The Lies Uncovered Trilogy (Books 4, 5, and 6 of The Dancing Moon Ranch Series) (6 page)

"I'm behind some bushes near your mother's place," Sophie said, in a panic-stricken voice. "Something terrible happened..."

CHAPTER 4

The instant Rick pulled to the curb in front of the fitness center, Sophie rushed out from the shadows where she'd been standing and got in the truck. She said nothing, and Rick didn't pump her for an account of what happened, but as the scene she'd witnessed began to fill her mind, she started trembling. Rick glanced over and saw what was happening and pulled the truck to a halt. Placing his hand over hers, he said, "What's going on?"

"Please don't ask what happened," Sophie said.

"You're shaking like a leaf," Rick replied. He slid from behind the wheel and took Sophie in his arms, and she let him hold her while she tried to collect her thoughts, but feeling Rick's arms around her was like releasing a torrent of emotions that went beyond what she'd witnessed. It was like the culmination of everything that happened in the past two days, and suddenly tears started coming, as if her body was filled with giant sobs that captured all the air in her lungs and forced copious quantities of tears from her eyes, and stopped up her nose so she couldn't breathe.

Rick loosened his hold on her, and taking a tissue from a box on the floor of the truck, blotted her eyes then handed her another so she could blow her nose. When she'd finally gained some control, she said. "Can you hold me a little longer?"

Rick closed his arms around her again, and said, "I'll hold you as long as you want, honey, but eventually you'll have to tell me what happened."

Sophie said nothing, just enveloped herself in the security of Rick's arms and pressed her face to his chest and let him become her anchor. Just as he'd always been, all the way back to when she was five and had lost her mother and was dumped on a father who hadn't known she existed, and Rick crawled under the table with her and let her pet the cat.

After a while, Rick tucked his finger beneath her chin and raised her face so she'd have to look at him, and said, "Did Buzz rape you? If he did we need to file a report."

Sophie shook her head. "I got away from Buzz. But please don't ask me anything more. Just take me back to the ranch."

Rick eyed her with concern, and his jaws clenched as if he were trying to hold something back, then he released her, moved behind the wheel, and said nothing more. As they drove, Sophie sat staring out the window at the highway ahead, while trying to figure out how to tell Rick what she'd seen. When they finally got back to the ranch, Rick pulled the truck up in front of his folk's house, killed the engine, but didn't get out. Instead, he reached out and took Sophie's hand, untangling it from the one she'd been clasping in her lap, and said, "Whatever happened, I'm here for you, and I promise you that wherever you are, and whoever we marry, and however many miles separate us, if you ever need me all you have to do is call and I'll come."

Wherever you are and whoever we marry...

Rick's words said it all. She was nothing more to him now than a sort of wayward little sister. For years, he looked at her with love and affection, but all the while she sensed it was not the love and affection of a big brother, even though he held himself out to be that. Yet, during that time she viewed him as the brother she never had and always wanted. Then in two days, everything changed. Now, she saw him as the man she wanted in her life as her lover, her husband, her soulmate.

"Sophie?"

When she didn't respond because she was still deliberating whether she could wait until morning before telling him what she'd seen, Rick said, "It was my mother, wasn't it?"

Sophie was at a loss how to respond, so she simply nodded. When she still said nothing, he said, "Then you walked in on them."

"I didn't have to walk in," Sophie said. "The door was open. Your mother thought I'd be out for the evening and she wasn't expecting me home so soon. Buzz wasn't very subtle about what he expected after dinner, so when we were through I told him I had a headache and wanted to go back to your mother's place. As soon as we got there he was all over me, claiming I'd been ready to put out at the party for a guy who hadn't done anything for me and he'd bought me dinner and expected me to put out for him, so I shoved him away and ran into your mother's place and up the stairs into the apartment, and that's when I found them. The door to the bedroom was open."

Rick eyed her with uncertainty. "Them?"

Sophie nodded. "She was with Don and Kenny."

Rick released her hand and hooked his fingers around the wheel and said, in a tone she'd never heard, "I assume she was having sex with Don, and Kenny was watching."

Sophie shook her head. "She was having sex with Kenny… and with Don too, sort of. Don was doing other things, but Kenny was the one who was… connecting."

Until now, she'd kept her gaze on her hands, not wanting to look at Rick and see the disillusionment she knew would be there when she relayed to him what she'd seen. But when she finally turned to him, she saw awareness on his face, like he wasn't totally surprised. "I'm sorry," she said. "Your mother seemed so nice. So... ordinary. But the look on her face… she didn't hear me coming up the stairs, but when she saw me standing in the doorway she got the most horrified look on her face, like she just wanted to die. That's when I ran out and called you."

"We'll need to file a report," Rick said, "if not tonight, then at least by tomorrow."

"She's your mother," Sophie replied, "and Kenny isn't exactly an innocent boy. He's almost eighteen. At least talk to your mother first. This might be a one-time thing."

"I'll talk to her," Rick said, "I'll give her a chance to turn herself in and go through counseling, or face us filing a report."

"I suppose you're right," Sophie said.

Before getting out of the truck, Rick sat gripping the wheel while staring out at the night, as if digesting things. Sophie wanted to put her arms around him and let him know she was there for him too, but from the hard look on his face she knew he wouldn't welcome it, that he had to deal with this in his own way.

Saying nothing more, Rick got out of the truck and started up the porch steps. Sophie jumped out and caught up with him. When they stepped into the house, Sam was waiting for them, but when he started asking about what happened, Rick waved him off, and said, "We'll talk about this later, Dad. I'm putting Sophie in my room tonight. I'll stay on the couch." He took Sophie by the arm and walked with her down the hallway and into his room.

"I'm sorry about this," Sophie said. "If I hadn't insisted on staying with your mother this wouldn't have happened, or at least you wouldn't have known about it and felt obligated to do something."

Rick said nothing, but the dark look on his face said it all.

At least she understood his resentment towards his mother, but now she wondered how he could ever want anything to do with such a woman again. "You'll be okay then?" she asked, before Rick left the room.

Rick shrugged, and said, "I'll put some towels and a pillowcase in the bathroom for you."

And Sophie knew the subject of his mother was closed.

***

When Rick returned to the living room, he found his father sitting at the kitchen table, waiting for him. He closed the door to the hallway, not wanting Sophie to hear them talking, then sat in a chair across from his father and said, in a lowered voice, "Where are Jayne and Becca?" He knew he didn't want to get into this with either of them tonight.

"Grandma got back late this evening so they're over there," Sam replied. "They should be home soon. So, what gives?"

Rick tried to put together the words to explain what Sophie had seen. It was a side of his mother he knew his father didn't know about. Unable to find a diplomatic way to tell him, he started in, pretty much parroting what Sophie told him. When he finished, his father studied him for a few moments, as if trying to assimilate what he'd heard, which he qualified by saying, "You sure he's only seventeen?"

Rick nodded. "If it's reported she'll be arrested, and even the most hardened women in prison don't put up with this kind of crap. And Sophie will feel like shit since she'd have to be the one to file the report, but Mom has to be stopped. This guy's almost eighteen, but she could start hitting on younger guys. Tomorrow I'm going to give her a chance to turn herself in and ask for counseling and let children's services decide what to do. At least she'll be stopped, and Sophie will be off the hook for reporting it."

Sam reached across the table and squeezed Rick's hand, and said, "Son, I've been proud of you over the years. You've always had a good head on your shoulders, and what you're faced with has to be the hardest thing you've ever done, but you're doing the right thing."

"Yeah, and when the shit hits the fan the whole family will be adding their two-bits too."

"I'll have a good long talk with each of them and make sure they don't," Sam said. "As for your mother, it's hard to separate the woman she is now from the one I married. I still have trouble with that."

"Then you still love her?" Rick asked.

Sam shook his head. "Jayne's the love of my life, but your mother and I had a few good years, and when you were born with the blood problem she was a model mother... stayed by you all the time. The problems with men started later. But I don't want to get into that with you. It's done. What about Sophie? How is she holding up?"

"She's pretty upset." Rick replied. "Walking in on a woman she thought was motherly and finding her having sex with two guys, one only seventeen, was stressful enough, but facing having to report it, knowing what it would do me and the family, is worse."

"We'll make sure she has our support, one way or another," Sam said. "Meanwhile, I think we need to keep this quiet until you talk to your mother and see if she's willing to turn herself in. I'll tell Jayne what's going on, but there's nothing to be gained by telling the others right now."

Rick never liked the idea of hiding things, which was why he'd always admired Jayne and the guts it took her to stand up in front of a class of fourth graders and explain why she'd spent five years in prison, even if it was for a crime she didn't commit. "So if Mom turns herself in and gets counseling, and it doesn't make the newspapers, this is to be our family secret?" Rick asked.

Sam got an odd look on his face, the same look as when they were talking about Justine's past, like maybe there were yet other family secrets, and Rick couldn't set aside the revelation that his mother and Marc had the same odd-colored eyes. But while he was mulling over whether to bring that up, Jayne and Becca swept through the front door.

Walking over to where Sam sat, Jayne bent over and kissed him and said, in an excited voice, "It's so good to have your mother back. This place is never the same when she's gone, and she's so happy to have another girl in this family." She took the baby from Becca's arms and nuzzled her chubby cheek, and said to her, "You'll be the apple of Grandma Maureen's eye, sweetheart. Well, you and Maddy. Two girls finally, after a string of seven boys." She looked at Becca then, and said, "Honey, you said Lindsey was keeping you up at night with all the baby noises. We can move her crib into the living room and set up the baby monitor so you can get a good night's sleep."

"Sophie's here," Rick said. "I'll be sleeping on the couch."

Jayne looked at Rick, baffled. "What made her change her mind about staying here? I'm glad she is, but from what you said earlier she seemed pretty set on staying with your mother."

Rick looked at his father, who clearly wanted the incident kept quiet, and said, "There were issues with Mom so Sophie decided to stay here."

"Issues?" Jayne said, eyes shifting between Rick and Sam.

"It's complicated," Sam said.

Becca, who'd been standing off to the side observing, said to Rick, "You said earlier that Sophie was going out with Buzz Newman tonight. Did something happen, again?"

"It had nothing to do with Buzz," Rick said, wanting to make sure Becca didn't jump to the wrong conclusion about Sophie. "How about we just drop the whole thing. Sophie's here and she'll be here until… I don't know yet."

Jayne handed the baby to Becca, and said, "Go get Lindsey ready for her bath and I'll be back to help you in a few minutes." After Becca disappeared down the hallway, Jayne said to Rick, "Honey, you really need to think things through with Sophie. She's making unwise choices right now, and by letting her stay here, you're enabling her to keep making unwise choices. She needs to go back to California and set things straight there and begin to organize her post college life. Right now she's drifting, and that's not good."

Rick loved Jayne, but he'd about had his fill of everyone telling him what he needed to do. "Look, Sophie's staying here because she needs me and I won't let her down." He turned and headed for the front door, deciding he wouldn't be back until the house was dark and he could sort out his feelings about Sophie without everyone telling him what to think.

***

Sophie tucked her nose into the pillow, tugged the covers up around her face, and breathed in the scent of Rick. She hadn't realized it until now, but he had a distinct smell. She couldn't verbalize it. It was like pure man, the way a man would smell when he was fresh out of a hot shower and his skin was warm, and there would be the hint of soap, but not scented soap. Just clean warm man. The thought made her lonely. Made her want Rick there with her. Rick, the way he was when he got out of the pool at the spring. But this time he'd be curved around her, with his chest against her back, and his knees pressed into the insides of her knees, and his arm draped over her, and she'd be surrounded by warm fresh man.