She had been asleep, he thought. Slightly unresponsive because she had been sleep. But he needed her. He needed to move inside her, to feel her body, hot and wet, opening to surround him. Waiting for his touch. Welcoming. He needed her to destroy the sight and sound and smell of the dream, because he could bear anything but that—losing her. Anything else but that.
He eased his tongue deeper into her mouth, his hand drifting downward, trying to find the hem of the gown she wore. She loved silk, and so he bought it for her, delicate lace decorating the necks and hemlines of the gowns he chose. He wanted the sleek, so-achingly-well-known slip of that fabric over his skin, but what his searching fingers encountered was unfamiliar. Something was wrong. Something…
And suddenly he remembered. Everything. All of it. No barrier between his charred soul and that memory. No protection.
He had been hard and aching, ready for her. Anticipating release. So long. Such a long, agonizing denial. A denial that his body had been aware of even as his mind had briefly escaped the reality of it. He put his hands against the mattress, one on either side of the trembling woman who lay beneath him. He pushed himself up, away from her softness and back into the cold darkness. Awake now. Aware of what he had done. Aware of everything again.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly. He could see her face, eyes dark and too wide, afraid of him. “It was a dream.”
“I know,” she whispered. She touched him, her fingers gentle against his cheek. “It’s all right,” she said. “I understand.”
They stayed unmoving for an eternity. Finally he could feel his arms begin to tremble with reaction. He had to get out of here. Just for a little while. Just away. Because…He tried to banish the realization, to deny it, but he knew. And he would always know.
Even after he had realized his mistake, he had still wanted her. He wanted to make love to the woman who lay beneath him—even after he’d known she was not his wife. And that frightened him far more than anything else that had happened. The realization that he wanted so badly to make love to Becki Travers. Even after he had remembered it all.
He pushed away from the bed with one strong surge of motion. And then he was across the width of the small room, as far as he could manage within the confines of the space they were forced to share. The quietness drifted back gradually, the creaking springs beneath the mattress finally silenced, no traffic on the highway in the near dawn. Only the hum of the air conditioner, background, already unheard.
“Sometimes…” she said, the sound touching him out of the darkness. He could no longer make out her features. She was simply a shape in the dim, eerie illumination of filtered moonlight. “Sometimes,” she said again, her voice stronger, wanting him to hear and to know that she understood, “after my husband died, I’d wake up and think I could hear him breathing. Just beside me. It would seem so real that I’d reach out my hand and touch the emptiness.” It was a long time before she finished. “Just to be sure,” she whispered.
He felt his eyes fill, suddenly wet with the tears he could not allow. Had to control. He felt one slip downward and stop beside his mouth, blocked by the tightness of the ridged muscle there. He licked it off, tasting salt. When the second followed, it trickled unhindered to his chin, hanging a moment before spilling onto his bare chest. It was hot. Burning his skin. He clenched his eyes to prevent the escape of another. Not his right, he thought. He had no right to cry. And no right to her sympathy.
And so he spoke, his voice cold and dark from the shadows.
“Did you kill your husband, Ms. Travers?” he asked.
“No,” she answered finally, after he had waited a long time. Her voice was now only a whisper.
“Then you can’t really understand, can you?”
There was no answer from the woman whose body had lain acquiescent under his. He picked up his boots and shirt from the floor beside the bed. He pulled the chair from beneath the knob of the door and set it aside. He stepped out into the sticky heat of the Louisiana night, welcoming its warmth on his shivering skin.
And now she knows, he thought, and closed the door behind him.
BECKI LAY A LONG TIME in the darkness after the sound of that closing door. Her thoughts touched on and then skittered away from what he had said, like birds that wanted to feed but were frightened by the wind-driven movements of the scarecrow. She wanted to think about what those words meant, but her mind wouldn’t allow her to.
They had said he killed babies, and she had seen him strangle a man. Or thought she had. He had claimed the man they called Richard had only been unconscious, but how could she know? She was in the hands of a man about whom she knew nothing. A man who admitted that he had…Again her mind fled from the memory of what he’d said.
She had no idea what to do. Trust him to take her to Mike and Bill? Let him find and protect Josh? Or run as far and as fast as she could from a man who just might be insane? How did she know that the men who followed him, who had appeared out of the darkness, were what he had said? How could she possibly know what was really going on? She felt panic beginning to build, and she fought it, knowing that she couldn’t figure out the right thing to do if she were afraid. Afraid of him. Afraid for Josh. Fear would only interfere in her ability to function, to make the wise decision.
Suddenly, she threw the sheet off and began to hurry into her clothes. He might come back at any minute, and she hadn’t decided what to do. At least his absence made it possible to have an option. Unless he was waiting just outside the door.
She finished dressing, almost throwing on the garments, hands trembling, and then she sat down on the edge of the bed to put on her socks and shoes. She froze, afraid he might hear the movement of the springs. She listened for any reaction, waiting, but when she heard nothing, she completed the task. Then steeling herself, she tiptoed to the windows and pulled the shade back a fraction to look out.
In the early morning stillness the small cabins scattered under the moss-draped oaks were absolutely silent. The landscape was unpeopled, and there were no cars before any of the units. Apparently, they were the only ones who had taken advantage of the motel’s unwelcoming hospitality the night before. There was no sign of Deke Summers, and she wondered if he had simply left her here. Then she remembered that she hadn’t heard the truck. If he had gone, it had been on foot.
Her eyes continued to examine the area, moving past the entrance with its neon vacancy sign, to the office where he’d gotten out to rent the room, and over the distinctive blue-and-white stand by its door. Her eyes, skimming past, came back suddenly to the telephone, her mind racing. Contact with the outside world. Except, she remembered, she had no money.
She walked over to his canvas bag. She stood a moment, her natural inhibitions about invading his privacy strong. Finally, she knelt, and unzipping the bag, rummaged through, finding nothing but a few items of clothing and clips for the gun she had seen.
Still on her knees, she glanced toward the door and remembered the soft clink of the sack when he’d put it down on the bedside table the previous night. Her mind had automatically registered the sound. He had dropped the change from the transaction into the sack with the food instead of putting it back into his pocket, an action almost impossible for a man seated behind the wheel of a car.
She stood up and walked over to the grease-stained paper bag. The second burger she’d ordered was still there, the paper-wrapped bun cold and hard under her searching fingers, and in the bottom, on top of the napkins, were the coins.
When she slipped out the door of the cabin a few minutes later, she held her breath, waiting for someone to question her right to leave, but nothing happened. Everything was as deserted as it had been when she’d taken her survey from the window.
She walked quickly toward the phone, head down, letting the fall of her hair screen her face. Expecting at any moment a challenge to what she was doing, she lifted the receiver. She raised her hand, the quarter she’d found poised before the slot, and then sh
e hesitated.
Who could she call? The local authorities, about whom she knew nothing? Despite what had happened the previous night, in the back of her mind were the warnings Deke Summers had given. You never knew who might be involved, he had said. Overlying the words was the image of the filmed execution she had watched so long ago, carried out exactly as he’d described. They’ll put the muzzle of a rifle to the back of my head…
What if he had been telling the truth about the men following him? Suddenly she remembered the words of the commander whose face she had never seen. That ole boy don’t make the same mistake twice. Which implied his wife’s death had been the result of a mistake. Not deliberate. Some kind of tragic mistake. And if that were true…
Her family, she decided finally. She could at least call to see if they’d heard from the boys yet, if they had any information. She couldn’t call her mother. Mike would have been the one she would normally have turned to. Or maybe Bill. Not her oldest brother, Don, because of her run-in with Charlotte. Which left…Mary.
She slipped the coin in and dialed the code for a collect call. She told the operator her first name and then waited, listening to the distant ringing, wondering what time it was. Surely it was early enough that Mary hadn’t left the house.
“Hello.” The reassuringly familiar texture of her sister’s voice, still half asleep, came over the line, and Becki smiled, listening to the operator’s question.
“Mary,” she said, when her sister had agreed to take the call.
“What’s wrong?” came the automatic response.
“Nothing’s wrong. What makes you think something’s wrong?”
“It’s the crack of dawn, and you’re calling me long-distance. Why wouldn’t I think something’s wrong?”
“No,” Becki said, forcing a reassuring laugh, and then she wondered why she wasn’t explaining that there were lots of things wrong. Wasn’t that why she’d called? To get help? “I just wondered if you’d heard from the boys.”
“From the kids?”
“If Mike or Bill had called you.”
“They just left day before yesterday,” Mary said, her tone rejecting the question as ridiculous. “You okay?”
“Just missing Josh. I just wondered if you’d heard.”
She was aware that her sister had put her hand over the phone. She heard some sound, muffled.
“Mary?” Becki questioned.
After a small pause, the familiar voice came back.
“Sorry,” Mary said, “I thought I heard something. Mom on one of her ‘I thought you’d be awake by now’ visits, but I guess not.”
Becki smiled, relaxing at the complaint, the remembrance comforting. Their mother often just walked into their houses. If it was early enough, she didn’t knock or call out a warning because she was afraid she might wake someone. That was part of the familiar normality of the life she had left behind.
“Give me your number at the beach, and I’ll call you when I hear. Or I’ll have Mike call you down there,” Mary offered.
It wouldn’t do any good to give the number, Becki realized. She couldn’t stand out by this phone, waiting. She wasn’t registered at the motel, so Mary couldn’t ask for her or leave a message. She didn’t even know if she’d be here another night.
“The place I’m staying doesn’t have a phone,” she lied. “I guess they’re afraid somebody will run up a bill. I had to find a pay phone. That’s why I called collect. I’ll have to call you back. Unless you think they might have called Louise last night?”
“No, I talked to her. It was after nine and she hadn’t heard. They might call tonight, but I’m thinking Saturday. Friday at the earliest. They’ll probably eat out somewhere, maybe get a couple of rooms and make the calls.”
“Friday?” Becki repeated, thinking. This was Thursday morning. It was a long time to wait, especially now that she was unsure about the man who had taken her from her home. Unsure about everything because of what Deke Summers had said. “Okay,” she said, finally. “But I may call you back tonight. Just in case.”
“Is something wrong?” Mary asked again, her voice concerned, more awake now, more conscious that something wasn’t right about the conversation.
“I’m just missing Josh. And feeling homesick.”
“I was a little surprised when Mom told me you were going to the beach, but then I thought it was great. You need a break.”
“Yeah,” Becki agreed. “I guess.”
“Call me tomorrow night. They might be in touch by then.”
“Okay.”
“Love you, Bec.”
“Love you, too.”
The connection was broken, too soon, and she stood, holding the phone, listening to the slight hum of the dial tone.
She finally put the receiver into the metal hanger and turned to look back toward the cabin where she’d spent the night. There was a light mist over the dirt between, drifting upward from the warmth of the ground into the cooler morning air. Nothing moving, no sounds to disturb the peace. She took a breath and realized that she had to go back to the cabin and wait. Unless she wanted to set out on her own and try to find her brothers with the eighteen cents that remained of the change she’d found. Hitchhike, maybe? Suddenly, the known danger seemed highly preferable. The known danger, her mind repeated the phrase. Deke Summers. Only, there was so little that was known about him. And maybe, she decided, it was time to find out more.
SHE HADN’T BEEN BACK inside the room thirty minutes when Deke returned. She had locked the door behind her, but she hadn’t put the chair under the knob. She hadn’t even thought about it until she heard the key turning and then realized in quick panic that it was too late.
Deke pushed open the door, his big body outlined quickly against the light outside, and Becki took a breath in relief. Despite everything, she was glad it was Deke and not someone else. Instinctively, she trusted him more than the men who were looking for him.
Deke closed the door and again put the sack he was carrying down on the bedside table. Because he’d had to get away from what had happened, he’d convinced himself that going for food was a necessary risk. They had to eat. Based on his long experience, he figured they should be safe here for a few days. He had done everything right. There was no reason for the uneasiness he’d felt the entire time he’d been in the small café a few hundred yards down the highway.
Despite the early hour, there had already been a couple of people eating breakfast, their eyes sliding over him as he stood by the counter to order. In this rural environment, he’d told himself, strangers were probably rare enough to seem interesting. No one had followed him out. No one had seemed suspicious. He had no valid reason to feel the apprehension that had tightened his gut when he’d walked out. No reason other than his dread of having to return to the motel and face Becki Travers’s reaction to what he’d told her.
“I brought you some breakfast,” Deke said, carefully controlling his voice and his expression. No nuance of the dawn intimacy was allowed in either. Nothing would change in their relationship. Nothing could change, despite the fact that he had admitted to himself how close to the edge he was, how badly he wanted to make love to her. “I thought you’d be hungry. Since you didn’t eat last night.”
“Thanks.”
Becki made no move toward him, held back by what had happened between them less than an hour ago. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking, his features arranged in the expressionless mask she’d grown accustomed to when he’d lived next door.
When she said nothing else, Deke walked into the bathroom and returned with the single glass that comprised the amenities the management had provided. He opened the sack and took out a large container of coffee, and taking off the plastic cover, poured half of it into the glass which he set down on the table. He stepped toward her, the disposable white container held out.
“I’ve got cream and sugar,” he offered. “I wasn’t sure how you took your coffee.”
“Bl
ack, hot and by the gallon.” She had forced her mouth to form the words, but when she reached for the container, her hand was shaking.
His mouth tightened, aware that she was afraid of him. “Sausage and biscuits?” he asked, forcing himself to move back to the table, acting as if he hadn’t seen that telltale reaction. “Or just a biscuit? I picked up some jelly.”
When he turned back to face her, a wrapped biscuit in each hand, she was still holding the untasted coffee, the cup vibrating visibly with the trembling of her hand, her dark eyes held by force of will on his face.
“I think you have to tell me what you meant,” she said.
He didn’t pretend not to understand. After a few seconds he tossed the food on the unmade bed and walked to the windows. As she had earlier, he lifted the tattered edge of the shade and looked out. A muscle moved in his jaw, and she waited, wondering what she would do if he refused.
“You want to know how I killed my wife,” he said finally.
“They said it was a mistake.”
“And you prefer their version?”
“I prefer that you tell me the truth. I need to know. The truth about everything that’s happened.”
“The less you know, Ms. Travers, the better. That’s the truth,” he said.
“It’s not my fault I’m here,” she said, trying to be reasonable. “I don’t have anything to do with what’s happening. Josh and I are involved in all this just because we lived next door to you.”
“And because you couldn’t leave it alone,” he said with a trace of bitterness. Because I always knew what you were thinking.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean? That I didn’t leave you alone? I tried to be neighborly, so I deserve those men breaking into my house? Is that what you’re saying?”
“No,” he admitted softly, his eyes still directed outside. He regretted the accusation. It wasn’t her fault that her reaction had been…obvious. He had known she was attracted. Interested. And he had known from the first she was special. Except there was no place in his life for any of that. It was his life that was unnatural, not her reactions.
Men Made in America Mega-Bundle Page 11