Best Kept Secrets (26 page)

Very quietly, he said, "Good try, Alex, but I'm not admitting anything."

He tried to move away then, but she caught his arms.

"Well, weren't you her lover? What difference does it make if you say so now?"

"Because I never kiss and tell." His eyes slid down to her pulsing throat, then back up. "And you should be damned glad I don't."

Want surged through her, as warm and golden as the morn ing sunlight. She craved to feel his hard lips on hers again, the rough, powerful mastery of his tongue inside her mouth.

She became dewy with desire and tearful with remorse for what she desperately wanted and couldn't have.

Eyes locked, neither realized that they were being observed from across the street. The sun was as good as a spotlight on them.

Willing herself out of the dubious present and into the disturbing past, she said, "Junior told me that you and Celina were more than just childhood sweethearts." It was a bluff, but she gambled on it working. "He told me everything about your relationship with her, so it really doesn't matter whether you admit it or not. When did you and she first . . .'" you know?"

"Fuck?"

The vulgarity, spoken in a low, thrumming rasp, sent shafts of heat through her. Never had that word sounded erotic to her before. She swallowed and made an almost imperceptible nod of acknowledgment.

Suddenly, he hooked his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her against him, placing her face directly beneath his. His eyes bore into hers.

"Junior didn't tell you shit, Counselor," he whispered.

"Don't try your fancy, courtroom-lawyer bluffs on me. I've got eighteen years on you, and I was born smart. The tricks I've got up my sleeve, you've never even heard about. I'm damn sure not ignorant enough to fall for yours."

His fist clenched tighter around the handful of her hair he was holding. His breath felt hotter and came faster against her face. "Don't ever try to come between Junior and me again, you hear? Fight us both or fuck us both, but don't

tamper with something outside your understanding."

His eyes narrowed with sinister intensity. "Your mama had a bad habit of playing both ends against the middle, Alex.

Somebody got a bellyful of it and killed her before she learned her lesson. You'd do well to learn it before something like that happens to you."

The morning was a washout in terms of discovering new clues. Nothing diverted her mind from the disturbing conversation she had had with Reede. If a deputy hadn't knocked on the office door and interrupted them, she didn't know whether she would have clawed at Reede's eyes or yielded to her stronger urge to press her body close to his and kiss him.

At noon she stopped trying to concentrate and crossed the street to have lunch at the B & B Cafe. Like most people who worked downtown, that had become her habit. No longer were conversations suspended when she went in. Every now and then she even merited a greeting from Pete if he wasn't too busy in the kitchen.

She dawdled over her meal as long as possible, scooting the yellow ceramic armadillo ashtray back and forth across her table and leafing through Pete's printed brochure on the proper way to prepare rattlesnake.

She was killing time, loath to return to the dingy little office in the basement of the courthouse and stare into space, recounting unsettling thoughts and reviewing hypotheses that seemed more farfetched by the hour. But one thought kept haunting her. Was there any connection between Celina's death and Junior's hasty marriage to Stacey Wallace?

Her mind was steeped in speculation when she left the cafe. Ducking her head against the cold wind, she walked toward the corner. The traffic light, one of the few downtown, changed just as she reached the corner. She was about to step off the cracked and buckled concrete curb when her arm was caught from behind.

"Reverend Plummet," she stated in surprise. Subsequent events had quickly dismissed him and his timid wife from her mind.

"Miss Gaither," he said in a censorious tone, "I saw you with the sheriff this morning." He could have tacked on any number of deadly sins to account for the accusation smoldering in his deep-set eyes. "You've disappointed me."

"I fail to see--"

"Furthermore," he interrupted with the rolling intonation of a sidewalk evangelist, "you've disappointed the Almighty."

His eyes rounded largely, then closed to mere slits.

"I warn you, the Lord will not tolerate being mocked."

She nervously moistened her lips and glanced around, hoping to see some avenue of escape, though she didn't know what form it might take. "I haven't meant to offend you or God," she said, feeling foolish for even making such a statement.

"You haven't locked the iniquitous behind bars yet."

"I haven't found any reason to. My investigation isn't complete. And just to set the record straight, Reverend Plummet, I didn't come here to lock anybody behind bars."

"You're being too soft on the ungodly."

"If by that you mean that I've approached this investigation impartially, then yes, I have."

"I saw you this morning fraternizing with that son of the devil."

His maniacal eyes were arresting, if repellent. She caught herself staring into them. "You mean Reede?"

He made a hissing sound, as though the very name conjured up an evil spirit that must be warded off. "Don't be taken in by his wily devices."

"I assure you, I'm not."

He came a step closer. "The devil knows where women are weak. He uses their soft, vulnerable bodies as channels for his evil powers. They're tainted, and must be cleansed by a regular outpouring of blood."

He isn't only nutty, he's sick, Alex thought in horror.

He slapped his hand upon his Bible, causing Alex to jump.

Raising his index finger into the air, he shouted, "Resist all temptation, daughter! I command every lascivious impulse to desert your heart and mind and body. Now," he bellowed.

He slumped, as though the exorcism had totally drained him of energy. Alex stood transfixed by disbelief. Coming to her senses, she glanced around uneasily, hoping that no one had witnessed this madness and her unwitting involvement in it.

"As far as I know, I have no lascivious impulses. Now, I must go. I'm late." She stepped off the curb despite the fact that the traffic light was flashing instructions not to walk.

"God is counting on you. He's impatient. If you betray his trust--"

"Yes, well, I'll try harder. Goodbye."

He lunged off the curb and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"God bless you, daughter. God bless you and your holy mission." Clasping her hand, he pressed a cheaply printed pamphlet into it.

"Thank you."

Alex worked her hand free and jogged across the street, quickly putting two lanes of traffic between her and the preacher. She trotted up the steps and barreled through the courthouse doors.

Glancing over her shoulder to see if Plummet had followed her, she ran right into Reede.

He caught her against his chest. "What the hell's the matter with you? Where have you been?"

She wanted to lean against him, feel his protective strength, until her heart stopped racing, but didn't allow herself the luxury. "Nowhere. I mean, I went out. To lunch. At the, uh, the B & B. I walked."

He studied her, taking in her windblown hair and ruddy cheeks. "What's that?" He nodded down at the pamphlet she was clutching in her white-knuckled hand.

' 'Nothing.'' She tried to stuff it into the pocket of her coat.

Reede snatched it out of her hand. He scanned the cover, flipped it open, and read the message heralding doomsday.

"You into this?"

"Of course not. A sidewalk preacher handed it to me. You really should devote some attention to clearing the panhandlers off your city's streets, Sheriff," she said haughtily.

"They're a nuisance."

She stepped around him and continued downstairs.

Twenty-two

Nora Gail sat up and retrieved the filmy garment she'd worn into the room.

"Thanks," Reede said to her.

She gave him a reproving glance over her milky-white shoulder. Drolly she replied, "How romantic." After shoving her arms through the ruffled sleeves of the peignoir, she left the bed and moved toward the door. "I've got to go check on things, but I'll be back, and we can talk." Patting her beehive hairdo, she left the room.

Reede watched her go. Her body was compact now, but in a few years it would go to fat. The large breasts would sag. Her oversized nipples would look grotesque without any muscle tone supporting them. Her smooth, slightly convex belly would become spongy. Her thighs and ass would dimple.

Even though they were friends, he hated her at the moment.

He hated himself more. He hated the physical necessity that propelled him through this travesty of intimacy with a woman.

They rutted, probably more mindlessly and heartlessly than some species of animals. The release should have been cleansing and cathartic. It should have felt great. It didn't. It rarely did anymore, certainly not recently.

"Shit," he muttered. He would probably go on sleeping with her through their old age. It was convenient and uncomplicated.

Each knew what the other was able to give and

demanded nothing more. As far as Reede was concerned.

passion was based on need, not desire, and sure as hell not on love.

He got off. So did she. She had often told him he was one of the few men who could make her come. He wasn't particularly flattered because that might be, and probably was, a lie.

Disgusted, he threw his legs over the side of the bed. There was a pack of cigarettes on the bedside table, courtesy of the house. The carefully rolled joints you had to pay for. He lit one of the cigarettes, something he rarely did anymore, and drew the tobacco deep into his lungs. He missed the postcoital cigarettes more than any others, maybe because the tobacco punished and polluted the body that continually betrayed him with a healthy sex drive.

He poured himself a drink from the bottle on the nightstand--that would be added to his bill, even if he did fuck the madam herself--and tossed it down in one swallow.

Rebeling, his esophagus contracted. His eyes teared. The whiskey spread a slow, languid heat through his belly and groin. He began to feel marginally better.

He lay back down and stared at the ceiling, wishing he could sleep, but welcoming this coveted time of relaxation when he wasn't called on to speak, move, or think.

His eyes closed. An image of a face, bathed in sunlight and wreathed by loose, dark-auburn hair, was projected on the backs of his eyelids. His cock, which should have been limp with exhaustion, swelled and stretched with more pleasure than it had felt earlier tonight.

Reede didn't whisk the image away, as he usually did.

This time he let it stay, evolve. The fantasy was welcomed and indulged. He watched her blue eyes blink with surprise at her own eroticism, watched her tongue nervously flick over her lower lip.

He felt her against him, her heart beating in time with his, her hair tangled in his fingers.

He tasted her mouth again, felt her tongue shyly flirting with his.

He didn't realize that he made a low moan or that his penis twitched reflexively. A drop of moisture pearled the tip.

Yearning pressed down on him suffocatingly.

"Reede!"

The door to the room was flung open and the madam rushed back in, no longer looking cool and elegant.

"Reede," she repeated breathlessly.

"What the hell?" He swung his feet to the floor again and stood up in one economical motion. He didn't think to be embarrassed by his evident arousal. Something was desperately wrong.

As long as he'd known her, he'd never seen her rattled, but now, her eyes were wide with alarm. He was stepping into his briefs before she even started speaking.

"They just called."

"Who?"

"Your office. There's an emergency."

"Where?" Already standing in jeans and an unbuttoned shirt, he crammed his feet into his boots.

"The ranch."

He froze and swiveled his head toward her. "The Minton ranch?" She nodded. "What kind of emergency?"

"The deputy didn't say. Swear to God he didn't," she added hurriedly when she could see that Reede was about to question that.

"Personal or professional emergency?"

"I don't know, Reede. I got the impression that it's a combination of both. He just said you're wanted out there pronto. Is there anything I can do?"

"Call back and tell them I'm on my way." Grabbing his coat and hat, he pushed her aside and ran into the hallway.

"Thanks."

"Let me know what happened," she called down to him, leaning over the banister, watching his hasty descent.

"When I can." Seconds later he slammed the door behind him, leaped over the porch rail, and hit the ground running.

Alex was in a deep slumber, which was why she didn't associate the knocking on her door with reality. Subconsciously, she thought the racket was an extension of her

dream. A voice finally roused her.

"Get up and open the door."

Groggily, she sat up and reached for the switch to the bedside lamp, which always seemed to elude her. When the lamp came on, she blinked against the sudden light.

"Alex, dammit! Get op!"

The door was vibrating with each fall of his fist. "Reede?"

she croaked.

"If you're not up in ten seconds ..."

She checked the digital clock on the nightstand. It was almost two in the morning. The sheriff was either drunk or crazy. Either way, she wasn't about to open her door to him in his present frame of mind. "What do you want?"

Alex couldn't account for the change in the sound of the thumping until the wood began to splinter, then shatter. Reede kicked the door open and let himself in.

"Just what the hell do you think you're doing?" she shouted, gathering the covers against her as she sat bolt upright.

"Coming to get you."

He grabbed her, covers and all, plucked her off the bed and stood her on her feet, then ripped the covers away from her grasping hands. She stood shivering in front of him, wearing only panties and a T-shirt, her usual sleeping en semble. It would be difficult to say which of them was the more furious or riveted.