Velvet Rain - A Dark Thriller (43 page)

The
little
bitch was there—Ray’s little girl. Finally got those bandages off from the look of it. She was quite the nice piece of ass, looked just
like
her old lady. He’d never tell Ray that, of course. Crazy sonofabitch’d tear him limb from limb and stuff both his arms up his ass. Probably douse him with gasoline and throw a match on him. But wouldn’t it be nice, just once, to pound that little bitch?

Christ. She was
talking
to him. The fucking half-breed. Well, not exactly; looked like he was doing most of the talking. Did he really think she wanted him there? He had half a mind to go over there and wipe that goddamn grin off his face. Show him how things are.

Did he even know who he was talking to? No-brain fucking Indians.
Animals.
Nothing but instinct. And when they aren’t cheating you, they’re stealing from you, and—

—and fucking your women.

The kid did know her, didn’t he?

Sonofabitch! Kid figures he can get his hands on Ray’s little girl. Get back at him for what they did. It wasn’t like it was some secret. Pretty well everyone in the county knew, for Chrissake. They didn’t know everything that happened that night—sure as shit they didn’t—but they knew enough. And so did Mr. Injun here.

Thing was, she didn’t look like she minded. Oh, she wasn’t talking much, nodding, mostly, but she sure as hell wasn’t telling the kid to back off. But when he thought about it, she was probably afraid of him. Yeah. Afraid he might rape her. Fucking animal.

He was about to tell the little fucker to mind his own business, take a hike back to the woods with all the other savages—and he would have, he was pretty sure—but then Ray’s wife stepped out, a small bag of groceries tucked under her arm. She gave him a look, not a very nice one, and made it down the steps and hurried past him. She stepped onto the street, but when she realized just who it was chatting her daughter up, she held up short. But didn’t it take her all of three seconds to get to her car after that.

He got close to the curb, swept a bit, and held a wide ear. She seemed pleasant enough to the kid, but it was clear as glass she was in one big hurry all of a sudden. He couldn’t make it all out what with her turned away from him, but now the kid was asking if it was all right if he could take the girl to a show.
The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance.
Kid had balls. Or a death wish.

She didn’t think so, at least he thought that’s what she said, and didn’t she sound all polite as all get-out. Told him she’d have to talk it over. A line. Had to be. The kid’s face, well, it was just about what you’d expect. And damn it all if the dumb fuck didn’t just stand there all clueless as dogshit, nodding like the dumb fuck he was.

She turned and caught him staring again. He faked a coughing fit, although once he got going it was the real thing, and it hurt like hell. She gave him another nasty look, but there was a lot more to it than that. Wasn’t there.

She couldn’t get behind the wheel fast enough. The kid said
Have a nice day,
and she started the car without saying boo. She turned to see if the way was clear, and just as she started to pull out, she looked back toward the store. Right at ol’ Frankie.

Oh yeah. Her eyes were shining. Shining like glass.

She knew. Knew he’d be seeing her old man soon enough, likely out at the Wild tonight—and wouldn’t that be an interesting conversation. Wouldn’t it.

He stared back at her. Nodded to her. And then he wired her a small grin. Chipped teeth and all.

The Chev took off. The kid stood like a stone, all puzzled to shit. Like he just couldn’t figure how it was that a good white woman wouldn’t want those filthy hands touching her daughter. Like it was a real fucking mystery. He even waved, for Chrissake.

He would have said something when the kid crossed and went into the store, but the fact was, the kid was big. Nearly as big as his old man. When he came out a minute later with a soda, he gave him a good old-fashioned
How do you do, half-breed,
instead—just a look, mind you, but dark enough to make it clear he wasn’t welcome round these parts. But didn’t the bastard give
him
a blast, tell him to stay the hell away from him if he knew what was good for him, and all he could do, besides nearly piss himself right then and there, was start coughing up a lung. And didn’t it hurt like a bastard. The burning was getting worse.

The kid slipped in behind the wheel. Stared him down with those deep half-breed eyes. Oh yeah. He knew those eyes. Dark and black like a swamp. The kid started the engine and gave him the finger. He would have taken the broom to the little cocksucker, whacked it right upside his half-breed head—that was, if Ray or Jake were here—but he didn’t. What he did do was stand there like a coward, watching the old Mercury slip down the street and round the corner. And when he stopped trembling and headed up the steps to see if the old man had gone for a dump, he stopped cold. Caught his sorry reflection in the shop window.

His nose was bleeding.

~ 18

The young man looked weary, very old and very trodden, as if a combination of worry and drink had punished him for years. He seemed lesser than he was. His tanned skin had grayed. His voice, usually smooth and youthful, held a roughened, toughened edge, one that suggested, if not wisdom, the hard lessons of experience; this, despite his age. He sounded cold and hard and frightened. But mostly, he sounded small.

“Sometimes I lie in bed, listening to the thunder,” he said quietly. “Sometimes I do. You ever do that?”

Ryan shifted anxiously in his seat. He waited for a reply and received not a word.

“Like I was saying … it was just over two years ago. The old man was out late. Guy could celebrate a fart with a bottle of Jack Daniels. I couldn’t sleep. The thunder. It must have been three in the morning when I saw the headlights on the ceiling.

“I got up to see. I’d watch him sometimes, and … sometimes … well … well sometimes he brought home a woman. I think Ma knows. I hope she doesn’t. This time he was alone. He came in, and Beaks barked. He kicked him. I know that sound.

“I heard him stagger upstairs. He almost fell. But then I heard this really soft knock. Not on my door. He never knocks at
his
door. Why would he? Thing was, Ma was up at my granddad’s place. He had a small setback the day before. His heart. You see? Pa
knew
she’d be out.

“It was Lee’s door. I heard him sneak in. Her door creaks when you open it slow like that. I heard them come out, and when I cracked my door I saw them heading downstairs. I think I heard Lee say ‘No,’ but I can’t be sure. He said ‘Shut it.’
That
I heard. Then I heard the front door, and I went to the window.

“It was hard to see them in the rain. The lightning made them look like ghosts. He led her by the hand, but she didn’t want to go. She couldn’t keep up. Kept slipping. On account she had slippers on. He got the spare key above the door—same way I got in. Sorry. Anyway … he made sure she went in first.

“He looked up at my window, but I don’t think he saw me. I went downstairs. Beaks had mud on his coat where the bastard had nailed him. He was really in a bad way. I petted him for a bit, to calm him down. Then I slipped on my shoes and grabbed my coat.”

The boy stopped. He looked sickly.

“She didn’t fight,” he said. His voice had fallen. “I think maybe that’s what got me most. She just laid there and took it. Let him have his way. God—like it had happened before, you know? All she could do was close her eyes and cry. I wanted to kill him.” He said it matter-of-factly, like a man asking for cigarettes along with the magazine. He said it again.

“I was so scared, Kain. I didn’t know what to do. I started to slip away, like a coward. But he saw me. The lightning. I panicked. I pounded on the window … so hard I cracked it.”

The boy drifted a moment.

“He snapped,” Ryan said. “It was in his eyes. They were big black balls. He came out screaming he was gonna kill me. I figured if he went after me, Lee would be okay. Didn’t think he could run that fast. Not in the rain. Not drunk.”

“He caught you.” Kain did not expect a reply. Not really. “You okay?”

“No,” Ryan said, sniffling. “He dragged me through the mud. Tied me up in the barn like an animal. Hog-tied me. Tied us both.”

Silence hung there like death; the boy couldn’t bring himself further. It was as if he were standing on the edge of a cliff, blind, some dark whisper daring him one foot forward. But then, he bolted sharply from his seat, and with all the vigor he could muster, flung his glass as hard as he could. It shattered not far from where Beaks got run down.

“Why the hell did he do it?
WHY?
”

He was shaking, nearly in tears.

Kain rose. He hesitated, and then he risked a hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“If I had the chance, Kain … I
would
kill him.”

Ryan turned. His eyes told of black secrets long buried; he looked like a man in a burning building, who has come to know there is no recourse but to jump. He started to say something, but then his gaze fell. He trembled slightly, and without a word, turned away. He untucked his shirt, and then raised it slowly.

“
Good God.
”

The boy’s back was rife with the rigors of healed burns. The ravaged skin was flabby and rippled, discolored and hideous.

“Enough,” Kain muttered, and Ryan let his shirt back down.

Slowly, the boy turned about. He was weeping. Trying not to show it.

“He
was
gonna kill us,” he said. “I think he almost did. Sometimes I wish he had.”

“You don’t mean that.”

The boy shook his head weakly, as if to say,
You have no idea.

“He whipped me with his belt. Whipped Lee. Said it was all her fault. For trying to look like Ma.” He stirred. “He burned
her
first.”

“Jesus.”

Ryan steadied himself. “He took a blowtorch to her arms. Did her legs after.”

Tears slid down his cheeks. “She screamed so much, Kain. I can still hear it in my head. Sometimes I wake
up
hearing it. Lee … ohhh, God, she was screaming … and so was I. Don’t you see? I wasn’t thinking about
her.
I knew I was next. I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t stop him.”

“This wasn’t your fault …”

“
Wasn’t it?
If I hadn’t gone out there—if I’d just minded my own damn business—”

“He’d still be here,” Kain told him, cutting him off. “Still hurting your sister.”

The boy faltered. “Know why he burned her the way he did? Wanted to
ruin
her. For anyone. She’ll always be alone, Kain. Always.”

“She’ll find someone she can trust. She will.”

Ryan refuted this with a limp shake of his head.

“Know why he burned
me?
”

“No.”

“Not because I caught him,” Ryan said. “Because I was
spying
on him. He said I—” He choked up. “Said I was good for nothing.”

“You know that’s not true.”

“Ask my Ma. Ask
Lee.
Ask Lee. I failed her.”

~ 19

To be sure, the Hawkeye State has spawned more than its fair share of shining stars: Marion Michael Morrison, not the Little Duke, but rather, that somewhat famous actor from Winterset, nicknamed after his trusty Airedale; Buffalo Bill Cody, the Cavalry scout turned Wild West Showman; the ill-fated bandleader, Glenn Miller, who would perish on a flight to Paris on a cold December night in 1945 at the ripe old age of 40; the classic American crooner, Andy Williams; James Van Allen, whose “Rockoons” (a seemingly unnatural, yet entirely successful, marriage of rocket and balloon technology) helped discover the radiation belts surrounding the Earth that bear his name; the Friedman sisters, Esther Pauline and Pauline Esther (neither typo nor joke, that), who would go on to advise the lost and the lovelorn as Ann Landers and Abigail Van Buren (aka Dear Abby); the orphan, the humanitarian, and later, the thirty-first President, Herbert Clark Hoover … the list goes on. And yet, of all the stars in Iowa—past, present, and dare we say, future—none possess (or will) the lasting memory, the raw beauty, of its sparkling prairie heavens. To leave behind one’s trials and troubles and venture out on a moonless midsummer evening here, taking with you nothing more than a blanket and imagination, the Summer Triangle blazing overhead, the cream of the Milky Way glowing in the velvety darkness with the delicate starlight of billions of suns, some, perhaps, nurturing a home not unlike our own … it is a wondrous pleasure, the deepest exploration of the mind. It is to stir the soul.

And so they lay, dreaming on the blanket they shared.

They had a late supper, and on a whim Kain had taken her on a leisurely stroll along the trail to the grassy knoll. There were no butterflies to enchant them, not at this hour, but the starry view was intoxicating. Neither breathed a word for nearly thirty minutes; the sparkling gems in the sky had taken them away, at least for a time.

“Is that the Big Dipper?” Lynn said, pointing.

“Uh huh.” He guided her by motioning his hand. “And that’s the Little Dipper.”

“I don’t see it.”

He shimmied closer. They were passably cheek to cheek, and with an outstretched arm, he outlined the lovely asterism among the throng.

“Oh! There!”

“And that’s the North Star,” he said. “The bright one at the end of the handle.”

He spent the next half hour sharing what he knew of the summer sky, and when he had run out of constellations—those that had risen, at least, for he knew a good third of the eighty-eight—he ended the impromptu astronomy lesson with one of his favorites from the southern horizon, Sagittarius.

“It does look like a teapot,” she said.

Kain sat up, and she joined him. A shooting star flashed brightly, and then, like a last breath, was gone.

“A wish?” she asked. “You looked like you were back in Oz again.”

“A hope,” he said, after some length.