Scarlet Nights (Edilean 3)

“I’ll wait for you here,” he said.

“No you won’t.” From the backseat, the dogs yipped, but Mike turned and gave them a look that made them sit down in their cage.

They heard a door slam and Mr. Lang came out with a shotgun in his hands, but when he saw Mike’s car, he put the gun to his side. His round face twisted into an expression that could be taken for a smile.

“Will you call him Gramps?” Sara asked.

“Wait until the next time I get you in the gym,” he said under his breath as he got out of the car.

“You’re Prudie’s grandson,” Mr. Lang rasped out.

“That I am,” Mike murmured as he opened the back door of the car. He was careful when he removed the big crate; he didn’t want to hurt the leather of his seats.

Sara had walked around the car to stand behind him, and the look on Mr. Lang’s old face when he saw the dogs almost made her forgive him everything. She tried to forget the fear she’d felt since she was a child—and she wanted to forget about his retaliations on people who crossed him.

Mike unzipped the cage, clipped on leashes, and let the dogs out. They were young and energetic and wanted to run. “This is Baron and Baroness,” Mike said, “and they’re an unrelated pair, so their breeding will be healthy. They’ve had shots and microchips saying they belong to you put in their necks.”

Mr. Lang went down on his old knees to put his arms around the dogs. “Thank you,” he said.

Sara was looking at him with sympathy. Everyone in town always worked to stay away from the vindictive old man, so she’d never considered how lonely he must be.

“What happened to your other dogs?” she asked before she thought. The moment it was out, she expected Mike to give her a look to be quiet, but he didn’t so much as turn around. He was still holding the leashes of the dogs and his eyes were on Brewster Lang.

Mr. Lang looked up at Sara, and the happiness on his face was replaced with a sneer.

Mike put his body between her and the old man. “She’s my wife and you will treat her with respect. Her name is Mrs. Newland.” Mike’s voice was low.

“Wife? You married a—”

“I know what you did, so you can drop the fake hatred of the McDowells.”

Sara peeped around Mike to watch Mr. Lang’s face. It went from confusion to shock to fear, and finally, to delight.

“You know?” His voice was so low she could hardly hear him. “You know that your grandmother and I were … were sweethearts? And that you are—?”

It looked as though Mike was right and Mr. Lang remembered what happened that night as a love story.

Mike interrupted him. “There are things that shouldn’t be said out loud. I’m a policeman and I’d be duty bound to report what I hear.”

Sara knew that the statute of limitations for rape was about seven years, but from the fear that ran across his face, Mr. Lang didn’t seem to know that. Come to think of it, she hadn’t seen a TV in the house, and she doubted if he had Internet service. It looked like he wasn’t much in touch with the outside world.

Standing up, Mr. Lang nodded. The dogs were at his feet, and they already seemed to knew who their owner was.

“I have questions to ask you,” Mike said as he handed him the leashes and took the shotgun from where it rested on the gravel.

Mr. Lang took the dogs’ straps, wrapped them around his hands, and started toward the house. As the leader, he was in the front, not the dogs.

When they reached the house, Mr. Lang opened the door for Mike, but he stood where he was and glared at Lang. Reluctantly, the old man stepped back and let Sara go in first, then Mike, while he stayed outside to take care of the dogs.

Sara and Mike went into the living room and sat down on the old couch. “You forgot to tell me what not to talk about,” she whispered.

“Say anything you want. That old man would die before he gave out any information. He won’t spread the news that we’re married.”

Minutes later, Mr. Lang came into the room carrying a tray full of matching cups and saucers, a teapot, and cookies on a plate. Sara’s eyes widened as she recognized the china pattern as one she’d seen in a museum. He poured tea into what had to be a hundred-year-old cup, as fragile as a butterfly’s wing, and held it out to Mike.

He nodded toward Sara and with a grimace—a step up from his sneer—Lang handed her the cup.

She took a sip. “Jasmine?”