Читать книгу The Stronghold - Lisa Carter - Страница 15

Chapter 7

7

The landline rang as Pilar crossed the threshold into her home. Tossing the folder onto the coffee table, she caught the call on the last ring before it routed to voice mail.

“Hello?”

She placed one hand over her ear to drown out the blaring noise of the television. Manny sprawled on the couch, his long legs extended. His big, socked feet propped on the coffee table.

“Byron? I can barely—” She scowled at Manny who kept his face turned toward the television screen. “Hang on. Let me get to the kitchen where I can hear . . .” She nudged Manny’s legs.

Manny didn’t budge.

She stepped over his legs and, with a not-so-gentle back-kick, shoved Manny’s legs off the table. Unbalanced, Manny rolled off the couch and landed with a thud onto the carpet.

“Hey!”

She positioned her hand over the receiver. “Hey yourself, Manny. Get off your butt and turn the television down. Byron’s calling from overseas.”

Manny muttered something under his breath, but he got up and switched the television off.

“You need to tell him, Pilar,” Byron urged.

She turned her attention to her brother over seven thousand miles away on a peacekeeping mission.

Pilar swiveled toward the living room. “Go to bed, Manny.”

“Dad’s got nothing to say to me?” Manny’s dark eyes glittered. “Good. ’Cause I got nothing to say to him, either.” He stomped down the hall to his room.

She heaved a breath. “I guess you heard that.”

Byron gave a mirthless laugh. “Sister, half of Arizona heard that.”

“I’m doing the best I can, Byron.”

“That’s why you need to tell him.”

She shook her head as if Byron could see her. “That’s why now isn’t a good time to tell him. He’s already hurting and confused.”

Byron snorted. “He’s a teenager. When’s he not going to be hurting and confused? When he hits middle age? You’re not doing him any favors by shielding him from the truth. Fee and I have set the date. Time to move on, Pilar.”

She leaned against the refrigerator. Its low hum mimicked the thrumming in her head. “Easy for you to say now you’ve found religion and the love of your life.”

“You’re wrong on both counts, Sister. It’s not a religion. It’s a relationship. What Abuela tried to teach us. As usual, she’s right about everything. But don’t tell her I said that. And this relationship with my Creator is the love of my life. The always and only constant love. Fee’s the icing on the cake.”

Pilar stiffened. “Some love after what you and I both endured at the hands of a monster.”

“I’ve made my own mistakes since.” Byron’s voice softened. “It’s a cop-out to blame the failures of my life on him. I made my own bad choices after that. Including what happened with Alex.”

She scrubbed her forehead as the headache mounted. “I don’t want to talk about that.”

“You never want to talk about that. And, God help me, I let you suffer in silence. Instead of confronting what happened and lancing the wound.”

She laughed at the irony. “Trust me, lancing the wound doesn’t help. Not much anyway.”

“Healing for me came when I forgave our stepfather and Alex, Sister. When I finally found the courage to tell what happened to the platoon chaplain. I experienced a peace and a lightness I’d never known before.”

“It’s the forgiveness part where you lose me, Byron.”

“How’s the bitterness and revenge working for you, Sister?”

Pilar’s lips twisted. “Keeps me on my feet and swinging, Brother.”

He let out an exasperated breath. “It keeps you chained in a prison of your own making, Pilar. A stronghold forged in the fires of hate. I learned the hard way that secrets only feed the stronghold. One day you’ll decide you want to be free, but by then, I fear it’ll be too late. The bars will be too strong to bend, and you’ll be captive forever.”

“Stop . . .” She shouted at the receiver. “Just stop.”

Byron sucked in a breath. “Pilar . . . Please . . . I’m sorry. I promised I’d never speak of that and I won’t. But Manny needs to know. His entire future is at stake.”

“He got expelled today, Byron. For fighting.”

Byron sighed. “The To-Clanny gene doesn’t fall far from the tree, does it?”

“I told you about this new gang on the rez last time you called. I’m afraid they’re recruiting our Manny.” Her voice quavered. “I’m scared. I’m not sure how to save him.”

“There’s only One who can save him, Pilar.”

She growled. “Don’t start with that again, Byron. You and I know there’s no rescue there. Just a bunch of hymn-singing, pew-pounding, red on the outside, white on the inside apples.”

“Then you better start packing his bags and send him east to Bragg and Fee. ’Cause that’s the only way you’re going to get him away from the gang.”

Her breath hitched.

“Once they pressure him into going through with whatever wicked initiation scheme they’ve got planned for him, Pilar, there’ll be no going back.”

She gulped past the boulder lodged in her throat. “I know, Byron.”

“You either get him the help he needs there, or send him here. If the darkness gets a foothold, our boy as we know and love him will be swallowed whole.”

She ground her fist against her eye.

Apaches don’t cry. Apaches don’t cry.

“I know, Byron,” she whispered.

“Please, Pilar. I’m begging you. Do what’s right for the boy. Before it’s too late.”

“I’ve always tried to do what’s right for Manny.”

Someone on his end called Byron’s name.

“I’ve got to go.” Byron’s voice changed. “I’ll call next chance I get. There’s more I need to talk to you about. But you need to have made your decision about Manny by then, Pilar. Do you hear me?”

Alex’s offer drifted past her mind.

With her brother so far away, perhaps another male influence wouldn’t be such a bad idea. Even if that influence meant Alex Torres. Wasn’t like she had that many options.

She’d never had many options. And that stark reality only fueled the anger she kept stashed deep inside herself.

“I hear you, Byron. Be safe.”

“Tell Manny goodnight for me. Fee sends her love. I’ll—”

Static filled the airwaves between them as the connection ended.

Pilar scrounged around the kitchen, cleaning the mess Manny left of dinner. She took one look at the taco salad she’d ordered and hurled it into the trash.

She drifted through the rooms and turned off the lights as she went. Double-checking the locks. She hesitated outside Manny’s door. No light shone underneath its frame.

Pilar rested her forehead against the wood. It hadn’t been that long ago Manny wouldn’t go to bed without her goodnight kiss and a bedtime story.

How she missed those days. Now Manny preferred to follow his own interests. He couldn’t be bothered to turn his homework in on time, but he made sure those dry, scholarly tomes on Apache history returned to interlibrary loan.

“Good night, Manny,” she whispered through the door.

For a moment, she imagined Manny whispering back to her. Byron wasn’t wrong about the fortress she’d built around herself. She’d tear down those walls and more if it meant keeping Manny from making irreparable choices. Even if it meant making Alex a temporary fixture in their lives.

She secured her firearm in the safety box on the top shelf of her closet. Her skull pounded. Sleep or the other thing she shamefully did were the only things that ever helped.

It’d been a long, long time since she’d endured one of these migraines. Probably brought on by the stress of seeing the girl in the shallow grave. Triggered by the shock of finding Alex on the rez.

Flicking off the light, she changed into her pajamas. Releasing the pins that bound her hair in the tight bun at the nape of her neck, she shook her hair free. Giving in to the urge to lie down, she slid underneath the comforter. Laying her head on the pillow, she massaged her temples.

What she wanted to do was scream every obscenity at Alex she’d rehearsed in her mind over a dozen years in the off chance they ever met again.

She wanted to rail and beat her fists into his too-handsome-to-live face. She wanted to hurt him as deeply and as irreversibly as he’d hurt her. A hurt far deeper than anything done before or since Alex came into her life.

And that—she closed her eyes, wishing for oblivion—was saying a lot.

Instead, she dreamed of his fingers tangled in her hair and his breath on her cheek. Of the distant strains of a mariachi band. Of the fiesta revelry. And of the fluttery anticipation in her stomach as his mouth moved closer.

But just as suddenly her dream switched to the first time Alex Torres told her he loved her. At the top of the mesa behind the ranch. With the wind blowing the tresses of her hair, he’d taken her face between the palms of his hands. She basked in the sensation of his lips touching hers. Then, it was no longer Alex.

An implacable shadow took control of her mouth. Recoiling, she ran. If It caught her, she’d be lost forever. But no matter how hard she strained, she couldn’t outrun the suffocating, oppressive darkness.

She screamed for Alex. For God. But the Wicked One gained. Arms held her down. Hurting her. Dragging her against her will to the pit, to the hole in the earth from which she’d never emerge—

“Auntie! Wake up, Auntie!”

Choking off a sob, she jerked upright.

The sheets entwined around her limbs, she forced the terror into the dark place where she held it at bay during her waking hours. Her eyes darted around the familiar confines of her bedroom as the night gave way to molten streaks of light. A cool breeze from the open window blew against her face. Had she left a window—?

“Auntie?” At Manny’s frightened voice, her gaze flitted to where he stood beside her bed.

“It’s me, Auntie. Manny. It was only a dream. Like the others.”

Barefoot in his pajamas, he displayed his hands before smoothing a hunk of hair from her face. Careful because last time, she’d not recognized him at first and lashed out in her confusion.

“M-Manny?”

“It’s okay, Auntie. You want to tell me about your dream?”

She inched farther onto the pillows. “No.”

Manny shouldn’t have to play the adult. And she had no intention of ever befouling his life with the horror of her nightmares.

“I-I’m okay. I’m sorry I woke you, honey.”

Manny frowned. “It’d been so long I hoped the dream wouldn’t return.”

She swung her legs off the bed. “You and me both. Thank you for—for . . .”

Apaches don’t cry. Apaches don’t cry.

She swallowed. “For being here.”

“How about I fix pancakes?”

She eyed him. “I meant what I said about grounding you.”

A smile played at the corners of his lips. “Yeah, I know. But a guy’s got to eat, right? And I won’t forget to put chocolate chips on yours.”

Their special Saturday breakfast ritual. Hers and the old Manny’s. She almost sent out a prayer of thanksgiving before she remembered she didn’t believe any of the stuff Abuela peddled.

Promising to be out of the shower in five minutes, Pilar grabbed the water glass on her bedside table. She probably looked like a wreck. Stretching, she plodded into the adjoining bathroom and yawned. Reaching for the faucet, she shot a glance at her reflection in the mirror.

Her hand spasmed. The glass struck the porcelain sink. Shards of broken fragments ricocheted everywhere.

She covered her mouth with both hands and fought the primal scream rising in her throat.

He’d been here. He’d found her. Despite her efforts to fly under the radar.

Yesterday at the canyon somehow she’d known. She’d felt him there. Staring. Waiting to devour her again.

This couldn’t be happening.

Pilar moaned, her knees buckling.

She wouldn’t let this happen again. She wasn’t the same girl he’d taken. She’d never allow herself to be taken again.

Pilar squeezed her eyes shut and opened them. Hoping against hope her eyes deceived her. But in vain. He was back.

He’d written one word in soap on the mirror. The word forever carved into her soul.

Mia. Mia. Mia.

The loathsome word he’d whispered over and over into her ear.

Mine.