"Spoken like someone who's never had responsibility for a child!"
He went absolutely still. Seconds ticked by before his lips moved. "You're fired. Get out of here."
Edward began to cry as he wrapped his arms around her neck. "I'm sorry, Mommy. I tried not to let him see me, but he catched me."
Her heart pounded, and her legs felt like rubber. She wanted to rage at Bonner for frightening him, but that would only upset Edward more. And what was the use? One look at the blank canvas of Bonner's face told her his decision was final.
He pulled a wallet from his back pocket, peeled out several bills, and extended them toward her. "Take this."
She stared down at the money. She'd sacrificed everything for her child. Did she have to give up the last ounce of her pride, too?
Slowly she took the money and felt a little part of herself die.
Edward's chest heaved.
"Shh…" She brushed her lips over his hair. "It's not your fault."
"He seed me."
"Not for a whole day. He was so dumb it took him a whole day to find you. You did just fine."
Without a backward glance, she carried Edward to the playground where she gathered up their things. Blinking against the tears, she clutched her meager possessions in one hand and her son in the other. What kind of man would do something like this? Only one who had no feelings at all.
As she left the Pride of Carolina, she wanted to fall off the end of the world.
Gabriel Bonner, the man with no feelings, cried in his sleep that night. He jolted awake sometime around three in the morning to find a wet place on his pillow and the awful metallic taste of grief in his mouth.
He'd dreamed about them again tonight, Cherry and Jamie, his wife and son. But this time Cherry's beloved face kept changing into the thin, defiant face of Rachel Stone. And his son had held a bedraggled gray rabbit as he lay in his coffin.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed, and for a long time he did nothing but sit with his shoulders hunched and his face buried in his hands. Finally he pulled open the drawer in his bedside table and took out a Smith & Wesson .38.
The revolver felt warm and heavy in his hands. Just do it. Put it in your mouth and pull the trigger. He touched the barrel to his lips and closed his eyes. The cold steel felt like a lover's kiss, and he welcomed the click of it against his front teeth.
But he couldn't pull the trigger, and, at that moment, he hated his family for keeping him from the oblivion he craved. Any one of them—his father or mother, his two brothers—they would all put a dog out of its misery, but they wouldn't be able to bear it if he killed himself. Now their stubborn, unrelenting love kept him shackled to an intolerable world.
He shoved the gun back in the drawer and withdrew the framed photograph he also kept there. Cherry smiled back at him, his beautiful wife who'd loved him and laughed with him and been everything a man could want. And Jamie.
Gabe caressed the frame with his thumbs, and in his chest, his heart seeped. It wasn't blood that escaped—that had been shed long ago—but a thick, bile-like fluid that ran through veins that had become rivers of pain carrying a bottomless cargo of grief.
My son.
Everyone had told him his grief would be easier to bear after the first year, but they'd lied. It had been over two years now since his wife and son had been killed by a drunk running a red light, and the pain had grown worse.
He'd spent most of that time in Mexico, living on tequila and quaaludes. Then, four months ago, his brothers had come to get him. He'd sworn at Ethan and thrown a punch at Cal, but it hadn't done any good. They'd brought him back anyway, and when they'd dried him out, he had no feelings left. No feelings at all.
Until yesterday.
A vision of Rachel's thin, naked body swam before his eyes. She'd been all bones and desperation when she'd offered herself to him in exchange for a job. And he'd gotten hard. He still couldn't believe it had happened.
He'd seen one other woman naked since Cherry had died. She'd been a Mexican whore with a lush body and a sweet smile. He'd thought he could bury some small part of his anguish inside her, but it hadn't worked. Too many pills, too much booze, too much pain. He'd sent her away without touching her and drunk himself into a stupor.
He hadn't even thought about her again until yesterday. An experienced Mexican whore hadn't been able to make him respond, but Rachel Stone with her scrawny body and defiant eyes had somehow managed to penetrate the wall he'd built so solidly around himself.
He remembered the way Cherry used to curl in his arms after they'd made love and play with the hair on his chest. I love your gentleness, Gabe. You're the most gentle man I've ever known.
He wasn't gentle now. Gentleness had been burned out of him. He put the photograph back in the drawer and walked naked to the window where he stared out at the darkness.
Rachel Stone didn't know it, but getting fired was the best thing that could have happened to her.
Chapter Five
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"You can't do this!" Rachel exclaimed. "We're not hurting anyone."
The police officer, whose badge read Armstrong, ignored her and turned to the driver of the tow truck. "Go ahead, Dealy. Get this piece of junk out of here."
With a sense of unreality, Rachel watched the tow truck back up to her car. Nearly twenty-four hours had passed since Bonner had fired her. She'd felt so ill and exhausted that she hadn't been able to summon the energy to do anything but stay by the car. Half an hour earlier, a police officer driving by had spotted the reflection of the late-afternoon sun off the car's windshield and come to investigate.
The moment he saw her, she'd known she was in trouble. He'd swept his eyes over her and then spat. "Carol Dennis told me you'd come back to town. Not a smart thing to do, Miz Snopes."
She'd told him her last name was Stone—she'd legally reverted to her maiden name after Dwayne's death—but even though she'd shown him her driver's license, he'd refused to address her by anything but Snopes. He'd ordered her to move the Impala, and when she'd told him it no longer ran, he'd called for a tow.
As she watched Dealy squeeze from the cab of his truck and lumber toward her rear bumper to attach the hook, she dropped Edward's hand and sprang forward to block the man's way. The skirt of her old blue chambray dress, cleaned now from the pounding she'd given it in the river, twisted around her legs. "Don't do this! Please. We're not harming anyone here."
He hesitated and looked over toward Armstrong.
But the wiry, straw-haired police officer with the creased face and small, unkind eyes, remained unmoved. "Get out of the way, Miz Snopes. This is private land, not a parking lot."
"I know that, but it won't be for long. Please. Can't you cut me a little slack?"
"Move aside, Miz Snopes, or I'll have you arrested for criminal trespass."
She saw that he was taking pleasure in her helplessness, and she knew she couldn't sway him. "My name is Stone."
Edward slipped his hand back in hers, and she watched Dealy fasten the hook to the rear of her car.
"You sure wasn't anxious to call yourself by anything but Snopes a few years back," Armstrong said. "Me and my wife was regulars at the Temple. Shelby even turned over an inheritance she got when her mother died so she could help out all those orphans. It wasn't much money, but it meant a lot to her, and now she can't seem to forget about the way she was cheated."
"I'm—I'm sorry about that, but surely you can see that my son and I haven't profited."
"Somebody did."
"Problem here, Jake?"
Her heart sank as she heard the soft, toneless voice she recognized only too well. Edward pressed against her side. She'd thought she'd seen the end of Bonner yesterday, and she wondered what new malevolence he was getting ready to inflict on her.
He took the scene in with those impassive silver eyes. She'd told him she was staying with a friend, but now he could see that she'd lied. He watched the Impala being h
oisted and studied the meager pile of her belongings tossed out on the ground.
She hated having him look at her things. She didn't want him to see how little she had left.
Armstrong nodded a curt greeting. "Gabe. Seems the Widow Snopes here has been squatting on private land."
"Is that so?"
While Gabe watched, the officer once again began to question her. Now that he had an audience, his manner became even more overbearing. "You got a job, Miz Snopes?"
She refused to look at Gabe. Instead, she watched her Impala being towed away. "Not at the moment. And my name is Stone."
"No job, and no money from the looks of. things." Armstrong rubbed his chin with the back of his hand. His skin was florid, she noticed, the complexion of a man who burned easily but was too stupid to stay out of the sun. "Maybe I should take you in for vagrancy. Now wouldn't that be a story for the newspapers. G. Dwayne Snopes's fancy wife arrested for vagrancy."
She could see him relishing the prospect. Edward pressed his cheek to her hip, and she patted him. "I'm not a vagrant."
"Sure looks that way to me. If you're not a vagrant, tell me how you're supporting that boy of yours."
A flutter of panic went through her, an urge to pick Edward up in her arms and run. A flicker in Armstrong's small, dark eyes told her he'd noticed her fear. "I have money," she said quickly.
"Sure you do," he drawled.
Without looking at Gabe, she dug her hand into the pocket of her dress and withdrew the money he'd given her, one hundred dollars.
Armstrong sauntered over and glanced down at what she held. "That won't hardly cover Dealy's towing fee. What're you planning to do then?"
"I'll get a job."
"Not in Salvation. People here don't appreciate anybody hidin' behind the Lord's name to make a fast buck. My wife wasn't the only one who lost a big chunk of her savings. You're foolin' yourself if you think anybody'll hire you."
"Then I'll go somewhere else."
"Dragging your kid with you, I suppose." A sly look came over his face. "Seems to me social services might have something to say about that."
She went rigid. He'd spotted her fear, and he knew where she was most vulnerable. Edward's free hand clutched her skirt, and she had to fight to keep her composure. "My son is just fine with me."
"Maybe, maybe not. I'll tell you what. You ride on into town with me, and I'll give the child-welfare people a call. We'll let them be the judge."
"This isn't any of your business!" She tightened her grip. "You're not taking me in."
"I do believe I am."
She backed away, bringing Edward with her. "No. I won't let you."
"Now, Miz Snopes, I suggest you don't add resistin' arrest to everything else."
An awful roaring sound surged through her head. "I haven't done anything wrong, and I won't let you do this!"
Edward made a soft sound of distress as Armstrong pulled a set of handcuffs from his belt. "It's up to you, Miz Snopes. You comin' willingly or not?"
She couldn't let him arrest her. She wouldn't, not when she knew they might take away her son. She hauled Edward up into her arms and braced herself to run.
Just then, Bonner stepped forward, his expression stony. "That won't be necessary, Jake. She's not a vagrant."
Her hands tightened around Edward's hips. He squirmed against her. Was this a trick?
Armstrong scowled, clearly unhappy with the interruption. "She's got no place to live, no money, and no job."
"She's not a vagrant," he repeated.
Armstrong switched the cuffs from one hand to the other. "Gabe, I know you was raised in Salvation, but you wasn't around when G. Dwayne ripped the heart right out of this town, not to mention most of the county. You'd best let me take care of this."
"I thought this was about Rachel being a vagrant, not about the past."
"Stay out of it, Gabe."
"She's got a job. She works for me."
"Since when?"
"Since yesterday morning."
Rachel's heart lodged in her throat as she watched the two men stare each other down. Bonner provided an imposing presence, and Armstrong finally turned away. Clearly unhappy about having his authority challenged, he slapped the handcuffs back on his belt.
"I'm gonna be checking up on you, Miz Snopes, and I'm warnin' you right now that you'd better watch your step. Your husband broke nearly every law on the books and got away with it, but believe me when I tell you that you ain't gonna be so lucky."
She watched him walk off, and only when he had disappeared did she release her grip on Edward and let him slide to the ground. Now that the crisis had passed, her body betrayed her. She took several uneven steps and slumped against the trunk of a maple to support herself. Although she knew she owed Bonner her gratitude, the words stuck in her throat.
"You told me you were staying with a friend," he said.
"I didn't want you to know we were living in the car."
"Get over to the drive-in right now." He stalked away.
Gabe was furious. If he hadn't interfered, she'd have run, and then Jake would have had the excuse he was looking for to arrest her. Now he wished he'd let it happen.
He heard her footsteps behind him as he strode back to the drive-in. The boy's voice carried on a current of air.
"Now, Mommy? Now are we gonna die?"
Pain sliced through him. He'd been numb inside, just the way he wanted it, but the two of them were cutting him open all over again.
He walked faster. She had no right to barge into his life like this when all he wanted was to be left alone. That's why he'd bought this damned drive-in in the first place. So he could go through the motions of living and still be left alone.
He made his way to his pickup, which sat in the sun next to the snack-shop door. The truck was unlocked and the windows rolled down. He jerked the door open and set the emergency brake, then turned to watch them approach.
As soon as she realized he was watching, her spine straightened, and she marched right toward him. But the boy was more cautious. He moved slower and slower, until he came to a stop.
She bent to reassure him, and her hair tumbled forward in a tangled flame curtain. A gust of wind shaped the worn fabric of her dress around her thin hips. Her legs looked frail in contrast to those big men's shoes she was wearing. Despite that, his groin stirred unexpectedly, adding to his sense of self-loathing.
He shot his head toward the truck. "Get in, boy. You stay here and keep out of trouble while I talk to your mother."
The boy's bottom lip began to tremble, and pain clawed away inside him. He remembered another little boy who'd sometimes lost control of his bottom lip, and for a terrible moment he thought he was going to collapse.
But Rachel wasn't collapsing. Despite his hostility and all that had happened, she stood squarely on her feet shooting him a dagger-sharp glare. "He's staying with me."
Her defiance was suddenly intolerable. She was alone and desperate. Didn't she understand her powerlessness?
Didn't she understand she had nothing left?
Something dark and awful twisted inside him as he finally acknowledged the truth he'd been trying to ignore. Rachel Stone was tougher than he was.
"We can either have our conversation in private or in front of him. Your choice."
He watched her bite back the obscenities she wanted to throw in his face. Instead, she gave the boy a reassuring nod and a gentle prod toward the truck.
Jamie would have bounced onto the seat in one joyous motion, but her kid had a hard time pulling himself up. She'd said he was five, exactly the age Jamie had been when he'd died, but Jamie had been strong and tall, with glowing skin, laughing eyes, and a mind for mischief. Rachel's son was frail and timid.
His heart spilled bile, and he couldn't push away the ugly comparisons.
She shut the door of the truck and leaned into the window. Her breasts pressed against the side panel, and he couldn't look away. "Stay here, hone
y. I'll be back for you in a few minutes."
He wanted to weep at the apprehension on the boy's face, but that would mean more pain, so he distracted himself with malice. "Stop mollycoddling him, Rachel, and get inside."
Her spine straightened and her chin shot up. She was furious, but she didn't even glance in his direction. Instead, she swept into the snack shop as grandly as a queen, leaving him trailing in her wake.
Like a maggot, his malice ate away at the parts of him that were still healthy. She was beaten, but she wouldn't admit it, and that was unbearable. He needed to see her defeated. He needed to watch the last glimmer of hope fade from her eyes until her soul was as empty as his. He needed to stand by and watch her accept what he'd already discovered. Some things in life couldn't be survived.
He jerked the doors shut and threw the lock. "You're turning that boy into a sissy. Is that what you want? A sissy boy who's never going to leave your side?"
She spun on him. "What I do with my son is none of your concern."
"That's where you're wrong. Everything you do is my concern. Don't forget that I can put you in jail with one phone call."
"You bastard."
He felt an unfamiliar heat in his chest and knew that his malevolence had begun to char the borders of his heart. If he didn't leave her alone, his heart would burn away until nothing was left but a pile of ash. The idea tantalized him. "I want my money back."
"What?"
"You haven't earned it, and I want it back. Now." He didn't care about the money, and one chamber of his smoldering heart imploded. Good. That meant there were only three more to go.
She reached into the pocket of her dress and threw the small stack of bills at him. They fluttered to the ground like broken dreams. "I hope you choke on every penny."
"Pick that up."
She drew back her arm and slapped him as hard as she could.
What she lacked in muscle, she made up for in passion, and his head snapped to the side. The sting sent fresh blood pumping through his body, fresh blood he didn't want. It renewed his charred cells, undoing what he needed to accomplish and releasing a torrent of new pain.
"Take off your clothes." The words, born in the dark and empty place where his soul used to be, came unexpectedly. They sickened him, but he didn't take them back. All she had to do was show fear, and he would let her go. All she had to do was crumble.
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