How to Howl at the Moon (22 page)

“I saw them in the greenhouse. Ruth said they looked like they were going to be okay. That’s good. That’s
really
good.” Lance sounded stupidly relieved. But Tim wasn’t ready to hear it.

“I’d better go help,” he said stiffly. He started for the greenhouse, the untouched mocha still clenched in his hand. He’d get out of Lance’s sight and drink it. Why waste a perfectly good
mocha?

“Do you want me to leave Renny with you?” Lance called after him.

Tim looked back and saw both man and dog poised and staring at him with equal expressions of devotion and
let-me-in-ness
.

“Renny can stay for now,” Tim said coolly.

As for Lance, that remained to be seen.

Chance Makes a Stand

LANCE WAITED
three days to go and talk to Tim. He waited until the glass, shiny and new, was installed in all the windows. He waited until Ruth, Gus, and Lily had helped Tim plant several rows of peas and lettuces in the field and dozens of new seed trays in the greenhouse. He waited until the chips in the cabin wall were plugged, and the last crumbs of disaster had been swept away.

He had one shot at this. He wanted the hurt of all that damage to have faded.

He was also scared out of his ever-loving mind.

“Pfft! Just sweep him up in your arms and take him to bed.” Lily had advised. “Lick your way out of it. Always worked on your father.”

Lance had groaned and cringed at the
illusion to
parental sex.
Nope. Mental pictures unwelcome, thanks.
But in all honestly, he’d do it if he thought he could get away with it. No, Tim would need an apology before he let Lance touch him again—if he ever did. And Lance knew he owed Tim some serious groveling. Licking wouldn’t cover it.

Tim didn’t look happy to see Lance when he opened the door.

“I brought two chicken dinners from the diner,” Lance said, holding up the bag. “I’d really like to talk to you, so I’m hoping you don’t make me eat mine in the car.”

The joke fell flat, or at least Tim didn’t respond to it. After a moment, he stepped back from the door. “Come in.”

Tim walked to the kitchen, not checking to see if Lance was following or not. He put a piece of aluminum foil back on a casserole dish, as if he’d just been preparing to have it for dinner. He stuck it into a crowded fridge. “I can’t even eat all the food people have been bringing by,” Tim said in a neutral voice. “I froze some of it.”

“That’s good.” Lance knew Lily felt almost as bad as he did, and she’d been the master of cooking-as-a-form-of-apology since time immemorial.

“So what do you want to say to me?” Tim asked bluntly, turning to give Lance a challenging look and folding his arms defensively.

“Do you want to eat first?” Lance put the bag on the counter.

“Not really. I don’t care to eat with you right now. I’d rather just get this over with.”

Despite his tough words, Lance could sense an undercurrent of want that radiated in Tim’s being. He was like a mistreated junkyard dog snarling at anyone who approached, but at the same time wanting kindness so bad he ached with it.

The thought gave Lance a modicum of courage. “Okay then. I want to explain what happened.”

“I know what happened.”

Lance shook his head. The motion came out more exaggerated than it should be. His nerves were getting the better of him, and, inside, his dog paced anxiously. He pushed it down. “You don’t know my side of it. I know I can be intense, and bullheaded, and protective as hell. And I’ll admit I didn’t handle things as well as I should have. But I never meant to hurt you.”

Tim snorted. “Hard to believe someone could be that effective at something they didn’t mean to do.”

He had a point. Lance sighed. “Will you listen?”

*                          *                         *

Tim had done a shit load of forgiving people and believing them when they said they
hadn
’t meant it. A lifetime of it. So he was determined not to be a fool now even though he wanted to be one. He wanted to forgive Lance and be held again in those arms, and believe, even if only for a short while, that someone loved him. He wanted to roll over because of all the work and goods and food people had donated to help him out. He hadn’t paid for any of it, and he figured most of that had come out of Lance’s pocket.

But he knew what that road was like. His dad could be charming and repentant too. His father had bought him ‘blood presents,’ as Tim thought of it, as if money could make up for broken bones. Further down the line, there’d only be more
lost tempers, more pain,
more apologies
,
and more grand gestures. And so it would cycle on. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t live like that, always waiting for the bad shoe to drop.

“Go on and talk,” Tim said, steeling himself to take anything Lance said with a huge grain of salt.

“Can we sit down?”

“I’m good.” Tim preferred to remain on his guard.

Lance nodded, accepting it, and wiped a hand over his brow.

“The first time I saw you in the diner, you were asking about potting soil and gardening supplies. And… and you smelled like pot. See, there’s been a lot of trouble in these mountains with marijuana growers. There was a shoot-out that killed three people a few months ago down near Merced. So I’ve been on the lookout. I don’t want that shit in my town.”

Oh God, the hitchhiker Tim had picked up. He’d reeked of the stuff. Tim said nothing.

“So… after the diner, I decided to follow up on you. See what you were up to, a routine check. That’s when I visited you that first day, and you were in the greenhouse, and you shut the door like you didn’t want me to see what was inside.”

That day came back to Tim.
The rose hips.
He inwardly groaned.

“And you told me your name was Timothy Traynor. But when I did a routine check with Linda
Fitzgibbons
, she said she was renting the place to a Tim Weston.”

“Oh God.” Tim stumbled to the little table in the kitchen and sank into the chair.

Lance waited, not saying anything.

“My name is Weston. It was a stupid, impulse decision to say ‘Traynor’,” Tim admitted, feeling like a fool. “I’d just quit my job in Santa Barbara, and my boss was a real dick. I didn’t want him finding me. Traynor is my mother’s maiden name.”

“All right,” Lance said calmly. “Anyway, by that point, I had some reasonable concern that you might be up to something. So I called the police in Fresno. There’s a drug squad guy there I’d met at a training session. I had him run a background check on you.”

Lance’s voice was bitter, and Tim looked up.

“I think the rumor that you were growing pot had to have leaked from that guy or at least from his office. There must be someone there who’s on the payroll of the drug cartels. That shouldn’t have happened, Tim. And I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am about it. But I’m going to find out how it got leaked, I promise you that.”

Tim nodded. What Lance said made sense, and he seemed angry about it. But Tim still felt pretty much numb. “Fine. Is that all you have to say?”

Lance sighed. “
Hell
no.” He wiped his face again, looking haggard. His hand absently drifted to his ear and scratched at it. Tim waited.

Lance suddenly let out a growl that was so deep it sent a prickle up the back of Tim’s neck. “I had no idea my mother took your seed trays! I couldn’t believe it when I found out! That was so far over the line.… But she didn’t mean to hurt you either. You see she… she thought I would… well, I’d told her that once your seeds were up, and I could verify that they weren’t pot, I wouldn’t need to… to come by here anymore. Or, uh, concern myself with you. She was trying to set us up, Tim! She figured as long as I didn’t know for sure what you were growing….” Lance huffed as if frustrated. “As soon as I realized what she’d done, I made her bring the trays back. That’s why I took you so far out of town to dinner, so she had time to replace everything. It would have been fine! But then the shooters showed up…. And I’m…. Everything got… And it’s my fault, ultimately. And I’m sorry!”

Tim blinked, trying to catch up. Lance looked so sincere, but what he was saying hurt. So the whole point of that date had been to get him out of the house so Lily could sneak back in the plants she’d stolen from him? Great. Perfect. Tim had had sex with Lance
in the car
, and believed all his bullshit talk. Lance really was an asshole. And even his answer about the
seedlings didn’t hold water. The past few months flashed through Tim’s mind.

“What are you talking about? Were you spying on me? Like from the woods? Because I hardly even
spoke
to you until the night of the party at your mom’s. My plants had been missing for weeks by then. Why would your mom have thought she could fix us up? According to you, I was a
suspect
or something.” It made no sense.

There was a weird look on Lance’s face—part reluctance, part pleading, part shame, part… doggy eyes? “I….” He sighed. “She’s…
.
Lily gets ideas and….” He sighed again.

And that was that. Apparently, that was all Lance had to say. Tim felt a wave of bitter disappointment. God damn it all to hell, he hadn’t even admitted to himself how much he hoped Lance would be able to talk him around. Stupid, stupid. Instead, all he’d really learned was that even their date
night
had been a joke, and that Lance couldn’t lie worth shit. When would
Tim
ever learn? Anger and pain coursed through him.

He
stood up abruptly. “I want you to leave.”

“Tim, please,” Lance begged. His nose twitched.

“Nope. I mean it. You have to go
.
Now
.”

Lance closed his eyes as if the words were a blow. H
is
face squinched up.

Maybe it was Lance’s reaction—
grief
rather than anger—that gave Tim the courage to be firm. He grasped Lance’s arm and tugged him to his feet, started marching him toward the door. He wasn’t going to be a doormat anymore!

“Tim! I did like you! Even early on, and Lily knew it! She—”

“Out!”

“I know I’m not—” Lance’s voice broke. He panted. “
huff
—explaining this well, but if you just—”

They reached the front door. Tim yanked it open, not looking at Lance, and tried to push him out. It didn’t work. When Tim tugged on Lance’s arm this time, Lance felt like a hundred eighty pounds of iron bar. Confused, Tim looked at his face.

Lance’s mouth was slightly open, and he was panting hard. His eyes were wide with
surprise, and he was rigid.

“Out?” Tim meant it as a command, but it turned uncertain in his mouth.

“Please! I j-j-just… ARROOOOOOO!” Lance threw back his head and made this noise.
What the ever loving hell?
It sounded exactly like a dog’s howl. A finger of ice shot up Tim’s spine, and his knees went weak. His anger evaporated in pure fear.

“L-lance?”

“AR-AR-AR-AROOOO!!!” Lance’s head remained back, his body rigid. His fists were white-knuckle clenched at his side as if he were fighting something hard. The cry made Tim feel sick. It was the most mournful thing he’d ever heard. It was the sound of utter heartbreak. Before his eyes, Lance’s hair seemed suddenly thicker, longer, and his day’s stubble darkened rapidly, like time lapse photography.

Tim took a step back, his tongue frozen. What the fuck?

Lance panted and slowly forced his chin lower. His eyes were dazed, panicked. “S-sorrrrry. I—”
pant, pant,
“There’s something I have to tell… C-chance.
He
-eeeeeeeeEEEEEE!” Lance’s words turned into a sad and painful whine and, from the look on Lance’s face, it scared the crap
out
of him.