Face the Music: Beyond Jackson Falls Book 1 Page 7

  “By all means, come in,” he said, and shut the door behind her. “Something I can do for you?”

  “Nice color,” she said, taking in the garishly-painted living room walls. “What’s it called?”

  “Purple Rain.”

  “My compliments to your decorator.”

  “My sister,” he said.

  That explained a lot. She’d already seen a prime example of her cousin’s interior decorating skills. Beth and Emma had turned Emma’s room into a vomitous mix of pink so shocking that even Barbie would’ve run away screaming. But this—this was more Prince than Barbie. In spite of herself, Paige grinned. The color might be outrageous, but the fact that he’d allowed his kid sister to talk him into it said something about Mikey Lindstrom.

  With difficulty, she tore her gaze away from the hideous walls, instead drinking him in, from the top of his head to the feet resting on the floor. He’d filled out since high school, had packed on some muscle. But he wasn’t one of those neckless, muscle-bound body builder types. Mikey was still lean, but solid and muscular in a way he hadn’t been before. It was a look he wore well. Pausing deliberately when her eyes reached his legs, she said, “Can you run with that thing, Lindstrom?”

  His eyes widened, and then he locked his stance. “I can. That doesn’t mean I intend to.”

  “Tough cookies. You and I are going running. Get dressed.”

  He stood, feet apart and nostrils flared. “Have you always been this much of a bitch? Because I don’t remember it.”

  She reared back on her heels and gave him a long, level stare. Okay, then. Game on. “And I don’t remember you being this much of a wuss. Get over it.”

  “So what is this, some kind of pity party?”

  “Only if you turn it into one.”

  They glared at each other, neither one willing to give in. Until finally, surprisingly, he crumbled. “Wait here,” he said curtly, and disappeared down the narrow trailer hallway.

  Curiosity almost made her follow him, just to see how much worse it could get. The place wasn’t horrible, as long as you didn’t mind a soulless, empty rectangle. There was no bric-a-brac to clutter the rooms, not so much as a magazine to mar the empty surface of the coffee table. What the hell did he do in here all day? The kitchen counter held a basic chrome toaster, the sink a white plastic dish drainer. The floors were so clean they gleamed. To be honest, there wasn’t a thing wrong with the place. Except that, aside from the purple living room walls, the mobile home had about as much character as a roll of toilet paper. And not the pretty, perfumed kind. The plain, unadorned, scratchy kind.

  Mikey returned, minus the sleep crystals and the rooster tails. He’d changed into running shoes and gray sweats, and looked fairly presentable. “Can you drive?” she said, holding up her keys.

  “If it’s an automatic, I can.”

  “It’s your lucky day, Lindstrom,” she said, and tossed him the keys.

  MIKEY

  HE USED TO be able to run ten miles without breaking a sweat. But that was when he still had two working legs, and didn’t have to depend on some electronic contraption to keep him upright. Learning to walk again after the amputation had been the hardest challenge he’d ever faced. But he’d done it, through sheer willpower and more than a little of the stubbornness his dad had spent the first eighteen years of his life trying to drum out of him. If he was going to be half a man, then, by God, he was going to be a strong one. Once he’d graduated from physical therapy, he’d joined a gym in Farmington, where he’d spent the last year working out tirelessly.

  The end result of all that work was that he’d passed with flying colors the strength and physical endurance tests that had qualified him to be a cop. It was true that he spent a lot of time behind a desk. Also true that not much happened in a small town like Jackson Falls. But even here in Hooterville, a cop still had to be able to chase down bad guys, in the unlikely event that one of them took a wrong turn off the highway, accidentally wandered into town, and decided to knock off the local mini-mart while he was here.

  But it killed him, knowing that Paige MacKenzie now viewed him with the same pity as everybody else in town. She clearly hadn’t known about his leg the day they saw each other at Gunther’s place. Somebody—probably her parents—had told her about poor Mikey Lindstrom, who went off to war a whole man, and came back in pieces.

  Bitter much, Lindstrom?

  “Who told you?” he said.

  Without breaking stride, she tilted her head and eyed him for a minute or two. “Does it matter?”

  “Just wondering who’s using my misfortune to stoke the gossip mill.”

  She focused again on the path ahead of them. “If you must know, it was Lissa Norton.”

  “I should’ve guessed. She’s always had a way of sticking her nose in where it doesn’t belong.”

  “It’s a small town, Lindstrom. You know that. You grew up here. What’s your business is my business, and vice versa. That’s the way it goes in places like this.”

  “Or places like Hollywood?”

  “Bite me.”

  She was deliberately maintaining a slow pace for his sake, and it chapped his ass that she thought he wasn’t up to a long, hard run. Even if it was true. ”I’m not an invalid,” he said. “Stop being nice to me.”

  “Trust me, you’ll know when I’m being nice. Tell me about your girlfriend.”

  “Amy?” He blinked at the sudden change of subject. “She’s a teacher.”

  “And?”

  “Head of the high school Drama Department.”

  “Jesus Christ, Lindstrom, I ask you about your girlfriend, and you give me her résumé. Tell me something personal. What’s her favorite color?”

  He had to think about it. Beside him, Paige rolled her eyes. “How long have the two of you been dating?”

  “A year, give or take.”

  “And you don’t know her favorite color?”

  “It’s not something we’ve ever discussed.”

  “Of course not. I’m sure your conversations are more likely to be something along the lines of, ‘Hey, good-looking, how about a nice roll in the hay?’”

  “You clearly have a very high opinion of me.”

  “If the shoe fits…”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “Oh? So you’re not sleeping with her?”

  “I didn’t say I’m not sleeping with her. Just that we’re…casual.”

  “Jesus Christ. Men are so fucking stupid. If you’ve been together for a year, and you’re sleeping together, your relationship’s gone way past casual. You may not think so, but I can guarantee Amy does.”

  “And you know this because?”

  “I’m a woman. Trust me. So tell me, champ, after a year of dating, what do you know about this paragon of womanly virtue?”

  ”I know enough to be pretty sure she won’t understand why I’m out running with my ex-fiancée.”

  She didn’t look at him, but her body language clearly showed her discomfort. “Ex-fiancée?”

  “We were engaged, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  “We were engaged for about ten minutes, more than a decade ago. We were kids. You never even gave me a ring, and we sure as hell didn’t make it to the altar. Not even to the Elvis Presley Chapel of Love in Vegas. I don’t think it counts.”

  “It counts for me. You think you know so much, then tell me about Ryan. What do you know about him?”

  “He’s a lying, cheating, prick bastard, and I hope I never see him again. Is that enough?” Eyes straight ahead, not looking at him, she added, “And he stole my dogs.”

  “Wait. What?” He stopped abruptly and stood, trying to get his breathing under control. Real men didn’t have trouble with their breathing. Only men who’d been stripped of their dignity, castrated, turned into empty shells of their former selves.

  She slowed, stopped, and turned to him. From a distance of twelve feet, she took his breath away: long and lean and edgy
, with all that crazy blond hair falling in a wild cloud around her face. She wore it well, that just-got-laid look. “He took my dogs,” she said. “Bo and Janis.”

  Mikey raised an eyebrow. “Bo and Janis?”

  “Mister Bojangles and Miss Janis Joplin MacKenzie. I hope he dies a slow and painful death. I hope they rip his throat out. And when they’re done with that, I hope they tear him to shreds and devour him, right on the spot.”

  “You never used to be quite so bloodthirsty.” Picturing a pair of massive Rottweilers or Pit bulls, he said, “What kind of dogs are they?”

  “French bulldogs. And you can wipe that smirk off your face anytime.”

  Was he smirking? The image of two French bulldogs ripping out a man’s throat and then devouring him tickled his funny bone. He couldn’t help it. “And you let him get away with it?”

  “What was I supposed to do?”

  “If they’re really yours, there’s plenty you can do.”

  “I had those dogs for two years before he came along. I bought them from a legitimate breeder. I have papers that prove they’re mine.”

  “That’s theft, then. The dogs are your property, not his. You could have him arrested.”

  “It’s not that simple, Lindstrom.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because we lived together for three years! They love him. He’s as much their dad as I am their mom.”

  “They’re dogs, MacKenzie. Not kids. You’re not their mom.”

  “Have you ever owned a dog? I thought not. They may be four-footed kids, but they’re still my kids. And the way my love life is going,” she added darkly, “they’re likely to be the only kids I ever have.”

  “Then take him to court. Sue him for custody.”

  “Of a dog?”

  “Of two dogs. Unless you want to split ‘em up. You take one, he takes the other one.”

  “No, I don’t want to split them up. They’re littermates. Separating them would be the cruelest thing I could do.” She leveled a steely glance at him. “How long did you say you’ve been a cop?”

  “Six months.”

  “And you already know everything there is to know about the law. Isn’t that precious?”

  “Just trying to help, MacKenzie. Remind me to resist that urge the next time it hits.”

  They ran in silence after that, hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder, both of them inhaling great gulps of oxygen. He wasn’t used to this. His chest felt like he’d been attacked by fire ants. Sweat poured down his spine, and his leg, that traitorous leg, was starting to throb. Not with the phantom pain that generally sent him through the roof; this was the real thing, the weight of his body pounding the tender stump continually against the socket of the prosthesis.

  Normally, the cushioning sock and the air pocket prevented that kind of pain. But this wasn’t normal. Normal was taking a leisurely two-block stroll from the station to the Jackson Diner to pick up lunch. Normal was not a hard, three-mile run down a paved path that led to—where? He wasn’t even sure where it ended, because he’d never run this path before. The truth was that he didn’t run at all anymore, and he was growing increasingly suspicious that once they reached the end, there’d be no taxi waiting to carry them back to the starting point. Like an old videotape rewinding, they’d be reversing direction and doing it all over again.

  Mikey gritted his teeth, clamped his mouth shut, and said nothing. The damn woman could run circles around him without expending an ounce of effort. She was barely sweating. It figured. Little Miss Rock Star. If she thought she was doing him any favors, it would be easy to set her straight. Except that he’d then have to admit to weakness, and Mikey Lindstrom wasn’t admitting that to anyone. Least of all to Paige MacKenzie.

  So he pushed himself a little harder. It would be a miracle if he could move tomorrow. Like a foot squeezed into a new shoe that was a little too tight because it hadn’t been broken in yet, his leg, slammed too many times against that prosthesis, was starting to scream at him. In spite of his determination, his stride began to lag.

  She noticed right away. Damn woman was far too perceptive for her own good. “If you need a break,” she told him, “just say so.”

  Through gritted teeth, he said, “I don’t need a break.”

  “Jesus, Lindstrom, don’t be such a guy.”

  “I am a guy. What else would you like me to be?”

  “You should have told me this was too much for you.”

  “It’s not too much for me!”

  “I wasn’t trying to kill you. I just—”

  “Just what?” He stopped abruptly, whirled around, wiped the sweat from his brow on the sleeve of his shirt. What had he been thinking, wearing a sweatshirt on a warm day like this? “Just what the hell were you trying to do, MacKenzie?”

  Uncertainty flitted across her face. While he watched, the wheels inside her head moved visibly as she tried to come up with an answer that wouldn’t wound his pride. But it was too late for that. With a snort, he turned away from her and began moving again, lengthening his stride, adding a little more effort to his steps. The more effort, the more pain, but sometimes, facing a problem head-on was easier than avoiding it. He would make it to the end of this damned running path if it killed him. And before he collapsed and died, he would turn around and run those three miles back to civilization.

  Except that it didn’t work out that way. Instead, he spied a bench and, lungs screaming for oxygen, he strode over to it and collapsed. Back bent, elbows braced against his thighs, he cradled his head in his hands and waited for either death or salvation, whichever came first.

  She sat beside him, rested a hand on his arm. “Don’t touch me,” he said.

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “I know what you meant to do.”

  “So now you’re a mind reader?”

  “Let me take a guess,” he said, “and then you can tell me how I’m doing.” He paused, waited for oxygen to fill his lungs. “Somebody—if I wanted to guess, I’d say probably your father—told you a sob story about poor, pathetic Mikey Lindstrom, who can’t manage to pull his head out of his ass and get on with life.”

  Her face grim, she didn’t respond. He took another breath, and some of the tightness left his lungs. “So you just rushed in,” he said, “all high and mighty, with all your money and all those people fawning over you, and decided to make me your pet project. What the hell, you have deep pockets and plenty of time on your hands. You probably need a hobby, now that you don’t have a boyfriend to fill your time any longer. So you thought you’d take Broken Boy and fix what’s wrong with him. Am I getting warm?”

  He wasn’t sure why he kept pushing, except that once he’d gotten started, he couldn’t seem to stop. He’d clearly touched a sore spot. Her lips, clamped tight, narrowed even further. Both her cheeks sported a splotch of color, and the skin over her forehead had grown tight and pale. But she refused to flinch, refused to respond. This was, after all, Paige MacKenzie. She was tough. Unbreakable. Except that he knew, better than most, that everybody had a breaking point. And right now, some part of him was determined to find out where hers lay.

  “Let me tell you something, Miss High and Mighty. You can’t fix me. Nobody can fix me. You know why? Because I’m Humpty-Dumpty. I’ve had one hell of a fall, and nobody—not the king’s horses, not the king’s men, and sure as hell not you—can glue those broken pieces back together. I’m scrambled eggs now. So don’t even bother to try. If that’s why you’re here, you can just turn around and go back to where you came from. Go find some other charity case to obsess over, and leave me the hell alone!”

  He paused for breath as a searing pain lasered through his chest.

  Silently, she got up from the bench. Crossed her arms. “You,” she said in a surprisingly calm voice, “are an insufferable ass.”

  Without warning, the wave he’d been riding capsized, leaving shame and regret in its wake. She was right. He was a dick, and none of this was her
fault. She’d been thousands of miles away when his life had come to a screeching halt. So why had he felt the need to take out his fury on her?

  “I’m not sure why I ever thought you were worth my time,” she said, “but I won’t make that mistake again. As far as I’m concerned, you can go directly to hell and rot there. Have a nice life.”

  Most women would have flounced away. But Paige MacKenzie wasn’t a flouncer. She simply turned, her dignity still intact, and without looking back, strode silently and steadily away from him.

  He watched until she was out of sight, exhaustion and pain filling the crevices between all those broken pieces of him. Fueled by a combination of pride, fury, and resentment, he’d pushed himself beyond his limits. He’d known he was doing it, but he was too stubborn to quit. She’d infuriated him. Just by being there, all wild hair and long, slender, perfect limbs, she’d set off a rage he hadn’t known was inside him. Once upon a time, they’d been kids together, both of them strong and young and healthy and perfect. Only one of them was perfect now, and it wasn’t him.

  And a part of him hated her for it.

  The more rational side of him understood that although it was Paige who’d been the beneficiary of his rage, the person he was really infuriated with was himself. He was broken, flawed, irreparably damaged. Not just his leg, but other, more integral parts of him. His mind, his heart, his soul. That IED had shattered every one of them, had turned him into scrambled eggs, and nobody could put him back together again.

  The pain was everywhere. His leg, his chest, his soul. He’d just alienated the one person who seemed to believe he could be salvaged. At least she’d believed in him until he’d eviscerated her, proving all the rest of them right. He really was a lost cause.

  Belatedly, it occurred to him that not only had he just dismissed his ride, but he was miles from home, and he’d left his cell phone on the dresser next to his bed. He couldn’t even call for a taxi.

  He was going to have to walk.

  The realization almost undid him. It would be easier to sit here and wait for death. It wouldn’t take more than a few weeks before starvation got the best of him. If he was lucky, dehydration would get him first. Either option was preferable to walking several miles back to the trailer.