be treated like a weakling. “I need you to stay at the camp with Cee Cee. I’ll go get Joseph and Malone to help me.”
“Of course. That makes sense. I’ll follow you in the Jeep.”
He wasn’t about to put her behind the wheel of a Jeep, not after the shocks she’d received.
“Leave it. I’ll pick up Malone, and he can drive it back.”
Ruth had always taken care of her own problems, took pride in her independence, but it felt so good to let go, just this once—to give all her problems to Brett and let him handle them. She wished she could curl up beside him and stay that way for the next few days, the next few weeks, even years, her head resting on his chest, her leg touching his, her hand curled into his, fingers twined.
But she was a married woman, and there was no longer any excuse for the kind of uninhibited behavior she’d shown. She sat on her side of the Jeep, holding on to t
he door handle.
The jungle was quiet, not even a breeze stirring the trees, as if the plants as well as the animals knew the tragedy that had befallen them, knew of the slaughter on the mountainside.
As they came closer to Brett’s camp, Ruth remembered the last time she’d been there, remembered the ribbon on his bed and the way Malone had defiled it. She had sworn never to go back.
“Brett ... I have to explain ... about your bed ...”
“No!” The word was more than a command; it was a denial. “It’s over and done with. Finished. What happened is between you and my brother.”
He believed she had lain in his bed deliberately, too anxious to mate with Malone to wait for an appropriate time, an appropriate place. She had to make him understand how it had been, how she hated having Malone touch her, how she shut her eyes and pretended to be somewhere else, anywhere except in the arms of her husband.
And yet, how could she say those things without betraying Malone, without making Brett somehow an accomplice in the betrayal of his brother?
Ruth kept her silence.
Chapter 48
Malone came rudely awake. Someone was shaking his shoulder. He opened his eyes, then wished he’d kept them shut. Brett was leaning over him scowling, a look that didn’t bode well.
“Time ‘zit?” Malone mumbled.
“You smell like a brewery.” Brett stalked across the room and tossed Malone’s pants to him. “Here. Put these on. I’ll have a pot of coffee in the kitchen.”
“Don’t want coffee.” He rolled onto his back and put the pillow over his face. “Want to sleep. Head feels like a watermelon.”
Brett jerked the pillow off his face and threw it against the wall—behavior totally out of character for him.
“What the hell?” Malone said.
“Get up under your own steam or under mine. Take your choice.”
“All right. Hold your horses. I can take a hint.”
Brett was not amused. Another bad sign.
“Go, already,” Malone said, sitting up and waving him off. “I’m halfway up.”
“I’ll be in the kitchen.”
Malone reached for his pants, and Brett stalked out of the bedroom.
Broken china was scattered all over the kitchen floor. It looked as if Ruth had broken every piece of china in the cabinets. Brett studied the destruction. Surely the knowledge of what her mother had done was not enough to cause such rage.