Circle Eight Millennium: Lazarus (7 page)

She shook her head. “I don’t know. I was going through a box of receipts and found the flyer.” She reached into her purse and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. “I thought it might help.”

“You were going through a box of receipts.” He could hardly believe that was what she chose to do after the most momentous sexual experience of his life. Perhaps it hadn’t been as momentous for her.

That was a lowering thought.

“My mind was spinning after, uh, after what we did. I didn’t have a gun to clean and I can’t do anything else in the store until the insurance claim is finalized. I have to
do
something to settle my thoughts when I’m stressed.” She shrugged. “Receipts are boring but don’t require brain power.”

“Your mind was spinning.”

“Are you just going to repeat what I say?” She clucked her tongue. “I can think of a few more interesting things to talk about.”

Laz considered his next words with care. The last thing he needed was to say the wrong thing, offend her, and send this new, terrifying relationship, such as it was, off the rails before they really got started.

“My mind was spinning too.” He kept his eyes on the road and didn’t put any emotion in his words, although they were running riot in his gut.

She cleared her throat. “That so? Huh, I wouldn’t have thought so given your greeting this morning.”

“I meant what I said to you. I’m not the same person I was before I left Brier Creek. I made mistakes, just like every other human being.” He spotted the giant tree that marked the border of the Circle Eight and his hands tightened on the steering wheel. “I can’t fight the right words right now for you, but I will.”

She stared on the side window. “Okay, I can be patient. I’ve spent my life perfecting the art of waiting.”

He heard much more in her words than he had time to explore. They’d both made choices, or had been pushed to making choices, that had shaped their lives.

They turned into the main gate and the familiar sight of the Circle Eight sign was a punch to the gut. He had a flash of memory from when he was eight and his father had commissioned a local blacksmith to repair the original sign from the late eighteen hundreds. When the man had hung up the intricate scrolls in the number eight, it had seemed magical to a young Laz.

Now the weather and elements had taken some of the shine off the iron, but it was still as beautiful as it had been twenty years earlier. A wave of homesickness washed over him. His throat grew tight and damned if he didn’t miss everything; even the smell of the air was familiar.

Bea didn’t say anything, for which he was grateful. The emotions running riot through him were enough to make him turn the car around, but he didn’t. He was a Graham after all, and his blood ran stubborn.

The house came into view and his homesickness started to slide into a shade of joy. The color had changed, no longer a cream, but more of a light green, but the long, sweeping front porch was still peppered with rocking chairs throughout and a swing at both ends.

A hound dog perked up from his prone position on the grassy front lawn. The vibrant green seemed incongruous for hot Texas weather. Perhaps his father had installed sprinklers to keep up appearances. Or maybe they’d found drought-resistant grass that could finally withstand the heat.

The dog bayed at the car but stood his ground. Laz put the car in park. He lowered his chin to his chest and took a deep breath.

“I know you didn’t want to come here but I’m glad you did.” She touched his hand, her fingers cool against his overheated skin.

He managed to nod. “Sometimes we have to do shit we don’t want to do.”

“Amen to that.” She held out the flyer to him. “Ready?”

There was no pity in her face, but he saw understanding. She had her own family issues to deal with, although for her, it was dealing with ghosts. Laz had to deal with living, breathing people along with his ghosts. It was a helluva thing to come back to the scene of the crime ten years after the fact.

He took the paper and reached for the door handle.

The dog trotted up to Bea and nudged her palm with his snout. She crouched down and scratched him behind the ear.

“Hey there, Bear, what are you up to today?” Her voice was sweet and melodic. Damn, he wished he didn’t know she could sound like that. It put all kinds of ideas in his head he didn’t need to think about right about then.

“You know him?” Laz watched the dog, his canine tongue lolling out at the attention from a pretty girl.

“He was Rose’s birthday present about five years ago. Can’t hunt worth a damn but he is loveable.” She straightened up with one last pat for Bear.

The dog sniffed at Laz’s pants but made no move to befriend him. It was just as well. He was there as a ranger only, not as a welcomed visitor.

“If I’d known there was to be a party, I’d have baked a cake.”

Laz turned to find his father on the front porch. The elder Graham had aged in the last ten years. His formerly thick, dark hair was nearly completely silver. Lines bracketed his eyes and mouth and the sun and wind had turned his skin into a honey-colored leather. His eyes were the deep blue-green color looking back at everyone with the arrogance and strength he had in abundance.

Physically he looked the same. Big with wide shoulders and big hands. Laz resembled him in many ways, especially in the inability to have an honest conversation with each other.

“Pa, I’m here on official business.” Laz was pleased his voice was steady although his heart was beating against his ribs like a bass drum.

“I see.” He gestured to the car behind him. “I heard you were a ranger, but that doesn’t look like a cop car.”

“It’s unmarked.” Laz held the flyer up. “I need to ask you about the business expo you hosted last year.”

His father put his hands on his hips and narrowed his gaze, then looked at Bea. “Good morning, Beatrice. I didn’t know you were on terms with Ranger Graham.”

“Mr. Graham.” She stepped up beside Laz. “He’s investigating the break-in at the store. That’s why we’re here.”

“Bad business, that,” his father replied. “Sorry to hear about it.”

“Thank you. Now, if you have a few minutes, the ranger has some questions.” Beatrice sounded calm and reasonable while Laz wanted to howl.

He could almost feel the disappointment coming off Pa in waves. Why shouldn’t he be? Laz had never been the son he could and should have been. No, he’d been a wastrel and selfish asshole.

“I was just sitting down with some coffee. You can join me.” His father turned and went back into the house.

Bea raised her brows, her turquoise glasses shining in the bright sunshine. He gestured with his hand for her to precede him up the front steps. It was time to enter the lion’s den.

Laz would rather face down a loaded gun.

Beatrice could see
the tension in the ranger’s jaw and expression, which were tight and harder than granite. This was a reunion that had been ten years in the making. She almost felt like she was standing on railroad tracks while two trains hurtled toward each other at breakneck speed.

One of the Graham men needed to ease up on the throttle, but it wasn’t her place to tell either of them that. She was glad she was there, and not because they might get a clue to the identity of the perp, but because although he wouldn’t admit it, Laz needed her there.

It made her feel good about herself. She spent so much time struggling to keep the store solvent, Bea had little left over for herself, her personal life, or even her sex life. The last couple days with Laz had been eye opening and reminded her she needed to live and not just exist.

Now it was her turn to pay it forward and remind him of the same.

The inside of the house was a huge great room that had been constructed similarly to the original house on the property, which sat half a mile away. No one lived there any longer due to the lack of electricity and indoor plumbing, but the Grahams kept it up.

The one thing that still remained from the first of the family to settle on the ranch was the table. It was a massive piece of furniture hewn from wide planks and sat at least fifteen people. The benches were also original. The elder Graham was setting down a carafe of coffee and three cups.

“Do you take cream or sugar, Beatrice?”

She nodded. “Both, please.”

Laz stood there, gazing at the room with what she surmised was longing. He’d missed his home. and rightfully so. Perhaps this day would change his banishment, self-imposed or not, and he could come back where he belonged.

The three of them settled at the table and busied themselves fixing the coffee just so. Beatrice pointed at the flyer.

“Let me tell you why that expo is important.” She relayed the background of the five burglaries and the theory they were connected through the expo attendees.

Mr. Graham frowned, his silver eyebrows in a sharp V. “You’re saying I invited a thief into my house?”

“I don’t know, but if we could look at a list of the attendees, we can find out if we’re right about how the crimes are connected.” Bea looked at Laz, whose gaze had not left his coffee.

The air almost shimmered with tension as the two Graham men sat across from each other. Neither one looked at the other and somehow she was stuck between them.

“Do you have the records?” she prompted.

Jeremiah nodded. “I do. It will take a few minutes to find it. Don’t use computers or nothing. It’s all in my filing cabinet.”

“Maybe we could go look?”

“Yep, I suppose we could.” The older man got to his feet, taking the cup with him.

When he left the room, Bea met Laz’s gaze, his expression hard to read. “Do you want to stay here?”

He shook his head. “No. I gotta see this through.”

They followed Mr. Graham through the house and down the hallway. The man’s office had always been off-limits when they’d been kids. It was a masculine domain with dark wood paneling and a huge bookcase full of books of varying shapes and sizes. A fern that had seen better days sat on a plant stand by the big window where sunshine streamed in.

A tall, black filing cabinet sat in one corner where Jeremiah stood, gazing at the open drawer. He sipped at the coffee as he walked his fingers across the manila folders.

“Was anything stolen?” he asked.

“Some, but the son of a bitch did more damage than he stole.” She was bitterer about the personal nature of the crime than the money. Insurance would pay for most of it, but it wouldn’t mend the pain at the destruction of her family’s store.

“Then we need to find him.”

“Yes, sir, we do.” Laz finally spoke. “If we’re right, he’s done the same thing to four other businesses.”

“Is that right?” Jeremiah glanced at his son. “We, is it? You two partners?”

Bea felt her cheeks heat while Laz cleared his throat.

“Something like that. She was smart enough to figure out this lead.”

This time his father turned completely to look at him, his gaze probing. “You wouldn’t have come out here if not for Beatrice?”

To his credit, Laz didn’t blink or stammer. “No, sir, probably not.”

Jeremiah went back to looking through the folders until he found what he was looking for. He handed it to her and left the room, coffee in hand.

She pointed her thumb toward the door. “That’s your cue, Ranger. Take care of your past or you won’t get a chance at the future.”

Bea sat at the desk, the creek of leather beneath her and the smell of pipe tobacco filled the air around her. She didn’t look at Laz but she heard him exit the room.

Lazarus had never
been a coward, or at least he never thought so. Facing his father had taken balls. Leaving the Circle Eight ten years earlier had been the act of a boy, scared and humiliated by his actions.

Beatrice had bullied him into coming but he was glad of it. Or at least he would be after his gut settled down. The coffee he’d drunk sat like a brick, sloshing and burbling.

Pa wasn’t in the house, which could only mean he was in the barn, likely tending to his horse. It was the same thing Laz used to do, that most Grahams did when there was turmoil in their lives.

He walked across the achingly familiar ground toward the barn. It had been painted sometime in the last couple of years, the color darker than he remembered. A few yearlings milled around in the corral, tossing their heads and posturing for each other. Somewhere a dog barked and chickens chattered. It was all so normal and yet it was foreign to him.

Laz stepped into the barn, his eyesight adjusting to the darkened interior. The scents of horses, hay, shit, and other familiar smells hit him hard. He closed his eyes and breathed in. As long as he told himself he didn’t belong at the Circle Eight, then he hadn’t missed it. What a pack of lies he’d told himself.

He missed this place and everyone and everything. His pride was bigger than the state of Texas, consuming his decisions until he’d not been able to see what he’d done. Perhaps he’d be able to repair his relationship with his father. Perhaps not.

Laz walked toward the back left corner. The largest stall was there, the one his father had always claimed for his own. The low sound of murmuring grew louder as he approached. His stomach also flipped a few times.

The stall door was open, hanging like a gateway to his past. He took a deep breath and stepped into the doorway. His father ran the curry brush down the flank of a spectacular quarter horse. The gelding was probably five years old and was flawless.

“He’s a beaut.” Laz didn’t realize he was going to speak until the words tumbled out of his mouth.

His father’s hand stopped in mid-brush. “His name’s King. He’s Ten Speed’s get.”

Mention of the stallion that had been Laz’s lifelong friend, Ten Speed, made him smile. “Is he still providing stud service?”

“Nah. He’s spending his days eating grass and napping, just like an old man.” The brushing resumed. “Didn’t expect I’d see you before I cocked up my toes.”

“I deserved that.” Laz leaned against the stall door. “I’ve got no excuse. I was full of pride and a self-hate, and I let Mama down. I let you down.”