Country Roads(54)

“Is something wrong with your nephew?” she asked, putting her hand in his and letting him pull her to her feet.

“No, Eric’s with his mother this weekend, and she lives about a mile outside town, thank God.” He didn’t offer any further explanation.

“If there’s anything I can do to help, I’d like to.”

He cupped Julia’s face in his hands and leaned down to give her a tender kiss. “We have to go.”

As they drove back to the Traveller Inn, Julia noticed his white-knuckled grip on the wheel and the grim set of his mouth. There was no sign of Paul the affable ex-mayor or Paul the charming and passionate lover. This was a man she didn’t recognize, and she wished she knew how to call back one of his other selves, because this Paul made her understand how little she really knew him.

He pulled the ’Vette into the parking lot and started to get out. Julia opened her own door before he got around the car and teetered up onto her high heels. “You don’t have to worry about me.” She stretched up to kiss him. “Go!”

He hesitated a moment before his mouth relaxed into a half smile. “Given the crime rate in Sanctuary, I guess you’ll be safe between here and the front door. I…we—” He shook his head. “I’m sorry. This wasn’t what I intended.” He lifted her hand to press a quick kiss on the palm. Then he strode back around the long hood and disappeared into the car’s interior. The headlights flashed once and the Corvette swept around the circular driveway and out onto the street.

She pulled her stole tighter around her shoulders and wondered about the demons Paul so carefully concealed.



Paul yanked the steering wheel left as an inebriated patron reeled out of Archie’s Bar and Games and into the parking lot. Nosing the ’Vette into an empty space, he got out and turned to brace his forearms on the car’s cool, hard roof, drawing in and releasing several deep breaths to control the anger and frustration boiling within him.

He kept seeing the bewildered expression on Julia’s face. He should have come up with some explanation for his abrupt departure, but he couldn’t bring himself to confess his brother was a hopeless drunk. He only had a week with her, and he wanted to keep all the ugliness away for that short period. Baffling her was better than soiling their time with the sordid truth.

Pushing himself away from the car, he straightened the lapels of his jacket before walking to the bar’s battered pine door and slamming it open.

The reek of smoke, the thumping bass of the electronic jukebox, and the cacophony of voices raised and slurred by alcohol smacked into him like a fist. This had been his bar of choice in his youth since they accepted his fake ID without a blink. It was here he had honed his foosball game. Now the place made him feel old and tired.

He shouldered his way through the mix of teenagers and farmhands, nodding to the bartender as he approached. “Hey, Vince. Thanks for the phone call.”

“He’s in the office,” Vince said. “He gave me his cell phone to call you.”

Paul felt the anger start to build again. His brother had made certain he would come running. He pulled a fifty out of his wallet and held it out to the bartender.

Vince waved it away. “All I did was call you.”

Paul slid it across the scarred wooden counter. “Buy your wife a present.”

Vince looked at the bill before swiping it up and pocketing it.

Paul nodded and headed for the door that led behind the bar’s public rooms. Someone called out his name, but he didn’t bother even to lift a hand in greeting. It would be too tempting to start a good old-fashioned bar fight to vent his fury since he couldn’t take it out on his brother.

Two strides took him down the cracked brown linoleum of the hallway and to the office door. He turned the knob and stepped inside, closing the door behind him. Jimmy lay sprawled and snoring on a brown-and-orange plaid couch whose springs sagged to the floor. Paul stood looking down at his brother, wondering how the cute, annoying kid who followed him everywhere had become an alcoholic who nearly lost the right to spend time with his own son.

He searched the slack face for signs of the younger brother he’d taught to swing a bat and drive a car, the nervous kid he’d driven to the movies for his first date, the cocky teenager who’d dreamed up some of their best pranks.

All the anger drained from his body, and he slumped into a threadbare red brocade chair beside his brother.

Jimmy might have set out to get Paul’s attention, but at least he had chosen a bar where he was least likely to be seen by people who would tell his ex-wife about it.

He reached out to give Jimmy’s shoulder a shake. His brother opened his bloodshot blue eyes and blinked at him. “Whah?”