Blood Brothers (40 page)

Had he fought until his body felt like a sack
of pulverized calcium, just to be smothered by the smoke?

The smoke was worse than the fire, it seemed.
As long as he stayed out of reach of the constant, sizzling licks
of the flame, he was safe. But the smoke was something else
entirely. It filled every square inch of space. It’s acrid,
gasoline-infused form with traces of a home left long abandoned,
scorched Michael’s throat like deadly acid. He was getting
lightheaded and the room began a sickening spin, an all too real
tilt-a-whirl.

And then Jerry emerged from the glowing
curtain of death.

Or, more appropriately, what had been Jerry
Garrett. The fire had left him far from unscathed. His skin looked
liquid in places, blackened and crispy in others.

And by some miracle, Jerry still walked. For
a moment, at least. Free from the fire, he collapsed, steam and
smoke trailing from his ruined and destroyed body. Michael watched
as his back rose one final time in a ragged breath and then fell
still.

It was over.

Michael looked around, scanned his little
ring. The walls of flame were impenetrable. With everything else
around him now fuel for the fire, his little spot of safety was
next. The fire came closer, inch by inch, but it was coming just
the same.

Yes, it really was over.

And then, the whole world seemed to crash
down on him. Ceilings, walls, perhaps even floors. It was like
thunder, but infinitely louder. And then the room was gone.

Now

Marvin Dexter had lived in his cabin way up
out of Benedict for a long time. While his three acre lot was
nothing fancy, it was his little slice of heaven. Marvin had long
ago consigned himself to lifelong bachelorhood and with no living
relatives or any close friends, he found even going into town for
food and supplies was becoming more and more a chore. At
seventy-three—still smoking two packs of Pall Malls a day and
drinking himself to sleep with Keystone Light every night—he was
just about as reclusive a figure as the county had ever seen. He
paid most of his bills through the mail and had no telephone or
television. Electricity was his most luxurious service and he read
stacks of Louis Lamour when he wasn’t napping in his old, broken
down recliner. As it was, it’d been three weeks, at least, since
he’d fired up his aged Ford and driven down the hillside into
town.

The little girl standing at his back door
looking like she’d seen a ghost was the first person he’d seen
since that last trip. Ordinarily Henry, his mutt, would have
alerted him to a stranger’s presence, but Marvin had to take him
out in the woods just Tuesday before last and put him down. He’d
caught rabies and there was nothing else to be done. Marvin didn’t
anticipate replacing his old friend. He’d buried too many dogs
during his life and wouldn’t bury another. When he’d first caught
sight of the girl, he’d taken her for being older—a trick of his
old, weak eyes—and thought she was either about to rob him or
vandalize his cabin. Both had been done before. But when he
approached her and put the shotgun to her, he saw she was nothing
but a child, a baby, really.

“Please, mister, don’t shoot.” She’d said.
She’d been in bad shape. Looking like she’d walked ten miles
through the woods and knocked into every tree, branch, and briar
bush she came to, Marvin’s crusty old heart had gone out to
her.

Despite himself, he’d believed her story. And
boy, what a story it was. But when she described the old Garrett
house so well, perfectly, the deal was sealed. Marvin remembered
what’d happened there back in the eighties. He was much more social
then, a young man in his fifties. Nothing about that place would
surprise him. But without a phone, without any way to contact the
authorities, he did the only thing he knew to do.

“Come on, girl,” he’d told the little beauty.
“Let’s go get your mama.”

But he’d seen the smoke before there were out
of his rutted gravel driveway. Black as tar, it billowed high into
the darkening sky. Nope, not a good sign. By the time they’d
reached the gate at the Garrett house the flames were stretching
higher than the trees. Something sank in old Marvin’s stomach.

He came to a stop halfway down the drive.

Looking down at his passenger, Marvin, who
hadn’t shed a tear for anything besides a long line of canine
companions in decades, choked up. After a long second he looked
back at the house. The inferno was raging. Flames licked out of
every window on the front and already the huge, hulking monstrosity
of a house—a fine example in greed, Marvin reckoned—was blackened,
the walls disintegrating before his very eyes.

The little girl—he didn’t even know her
name—sat close to her door. Her eyes were on the fire as well, and
he could see the slightest of shivers coursing through her.

Marvin slid the truck into reverse. Gently,
using the rearview, he started back to the road. There were things
to be done. While it was too late for the fire department to do
anything, he had to get the girl somewhere. Where, he didn’t know.
Maybe the police, maybe a hospital, he’d just have to play it by
ear. But, Marvin knew, he wouldn’t leave this child’s side until he
was sure she was safe.

The old engine groaned as it began reversing
down the drive. Suddenly the girl reached for the door handle and
before Marvin could mutter a world, she’d swung the heavy door open
and jumped out. He watched as her feet hit the ground and shot off
into a run. He thought the girl had flipped out at seeing the house
aflame, but then he saw something else. From the far corner of the
house, out from the smoke a form appeared. It took Marvin’s eyes a
few seconds to recognize the pitiable figure in the waning evening
light. It was a woman, dirty and soot-covered, but a woman. He saw
the little girl close the distance in the blink of an eye and then,
just as she reached the lady, she jumped into her arms. The little
girl wrapped her arms around the woman, who had to be the mother,
and she wrapped her arms just as tightly as her daughter.

It was right about then that Marvin decided
he’d go looking for a friend to replace Henry.

* * *

“Mommy! Mommy!” Christal shouted with every
ounce of air in her lungs. Her legs were rubbery weak from all the
exertion of the day, but they still pumped like pistons. She’d
given up all hope as soon as she saw how big the fire had gotten,
so seeing her mother was the best surprise ever.

She squeezed as hard as she could, relief
flooding through her. “Mommy, I love you.”

“I love you, too, sweetheart,” her mother
whispered into her ear. “I love you so very much.”

Stephanie Cole stumbled then, almost dropping
Christal. She understood her mother was weak, so she stood up on
her own. Her mother was very dirty. Covered in black, she smelled
like she herself had been on fire.

Stephanie knelt down, looking her daughter
directly in the eyes. Christal could see that over her shoulder her
mother spotted the old man and his truck. “It’s okay. He’s a nice
man. He’s got funny hair, but he’s real nice.”

Stephanie nodded as if that explained
everything.

“Baby girl, I have to tell you something,
okay?” That sounded bad enough, but when her mother lowered her
head, Christal knew whatever her mother was about to say was really
bad.

* * *

Stephanie didn’t even know where to start.
She’d barely managed to escape being roasted alive, only to find
Christal safe, unharmed. Well, save for a few scratches and torn
clothing. As she’d left Michael back in the house, she knew there
was no reason for her to leave. Without her family, she might as
well be kindling herself.

But here was Christal. And with Christal a
life that moments ago, seemed no longer worth living, had meaning
after all. She’d been so close, even after all she’d been through,
to just toss herself on the flames, set her body afire and save
herself from facing a world alone. If she’d done that, she now
realized, she’d be leaving this beautiful child an orphan in this
cruel world.

How do you tell your daughter her father is
dead?

There’s no easy way. Stephanie knew she
wasn’t the first mother to ever have to impart such crushing news,
but knowing that didn’t make this a damn bit easier. And she had to
tell her now. While the adrenalin from escaping still coursed
through her. Christal had a right to know. She also had the right
to know that no matter what was said about Michael Cole after this
evening, he was a decent man. He was not a great man, perhaps not
even a good man. But he loved Christal to no bounds and he’d
proved, if there’d been any doubt, that he loved Stephanie.

Christal would learn of the affairs her
father had. She’d learn, no doubt, that he’d killed people, though
one might have indeed been an accident, the other purely necessity,
but killed just the same. Took their lives like his had been taken:
too soon.

She stroked Christal’s arms lightly, feeling
the warmth of her blood as it coursed through her body. If what had
transpired here today had not ended her childhood, what Stephanie
was about to say surely would. Goodbye innocence.

“Christal, honey, I hate to tell you this,
but,” she began.

“Daddy! Daddy!” Christal shouted. She broke
free from her mother. Jumping up and down and waving her arms she
continued to shout. Stephanie turned to look behind her and there,
lo and behold, stepping through smoke was Michael Cole. If she
looked as bad as she felt, she couldn’t begin to image how her
husband felt. He was black from head to toe, holes were burned
through his shirt and one pant leg was ripped.

He fell to a knee when he was out of the
smoke, arms wide open, waiting for Christal to reach him.

After

Secrets are funny things. Like treasures,
they are held close and only handled with care. The longer one is
kept hidden, the stronger a secret grows. Held for too long, it
begins to poison the body and the mind. Some say secrets are
necessary in life. Others say truth will set you free. Regardless
of which is true, no secret can be held forever.

Michael Cole sat in an Adirondack chair near
the front door of his rented apartment. He watched the traffic as
it went by, not noticing one car from the other. His mind was
turned inward and the world around him was not even a quiet
distraction.

Three weeks had passed since the events at
the Garrett house. His whole life had changed in that short time.
He had been arrested and charged with multiple homicides. With the
help of his attorney and twenty thousand dollars in cash, he’d been
set free under his own recognizance. None of that mattered. He knew
he had done nothing illegal. The deaths he had caused were
justified. A court of law would either clear him or not. He would
be free or he would not be. There was nothing he could do about
that.

He still ran his business, but from his
living room now, on a phone.

A half hour passed as he sat quietly.
Stephanie pulled into the drive, Christal sitting beside her in the
front. That there, in the concrete drive, that was what mattered.
Nothing else.

Christal opened her door and came his way. He
stood, his smile returning from a long absence.

“Hey kiddo,” he called as he stepped down the
porch steps.

“Hi, Daddy.”

Michael Cole waved at Stephanie even as she
was pulling away. The divorce papers had been signed almost
immediately, and that, too, was just a matter of time. With his
dirtiest secrets revealed, there was little to be done. There is
scant chance of salvage when the heart has been betrayed.

Michael and Christal made their way in. It
was only a few hours, once a week, but it was Michael’s whole world
now.

Still walking with a limp, he closed the door
once they were inside. The apartment was nothing fancy and the
furnishings were modest. He had to learn to live on a budget; he’d
given almost everything to Stephanie and Christal, keeping only
enough to last him a few months. When that was gone, well, he’d
figure something out. He couldn’t repay his sins with money, but he
wanted his estranged wife and child to want for nothing.

They watched television, or at least had it
turned on. They talked mostly, Michael playing silly and his
daughter laughing with glee. Things that should have been done when
times were good, but he’d just been too busy.

Far too soon, a knock came at the door.

Michael and Christal were in the kitchen,
making ice cream sundaes. He was learning more and more that his
daughter was becoming a young woman. Something he’d been blind to.
When the sound reached them, both of their faces went solemn.
Michael’s because the time he’d looked forward to all week long, a
precious time worth more than all the jewels and gold in the world,
had came to an end. Christal’s, because no matter what, she loved
her father. While she was smart enough to know he had done some bad
things and that he and her mother would never get back together,
she longed for the past when, despite the hour, she would never
find good sleep until he was home, had cracked the door, and not
knowing whether she heard him or not, told her he loved her. She’d
never tell him, but on the nights that he wasn’t out of town and
she failed to hear him say it was when tired and groggy, she’d
drifted away. But she dreamed it.

“Come on, let’s get your things,” Michael
said. “You can take your ice cream with you.”

Resigned, the girl nodded. Scooping up her
sundae and a long handled spoon, she followed him into the living
room.

As soon as the door was opened, Stephanie
stepped in. Her arms were weighed down with brown paper sacks with
more than just a little splattering of grease leaking through.