William tapped twice on the bedroom door before pushing it open. Then he just stood there, arms at his sides, staring. Why was he standing there staring into his sister’s bedroom, acting weird even for William Ritt? Dutch wondered.
Unless what William was staring at had rendered him unable to move, unable even to react.
Dutch’s cop instincts kicked in. He spoke William’s name with a question mark behind it, but already he was moving down the hallway. He wouldn’t be surprised to see blood spatters on the walls and a dismembered body.
“What the hell’s going on?” asked Wes, who also must have noticed William’s strange behavior and was following close on Dutch’s heels.
In the few short seconds it took to reach the bedroom, Dutch’s adrenaline was pumping in cop mode. Mindful not to rush into the room and destroy or compromise crime evidence, he drew up short at the doorway and pushed William out of his way.
There were no blood spatters. Marilee had not been dismembered. She was sitting bolt upright in bed, covers drawn to her chin, staring at him, shocked speechless by the intrusion.
Beside her in bed, equally shocked, was Scott Hamer.
“Oh, shit.” Dutch spun around, hoping to block Wes from getting any closer, but he was already there.
He shoved Dutch into the room, then stood with his hands braced against the doorjamb as though he needed them for support. “What the hell is this?” he boomed.
“Wes.” Dutch reached out to lay a cautionary hand on him, but Wes knocked it aside as he angrily lumbered toward the bed.
Scott threw off the covers and scrambled out of bed. He was buck naked. But far from ashamed. He faced his father belligerently. “It’s exactly what it looks like. Dad.” He attached the name like an epithet.
Dutch guessed that Wes was furious as much over Scott’s defiant attitude as over catching him with his pants down. But it was to Marilee that he directed his furious glare. “You couldn’t get a man, you pathetic old cunt.”
Scott sprang forward and rammed into Wes like a linebacker, driving his head into his father’s belly and propelling him back several feet. He crashed into an old-time cheval glass. Wood splintered, and the mirror shattered into a thousand shards. That didn’t stop Scott. He was pummeling Wes with his fists
and yelling how dare he talk to Marilee like that?
Dutch could see that both of them would be sliced to ribbons by broken glass if he didn’t intervene. Glass crunching under his boots, he grabbed Scott around the waist from behind and hauled him off Wes, who was winded and panting.
Dutch slung Scott toward the other side of the room. “Simmer down and put your clothes on, Scott. Wes.” With his head, he motioned him toward the door. Wes shot one murderous look toward Marilee, then stepped into the hall. Dutch followed, pulling the door closed behind him.
Wes paced the hallway like a caged lion. Dutch turned to William, ready with a suggestion that they return to the living room to await an explanation when he realized that William didn’t need an explanation. He was wearing a self-satisfied smirk. And suddenly it all made sense to Dutch. William’s insistence they come to the house and wake up Marilee, that had been a ploy. He’d staged this scene. “You son of a bitch. You knew.”
William didn’t even try to hide it. “My sister is a noisy lover. To say nothing of Scott.”
Marilee stepped out of the bedroom, remarkably composed, wrapped in a robe, her hair pulled back in its customary ponytail. “Scott has left,” she said. “He’s extremely upset.”
Wes bore down on her. “He’s upset? He’s upset?”
“Yes, and he is my only concern.”
“Well, you’d better be concerned about future employment. Your teaching career is over.”
“I realize that, Wes, so you can stop yelling at me. I’m not afraid of you. Nothing you threaten me with will hurt or matter.”
“How many other boys have you taken to bed?”
“Scott is not a boy.”
“Don’t smart-ass me. You should be begging my forgiveness.”
“For sleeping with Scott?”
“For fucking him.”
“How is that worse than giving him steroids?”
Dutch reacted with a start. He shot Wes a look of dismay, but Wes didn’t see it. He was so angry, he was shaking. At his sides, he was clenching and flexing his fingers as though preparing to wrap them around Marilee’s throat.