Unspeakable (49 page)

Before getting out, he smoothed down his hair and practiced his smile in the mirror. The place seemed unnaturally quiet. There was no one around. As he climbed the front steps, Emory was irritated to note that his collateral had suffered some storm damage, most notably to the barn. The house, however, seemed okay except for a broken front window.

He was about to ring the doorbell when he remembered that the electricity was probably out. He rapped the doorjamb smartly three times. Immediately the door was answered by none other than the man who now topped his shit list.

Rudely, Jack said, "What are you doing here, Lomax?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but I came to see Mrs. Corbett. Would you please summon her to the door?"

"She's unavailable."

"What does that mean, 'unavailable'?"

"It means she's not available. I'll tell her you came by."

The man's gall was infuriating. He didn't even have the courtesy to look him straight in the eye. Instead he was looking beyond him, his eyes darting from one side of the yard to the other. "See ya."

He tried to close the door, but Emory stepped forward and stopped it with his hand. "Look here, Jack," he sneered. "I'm insisting that you call Mrs. Corbett to the door."

"She can't see you right now. In any case, she doesn't even want to." Emory blustered, "How do you know what she wants and doesn't want? Isn't it for her to say whether or not she wants to see me?"

"I'm saying it for her. Now go away."

The hired hand was shooing him away like a stray dog. Emory wouldn't stand for it. "Who the hell are you to talk down to me?"

"Look, Lomax, sometime we'll get together over a beer and I'll list all the reasons why I think you're an asshole. But that's not why I'm asking you to leave. I'm asking you to leave because it's in your best interest to do so."

"Is that right?"

"Believe me."

"Well, I don't believe you. It's in your best interest that I leave."

"Okay. But it's also what Mrs. Corbett wishes."

"'Mrs. Corbett,'" he scoffed. "How polite. And how phony. Everybody in town knows what you do for her. You took over where the old man left off, right? Did you at least change the sheets after he died, or did you jump right in and take—"

"Shut up."

"Or what?"

"Just go."

"Not before I tell Mrs. Corbett that if she wants me to be nice to her, she'd better start being nice to me." He tried to push the man aside, but he resisted. "I'm coming in."

"I can't let you inside."

"Over, around, or through you, I'm coming in." Emory was tired of being condescended to by Anna Corbett and her ranch hand. He couldn't let them insult him like this and get away with it. If she would stoop to sleep with the likes of this cowpoke, she didn't deserve the kid-glove treatment.

As of now, all bets were off. No more Mr. Nice Guy. He would strike back with a vengeance. He would call her note, repossess the property, hand it over to Connaught, and become a corporate hero.

He would teach the deaf broad to snub him!

But he wanted to tell her this himself, while he was angry and his resolve still fresh. Regardless of her deafness, he would make himself understood.

But first he had to get past this guy. Again Emory tried to shove him out of his way, and when he stood his ground they became engaged in an undignified struggle.

"I will not be turned away by the hired hand," Emory panted scornfully. He pushed against the man's chest with all his strength and had the pleasure of seeing his face turn white with apparent agony. He stumbled backward into the entry. Seizing the opportunity, Emory barged inside.

Confusion brought him up short.

Anna was kneeling on the floor.

The kid was pinned against the wall with a gun to his head.

The guy with the gun—

Gun?!

CHAPTER FORTY–SEVEN

D
avid was terrified. He had seen a man shot to death only a few feet away from him. He was crying and it must have been loud because Carl grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him hard. "Shut up that bawling, kid. Hear me? Shut up."

Anna reached for her son, and Carl pushed him toward her, saying, "Shut the damn kid up." She didn't know what Carl had in store for her when he shoved her to her knees, because just as he did, Lomax arrived. Jack's back had been to her, so she hadn't been able to follow what he said, but she could tell by the way he had stood in the partially open doorway that he had tried to protect Lomax, probably by persuading him to leave. The man's arrogance wouldn't allow him to back down. Lomax burst through the door; Carl had killed him instantly. David clung to her tightly, his small body racked by shudders. Jack raised his index finger vertically against his lips, asking David to please be quiet. David nodded and did his best to be manly, but he continued to hiccup sobs.

How quickly the priorities of a lifetime are rearranged, Anna thought. Since David's birth, she had fretted over the embarrassment her impairment might cause her son. Those worries seemed trivial now. If their lives were spared, if they were allowed to go on living, what difference did it really make that she couldn't hear?

She fervently wished she could turn back the clock. Only minutes ago they'd been naively unconcerned for the future. Now they were in danger of dying soon. Why had this happened now, just when she and Jack had found each other?

Jack. He was in tremendous pain. He must have broken a rib when he fell into the wall. He continued to hold his side, and his face was white with pain. She could tell that each breath was a gasping effort to override the agony. His lips were tense and moved unnaturally, although she could read everything he said and realized that he was attempting to speak distinctly so she could follow his dialogue with Carl.

She had also seen him spelling out the word knife, and remembered, as he obviously had, that his knife was still in David's backpack. After marking the trees with it, David had asked if he could keep it for a while, and Jack had consented, but on the condition that he carry it sheathed and in his backpack. There it remained, in a child's backpack covered with spotted dalmatians. But how to get it without Carl's seeing?

David must have dropped the backpack when Carl grabbed him as he entered the house. It, along with her photography gear and the food hamper, had all been kicked into the corner. Carl stood between it and Jack. She was closer to it. but had no more chance of retrieving it than Jack did. If he even tried, Carl would kill him. Of that she had no doubt.

Seemingly indifferent to having just taken a stranger's life, Carl nudged the bleeding body with the toe of his shoe. "Who's he?" Emory Lomax had landed on the floor in a supine position, his sightless eyes staring at the ceiling, his face still registering puzzlement.

"He's dead," Jack said. "What difference does it make to you who he was?"

"None, I guess." He scowled at Jack. "Remember me warning you not to lie to me?"

"So?"

"So, the stiff here was more honest about the nature of your relationship with my sister-in-law." Anna signed, " Don't call me that, you son of a bitch."

"Whoa, whoa. What was that?" Laughing at her, he moved his fingers to mimic sign language.

"What'd she say?"

"I don't read sign," Jack told him.

Carl looked skeptical, but he let it pass with an uncaring shrug. "Doesn't matter. I can guess what she said from her expression."

She hated that he found her so amusing. She hated that he mimicked her like cruel children had done when she was in school. But to tell him off in sign would only give him more ammunition to ridicule her. She had learned early to ignore taunts from people too stupid and insensitive to realize that when they made fun of her they only embarrassed themselves. He was talking to Jack again. "You lied to protect the woman and kid. Sweet. Real sweet."

"Do whatever you want with me," Jack said to him. "I won't even put up a fight if you'll let them go."

" No! " Anna shot to her feet and took a step toward Jack. Carl grabbed her arm and spun her around abruptly.

"Now where do you think you're going? If you're so eager to be near a man, I'm right here." He drew her up flush against him. She didn't flinch, only glared at him haughtily.

"What's so special about you, hmm? You've got one man beating down your front door, another willing to die for you. You must be in heat is what I'm thinking. You're putting out a scent that's got 'em panting after you."

He peered into her eyes more closely. "Can you understand what I'm saying? You're one of those... what do they call them? Lip readers? Aren't you a lip reader, sweetheart?" She gave him a stony stare.

"I bet you'll understand this good enough."

He moved his hand over her breasts, then reached between her legs and groped her. Reflexively she squeezed her thighs together and slapped at his hands, which only made him laugh. His silent laughter looked obscene.

She felt his breath on her face, but she didn't give him the satisfaction of averting her head in disgust, not even when he raised his fingers beneath his nose and sniffed them. He winked lewdly. "Nice."

She didn't hear Jack's approach, but she felt it a heartbeat before he barreled into Carl, who rapped his temple with the butt of the pistol. Jack collapsed. She crouched down beside him. The blow had opened a two-inch gash on the side of his head. Already it was bleeding profusely. David started crying again.

Despite his own pain, Jack reached for David and tried to quiet him. But even though he was speaking to David and stroking his head, he was looking at her. She'd never seen a smile so sweet or so sad. It was as though Jack's entire life had come down to this moment, as though he were resigned to this being the last few moments before the end of his life, and that it was no better than he had expected it to be. The futility suggested by his smile broke her heart. She wished that she could tell him everything would be all right. She wished that she believed everything would be all right. Instead she laid her fingertips against his lips and he mouthed " Ilove you" against them as he had this morning—in what seemed another lifetime. Carl knocked her hand away from Jack and roughly hauled her to her feet. "I hate to break up this touching scene, truly I do. But I came here for one purpose and one purpose only, and that was to get revenge on my old stepdaddy."

"You're too late," Jack said.

"To kill him, yeah. But that doesn't mean I can't get some satisfaction. Since I can't snuff Delray, guess I'll have to settle for those he left behind."

"If you came here to kill us, why haven't you already done it?"

"Are you that anxious to die, hired hand?"

"Just curious."

Carl shrugged. "That's fair, I guess. Fact is, I don't want to spoil my fun. I waited over twenty fucking years in prison for this day. I want to prolong the pleasure, same way I did with Cecil. He deserved a slow, painful death for being such a goddamn coward, and that's what he got. Damn shame I didn't get to kill Delray, too. I would've liked to make him suffer for all the years he cost me. The good news is, he's dead." He leveled the pistol on Jack.

"The bad news is that—"

"The bad news is that your partner seems to have run into some trouble." Following Jack's nod toward the open front door, Anna turned at the same time Carl did. The pale man smiled through the blood running down his face. "Hi, Carl."

"Jesus Christ, Myron!"

***

Carl grabbed the front of Myron's bloody shirt and yanked him across the threshold. He looked through the door but saw only a beat-up orange pickup and a shiny Jaguar that must've belonged to the stiff.

"Where's the car, Myron?" he screamed.

"The car?"

Carl slammed the door shut and bore down on Myron. "What happened? Why'd you leave the car? Where's the money?"

Myron's idiotic grin collapsed. "The money?"

"The money from the bank, Myron. Jesus! What were you thinking to go off and leave it?" Agitated, Myron dragged his sleeve across his face, smearing the blood and sweat. "I shot the man like you told me to."

Carl wanted to kill him. The need to kill him pulsed through his veins. He envisioned wrapping his hands around Myron's long, skinny neck and squeezing until his strange eyes bulged out of their sockets. He saw himself shooting him in the face again and again, until that stupid expression was reduced to pink mush and the ugliness was pulverized.

But until he knew about the money, he had to keep Myron alive. He forced himself to take several deep breaths. Eventually the blood vessels in his head no longer felt ready to burst. More calmly he asked, "Where's the money, Myron? What did you do with it?"

"It's still in the trunk."

"Where's the car?"

"You know where it's at, Carl."

"Same place I left it?"

"Yeah."

"Where're your guns?"

Myron replied only with a blank stare.

"Your guns, your guns!" Carl shrieked.

Myron was near tears. "I must've left 'em."