“You used an assumed name, right?”
“Of course. Which sooner or later, they’ll anticipate. It’s been a week and I haven’t materialized in D.C. It’s a pretty safe bet that I’ve left somehow. Next stop, Maddensfield.”
“I have my deputies keeping an eye out.”
“What did you tell them?”
“Not much. Just that people were looking for you, and since this was your hometown, they’d pass through, so we’d better keep our eyes open. Anything they hear, they should pass along to me.”
“Did they ask if I was actually here?”
“Give ’em some credit, Garret.”
“Yeah, well…” He tried to take another step, but there was really no room for decent pacing in the tiny shed. He raked his fingers through his hair instead, a gesture that unconsciously mirrored Cagney’s. “I don’t know whether to go or to stay,” he said at last, his voice low.
Cagney simply looked at him with his steady gray eyes.
“I mean, sooner or later, pressure will be applied here. And if it’s a professional, maybe more than a mere note. But even if I’m not here, they’ll still go through that process. If I left, I’d probably be unable to do anything. Let alone figure out where I’d go. Hell, I’ve got the navy and a hit man looking for me and I have no idea what to think of either. And my brain is so damn fickle it won’t give me an answer.”
“Aren’t you get forgetting someone else?” Cagney asked quietly.
Garret looked up impatiently. “Who?”
“Suzanne,” Cagney said in a steely voice. “You know, the woman who’s putting you up.”
Garret looked startled, then wary. “Suzanne knows I’ll leave sooner or later.”
Cagney shook his head, his eyes narrowing. “Does she, Garret? You look me in the eye and tell me you’re not involved with her.”
Garret straightened up to his full height, looking down on his younger brother. “That’s none of your business.”
“Like hell, it isn’t,” Cagney countered levelly. He shook his head. “You are sleeping with her, aren’t you? You bastard.”
Garret stiffened, his hands balling into fists at his side. “I’m telling you, Cagney,” he warned softly, “it’s none of your business.”
But Cagney stepped right up to him, his eyes an unusual and dangerous shade of gray. “Why, Garret? Why drag her into all this? Wasn’t leaving her fifteen years ago enough for you? Did you have to return just to break her heart all over again?”
“Damn it,” Garret growled, “Suzanne can take care of herself.” But Cagney’s words were striking uncomfortably close to home.
“Yeah, Suzanne can take care of herself,” Cagney agreed. “And she can take care of you, and her sister, and this whole damn town. But who takes care of her, Garret? Just this once, who takes care of her?”
“She doesn’t need me,” Garret said slowly.
Cagney looked at his older brother and shook his head in disgust. “You’re sleeping with her and you still don’t understand her at all. But then I shouldn’t be surprised. You always were a selfish bastard.”
“Cagney, I’m telling you, I’ll handle it.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Who do you think held her up the last time you left, Garret? Who gave her the shoulder to cry on when suddenly you were gone and she was trying to believe in that damn fairy tale you left her with? Who drove her to visit her mom in the hospital? Who held her hand while she watched her mother die? It wasn’t you, Garret. It was never, ever you.”
“I checked up on her,” Garret said stiffly.
Cagney just laughed. “How charitable of you, Garret. And did you check up on her when she used her baby-sitting money to catch a bus to Charlotte so she could bail Rachel out of jail? Did you check up on her when she declared medical bankruptcy to cover her mother’s hospital bills? You are some piece of work, brother.”
“She did just fine.”
“Of course she did fine. When did she have any other choice?”
“Damn you, what do you want from me?”
Very slowly, Cagney jabbed his brother with his index finger. “I want you to stop toying with her. I want you to stop thinking about yourself and start thinking about her for a change.”
“I do think about her,” Garret countered gruffly. Not knowing what else to do, he pointed toward the back porch. “I made her a table.”
“A table, Garret?”
“Damn it,” Garret practically roared, “I do care!”
“Like hell,” Cagney countered just as fiercely. “You’re a selfish son of a bitch who knows nothing about love.”
“You have no right!”
“I have every right. So help me, God, Garret, if you break her heart yet again…”
At Cagney’s unfinished threat, Garret’s eyes narrowed, the pulse at his temple pounding dangerously. He felt frustrated and angry and guilty, and hated feeling any of these things. “You’ll do what, little brother?” he challenged softly.
Cagney looked at him long and hard, then felt something snap inside him. Without any warning, he drew back his fist and slammed it into his older brother’s eye. Caught off guard, Garret took the blow squarely, staggering back a couple of steps.
Almost in slow motion, he brought his hand up to his face. Before him, Cagney shook out his fist, his gray eyes wary.
“You’ve had that coming for a long time,” the younger Guiness said levelly.
Garret just looked at his imperturbable brother, the one he’d never been able to provoke, though God knows he’d tried when they were younger. With light fingers, he felt around the top of his cheekbone, already beginning to swell. “When the hell did you learn to fight?” he finally asked, his voice gruff.
Cagney looked down at his bruised knuckles and winced. “Never really did, actually.” Though he’d done a decent job with Bennett Jensen only a month ago. Of course, that monster had insulted Marina. He looked at his brother once more, not willing to back down though Garret outweighed him by twenty pounds.
Garret, however, was still checking out his cheek and staring at his brother as if he’d never seen him before. Abruptly, the shed door was yanked open, blinding sunlight leaping into the dim shed.
“So here you are,” Suzanne said. She peered in, her eyes focusing on them one after the other, Garret still touching his cheek. All of a sudden, she stiffened, her lips thinning as she took in the scene. Garret felt himself flush, and beside him, Cagney began to shift uncomfortably. “And exactly what happened in here?” she demanded crisply.
“I fell,” Garret said immediately.
Cagney nodded. “And I was just helping him up,” the younger brother filled in.
“And I’m the Queen of France,” Suzanne informed them curtly. “You two were fighting.”
They both looked away, two guilty kids caught in the act.
“What is going on?” Suzanne demanded to know. They still wouldn’t meet her eye, but Cagney’s cheeks were turning beet red. Abruptly, her eyes opened wide. “Cagney Guiness,” she breathed softly, “please tell me you didn’t.”
“I didn’t,” he said weakly.
“So help me God,” she stormed, “if you interfere with my business again, I’ll…I’ll…I’ll tell Marina about little Mary Maple who punched you out when you were nine.”
Cagney paled nicely. “Suzanne—”
“Cage, I can take care of myself. Though, God knows, Garret doesn’t make it easy.”
This time, Garret flushed, looking down at the floor as if he suddenly had a keen interest in his shoes.
“Brothers shouldn’t fight,” Suzanne said sternly in her best schoolteacher’s voice. They both nodded obediently. After another awkward moment, Cagney cleared his throat.
“I’d better be on my way now. I’ll, uh, check on you two later.” He dipped his hat at Suzanne, already beating a hasty retreat toward the door. She stepped back, allowing him to pass into the bright July sunshine. She could see him limp more than usual, and her hazel eyes returned to Garret with dangerous intent.
“Whatever Cage said,” she uttered stiffly, “I’m sure it was true.”
Garret didn’t say anything, but his jaw clenched.
In the awkward silence, Suzanne’s gaze swept around the shed, taking in the half-packed boxes and dismantled tools. Her lips thinned, but her look met his squarely.
“We’d best get some ice for your eye,” she said shortly.
He nodded, and after a moment followed her from the shed.
W
ith a groan, Garret sat up in bed, the sheet already twisted around his waist. It was too hot for sleeping, the old air conditioner no match for the intense heat. Not to mention that his eye throbbed and he could barely see a damn thing. Garret used to spend half his waking moments trying to provoke his quiet younger brother into fighting, and all those moments had come to nothing; Cagney had simply stared down Garret’s raging temper with cool gray eyes.
From the current state of Garret’s face, Cage had picked up some of his older brother’s talent after all.
Garret rolled out of bed, standing naked and sweaty in the middle of the room.
He opened the bedroom door and crossed the hall to the bathroom. There, he splashed cold water on his face and looked at the nice black-and-blue mess that his eye had become. For a moment, he allowed genuine admiration for Cagney’s blow. Not bad for a kid who’d spent his whole life with his hands behind his back. Seemed like everyone in Maddensfield had grown up nicely while he was away.
Cagney was now engaged and, from what Garret could tell, a fine sheriff. And Suzanne…Suzanne was just plain beautiful.
He stilled for a moment with his hands on the sink. And then he swore again.
She was back to being distant. Oh, she was polite enough. She fed him dinner, made small talk and was unbearably cordial. He hated very minute of it.
He supposed he couldn’t blame her. To hear Cagney talk, all he ever did was hurt the woman. And yet she’d taken him back in and asked nothing from him. When he needed her, she was there.
But if she needed him?
He turned away from the sink and padded back into his room. It was too damn hot. He fumbled with the air conditioner’s controls, but was afraid if he cranked it much more the miserable thing would explode. He settled for standing directly in front of it, and felt the cool air whisper across his stomach.
The sound of sirens cut through the air, and he looked up, senses alert. The sirens kept on wailing. Fire engines.
He peered out the window, but couldn’t see any sign of flashing lights. Working on instinct, he retrieved his jeans from the floor and pulled them on. He’d just walked out into the hall again when he ran into Suzanne.
“Fire engines wake you, too?” he asked gruffly. She was wearing a white cotton gown that came discreetly to her knees. But the material was thin and virginal, and he knew she was naked beneath it.
“Yes,” she lied. She walked to the back door, opening it to the porch so she could peer outside. “Sounds close,” she said presently, “but I don’t see anything.”
Garret walked up behind her, standing close enough to catch the scent of roses. She immediately stepped away.
“My parents’ house isn’t too far from here,” he said quietly, not pursuing her…yet.
She looked at him sharply, and he could tell by the sudden lowering of her eyes that it had been her first thought, as well. “I’m sure it’s nothing serious,” she said. “Probably just a routine call. You know how it is when some of those systems get set off these days—the fire department has to arrive at the scene.”
“Could be,” Garret acknowledged, but both their eyes looked out toward his parents’ house. The night was too dark to see much.
Idly, Suzanne walked over to the table still sitting on the porch, running one finger across the dry finish. “We should take this inside,” she said absently.
Garret nodded, still peering at the horizon. Was it his imagination, or did he smell smoke? It should be impossible to smell anything at this distance.
“It’s really beautiful,” Suzanne remarked. “The table, I mean. I don’t think I ever thanked you properly.” He looked back at her, his eyes unable to stop from drifting over her thinly clad form. She shifted a little under the intensity of his gaze, the color rising becomingly to her cheeks. Stiffly, she brought her chin up. “You have a nice touch with furniture, Garret,” she said levelly.
He stepped toward her. “With furniture?” he drawled. She backed up lightly against the table, but that didn’t stop him.
“Bored again?” she quizzed ruthlessly.
He traced a finger down her cheek. “Hungry again?” he retaliated just as softly. He trailed the finger down her bare arm, his body already hard for her.
“You don’t play fair, Garret Guiness,” she whispered, turning her face away.
For one moment, he looked at her pale, luminescent profile. She looked like a cameo portrait, round and soft and feminine, and everything he’d never wanted in a woman until he’d found it in her. “Do you really want me to?” he demanded bluntly now.
“Yes. No. I don’t know.”
He let his hand slide down to cup her breast through the thin fabric of her gown. She arched back a little, filling his hand. In response, he rubbed his thumb over the sensitive nipple. Her eyes drifted shut, and he saw her teeth sink into her lower lip with the sensations.
“I can make it good again,” he promised. He cupped her other breast.
“I know,” she whispered. Her eyes fluttered open, and there was an anguish there that caught him off guard. Her mouth opened, her eyes beseeching him to let her be even as she arched against his touch and a moan escaped her lips as a fluttered sigh.
He could take her, claim her body, please her senseless. But her gaze told him how much he hurt her anyway, giving her so much, but leaving her in the end.
“Suzanne—”
The phone rang, cutting through the silence with shrill demand. Instantly, she pulled away, her eyelids shuttering down.
“I’d better get that,” she whispered. Not looking at him, she fumbled with the door and disappeared down the hall. Shaking his head in the darkness, he followed.
He’d just walked into the kitchen when she picked up the receiver.
“Suzanne? Cagney. Don’t let him out of the house, you hear me? No matter what he says or does, do not let him out of the house.”