Hot and Bothered (18 page)

An amused, draggy voice came from the doorway. “Now ain't this sweet? Gideon getting the stomp of approval from his honey's family.”

It was Jimmy Beetles, who had wandered to the edge of the courtyard, a dirty blue bandana over his long, scraggly hair, his cutoff leather jacket straining over his gut. Jonsey stepped toward Gideon again as Rochelle hung onto him, but Harry came through the door, gently pulling her away and backing Jonsey off with his sheer physical presence.

“Now calm down, Jon,” he said.

Jonsey raised his hands. “I'm calmed already. But this is family business, Harry.”

Unfortunately, he bumped back into Jimmy Beetles.

“Watch your ass, kid,” he said, shoving Jonsey.

Her cousin regained his balance, turning around to Beetles. Jonsey was much taller and a lot more hotheaded, too.

He pushed back his cowboy hat. “Watch
my
ass? Which one of ours is planted here, shoving itself into a situation where it's not welcome? Get yourself back inside, Beetles.”

The man flashed his yellow teeth in pure glee, and before even Harry could do anything, he head butted Jonsey.

With a grunt, Jonsey stumbled back, but in a flash, he swung at Beetles, connecting with his bearded jaw and sending the biker quickstepping back into the saloon, cackling. Shouts rose as they took the fight to the bar.

Rochelle felt a hand on her arm pulling her toward the General Store. Harry huddled at her back as they opened the door and ushered her through.

She got a faint glance at candy shelves, T-shirts, anemic tables, and a refrigerator with sandwiches and salad. Then she saw Clancy DeForge sitting behind the counter and reading a newspaper, looking as if it were nothing out of the ordinary for men to be dragging women through the store as an escape route.

“Clancy,” Gideon said, and there was regret in his tone, a promise that he was going to make amends to the man later.

No word from Clancy, though, as all of them rushed into the sunny afternoon, where SUVs were parked in front of the saloon, side by side with a few more Harleys than there'd been earlier.

“My truck,” Harry said to Gideon.

Next thing Rochelle knew, she was in Harry's black Chevy, speeding the short way to Gideon's house, where Ben Hughes' Porsche was still in the driveway. With efficiency, they had her inside and on Gideon's sofa before she could gather her wits.

But before she did, she came
this
close to going to Gideon, touching his jaw, and seeing how hurt he was.

That'd be a great idea with Harry here. Hell, a
wonderful
idea in general. Hadn't there been enough trouble with them today?

“Damn Jonsey,” she muttered. “He flies off the handle sometimes, especially when it comes to family.”

Gideon was testing his jaw. Harry was already in the kitchen, reaching into the freezer and pulling out a bag of peas, and, without a word, he brought it to Gideon. He pointed to the patio, shaking his head, knowing the drill by now.

Time for Rochelle and Gideon to have a private talk.

As Harry slipped outside and shut the glass door, Gideon merely held the peas to his jaw. “A slugfest is always Jimmy Beetles' biggest idea of fun. Damn
him
for pulling Jonsey into a brawl. The kid better not end up in the slammer tonight.”

“Do you think he will?”

He chuffed, then worked his jaw and said, “Kat probably pulled out the bat before everything got out of hand. She's used to the fights, but she's got a soft spot for both Jonsey and Beetles.”

“Really? Beetles?”

“The old guy would defend her to the death 'coz he's got this fatherly affection for her.”

They were
so
avoiding what they should've been saying to each other. And, this time, she was the one who felt like flicking some lighter on and off.

Reminded that she'd taken it from him earlier, she reached in her pocket for old Bettie Page, only to come up empty.

For some reason, it felt like she'd lost a lot more than just a lighter.

***

“She's gone,” Rochelle said.

Gideon's bell had been slightly rung by Jonsey but not so hard that he couldn't respond. “Who's gone?”

“Bettie. I had her in my pocket and . . .”

He waved off the rest of it, but wasn't that poetic justice for you? The lighter, a flame, had disappeared, just as Rochelle was going to do soon.

Why had he even said anything about her leaving earlier? It'd just slipped out from him at the saloon, like he'd stepped on a banana peel and gone down ass first on the floor, his emotions escaping in one ill-thought comment.

“You'll hightail it out of here if it gets too real . . .”

And then, when Rochelle had laid that kiss on him, stealing what was left of his denials about how he really felt about her, he'd slid down an even crazier hole. On his way down, it felt as if he was grabbing at questions, never finding a grasp, just falling farther and farther into oblivion.

She sat on the sofa with what felt like a canyon between them, but that didn't stop whatever he was feeling for her beating within him, clamoring to get out.

But it couldn't. He, the quick-draw cowboy, wasn't going to put his heart out there for anyone. Hadn't he decided that a long time ago, when he'd learned all too well from his parents that love was a lie? Maybe it could start out well enough, but it broke down, burned up like a letter with promises scrawled on it. It ended in yells and screams and then more promises repeated and broken again.

Didn't it?

The cold peas numbed his cheek where that gunpowder mark still lingered. His destiny.

But couldn't destiny be changed?

Rochelle glanced up at him, her green gaze soft. It hadn't been that way before she'd told him about the lighter being gone, and now it looked like she was debating herself about something.

Before he could tell his optimism to go to hell, she got up from the sofa and came over to him as if she'd lost a battle, one that probably involved seeing how hurt he was. He almost backed away, trying to put out the flames she whipped up in his gut every time she got too close.

“Just stand still,” she said, but then she gently eased the peas away from his cheek. “I'm just hoping Jonsey didn't leave a bruise.”

“I've had much worse.”

“I know.” Was her hand shaking as she reached out to touch his gunpowder mark?

He let her brush her fingers over it. He didn't know why, just that it felt right, maybe because she kept looking at him with that soft, conflicted gaze. Like she wanted to kiss him again.

He abruptly put the chilled pack to his cheek, and she pulled her hand away, as if she'd smacked herself back to reality.

Was she also thinking about his mark again? He'd spent his life running from his parents, trying to block out the yelling, then spent the past few years since their deaths running in a different way altogether, until he'd found the strength to cram their black memories into that box in the back of his mind. After that, everything had been fine. He'd gone back to fucking women, letting them caress and kiss him until there was no blackness at all.

But what would Rochelle do if she saw what he'd put away in himself? Would she still be standing next to him like this?

The hunger to know the answer chomped at him, telling him to see how far he could go with her before she really did run, never looking back at him.

She said, “When we were kids, you'd get like this sometimes—distant. It usually happened after you left your parents to come to Uncle Dennis. Tucker used to tell me that they were hard on you, not that you'd ever talk about it to me.”

“You didn't need to hear that shit.”

“I could've handled it.”

Could she? Could any woman? Even if she'd kissed him with such passion back in the saloon, he wasn't sure.

Make her really want to leave
, he thought.
Give her a reason and see what she does.

She started to speak again when there was a harsh knock on the door. Gideon instinctively shielded her, took up his two-way radio, and then spoke to Harry.

Another knock, voices outside. “Rochelle! We know you're in there!”

Right away, Harry slid open the patio glass door and entered without expression. “Let me guess—two sorry cowboys who want in.”

“No doubt.”

Gideon looked down at Rochelle. His heart was going a mile a minute, but thank God it was starting to calm down. Thank God for the boys, coming to his emotional rescue.

“You want to talk with your cousins?” he asked her.

“I want to yell at them, not just talk.” She seemed relieved that they'd been interrupted, too. “Are you okay with them coming in?”

Gideon worked his jaw, which was numb from the peas.

“I'll have to talk to them sometime.” Hell, Gideon hadn't blamed Jonsey for losing his cool anyway. He would've done the same if his seemingly sweet, favorite cousin/sister had been kissing on one of the whoring men from the Rough & Tumble.

As Harry stood by, Gideon went to the door, looked through the peephole, and then opened up.

Buzz had his hat in hand. Even though his dark hair was short, it stood up everywhere it could, like he'd been tussling with it. Behind him, Jonsey was the poster boy for pugilism, gripping his own ripped straw hat as he held it in front of him, a cut by his mouth and one eye starting to swell.

The older Burton boy grasped Jonsey by the back of the neck and brought him forward, obviously having talked to him about the proper steps to take for a “sorry.”

“Many apologies, Gideon,” the blond kid said.

Gideon stepped aside, letting them in. Even though Buzz was here to have his little brother make amends, Gideon could see jagged questions in his old friend's eyes.

Questions about Rochelle.

Jonsey went over to her as she crossed her arms.

“Sorry, Shel.”

“I should box your ears,” she said.

“But—”

Gideon cut in. “Why don't you two sit.”

The cousins did, although it was on the edge of a sofa, their shoulders as tense as Gideon's usually were.

Harry began to go to the porch again, but Gideon stopped him. His partner had figured out the score a while ago, and, frankly, bodyguards were used to being in the room when a lot of personal crap was going down.

Rochelle was watching Gideon as if trying to figure out what he had in mind to say to her cousins, but he was sick of all this hopping around, like the two of them were in an oiled pan trying to avoid getting burned.

The fact was, they couldn't. But how should he tell that to the boys when
he
didn't even know what to make of him and Rochelle?

Buzz saved him. “Gideon, Jon sure handled things the wrong way, but when we were young, we thought it was clear that Rochelle was off limits. It was a guy code thing . . .”

“A brotherly code,” Jonsey added. “If Tucker knew for sure what was happening with you two, he'd be here on this couch right now telling you he agrees.”

Gideon's stomach curled into knots. “You boys are right. You were like brothers to me, so that kind of code would apply.”

Buzz's neck was ruddy, like he regretted having to talk about this. “There're so many girls in the world, Gideon—you of all people know that. Why Rochelle?”

He almost stuck up for himself, telling them that he could be more than just a walking penis. He could be good for someone, feel for someone, and not just fuck her silly, believe it or not. He
was
feeling for someone . . .

Rochelle walked in front of the boys, drawing their attention, her arms still crossed over her chest. “I hate to break it to you two, but I'm not exactly a virgin.”

Buzz and Jonsey muttered, not wanting to hear this, but she went on.

“For God's sake, I'm thirty-five! I have sex. I
like
sex.”

The boys shifted even more uncomfortably, looking like they wished they could seep into the sofa.

“And,” Rochelle said, “if I wanted to have it with Gideon, I would.”

Well, it was the closest they'd get to an admission, Gideon supposed. From the way Rochelle was looking at him, he wondered if she was about to give the boys the full details, to admit that she'd been sneaking around with the help.

But then she glanced at Harry, and he knew why she was keeping mum.

Because this was a matter of pride for Gideon—professional pride—and she actually gave a shit about ruining it for him.

Yet Harry didn't seem to notice the nuances of the discussion, because he was creeping toward the glass patio door, his hand on his firearm.

With an alert start, Gideon did the same, not knowing why Harry was on the move but knowing enough so that he dropped those peas and went for Rochelle, bringing her down to the floor to shield her.

During that tense couple of seconds, he managed to see what Harry had witnessed just outside: a lone figure standing on his patio.

It was as if Rochelle's life was on repeat.

Gideon, covering her with his body, pushing her to the floor, panicked voices around her, this time from her cousins as they backed up Harry in his rush to the patio.

At least there's no cherry juice this time
, she thought, her mind disconnected as her vision tunneled.
No fear of blood or acid or bullets coming at me . . .

She heard the patio door roll open, heard Harry yelling at someone to raise their hands and get on the ground. Her adrenaline hit her with a whoosh of ice, and she let Gideon hold her tightly against him.

Time didn't seem to be separated by seconds or minutes, only a blur of speed that was both slow and fast at the same time. Eventually, she was aware that Gideon was bringing her to a chair, where he looked into her eyes.

“Rochelle,” he said, holding her face with one hand, his gun in the other. His hat had been knocked off in the commotion, leaving his hair chaotic. “It's okay. They have someone under control out there, and Buzz has already called in the law.”

“I want to know,” she whispered nonsensically, barely loud enough to hear herself, not recognizing the zombie flatness of her voice.

“Just rest, Shel.” He ran a hand over her hair.

He looked as if he would die for her right now, like he'd do it again and again, and she started shaking. She tried to make it stop. She'd succeeded last time in controlling herself when the second creeper had confronted her in the Rough & Tumble, and she could do it again . . .

But she quivered anyway, her body betraying her. Tears even pushed against her throat, her eyes, but Gideon didn't make her feel weak about it. He merely kept brushing her hair back from her face.

“Don't worry. I'm here. I'll always be here . . .”

“I want to know,” she repeated, whispering.

And when she started to get out of the chair so that she could see who the creeper was, he let her. He probably knew that her knees wouldn't hold her and that she'd have to sit back down, so he was there to scoop her back up.

She resisted him, crashing back into the chair, her chest clogged and heavy, sharpened by needles of fright.

“It's the adrenaline rush again,” he said tenderly, not minding that she was fighting him. “Let it run its course, then it'll be over.”

She leaned forward, her forehead against his shoulder, then sobbed, letting it all out—the whole week of being threatened, the general confusion that had spun her around for days . . .

And when she was done, Gideon whispered in her ear. “That's my girl. Just let it go. That's my brave, brave girl . . .”

Tear-fogged, she looked at him, not caring if her eye makeup was messed up, not caring that she'd lost control in front of him. And he seemed to look into her, understanding every bit of what she was feeling.

“I want to know who it is,” she said.

“You don't have to put yourself through that, Shel. We'll get a report afterward.”

“Please, Gideon.” She'd pictured a person who might have been beneath that hood in the photo of the bookstore-poster vandal—aka Creeper One. Could it be the same person who was on the patio? “It's like knowing there's something in your closet, and you have to see just what it is so you can put it behind you. Please.”

He didn't argue. If there was one person who knew it was fruitless, Gideon was it.

He helped her up from the chair, keeping his hand on her back as they walked to the patio. Her legs were stronger now. So was her will. And her anger . . . it was roiling, heating up.

Was
it Creeper One out there? The game player?

The door was already open, revealing her cousins, who gave her stares like you'd give a ghost who'd suddenly appeared from a different world. Jonsey had his phone out, like he was filming whatever the intruder had to say, although Rochelle wasn't sure what good that would do legally unless this trespasser had given permission.

Then there was Harry, hovering over the person in question, who was sitting on the concrete, head bent and hands palms up.

Red hair
. Her heart jerked.
Cherry?

But when the intruder looked up, Rochelle saw only a rail-skinny, long-haired kid with lucid blue eyes and a storm of freckles. Dressed in a light red jacket, jeans, and Birkenstocks, he couldn't have been much older than twenty.

No, it wasn't Cherry at all. First, she would've been around seventy years old if she really were still alive. And she would've been a woman.

The boy smiled at Rochelle without any trace of the crazy on him.

Harry spoke. “He's clean. Says he only wanted to catch a closer look at the author. He came into the saloon earlier with all the tourists and saw us drive Rochelle here.”

“Ms. Burton,” the boy said, barging in. “I'm a huge fan. Never wrote to you or anything before, but I've read all your books.”

This was . . . surreal. Rochelle had almost expected a creeper to be slobbering and mumbling a bunch of nonsense. But this boy was polite, mellow.

Harry held up a small backpack that Rochelle hadn't noticed before, then a book. Cherry's book.

“He actually wondered if he could have you sign his copy.”

“To Aron,” the boy said. “A-R-O-N.”

Gideon's gruff voice came from her side. “You are shittin' me.”

Rochelle was still processing everything, unable to focus on the signing part. She was still back on his appearance. “Your . . . hair.”

“Cool, huh?” When Aron shifted, Harry made a menacing move toward him, his firearm in hand. The boy gave him an annoyed glance but obeyed, staying still. “Isn't it like I could be Cherry's long lost, unknown son?” He laughed. “That's what Loralei told me after we met on one of your book boards at a reading site, before we started our game. I just liked the color of Cherry's hair in that painting—you can find it on the Internet from people who've snapped a pic of it in the saloon. I thought Cherry was kind of washed out as a blonde, don't you? You can see her for a split second by the pool in
Viva Las Vegas
.”

Rochelle couldn't hold it in any longer. “
Why?
”

“Why did me and Loralei do this?” The boy shrugged off the question. “Like I already told this Neanderthal you hired to protect you, everything we did was only part of our game. But we wanted to make your book popular, too, so we thought of ways to get you some press
during
the game. I started things off with defacing that bookstore poster with a comment that'd get people wondering about your book, then we went from there.”

She was still trying to absorb the meaning of his words. “So you weren't accusing me of lying about Cherry's life and then calling me a bitch about it?”

“No way. I read an advanced copy of your book, Ms. Burton, and it was awesome.” He smiled. “Dude, you have to admit that we totally got you some attention.”

Rochelle shook her head, marveling. “Do you know what you put me and those close to me through?”

“Wow, seriously, you're pissed about the PR?”

Now he'd become petulant.

Gideon chuffed next to her. She felt the same as he did: she didn't know what to do with this boy, didn't know if he was just weird or had only wanted to be a part of whatever fame Cherry had.

He drew his knees into a cross-legged position, looking utterly and strangely comfortable. “So how about that autograph for my copy of Cherry's book? I almost asked you to sign it for me at one of your events, but I didn't want to take the chance of your gorillas recognizing me from some dumb security tape at the bookstore.”

“So you came here instead for your own personal signing?” Rochelle asked.

“It'd get me a lot of points for the game,” he said.

Gideon stepped forward. “So you're still playing it, even though Loralei has been charged with assault.”

“Sure. We already established our goals at the beginning, and it's not my fault she got arrested. I'm totally going to win.”

“And what do you get if you win?”

The boy shrugged. “Prestige, man. Nobody here's a gamer? You'd understand if you were.”

Rochelle had played a game or two in her life, and she understood how good it felt to win, even if you didn't get anything material in return. But this was beyond her understanding.

She asked one last question: “And it was just you and Loralei playing, wracking up all these points?”

“Uh-huh. We started off with low points for collecting Cherry images in our digital scrapbooks, went a little higher for coming up with new facts about Cherry, and went from there. Dude, you totally should've called us for your research, though.”

Rochelle wondered how many points they'd get when she pursued stalking charges with the authorities.

Aron continued. “Obviously, I knew you'd been in Rough and Tumble because of the interview by Cherry's painting, so I've been checking town every day, coming into the saloon with all the rest of the tourists. I saw you take off here after the shit went down in the bar, and I figured that, in a house, your apes wouldn't do such tight-assed security.”

He leaned forward. “Really, Ms. Burton, me and Loralei never meant to hurt you. After I put that message on the bookstore poster and freaked everyone out, Loralei got the idea about the cherry juice and how talk-worthy that'd be. I didn't think she'd really do it; she was actually just going to leave behind a note for you there . . .”

Gideon interrupted. “Like ‘Cherry is an angel, you bitch'?”

“
That
.” He went on like this was no biggie, either. “But you have to admit, the juice was such an awesome idea. You got some
major
play from that one, even more than from the bookstore poster.”

Rochelle turned away from Aron. “I would've rather publicized my book the old-fashioned way.”

“I said it was just a game, okay? Calm down.”

Was this entitled little freak for real?

Harry managed to loom even larger. Aron rolled his eyes at the inconvenience.

“Don't get me wrong,” he said. “This isn't just about you, Ms. Burton. It's really all about Cherry. Hey,” he suddenly said to Harry, “would you give me my phone so I can show her my Cherry scrapbook?” Turning back to Rochelle, he continued. “It's the best. I found candid pictures of her with George Diluccio that weren't in your book.”

Just . . . whoa. This kid was the terror who'd kept her and her team on their toes.
This
. And with any luck, she was never going to see how far their game could've gone.

Gideon stepped in front of Rochelle, putting an end to
this
. “I think we're done here.”

“No!” the kid said, and as he started to get up, Harry stood over him. “Come on. It was all a joke. We were just playing . . .”

But Rochelle had already turned around, Gideon at her back, as they both went into the house.

He slid the door closed behind them, and with that final thud, cut her off from her nightmare.

That's when the shaking started again.

***

Gideon had done everything he could to soothe Rochelle, resting a hand on her back as she sat on the sofa, hunched over, her head in her hands. He could feel every quake under his palm.

He rubbed her, tried to be her pillar as she'd confronted her creeper. Leave it to Rochelle to be the one to finally bring closure.

“It's over now,” he said.

“Unless he was lying about it just being the two of them in that game.”

“I don't think he was giving us the runaround. He was pretty proud of himself for playing the game and was telling it straight. Besides, Boomer saw just two players online. We'll know for sure when the cops get to the bottom of everything.”

Speaking of the law, they'd arrived. Harry, Buzz, and Jonsey were talking to them outside as Aron was being led away. The boy actually craned his neck to get one last look at Rochelle through the glass door, and then he was gone, red hair and all.

When the cop who remained behind came inside to question all of them about the creeper, Rochelle put on a courageous face. If Gideon hadn't known any better, he would've said she'd already recovered and was chalking everything up to the price of being semifamous.

But Gideon did know better. She was bothered, soul deep.

Harry checked in with Gideon. “You got this, partner?”

Gideon nodded. Harry was going to meet with the cops and follow through with the arrest of both creepers. Buzz and Jonsey were obviously itching to go with him, but they were loath to abandon Rochelle.

“I got this,” Gideon said to them.

They must've known that his comment meant so much more than what it seemed at the moment, because they gave him a look that said they'd recognized a change in their childhood friend.

Buzz glanced at Gideon's gray Stetson, still on the floor after having fallen off his head when he'd been shielding Rochelle. Then he gave Gideon a respectful nod. With one more glance at Rochelle, who was by now leaning back on the couch, staring out the patio window, Buzz and Jonsey came over to touch her shoulders.

“We'll be back later, Shel,” Buzz said. “Gideon's here, though.”

Jonsey said, “We'll get these creepers put away.”

“You do that,” she said softly, resting her hands on theirs.

They squeezed her just before following Harry out the door.

Afterward, the house was silent as she zoned out, taking emotional refuge in a place that Gideon knew well. It was a place that you sought after something terrible happened, a place that had cotton walls that numbed everything out.

He'd visited that place a few times: first, after firefights in Iraq when he'd had friends die right next to him, and then again a few years ago, when he'd found his dad sitting next to his slumped mom by the pioneer graveyard in the dead of night as if everything was okay . . .