Flying in Shadows (The Black Creek Series, Book 2) (23 page)

Duncan must have noticed the direction and context of her glare, because he patted
the top of her hand, then picked up his coat. "I'll leave you two alone." Reciprocally,
he kissed her on the cheek as he tossed some money on the table.

Andy flexed his jaws as panic set in. His eyes darted back and forth between the two
of them. It was a familiar panic from years past and it crept back as if it had never
been tucked neatly away. He walked slowly, trying to run possible scenarios through
his head as to why Duncan had asked him there that night just to find him with her.
With her. He walked cautiously to the booth and sat eagerly, working to assess Rose's
face.

Spotting the papers, he wanted nothing more than to get his hands on his brother.
The silence could have broken him in two.

Her arms were lying listless at her sides. He could see her chest rise and fall quickly
as she looked at him through half-opened lids. She spoke just two words, "You knew."

Chapter 18

Andy looked into the ice blue and thought the color matched the tone. "Yes." He reached
and brushed the backs of his fingers lightly down her arm.

She pulled back as if he'd burned her. "I know that move." Her voice was uncharacteristically
and unsettling soft. "You knew and you didn't tell me."

"I couldn't."

"You couldn't?" Her voice cracked. "Or wouldn't?"

"Both, I suppose. I didn't want to hurt you. Don't want to hurt you."

"You told me you didn't want me anymore. No explanation, just left me there, but you
didn't want to hurt me?" She spoke through her teeth now. "You broke my heart."

"Where would you be today if I hadn't? What would you be if I hadn't?"

"I can't do this again." She left her untouched beer and ran out the side door.

He threw his own bill on the table before going after her.

She rounded on him before he'd made it all the way out to the parking lot. "You didn't
even talk to me. You just made that kind of decision without even talking to me?"

"You'd already made plenty of decisions without me. I didn't know what to do. What
would have happened if I did it any other way?"

"And all these years?" She raised her voice now. "There was never a time when you
could have said something? Anything?"

"You... you were happy. And you hated me. Hate me," he corrected. "And you were always...
engaged."

Shoulders dropping, she nodded. Stuck her hands in her back pockets and looked him
square in the eyes. "Andrew, I can't do this again. Finish the enclosure. It's what's
best for the bird. Then, don't come around anymore. Love isn't everything. You taught
me that."

He watched as she walked carefully to her pickup.

* * *

Andy wasted no time in finding Duncan. Knocking loudly on their uncle's guesthouse
door, he concentrated on the rise and fall of his chest as he waited for him to answer
the damned, frigging door. Duncan took his time on purpose, he knew. Rattling the
locked knob, he filled his lungs, ready to give his brother an earful when the door
opened. Duncan stood, squared on both feet. So Duncan. Andy jutted out a quick jab
to his face. "Mind your own fucking business." It felt good. So, he went for another.

His brother made no attempt to block the first one, but apparently wasn't going to
take another without a fight. He dodged and pushed him out to the grass and straight
on his ass. Andy spun around like a cat falling from a rooftop, then sprung.

They charged each other like bulls, rolling in the thick grass, throwing punches and
gut jabs. He had forgotten how tough Duncan could be when provoked and sucked air
when he took one to his solar plexus. They broke free and stood, Andy with his hands
on his knees waiting for an opening. Both panted as they stared.

Duncan dabbed the back of his hand to his mouth and looked down at blood. "Feel better?"

Andy lifted from his legs. "No, mother fucker. Stay out of my life." He started back
toward his car, but his brother took his arm. Duncan kept his head back, like he was
ready for a fist.

Andy looked down, then up to his eyes. "You really want to touch me right now?"

"Come on. I want to show you something."

Reluctantly, Andy allowed him in his Maserati. They rode in silence as Andy let the
fumes die down. The tussle actually helped. Some.

Trees started to thicken as they drove to just out of town. Duncan motioned for him
to turn the car down a gravel road he would have missed. They drove slowly. "Not exactly
a road for a sports car, bro."

"It's just at the top of the hill. If you drive any slower we might not get there
before dawn."

The road simply stopped. Andy cut the engine.

The hill was the highest spot as far as the eye could see, but not by much, and the
eye couldn't see all that far through the thicket of old-growth trees. The smell was
a soothing mix of leaves—dead and alive—grass and earth.

Not really up for riddles, Andy followed him out of the car. "What are we doing here,
Duncan?"

"I bought it."

"You bought what? There's nothing out here."

"I bought the land. Forty acres. There's a creek down that way, a clearing the other."
He turned in a slow and meaningful circle. "I'm standing in the library I think."

Andy lowered his brows. "You're staying?"

Duncan shook his head. "No. I've got an order in L.A. waiting. Chloe Lace, but I can't
keep staying in the guesthouse. I need a builder."

"Chloe Lace? You sure can pick 'em, man."

"They pick me, mostly. She's wants three. I believe she said four-by-eight for over
her fireplace in her great room or something or other." Duncan carelessly waved his
hand and turned.

Andy smiled now. "Four-by-eight
feet
?"

Duncan grinned back. "Mmm. So, what do you think? Will you do it?"

"Of course I'll do it. How much is she paying you?"

Lifting a brow, Duncan peered over his shoulder. "More than I'll be paying you."

* * *

Even over both the noise of Charcoal barking from inside and from the garage door
closing, Amanda still heard the quiet press of soft shoes ducking underneath the large
door before it lowered completely. She paused only for a second, then reached inside
her apron. Even though she knew it was coming, the feeling of her head slamming against
the steel door that led into her kitchen blackened her vision.

As Michael put his hand around her throat, he whispered in her ear from behind, "Miss
me, baby?"

It was strange how the fear of him discovering Rose's existence almost completely
erased her fear of him. She looked through eyes with purpose and vision. The smell
of him churned her stomach, but she kept her resolve. "How long has it been, Michael?"

"Over a year, baby. Where is it?" He tightened his grip. She knew he would be able
to judge just when to stop in order to give her enough air to answer.

She croaked, "No, I mean how many years have we done this now?"

He turned her, keeping his hand around her throat. He looked at her, from one eye
to the other with only inches between their faces. "How the fuck would I know?" The
tips of his fingers dug into her neck.

Her throat began to throb. "You dyed your hair black." She choked out. "And your eyes.
Contacts?"

"No more questions. Where's my money?"

Closing her eyes, she braced for the blow, then asked slowly, "Your money?"

He hit her, closed fisted, in her right temple. The blow sent her along the top of
her garage workspace, clearing off gardening tools and fertilizers. She landed on
her stomach on the cold, concrete floor in front of her car.

She could feel her eye instantly swelling but made herself lift to her hands and knees.

Michael pulled her up using a handful of her hair. He dragged her back to the steel
door as Charcoal scratched and barked madly on the other side. He pressed his forearm
against her throat and reached toward his ankle.

She turned her face away from the feel of sharp metal pressing against her neck. Her
eyes began to water from the pain, leaking from the corners of her eyes, stinging
the swelling that was growing. "Is that the knife you used to kill my grandfather?"

He brushed the deep lines of wrinkles from his cheek against hers and whispered in
her ear, "Oh, yes, it's a classic, and you're next if you don't come up with my money.
You have thirty seconds."

She forced herself to turn into his stale cigarette breath and look in his lifeless
eyes. She had plenty of experience with ways that would get him to talk. She reminded
herself that he hadn't killed her in their sixteen years of doing this dance and that
he needed her. She braced and croaked, "No."

His hand shook so hard, the blade made shallow cuts along her throat. Tiny red lines
formed in the whites of his eyes. "Whore!" he screamed.

The door shook against her back as the dog threw himself into it.

Michael unbuttoned his pants with his free hand, pulled his zipper as she scrambled
with her hands while trying not to move her neck. The dog barked behind her and Michael
grunted in front of her. She yelled as loud as she could, "How many women? Where are
they?"

He pinched, bruising her nipple through her apron. As she bellowed in pain he answered,
"As many as I want. All over the country." He pulled at her shorts.

He was too close. She couldn't maneuver her arm with his body pushed up against hers.
Pressing himself to her, she could feel he was hard. Panic began to creep back into
her mind like an old recurring nightmare. She'd always kept him from going this far.
But, she had never pushed him like this. Trembling, she worked her hand inside the
pocket of her apron.

She refused to let any more tears fall and instead looked up at eyes that were half
mad as he groped between her legs. "Then, here's for each of us all over the country,
you fucking bastard." And through the fabric of her apron, she tasered him in the
balls.

He fell into a heap with his pants around his ankles, convulsing rapidly.

She looked down with huge eyes at her shaking hands. Flying into automatic pilot,
she ran around him on the floor, punched the garage door button and opened the back
door for her dog. Charcoal snarled and bit, clamping on Michael's neck as he lay twitching
on the floor.

"No, Charcoal. In the car!"

The door opened, and the Lab obeyed but continued to snarl and bark through the window.
She scrambled for her keys and noticed Michael fumbling to pull himself up. She started
the engine, rammed the gear into reverse and sped out of her drive without looking
back.

Chapter 19

Rose stood in the warm, late afternoon sun, preparing for her last presentation of
the day. She aimed the base of Gracie's four-foot, wooden perch to the spot on the
ground where the galvanized steel extension would sink into the premade hole. The
scent of hot, dry July pines soothed her. She loved upstate New York.