Mike lifted his eyes from the stapled clump of single-spaced papers he’d been immersed in. He looked at his son, cleared his throat, and turned to Brady. “Let’s go inside.” Then to Gemma and Mary Kate, “We won’t be long. You be okay?”
Gemma nodded as Brady rose in one smooth motion. Okay, so he was agile, too. Still, she was glad to see them go. Even as thoroughly trashed as she felt, he was way too distracting. For now she wanted to do nothing, think of nothing but the play of the oscillating sprinkler against the green lawn and dark wood of the fence, or watch as Nikki began to zoom wide circles around the little boy who now stood splayed-legged in grubby, sagging-wet cargo shorts, daring the dog to come closer.
“Did you reach Ned’s mom—what’s her name? Joyce?” Mary Kate asked.
“Julia. Sort of. She was pretty drunk. It must be, what? Eight o’clock in Texas now? When I told her Ned was dead she screamed and then threw the phone down. Begonia hung it up.”
“Who’s Begonia? Is that the maid you told us about?”
“Maid, companion, something.” She was grateful to Mary Kate for giving her a space of time to sort out her feelings—not treating her like a victim. There would be time for that. “You know me too well, M-K.”
“Yeah, well—”
The pause was awkward. Gemma understood they were still working at getting their rhythm back after almost four years of enforced separation, but it fried her circuits when she remembered what an idiot she’d been to let Ned-the-lying-cheating-rat-bastard keep her away from her family. “I’ve missed you guys.”
“We’ve missed you, too, Gemma.”
She’d missed Mike and Mary Kate more than she had been willing to admit to herself. How could I have let Ned do that to me? she wondered for the twentieth time that afternoon—or was it the two hundredth?
Timothy shrieked in glee, and Mary Kate started to stand up, fixing him with her Mother’s Eye.
“Don’t, M-K. Let him have fun. This is just what I need right now. Let’s just pretend we’re having a nice family barbecue, just for a little while.” She gazed back out at Timmy. “I still can’t get over how much Tim looks like Mike. He’s a carbon copy.”
Mary Kate grimaced. “I know. I must be in the mix somewhere, but you couldn’t tell by looking. Timothy, come say hello to Auntie Gemma.”
The dog bounced her front legs coyly to one side, ducked her head, and charged, grazing Timothy just above the Speed Racer Band-Aid on his knee and knocking him onto his seat.
“Fake out!” he yelled, laughing as they closed and grappled. “Ow! Nikki, cut it out!” he protested when she held him down with one paw and licked his face. “Hello, Auntie Gemma,” he called between giggles.
“It’s okay, M-K,” Gemma said. “It’s nice to watch them play.”
“He can’t get away with that. He’s been on a roll since this morning. Come on, Tim,” his mother added, raising her voice.
“I’m Timofee!” he asserted, scrambling to his feet and striding toward them across the lawn in as close an imitation of Mike’s walk as his four-year-old legs could manage. “Not Tim. There’s another Tim in my school. I’m Timofee. Hi, Auntie Gemma.”
“Hey, dude. So, what’s best about school these days?” Gemma asked, grown-up to grown-up.
“I have two girlfriends,” he said, holding up three fingers, then folding one under. “Jess’ca and Wizzabah. I like Wizzabah best, ’cause her hair’s red like mine. But she pinches. I’m going to yell my best yell,” he said, and ran back out onto the grass shouting “YAAAAH” as he braced himself for another onslaught.
Gemma looked up at the sound of the screen door opening and closing with a small bang as Mike and Brady came out of the house carrying trays loaded with a pitcher of margaritas, soft drinks, chips and salsa.
Mary Kate said, “Brady, you might as well stay for dinner. I’ve got enough for an army. And for dessert,” she went on with a straight look at Gemma, “you get one of Mike’s migraine pills. Guaranteed eight hours of total oblivion.”
“I’d rather have margaritas.” She looked with longing at the tray of salt-rimmed glasses and the condensation on the pitcher of pale green slush.
“Spoken like a true daughter of the Old Sod,” Mike said in a heavy Donegal lilt.
Brady laughed. “Which old sod was that?”
That drew a smile from Gemma, and Mary Kate sputtered.
“Old sod!” Timothy shrieked. He began to run around in great circles yelling “Old Sod, Old Sod” over and over, punctuated by louder and louder shouts.
“Timothy, bí ciúin!” Mike said, raising his voice a little to be heard over the mayhem.
The uproar stopped.
“So, the whole family’s learning Irish, huh?” Brady said. “I haven’t heard that since I was a kid in Canada. Neighbor’s grandma used to yell at us kids. She’d wave a wooden spoon around in the air—scared us silly when we were little.”
Mike chuckled. “Ma was an Irish speaker from Donegal. She made sure our first language was Irish, but we forgot most of it when we got older and too cool to speak anything but English. I want Tim to learn as much as I can teach him.”
Brady nodded. “Languages are good.”
“Yeah. You speak how many?”
“Classified,” Brady said out of the corner of his mouth and grinned. “Nothing as cool as Irish, though. Maybe I should learn.”
Gemma had to admit, he had a nice smile. Mischievous. The corners of that long mouth sort of folded into lines in his cheeks, and his teeth looked strong and translucent. She found herself watching his mouth and wondering how it would taste. She wanted to fidget, but held still with an effort, and tried to concentrate on Mike as he began to pour.
The first tart-sweet swallow of margarita hit her empty stomach with a punch that left her fingertips tingling and her mind just a little distanced, like the first breaths of laughing gas in the dentist’s chair. She gulped down a few more swallows until her throat felt frozen. For now, she’d take all the numbness she could get and deal with the headache later.
Gemma watched in silence as Mike sat next to her and pulled his chair close. He waited until Mary Kate and Brady were talking, and pitched his voice under the level of conversation, but Gemma could hear him clearly enough.
“You’re going to have to tell me everything, Gemma. Everything. I know you’ve held back most of the cr—” he glanced toward Timothy “—details,” he finished. “But that stops, right now, between us. Have you got that? I can’t protect you unless I know all there is to know from your side.”
She stared at him. “Okay,” she said in a remote voice. “But I can’t think.”
He peered at her, then at her empty glass. “How many of these have you had?”
“Just one.”
“What have you had to eat today?”
She looked down and off to the side, trying to remember, but nothing came to mind.
Mary Kate touched Gemma’s hand, but her eyes sought Mike’s. “Brady and I will be fine out here. There’s more munchies in the fridge. I can see dinner’s going to be awhile.”
* * *
Brady picked up his glass and took a quick sip as he watched Gemma’s unsteady progress up the porch steps.
He’d missed what Mary Kate was saying, and now she had that amused twinkle in her eye married women get when they think they’ve got you all figured out. Okay. Maybe it wasn’t that hard in his case. He had been pretty obviously sizing up her sister-in-law.
He grinned at her. “Sorry, M-K. Listen, I’ve got some stuff to do, so I’m going to take off. Tell Mike I’ll bring his car back first thing in the morning.”
* * *
Gemma sat across from Mike at the small kitchen table, eating crisp sesame crackers he spread with rich cheese and handed to her as she babbl
ed through a tequila-loosened brain.
She bit into another cracker and brushed her tongue over a crumb on her lip. The food and a glass of strong iced tea were helping to clear the fog from her mind and settle her jumpy stomach.
Gemma shook herself. “I don’t have very good luck, do I? First Dad, then Trev, now Ned. The men I love all die. Even the ones I don’t love.”
“And that makes me, what? Corned beef? Shit happens, Gemma. The Irish know that better than anybody.”
Gemma wiped tears away with the side of her hand.
Mary Kate knocked a warning and stepped into the kitchen. “That’s enough, Mike,” she said after a glance at Gemma. “The poor kid looks done in.” She turned and burrowed into the refrigerator, emerging with a heaped plate of wrapped sub sandwiches and a large pottery bowl with a smaller plate balanced on top.
“What have you got there?” Mike took the bowl as they followed Gemma out into the yard.
“I thought we should get started. We all need food. The chicken is for Timmy, because he’s starting to get cranky, and he hates sandwiches this week.”
A half hour later, replete and still feeling slightly dreamy, Gemma let the evening wash over her, her gaze resting on Timothy as he yawned into his plate of chicken nuggets and carrot sticks, until Mike stood and stretched.
“Come on, Rocket Man, time for bed,” he said, scooping the groggy little boy off his chair and carrying him into the house.
Gemma stood slowly and took a deep breath of the evening air. “I think I’ll turn in, too.”
“I’ve set you up in the spare room,” Mary Kate said.
Gemma bent to kiss her sister-in-law’s cheek. “Thanks, M-K. You’re the best sister I could ever have.”
* * *
Maybe it’s the potato salad that’s keeping me awake, Gemma thought as she tossed and kicked at the covers. She hung half waking as emotions crashed and overlapped like waves on a beach. How could Ned be dead? She couldn’t believe it. Murdered. She shuddered. Loathing popped to the surface, shouldering out horror.
She’d been so stupid about Ned. Still too shocked from Trevor’s death, feeling so lost, so empty. And along came this handsome, articulate, sophisticated guy who seemed to worship the ground she stumbled across. He’d swept her off her feet, and she’d let it all happen too fast.
Mike had tried to tell her, but she wouldn’t listen. No one she knew really liked Ned, but she’d ignored all that and started shutting people out. Doing things Ned’s way. Eloping had been his idea. He’d kept pointing out how miserable it would be to have a formal wedding with everyone on her side of the church hating the whole idea. She’d been in some sort of emotional bubble, just floating along. She’d convinced herself she could be a good wife, but she hadn’t really loved him. Not like she had loved Trev. Trevor. The love of her life since the eighth grade. Sweethearts, best friends, lovers. She’d been so proud when he and Mike joined the Navy together right after college. Mike went into Intelligence, just as he’d always planned. Trevor—merry, loving, daredevil Trevor—fulfilled his life’s dream and became a pilot.
And three weeks before their wedding, he was gone in a ball of flame against a mountain in Bosnia. The Navy said it was mechanical failure, but that seemed too pale, too ordinary a thing to have extinguished someone so full of life and joy.
She punched her pillow into a more comfortable shape, but her mind kept racing. Damn Ned. The son of a bitch had ripped her life down, again. Okay, being murdered probably hadn’t been his idea—she’d grant him that much. But the effect was the same. It wasn’t his fault. Or maybe it was. Maybe he’d pushed the wrong person too far. God knew, there had been times she’d wished she could slip something into his soup, back when she’d cared enough to feel anything at all.
Now she was going to have to care again because he’d be in her face, everywhere she turned, until they caught the guy who killed him. She’d like to punch that s.o.b. for throwing her back into all this. Or kiss him for ridding the planet of that perverted slime ball.
Rats! Okay. They could give the guy a medal and then shoot him.
She wondered what had happened to Ned. And how he’d ended up at Bob’s cabin.
He’d taken her to that cabin once, for a party. She’d felt completely out of place among the sleek, world-weary crowd of his friends. They made her feel gauche and naïve, just the way Ned did. No one had missed her when she wandered out of the house and spent the afternoon sailing alone on the little lake.
Gemma jerked the comforter off the floor and tugged one corner over to cover her feet. She didn’t have the energy for this any longer. Resentment swelled under her solar plexus and she clenched her teeth hard enough to make her ears hurt. The sharp little pain reminded her to take a deep breath and keep breathing. Just keep breathing.
She finally dropped off into half dreams, where the cabin guests all watched her in a way that made her think of old vampire movies. Brady hovered around the edges of the crowd, juggling a keyboard and a huge margarita. Ned was there, charming, smiling, then dead, splayed across the deck, still smiling as Brady turned into a wolf and bit her with strong white teeth.
The throbbing of her orgasm was so intense it startled her awake. It had been so long since she’d felt this aroused. Since Trevor’s death. Almost seven years. Way too long. Maybe she was ready to come back into the world of the living after all. And Brady McWhatzis might be just what the corpsman ordered to tempt her over the threshold. She stared into the darkness. Every time her pulse and breathing subsided, she pulled the dream images back into herself and felt the sharp thrill all over again.
If Brady did try to bite her, she just might let him.
Chapter Four
“Come on in.” Mike led Brady down the hall. “We can talk in the kitchen. “Gemma’s still asleep and it was M-K’s turn to drive Tim to school this morning. What’ve you been able to find out?”
Brady sat on a stool at the kitchen counter. “This wasn’t your everyday domestic homicide.” he said, and accepted the cup of coffee Mike held out to him. “The Pierce County cops are saying it was one of the worst crime scenes they’ve ever walked into. The guy was tied to a chair—what was left of him. He was alive and probably awake when they started carving on him.”
“Carving? Jesus. What’d they do to him?”
“There’s a guy in the ME’s office used to patch up the Frog Guys,” Brady said, using a phrase SEALs used to refer to themselves. “He said they’ve got one big, messy jigsaw puzzle. It’s going to take at least a full day just to put all the pieces back together.”
“Think they were after information?”
Brady shook his head, once. “He’d have told them everything he knew in the first couple of minutes, probably less. No, whoever did it was really into their work, and didn’t much care about how messy things got. They enjoyed it. Rage, sadism—I don’t know. It was a fucking horror show. Guy said it was like a big stump tied to a chair in the middle of a lake of blood with pieces everywhere, like the doer had flung them around with the point of the knife.”
Mike whistled through his teeth.
“Yeah. The thing is, there were photos on the body, on the floor, in the blood, everywhere. Dozens of them.”
“Photos of what? The murder?”
Brady folded his arms across his chest. Unfolded them. Reached for his coffee, but didn’t drink. “Sex photos. Carrow with different women. One photo in particular they’re holding close to the chest. Not sure why.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah. The whole scene’s a little over the top for a pissed-off wife, even a redhead.” He flicked an eyebrow upward and shot Mike a look out of the corner of his eye. “Cops are looking her direction, though. Not too hard right now, but they are.”
Mike snorted. “Gemma? Not a chance. She’d never use
a knife—she’s too impatient. She might empty a clip into the guy, given enough provocation, but what you’re describing is insane.”
“Cops think so too. They’re looking at her maybe hiring somebody to do him, but their main thinking at the moment is Asian gangs. The women in the photos were Asian.”
“Revenge killing? He messed with someone’s wife? Daughter, maybe?”
Brady shrugged.
“There’s always been something just a tad wrong about Ned,” Mike said. “Never could pin it down. Just got my fur itchy. I was sure he was going to do something to Gemma to get even for divorcing him. I’m glad somebody got him first, but I wish she didn’t have to go through all this.”
He got up and pulled a paper towel off the roll to wipe up the few drops of coffee on the counter. “We’ve got an interview with the Pierce County detectives at ten thirty. It’s been moved to Seattle. Any ideas what that’s about?”
Brady shook his head. “Something to do with the photos, from what info I’ve been able to pick up. They link to an ongoing case, but it’s being kept really quiet.”
“Any threads you can pull with your Task Force buddies? Is Tran Nguyen still head honcho over there?”
“Far as I know. I’ll see what I can find out.”
“Maybe we’ll learn something at the interview.” Mike glanced at his watch. “Listen, Brady, I’ve got court today. Can you clear your schedule to stay with Gemma this afternoon? I don’t think she should be alone until somebody figures out what’s going on.”
“Not a problem. Give me a call when you need me.” He paused a beat. “One more thing before anyone gets up,” Brady looked down the hall, “or gets back. You didn’t tell your sister about me, about the Team, did you?” Mike gave him a “Puh-leeze” look from under heavy red eyebrows.
“That’s what I thought.”
* * *
Oh, terrific, Gemma thought as she inched her way across Mike’s kitchen toward the coffee pot on the far counter. What’s he doing here again? She so didn’t want him to see her looking like this. Her swollen eyes felt like lead, and she had seen her face in the bathroom mirror, pale and puffy. A cool washcloth and an extra minute with the toothbrush had helped, but she knew she needed about a quart of strong coffee and another four hours of sleep to feel fully human.
Now You See It Page 5