Revenge (3 page)

“Are you mad?” Hillary asked before Skye could escape the booth. Chocolate and vanilla were smeared over her lips and chin.

“Of course not.”

“You look mad. Just like Mommy every time—”

“Enough, Hillary,” Max snapped, his face flushed with a silent rage.

“You hate Mommy,” Hillary said, and her little face crumpled. Tears rose in the corners of her eyes and she dropped her spoon.

“No, honey, I don't—”

Skye felt immediately contrite. What was she doing, letting herself be pulled into some infantile argument with a man who meant nothing,
nothing
to her? “I—I'm sorry, Max. I didn't mean—”

“It's not your fault,” he retorted, snatching a napkin from the dispenser and tending to the ice cream and tears on Hillary's face.

“I...” She felt suddenly useless. She was a mature woman, a doctor, for crying out loud. She'd worked in emergency rooms, helped save lives, lost a few, told patients when their diseases were life threatening, and even consoled the grieving. Yet this one man, this one damnably arrogant man, and his imp of a daughter had reduced her to fumbling and stumbling and muttering apologies that she didn't mean. “I didn't expect to run into you this soon—”

“Just leave, Skye,” he said coldly, his jaw suddenly as hard as granite. “It's what you do best.”

She didn't need to hear anything else. Already a few eyebrows had risen behind the plastic-coated menus, and she felt more than one curious glance cast in her direction. She wasn't making a good impression. As the new doctor in town, she couldn't appear rash or quick-tempered or tongue-tied, or anything but a levelheaded professional. These people would have to trust her, depend upon her decisions when they were injured or when one of their loved ones was dying. She stiffened and managed what she hoped was a clinical smile. “I'll see you,” she said to Max, though the words had a hollow and familiar ring to them.

“Sure.”

She walked out the door and into the blasting heat. Grinding her teeth together, she marched to the patch of shade where she'd parked and flung open the car door. She wedged the cat carrier on the back seat and wished to high heaven that she'd never set eyes on Max McKee. Inside the sweltering interior of the Mustang, she turned on the ignition, praying under her breath as the engine coughed and sputtered then finally, with a wheeze, turned over.

“Thank you, God,” Skye said as Kildare mewed loudly. Backing out of the parking space, she caught a glimpse of Max's rough-hewn profile through the window of the café. Just her luck to have run into him the first five minutes she was in town.

She drove through the familiar tree-lined streets, drumming her fingers on the hot steering wheel and half listening to the radio while she calmed down. It was inevitable that she would see Max again, and probably better to have gotten it over with. This was a small town and now the ice had been broken.

But her hands were still sweating as she turned down the familiar little avenue with its vintage cottages that were all, aside from the differing, peeling paint, nearly identical. She stopped at the curb in front of her mother's little bungalow—the house where she'd grown up. Covered in yellow aluminum siding, compliments of Jonah P. McKee, the house had never needed painting, though the porch sagged and the gutters had rusted. The old covered swing had grown dusty beside the living-room window and the hedge separating the side yard from the neighbor's property was in desperate need of a trim.

Her chest tightened as she snagged her purse and cat carrier and hurried up the cracked concrete path where dandelions, now gone to seed, grew tenaciously. After rapping softly on the door, she opened it and stepped into the darkened room. “Mom?”

“Skye!” Irene Donahue's voice drifted from the kitchen. “You here already?”

“Couldn't stay away.” She followed the sound of her mother's voice to the small kitchen tucked in a back corner of the house.

Her mother was stirring sugar and lemon slices into a glass pitcher of iced tea. Balancing a hip against the cupboards, she dropped her wooden spoon and wiped her hands on her apron. Her cane was propped under the windowsill. “Dr. Donahue, I presume,” she said with a proud smile.

“Sometimes I still find it hard to believe.”

“Not me. Never had a moment's doubt.” Frail arms surrounded Skye. “And you'll be the best damned doctor this town's ever seen.”

Hot tears stung the back of Skye's eyes. “I hope so.”

“I know it. I told old Ralph Fletcher so, too. Now, who's in here—Kildare, is that you?” she asked, peeking through the screen of the cat carrier.

A loud meow erupted and Skye set the plastic carrier on the floor. She opened the door and Kildare, a sleek gray tabby, streaked across the kitchen. “He's not very happy,” Skye said as she found a small dish and filled it with water. “Abused, aren't you, boy?” Kildare rubbed against her legs, nearly tripping her while she made her way to the screened-in back porch and left the water dish near the door. She scratched the old tomcat behind the ears. Kildare had been her sole constant friend during the long years of medical school.

Two tall glasses of iced tea were already beginning to sweat on the tiny table wedged between the stove and back door. Irene settled into one chair and waved her older daughter into the empty seat. “Tell me all about your deal with Doc Fletcher,” her mother insisted. “And if that old skinflint ripped you off, I'll personally drive down to the clinic and—”

“Hey, slow down.” Once her mother got going, she was like a freight train gathering steam. “Believe me, he didn't rip me off.” Picking up her glass, she leaned against the windowsill and felt the slight breeze creep past the old gingham curtains as she sipped. The tea was cool as it slid down her throat. “Actually, I think he was relieved I was interested. It's a good deal.”

“I'm just glad you're back.” But her smile gave way. “I hope you didn't feel obligated—” she motioned to the hated cane “—because of the stroke.”

“Of course not.” Skye shook her head. “I came back because I wanted to. I was tired of the city.”

Her mother's graying brows lifted suspiciously. “What about all your declarations about never living here again?”

“I was a kid. And I was wrong.”

Her mother glanced nervously at her hands. “You heard about Jonah?”

Blowing a stray strand of hair off her face, Skye nodded, though she didn't want to think about Max's manipulative father and the role Jonah P. McKee had played in her life. His had been much too large a role.

“Virginia's stirring up trouble. Claims he was murdered.”

“Murdered?” Skye repeated.

“I know it sounds crazy, but she's hired a private investigator and insists that Sheriff Polk's involved in some cover-up or conspiracy or the like.”

“That's insane.”

“Tell it to Virginia.”

“All her kids think she's gone off her rocker, but she's standing firm, even called a reporter for
The Rimrock Review.
Oh, Lordy, poor old Jonah will never rest in peace.”

Skye bit the words that seemed destined to roll off her tongue. Jonah was dead. She was sorry that Max had lost his father, Virginia had lost her husband, and Hillary had lost her grandfather, but if she was honest with herself, she didn't feel a speck of grief for a man who had manipulated people and played with their lives, all for the love of the almighty buck.

It was ironic, she supposed, that she was back in town so soon after his death. It looked as if she'd been waiting for him to find a way to escape Rimrock. But the truth of the matter was that now was the most convenient time for her to return.

“He was a good man,” Irene said, apparently reading her mind.

Skye couldn't let it rest. “He wasn't good, Mom. Not by any stretch of the imagination.”

Irene's jaw tightened and her chin set stubbornly. “And where would we all be without him, hmm? When your father died and left us without a dime—no insurance whatsoever—what would we have done without Jonah's help? He gave me a job, a damned good job, and I was able to raise you and your sister decently. We never went hungry, now did we?”

“No, Mom, we didn't. Maybe we shouldn't discuss this right now—”

“And when I had to go to the hospital for that operation, didn't he see that all my bills were paid and the payments on the house kept up?”

“Yes, Mom—”

“So don't you go bad-mouthing him, Skye. You may be some fancy doctor nowadays, but you're still my daughter, and I won't have you or anyone else spreading bad words about the dead. Especially about a man who did us nothing but favors!”

Skye settled back against her chair and drained her glass. She thought about telling her mother the truth about all the reasons she'd left Rimrock so suddenly, but she hated to disillusion a woman who had done nothing but struggle to survive, who had given up her own youth so that her daughters could live better lives than she. For years, Skye had suspected that her mother had been secretly in love with Jonah McKee. In Irene's opinion, the man was nearly a god, saving her from ruin. He'd been upstanding in the community, an elder in the church, a faithful husband, loving father and honest businessman. Irene, as his secretary, had worshiped the ground he'd walked on and had continually compared him to the man she'd married, who had never had much ambition and had died in a logging accident when Skye was five and her sister, Dani, was only three. Though Irene had loved her husband, and Skye had faint, but warm memories of her father, Tom Donahue had made the mistake of dying suddenly and leaving his small family penniless.

Jonah McKee had stepped in and saved the day. Not only had he given Tom's widow a job, but he'd helped her move into this little house, a rental he'd owned. Eventually he'd written up a contract and sold the cottage to her.

Irene Donahue believed Jonah P. McKee was her personal savior.

And he was dead. It would serve no purpose to expose him now.

“I expect you're staying here?” Irene asked.

“Probably just tonight, and only if you want me.”

Her mother smiled as if their argument about Jonah McKee had never been aired. “Of course I want you. Don't be silly. Dani will be over as soon as she's off work.”

Skye nodded and put down her glass. Her younger sister seemed to have straightened out over the years, but she'd given their mother nothing but grief as a hell-raising teenager. “Tomorrow I have to go to the clinic. As part of the deal, Ralph offered to let me buy his old apartment house, too.”

Irene's lips curved downward. “Isn't that a lot of debt? The practice and clinic building and house—”

“I'm only renting the clinic and I could live in one of the apartments while I rent out the rest of the building. It's half-filled already. Two more tenants and I could make money on the deal.”

“Have you seen the place?” Irene asked, her brows knitting in concentration. “It needs a lot of work.”

“Then I'll hire someone—offer an apartment rent-free for him to keep up the yard and house and manage the building.”

Irene worried her lower lip. “I just don't want to see you biting off more than you can chew. You've already got college debts.”

“I'll be all right, Mom. Really.”

“Jonah always said you were ambitious. I guess he was right.”

Skye didn't utter a word as she carried her glass to the sink. The subject of Jonah McKee wasn't comfortable. She knew too much. Way too much...

“I ran into Max today,” she said instead. Her mother's back stiffened slightly. “He was with his daughter at the Shady Grove Café.”

“He thinks the world of that child.” Irene slowly rose from her chair to run hot water in the sink.

“I could see that.”

“Too bad about him and his wife,” Irene said, washing a glass. She wiped it dry with the corner of her terry-cloth apron and cast a worried glance at her older daughter. “They're divorced, you know. Have been for three...no, it's closer to four years now.”

Skye's head snapped up. “He's divorced and you didn't tell me?”

“You never asked,” her mother replied and went on polishing the rim of the glass until it sparkled. “The way you felt about Jonah and what you said about Max when you left town, I thought it best to keep my big mouth shut.”

Skye felt as if the rug had been pulled out from beneath her feet. Max wasn't married? Her stomach clenched, but she lifted a shoulder. “Doesn't matter,” she said, trying to convince herself. Kildare slid like a shadow into the room and rubbed up against her leg. “Max and I are history.”

D
riving Hillary back to Colleen's place in Dawson City, Max ardently refused to think about Skye. He had enough problems as it was. His father had just died, his mother was losing her mind, Jenner's bad attitude was in the way, and Casey seemed about ready to explode. Then there was his continuing struggle with Colleen about Hillary. He glanced at his little daughter, strapped into her seat belt and half dozing, her head resting against the window. No, he didn't need any more complications in his life—especially a complication like Skye Donahue.

Max had convinced himself that he was over Skye, that when she'd driven away from Rimrock and left him in her dust, he was over her. But he'd been wrong. Seeing her again had only proved that point all too well.

Interrupting his troubled thoughts, Hillary stretched and yawned. As if she was able to read his mind, she said, “You liked that lady.”

“What lady?”

“The one in the restaurant.”

Max's teeth ground together. “I knew her a long time ago.”

“Did you like her then?”

He didn't believe in lying to children. “I used to like her a lot.”

“More than Mommy?”

“I knew her before I met your mommy.” That was stretching the truth a bit, but not much.

“So why were you so mad?”

“I wasn't.”

“You looked mad,” Hillary accused.

“Did I? Well, I'll have to work on that, won't I?” he said as the truck rolled past the sign welcoming one and all to Dawson City.

Hillary turned her head, stared out the window and saw the familiar landmarks of the town where she now lived. A dark cloud seemed to settle over her small shoulders. She caught her father's eye and pouted, crossing her chubby arms defiantly. “I don't want to go back to Mommy's house.”

“It won't be for long. I'll pick you up on Friday,” he said, hoping to keep the conversation light but knowing that it would deteriorate as it always did. It wasn't that Hillary didn't love Colleen and vice versa, but Colleen, with two-year-old twins and a demanding husband had more than she could handle already. “I hate Mommy's house.”

Max swallowed. He despised this separation every Sunday night. “You don't hate—”

“I do! I want to live on the ranch with you and Aunt Casey,” she insisted as she did every time he took her home. “I hate Frank!”

“Frank's all right.”

“He hates you.”

“Enough with the hating, okay?” Max said tightly. Truth to tell, he didn't much like Colleen's second husband, either. Frank Smith was a blowhard with a quick temper, which hadn't improved with the birth of his twin girls. He'd been hoping for a boy and hadn't bothered to hide his disappointment when Mary and Carey had come along. According to Hillary, he was talking about having another baby.

What Colleen did with her life was her business. When it affected Hillary, it was Max's.

He pulled up in front of a two-story frame house located just within the city limits. The yard was overgrown and toys littered the sun-bleached grass.

“Please don't leave me, Daddy,” Hillary said, her little chin trembling and tears filling her eyes.

His guts twisted painfully. “I'll be back.”

“But not for five days.”

“I know, but you know how to count, don't you?” He reached into the pocket of his work shirt for his weekly bribe and inwardly cringed that he was reduced to playing this silly game. She held out her hand expectantly and her tears dried surprisingly quickly. Max wondered, as he did every Sunday night, if he was being conned by one of the masters. “Okay, here you go—five candy sticks. You can have one each afternoon, and by the time the last one is gone—”

“The peppermint one,” she said, her eyes suddenly dancing.

“What happens?”

“You'll come get me!”

“That's right, dumplin'.”

She flung her soft little arms around his neck and encased him in the scents of baby shampoo and dirt. Though he always made her bathe before they returned to Colleen's house, the grit of the ranch seemed to stick to her. His heart seemed to rip into a thousand pieces, as it always did when he dropped her off.

He carried her through the gate and up two steps to the front porch, where she leaned over and rang the bell— their Sunday night ritual. There was a loud crash and a baby started screaming loudly.

“Shut up!” Frank yelled from somewhere in the back of the house.

“The twins are dweebs,” Hillary said.

“They're just little.”

The door swung open quickly. Colleen's usually neat hair was rumpled, her lipstick long since faded. She was carrying one crying two-year-old while the other clung to the back of her legs, peeking up at Max and wailing, “Mommy, Mommy, Mommy.”

“Well, come on, Hillary, hurry up,” Colleen said. “Can't you see I'm busy?”

The baby on her hip let out a whimper of protest and Max felt Hillary's legs clamp more tightly around him.

“It's okay,” Max said to his daughter, and Colleen blew her bangs out of her eyes.

“Of course it's okay,” she said a little harshly, then seemed to melt. “Just let me put Mary in the playpen—she bumped her head, but she's fine now.”

“Noooo!” Mary screamed as Colleen deposited her into a playpen pushed into a corner of the living room. The second little girl, Carey, Max presumed, still clung to one of Colleen's legs. “Now there, did you have fun at Daddy's?” Colleen asked as she took Hillary from Max's arms and set her on the floor.

Hillary was still clutching her candy sticks in a death grip. She sent a pained look to her father, then answered, “Lots of fun. I rode Cambridge and played with Reuben and—”

“Good, good, well, come along. Supper's almost on the table.” Colleen raised her eyes to meet Max's worried gaze. “Goodbye,” she said without a trace of a smile. “Next time, forget the candy, okay? I don't need trips to the dentist.” She shut the door quickly, cutting him off from his daughter. Max's fingers curled into angry fists of frustration.

Not that he blamed Colleen. She'd tried to make him happy, he supposed, but he'd never loved her. Not as much as he'd loved Skye, and Colleen had sensed it. Their marriage had foundered, not so much from dissatisfaction as apathy, and Max had always felt that he'd failed Colleen, Hillary and himself.

Jaw clenched so tightly it hurt, he strode back to the pickup and drove away from the shaded sidewalk. Storm clouds were gathering in the Blue Mountains, and as he crested the hill just outside of town, the first fat drops of rain hit the dusty windshield and thirsty ground.

He flipped on his wipers. Just then an old love song, which had been popular years ago when he and Skye were dating, drifted plaintively from the radio. Old, nearly forgotten memories surfaced. Despite all his efforts, he couldn't keep his thoughts off Skye. With intelligent, hazel eyes that seemed to cut right to his soul, and tousled blond hair that framed a flawless face, she was, and always had been, the most interesting and frustrating woman he'd ever met. He'd fallen in love with her completely, without guarding his heart.

And though it had turned out his father was right about her temperament, seven years ago Max had loved her with a passion that scared the bejesus out of him. She'd meant everything to him, but she hadn't felt the same. She'd left Rimrock suddenly, never once glancing back over her shoulder.

Well, maybe she had, he thought sullenly as the wipers slapped the drizzling rain from the gritty windshield. The letter he'd just found the other day seemed to indicate that she'd had a few doubts of her own.

Damn the old man for lying to him. His back teeth gnashed together when he considered all the years gone by that his father hadn't said a word about Skye's letter. Not one goddamned word.

A prince among men, Jonah McKee.

Skye was back, Hillary was unhappy, and his mother was convinced that the old man had been murdered.

It had been one helluva week.

And it was only Sunday night.

 

The clinic had changed in the past seven years. It had originally been housed in the basement of Doc Fletcher's home, but after Skye had moved from Rimrock, Fletcher had leased the renovated single-storied complex on the adjoining property. Carpeting now covered the old linoleum hallways and new Formica cabinets replaced the metal cupboards that Skye remembered from the old house.

Doc Fletcher gave her the guided tour, showing off the four examining rooms, reception area and finally his office. He shepherded her inside and closed the door behind them without missing a beat.

“—and of course some of the equipment needs to be replaced,” he was saying, “but everything's still operational and should last a few more years. We send all our lab work to Bend and any injury we can't handle goes to the hospital in Dawson City. There's the local ambulance service in town, all volunteer, and then we have life-flight capabilities thanks to a local helicopter service.” Shedding his white jacket and hanging it on a peg near the door, he kept talking. “So we're not as backward as you might think—or as isolated.” He used his fingers to comb his white hair while he ambled to his worn leather chair.

His desk was littered with open medical books, mail, patient charts, notes to himself, and folders. “I trust my accountant sent you all the records you need, including the information on the apartment house, right?”

She nodded. “I looked them over, then had a C.P.A. and my lawyer go over everything.”

“Good, good.” He seemed vastly relieved. “Let's take a look around the house and then we'll set up a meeting with my lawyer tomorrow. You can move in whenever you like. The main-floor apartment is vacant.” He extended his hand and Skye clasped it firmly, though she felt as if she was sealing her fate in a town where she would never be wanted, might never belong.

Fletcher punched a button on his intercom, explained to his receptionist-secretary that he'd be gone for about twenty minutes, then led Skye out the rear door. A concrete pathway parted overgrown laurel hedges and ended up at the back porch of a three-storied home built sometime in the early part of the 1900s. The broad back porch was enclosed by windows and sagged a little on one side.

He opened the door and stepped into a kitchen that hadn't been updated in thirty years. The linoleum was cracked but clean, and the appliances looked as if they'd been new in the early sixties. “Like I said, it needs a little work.” Fletcher guided her through an arch to a dining room with a bay window and a view of an overgrown grape arbor. The living room, adjacent to the dining room, was graced with a fireplace surrounded by tile and carved wood. He led her through French doors to a sun porch and then on to the bedroom and a bath with a claw-footed tub.

“As you know, two of the units on the second floor are occupied, the third is vacant and needs work, and the unit in the basement—well, I won't lie to you. It needs to be gutted and reconstructed. I worked a deal with Jenner McKee. He's already signed a lease, and for free rent he'll do all the labor involved. He's kind of a jack-of-all-trades now that his rodeo career has—”

Jenner McKee? As in Max's brother?
“I thought you said it was unoccupied.”

“It was, but Jenner needs a place to rest his boots for a few months, though he hasn't moved in yet. This isn't a fact, of course, but rumor has it that old Jonah cut the kid completely out of his will. They had a falling out a few years back and...oh, hell, here I am spreading town gossip and I don't know what I'm talking about.” He offered a sheepish smile. “For all I know, Jenner could be loaded. Anyway, I thought since the basement needed fixing and he was looking for a place...is there a problem?”

What could she say? That she didn't trust anyone by the name of McKee? That she needed to keep the entire family at a distance? In this town? Who was she kidding? She'd only met Jenner a few times, but knew his reputation. A bad apple. The black sheep. Trouble from the get-go. But what was done was done and she'd rather deal with Jenner than his brother. “I'm sure there'll be no problem,” she lied.

Fletcher clapped his hands together. “That's fine then. The McKees, they're all good people,” Fletcher continued as they walked down a concrete stairwell to the lower unit. “Besides, I thought you might like an able-bodied man around, you know, to—” He stopped short, obviously seeing the censure in her eyes.

“Look, I appreciate everything you're doing for me, Dr. Fletcher, but since we're going to be working together, I think you should know a few things about me. The first is I
don't
need a man.”

He shuffled his feet and had the decency to color behind his ears. “I didn't mean to imply that you did. Hell, you've been through medical school. In my time, few women dared even apply, but...oh, well. Didn't mean to offend you.”

“No offense taken,” she lied again.

He twisted a key in the lock and held the door open for Skye. He hadn't been kidding. The place was a mess. Most of the floor tiles were cracked or missing, exposing the dingy concrete below. The place smelled musty, the low ceiling sagged in several spots, and the old paneled walls were filthy and scratched. Some of the panels had fallen from the framework, revealing the dirty pink insulation. Ancient pieces of furniture and cabinets from the days when Fletcher's medical practice had been housed down here were stacked in a corner, and probably the homes of several nests of mice. The windows looked as if they hadn't seen any glass cleaner or a sponge for years. The smell was awful, a blend of mildew and dust and oil, and a bucket had been set in the middle of the floor to collect drips from an old pipe that drizzled rust and water.