Rough Canvas (35 page)

She didn’t know how to make them listen, but she wished she did. She’d head back to college in two weeks, and already the relief she felt about it made her most angry with herself. She knew Thomas needed them in some desperate way, and they were all failing him.

“I’m thinking of taking a semester off,” she blurted out abruptly.

Thomas’ head lifted. He pinned her with that oldest brother no-bullshit stare that always reminded her uncomfortably of Dad. She squared her shoulders. “You need the help around here.”

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“No, we don’t. Not as much as you need to stay on track with your classes.”

“Why does everybody get to have what they want, Thomas? Everybody but you?

Has Mom been spouting the whole Jesus thing so much you think you’re supposed to be a martyr?”

Oh geez. Maybe she was more upset about this than she’d known, because she

certainly hadn’t meant to blurt that out too. Things had gotten quiet over in the power tool aisle.

Thomas looked startled. He closed his mouth, various expressions crossing his face.

“Rory isn’t getting what he wants.”

“If rolling around feeling sorry for himself and peeing in everyone’s cornflakes is what he wants, I beg to differ. In spades.”

“Les.” He shook his head, ran a hand over his face that was so tired looking. Her brother was beautiful. There was no other way to say it. Growing up, her girlfriends had tried to see him naked in the shower on every sleepover. One or two had told her if he was their brother they’d think about committing a mortal sin. But now he looked so weary, and she was sick of it. “I want to paint. I’m painting now. That’s what I want.”

“I’m not talking about your painting and you know it.”

She knew she’d hit the nail on the head by the way his face shuttered closed, like a trap. She almost heard the bones being crushed by the metal jaws.

“We’re not doing this, Les. That’s none of your business.”

“As much as it is for you to tell me I can or can’t go back to school when the family needs me. I’m over eighteen. I can make my own choices. And maybe I think the family needs
me
to make some sacrifices. Maybe that will take away some of the things you’re using to keep from doing what you really want to do. Because you’re scared. We won’t fall apart, Thomas.”

“What are you talking about, Les?” Rory came rolling up, his eyes darting between both siblings. “You’re scaring customers.”

“I’m talking about how it’s time for us both to get off our asses and do more.

Thomas shouldn’t have to bear it all.”

“Well I can’t exactly get off my ass, sis,” Rory snapped. “And I was trying to let Thomas have a life when this happened, and you were at school.”

“Stop it.” Thomas slammed the clipboard against his thigh, brought both their

heads around. “Enough. Les, you’re going back to school. Rory, maybe you should think about whether feeling sorry for yourself your entire life is a good career plan. I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing. That’s the end of it.” He pivoted on his heel and strode back into the stockroom, leaving them both staring after him.

“You’re not the boss of us.” Rory attempted to regain the upper hand.

Thomas put his head back out, glared at him. “Yeah, I am, as a matter of fact. Deal with it. I have to make a grain delivery to the Worthington farm. I’ll be back in an hour.”

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“Or two. The Widow Worthington,” Les said.

The tension dissipated as Rory and she exchanged a conspiratorial look, siblings in perfect accord.

Thomas rolled his eyes as he took off the work apron and shrugged into a coat.

“Cut it out.”

“Hasn’t had a cow or horse on her place in ten years, but wants you to deliver five bags of grain every month. Just so she can see your cute butt in a pair of jeans. She loves the summer… He might just strip off the shirt if she buys a few extra bags.”

Rory made a suggestive gesture that had Les clapping her hand over her mouth,

stifling a giggle.

“Sounds like the widow has good taste.”

Thomas had heard the bells and assumed it was a customer. He was so jolted to see Marcus leaning against the display of concrete paver samples he almost felt

lightheaded, wondering if he was dreaming. Oh hell, he wasn’t going to faint. Neither Rory nor Marcus would let him live that one down.

Rory turned his chair, a scowl crossing his face. But Thomas had laid down the law.

Marcus was managing a good chunk of their potential income during the off months. If he called, he was to be treated with courtesy and respect. Thomas just hadn’t expected him to show up.

“Decided I didn’t trust a courier service. Wanted to look at them before they were wrapped for transport and take some snapshots for Hans, even though he’s already sent me a check, sight unseen.”

He could have asked Thomas to email the pictures. Marcus goddamned well knew

that.

“Oh, that’s marvelous.” Les grinned hugely and spun on her heel, looking between Marcus and Thomas. “Someone buying them without even seeing them. Imagine that.

That’s so amazing. Thomas, you’ve just got to be thrilled to your toes.”

He was, but for reasons that had nothing to do with his work, watching Marcus’

attention caught by his sister’s exuberance, a slight smile curving his mouth. The bottle wound was barely more than a faint line. He really
didn’t
scar.

“There are people who have seen your brother’s work and are willing to pay to

stand in line for the next piece.”

“As they should.” Les sniffed, turning her pert nose in the air. “Just think, before long he’ll be so important that he’ll do just one piece every year and Donald Trump will bid a million dollars to hang it on the wall of his mansion. You’ll become one of those…prima donnas?”

“Diva was what I was thinking,” Rory sneered.

“Why don’t you get it out of your system?” Marcus eyed him.

“What?” Rory demanded.

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“The part where you call me some derogatory name, I call you a bitter cripple and we each feel vindicated.”

Rory backed the chair and altered direction. “I would,” he flung over his shoulder,

“but if Thomas is willing to be your bitch for a meal ticket, I can keep my mouth shut.

As long as you don’t decide we all have to whore for you.”

Thomas stepped forward. He was going to knock him out of that chair, seize his

brother in a headlock and pound him. The way he should have done a long time ago…

“Rory.”

Rory wheeled his chair around just as Marcus hefted the fifty pound sack of grain at him. Celeste gasped, but the boy reflexively caught it in the air, even as it knocked his chair back a yard, into Thomas’ quick hands to bring him to a halt.

Before anyone could say anything, Marcus nodded. “If you can lift that, catch it the way you just did, you can run this place as well as anyone. And the difference between you and your brother is you
want
to do it.”

“I can’t walk. I have to be able to load a truck.”

“You have to be able to run a business. A high-school kid earning money for college can load a truck. If you were my brother and you’d just spouted out that bullshit, I would have wrestled you to the floor and sat on you until you screamed like a little girl.” He lifted his gaze back to Thomas’ troubled expression. “Of course, all you’d have to do is elbow him in the gut and you could break the lock. He’s weak there.”

“Son of a bitch.” Rory thrust the sack off his lap. “You think I wouldn’t do it if I could?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what I think.” Marcus stepped forward until he was toe-to-toe with the boy. The green in his eyes was ice. “I knew this kid once. We called him Lassiter. He was in a wheelchair. Great scam artist, but not as a panhandler. He was a pickpocket. Got into a fight one night with two guys in an alley. They killed him in the end, but he beat the hell out of both of them first with nothing but guts and the slugger baseball bat he carried.”

There were only a few feet and Rory between them, but he didn’t look at Thomas.

Marcus wasn’t being polite, he wasn’t being sarcastic. He was holding all three of them riveted, the alpha male who’d had enough and was more than capable of snapping the pack back into line.

“The only thing that ever scared him was finding out there was something he

couldn’t do, so he damn well made sure there wasn’t anything he couldn’t. You’ve got it all here. He had nothing. So stop being such a little prick and prove to us you shouldn’t have died under that tractor’s wheels. Because if this is all you want to be, then that’s what should have happened.”

Marcus shifted his attention to Thomas, nodding to a speechless Les. “I’d like to see those paintings now.”

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* * * * *

They walked across the paddock, Kate plodding patiently behind them.

“You think I was too hard on him?” Marcus broke the silence first.

“No.” Thomas shook his head. “I should be doing exactly what you just did.”

“You know how to handle him, pet.” Marcus gave him a glance. “It’s all tied up

with everything.”

Thomas curled his hands loosely at his sides, feeling the sudden hard need to reach out and touch. The shed would be empty, could be locked from the inside. Despite himself, his step quickened. Marcus’ heavy-lidded expression told him he knew exactly where his thoughts were going.

“Think scratching your itch is what I came down here to do?”

The anger was immediate, given a shove by aching lust and loneliness that was

underscored by Marcus’ presence. “You didn’t come to look at my paintings,” Thomas retorted. “You could have done that in New York. So maybe you came down to scratch yours.”

“Now why would I do that when I have all that fine ass available to me within

walking distance of a Starbuck’s?”

Thomas stiffened and Marcus raised a brow. “You’re the one who thinks all I need is an excuse to move on to fairer game. I’m just reminding you of that.”

“Stop it.” Thomas came to a halt, his hands now clenched. “Whatever stupid,

fucking, bored urbanite game you’re playing, just stop it. I told you I love you, damn it.”

“And what do I get with that, Thomas? What’s the prize in that Cracker Jack box other than those three words?”

He couldn’t match him on these grounds. Marcus was at his verbal best when he

was pissed, whereas Thomas couldn’t think of the right retort, could think of nothing but walking away before he smashed his fists into the offender’s face.

“You’re right,” he said at last, quietly. He stared across the field, not at Marcus. “It’s everything, but it’s nothing. The nothing-everything I’ve got to give, that I only want to give to you and no one else. You’re right.”

Turning, he walked away toward the shed. He wanted Marcus to see the paintings.

He wanted to stand next to the rug where his Master had brought him to climax with just the sound of his voice, the touch of his hand, the imagining of it.

But here they were, in the same old argument. Over and over and over again. God, he was sick of it.

He’d left the shed unlocked so if the courier came when he was on an errand, Les or Rory could let them in to pick up the paintings. He found the door standing open.

His mother was inside, using a Number Three broadstroke brush and a heavy-duty

latex to cover the enormous canvas, his tree of life.

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It took him a moment to process it, to comprehend that his mother, in her pantsuit and crisp white blouse, her hair sprinkled with paint, was doing what she was doing.

Her countenance was rigid, almost manic as she slapped up and down, fast, so thick the paint was running like curdled milk and dripping in glops on the concrete floor. She’d been at her garden club meeting, he remembered vaguely.

“Son of a—”

Adrenaline surged through him at the sound of the fury in that voice. It woke him out of the paralysis of shock. Thomas was quick enough to grab hold of Marcus, but Marcus elbowed him with pinpoint accuracy in the gut and stormed into the shed, slamming the door back so it hit the wall.

His mother spun around at the sound of Marcus’ voice. Shock coursed over her

expression, as well as apprehension as he advanced on her. Her son she knew would never harm her. What she faced at the moment Thomas knew was entirely different.

Because of that, he managed to straighten, stumble after Marcus. Since he felt like he’d been stabbed, it was no easy feat. Marcus knocked the brush out of her hand and herded her by the sheer energy of his anger away from the painting, putting himself between it and her.

Thomas’ attention was darting around the room. Some of the anxiety eased as he

saw none of the others had been harmed. Just that one, the masterpiece of them all, the most explicit and raw work he’d ever done. A couple of the canvases close by had been flecked, but he could fix that.

“That wasn’t artwork.” She clasped her hands in tight balls, and Thomas could see she was trying not to shake, even as she blurted out the words. She’d been crying while she was painting, her mascara blotching the shadows under her eyes that suggested she’d been having some sleepless nights of her own.

She was getting over her initial fright. Whatever great emotion had propelled her to this moment was now ready to engage in battle. Thomas could almost see her on a burro, drawing a stick as her weapon, while Marcus, fully armored, peered distastefully down at her from atop a warhorse. “It was…sodomy. Unnatural. Sinful, unclean. Like you.”

Because Thomas loved his mother, he managed to propel himself, despite the sharp pain in his gut, between her and Marcus. Marcus’ face briefly flashed with that level of violence he’d seen in the parking lot of the diner. The room was heavy with heat, and more than one demon. He felt them swirling around Marcus, saw them in the way his hands tightened into fists that could easily break his mother’s face and limbs. Marcus looked at his mother as if he was looking at someone else, someone he
had
wanted to hurt that way.