by W. Winters
In a single blink it’s gone, replaced by a narrow gaze and a teasing smirk. The air shimmers and I nearly second-guess what I saw. “There’s no one here …” His voice is deep and seems to rumble from his chest. “I could do anything I want to you.”
I know only days ago, the statement would elicit more fear than anything else. As he looks down at me, like a hunter at his prey, there isn’t anything I feel other than want.
He makes me want more than I ever thought possible. It’s all the teasing. It has to be the way he plays with me.
As if that is something that should turn me on. I’m a foolish girl and so very aware of it when I ask him, “And what is it that you want to do to me?”
Thump, thump, the thrumming in my veins provides such little heat compared to what I know he could give me. “It’s more …” he starts but then huffs a laugh and asks a question instead. “Would you kiss me still?”
“What?” Nothing he says tonight makes any sense. Not with what I currently know.
“Now that you don’t need me?”
Is that what caused the pain in his gaze? He’s truly mad.
“Do you want to kiss me?” he asks bluntly as I stand there, feeling as if I’m nothing beneath him and wondering how he could see me as anything at all.
“Yes.” I answer without thinking.
“How badly?”
My heart beats madly as I see the desperation in his cold eyes. On tiptoes, I kiss him. No thought at all, just a desire, a wish come true that didn’t take crossing a barren field and climbing up an old tree. A real kiss between a man and a woman. It’s tender, but quickly deepens. His hand splays against my back and braces me there.
Ever so slowly, I reach up, my hand resting on his collarbone and the other sneaking up.
It’s over far too quickly at the sound of tires in the distance, just beyond the tree line where the backroad is and where my car is parked.
The gentle moment vanishes, and without a goodbye, Marcus leaves, stalking toward the barn. I’d follow, but my name is carried with the wind.
“Delilah,” Cody’s voice calls out followed by the sound of a car door shutting.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
I’m sure he can tell something’s off—I can see it in the way he strides to me, at first deliberate and then slowed. My breathing is erratic and my mind races not knowing how to pick up the pieces of where I left off with Cody Walsh.
So much has happened since I met him in a darling coffee shop with a soft goodbye kiss. Too much to explain and far too complicated.
“Delilah,” he says and relief is evident in my name on his lips.
“Cody …I …” I struggle to put anything into words, pulling at my sleeve and meeting him halfway to where he is. The barn is at my right, the field at my back and in front of me, is a man who stares down with both worry and devotion.
“How did you know to find me here?” I ask rather than digging deep. I’ve just kissed his brother, a man who helped me help my mother get away with murder.
The confessions threaten to tumble out and smother me even in the fresh air.
“Your cell phone,” Cody says and his expression wrinkles with questions of his own.
“Right, right,” I say, turning away from him as the clouds return and the gray sky morphs to dark shades of blue in the skyline. It’s darker sooner this time of year.
There’s never been a time in my life where I caught sight of Cody and felt what I feel now. This feeling like I should be running and hiding from him is completely alien but still it seems like the right thing to do. The dread that seeps into my blood, weighing everything down like lead, keeps me planted right where I am.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call and I didn’t answer …” I push out the apology, needing it to be heard in its sincerity. “You didn’t deserve to worry.”
“Don’t be. I know why …” He’s calm, far too calm. As if he knows. My heart hammers and I wonder what information he’s gathered.
There’s a silence between us, and an uncomfortable prick at the back of my neck. I’m certain that somewhere, Marcus watches.
I want to tell him. When Cody looks at me like he is, with his hands slipping into his jean pockets, his Henley blowing slightly in the wind but still firm on his broad shoulders, I want to wrap my fingers in the light gray fabric and pull him closer. I want to confide in my friend and be held by my lover.
I don’t deserve an ounce of that want. I’ve ruined it; I’ve sacrificed us … even if he doesn’t know.
“I’m sorry about your father,” he finally speaks. Glancing behind him, for only a moment, I see my father standing there at the entrance to the barn, locking it and telling me this is no place for kids. To go away unless I want to work.
His voice is so clear in my memory. My eyes prick and that could be the wind, it could be the unforgiving breeze. But my throat getting tight isn’t from the weather.
“Thank you,” I say in a nearly inaudible whisper. “You followed me here to give me your condolences?”
“Don’t do that,” he says, scolding my sarcasm, but it’s not in a superior way. There’s only pain that lays in his words.
“I just … I’m not well right now,” I say, giving him the honest answer. I don’t want Marcus watching us. Not when Cody doesn’t know it. Not when I just kissed him. “I’m not doing well.”
“We need to talk about this.”
“We don’t, though,” I say and shake my head in denial.
“They brought me on the case.” His tone is firm when he answers.
And for a moment I pause.
“The case? My father’s murder?” That’s what he wants to talk about … not us? I deserve the pain that grips me and tears me into two. “I don’t want to talk about this right now …”
“We can’t wait on this, Delilah.” Cody doesn’t let up and I know just looking at him that he’s not going to let me walk away and hide. He’s not going to back off, not a single step. It’s an indescribable pain, knowing that there is no way to go back and how badly I’ve hurt him and ruined us.
I don’t want him to know. If I could keep it from him and let him down easy, it would be best, wouldn’t it?
“There are questions …” he continues and I have to close my eyes, taking in a steadying breath. With everything between us, the tension, the disappointment … the last thing I want to think about is my father’s death. A snide voice hisses, it’s murder in the back of my mind. Your father’s murder, not death.
“Can we talk about it another time?” I ask although I don’t wait for a response and turn away from him, wanting to get to my car. With the sun hidden behind the clouds, the autumn turned brutal without any warning.
Cody’s quick to grab my wrist. It’s not so much that it hurts or that it jostles me. The firm grasp only keeps me from moving away, but it’s the desperation in his touch that has my eyes pinned to his and my breath stolen.
My heart races.
“I fucked up, Delilah,” he says just beneath his breath. His ever-confident tone is shaken and his gaze falls before mine. Glancing behind me, an act that sends a chill down my spine, knowing that Marcus could be and probably is watching.
My shoulders shudder with the cold breeze as I wrench my hand away, although my flats are firmly planted where they stand.
“I know he spoke to you,” Cody whispers even though, to his knowledge, there’s no one here to eavesdrop. The breeze blows through the tree leaves and another chill runs through me.
Ever the gentleman, Cody removes his jacket, but he doesn’t lay it across my shoulders. Instead he offers it as if he’s not sure that I’ll take it.
In a formfitting Henley, snug on his shoulders, he looks back at me with a softness in his blue eyes. “Please, even if you’re angry.” My pulse weakens watching him struggle in front of me. His eyes are rimmed with red and the chill has bitten his cheeks, turning them a pink hue to match the tip of his nose.
Reaching out to
grab it, I take a half step closer to him and slip his jacket around my shoulders, even if it is far too oversized for me. The warmth is immediate, blanketing me as if it’s safe now. As If nothing can hurt me beneath the shield of this man.
With his hands in his jean pockets, Cody says, “I know he spoke to you and I’ve lied. I’ve kept things from you.”
The world blurs behind him.
“There are so many reasons I can’t—I couldn’t.” He’s quick to correct himself but that mistake forces him to heave in a flustered breath.
“Just tell me the truth,” I plead with him.
“That’s what I want to do, Delilah.” His eyes hold nothing but sincerity. “I want to tell you everything.”
Marcus
Twelve years ago
Some things never change. Like the streetlamp on Parkway Avenue coming on before the rest of the lights in the vicinity. Or the bench outside of the hardware store being fully occupied with high school kids. The roll of wheels from skateboards and the chatter bring back memories.
Back then, they were the big kids. Now I’m around their age, maybe older.
The keys clang in my hand as I twirl them around my fingers. The small shop area used to be bustling this late at night. I noticed the new mall down the highway coming in and wondered if it would affect the stores here.
Maybe some things do change.
I don’t even know what I’m doing here.
Things are tedious upstate and I may have been a little reckless. While the heat dies down, it’s best to get away. I could have gone anywhere, though. Nothing explains why I ended up here in the town I grew up in.
With a few hundred dollars in my pocket, and a car to stay in, I could go just about anywhere. So long as I don’t get caught, I’m golden. The fake license, the fake storylines—it’s all worked out well for me these last two years. It’s easy to make necessary acquaintances when you know people. And more importantly, when they know your name.
It’s best they don’t see my face, though, or ever meet me in person. I’m far too young. I’ve had to kill too many men already for their arrogance and laughter when they see me. I can’t risk a damaged reputation because some old fuck doesn’t know what’s good for him.
Like I said, it’s tedious. And I needed to get away for a while.
The jingling stops, the clatter of skateboards hitting the sidewalk and the rev of engines at the streetlight behind me turning to white noise. None of it makes any noise at all when I stare straight ahead. Because I see them. Cody’s still living with my uncle. A smirk kicks my lips up as I think, I might be as tall as him now.
They walk side by side, Cody right at Uncle Myron’s height. Although it’s obvious he’s younger. He should be headed to college. I saw online and on social media. He got into a few good schools but he hasn’t decided yet where he wants to go.
He’s got a girlfriend too and a job at my uncle’s friend’s construction site.
He wants to be a cop, though. My brother … a cop.
Shaking my head, I wave off the woman who stopped to ask if I’m all right. “Fine,” I answer her and her brow wrinkles. Before I can head out, following down the path Cody and Uncle Myron just took, she asks me, “Are you a Walsh?”
I’ve practiced my expressions a million times. It’s a way to keep people from knowing what you’re thinking. Or vice versa to control a situation. Still, I feel my own expression fall.
Just like how the feeling of dread drops into the pit of my stomach.
I don’t recognize her. Not in the least. The tight white curls that stop above her shoulders may have been dark brown locks long ago. I don’t know who she is, but with that questioning look in her eyes, I can see that she remembers me.
“No ma’am,” I say, putting on a slight Southern accent. “Have a good evening.”
With the dull thud in my chest and the numbing tingling on my skin, I head off with my hands in my pockets and search out my brother. I only look back once and the woman’s still standing there, a bag in one hand and a cane in the other. People move on, people stop talking, and people get forgotten.
Maybe it’s selfish for me not to want to forget Cody, when I’m doing everything I can for everyone to forget who I used to be.
He has everything going for him. I’ve kept an eye out for years. It helps me sleep at night to just check in.
He doesn’t need someone like me. He’s going to be a cop, for fuck’s sake. Melancholy drifts into the darkness of my mind when I turn the corner and no one’s there. Hell, maybe one day he’ll arrest me.
I wonder if he’d know it’s me. I don’t see how he would. I’m dead and long gone and he’s the man everyone thought he’d become.
“Hey kid,” I say, tilting my chin up at one of the smaller kids a good bit away from the others. In his striped shirt and baggy black pants with more pockets than anyone would know what to do with, he’s trying to do some trick on a skateboard that looks far too big for him. “Want to earn a dollar?”
“Yeah,” he says with his eyes wide.
“Would you go in there and get me a bag of jerky?” I ask him, digging out five dollars and handing it over.
“You just want me to buy you jerky?” he says, hesitantly staring at the money I’m holding out for him to take.
“It only costs a few bucks, bet it’ll be a bit more than a dollar left over.” His hazel eyes peer up at me and then shine with delight when I add, “And it’s all yours.”
“You got it, mister,” he says, picking up the skateboard at the same time as he snatches the five.
It would be easy to just buy the damn thing myself, but this is how you meet people. It’s how you build trust. And no one suspects kids. They don’t know what’s going on. They don’t talk to people and if they do, they aren’t taken seriously.
Maybe I shouldn’t set myself up here, not when some woman I don’t even know recognizes me.
I’m just … checking in and then I’ll be gone.
Back to the barn where I belong.
Cody
Nine years ago
This town is haunted. Or there’s someone following me. There isn’t any other explanation for it.
At first I thought it was nerves from starting this job. Working murder cases and being called out to dead body after dead body would take a toll mentally on anyone.
But I keep seeing him. I swear I see the same man over and over again.
I swallow thickly, the folded note tucked safely in my hand as I sit at the busy bar. I used to think I saw him back home too. Every so often, a block or two behind me. More than once I’ve chased after a figure that ran when I called out his name.
The grief counselors said it was in my head. But to follow me here?
I’m either haunted by him, or he’s here.
“Another?” the waitress asks and I nod my head, adding a yes, please. The first four beers should be enough. I’m already hearing his voice again and remembering the last time I said goodbye. It wasn’t good enough.
The regret is what I need to let go of. That’s what the therapist said, but if I let go of it, then I let go of him.
I could feel myself on the edge of crying. It wasn’t fair he was going to live with our aunt and I was going to our Uncle Myron’s. The lawyers didn’t want us split up, but the judge said it was for the best. We were to stay with family and that meant we were going separate ways.
So when Christopher hugged me and he started crying like I wanted to, I had to be strong. Dad would have wanted me to. I made it quick and then I ripped him off of me, telling him I’d see him soon and to act right.
I’ve carried that guilt and regret with me for as long as I can remember. As I sit here in the bar, it overwhelms everything and that should be my cue to stop drinking, but the beers come easy and the memories … I don’t want to let go of them.
“A love letter?” the waitress jokes, nodding her head at the note in my hand as the beer hits the bar top. I only huff a lau
gh and she gets the hint, taking off before I feel obligated to say anything more.
A small boy’s laughter resonates in the back of my mind, complete with a picture of my little brother smiling as he makes fun of me: a love letter.
He wouldn’t be a child any longer, though. And whoever wrote this, isn’t my brother. The second part of that statement is the one I’m hung up on.
I was a little messy with this one but you’ll help me, won’t you?
I’ve done what I can to help you and I know you want to help me too.
Now’s your chance. I’ve been looking forward to this. For so long. I miss you.
He didn’t sign a name. The note is written in blue ink and the handwritten font itself is unique. All the letter As are written two different ways. When I looked it up in the system, searching for a match so I could come up with a suspect list, I was shocked at the number of hits it got.
All over the tristate area and for all sorts of crime. From petty theft five years ago, to money laundering cases that led to murder and a wanted serial killer in this part of Pennsylvania. There was even a hit from an apology note dating back almost a decade ago. A brick was thrown into a small sandwich shop and food stolen. The apology note is what tipped me off. Christopher used to say sorry that way. I know it was wrong and I’ll make it right.
He always said that right after he said he was sorry. Always. The deep-down gut feeling just won’t let that go. The detectives working the case left a synopsis that sends a chill down my spine.
They suspected a young boy at first, or a very uneducated adult because of the grammar and spelling. As the crimes increased in intensity and number, they were able to narrow down the criminal profile. It was textbook how the crimes progressed.
Now he’s a serial killer. And a shadow who’s followed me for years.
The beer slips from my hand, luckily landing with a clank and then bottoming out on the tabletop. With a glance over my right shoulder, then the left, I pull my shit together.