“Her heart was a secret garden and the walls were very high.”
― William Goldman, The Princess Bride
~Cletus~
“It looks real nice, Jethro.” Beau inspected the crown molding Jethro had installed yesterday. “I can’t believe you routed this yourself.”
“Yeah. And it was Cletus’s idea to run the wiring through the molding, so we have surround sound. See the speakers here and here?” Jethro pointed to the inset speakers along the living room wall. My brothers squinted at the spots where Jethro pointed.
“I don’t see anything.” Drew stepped closer to the wall and inspected it. “Cletus, you sure are good at hiding things in plain sight.”
Jethro clapped a hand on my shoulder and grinned; he gave me an affectionate shake. “It’s his gift.”
“Among other things,” I conceded, checking my watch.
The truth was, I’d spent more time on hiding the speakers than was prudent. But I was determined they be invisible. I called it superior work ethic. Jethro said I was fixating again.
Jethro, Beau, Duane, Drew, and I had just finished the final touches on the carriage house. We were standing in the new kitchen, the wood glue wasn’t yet dry, and the entire house smelled of paint and sawdust, but we’d done it. The space was finished and ready for Jethro, Sienna, and to be determined Winston Progeny #1.
Sienna was due back home in two days and I was still the only one who knew they were pregnant. Meanwhile, Duane and his woman Jessica would be leaving for Italy soon. Their tickets were of the one-way variety.
It was a time of change. I avoided change or did my utmost to discourage it, mostly. This was the good kind of change. I knew that. Still, even good change made me antsy.
“Billy helped,” Jethro said, his voice held hesitation.
“Billy?” Duane didn’t try to mask his surprise; he and Beau stared at each other, communicating for several seconds without talking. The twins’ ability to impart thoughts through a look had always been frustrating. I didn’t like being left out of a conversation.
“Yes. Billy. Billy helped,” I confirmed irritably. “And will you two cease discussing with your eyeballs. There are several other people in the room who can’t brain-link.”
Duane lifted an eyebrow, his eyes darting from me to Beau and then quickly to the floor. “Fine, Cletus. Cool your engine.”
I grunted, but said nothing. I didn’t want to pick a fight with Duane. I only had a few more weeks of him hanging around and the thought depressed me. He was a grumpy, brooding little bastard who had the habit of only speaking when spoken to—and sometimes not even then. I was going to miss him.
“Where is Billy now?” Drew asked, still squinting at the wall and looking for the inset speakers.
“He’s at work,” Beau answered, then to me asked, “you still going fishing with us tomorrow, Cletus?”
“Are Drill and Catfish still going?” I asked.
Beau shrugged. “As far as I know.”
“Then I’ll be there.”
“Why do you want to go fishing with those Iron Wraiths?” Duane’s tone told me he didn’t approve, but he didn’t give me a chance to respond before turning to Beau. “I can’t believe you’re still friendly with them, after what happened with Jess.”
Jess was Jessica James, Duane’s lady love. Last fall she’d been caught in the middle of some nasty business with the Iron Wraiths motorcycle club. Long story short, higher ups in the club tried to blackmail Duane and Beau into running their chop-shop. Since the unpleasantness, Duane had joined my brother Billy in his unconditional loathing of each and every member. Drill and Catfish were members; they weren’t responsible for the situation with Jess or the attempted blackmail, but they didn’t do anything to stop it either.
“Drill isn’t bad people,” Beau said, attempting to defend the man.
Duane’s glare intensified. “They’re all evil assholes and should burn in hell.”
Drew’s eyebrows jumped, but he said nothing. Meanwhile, Jethro—who’d once come close to becoming a full-fledged member of the Iron Wraiths—studied the label of his beer. The room fell into a complex silence; complex because our family’s history with the motorcycle club was multifaceted and complicated.
Our father was a member. He’d been a captain. We grew up with a number of fellas who were now members. Personally, I didn’t consider each and every one of their rank to be evil assholes, but I did recognize the Wraiths were a disease.
I was going to destroy them, but not for any reason as altruistic as eradicating Green Valley of evildoers. My reasons were far more self-serving.
“Uh, Cletus, you want a beer?” Drew held out a longneck, breaking the tense silence.
I shook my head. “I can’t, I have an appointment after this.”
“Anyway,” Beau—clearly eager to change the subject—pointed down the hall, “let’s talk about the color Jethro decided to paint the second bedroom.”
“What’s wrong with green?” Jethro grinned slyly. His poker face had always sucked.
“Nothing is wrong with green, but that’s a very odd shade of green. What was it called again?”
“Sweet pea,” Duane supplied flatly for his twin. “It was called sweet pea and I believe it was labeled as nursery paint.”
“Nursery paint, huh? You have something to tell us, Jethro?” Beau teased, mirroring Jethro’s grin. “No news to share? No big bombshell to drop?”
Jethro glanced at me. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell them yet.”
“Why would I? I’m good at keeping secrets.” I shoved my hands in my pockets, making sure I looked innocent. “And I’m not the one who’s pregnant.”
“I knew it!” Beau attacked Jethro, pulling him into a quick man-hug.
Jethro’s grin widened to as large as I’ve ever seen it. “How could you possibly know?”
Duane clapped Jethro on the back as soon as Beau released him. “Because you’ve always wanted kids, and weren’t one to futz around once you made up your mind.”
“You should have painted it vomit green, to disguise all the baby vomit you’re going to have to deal with,” Beau suggested.
“And shit brown,” Duane added. “Don’t forget about the shit.”
“Y’all are the best.” Jethro placed his hands over his chest. “You warm my heart.”
“Make sure the floor is waterproof.” Beau grabbed a beer and uncapped it.
“Don’t tell me, to catch the vomit and poop?”
“No,” Beau wagged his eyebrows, “because of all the crying you’re going to do when you can’t sleep through the night or make love to your woman anymore.”
“Ah, yes. Infant-interuptus is a real condition. No cure for it either.” Duane nodded and it was a fairly good imitation of my somber nod. In fact, how he sounded was a fairly good imitation of me.
“You sound like Cletus.” Drew laughed, obviously catching on.
Duane slid his eyes to mine and gave me a small smile.
I lifted an eyebrow at my brother to disguise the fact that I thought his impression was funny. “Y’all need to lay off. Babies are the best. Think of all the cuddling. This is great news.”
“It is great news.” Beau held his beer out to clink it with Jethro’s and added sincerely, “It’s the best news.”
“I can’t wait.” Duane also tapped his beer against Jethro’s. “Jess and I will come home once the bundle of joy arrives. And I’ll teach Duanita how to race cars.”
“Duanita?”
“That’ll be her name, of course.” Duane took a long pull of his beer, nodding as though the matter was settled.
“I don’t know.” Drew shook his head thoughtfully, scratching the back of his neck. “Andy has a nice ring to it. And it could work for a girl or a boy.”
“Short for Andrew, of course.” Beau rolled his eyes.
“Or Andrea.” Drew shrugged, hiding his grin by taking another swallow of beer.
“Y’all forget, I’m not the only one naming this baby. Sienna has more than a say in the matter and veto rights.”
“So what you’re telling us is, we need to butter up Sienna?” Beau interpreted.
Jethro laughed, and so did everyone else. I didn’t.
I mustered a smile through my inexplicable melancholy while the urge to take my leave gripped me with a sudden ferocity.
I felt Duane’s eyeballs on me, so I gave him a flat smile, then glanced at my watch. “Well, it’s been fun, but I must take my leave.”
“Yeah, I need to go, too.” Drew placed his empty beer bottle in the new recycling containers; he turned to Jethro and shook his hand. “Congratulations, Jethro. Happy for you.”
“Thanks, Drew.”
The two men stared at each other and something passed between them, an understanding of some sort.
“Oh great, now Drew and Jethro can mind-meld. I’m getting out of here.” I turned from the group and their chuckles.
“Come on, Cletus. Stick around. I’ll gaze longingly into your eyes. Us single guys need to stick together,” Beau called after me.
“Cletus won’t be single for long,” Jethro said, likely hoping to get a rise out of me. It didn’t work. I didn’t want to be late for my first lesson with Jennifer Sylvester. We had a lot of work to do.
“What do you mean? Cletus got himself a girlfriend we don’t know about?” Beau sounded positively elated.
I was almost to the door when I heard Jethro say, “It’s not my place to tell.”
“That’s not nice, Jethro. You know Beau won’t rest until he figures out who it is,” Drew counseled, his tone half-serious.
“Who is she?” Duane asked, sounding interested, and I was surprised; typically he stayed out of the gossip.
“I bid you good evening, charlatans.” I waved over my shoulder and let the door shut behind me, blocking out their voices and strolling purposefully to my car.
I hadn’t been thinking on Shelly Sullivan’s suitability as a life partner recently, not since I’d met her a few weeks ago. I had no reason to rush things, no cause to instigate additional changes at present. We, as a family, were already dealing with enough disruption, no reason to add to it.
When the time was right, when things settled down to a routine, I’d ask her out for steak. We would discuss the future, draft a pro-con list, and then come to a mutually advantageous agreement. Once I’d dismantled the Iron Wraiths, finished teaching Jackson James a lesson, and helped Jennifer Sylvester find her backbone, then I’d get around to things with Shelly.
I was glad for Jennifer Sylvester. Helping her would be a good project; a nice, easy, manageable distraction.
***
“Jennifer, you can stop being afraid of me now.”
“Okay.” She nodded, not looking at me.
I stood facing her, on the other side of an immense counter in the Donner Bakery kitchen. Donner was Jennifer’s momma’s maiden name. The bakery and adjoining lodge had been in her family for three generations.
I’d received confirmation from my friend in Chicago that both Jenn’s computer and cell phone were video free. If she had any idea that I’d deleted the video from her devices, she hadn’t said a thing. More likely, she had no idea I’d had a professional hacker break into her laptop and mobile phone.
Her knowing or not knowing didn’t really matter in the long run, but—for now—I decided it would be best to keep this information to myself. She was already jumpy enough.
Jenn was currently spooning cookie dough onto a tray and not making eye contact. She hadn’t looked directly at me since letting me in the kitchen back door some minutes ago, and she’d been silent in a way that resembled anxiety and impatience. If she discovered her leverage was gone, I prophesied she would faint from distress.
“I meant what I said, I have no plans for revenge.” I was using my most harmless and innocent of voices.
“Okay.”
I examined her and waited. She was still in one of her costumes—a yellow housedress—but she’d scrubbed all the makeup from her face, was barefoot, and had her hair in a ponytail. A baseball hat sat on her head and a Smash-Girl superhero apron was tied around her waist. I’d never seen her look so normal before, so much like a real person. I could work with this.
And I could wait her out. I could be patient if I wanted to be and the situation warranted patience. Or I could try disarming and distracting her into submission.
“I won’t send any Navy SEAL strippergrams to the workplace, or file any health code complaints against the bakery.”
Her movements stilled and she stared at the cookie sheet. “Is that what you were going to do to me? Was that your revenge? For me blackmailing you?”
“Yes,” I lied. “One or the other. I was leaning toward the stripper, though. I have an acquaintance in Nashville that would’ve put on a good show for your Sunday morning customers. I imagine the after-church crowd would rile up nicely post sugar and coffee. Plus, bonus, he’s an actual Navy SEAL, retired in 1975.”
The side of her mouth tugged to one side, but her eyes remained studiously focused on the bowl of raw cookie dough.
I watched her carefully, adding, “I still might do it, for your birthday instead, but only if you’re really nice to me between now and then.”
Her hand trembled slightly where it held the spoon. She was still uneasy.
“Moral of the story, Jenn: you’re getting a free pass, so try to loosen up.”
“Okay.” She nodded, still didn’t glance my way, and dug the spoon into the cookie dough, moving it around to no purpose.
She’d mellowed, just not enough.
Curious, I asked, “Why do I scare you so much?”
“You don’t scare me,” she responded immediately, sounding defensive.
“Then why are your hands shaking?”
Jennifer let the spoon fall into the batter bowl and leaned against the counter, her eyes lifting for the briefest of seconds. “You don’t scare me, I’m just . . . I’m just nervous.”
“Why’re you nervous?”
“Because . . . because . . . because you’re dangerous. And I have a hard time believing your revenge plan involved anything as benign as a male stripper.”
“Make no mistake, George is not benign. He is an eighty-five-year-old committed professional and brings his gun. Well, he brings both his guns.”
She huffed and fought her smile admirably, her cheeks staining with a hint of pink. Jenn’s eyes finally lifted and held mine. “I see what you’re doing, you’re trying to get me to let my guard down.”
“Yes. Yes, I am. How am I supposed to help you if you don’t trust me?”
“How am I supposed to trust you when you have a long, established record of underhanded dealings and manipulations?”
Astute woman is . . . very astute. But I was running thin on patience.
“Listen, woman. Do you want my help or not? Because, as far as your well-being is concerned, I’m as gentle as a toothless, blind bunny rabbit.”
“You are no such thing,” she contradicted, chuckling in spite of herself—like she was both amused and frustrated—and I noted her hands were finally steady. “You know things about everybody. Everybody. You’ve gathered information and held it over people’s heads, forcing them do what you’ve wanted for years. In fact, I bet you know something about my family that could tear our world apart.”
I was careful to keep my expression even, because Jennifer was completely correct.
Her daddy had been having an affair with Elena Wilkinson, the high school secretary, for years. I’d had suspicions for a time, so I’d audited the advanced placement calculus class as a cover, until I could confirm the sordid truth. Kip Sylvester was a heartless and vapid excuse for a human being who only cared about himself.
Whether his wife realized this or not, I couldn’t say. But I did know that if Diane Donner-Sylvester ever found out about her husband’s cheating, she’d divorce him in a heartbeat. And he’d lose everything, because that woman made more money in a month than he made in a year.
I had no current plans to leverage the information, but I probably would. Eventually.
Jennifer wasn’t finished. “You’ll keep it a secret, so long as it serves your purpose. And that makes you dangerous, like a viper ready to strike. I think my caution is justified.”
“Fine. I’m dangerous. I know things.” I shrugged. “But you need to trust that I’m not dangerous to you. I can’t help you if you’re going to be jumpy Jennifer all the time.”
She hesitated, picked up the spoon again, and then said, “You’re right. I can’t be jumpy Jennifer and I’ll have to find a way to relax around you.”
The way she said “relax” made it sound like a herculean task.
“Jenn—”
“I’ll work on it.” She frowned, tilted her chin up, looking harassed and strangely cute.
Yes, cute. Jennifer looked cute. The woman’s features were aesthetically pleasing, especially without those fuzzy caterpillars on her eyelids. I would rate her as very pretty at present. I could toss her to the likes of officers Dale and Evans. Clearly, both men had been enchanted with her at the jam session. But very pretty wasn’t going to help much or take her very far without a backbone.
“Fine. You work on it, and I’ll work on you.”
Her cheeks colored a deeper shade of pink and she nibbled on her bottom lip. Eventually, she cleared her throat and dipped her chin to her chest.
I leaned forward on the counter, resting my weight on my elbows and forearms so I could see her face. When she dipped her chin, the rim of the hat hid her features. I would need to take it off.
“Did you do your homework?” I asked, noticing that her hat had Japanese characters on it.
“I did.” Abandoning her spoon and wiping her hands on the apron, she crossed to a burlap bag resting on a shelf by the back door. Jenn withdrew a folded piece of paper and turned toward me. She held it outstretched between us.
I glanced from her to the list, then back, endeavoring to ignore the compulsion to examine her odd irises. I wanted her to relax, not feel self-conscious.
But they provoked me. Scientifically speaking, her eye color was an impossibility.
They’re contact lenses.
Despite my intentions to the contrary, I held her eyes just a hair’s breadth too long, searching for the telltale ridges of her contacts. I saw none. Just violet eyes that shouldn’t have been possible.
She studied me, looking worried; the hand holding the paper dropped. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” I frowned, disliking how this woman’s eye color upset the natural order of the universe. “You read the list.”
“Okay.” Her gaze moved between mine before dropping to the paper. She unfolded it, cleared her throat, then read, “Um, number one: gardening in overalls.”
“Gardening in overalls.”
“That’s right.” She nodded jerkily, lifting her chin and crossing her arms over her chest, like she expected me to argue.
“Why in overalls?”
“I like all the pockets.”
“I like pockets, too,” I thought and said in unison. “And gardening, flowers or vegetables?”
“Both. Vegetables for cooking, but flowers too. They bring in the pollinators and keep away the pests. Marigolds and lavender are good for that. I also press for essential oils.”
“You press for essential oils?”
“Yes. Lavender, geranium, and rose mostly.”
“Hmm. Interesting.” I glanced at her hands. I couldn’t examine them while she had them tucked under her arms, so I reached for one.
She flinched away. “What are you doing?”
“I’d like to see your hand.”
“Why?”
“I’m curious. Do you have farmer hands?”
Her expression relaxed, like she hoped she did have farmer hands, and she held one palm up between us. “What do you mean? Like Nancy Danvish?”
I peered at her fingers and what I found was surprising. She had callouses, and her fingers weren’t fine and ladylike, but strong and long. Yes, her nails were painted perfect pink, but she had the hands of someone who engaged in manual labor often.
“Do you play any instruments?” I asked, apropos of nothing. Or maybe I asked because her fingers were so long, especially for a short person, that it would be a shame if she didn’t play something.
“I did. I played the piano growing up. All girls had to have a talent, during the pageants, so I sang and played the piano.”
I nodded thoughtfully, recalling a conversation I’d overheard years ago between my mother and Naomi Winters. The two women lamented how Diane Donner-Sylvester forced her only daughter—whom they both considered exceptionally sweet and shy—to participate in the pageant circuit. They’d also lamented that Diane had started dyeing her daughter’s pretty dark hair yellow at such a young age.
I eyeballed her blonde hair, or what I could see of it, then refocused my attention back to the list; I grabbed her hand and turned the paper toward me so I could read it. “Let’s see . . .”
Gardening in overalls
Writing letters at a well-lit desk
Reading a book while it rains
Teaching the troops how to bake
“What’s this one? ‘Teaching the troops how to bake.’ What’s that?”
“The Cub Scouts and Brownies—”
“Brownies being the little-kid Girl Scouts?”
“That’s right. I teach the merit badge for baking.”
“Once a year?”
“Oh no, whenever they need it. Sometimes I have a big group of kids, sometimes it’s just one-on-one.”
“Does your boss allow this?” I wasn’t ready to invoke the name of her mother, but the question needed asking.
She fidgeted, twisting her fingers and placing the list on the counter. “Eventually, she let me do it. Once I pointed out how nice the pictures would look on social media and had the parents sign photo waivers.”
“You like teaching the kids? How to bake?”
She grinned and nodded enthusiastically. “Oh, yes. It’s one of my favorite things to do. Baking is fundamentally chemistry, and I try to bring it back to that. I do a demonstration with emulsifiers first, because baking is all about turning something water soluble into something that’s oil soluble.”
“What kind of demonstration?”
“I use milk, food dye, and dish detergent.”
“And the dish detergent breaks down the fats.”
“Yes, and the dye saturates what’s left.”
I nodded somberly. In truth, I nodded somberly to disguise that fact that Jennifer Sylvester had once again surprised me.
“Any other chemistry experiments? With the kids?”
“I do lots, but it depends on their age.” Her purple eyes brightened, becoming almost lavender. “The one that’s the biggest hit is when I have them write their recipe down using a toothpick and petroleum jelly.”
I stared at her upturned face, trying to figure out why in tarnation she would have them do that. “Okay, I give up. Why would you have them write their recipe down using a toothpick and petroleum jelly?”
Her grin was huge and showcased a quantity of pearly white teeth. “Because then it’s a secret recipe, one that can only be viewed under a black light. It teaches them about—”
“Fluorescence,” I supplied, squinting at this closet chemist by the name of Jennifer Sylvester.
No wonder she was so good at baking. Baking is a precise science and was—as she said—fundamentally the application of chemistry. She should’ve been going to school for chemistry, not chained to an electric mixer in this state-of-the art industrial kitchen dungeon.
She was, as ever, surprising. I studied her: the warm smile, the bright violet eyes, the pointed chin, and the baseball hat. Making up my mind a split second before I did it, I snatched her hat and hid it behind my back.
Jennifer’s hands went to her head and her mouth fell open. Clearly, I’d caught her off guard.
“Why’d you take my hat?”
“You have very dark eyebrows.” I studied her eyebrows, but my attention instinctively moved lower. The woman’s eyes were unreasonably pretty, truly remarkable, and I needed to stop staring at them.
She crossed her arms again, lifting her chin and looking unhappy. “How long are you going to keep my hat?”
“When did your momma start dyeing your hair? How old were you?”
Her preposterously pretty eyes—pretty in both color and shape—lost focus for a split second. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Do you like your hair color?”
She didn’t answer, and that was answer enough.
“Would you ever consider going back to your natural color? Or something else of your choosing? Red, maybe?”
She gawked, a perplexed line between her eyebrows. “Do you think that would help?”
I understood her question perfectly and why she’d asked it. Would it help her get a husband if her hair were a different color? Yes. But not for the reason she thought.
Taking control of her appearance, well, that was the first step toward taking control of her life.
So I answered a version of her question. “Yes. I think it will make a big difference if you decide what hair color you like, and then make your hair that color.”
Her frown intensified and her eyes lowered to my chest where she stared without seeing. She appeared to be torn.
“I don’t think my momma would like that.”
I opened my mouth to respond, but then stopped myself, because the question I was about to ask was a critical one. I needed to use just the right tone. I needed to employ exactly the right expression.
I shuffled a step closer, placing a hand on the counter to my left, and softened my voice. “Are you always going to do everything your mother likes?”
Her gaze lifted to mine, and it was sharp, sharper than I’d thought possible coming from Jennifer Sylvester. Gorgeous eyes, hot with anger; stern, pointed chin; silent accusations cutting me with unsaid words. All this added up to a potent mixture. The combination made the fine hairs on the back of my neck prickle.
It was a scathing look.
And I was impressed.
But before I could compliment the impressiveness of her scathing look, she turned and said softly, “I think the lesson is over. You should leave out the back,” and exited the kitchen through the entrance to the main bakery.
I stared after her for a full minute, not because I expected her to come back, but because I was listening. I was listening for footsteps, or any sign that she was moving around the main bakery. But I heard no sound. That meant she’d fled to the front and was hiding, doing nothing, and listening for signs of my departure.
That was fine. I’d rattled her cage. I understood her desire to flee.
I checked my watch; I still had six hours until my next appointment, enough time to catch a nap. I gathered my belongings, just a red and black checkered coat and my hat, and glanced back at the kitchen. She’d left the folded piece of paper, the list of things she liked to do, on the counter. I tucked it into my pocket and left out the back door.
Our next lesson wasn’t for two weeks. Two weeks would give Jennifer plenty of time to marinate on my question and make a decision. Who was she living her life for? Herself or her mother?
***
Hank Weller was good at two things: making money and fishing.
As the owner of the local strip club, Hank frequently treated customers to fishing excursions on his big boat. I was not a customer. Nevertheless, he did take me fishing from time to time, if I asked. This was because Beau and Hank were close friends and had been since childhood. Beau was my in.
It was a nice morning for fishing. Not too cold. Water vapor rose over the lake, making the surface hazy, like it was covered in gauze. Since it was late September, the lake was surrounded on all sides by trees doing their best impressions of autumn fireworks. Birds were complaining about their breakfast, otherwise the only sound was water lazily lapping against the shore.
I liked nature just fine, yet I didn’t like to fish. But far be it from me to pass up a convenient opportunity to cross a to-do item off my to-do list.
“Long time no see, Cletus.” Catfish lifted his chin in greeting as he boarded Hank’s big boat. “What you been up to?”
Catfish, which was not his Christian name, was a captain in the Iron Wraiths motorcycle club. So not the bottom of the barrel, but not a decision-maker either. He was a good soldier.
“A bit of this and that,” I responded easily.
“How’s that sister of yours?” This question came from Drill, who was the next to board the boat.
“Easy.” Hank came to stand next to me, crossing his arms. “No talk of family. Let’s keep this nice.”
“Just asking.” Drill shrugged his boulder-like shoulders and grinned. The rising sun glinted off his bald head. To my mind he resembled a steroidal version of Mr. Clean, if Mr. Clean wore black leather from head to toe and smelled like lube.
I eyeballed the third person in their party and put my hand on Hank’s shoulder. “No, no. It’s fine. Ash is great, thanks for asking, Drill. Just got her double black belt in Kenjutsu—you know, that’s the martial art where they use those sharp knives? Since she’s a nurse, she knows just where to stab a person. You should see her skin a rabbit. We’re pretty proud.”
This, of course, was complete bullshit—except for the part about her being a nurse and skinning rabbits, because she was real good at skinning rabbits. But Drill widened his eyes, looking a little piqued, and let the subject drop.
“Hey, Twilight,” I welcomed the third member of their party by extending my hand for a shake. He looked at it, then at me, then at my hand again. Finally he shook it.
Isaac Sylvester, AKA Twilight, who also happened to be Jennifer Sylvester’s brother, wasn’t yet a member of the Wraiths. He was what’s called a “prospect.” Jethro had been a prospect about five years ago, but left before he’d been made a full member. Thank God.
“Cletus,” he said, meeting my eye. I inspected his and discovered Isaac’s were plain blue. I frowned.
Where did she get those purple eyes?
“Speaking of sisters,” I adopted as harmless an air as possible and gave Isaac a cheerful grin, “how’s your sister doing?”
His jaw ticked and his plain blue eyes narrowed and darted to the side, like he was wincing and didn’t want me to see.
“I don’t have a sister,” he mumbled, his mouth pinched.
“Sure you do.” I widened my grin, playing the well-meaning buffoon. “She bakes cakes, don’t she?”
“You know how it is, Cletus.” Catfish spoke up, waiting for me to give him my full attention before continuing. “Once a man joins the Wraiths he ain’t got no other family. Twilight has only brothers now.”
I nodded thoughtfully. “Ah, yes. I forgot about that detail.” I moved my eyes back to Twilight, wanting to see his reaction when I added, “Must be hard on the sisters, though.”
Isaac looked out over the lake, but I doubt he saw it. He appeared to be absent, wading through weighty thoughts.
Meanwhile, I felt sorry for Jennifer Sylvester all over again. She’d lost her brother; at least he was lost to her. I considered how it might’ve been for us if Jethro had disowned us in favor of the Wraiths. The thought was not a nice one. I quickly banished it.
“Are we waiting for anybody?” Catfish grabbed a beer from the cooler and took one of the cushioned seats on the big deck.
“Just Beau,” I said, glancing at my phone. He didn’t like to be late, but I’d instructed Beau to be late. I needed the delay. In return I’d promised I would make sausage for dinner on my assigned night this coming week. Unsurprisingly, my sausage was his favorite. “Let me call him and see where he’s at.”
I stepped off the boat and strolled the length of the dock, up to Hank’s cabin and beyond, to where Catfish had parked their truck. I knew this truck. Five years ago I’d installed traps in this truck.
Traps are secret compartments used to traffic drugs and the like in order to evade police detection. I’d installed them at the time in order to help Jethro extract himself from the Wraiths.
Using the traps now—as a means to bring the entire Iron Wraiths organization down—was a happy bonus.
Contrary to popular belief, installing traps is perfectly legal. It’s legal just as long as the engineer responsible informs local law enforcement about the installation. I’d informed local law enforcement. And then I’d made certain the certified letter never saw the light of day. It was buried in their evidence storage, misfiled. But I knew where it was and would make certain the letter became found on Sheriff James’s desk when the time was right.
Slipping on gloves from my pocket, I opened the truck’s door—which wasn’t locked, because these guys obviously considered themselves to be untouchable—and released the trap under the driver’s seat. I pulled the evidence I’d taken two weeks ago out of my coveralls, evidence handed over to the sheriff by the King brothers, and placed it in the bottom of the trap along with a bogus list of dates and places.
By “bogus”, I meant real. The only thing bogus about the list was that I’d drafted it after the fact, after watching Wraith activity for the last eight months. The list of dates, names, and places just made their inefficient chaos appear more organized.
And organization was the point. The appearance of pre-meditation and planning was my goal, and this list achieved it.
Seeing everything set to rights, I closed the door just as Beau pulled up in his red 1967 Pontiac GTO.
I admired the line of the hood. It was a pretty car, but too flashy for me. As Drew had noted yesterday, I preferred hiding in plain sight.
It was my talent.