She studied him. "For some reason, I can't see you with someone like that."
"Neither could I. And neither could she. Not in the long run, anyway. But for a while, it was surprisingly easy to overlook our obvious differences. And we did."
"How long did it last?"
"A little more than a year."
"Do you ever hear from her anymore?"
He shook his head. "Never."
"And that's it?"
"Aside from a couple of high school crushes, that's it. But bear in mind that the last five years haven't exactly been conducive to starting new relationships."
"No, I don't suppose so."
Zeus got up and stared down the drive, his ears twitching. Alert. It took a moment, but Thibault heard the faint sound of a car engine, and in the distance, a broad, dispersed light flashed in the trees before it began to narrow. Someone pulling up the drive. Elizabeth frowned in confusion before a sedan slowly rounded the corner and came toward the house. Even though the lights from the porch didn't illuminate the drive, Thibault recognized the car and sat up straighter. It was either the sheriff or one of his deputies.
Elizabeth recognized it as well. "This can't be good," she muttered.
"What do you think they want?"
She stood from her spot on the porch. "It's not a they. It's a him. My ex-husband." She started down the steps and motioned toward him. "Just wait here. I'll handle this."
Thibault motioned for Zeus to sit and stay as the car pulled to a stop beside Elizabeth's car at the far end of the house. Through the bushes, he saw the passenger door open and watched as Ben got out, dragging his backpack behind him. He started toward his mother, keeping his head down. When the driver's-side door opened, Deputy Keith Clayton stepped out.
Zeus let out a low growl, alert and ready, waiting for Thibault's command to go after the guy. Elizabeth glanced at Zeus in surprise until Ben stepped into the light. Thibault noticed the absence of Ben's glasses and the black-and-blue bruises around Ben's eye at the same moment Elizabeth did.
"What happened!" she cried, hurrying toward her son. She squatted to get a better look. "What did you do?"
"It's nothing," Clayton responded, approaching them. "It's just a bruise."
Ben turned away, not wanting her to see.
"What about his glasses?" Elizabeth said, still trying to make sense of it. "Did you hit him?"
"No, I didn't hit him. Christ! I wouldn't hit him. Who do you think I am?"
Elizabeth didn't seem to hear him and focused her attention on her son. "Are you all right? Oh, that looks bad! What happened, sweetie? Are your glasses broken?"
She knew he wouldn't say anything until after Clayton left. Tilting his face up to hers, she could see the vessels had burst in his eye, leaving it bloody.
"How hard did you throw it?" she demanded, her expression horrified.
"Not too hard. And it's just a bruise. His eye is fine, and we managed to tape his glasses back together."
"It's more than a bruise!" Elizabeth's voice rose, barely controlled.
"Stop acting like this is my fault!" Clayton barked.
"It is your fault!"
"He's the one who missed it! We were just playing catch. It was an accident, for God's sake! Wasn't it, Ben? We were having fun, right?"
Ben stared at the ground. "Yeah," he mumbled.
"Tell her what happened. Tell her it wasn't my fault. Go ahead."
Ben shifted from one foot to the other. "We were playing catch. I missed the ball and it hit me in the eye." He held up his glasses, crudely taped at the bridge and the top of one lens with duct tape. "Dad fixed my glasses."
Clayton held up his palms. "See? No big deal. Happens all the time. It's part of the game."
"When did this happen?" Elizabeth demanded.
"A few hours ago."
"And you didn't call me?"
"No. I took him to the emergency room."
"The emergency room?"
"Where else was I supposed to take him? I knew I couldn't bring him back here without having him checked out, so I did. I did what any responsible parent would do, just like you did when he fell off the swing and broke his arm. And if you remember, I didn't get all crazy on you, just like I don't get crazy about you letting him play in the tree house. The thing is a death trap."
She seemed too shocked to speak, and he shook his head in disgust. "Anyway, he wanted to go home."
"Okay," she said, still struggling with her words. A muscle clenched and unclenched in her jaw. She waved Clayton off. "Whatever. Just go. I'll take it from here."
With her arm around Ben, she started to lead him away, and it was in that instant that Clayton spotted Thibault sitting on the porch, staring directly at him. Clayton's eyes widened before they flashed in anger. He started for the porch.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded.
Thibault simply stared at him without moving. Zeus's growls grew more ominous.
"What's he doing here, Beth?"
"Just go, Keith. We'll talk about this tomorrow." She turned away.
"Don't walk away from me," he spat, reaching for her arm. "I'm just asking you a question."
At that moment, Zeus snarled and his rear legs began to quiver. For the first time, Clayton seemed to notice the dog, his teeth bared, the fur on his back standing straight up.
"If I were you, I'd let go of her arm," Thibault said. His voice was flat and calm, more a suggestion than an order. "Right now."
Clayton, eyeing the dog, let go immediately. As Elizabeth and Ben hurried to the porch, Clayton glared at Thibault. Zeus took a single step forward, continuing to snarl.
"I think you'd better go," Thibault said, his voice quiet.
Clayton debated for an instant, then took a step backward and turned away. Thibault heard him cursing under his breath as he stalked back to the car, opened the door, and slammed it shut behind him.
Thibault reached out to pet Zeus. "Good boy," he whispered.
Clayton backed out of his spot, made a sloppy three-point turn, and took off up the drive, spewing gravel. His taillights receded from view, and only then did the fur on Zeus's back finally lower. His tail wagged as Ben approached.
"Hi, Zeus," Ben said.
Zeus glanced at Thibault for permission. "It's okay," Thibault said, releasing him. Zeus pranced toward Ben as if to say, I'm so happy you're home! He nosed at Ben, who started to pet him.
"You missed me, huh?" Ben said, sounding pleased. "I missed you, too. . . ."
"Come on, sweetie," Elizabeth urged, moving him forward again. "Let's go inside and put some ice on your eye. And I want to see it in the light."
As they opened the screen door, Thibault stood.
"Hey, Thibault," Ben said, waving.
"Hi, Ben."
"Can I play with Zeus tomorrow?"
"If it's okay with your mom, it's okay with me." Thibault could tell by looking at Elizabeth that she wanted to be alone with her son. "I should probably go," he said, rising from his spot. "It's getting late, and I've got an early morning."
"Thanks," she said. "I appreciate it. And sorry for all this."
"There's nothing to be sorry for."
He walked a ways down the drive, then turned toward the house. He could just make out movement behind the curtains of the living room window.
Staring at the shadows of the two figures in the window, he felt for the first time that he was finally beginning to understand the reason he'd come.
14
Clayton
Of all the places in all the world, he had to find the guy at Beth's place. What were the odds on that? Pretty damn small, that's for sure.
He hated that guy. No, scratch that. He wanted to destroy the guy. Not only because of the whole stealing-the-camera-and-flattening-his-tires thing, though that was definitely worthy of a little time locked in the jail alongside a couple of violent methamphetamine addicts. And it wasn't because Thigh-bolt had him over a barrel with the camera dis
k. It was because the guy, the same guy who'd played him once, had made him look like a quivering jellyfish in front of Beth.
If I were you, I'd let go of her arm had been bad enough. But after that? Oh, that's where the guy went seriously wrong. Right now. . . . I think you'd better go. . . . All spoken in that serious, steady, don't-piss-me-off tone of voice that Clayton himself used on criminals. And he'd actually done it, slinking away like some stray dog with his tail between his legs, which made the whole thing worse.
Normally, he wouldn't have put up with that for a second, even with Beth and Ben around. No one gave him orders and got away with it, and he would have made it perfectly clear that the guy had just made the biggest mistake of his life. But he couldn't! That was the thing. He couldn't. Not with Cujo around, eyeballing his crotch like it was an appetizer at the Sunday buffet. In the dark, the thing actually looked like a rabid wolf, and all he could do was remember the stories Kenny Moore told him about Panther.
What the hell was he doing with Beth, anyway? How did that come about? It was like some sort of evil cosmic plan to ruin what had been for the most part a pretty crappy day--starting with mopey, moody Ben showing up at noon and complaining straight off about having to take out the garbage.
He was a patient guy, but he was tired of the kid's attitude. Real tired of it, which was why he hadn't let Ben stop at just the garbage. He'd had the kid clean the kitchen and the bathrooms, too, thinking it would show him how the real world worked, where having a halfway decent attitude actually mattered. Power of positive thinking and all that. And besides, everyone knew that while mamas did the spoiling, dads were supposed to teach kids that nothing in life was free, right? And the kid did real well with the cleaning, like he always did, so for Clayton the whole thing was over and done with. It was time for a break, so he took Ben outside to play catch. What kid wouldn't want to play catch with his dad on a beautiful Saturday afternoon?
Ben. That's who.
I'm tired. It's really hot, Dad. Do we have to? One stupid complaint after the other until they finally get outside, and then the kid shuts up tighter than a clam and won't say a thing. Worse, no matter how many times Clayton told him to watch the damn ball, the kid kept missing it because he wasn't even trying. Doing it on purpose, no doubt. But would he run to the ball after he missed it? Of course not. Not his kid. His kid is too busy sulking about the unfairness of it all while playing catch like a blind man.
In the end, it pissed him off. He was trying to have a good time with his son, but his son was working against him, and yeah, okay, maybe he did throw the ball a little hard that last time. But what happened next wasn't his fault. If the kid had been paying attention, the ball wouldn't have ricocheted off his glove and Ben wouldn't have ended up screaming like a baby, like he was dying or something. Like he was the only kid in the history of the world to get a shiner playing ball.
But all that was beside the point. The kid got hurt. It wasn't serious, and the bruises would be gone in a couple of weeks. In a year, Ben would either forget it completely or brag to his friends about the time he got a shiner playing ball.
Beth, on the other hand, would never forget. She'd carry that grudge around inside her for a long, long time, even if it had been more Ben's fault than his. She didn't understand the simple fact that all boys remembered their sports injuries with pride.
He'd known Beth would overreact tonight, but he didn't necessarily blame her for it. That's what mothers did, and Clayton had been prepared for that. He thought he'd handled the whole thing pretty well, right up until the end, when he'd seen the guy with the dog sitting on the porch like he owned the place.
Logan Thigh-bolt.
He remembered the name right off, of course. He'd searched for the guy for a few days without luck and had pretty much put it behind him when he figured the guy had left town. No way some dude and his dog couldn't be noticed, right? Which was why he'd eventually stopped asking folks whether they'd seen him.
Stupid.
But what to do now? What was he going to do about this . . . new turn of events?
He'd deal with Logan Thigh-bolt, that much was certain, and he wasn't about to be caught off guard again. Which meant that before he did anything, he needed information. Where the guy lived, where the guy worked, where he liked to hang out. Where he could find the guy alone.
Harder than it sounded, especially with the dog. He had the funny feeling Thigh-bolt and the dog were seldom, if ever, separated. But he'd figure out what to do about that, too.
Obviously, he needed to know what was going on with Beth and Thigh-bolt. He hadn't heard about her seeing anyone since Adam the dork. It was hard to believe that Beth could be seeing Thigh-bolt, considering the fact that he always heard what Beth was up to. Frankly, he couldn't imagine what she'd see in someone like Thigh-bolt in the first place. She'd gone to college; the last thing she wanted in her life was some drifter who rolled into town. The guy didn't even have a car.
But Thigh-bolt had been with her on a Saturday night, and that obviously counted for something. Somewhere, something didn't make sense. He pondered it, wondering if the guy worked there. . . . Either way, he'd figure it out, and when he did, he'd deal with it, and Mr. Logan Thigh-bolt would find himself hating the day he'd ever showed up in Clayton's town.
15
Beth
Sunday was the hottest day of the summer yet, with high humidity and temperatures in the triple digits. Lakes had begun to go dry in the Piedmont, the citizens of Raleigh were rationing their water, and in the eastern part of the state, crops had begun to wither under the never-ending heat. In the past three weeks, the forests had become a tinderbox, waiting to be ignited by a carelessly tossed cigarette or bolt of lightning, both of which seemed inevitable. The only question was when and where exactly the fire would start.
Unless they were in their kennels, the dogs were miserable, and even Logan had been feeling the effects of the heat. He shortened the training sessions by five minutes each, and when he walked the dogs, his destination was always the creek, where they could wade into the water and cool off. Zeus had been in and out of the water at least a dozen times, and though Ben tried to start a game of fetch as soon as he got back from church, Zeus showed only halfhearted interest. Instead, Ben set up a floor fan on the front porch of the house, angling the breeze toward Zeus, and sat beside the dog while he read The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, one of the few books by Agatha Christie that he had yet to finish. He stopped briefly to visit with Logan in a desultory fashion before going back to his book.
It was the kind of lazy Sunday afternoon Beth typically enjoyed, except that every time she saw the bruise on Ben's face and his crudely repaired glasses, she felt a flash of anger at what Keith had done. She'd have to take Ben to the optician on Monday to get his glasses repaired. Despite what he'd said, Keith had thrown the ball way too hard, and she wondered what kind of a father would do that to a ten-year-old.
The Keith Clayton kind, obviously.
It was one thing to have made a mistake by marrying him, it was another thing to have that mistake endlessly compounded for the rest of her life. Ben's relationship with his father seemed to be getting worse, not better. Granted, Ben needed an adult male figure in his life, and Keith was his father, but . . .
She shook her head. Part of her wanted to take Ben and simply move away. Relocate to another part of the country and start over. It was easy to fantasize that if she simply had the guts to do it, her troubles would be over. But that wasn't reality. She had the guts; it was everything else that made the scenario impossible. Even if Nana was healthy enough to handle things on her own--and she wasn't--Keith would find her no matter where she went. Gramps would insist on it, and the courts, including Judge Clayton, would intervene. Most likely, in her absence, Keith would be awarded sole custody. Keith's uncle would make sure of it; that had been the implied threat since the divorce, a threat she had to take seriously in this county. Maybe she would have a shot on appeal, bu
t how long would that take? Twelve months? Eighteen months? She wasn't going to risk losing Ben for even that long. And the last thing she wanted was for Ben to have to spend more time with Keith.
The truth was, Keith didn't want full custody any more than she wanted him to have it, and over the years, they'd worked out an unspoken solution: Keith would have Ben as infrequently as possible, but enough to keep Gramps happy. It wasn't fair for either of them to use Ben like a pawn, but what else could she do? She didn't want to risk losing him. Keith would do what he had to do to keep the money flowing, and Gramps wanted Ben around.
People liked to imagine they were free to choose their own lives, but Beth had learned that choice was sometimes illusory. At least in Hampton, anyway, where the Claytons pretty much ran everything. Gramps was always polite when they bumped into him at the church, and though he'd wanted to buy Nana's land for years, he hadn't made things difficult for them. So far. But in the world of black and white, there was no question that the Clayton family, Gramps included, were masters of the gray, and they used their power when it suited them. Each and every one of them had grown up with the idea that they were special--anointed, even--which was why she'd been surprised at how easily Keith had left her house last night.
She was glad that Logan and Zeus had been there. Logan had handled the situation perfectly, and she appreciated the fact that he hadn't hung around afterward. He'd known she wanted to be alone with Ben and had accepted that as easily as he'd dismissed Keith.
In all things, Logan was calm and steadfast, she reflected. When she talked about Drake, he didn't turn the conversation to himself or how it made him feel, nor did he offer advice. It was one of the reasons she trusted him and had ended up telling him so much about herself. She'd been a little out of sorts because of Drake's birthday, but in truth, she had known exactly what she was doing. She'd been the one to ask him to stay in the first place, and she supposed that deep down, she'd wanted to share those parts of herself with him.