“Stay here?” she asked.
“Billy is a guest.” She shrank slightly in the face of his intensity, shifting sideways, putting the corner of the island between them.
He noticed and crossed his arms, only managing to look more threatening.
“That’s great,” she said, trying to smile and knowing she’d failed. Luc’s eyebrows clashed over his beautiful eyes.
“Who did you think he was?” Luc pointed at Billy. Her mind backtracked, trying to remember what she’d said, what she’d unwittingly revealed.
“A burglar.” She knew she sounded ridiculous, but she tossed her hair over her shoulder and met Luc’s unreadable gaze. Fake it till you make it was kind of her motto.
“Stop lying,” Luc said through his teeth, and she realized he was mad. Unease, the lesser cousin to all that fear she’d just felt, climbed into her heartbeat.
“I’m not—”
He shook his head once and she fell silent, her lies giving up the fight.
“You mentioned Dennis,” he said.
Shit.
“What the hell is going on, Tara? And you tell me the truth or you can get the hell off this ranch.”
Luc stood there a stranger to her—his loyalty firmly on the side of his sister, not that she expected anything else. Not really.
She glanced sideways at Billy and that charming little boy was gone, replaced by a gladiator. He was better backup muscle than Carl could ever dream of being and she knew when she was beat. And frankly, while she would never tell him the truth—not all of it anyway—she was very glad to hand over the protection of Victoria to someone who was better suited for the job.
“Victoria is interested in Dennis.”
“Interested?”
“Yes.”
Luc looked baffled, as if he didn’t understand the word, and she sighed. “Interested as in, wanting to get to know him better?” She lifted her eyebrows, using his words from this morning to make it clear.
“That’s ridiculous,” he laughed.
“She came into the workshop this morning to ask about him.”
“Dennis?”
She nodded, and after a long minute he sighed. “Okay.”
“No, not okay. Not at all. He’s …” She licked her lips, finding the fine line she was going to walk. “Not a good guy. Not for her. Not for anyone.”
Luc and Billy shared a quick look.
“You thought I was this Dennis guy?” Billy asked.
“A friend of his.”
Luc’s face was hard as rock and she saw all the dots connect in his head. He understood the threat, understood exactly what she’d brought into his house.
“Yes, Dennis is the kind of man who has friends that break into people’s houses to scare them.”
She didn’t say “and worse.” She sort of thought that was a given.
“And you know him how?”
“I hardly think that’s the point.”
Luc’s eyes penetrated her chest, and she had to look away. You’re the point, his eyes said, but she could take care of herself. They’d covered this ground and she’d all but asked him not to care.
“You need to keep Victoria away from Dennis,” she said. “I tried to dissuade her, but …” She looked back up at Luc and saw the fear in his eyes.
“She’s so desperate,” he murmured, and she nodded.
“What about you?” Billy asked. “Does someone need to keep this Dennis guy away from you?”
Luc stared at her so hard it was as if he were reading her mind, the back of her skull, the inside of her soul.
And the words she thought she’d never say grew in her mouth like weeds, fertilized by the weakness she felt in her bones and her skin, deep in her belly. She was tired of the fight. Of Dennis. Of pretending she was tough, when all she wanted was a soft spot to lay her head and someone to talk to. Really talk to.
She was tired of being her.
She opened her mouth, the words poised to fall out, but Luc got there first.
“She can take care of herself,” he said.
It wasn’t rejection, not like what she’d done to him, but the sting pierced her chest, going all the way down to her stomach.
What did you expect? the demon whispered.
Too much, she thought, when she least expected it. And that in the end was always her downfall.
He stood there, staring at her, and she didn’t know what he saw when he looked at her. What truth he was looking at. Hell, she couldn’t even understand what he expected. And that, of course, made her search for the worst possible thing—because that was what was usually expected of her.
“I’ll … ah … pack my stuff.” She cleared her throat, and hated herself for her clenched hands. Her stinging sadness. “Head back to town.”
“Probably a good idea.” Luc nodded, no longer looking at her.
“Good night,” she whispered, nodding to Billy because she was too tired to do anything more, and she left without once looking back at Luc.
chapter
18
“You’re going to just let her go?” Billy asked, and Luc nodded, getting a beer out of the fridge. He didn’t want a beer, but he needed to do something with his hands. With his body. Because that woman’s naked eyes were a magnet he was going to resist if it killed him.
“She’s in trouble,” Billy said.
“I think she’s the kind of woman who is always in trouble.” He stared at the bottle, watching condensation gather under the frilled metal cap.
“Dude—”
“What?” Luc barked. “She doesn’t want me worrying about her. She made that clear.”
“That’s never stopped you before.” Billy took the beer from off the counter. He popped off the top and handed it back to him.
“If you’ve got something to say, Billy, spit it out.”
“Do you know why the guys call you Grandpa?”
The beast of his temper rattled its chains. “I can guess.”
“It has nothing to do with your age,” Billy said. “And everything to do with how you worry. About everyone. Whether they want it or not.”
“I’m team captain—”
“Right, and there’s not another team captain in the league who cares if their center has a thing for strippers! You get that, right?”
Luc forced himself not to sag against the counter, not to feel every single second of his age in the face of Billy’s assessment. Of course he understood that—this compulsion he had, no matter how much it chafed or how badly he wanted to resist it, was his own. He needed to take care of the people around him.
“You know this thing with your sister and your dad—he put all this shit together, the will, all of it—”
“You’re making me very sorry I told you about any of that.”
“Yeah, I’m sure.” Billy grinned and leaned past him to get his own beer. “But I’m guessing your dad knew that you wouldn’t leave your sister—”
“I was going to,” Luc insisted, realizing that as far as defenses went, that one was awful: I was going to be an asshole.
“No, you weren’t,” Billy scoffed. “You’d have found a reason to stay. Just like you’re going to find a reason to go talk to that woman.”
“Tara?” He jerked his thumb in the direction of the door. “She doesn’t need me. She’s made that very clear.”
“She needs someone.” Billy pulled a bag of chips out of the pantry door, already at home. “I’m dumb as rock, but I can see that.”
Luc took a swig of beer, as if challenging Billy’s assessment. As if to say fuck you and fuck Tara. Fuck everyone else I need to need me. He resisted as long as he could, his hands gripping the counter as if there were one of those cartoon gale-force winds working against him, threatening to suck him right back out to Tara.
“Damnit.” He pushed the beer over to Billy and followed Tara out the door.
“Go get her, Grandpa!”
Everything fit into her purse. The negligees
that had been sitting in the top drawer for weeks before Lyle died. The bunny slippers—all of it. When she walked out of here, she was taking every last scrap of lace and silk and leather she owned. And it fit inside a purse—how sad was that?
She’d put extra locks on the door of her apartment. The windows. Hell, maybe she’d move. There were fresh starts everywhere. Someone just had to be desperate enough to find them.
She swung the overstuffed hobo bag over her shoulder and turned, only to find Luc filling the door. Shadows cut across his face, leaving his eyes and lips revealed in moonlight from the window.
He was a closed book, every feature and muscle held in the kind of control she could only dream of.
Her body sighed, swooning in remembered pleasure. So weak in front of all of his strength.
“I’m leaving,” she said when the silence became too much. “You don’t need to stand here and watch me go.”
“I’m worried about you.”
Worried? About her? That was sort of a first in her life, so she gave herself a moment with the words, a breath, a heartbeat, like holding a diamond in her hand. And then she pushed them—and him—away.
“I thought I made it clear I wasn’t interested in your concern.” She shook her hair out of her eyes, meeting his gaze with every ounce of bravado and bullshit she could muster. Don’t care! she wanted to yell at him. I’m the poison, I’ve always been the poison, and I will ruin this place and this family.
“Unfortunately, Tara, I can’t lie every time I feel something I don’t want to. I can’t turn it off and I can’t pretend I’m not feeling it.”
There was no response, no flippant comeback to something so honest. It shamed her, his honesty. So she said nothing. She just put her chin up and walked toward the door. Toward him.
An arm’s length from him, she stopped, the heat from his body something she imagined to be real, holding her there.
“Let me go.”
He shook his head. “Not until you tell me what’s going on, Tara. And no more bullshit.”
“I’ve told you. Victoria—”
“You.” The word jabbed her in the chest. He stepped forward and now she wasn’t imagining the heat from his body, it was there. So close she could put her numb hands against him and feel its warmth. “What is going on with you?” He lifted his eyebrows. “I won’t let you leave, Tara. Not until you tell me the truth.”
“Oh please—”
“Stop it!”
She jerked back, stunned by his sudden ferocity. He rubbed his hands over his face, into his dark hair, putting every strand on end. “Just talk to me, Tara. I want to help and you know I can, otherwise you wouldn’t have been staying here. Now, I know this has something to do with Dennis. And I know it’s not good, so cut the crap and talk to me. I can help you. I want … I want to help you.”
He sounded tired, like he was dealing with a petulant child and sick of it. Her lip curled and her breath suddenly heaved in her chest.
He was going to … what? Save her?
Idiot.
She was past saving. So far past it, she couldn’t remember what innocence felt like.
Her bag fell to the ground like a thousand-pound weight. His eyes went wide at the sound and she had his attention.
Good, because she was only going to tell this story once.
“I met Dennis when I was sixteen. I was …” She licked her lips, unable of course to tell the whole truth, because some things she just couldn’t put into words. “I was in trouble and broke. Dennis had a job as an orderly at a nursing home and he had this scam going. He’d befriend little old ladies who had no family, no visitors, and he’d charm them into giving him gifts. Money.”
“I knew I didn’t like that guy.”
She put up her chin, braced for the left hook of his disdain. His disgust.
“He convinced me to do the same, but with the men.” He started to shake his head, his eyes as wide as if she’d told him she killed baby seals in her spare time, but she kept talking, a stone rolling downhill. “I’d go to a nursing home wearing a short skirt and my mother’s crucifix and I’d pretend I was looking for my grandpa so I could read him the paper. And …” She swallowed. Whoever said confession was good for the soul was a goddamned liar. She felt sick. “The first guy, his name was Mr. Beanfang.”
“You mentioned him before.”
“Well, he was rich. So rich. He had money just lying around, like it didn’t matter. And he didn’t have any family and he was … he was lonely. So I read him the paper. Or one of the books from his room. And he started giving me money.”
“And you took it?”
There it was—the trace of judgment, of disbelief—on the fringes of his voice. The destruction of everything he felt for her would begin like this—a trickle of doubt. He’d fight it, because he was the kind of man who would try to rationalize her behavior, see all the reasons behind the evil she’d done.
Pointless. Because in the end he’d abhor her.
She’d make sure of that.
“Of course I took it, Luc. That was the whole point. I was a thief and a liar. And I got enough money to get myself out of trouble and on a bus to California, and I left.”
“Dennis—”
“Followed me. He found me a few months later. I’d been kicked out of my apartment, my stuff had been stolen, and we started it all back up again. The nursing homes, the old guys with no family. And as soon as I’d make enough to get myself out of trouble, I left. Again. And a few years later he found me. My mom was sick. There wasn’t any money—”
“I get the idea—”
“Really? I doubt it. Because I did it four times, Luc! Four times I preyed on those men. I pretended to be something I wasn’t so they would give me their money!”
Her voice shook in the rafters and she felt herself falling into pieces. Luc reached out to her and she stepped away, appalled that he would try to touch her.
“Why is Dennis here now?” Luc’s voice was careful, slow and sure, like bedrock under her feet, and she pulled herself back from the brink.
“I … I gave the money back to the last old man. I couldn’t … I couldn’t do it. He’d given me ten grand and … I was twenty-nine and sick of what I was doing. But Dennis was in trouble with some people and he needed to get out of town. When he found out I’d given the money back, he beat me up. Put me in the hospital. Where I met Lyle.”
She saw the moment when her words hit home. His face sharpened, every inch of his fierce nature brought to bear against her, and she wanted to cower behind a lie, some fiction she’d created to keep her distance from the ugliness of her past. But she’d pulled down all her walls and she stood here, naked.
“You conned him.” His words were a blowtorch against her skin.
“I told Lyle every single thing about myself,” she said. “I told him about the old guys and the money.” And more. And more and more and more. But Luc would never know. Never.
Luc was shaking his head, disbelieving, and she didn’t blame him. “And you read to him and you accepted his gifts—”
“No gifts. He gave me the job. Straight up.”
It was the truth; she had nothing else to offer Luc, nothing else to sway him. He’d believe her or not.
Please, she thought, surprised that it mattered so much what this man thought of her. Please believe me. Please.
“So Dennis is here for the money?” His voice gave away nothing and she fought the urge to scramble in front of him, offering justification. “For you? You brought him here?”
“He just got out of jail.”
“Jail!”
She nodded and he swore. “He needs money and then he’ll go.” This was her hope, her fervent dream, but she doubted her words even as she said them. She would never get rid of Dennis, not unless she went to the police.
“How much?”
She bit her lips, the words none of your business on the tip of her tongue, but it was his business. By coming here,
by bringing her long tail of poison with her, she’d made Dennis everyone’s business.
“How much?” he thundered.
“Two hundred thousand.”
“The bonus?”
She nodded.
“Why haven’t you called the cops? This is extortion—”
“Are you kidding? What I did is called fraud. Dennis would and could put me in jail.”
“How much did you take from these men?”
“Including the ten grand—”
“You gave that back.”
She shook her head. “Doesn’t change the fact that I conned him into giving it to me. All told, around thirty grand.”
He whistled, and her stomach shook with guilt.
“I doubt anyone is going to put you in jail for thirty grand in gifts from men who were grateful for the company.”
“Dennis got arrested for fraud. Sent to jail for five years for doing the same thing I did but with less money.”
“Somehow I think they had more on Dennis than that.”
Tara was pretty sure of it too. He’d gotten busted a few times for stealing medication from the nursing homes and selling it on the street. He always had someone after him. Cops. Criminals. It hardly seemed to matter.
“Do you honestly think he’ll go away when you give him the money?”
She shook her head. “This is … this is the cost of what I did, Luc.”
“Bullshit, Tara. You want to make it right?”
“Of course I do, Luc. I’m paying—”
“Paying him money won’t do anything. You know that. You’re not stupid. You want to make this right, man up and go to the cops.”
For a moment she let the coward in her scramble, searching for another way, but then she took a deep breath and took a good, hard look at the truth.
She needed to go to the cops.
That woman who Dennis had described—the coward—was it possible she could just choose to not be that woman? Could she choose to be better? The idea was like a light going on in a dark room.
Right now, her own actions—not a new name, a different job—could change things for her. Forever. Suddenly the fear of going to jail was not as large as her hope that she could be different. Better. Someone she could be proud of.
Can't Buy Me Love Page 19