Dick Brewer turned out to be a short, pot-bellied man with a ring of brown hair, squinty eyes, and, best guess, size fourteen feet. He wore jeans with suspenders and a sweat-stained undershirt, and brought to Johnny’s mind a sloppy Pillsbury Doughboy. Gloom surrounded him like a storm cloud.
Stormy wasn’t far from the way Johnny felt. Melia still wasn’t ready to talk. He got that. What he didn’t get, not yet anyway, was a feeling of hope that they’d be able to work it out. That the damage might be repairable, given time and the fact that he loved her more now than he had when this nightmare had begun.
Three years. It was a long time to let her hate herself. He deserved all the anger and mistrust she could level at him, Johnny knew that. He’d known it from the start. Her life versus her death. It had seemed like a no-brainer back in Atlantic City. Why did it feel so wrong now?
Melia hadn’t deserved to be kept in the dark. So, hope? Did he even have the right to wish for it? What he’d done had been unforgiveable and, in the end, pointless. Because there they were, trapped in the very situation he’d wanted so desperately to avoid. Only this time, there were three years and a mountain of pain between them.
“Fuck,” he said softly. Her elbow dug into his ribs.
“Cady keeps crying and crying,” Dick was telling them. He grunted out each breath as they made their way through a large clearing filled with tires, stripped down tractors, and a broken-down plow. Next to the plow sat a turtle-shaped plastic pool half full of greenish water. “Bought it for the young’uns,” he explained. “I’ll send the boys to your place, doc. I already told ’em to wash the walls they splattered. But if that housekeeper of yours takes a broom to my kid again, I’ll be taking something a whole lot nastier to her.”
“It’s never a good idea to threaten people in front of witnesses, Dick. And I warned her last night about swatting Sammy.”
“That woman’s a righteous pain in the butt.” He glanced at Johnny. “Maybe you could take her to Los Angeles when you go back. She already thinks she’s Betty Grable.”
“Davis,” Melia corrected. “She can’t leave here any more than you can. You need to learn to deal with situations you can’t change.”
Was that remark aimed at Dick or at him, Johnny wondered. He spotted a filthy Dodge Ram outside a run-down second structure and gestured at it. “Your truck?” he asked.
Dick snorted. “That hunk o’ junk? Not frigging likely. Got renters. Two guys. They’re working on the new high school. Came down from Little Rock.”
“When?”
“No idea. They said they got sick of sleeping in their trucks. Offered me ten bucks a night each for a roof over their heads. I had the room and the extra cots. For that plus a hotplate and access to the well, I’m pulling in a hundred and forty bucks a week. Only rule, they can’t go near my girls, and my girls can’t go near them. Susie’s turning eighteen this month. Pretty as a picture. Hates her freckles.” His tone grew cranky. “Looks a lot like her ma.”
Melia smiled. “What about Cady?”
“I told you, doc. She’s been crying for the past two days. Tears and more tears.”
Johnny studied the rusty metal outbuilding. “How long have your tenants been here?”
“I don’t know. Six days, maybe seven.” Dick narrowed his eyes. “You reckon one of them made Cady cry?”
Melia shot Johnny a warning look. “How could he possibly know something like that, Dick? Let me talk to Cady. Johnny can wait out here, maybe take a walk down to the river, fish with the boys for a while.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Johnny agreed.
He spied movement in one of the outbuilding windows and headed for it. A week worked, he reflected. And the Brewer property was far enough from both town and the river road to serve as a proper hideout.
The door opened before he reached it. “Hey,” Johnny said as a man started down the stairs.
“Uh, hey,” the man said back.
Johnny figured him for the hired gun stereotype. The accent fit Little Rock, but that didn’t mean squat in his opinion. “You living here?” he asked.
“Um, yeah. Had a late night. Getting a late start.”
“So I see. Where’s your roommate?”
“Not here.” The man, five nine or ten at best and wiry, frowned. “You a deputy or something?”
“Or something.” Johnny kept his expression pleasant. “Why the late start?”
The man’s neck went red. “Pretty sure I don’t have to tell you that.”
“Chrissakes, how’d it get so late so fast?” A young woman raced from the building, tucking a T-shirt into a pair of Daisy Dukes. “I told you not to let me fall asleep, Lowell.”
“Lyle,” the man said out of the corner of his mouth. Then he swallowed. “You ain’t kin to each other, are you?”
“What? No.” The girl looked at Johnny, did a double take, and paused. “No.” The smile she flashed revealed several crooked teeth. “But I wouldn’t mind getting to know him better. Aw, hell, wait a minute. You’re with Doc Rose, ain’t you? That means Daddy’s somewhere close by.”
Johnny masked a grin. “You must be Susie.”
“Crap, I’m outta here.” The girl darted a glance at the house and disappeared into the undergrowth.
“I, uh…” Lyle scratched his cheek. “You won’t tell, will you?”
Johnny let the grin form, but he made sure Lyle saw the keen edge of it. “Might. Might not. Let’s you and me go inside and have a talk.”
“About what? The birds and the bees?”
“Nope.” Johnny gestured at the man’s arm. “You’ve got a bandana wrapped around your bicep.” The edge appeared, viper sharp. “I want to see what’s under it.”
…
“For God’s sake, Johnny.” Melia dropped her medical bag onto the back seat, next to Cas’s gift—which Johnny appeared to have opened. “You probably frightened the poor guy half to death.”
“He deserved it.” But Johnny chuckled as he slid into the driver’s seat. “Susie scratched him up good, arm, chest, and butt—I didn’t check that one out—and all the while, Daddy Dick’s fifty yards away making fishing poles. Girl’s got nerve.”
“Who’s Lyle?”
“An asshole, but probably not connected to Satyr.”
She regarded him in profile. “You’re supposed to own a hotel, remember? How many hoteliers carry weapons and force renters to strip down so they can examine a bunch of scratches incurred during a bout of hot sex?”
“I told the guy my brother was a cop and I was toying with the idea of selling up and joining him.”
“Great. So more lies for us to remember.”
“Hey, you came up with the hotel thing.”
“And the cousin thing,” she reminded him. “Act appropriately, or people will think I’m twisted.”
“Not around here, they won’t. Distant cousins marry each other all the time in insulated communities like this. Lyle told me that Susie’s family’s related to half the people in town, including Pappy Laundy and Sheriff Travers. It explains a lot of the backward thinking.”
She didn’t want to laugh, but her lips twitched at the corners. “You’re such a cynic. Not quite right, but jaded as hell. By the way, it might interest you to know that our third stop is at my real cousin Joseph’s place.”
“Joseph who came to our wedding wearing yellow shorts, white sneakers, and a man bun?”
“What can I say. He’s an artist.”
“He illustrates kids’ books, Mel.”
“That’s more than you or I could do, artistically speaking. You’re looking behind us again. Why?”
“Habit.” He checked the side mirror. “Plus the fact that the roads we’ve been on since lunchtime are a lot better than the ones we took this morning. I’ve even seen a hobby farm or two. And speaking of, what does Dick Brewer do besides make fishing poles?”
“He works at the local hardware store. He took today off because of Cady.”
“So, he’s not a total asshole, then.”
“Mostly just where his wife is concerned. He’s also not too keen on female physicians. Except today with Cady.”
“Why the crying jag?”
Melia moved a shoulder. “Cady’s growing up.”
“And that means?”