“
Why?
”
he shouted.
“
Why would you do something like that?
”
Alice pursed her lips together, trying to look so sorry.
“
Because I love you
,
Burke
.
I didn
’
t want her to come between us.
”
She tried pouting, she tried batting her eyelashes, and she tried cocking her head to the side and looking contrite.
“
Get this through your thick head. There is no US! Do you understand me?
”
he roared, boring his hate-filled eyes into hers.
Alice got up and ran up the stairs
,
pretending to be weeping hysterically.
Burke had caught that particular show before, too many times.
He ran his trembling fingers though his
brown
hair. He felt like such a fool. How could he have been so stupid, so blind?
There would be no talking to her now. Her moods were legendary. Tomorrow would have to suffice.
The whiskey flowed easily into his glass. It went down nice and smooth. Why? How? He couldn’t wrap his mind around what happened in town. A baby, his baby.
Hell,
he was divorced and his ex-wife was having his baby.
A jackass, plain and simple, that’s what he was. A stupid, gullible, jackass
. He tossed back two more shots of whiskey and decided to call it a night. He suddenly felt bone weary.
The next day, Burke spent the morning moving the cattle to another pasture. Alice usually slept late and he wanted her
wide-awake
when she gave him her answers. He had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach that there was more to it than he was seeing.
He turned his horse and rode for home. He couldn’t stand not knowing any longer.
Alice was in the thick of it he just knew it.
Approaching his
barn,
he saw one of Old Rowdy’s rental trucks in his driveway. It looked to be the same
o
ne that Annie had the day he met her. He thought that Noreen said that Old Rowdy had a new fleet of rentals
because of
Annie.
Swinging down from the
saddle,
he led his horse to the corral. He briskly unsaddled him and took the bit and bridle off. “I’ll be back to give you a good brushing in a bit, boy.”
A scream came from the barn and his first instinct was to run toward it. He stopped himself and walked silently to the door. Alice was holding her cheek and talking to a man who
se back was turned
.
The man turned a bit and Burke could see the Glock
pistol
in his hand.
“Sonny
,
I told you I’m sorry. I tried
every which
way to break them up.”
“You stupid cow, you were supposed to make sure they never got married in the first place. But no you were too busy taking a Hawaiian vacation with my money!”
“
I
…
I
got here as soon as I could honest.”
Sonny lifted his
hand,
threatening her with the gun.
“You
won’t
shoot me.”
Burke wanted to put tape over Alice’s mouth. He had
to get to
his rifle in his truck.
“You’re right, I’m not going to shoot you. I just wanted to come see you and give you a little what for. You cost me everything!”
“Please
,
Sonny, I can still get Burke to marry
me,
and then I’ll be in control of his half of Annie’s trust fund. Don’t you see baby? I’m doing it all for us.”
Burke slipped behind the barn, used his cellphone to call the Sheriff, and hoped that he wouldn’t be seen making a run for his truck.
He heard Alice scream again and off he
went
racing
across the yard to his truck. Ducking down he
made
it to the driver’s door and opened it
, r
eaching under the
seat
to
grab his rifle. He cocked it and ducked down again, waiting to make another run for it toward the barn.
“After I’m done
with
you, I’m going to see that bitch sister of mine. A minor but fatal accident will take care of all my problems. So you see
,
I don’t need you.” He aimed the gu
n
at Alice while she screamed.
Burke
got into position just in time and
shot the gun right out of Sonny’s hand. The gun
went
flying and Sonny cried out in pain. He
whirled
around
,
look
ing
startled to s
ee Burke. The blood poured bright
red down his arm. “What are you doing here?” He turned and looked at Alice. “You said he was out of town.”
Alice still had her hand on her cheek.
“Guess I lied. Sorry.”
“You shot me.” He looked at his bleeding hand and then back at Burke
, and quickly
dove for his gun that was on the ground.
Burke kicked the gun further away. With his rifle aimed at Sonny
,
he leaned down and retrieved the gun.
“Thank God you got here just in time
,
Burke. You always come to my
rescue
.”
Taking a step back he looked at Alice with disgust. “Stay right where you are
,
Alice. I know you are up to your neck in this.”
“You can see what a monster he is, Burke. Just let me go. You can pretend I was never here.”
“I wish I could pretend, but I can’t look the other way for you.”
“Hold it right there!”
Burke was
relieved
to see
Sheriff
Bodin standing in the doorway.
“Burke
,
drop the
weapon.” Burke nodded and put h
is rifle on the ground.
Sheriff Bodin put handcuffs on Sonny, who whined the whole time.
“What in tarnation is going on around here? Alice is that you? I heard you were back in town. You should have stayed gone.”
Alice stepped forward. Tears poured down her face and she still clutched her cheek. “He hit me
,
Sheriff. Arrest him.”
Sheriff Bodin shook his head. “I’ll be the one who decides who goes to jail. Now sit your skinny little ass on that hay bale over there.” He pointed to the hay bale near the first stall.
“I don’t even know this man. He just showed up with his gun and he hit me. I’ve been terrified the whole time.”
The
s
heriff rolled his eyes. “Burke
,
what’s the deal with these two?”
“I don’t really know. It has something about the money Annie recently came into. From what I
understand,
these
two
planned to take it from her. That is Sonny, Annie’s
s
tepbrother
. I do know that he beat her up before we were married. He threatened to kill her.”
“Kill her?” The
s
heriff stared at Sonny.
Alice stood up. “He said he
would cause
an accident to be sure that Annie’s money went back to him.”
The
s
heriff shook his head. “Burke
,
do you want me to take Alice in too?”
It was tempting, almost too tempting. “No, I need to talk to Alice about some
shenanigans
that have been going on around here.”
“
I’ll
take this
dirt bag
in and I’ll be back out to make sure that Alice hasn’t
committed
any crimes.” He gave Alice a hard look. “You’d better cooperate with Burke
.
H
e holds the key to your jail cell.”
Alice gasped. “But
—”
“Save it Alice. I never did like you.” He grabbed Sonny’s arm. “A quick stop at the Doc’s office and the
n
off to jail.
“Now wait a minute. I’m not going anywhere.”
Burke wanted to laugh at Sonny. How the hell did Annie survive having to live under his rules? His heart hurt just thinking about Annie.
He needed the whole story from Alice,
and then
hopefully he could have a talk with Annie.
“See you in a few
,
Burke
,
and
,
Alice
,
so help me if you give Burke a hard time, I’ll put your skinny ass in jail
too for just being a public
nuisance
.”
Alice sidled up next to Burke. It made him cringe to have her so close but he knew the score. Everything was all about Alice. She never thought of anyone else but herself. The best way to get her to talk was to make her believe that it was all about her.
They watched as the
s
heriff put a ranting Sonny into the back seat of the police car. Burke turned and looked at Alice. To his
surprise,
she looked rather pleased with herself. “Come on,
let’s
go inside and you can tell me all about it.”
Alice nodded. “He hurt my cheek you know.”
“I’ll get you some ice. Go on into the family room.”
Burke watched her leave and took a deep breath. All he wanted was to throw Alice off his property, but he needed answers. He took the time to make coffee, trying to regain his
sanity
. He wrapped some ice in a cloth and brought it to Alice.
“Thank you.”
“Okay
,
out with it.” He put the coffee pot and two mugs on the table.
Alice smiled. “I
was originally supposed to make sure that
you
and Annie never got married. Since
I
was too late for that
,
Sonny wanted
your
marriage broken up.
Sonny
stupidly
thought
that he could
legally
take
back
control of Annie
’
s
trust
fund
if she
was
divorced.
I
decided to cut Sonny out and
made a little plan of
my
own.
”
“
I wanted to scare her away. She seemed like such a little mouse that I figured
I
’
d give her
a good scare
,
and she
’
d be gone. I set the trap in the hayloft
,
and I told her that there were little bitty kittens up there,
”
she said
,
chuckling.
“
How
’
d you get the trap set?
”
“
I just took it off the wall. It was already open and set. The fact that you were convinced that I couldn
’
t have done it was
a big plus
. Actually, it was fun watching you and Nash running in circles, doubting the men you work with. It took the heat off me,
”
she b
oasted
.
Burke groaned, rubbing his hand over his face. He needed to portray an outward calm or she
’
d clam up.
“
I
wanted to make her jealous
, s
o I
played up to you constantly
. I wanted her to feel lacking as a woman. It wasn
’
t hard with that little
nobody
you married. Burke, you used to have such good taste.
”
“
So
nny told you
about her scarred back,
”
Burke murmured. He had wondered about it at the time. With each sentence, Burke became
more
disgusted
by the
way
she
bragged. Her
face grew more animated with each confession.
“
One of my best ones was the night of the storm. You were supposed to be away, remember, darling?
”