His expression conveyed extreme need, but just what he needed I could not have said in that moment; I could only sense that he desperately wanted me to understand something. Then he stunned me by whispering, “I love her…for fuck’s sake.”
“You love my sister?” I asked, bewildered.
He was so far beyond drunk that I thought his eyes might roll backward into his skull. He might have been attractive, if not for his demeanor and the overtly arrogant set to his features; his dark eyes were glazed by the alcohol.
“I have always loved…Patricia,” he whispered, shaking my arm just a little, for emphasis. “Even if she doesn’t…return my affections.” Derrick was staring into the middle distance, his gaze just above my head; exactly what he was seeing was uncertain – I only knew it wasn’t the Halloween festivities here in Jalesville. He said, “She loves that dirt-grubbing son of a bitch. He’s a goddamn…” He paused, drunkenly, before saying with certainty, “A goddamn killer for hire.”
What the hell?
“Who burned down Case Spicer’s barn?” I asked fervently, deciding to ignore his other very startling statements. It was crowded and one of the Nelson family’s teenagers (I couldn’t keep them all straight) jostled us, hastily apologizing.
Derrick muttered, “This fucking shithole town.”
“Who burned it down?” I pressed, speaking through my teeth.
“Pretty little sister,” he whispered, tilting his head and blinking slowly as he looked back at me, seeming to realize he was in danger of spilling additional secrets to a stranger. I tugged at my arm, which was still in his grip, just as he reached his other hand to cup my cheek, moving quickly for someone so drunk.
I jerked instantly away, not caring if he stumbled and fell. I needn’t have worried, as Marshall was suddenly there, and the look in his eyes would have made a much more sober man than Derrick turn tail and run; even through the thick boozy haze surrounding him, Derrick’s face registered apprehension.
Marshall was in what amounted to the calm before his storm, and though his voice emerged quietly, even I shivered at his tone. Not removing his eyes from Derrick’s, he ordered, “Walk away right now.”
“Or what, Rawley?” Derrick asked, with a singsong cadence.
“Or stick around and find out,” Marshall invited, his voice a finely-edged blade.
“No,” I implored, low, putting my hands on Marshall’s right arm. Beneath his sweatshirt I could feel his muscles, bunched and ready.
Before I could move, Derrick reached and stroked my hair, wrapping his fingers into my curls the same way Marshall usually did (my stomach lurched violently) and simultaneously said, “See you soon…pretty little sister.”
Marshall clamped a white-knuckled hand around Derrick’s shoulder and said directly into his ear, “I will break every fucking bone in your body.”
Derrick made a sound of disgust and shrugged away; Marshall let him go, to my great relief, turning instantly to me. I tucked myself against him and caught his jaws in my mittened hands. Before he could speak, I assured him, “I’m just fine.”
Marshall breathed out slowly through his nose, cupping my elbows in his hands, rubbing me with his thumbs. He said, “Wy ran over here to ask you to get him a hot chocolate instead and saw that bastard grab your arm.”
I noticed Garth, Sean and Quinn all headed our way, stern and imposing, clearly ready to help back up their brother, if necessary, and I felt the warmth of security; I knew they would fight to the death for each other, no matter how much they pretended otherwise.
Pam Heller, their cousin, leaned from the bar and asked us, “Someone call down the wrath of God, or what?”
Marshall’s shoulders relaxed a little as his brothers reached us. Garth put a hand on Marshall’s back and asked quietly, “Everything all right?”
Sean smacked a gloved fist in the opposite palm, hamming it up a little; he was pretty drunk himself, and the one to answer Pam, saying heatedly, “Someone screws with one of our women, they screw with all of us,” and then everyone in the vicinity was laughing.
“You tell ‘em, Sean,” Pam said. “I’m pretty sure you don’t mean that how it sounded,” and there was more laughter at her words.
Marshall said, referring to the local sheriff, “We have to find Jerry. Someone needs to take Yancy’s keys before he drives anywhere.”
“Let’s go,” Garth said. “I just saw Jerry a minute ago.
Marshall gently kissed me and then disappeared into the crowd with Garth, in search of the sheriff. Sean and Quinn stuck around with me in line; the two of them helped me carry everyone’s drink back to our seats.
“Everything all right?” Clark, Becky, Jessie and Wy almost simultaneously asked us. Baby Tommy was asleep on Clark’s lap, cozy in a blanket.
“It’s good, Pa,” Quinn said, patting his father’s shoulder.
Jessie held out her arms to Sean and he hustled back to his girlfriend. I heard her tell him, “I was worried about you, baby,” to which Sean responded, “I was like a gladiator, you shoulda seen it.”
Quinn, who’d broken up with Ellie a month or so ago, rejoined Wy on the quilt, while I went to sit with Becky until our men returned. Wy scooted close to us.
“Wy said Derrick Yancy grabbed your arm,” Becky said. “What happened? Ruthie, you should have seen Marsh, he just flew out of here to get to you. I hope he didn’t bulldoze anyone in his path.”
“I wasn’t trying to tattle,” Wy told him, as though I would have thought such a thing. “I was just worried. That Derrick guy looks nuts.”
“I know, buddy,” I assured him. Given what Derrick had said to me, I could have easily drawn the same conclusion. The troubling thing was I knew that Derrick was not crazy, and based on his statements, he had just given me ample reason to confirm that the past plagued him too. Maybe when he drank it was worse.
“Why doesn’t that asshole just go back to Chicago?” Becky wondered.
“He’s still making sales here, unfortunately,” I said. Al, Tish and I had just been discussing it at work. “Even though he’s been stalled, it’s enough that it’s still worth his time.”
Marshall and Garth rejoined us then, much to my relief. Both of them stopped to talk to Clark, though not before Marshall’s eyes swept to me, making sure I was safe.
“Jerry’s going to deal with Yancy,” Garth said, just as the first firework sounded, effectively lifting a rippling chorus of pleasure from the crowd at the sight of the glittering gold explosion.
Marshall and I reclaimed our lawn chair; Marshall settled the quilt over our laps and I cuddled against him, feeling so very safe and loved. Inside my left mitten, I used my thumb to touch my engagement ring. I already felt married to him; in my mind, I referred to myself as Ruthann Rawley, as I loved how that sounded. We had set our wedding date for next June 21st and planned to have everyone out here to Montana. We both wanted an outdoor ceremony, but hadn’t yet settled on an exact location.
Marshall murmured in my ear, “So I didn’t kill him, even though I thought seriously about it.”
“Marsh,” I scolded. I kissed his cheek, which felt chilly against my warm lips. He wasn’t wearing his hat, gloves or scarf, and I scolded more, “You’ll catch a cold, sweetheart.”
“Not with you in my arms. You’re so warm,” he responded, nuzzling me with little kisses. I tucked my wool mittens over his bare hands.
“Derrick said a bunch of really strange things,” I told him, as another explosion detonated in the black sky, this one sizzling with blue and green. “The strangest of which is that he loves Tish. He actually said that.”
“Loves the Tish he knows now, or the person he remembers from the past?” Marshall was as perceptive as always.
“Past,” I whispered, and as crazy as it was, I knew it was true. A violent chill swept up my spine, a shiver that bore no relation to the cold – at least, not the cold air, and Marshall held me even closer.
“I won’t let you go,” he a
ssured me, his voice low and warm. “You know that, darlin’.”
I did, but the insistent force of that energy, the sounds of the people from the past that I was still certain I somehow knew, were not so easily denied. I purposely avoided the letters written by Una Spicer (why couldn’t there be at least one word, anything to give me a clue about what had become of the marshal?) just as I avoided location of old Rawley homestead, and not only because of my terror. There was a small part of my soul, one I nearly refused to acknowledge, that felt as though I belonged there – rather than here. That was the crazy part.
The terrifying part.
“I know it,” I whispered, kissing him again, this time aiming for his lips.
Chapter Sixteen
The next evening, Tish and Case met us at The Spoke. It was Halloween and the atmosphere was made merry by the large crowd and the abundant decorations, including an array of glowing jack‘o’lanterns along the back edge of the bar. Most people were in costume. Marshall was filling in on drums for his friend’s band and I was excited to see him play; even though we had been here numerous times now, Marshall had not yet performed. For one thing, he explained, he’d been turning down requests because it would eat up the time we had together in the evenings. He played for me at home, and around the fire at Clark’s, and almost always sang with exuberance in the shower, but still I knew his favorite instrument of all was the drum set.
He’d played his drums for me one Sunday, an old set from high school that was still in Clark’s basement, much to my delight and amusement. He’d slipped on a pair of sunglasses and tied an old black bandana over his hair, so incredibly sexy as he took up his drumsticks and rocked out to my requests for over an hour, accompanied by an old tape deck. Clark had called down that dinner was ready (as though we really were a high school couple) and then we’d made love as fast as humanly possible before joining them, hearing everyone upstairs; I slid up my skirt to straddle him on the drum stool, giggling as our motion kept causing the pair of cymbals to tremble with exuberant pings.
Tonight the four of us sat at our customary table to the right of the stage; Marshall was wearing his cowboy hat and sat with one arm draped over the back of my chair. I was wearing jeans and a soft t-shirt that matched the garnets on my engagement ring, which I admired inconspicuously in the warm neon glow of the bar lights, tilting my hand this way and that to observe the fiery sparkle of the stones. My hair was twisted up into a loose knot, but a curl had worked free and trailed down my back; Marshall was winding and unwinding it around his index finger as we listened to Tish; I had told her and Case everything that Derrick had said last night.
“I’m so sorry you had to deal with that,” Tish said, turning her glass in circles between her hands. She was sipping soda rather than beer from the pitcher we’d ordered. I admired how beautiful she looked, her soft curls cast in scarlet from the neon. She was wearing a short-sleeved blouse the exact color of her eyes; Case had his hand on her thigh, beneath the table.
“It’s not your fault,” I assured her again.
“I am not normally a violent man,” Case said adamantly, as though we had told him otherwise. “But Jesus Christ, the thoughts I have of harming Yancy make me question it. Maybe I really was a mercenary in another life.”
“Derrick seemed pretty certain,” I said. “Even for being so drunk. He seemed sure you were a killer for hire.”
“When he drinks it must come to the forefront,” Tish said. “That time at the Coyote’s Den when he seemed to be remembering things from the past, he was totally obliterated. I’m sorry, Ruthie.”
“Even if he has inklings of it when he’s sober, he wouldn’t believe it,” I said. “I mean, most people don’t put any store in things like past lives. But it’s hardly your fault he approached me.”
“If he comes back within fifty yards of you, angel, I will break all his bones,” Marshall said, his jaw tightening. He released my curl and smoothed his hand over my back. He said, “I was pretty proud of myself for holding it together last night. But I don’t know if I could again. He thought he could just put his hands on you…”
“I hate when you talk about fighting,” I said quietly.
“Sometimes there’s no other way,” Marshall said; we’d had this talk last night already, reaching no good conclusion.
Tish said, “It is my fault. He thought you were me.”
I looked at my sister and said, “I tried to ask Derrick who started the fire. He was pretty insistent it wasn’t him.”
“I don’t believe it for an instant,” Tish said. “He saw it as a way to hurt me.” Her voice was low as she said, “That’s what he wants more than anything. Retribution.” Case took her hand and held it tightly in his; Tish acknowledged, “Though it might have been on Turnbull’s orders. Robbie did talk to Christina that night…God, it’s such a tangled web.”
“People are afraid to come forward,” I said. “People who could help us.”
“And people who lost their jobs with the plant closing were among the first to sell,” Tish said.
“A lot of them have already moved,” Case added.
“A crew was demolishing the Tomlins’ house and barn just last week,” Marshall said. “Garth and I saw on the way to Miles City. Garth said that Becky’s dad refused the contract to doze local homesteads. Yancy actually had the nerve to approach him to ask.”
“There has to be something,” Tish said, her teeth clenched in anger. “There has to be something we can dig up to prove that the Turnbulls and the Yancys have conducted unlawful business.”
“I’m sure there’s plenty,” I said. We talked about this frequently at work. “But it’s going to be next to impossible to dig up.”
“Lawyers and businessmen are going to be just as good at covering their tracks as a cop,” Case agreed.
“Derrick is the weak link,” Tish said. “I know it. He’ll slip up.”
“We have to count on Robbie,” I said, half-teasing. “He’s digging.”
“You’re sure he’s not in way deeper than you think?” Marshall asked Tish.
My sister chewed her bottom lip. Finally she said, “Even six months ago, I would have said maybe. But I don’t know – Robbie’s proving to be a better person than I ever gave him credit for. Affairs and shallow materialism aside, that is. He’s right in the thick of Ron’s business in Chicago. I believe he’d tell me the truth if he found something incriminating.”
“And you think that Turnbull trusts him?” Marshall asked.
“Ron doesn’t trust anyone,” Tish said reasonably. “Not to mention that Robbie was secretly screwing his wife. But Robbie is a good actor. If Ron suspected him, he’d have been out on his ass long before now.”
“Glen Westgaard is the key,” Case said. “Someone knows what really happened to him. If we can find that someone…”
“I’ve tried to get ahold of both Janice Mayne and Glen’s daughter in Wyoming,” Tish said. “But I can’t even find a number for the Maynes, and Linnae Westgaard won’t return my calls. I have half a mind to drive down there…”
“Maybe she doesn’t want to hear that her dad was possibly murdered,” I said, cringing at little at these words. I had already told Tish that’s why I was sure this woman wouldn’t call her back. “Who would want to acknowledge that possibility?”
“It’s not as though I told her that over the phone,” Tish said. “I just –”
She was interrupted as two men with guitar cases made their way through the crowd to our table. Both of them wore string ties and cowboy hats, and I guessed this was the band that needed a drummer for the evening, clearly a father and son; they introduced themselves as Walt and Junior Jorgenson.
“You girls have any other sisters?” the son joked, looking between Tish and me after introductions had gone around. He’d graduated Jalesville High the same year as Marshall.
Tish said, “We do, thanks, but she’s already married.”
“Damn,” he said regretfull
y, winking at her.
“You’re not too old for an ass-kicking,” Case warned Junior, who laughed good-naturedly.
“I’d disagree tomorrow morning when I couldn’t get out of bed,” Junior joked back, and then said, “Shit, you want to join us for a set, Spicer? We could use someone on fiddle, if you’re willing.”
Tish and I scooted our chairs around so we had a better view of the stage as the Jorgensons hauled Marshall and Case away to play with them; I had the sense that, like me, Tish was determined to enjoy herself, despite everything we had just been talking about.
The crowd was excited for the music, gathering at tables and already mobbing the dance floor; it was a little surreal to see some people in regular clothes and everyone else in costumes ranging from flamboyant to horrific. I giggled at the sight of a gruesome vampire with bloody fangs sitting at a table with a woman dressed as candy striper perched on his knee, both of them cheering along with the rest of the bar as the guys took their positions on the stage.
Walt Jorgenson greeted the crowd and wished everyone a happy Halloween, before saying into the mic, “Let’s give it up for longtime favorite on the fiddle, Case Spicer! It’s been a piece since he’s performed, but forgive him, folks, he’s a newlywed.”
Case was so cute, grinning and flushing, ducking his head a little, before sending Tish a wink; my sister had clasped her hands beneath her chin and was smiling radiantly back at him. We could barely hear Case over the good-natured teasing and laughter as he acknowledged, “It’s damn good to be married.”
Junior shifted his guitar to the side and leaned into his mic to add, “You do have that glow about you, Spicer, you lucky bastard.”
Marshall played a ba-dum-dum-ching riff on the drums and the crowd was wild with laughter; someone raised a beer bottle in salute and then everyone was toasting.
“Y’all ready to impress us with your dancing?” Walt challenged the crowd, and the general consensus seemed to be a riotous yes.
Until Tomorrow Page 29