by Ann Jacobs
Next his gaze settled on Jack, seated beside his mother on a loveseat upholstered in pale-blue silk, across from Four. From Jack’s taciturn expression, Bye knew without anybody telling him that the bastard had known who his father was, not just for the past few minutes but longer. He’d probably known for years, maybe since before Bye was even born. To think Jack had encouraged Deidre’s flirting when he’d known his half sister was off limits made Bye see red.
If Jack couldn’t have made himself tell Deidre his mother’s dirty little secret, at least he could have told her in a way she couldn’t possibly misunderstand that he wasn’t interested. When Bye thought back over the time since Deidre had set her cap for Duval, he realized Jack had never actually taken her out on a date. He’d even called her an innocent and said she wouldn’t make it sharing his hardcore BDSM lifestyle. Still the bastard had played along when Deidre tried to hit on him, and he’d danced with her more than once down at The Corral…
“Jack, how long have you known?” The question came out sounding gravelly, as if Bye’s voice box hated as much as he did, giving his—his half brother—the benefit of doubt.
“Almost two months. Ever since my mother apparently decided it was time to let me know.” Jack’s gaze was steady, his tone quietly persuasive. He paused, then looked directly at Bye and lowered his voice. “She told me a week or so after the night we played together at the Neon Lasso.”
When Bye looked at Jack, he sensed the man was telling the truth. Though it galled him to do it, Bye accepted that at least Jack hadn’t knowingly participated in a threesome with his own blood relative. “I believe you. That doesn’t mean I like it. Or that I appreciate you not having shared your knowledge with me and Deidre right away.”
“I would have, if I’d had a clue that Mother didn’t intend it to remain a secret between her and me. Believe me, I’m no more comfortable right now than I’m sure you must be.” Jack glanced at his mother, his expression pained. Then he turned away and rubbed at his temples as if this whole scene was giving him a headache.
He’s known for a couple months. Since right after the doctors told us there was no hope, that Mom was going to die. Bye’s mind churned. Had Four told Jack’s mother? It seemed likely that he had, probably during one of the so-called business trips he’d kept on making to Lubbock almost every week while Bye and Deidre had cared for their mom. The timing of seemingly unrelated events was rarely coincidental when it had to do with Byron Caden IV.
Jack’s head might be throbbing, but Bye was sure his hurt worse. The afternoon sun stung his eyes when its rays pierced through the sheer curtains. He wanted to be somewhere, anywhere but here. He needed to cry for his mother and pray she’d hear him from beyond that new grave in the family cemetery.
He’d walk out right now if that wouldn’t give his father more reason to think he had no balls. Anyway, Bye couldn’t sully his mother’s memory by murdering Four or his mistress, spattering crimson splotches of adulterers’ blood all over her pale-blue patterned Oriental rug.
Instead, Bye moved to the far end of the room where Deidre had retreated, sat on the arm of her chair and put his arm around her. “It’ll be okay, sis.” He knew it wouldn’t, but what the hell else was he going to say? “Come on now, don’t let the bastard know he got to you.” Deidre sniffed as she blotted her tear-stained face with a tissue. Then she lowered her head onto Bye’s knee and spoke, her voice a shaky whisper. “What if I’d slept with him? What if Daddy has more adult secrets like him that one of us may have fucked?”
Bye looked around at the others, noting the pained looks on their faces. He assumed from their father’s lack of reaction that Deidre’s conjecture hadn’t reached his ears. Since neither Jack nor his mother reacted, Bye guessed they’d also missed the slip of vulgarity that would hardly have gone unremarked upon, considering it came out of his sweet younger sister’s mouth.
“You didn’t, Funny Face,” he said, trying to get a smile by using the nickname he’d given her as a baby. “And I doubt Byron Four went around fertilizing every ripe human egg in Texas during his younger days. It seems to me he’s kept Duval’s mother stashed away ever since before either of us came on the scene. Let’s hope she’s the only one and Jack’s her only child.”
Deidre shook her head. “We can never be sure.” Hearing such despair in her voice made Bye want to cry with her, but he dared not show what Four would interpret as unacceptable male weakness. Rubbing her nape, he wished she hadn’t put her hair up or worn the tailored black suit he remembered their mom had occasionally worn at local funerals.
“Why’d you wear Mom’s suit today?” he asked, trying to divert her attention from possible unknowing incest they may have committed or might commit sometime in the future.
“I wouldn’t believe she was going to die in spite of what the doctors told us, so I refused to go out and buy something to wear to her funeral. I don’t own anything black, except a couple of cocktail dresses.” She traced a muted pinstripe up the sleeve of his gray suit jacket. “You’re lucky. Men aren’t expected to wear black, even for a parent’s funeral.”
“I’m not feeling very lucky today.” He felt her turn her head and knew she was watching Jack and his mother. “Want me to beat his ass for you?”
Deidre shook her head. “No, I just want to die.”
“And leave me all alone?”
She inclined her head toward Duval and his mother. “They’re not going to leave us alone.”
“I know that.” Before he’d known Jack was family of sorts, Bye had sort of hoped he’d marry Deidre and become part of their extended family. He’d liked the bastard. What a fucking joke!
Deidre poked him in the ribs. “Listen to that woman, Bye. She’s moved over by Daddy now. She thinks she’s going to move in.”
Bye stood and pulled Deidre up beside him. “That’s not about to happen. Let’s go show this woman that Cadens—even the younger generation—aren’t meant to be fucked with.” He led Deidre down the length of the room until they stood within five feet of the others, keeping his arm around his trembling sister as he tried to rein in his own anger that was threatening to take control.
His father’s attention was so focused on his mistress, he apparently didn’t hear them approach. But Bye heard the woman clearly enough.
“Now that she’s dead, you can sell my place in Lubbock and I can move here. With you,” Marianne said to Byron, sandwiching his hand between both of hers. Bye couldn’t help noticing her long, scarlet nails. They reminded him of the slashing talons on a falcon.
This is the day of my mother’s funeral, for God’s sake. What are these people doing in her living room? Why are Deidre and I listening to the old man’s whore acting as if Mae Caden never was?
What the hell was the woman thinking about? So furious he didn’t care that he was literally getting into a woman’s face, Bye stepped forward and stared down at her, not even trying to mask his fury. “Ms. Duval, this is my mother’s home. Mine and Deidre’s as well. Don’t think you can weasel your way in here just because you’ve been our father’s whore for years.”
He heard Jack’s deep intake of breath and sensed the other man had stood and was coming closer. Yeah, Bye had just insulted Jack’s mother. And he didn’t regret it. He might halfway pity Jack for the situation his mother had put all of them in, but right now he would damn reason and take any excuse to make mincemeat out of the man, mainly because he couldn’t tear in to Marianne or any woman, bitch or not. His mom had taught him better than that. “Back off, Jack,” he said through clenched teeth.
“Apologize.” Four’s growled order didn’t carry quite the weight it had with Bye for the past twenty-some-odd years. But it still had that familiar ring of authority.
Bye heeded it because it reminded him that his mom had also taught him never to insult a lady. Though he hardly considered Marianne Duval a lady, he figured she was probably a rung or two above your common garden-variety hooker. After all, his old man in
sisted on owning the best of everything—whores apparently included. “I apologize. My comments were out of line. But you have to know we—at least Deidre and I—don’t want you here. We’ve just lost our mother. This has come as a shock, hearing right after burying Mom that our father has apparently been keeping a mistress since before either of us was born, not to mention that a man we thought was our friend is actually our half brother.”
His fists balled so tightly his knuckles turned white, and his face set in a fierce pose Bye knew meant trouble, Four stood and motioned toward the door. “That’s enough. Marianne, you’re not moving in here, now or ever. I’ve never given you any reason to believe otherwise. I don’t appreciate you barging in on us today. You go on home to Lubbock, now, and stay there. You will hear from me soon.”
Bye had the feeling the woman wouldn’t like what she’d be hearing from Four. He’d been on the receiving end of his father’s temper often enough to recognize that tightly controlled disdain masked true fury about to be unleashed.
Four turned back toward Bye and Deidre. “Bye, I’ll excuse your rudeness this time, but don’t let it happen again. It’s been a long and difficult day. It’s past time for us to say goodbye.”
When Marianne made no move to leave, Jack placed a firm hand on her arm and lifted her to her feet. “Come on, Mother. Let’s go,” he said in a tone that suggested she’d do well to obey. “Deidre, Bye, I’m sorry for your loss. Father, I’ll be talking to you later.”
* * * * *
Bye could hardly wait for the door to slam behind Jack Duval and his father’s mistress before changing out of his suit and escaping. Whereas before the funeral grief had hung heavy in the house, now a pungent aura of betrayal pervaded every room, its scent oppressive. He doubted the place would ever feel like home again without Mom.
The rain that had persisted yesterday and throughout this morning had finally let up, though the sky was still cloudy and overcast. Bye checked his watch. Good. He had nearly two hours before Karen had said she’d meet him at the line shack, so he could ride instead of drive.
Maybe a hard run would be as good for him as for his blood-bay stallion, Vampire, whose exercise had been limited lately to short rides in the paddock. Bye had trouble understanding why none of the stablemen dared to ride him out on the ranch roads, since he always welcomed the challenge of controlling his spirited seventeen-hand thoroughbred.
Yeah, a gallop across the fields should do wonders toward clearing his brain. Eager now, Bye exchanged his hand-tooled dress boots for the worn pair he kept in the tack room and grabbed a pair of leather gloves while waiting for Manuel to saddle Vampire. Knowing how the stable boy shuddered at the thought of having to go anywhere near the horse, Bye would have done the chore himself if his father hadn’t always insisted that taking care of the horses and doing stable chores were parts of what he paid the help to do.
“Thanks, Manuel.” The boy handed over the reins and scurried back just in time to avoid a nip from Vampire. “You need to let him know he doesn’t frighten you.” Bye checked the girth to be sure it was cinched tightly before swinging into the saddle.
“But Vampire, he does scare me. He bites.”
“Then I’ll just have to tell him that’s not very polite,” Bye said, his tone deliberately teasing.
Manuel’s eyes widened. “De nada. I don’t mind taking care of your horse, Mr. Bye. I am happy to have the job.”
No doubt that was true. Like most of the Mexican ranch hands, Manuel sent most of his minimum-wage pay to his family south of the border. “Take it easy. I don’t think we ever fired a stable hand just because he got nervous around a full-grown stallion.”
“Gracias.”
As Bye rode out of the stable yard, he wasted no time giving his fractious horse a few gentle reminders as to who was boss, and by the time they turned onto a ranch road, Vampire had quit fighting the bit and was responding to Bye’s light touch on the reins.
* * * * *
Gray clouds hung low, buffeted in a fierce wind over the high plateau. Bye watched the miles go by under the big horse’s clattering hooves as if nothing had changed. At the fence encircling the wind farm he’d built above a large oil field that doubled as a pasture for calves and their mothers, he reined in, paused and stopped to look. Whereas seeing the turbines turning usually exhilarated him, today they were just objects to note.
The windmills weren’t dreams realized or obstacles overcome, only hundreds of three-bladed turbines placed on fifty-meter-high platforms in a precise pattern above the pasture to capture energy from the strong winds that constantly blew across the land. Bye recalled bringing his mother here before she got too weak to ride, watching the joy on her face when she realized he was finally doing something useful.
My boy has grown up. Her words rang in his ears. She’d been so proud of him, her love unwavering and unconditional. She’d always supported and loved him, even when he’d done little or nothing to deserve it.
“Mom, I’ll miss you more than you’ll ever know.” Though she was dead and beyond being hurt, Bye wouldn’t talk about what had happened back at the house. Not here, where he felt her presence almost as if she were still at his side, teasing him gently for tilting at windmills, expecting nothing more from him but that he be her loving son. She’d never demanded or expected perfection from him or expressed disappointment when he fucked up, the way Four always had.
As Bye watched the mesmerizing synchrony of the turbines, he wondered if anything would ever be the same. Deep down, he knew it wouldn’t. Not for him or for Deidre. With the revelation of one old, previously well-kept secret, all their lives had changed.
Of course Bye didn’t give a fuck about Jack. Not when the bastard had let Deidre fall halfway in love with him and done nothing overt to let her know he couldn’t be enticed, even in the couple of months when he’d known a relationship between them was impossible. And not when Jack had professed to be Bye’s friend but had left that generation-old secret hanging silent for months, never revealed until today.
I’m your brother.
Would Bye have felt less betrayed if Jack had told him when he’d first learned he and Bye were half brothers? At least when they’d teamed up to pleasure Karen that night at the Neon Lasso, neither he nor Jack had known. That was to Jack’s credit.
Had that encounter constituted incest? Probably not since they hadn’t pleasured each other, just Karen. And technically speaking, Jack hadn’t fucked Karen where it mattered. Still…
Bye had let his older brother take the lead with him and Karen, even though he hadn’t known it at the time. The memory left a dirty taste in Bye’s mouth. It had to have been wrong. Or was it? Did a lack of knowledge get them off the hook for having sort of violated Nature’s laws?
He didn’t know. He did know his life had changed. His world had tipped on its axis, all because he had a half brother whose accomplishments to date were so much greater than his own, academically, career-wise and God only knew where else. In their father’s eyes, Bye knew he’d pale by comparison with the man who’d come so much farther, who’d had to scrap and fight for each accomplishment while Bye had everything handed to him as his due.
Had Jack ever had to extricate himself from trouble? Bye doubted he’d been stupid enough to get in the sorts of scrapes Bye had frequently experienced. Knowing he’d only have his own wits to fight his way out of trouble would have been one hell of a motivator for Jack to stay on the straight and narrow.
Bye recalled how many times he’d picked up the phone and let Byron Four take care of making his problems go away. School project not turned in on time? Daddy got him an extension. Damages at a campus bar after a drunken fraternity fight? Caden money made the barkeeper’s threats to press charges go away. A bag of pot found by campus cops during a routine check of his car? Four had made that charge go away as well, although he’d been royally pissed off because the fix had apparently cost him some costly political capital as well as a bundle of c
old, hard cash.
Finally, he was beginning to realize he’d have been better off, not having had that lifeline to Byron’s cadre of cronies and his seemingly unlimited flow of cash and influence. If he hadn’t had those crutches, maybe he’d have studied harder, partied less.
Stroking his mount’s elegantly arched neck, Bye looked out over the wind farm. He couldn’t have achieved this particular dream by now, even with the electrical engineering degree it had taken him six years to earn, if not for Four’s reluctant help. Yeah, he’d done the planning and the sweating, but it was Bar C land and Bar C money that had made this all happen.
Would he have to share his dream with Jack now? Karen was a lawyer. She’d know the ins and outs of laws governing inheritance and sweat equity if there was such a thing a whole lot better than Bye did. He’d ask her. And he’d use her as his personal attorney from now on. It would give him a good excuse to see her in public, away from the Neon Lasso.
Fuck her old man and his, and whatever it was that had gone on generations earlier and had them itching to do each other in. Despite the fact Jack had seemed strained by the day’s events, Bye ungraciously imagined him chuckling over the situation his mother had foisted on his half siblings today. Bye wasn’t in a mood to be charitable about what his older brother might be feeling. To tell the truth, he felt hurt that his friend hadn’t warned him so he could have prepared himself mentally for Marianne Duval’s revelation.
The money didn’t matter. Byron Four had enough wealth to spread among a hundred bastard kids plus Deidre and Bye if that was what he wanted to do. Besides, it did Bye no good to agonize over things he couldn’t control. Closing that line of thinking, he concentrated instead on inspecting the portion of the vast Bar C holdings visible from this lofty vantage point.
Unbroken by mountains, valleys or heavy growth of trees, the view of the high plateau went on for miles, past the nearest boundary between Caden land and the Laughing Wolfe Ranch. Mavis Wolfe and her daughter Liz had been at the funeral earlier. His father had paid Mavis special attention, though Bye was only realizing that now. Liz, a quiet girl who’d been in his class at school, had stayed out on the front porch while other guests mingled in the dining room over the obligatory funeral spread. She was shy, or else she found funerals depressing. If so, Bye shared something with her.