Maggie's Mountain (14 page)

Hale glared at her, his eyes filled with anger and something else, something she hadn’t seen before. “I’m sorry you lost your husband, Maggie. I’m sorry I’m not the perfect man. I believe in being honest and I thought you were the sort who’d appreciate that, could understand that.”

“I do understand it, I do appreciate it.” She couldn’t explain how she felt, how his words had cut like knives because she knew, in the end, she’d be nothing more than a convenient female. “But I’m not the type of woman who has hushed up affairs.”

“And I can’t compete with a ghost.” He dropped his hands and took a small step away, creating a gap that couldn’t be bridged. “I don’t know if anyone can.”

She didn’t speak as he turned and walked back into the living room, his movements slow and somehow defeated. He ran his fingertips over the open letters and spoke without looking at her.

“What are you going to do with these?”

She blinked in surprise. “Put them away, I suppose.”

His head snapped up and she found herself caught in a cold stare. “My father destroyed your family. He practically put the noose around your father’s neck. He made it next to impossible for your mother to survive. He tried to do the same to you.”

She licked her dry lips and nodded. “He didn’t care who he hurt.”

“Why are you going to sit on these? Damn it, you should be making photo copies and handing them out. Instead you’re tucking them away. Why, Maggie?”

She couldn’t answer him. He would see her vulnerability and would take advantage of it. He would push his agenda. Tipping her hand would be dangerous for her heart.

If he was waiting for an answer all he got was silence. Finally, he heaved a deep breath and turned toward the door, his actions tired and drawn out. He had the door open, the crisp air swirling into the cabin, before he spoke again.

“I always seem to find myself walking away like this, leaving you here while we both want each other. I’ve told you before the wanting wasn’t going away. It isn’t. It won’t. But it feels like something’s shifted, whether we want it to or not. I…like you. Before I read those letters it was true. I don’t have affairs with women I don’t like.” One foot crossed the threshold before he stopped. “I don’t like the idea that people might be hurting you because of me…because of my father’s lies." He paused, seeming to consider his next words. "If I thought you’d let me I’d offer to take care of it…of you. It’s the least I could do, considering….”

He never finished his sentence. She watched as he slowly shook his head, then moved into the night, closing the door behind him with a firm
snick
. She wasn’t sure how long she stood there, tears balancing precariously in her eyes. When the oven buzzer sounded she was too numb for shock.

In not wanting to hurt Hale Warrick she had the stomach clenching feeling that somehow she had done so anyway.

And in a way he could never forgive.

Chapter Eleven

He wanted to be blind, stinking drunk. So drunk that her face would stop floating by every two seconds. Every five would be fine, he supposed, and tossed back another shot. Jackson’s Boon wasn’t particularly crowded, but the people who were there kept a wary eye on Hale. Even the rowdier ones avoided him. It wasn’t hard to guess when a man needed to be left alone, he decided, and tapped the bar for another drink.

Roland Jackson gave him a jaundiced look but complied. He put the half empty bottle on the bar beside him and leaned his scrawny hip against the polished wood. “Might want to slow down, Hale. Don’t want to have to explain to your momma why I had to scrape you up off the floor.”

“Screw my mother.” He uttered it before he could stop himself, then winced at his words. “Sorry, that wasn’t very nice.”

Roland shrugged and crossed his surprisingly wide arms over his thin chest. “We all get upset with our mothers sometimes. When mine was alive we’d have words at least once a month.”

“Mona was a yeller,” he replied. “At least with her you could get it out of your system and move on. Bet she didn’t care who you slept with.”

Always a good bartender, Roland kept his face straight and his answer noncommittal. “She loved me.”

Hale gave a disgusted snort and slammed back his drink. “I wish my mother would scream. Wish she would rant and rave and cry and demand. Wouldn’t feel so damned torn, you know?”

“Oh, sure, sure. You’re a lot like your daddy. Like the women to be a bit temperamental, not so meek.”

“My father…let’s not talk about him.” He shook his head, lifted his glass, realized it was empty and put it back down. “My mother, a meek woman.” He snorted. “More like she’s cold. Marble. You ever been loved by a hard marble woman, Roland?”

The older man picked up a clean glass and began to wipe it with a fresh rag. “Can’t say as I have. Gina would as soon pull my hair out than lecture me.”

“Me ask you something.” Hale blinked when he realized his words were beginning to slur. “If you died would you care if Gina slept with someone else?”

Roland paused in his work but otherwise didn’t show a sign of surprise. “That’s some question.”

“ ’Cause it seems to me that asking a young, pretty, healthy woman not to have a life after you’re gone is just wrong. Selfish.” Hale picked up the bottle and tilted more into his glass. “Gina feel obligated not to take anyone else to her bed?”

“I couldn’t answer that.”

“Guilty. That’s what it is. Guilt. Can you love someone too much?” He drank this round a bit slower, letting the fire seer his gullet.

Roland didn’t hesitate. “Yeah, I’ve seen it. It gets nasty.”

“Exactly. You love someone too much and when they’re gone you can’t be open to the idea of having anyone else in your life. Your bed. I meant in your bed.” He wasn’t sure that’s what he meant but he needed to believe it.

“Uh-huh.” Roland’s eyes strayed to the door for a moment before he turned his gaze back to Hale. “You know, sometimes love is a strong thing. Sometimes you can’t help but to love someone too much. Comparing people you might be interested in to the person you lost is natural. It’s something you do without really knowing it.”

“But you can get past it. I mean, if you want someone enough, you can get past it.” You had to, he thought, or he’d be sunk.

“I’ve seen it go both ways. My momma, now she was a passionate woman, and when my dad died she mourned him with all that passion. Buried herself in grief for a time, then was careful with that passion, didn’t place it too readily on any one person. Took her a while, but when Beau Kingston came into the picture and started courting her, he sparked that passion again, brought it right back up to the top.”

“Beau was a lucky man.”

“Beau was a patient man.” He chuckled as Hale poured more liquor into the short glass. “Got to be patient with a passionate woman. Course, a woman whose passion runs deep and quiet, those you have to handle with special care.”

That was Maggie Mae, a gentle woman with desires that ran as deep and rich as untapped gold. Or was it spring waters? He couldn’t remember. Didn’t matter, really. Roland was showering him with useful information and he needed to pay attention.

“Special care, right.”

“Women like that, they break just as easily as the others, you just won’t see it. Usually there’s a reason they play their cards so close. Could be they’ve been hurt and felt it just as deep as they felt the good. Passionate pain is the most destructive.”

He stared at the lanky man behind the bar in awe. “You should be teaching these things. Teach classes at the rec center. I’d sign up.”

Roland shook his head. “Happier back here serving drinks.”

A breeze filtered in letting Hale know someone else had wandered into the bar. He saw the quick flare of relief on the bartender’s face but was too much in a liquored haze to care. When a body slipped onto the stool next to his he swiveled his head around to look and found Trent sitting there.

“Welcome little brother.” He raised his glass in a small salute, noted it was empty again, and reached for the bottle.

“Hi, big brother. What’re you doing here this time of night?” The question was casual as he took a soda from Roland.

“Getting drunk. Blind stinking drunk if I can.” He tossed back the shot, closed his eyes for a quick second. “I have to get it out of my head.”

“Maggie?”

“Someone poisoned her garden. Said it was my fault. Probably is.” And that pain was acid on an open wound.

Trent made a noncommittal humming sound. “Think it might be more than the garden?”

If he hadn’t been liquored up he might have been angry. Maybe. He was too fuzzy headed to decide. “So what if it is? People talking, hurting other people, have to make choices. Sucks. Arguments make sense that shouldn’t. What about it?”

Trent gave a one shouldered shrug and sipped his drink. “Nothing, just curious. I’ve never seen you drink over a woman before.”

“Not just the woman. Not just the argument. The ghost. A damn ghost. Can’t beat up a ghost. Can’t speak ill of the dead. A hero. Of course he’d have to be a hero.”

“Chris?”

Hale hissed through his teeth. “She should’ve just put herself in the ground with him. Can’t admit she might want something that’s not him. Someone can give her more but she won’t take it.”

Trent sent him a quick glance, lifted an eyebrow, and looked back into the mirror over the bar. “You want to give her more?”

“Wanted to give her pleasure. Nothing wrong with that. Sleep together a few times, enjoy the company, maybe offer more, maybe get smacked down. Fine. Nice friendship with a lady. Nice lady. It’d be enough. It should be enough.” He hung his head as his heart gave a shudder.

“But it’s not enough.” It was a statement, not a question.

“Should be. Damn well should be. Maggie Mae Cooper…Hale Warrick…oil and water. Can’t mix ʼem. Shouldn’t mix ʼem. Want to mix ʼem. So bad.” He spun his glass, considered another drink. “Loves a dead man. Loving the memory, I could take that. Understand it. She loved her husband. But he’s dead, she’s alive, I’m alive, it makes sense.”

“So you asked her out?”

Shame blended with the guilt. “Sort of.”

Trent’s head turned so fast it made Hale dizzy. “Sort of? So, you want Maggie, I think I got that much. We both know how Mother feels about her, not that I think you’d really let that stand in the way of—wait, did you do what I think you did?”

Hale hung his head again. “Probably.”

“You propositioned Maggie, asked her to sleep with you.”

Fury rose then fell quickly. “Not just sleep with me.”

The silence was as good as a gasp. “You wanted her to have an affair with you. A hushed up, carefully concealed affair.”

There was no point in trying to cover it all up. “Yes, I did. Asked and was refused.”

“Because of her husband.”

“Because of gossip. Because of Mother. Because…” Trent stared him down until he relented. “Because of good olʼ, cop hero Christopher Brannon. Shouldn’t hate the dead.”

“I don’t think you hate him. I think you’re jealous of him.”

His brother hit the mark dead on. “Yeah, that, too.”

“Hale, I’ve tried to tell you that Maggie isn’t the type of woman you’d expect.”

“Loves her husband and won’t see past him,” he grumbled. “Could argue about everything else. Could convince her. Can’t see past
him
. Still loves
him
.”

“Of course she does. He did more for her in a few months than the rest of us did for Maggie her entire life.”

The words swam in his head but wouldn’t take ground. There was something in them he couldn’t quite piece together. “He did a lot for her. What’s the difference? She wants me, won’t take me, won’t have me.”

Trent just shook his head and gulped down the rest of his soda. “Okay, Hale, let’s get you home.”

“Hate that place. Hate what it is now.”

The walls filled with lies and deceit. The fine woodwork refurbished and cared for by the man Royce had later killed, if not in deed then by outside actions. The rigid, protective woman trapped inside a prison, partly of her own making, partly of his father’s. He knew the secrets that coated it all now. Knew them and was damned because he couldn’t tell them. Not when it meant so much to Maggie.

“I know it’s not Maggie’s place, but it’s where your bed is, at least for now.” Trent waited for him to stand then walked with him out the door, not commenting when Hale’s wavering steps smacked them together. “You know, Hale, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you like this, not over business, definitely not over a woman.”

“Stupid. Crazy.”

“Lost.” He opened the passenger door of Hale’s car and watched him slide inside. “Don’t worry, I took a taxi.”

“Coulda poured me into a taxi,” he tried to argue.

“You would have gone to Maggie’s and made an idiot of yourself.” The good natured smile would have pissed him off if the whiskey hadn’t smoothed his nerves down.

“Already did that. Idiot. Jackass.” He’d been both of those things and more.

“An idiot jackass with a hangover. I look forward to it.”

Trent closed the door with too much enthusiasm. Hale leaned his head back and closed his eyes, letting the world roll on around him. He didn’t know where he was supposed to go from here. There had to be a place where he and Maggie could meet, where both could find mutual satisfaction and have their needs met. His ego and her pride. The two were large enough to swallow the whole county.

Chapter Twelve

Maggie sat on the edge of her bed, groggy from a long nine hours of tossing and turning. Nightmares had plagued her, images of an angry Hale shouting in fury, pleading in sweetness, fading in and out as he moved through shadows, appearing first as an adult, then as a teenager. Overlaying it all had been the echoing sound of her mother’s weeping, the sound gradually becoming so loud it shattered the invisible windows of the darkened room, raining down prismatic shards that floated like snowflakes. It was her confrontation with Hale which had put her on a hard, serrated edge of fear and doubt. His admission of desire for her without love had hurt. But his accusations had cut deeper than she’d anticipated.
Was
she keeping the letters as some twisted way of preserving a sick martyrdom?