Part 14 (1/2)

I stood up, furious, just as Thom stepped back into the room, right between us, and a good thing, too. He glanced from his daddy, sitting splay-legged and relaxed on his stool, to me standing with my shoulders braced and my hands curling up into fists.

”What did I miss?” he asked.

I said, ”Your daddy is a little too interested in the state of my Catholic v.a.g.i.n.a.” I was breathing hard, eyes on Joe.

”Oh?” Thom said, the single syllable tolling low, like a warning bell. His wrongness, the not-Thom-ness of him, froze me in place and killed my temper with his daddy. Thom said to his dad, ”Pop, you want to go take a look, see if we put things where you want 'em?” and that didn't sound like my Thom either.

Joe looked back and forth between us, puzzled, as if he sensed it, too. Finally he nodded and said to Thom, ”Come on, then, I'll show you how I want to s.h.i.+ft things around.”

”Derek and James can help,” Thom said. ”I need a minute. I've yet to say a proper h.e.l.lo to my wife.”

Joe pushed his lips into a down pout, but he went. Thom didn't come toward me, though. He leaned in the doorway and crossed one foot over the other. ”So. What has has your Catholic v.a.g.i.n.a been up to while I was gone, Ro?” The words were right. It was a Thom-style line, and it should have made me grin, but the tone was all wrong. your Catholic v.a.g.i.n.a been up to while I was gone, Ro?” The words were right. It was a Thom-style line, and it should have made me grin, but the tone was all wrong.

I stared at him, wary. ”Just hanging out in my underpants, like always.”

”Is our home phone fixed?” he asked, and with such purpose behind the question that I felt myself go very, very still inside.

”The guy is coming tomorrow morning,” I said.

”Mmm-hmm. Here's a funny thing, Ro. I already know what's wrong with it.”

”You do?” I said. I swallowed, way too loud. I was suddenly pleased to have Joe and two sales guys in the store. I did not want to be alone with whoever the h.e.l.l this was.

He nodded. ”I was worried about you, sugar. Alone in the night with no working telephone. I called Larry from Houston and had him go by the house, check on things. He said the phone line had been cut. Deliberate. Now, who would do that.”

It didn't tilt up at the end like a question, but I answered it like one anyhow. My voice came out high and breathless. ”Kids, maybe? Teenagers?”

”I don't think so,” Thom said.

My fingers moved up to press my forehead, and I don't think I'd ever hated Larry Grandee more than I did at this moment. That chinless b.a.s.t.a.r.d must have been delighted to check up on his brother's wife.

”Larry said you weren't home,” Thom went on.

”Oh,” I said, faint. ”I had some errands.”

”Yeah,” Thom said. ”So I had him go back again, late.”

”Oh,” I said again. I couldn't look away.

”You never came home last night, Ro.”

Who is he?

I felt my face flush, deep and hot, obvious, a confession. He was still and so controlled, but any second I felt that he could calmly put his clenched hand through my face, all the way into my brain. His eyes had never been so cold on me before, or so at peace.

This wasn't temper. This was a fundamental s.h.i.+ft. He believed I'd stepped out. He'd added up my strangeness over the last ten days, my new wayward bedroom tactics, my overnight absence, and drawn an inevitable conclusion. He would end the game for good now, no winners.

Ro Grandee's husband had been peeled away, and I was seeing the thing that lived underneath. I stood in the middle of Grand Guns eye to eye with the hanged man, and his face was smooth and rested. A muscle jumped in his cheek, twice, and the rest of his face stayed as still as a corpse's. I could see my own death reflected there.

”I think you should drive me home now,” he said. ”This is something we should talk about alone. You and me.”

”I have another two hours on my s.h.i.+ft, baby,” I said. I let my body s.h.i.+ft into Ro's good-girl posture. No danger in being her now. Looking at him, I knew that there was no Thom left for Ro to go back to.

The new Thom had one thing in common with my husband: He did not know who he was looking at. He had sensed a difference in the hospital and while I looked for Jim, but he'd never understood his Ro was gone. It was the only advantage I had, and I smiled Ro's guileless smile at him, because I was d.a.m.n well keeping it.

”James and Derek can handle it,” Thom said.

”I better wait until Janine gets here. I was a couple minutes late and Derek was already being a d.i.c.k about it.” I could not get in the car and leave with him. If I went off with this man alone, it was the last thing I would ever do.

He shrugged, but his expression did not change. He didn't even have one to change. He was blank and still with cold, black purpose. ”Derek will get over it. Get your purse.” He stepped forward and closed one hand around my wrist like a manacle.

”Thom!” Joe called from the back. I jumped, but Thom stayed still.

Thom didn't answer. We looked at each other. He was thinking snake and bird, but it was snake and snake, and I was not done yet.

”You better see what your daddy wants,” I said. ”Sugar.”

Joe appeared in the doorway. ”Thom, boy, get your a.s.s back here. I can't find that Mauser.”

Slowly Thom's neck turned, his focus leaving me. Joe's influence held, even with this creature.

He said to his father, ”Okay. I'll find it, but then I think I'm going to grab Ro and cut out early. I'm tired and I want to take my best girl out to dinner.”

”Sure.” Joe shrugged. ”It's been slow, Derek said.”

Thom looked at me, his lips curving into a smile. This was chess, and he'd just hemmed my king. His goal was to get me off alone, and I couldn't let that happen. I couldn't win in a straight-up fight. He was so much bigger. A gun could level the playing field, and guns were all around me, but Thom was as good with one as I was, maybe better. Him or me. If he took me off alone in the car, armed or not, it would be me.

”That sounds great,” I said, working Ro's best perky. ”We should go to Rollo's and have crab legs.” They were Joe's favorite. ”You want to come eat with us, Joe?”

Joe paused, tempted, but the ploy failed. ”Too much to do. Plus you kids need to get working on that other project we've been discussing.” He waggled his eyebrows at my belly in that same too interested, pervy way. ”Come on, Thom.”

”Just a sec,” Thom said to his daddy. I smiled, trying to look sweet and clueless, but Thom had been hunting with his daddy since he was six. He lifted his head and breathed in a huff of air, smelling fear. If he walked out of this room now, he suspected I'd run like a deer. He was dead d.a.m.n right.

”Give me your keys,” Thom said to me. ”I'll grab my bags out of the truck and move 'em to your car after I find this gun.” Check.

”Sure, baby,” I said, no hesitation. I dug my keys out of my purse and handed them over. That threw him off balance. He wasn't expecting me to give up my escape route. I smiled as I handed them over, Ro's smile, pleased to be getting off work early and taken out for seafood.

His hand closed around my keys. He hesitated, not sure what he was missing.

”Thom,” Joe said, impatient.

”All right, then,” Thom said. He turned away.

Ro's expression dropped off my face and shattered on the floor. This was my one advantage: I knew what I was dealing with, and he did not. I was Rose Mae f.u.c.king Lolley, and I wouldn't go trotting off like a lambkin to my death.

He was barely out of sight before I was moving, grabbing Joe Grandee's jumbo-manly key ring out of the drawer by the register. The Buick had been Charlotte's before it was mine, so of course Joe still had a key. He had a key to our G.o.dd.a.m.n house, too. For once the fact that Joe's big sniffer was jammed hard into every crack of my life was working for me. I fisted my hand hard around the keys to keep them from jingling and ran, light and soundless, toward the front door.