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“I’m surprised you’ve stuck around this long,” Garrett said, propping his elbows on the weathered stone.
Landon shrugged, not annoyed so much by the crowds when he was able to escape them. “I’m waiting for her to leave.”
His brother chuckled, a sound much like Landon’s had been before he’d forgotten how to do it. “I admit I’m very intrigued about the contents of that little black book.”
Landon remained silent. He was intrigued, too. But he was the eldest, the cool head. His mother, his brothers, depended on him to make decisions with level-headed precision, not stemming from rage.
A breeze rustled across the nearby bushes.
“I don’t remember seeing such hate in someone’s eyes before,” Garrett said. After a charged pause, “Except maybe yours.”
An old, familiar rage crawled inside Landon’s stomach. He plucked a leaf from a prickly little bush, tore it in half, and tossed it aside. “If you have a point,” he said flatly, “then make it.”
“You know, Landon, I’ve been waiting for you to do something about what happened all those years ago. Mother’s been waiting. Julian has been, too. You never mourned. You never got drunk. You went to work the next day, hell, you worked like a dog. You’re still working like a dog.”
“And this is the attitude you all wanted me to take? I pulled Dad’s newspaper up from the ground, Garrett. I branched out online and tripled its earnings—you wanted me to get drunk?”
“No,” he admitted, contrite. “I wanted you to do something that will balance things out. I think it’s long past the time you took a hand to this. You know goddamned well you can crush him.”
“Halifax?”
A glint of mischief sparked in Garrett’s eyes. “Don’t tell me you haven’t thought about it.”
“Every night.”
“There you go.” With a satisfied grunt, Garrett emptied his wineglass and set it aside. “Landon, come on. You’re the loneliest bastard I know. We’ve stood by for six years watching you close yourself off. You’re not even interested in women anymore. The anger is reeking off your pores, its eating you inside.”
Landon rubbed two fingers up the length of his nose, his temples beginning to throb. “Back off, Garrett.”
“Why not take your revenge, brother?”
He didn’t know what happened. One moment he clutched his wine and the next the glass shattered on the nearest stone pillar, the shards scattering across the floor. “Because it will not bring them back!” he roared. “I can goddamned kill him and they’re still. Not. Coming. Back!”
The silence that followed felt like a noose around his throat. He’d said too much, had lost control, showed his brother just how very close he was to losing it, how perilous he found each day to be. How pointless it all seemed. Power, respect, even life itself. It was all one big nothing. Landon felt nothing but…hollow.
“Damn it,” he muttered, cursing himself and that female for bringing thoughts of Hector Halifax to the forefront.
Landon hated thinking about it, hated remembering, the phone call late at night, all the evidence the detective had discovered. But at the same time, it haunted him. How could he have been so blind? So fooled? Chrystine had been having an affair with Halifax for several months; the detective confirmed she’d been texting and emailing and stealing out into the night to see him. Landon hadn’t known of her betrayal until the day he’d buried her.
He’d felt cornered into the marriage, hadn’t wanted her, but she’d been pregnant with his child and he’d done the “right” thing with every intention of making it work.
He’d failed. And he’d failed to protect that chubby little infant, who’d already learned to sit, and grin and say “Papa.”
His son had died because of her.
And because of Halifax emailing in the middle of the night, demanding of Landon’s wife that it was now or never. She either went to him now or they would never be together.
Chrystine had been taking medication, medication Halifax had prescribed, medication no nursing mother should have been taking and no sane person should be driving on. Halifax had known, and he’d still made the demands. Demands he knew Chrystine would follow when he’d threatened not to “prescribe” for her any longer, vowed not to see her anymore if she did not follow. The night had been stormy, dark and though Chrystine had anxiously thought now, she would go to him now, the crash had said never.
Neither she nor her son had taken another breath.
Landon never again felt his son’s tiny, dimpled hand wrap around his finger. He’d never see him as a young boy or guide him through the painful process of becoming a man.
“I know they’re gone.” Concern etched in his features, Garrett reached out and firmly seized Landon’s shoulder. “Maybe they’re not coming back, brother, but I was hoping you would.”
Bethany sat outside on a carved wooden bench next to the valet parking booth, staring at the black book on her lap. You’ve brought the anger back to my brother, Garrett Gage had said with a marveled smile. I might even thank you.
She was still puzzling over his words, mulling over her own situation.
