Once Upon A Killing (A Gass County Novel Book 2) (14 page)

“I’ve been hard for you all day today,” he whispered into her ear, pushing the evidence between his legs into the apex of her thighs. “I think we should do something about that, don’t you?”

“Yes,” she whimpered under his relentless take-over of her body. Even with clothes on she could imagine what it would feel like having him inside her again, and with the solidness still growing between his legs she wasn’t surprised it could push through her pants and enter her without much force.

“I want to fuck you, Christine. Hard. In every single opening your body has. I want it all,” he grabbed strands on top of her head in his hands forcing her to look up at him. “Let’s go. Let’s fuck our brains out.”

Something interrupted them. A sound neither of them expected at this time of night.

“Brody or Bryce? Which one is your take?” he let out a deep sigh and pushed himself off Christine’s beating chest. “Mind going for the door?” he asked, pointing a finger down at his crotch. If it wasn’t for the fabric strength of his jeans, his cock would be jutting in excitement in midair looking for a place to bury itself.

It made her giggle, and with a hand through her hair, and the other pulling her shirt down over her bare stomach she left the pleasant moment they’d shared on the living room couch and went for the hallway leading down to the front door of his house.

As she looked out the frosted glass at the top of the door her eyes noticed neither Brody nor Bryce, but further down a slight body the size of a child. She thought for a moment, debated whether to call for Wayne or open the door. Her hand turned the lock around with a faint pop and opened slightly to let the chill of the evening and the small voice of a girl enter the house.

“Hi,” she said softly, a hoody covering what seemed to be darker hair pulled back in a ponytail, she assumed. “I’m not sure if this is the correct house, but I’m looking for a Wayne Matthews. Do you know where I can find him?” The girl took a half step back, possibly thinking she might not be welcome, and pushed her hands into the pockets of a green jacket covering the thick sweater. A lower lip trembling in the light of the porch light.

Too young to have slept with
. Christine’s mind quickly ran a scan.
Maybe family?

“Um, I guess so. Hold on a second.” Scrunching her eyebrows heavily together, certainly leaving a creased line, she held the open door steady in her hand and turned to yell into the house. “Wayne, there is a young girl here looking for you!”

“What?” A few quick steps were heard exiting the kitchen after the fridge door closed with a hard slam. As he walked down the hallway to the open front door, he met her eyes, quietly answering his question of who this girl might be. Neither of them seemed to have a clue.

“Hi, can I help you?” he said to the youngster standing outside, hands still deep in the pockets of her navy green cargo jacket.

“Are you Wayne Matthews?” the girl asked quietly but holding her voice steady, looking straight into Wayne’s eyes, which were growing more horrified by each second drifting by them.

“Yes, I am. Has something happened? Is something wrong? What is it?” Panic sheered through him like a bonfire. That’s what it was. That’s the feeling bubbling all the way from his feet and burning like a fireball at the center of his chest.

“No, not really,” the girl answered and looked down her feet.
“What do you mean, not really? Is someone hurt? You need to tell me? Who are you?”

“Calm down, Wayne. And you,” Christine interrupted them and turned to the girl outside. “You need to spill the beans and get to the point. What the hell is going on here?”

The girl took a deep breath and opened her mouth. “If you’re the Wayne Matthews who was dating Lucy Anderson in high school, well then… you are my dad.”

“What?” Wayne shook his head in disbelief, spitting out a gruesome laugh. “I’m sorry, what did you just say? I’m… I’m what? No, no, no. What… what?” His hands were flying vigorously in front of his chest, fending off any words aimed his way.

Eventually his trembling voice died down and an awkward silence spread between the three. For a long time Wayne’s voice was repeating words of a misunderstanding, until Christine placed a hand on his shoulder to quiet him down. Her eyes flew from each of the quiet houses on the cul-de-sac ending with his and noticed a light turned on in Mrs. Peterson’s upstairs bedroom. Unfortunately, she was the nosiest woman in all of Primrose Valley, and not someone to share things with unless you wanted everyone at Harold’s, Rick’s pub, or the members of Primrose Women’s Club’s knitting group to gossip about it.

“Please come inside the house so we can sit down and at least talk about this,” she motioned for the girl to enter the door. “This is not the place to discuss something of this nature, Wayne. Calm down and move so she can step inside.”

The cold darkness caressed the outdoor world leaving the three of them inside the growing, awkward, quietness of the house. Large blue cups containing hot coffee, and one tall glass of soda filled the hands around the table. But the quietness lingered around them like a heavy anchor, holding that big surprise at bay. Christine had excused herself once more to get some of her famous cinnamon rolls from the freezer to the microwave. They’d always been Wayne’s favorite, ever since the first day they’d met in the bakery that one late evening, and she hoped the sweet cinnamon smell would take down his edge a little bit. Shaking the walls he built up a mile high.

It was quiet in the living room. Quiet as in a fox hole. If someone dropped a needle against the wooden floor it could be heard from miles away.

“Here you go, please take one. Warm and gooey just like you prefer them, Wayne.” He wasn’t moving an inch in his chair and his strong fingers were still locked hard around the blue ceramic in his hand. If he just squeezed that hand a little bit harder Christine was afraid he might just break the porcelain in two. The tight hold made the usually so warm tone of his skin turn his knuckles pure white, pale against the blue cup. The other hand was creating slow, continuous strokes over the unshaven parts of his chin.

The young girl staring down into her tall glass of soda across the table let her left hand travel along the tabletop until it grabbed a warm bun then bit into the oozing sweetness with satisfaction. “These are very good, thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. In fact, I happen to be working as a baker downtown and I brought these over here not too long ago and placed them in the freezer for Wayne. Something sweet to enjoy when he comes home from long shifts at work. They’re his favorite, I’ve been told. Right, Wayne?”

His face hadn’t moved. Without the slow movement of his hand across his face she might have taken him for a solid stone statue, simply sitting there in the chair, with eyes deep in thought or away somewhere else, while staring at the young girl sitting across from him. He stayed silent for a long time until his stroking hand slowed to a complete stop on his now slightly rosy skin. Without taking his eyes of the guest he brought up the cup to his mouth at the pace of snail and downed a big gulp, the sound echoing throughout the room.

“What’s your name?” His dark tone shook the small person in the opposite chair.

The young girl stopped chewing and placed the half-eaten bun next to the glass on the table.

“Mary.”

“That’s a very religious name. Doesn’t surprise me knowing Lucy.”

“Wayne, come on. That wasn’t very polite. A lot of people are named Mary, it’s a very common name,” Christine’s voice cut him off, but he never took his eyes away from the girl whom he couldn’t quite place.

“How old are you?”

“Fifteen.”

“How did you say I know your mom?”

“Well, she never told me who my dad was until I found her diary after she passed away, and your name was in there. A lot.”

“Doesn’t mean I’m your dad, though. She might have just liked me a lot. We…” The sentence died off as soon as it started, leaving the two women around the table to look up from their drinks and wait for him to continue.

“Yes?” Christine said, urging him to finish what he started.

“You see, Mary,” his eyes were darting between the two women, “we only… slept together once, and we used protection.”

“Do you want me to leave, Wayne?” Having finished her cup, Christine stood, leaving the conversation to die once again.

“No. No, please stay. Believe it or not, it would be easier if you stayed. Would you, please?”

She smiled and let her hand move slowly across his upper back as she went back to the kitchen to refill her cup. As she rounded the corner, Wayne leaned across the table, and with a low voice got Mary’s attention.

“Just so you know, I’m demanding a paternity test, because I’m not sure I’m buying this shit.” The moment his sentence finished, he leaned back, and Christine walked back into the room.

“What just happened? Mary, are you okay?” From the moment she’d left the room Mary seemed to have shrunk a few inches down into the chair and her eyes looked as if they might burst in tears at any second.

“Wayne?”

“I just said I needed to see that diary, and have a paternity test done. Right?” His arms lay crossed over his broad chest, as his eyes drilled into Mary’s.

“Yes,” she faintly whispered before pulling her sweater more snug around her tiny body.

The conversation didn’t give the impression of leading any further, and after Wayne had eventually excused himself from the women still sitting down around the table, Christine had motioned for Mary to take the spare bedroom for the night, just until morning when things had to be discussed in more detail and they were all rested, in hopes Wayne may be less aggravated from the shock of suddenly becoming a parent.

Chapter Nineteen

Wayne’s body was already hiding under the sheets in bed when she closed the door quietly behind her. “Do you want me to stay the night, Wayne, or would you prefer me driving home?”

His burly body sat straight in bed like a joker erupting from a box. “Stay, of course. I can’t fucking deal with a fifteen year old stranger who thinks I’m her dad. Are you crazy? What if she’s some crazy lunatic deciding to stab us in the middle of the night, burn the house down, or something else? We have to sleep in turns.”

Her hands were already on his shoulders, sitting across from him on the bed. “Your shirt is soaked; you’re sweating like a boxer.”

“Fuck yes!” he hissed, and swiped her hands off of him. “I cannot be a dad. I slept with Lucy one single time when I was nineteen and she was seventeen, and we didn’t tell our parents because, you know… the age thing.”

“I understand.”

“No, you don’t. How can you possibly understand? How can any woman understand? As a man you have sex with someone, you protect yourself the best you can, and then you’re off. Who knows how many other women will have children showing up on my doorstep in the future.”

“Wow,” she huffed. “You just confessed to being a man-whore, Wayne. Perhaps you shouldn’t sleep around so much?”

“A bit too late with the lecture, thank you very much,” he whispered and pointed across the room to the wall from where they could hear water running from Mary using the bathroom.

“Are you pregnant too, just not telling me? Is that how you women work? Just using us men for sex when you’re aroused and then you send us unknowingly off out into the world.”

“Oh, stop it,” her head shook. “You’re starting to lose it, and nothing good will come out of insulting me. Why don’t I just leave and you can deal with yourself tonight. Call me tomorrow.”  She pushed herself back on the sheets and off the bed, but his hand grabbed her arm, and pulled her across the bed and into his arms.

“I’m sorry, please don’t leave. I know I’m losing it, but I have no idea how to deal with this. Help me, please.” His eyes were deep pools of sheer desperation but she had nothing else to give him but her care and concern. She wrapped her arms around him, and held him as tightly as she possibly could, just to feel his chest move a little slower with each minute ticking by on the clock hanging on the wall.

“Lie down with me,” he whispered into the fabric of her shirt, still covering her body. “I know I won’t be able to sleep tonight anyway, and without you here I’d probably just wander this room in a circle until my feet fall through the floor and you’ll find them peeking out through the ceiling when you walk in the house tomorrow morning.” He held her tight. Clinging on for dear life.

“Let me get up and brush my teeth, and put on something else. I’ll be back in a second.”

“No. When I said ‘don’t leave’, I meant ‘don’t you dare leave this bed right now’. Don’t leave my side. You’re my anchor for survival right now.”

“But Wayne, I…”

He’d already pulled her with him as he fell back down on the now cold sweaty sheets, Christine now half across his chest. His legs tangling around hers creating a vine of limbs; making it impossible for her to escape. “Anchor,” he whispered. “Anchor.”

He turned slightly and buried his face in the nook of her neck, the side of her face resting on top of his, and locked both his strong arms around her, holding her tight, tight, covering them both with sheets in his state of anxiety.