Golden Trail

  “Bags down boys, we gotta talk,” he announced.

  “Hey!” Tripp shouted, dropping his bags in the middle of the kitchen and petting an excited Blondie who was giving them a welcome home as if they’d been at sea for twelve months rather than at school for ten hours, at the same time he reached a hand to some groceries on the counter that Layne had not yet put away. “You got oatmeal!” Tripp finished, waving a box.

  Layne grinned at him. “Sustained energy, Pal.”

  Tripp grinned back.

  “Shit, Dad, why’d you buy Blondie five bowls?” Jasper asked. He’d dumped his bags too and he was fiddling with the stack of bowls Layne bought Blondie before he went grocery shopping.

  “Blondie’s dish goes in the dishwasher every night. She gets a new one in the morning,” Layne explained and both boys turned to him.

  “What?” Jasper asked then asked another question before Layne could answer, “Why?”

  “She just does.” Layne blew it off. “Now sit.”

  Tripp and Jasper looked at each other. Then they sat at the island.

  When they did, Layne moved to stand across from them. Then he laid it out for them and he didn’t pretty it up.

  “I talked with Rocky today and found out there’s another reason why she came over yesterday,” he declared and both their faces went from mildly baffled direct to openly curious. Layne continued. “I told you that me gettin’ shot tweaked somethin’ in Rocky and I wasn’t wrong. Now, there’s things I can’t fully explain to you, not now, maybe when this is done but, in the meantime, because of what happened to me, me and Rocky are gonna pretend we’re an item.”

  “What!” Jasper shouted.

  “That’s so cool!” Tripp yelled, that hope Layne had seen that morning washing full on through his face.

  Layne couldn’t focus on Tripp’s hope that Layne would hook up with his ex-flame who happened to be the school’s coolest teacher. He had to focus on Jasper whose reactions were usually more hostile and even volatile.

  Therefore, Layne’s eyes locked on Jas. “Calm down, Jas.”

  “What the fuck, Dad! She’s a teacher. At my school!” Jasper was still shouting and now he was in a squat, heels to the bar at the bottom of the stool, ready to go ballistic.

  “I said, calm down, boy,” Layne ordered low.

  Jasper stared at him. He knew Layne’s tone, a tone he didn’t use with him often but he used it when he meant it and Jasper knew what he meant so he moved his ass back to his seat. When he settled, Layne carried on.

  “I was workin’ a case when that happened, I got too close too soon. Now, Rocky and me have made a deal and she’s workin’ the case with me.”

  “You’re workin’ a case with a teacher?” Jasper snarled, settled but still unhappy.

  “Yeah, Jas, it’s safe for her because I’ll make it so and she’s returning the favor because,” his voice dipped quiet, “as you can tell, Bud, it became not-so-safe for me. She’s gonna provide cover. The thing is, not just the people we want to think we’re together are gonna see us together. Everyone’s gonna see it. Rocky was worried you two would get confused and I told her not to worry about my boys. I’m always straight with you and I told her you were good kids, you’d sit on it, play it out with us and keep us both safe. Now, I know you aren’t my biggest fan, Jas,” Layne kept his eyes locked on his son, “but I also know down to my gut you won’t make me a liar.”

  That muscle ticked in his oldest son’s cheek but Jas didn’t say anything.

  Correctly, Layne read that as agreement.

  He decided to sweeten the pot.

  “There’s another reason I’m doin’ this,” he told them. “Her husband is a jackass and he’s stepped out on her and, the story goes, he’s been doin’ it throughout their marriage. She barely got her foot out of the door before he moved another woman in. The whole town knew about him cheating on her but Rocky was clueless. She’s not handling that well.”

  Jasper’s eyebrows shot up and he asked, “No shit?”

  “No shit,” Layne replied.

  “What? He blind?” Tripp asked.

  “No, just stupid,” Layne answered.

  “Has to be, yeesh,” Tripp muttered and Layne grinned at him and continued.

  “Rocky doesn’t know this part but I’m gonna be in his face with this and I need you two to be good with that. You get me?”

  Tripp didn’t get him, he stared at his old man, confused.

  Jasper got him, he stared at his old man, blank, then his eyes lit with what was in them that morning before he smiled and when he smiled, he did it slow.

  Layne smiled back at him.

  “What?” Tripp asked, looking back and forth between his brother and father.

  Jasper held Layne’s eyes and didn’t look away.

  “What?” Tripp repeated and Jasper finally looked to his brother.

  “I’ll explain it later,” he muttered.

  “Later is good since she’s gonna be here in five minutes for dinner,” Layne told them and Jasper’s eyes swung back to his Dad.

  “She is?” Tripp asked eagerly.

  “She is, Pal,” Layne answered. “Get your gear sorted and books up to your room. Whose night is it to cook?”

  “I’m not cookin’ for Mrs. Astley!” Tripp shouted, not eager anymore, he was freaked out. “She makes, like, gourmet stuff! She even cooks her own bread!”

  “I’ll cook,” Jasper, cocky as ever, grinned at his brother. “I’m the bomb in the kitchen.”

  “Dude, you burn a TV dinner in the microwave,” Tripp told Jasper.

  “I was on the phone with one of my babes,” Jasper returned. “Learn from the master, Tripp-o-matic, babes need undivided attention. You get me?”

  It hit Layne that Jasper ended his statement with Layne’s words of not five minutes before. Maybe Jasper wasn’t completely immune to his influence after all. Though, he wasn’t certain he was down with where Jasper was taking it.

  “Keira Winters needs your undivided attention, you mean,” Tripp retorted and looked to Layne. “Jasper’s got the hots for the prettiest girl in school and she’s also the only one who doesn’t know he exists.”

  The muscles in Layne’s neck contracted and his eyes sliced to his older boy.

  “Keira Winters, Joe Callahan’s stepdaughter?” Layne asked.

  “One in the same, Dad,” Tripp answered for Jasper. “Jasper’s hot on the trail of the Lone Wolf’s hottie stepdaughter, and getting nowhere, I’ll add.”

  Oh fuck. This was not good. Jasper went through girls like water, he was cocky, he was confident, he was assertive and he expected to get him some. Jasper did not need an angry Joe Callahan on his ass and Layne didn’t need an angry Joe Callahan on his hands.

  Cal was a friend and he was a good guy but everyone in that town knew he’d bonded with his new wife’s stepdaughters and, by that, Layne meant he’d bonded. Layne already slept with a gun under his pillow, mainly because people in about twenty-seven states wanted him dead. In that ‘burg, he slept with it under his pillow because he figured fathers county-wide wanted his son dead. Cal would not be like any other father who went berserk because some hotshot football star got in their daughter’s pants. Cal would go commando on Jasper’s ass.

  “Tripp, sort out your gear and take Jas’s with you, I need another word with him,” Layne ordered.

  “Dad, his gear stinks like all get out,” Tripp complained and Layne’s eyes cut to him.

  “Do it, Pal.”

  Tripp stared at him. Then he slunk off, grabbed all four bags from the floor and trudged them up the stairs.

  Layne looked at Jasper and, the second time that night, he laid it out. “Lay off Keira Winters.”

  “What?” Jasper whispered, the good, warm, golden light flashing out of his eyes, the warning, red, volatile asshole teenaged kid one taking its place.

  Layne shook his head and leaned toward him, settling on his forearms. “You like her, Jas, go for it. You wanna
get in her pants, lay off.”

  Jasper started to make a move off his stool, muttering, “This is none of your fuckin’–”

  “Her father was murdered,” Layne cut in, Jasper’s body jerked and he froze on the stool. “Her uncle, the same. Her mother was kidnapped, her stepdad too. She almost lost her entire family, Jas. A girl like that, you handle with care. Yeah?”

  “You think I’m a dawg,” Jasper whispered, disappointment he couldn’t hide scoring through his features.

  Quietly, Layne replied, “Bud, you go through more condoms than the offensive line of the Colts after a win.”

  Jasper locked eyes with Layne and kept them locked long enough for Layne to get it without Jasper having to say it.

  “You know about her family,” Layne stated.

  “Everyone does,” Jasper returned.

  “You like her,” Layne concluded.

  It took some time but he finally dredged it up and, when he did, Jasper grunted, “Yeah.”

  Layne smiled at him and straightened off his arms, saying, “Then good luck, Bud.”

  Released, Jasper made a break for it, muttering, “Whatever.”

  Layne watched his boy move from the room and it hit him that from the minute he lost his virginity at fifteen to Cindy Stanley, a junior with a great rack and a broken home and a need to get whatever attention she could no matter what form it came in, he’d been like Jasper. No steady girl. No one special. The field wide and open and he’d played it. His mother called it “gathering lipstick” (though she did this while muttering and shaking her head) and she was not wrong.

  Until Rocky.

  He found himself wondering what Keira Winters was like when he heard a car on the street.

  His eyes went to the clock and then he walked to the window in the front room, saw Rocky swinging her Merc into his drive and he went straight to the door and out of it.

  As he strode down his walk toward her car, he looked across the cul-de-sac of which he was on the southern edge of the curve. Natalie Ulrich lived on the northern edge of the curve. Natalie Ulrich never parked her car in her garage so it was now in her drive. Natalie Ulrich had a huge fucking mouth and ran it as often as she could. And Natalie Ulrich was a surgical nurse at Presbyterian.

  She might have missed Layne backing Rocky into her car the morning before. She might not see what Layne was going to do now.

  Then again she might.

  And if she did, yesterday was all over Presbyterian Hospital and what he was going to do right now would be all over the hospital, and town, before his head hit the pillow.

  His eyes moved to Rocky who’d rounded the trunk of her car and met him where the drive met his walk. She’d changed out of her tight skirt and high-heeled shoes and now she was wearing tight jeans, a light, also tight, sweater and a pair of high-heeled sandals.

  Layne stood smack in her way so she stopped and tilted her head back to look at him.

  “Is everything –?” she started but he lifted both his hands to curl around her jaws and he pulled her up to her toes. Her body instantly got tight. “Layne, what –?”

  She didn’t finish because he dropped his head to kiss her like he did that afternoon. He did it hard but, this time, he did it long. Long enough for her fingers to curve around the sides of his waist and he pulled her close enough and high enough for her to lose balance so her chest was resting against his.

  Her lips tasted like mint and he released her when the urge to find out if her mouth tasted the same threatened to overpower him.

  He released her mouth but he didn’t release her jaw and he kept her close with his two hands there.

  “What on –?”

  “Natalie Ulrich ever work with your dickwad ex?” Layne whispered and saw her face pale. She misunderstood him. Natalie wasn’t hard on the eyes. “Sweetcheeks,” he kept whispering, “she lives across the street and the woman has a big mouth.”

  He kept her where she was but his eyes slid to Natalie’s house. He was right, he could see her silhouette in the front window.

  Fucking brilliant.

  Layne looked back at Rocky and finished, “And she’s watchin’.”

  “She is?” Rocky whispered back, her fingers flexing into his waist.

  “Yeah, can’t see her well but I’m pretty sure she’s got her phone glued to her ear.”

  “Oh boy,” Rocky was still whispering.

  Layne grinned and didn’t move.

  When this lasted awhile, Rocky asked, “Are we going to stand out here all night and pretend we’re kissing?”

  “Maybe,” Layne replied.

  “That would be bad since I’m starving,” she returned.

  “No, Roc, that would be bad because you’re about to enter a testosterone zone and no one in that house has the first clue how to cook.”

  “Then I’ll cook,” she offered and his hands slid down her neck to her shoulders and then around her back and he pulled her closer.

  “Nope, you cooked last night. We had a huddle before you arrived and Jas has decided he’s going to amaze you with his culinary brilliance.”

  He watched her eyebrows go up. “You had a huddle?”

  “Yeah,” his arms gave her a squeeze then he dropped one, slid the other one to her shoulders, he moved to her side and walked them forward, “they’ve been briefed.”

  She slid her arm around his waist and turned her head to the side, tilting it up to look at him and he felt the soft hair of her ponytail glide across his forearm at her shoulders. “They okay with, um… everything?”

  Layne nodded. “They’re good.”

  She looked to the house as they took the two steps to the small, white fenced, cement front porch and whispered, “Okay.”

  She didn’t sound okay. She sounded tentative and scared as hell.

  He pushed her forward, opened the storm door and held it over her head as he shoved the front door open and she preceded him.

  “Hey Mrs. Astley!” Tripp shouted, sliding across the wood floors on his tube socks with his greeting and Layne decided that lessons in cool were definitely in order for his younger son.

  “Hey Tripp,” Raquel replied and then was hit dead on with a frontal assault from Blondie that rocked her back on one of her slim high heels.

  “Down, Blondie,” Layne ordered, closing and locking the door and Blondie ignored him for the first time in her life, pawing at Rocky’s fancy-ass sweater and aiming repeated lashing of her tongue on Rocky’s neck like Rocky’s perfume was eau du bacon. “Tripp, get her off Roc.”

  “Blondie! Come here, girl, come on!” Tripp called, slapping his thighs and Blondie’s head jerked back and forth between Tripp and Rocky in excited indecision as to who was her favorite person in the world. It didn’t take her long to decide on Tripp and she shoved off Rocky and ran at Tripp who tackled her and wrestled her to the rug in the living room.

  “Hey Mrs. Astley,” Jasper said and Layne’s eyes went to where he was standing, leaning against the wall, arms crossed on his chest, foot crossed at the ankle, face set in a look of amused indifference and Layne wished Tripp wasn’t wrestling with the dog and instead was paying attention to his brother because Jasper, unlike Tripp, was the master of cool.

  “Hey, Jasper,” Rocky replied. “I hear you’re cooking for me tonight.”

  “Pasta bake,” Jasper returned.

  “Pasta bake? What’s that?” Tripp called from the floor in the living room while still wrestling with the dog.

  “I don’t know,” Jasper answered. “I’m gonna make it up as I go along.”

  “Great,” Layne muttered and then his world collapsed.

  It did this because Rocky’s head twisted to look over her shoulder, her ponytail flying, and she smiled at him. Directly at him. Her eyes hitting his and her dimple hitting her cheek.

  He could kiss her, hold her in his arms, pin her to the wall, lie on top of her on a couch and have a conversation and he felt it and knew he liked it but he could take it.

>   But he couldn’t take that smile aimed at him. That smile that twenty-one years ago promised a beautiful life and then three years later it reneged without any explanation.

  It was then he realized he hadn’t fully thought through this plan.

  Before he recovered, she turned back to Jasper and said, “I don’t know, it sounds good to me and I’m so hungry, I could gnaw off my own arm.”

  “I bet Jas’s pasta bake will at least taste better than your arm,” Tripp noted.

  “Shut up, Tripp,” Jasper returned and looked at Layne. “You want a beer, Dad?”

  Layne stopped staring at the back of Rocky’s head and looked at his boy.

  “Yeah, Jas,” he replied.

  “You want one, Mrs. Astley?” Jasper asked.

  It was then Layne got a good look at her sweater. He avoided shopping like the plague but he reckoned just her sweater cost more than every stitch of clothing he and his boys were wearing. It came to him that when he was at the grocery store, he probably should have bought her wine or, alternately, a two hundred and fifty dollar bottle of champagne.

  “Beer sounds good but I’ll get it,” she answered Jasper, her heels clicking on the tiles as she moved into the kitchen.

  Layne followed her and rounded the corner right when her head came out of the fridge. She had two bottles between her fingers and she handed both to him.

  “Can you do mine? Those twist tops hurt my hand,” she said quietly.

  “I can do it!” Tripp offered loudly and Layne heard thundering, tube sock covered feet.

  “I think I got it, Pal,” Layne said, twisting off the caps and flicking both into the garbage before he handed Raquel her beer. “Get your brother a soda to keep him hydrated while he slaves at the stove.”

  “Gotcha,” Tripp grinned and pushed through Layne and Rocky to get to the fridge.

  She shifted out of Tripp’s way. Layne looked toward Jasper who was standing in the middle of the kitchen surveying the scene exuding ice cold teenage football hotshot badass cool.

  “Jas, you gonna pull together this pasta bake or what?” Layne prompted.

  “I’m on it,” Jasper muttered and headed to the pantry.