Tender Absolution

  “I didn’t know it was engraved invitation only.”

  He smiled at that. “We were just trying to keep it small. Avoid a fiasco like what happened at the Fitzpatrick place.”

  “No one knows we’re here.”

  “No one?”

  Brenda shook her head.

  “You can trust us,” Carlie said, wondering why she felt like baiting him.

  “Can I?” His eyes narrowed a fraction. “Kevin seems to think you’re his girl.”

  She felt the hackles on the back of her neck rise. “Kevin’s wrong.”

  He took another swig from his beer. “So why he’d get the wrong information?”

  “Look, I don’t think it’s a good idea to discuss—”

  “Kevin got too serious,” Brenda cut in. “Besides, he’s too old for her.” With a shrug she walked past Ben and Carlie. “I’ll let you two work this out.”

  “There’s nothing to work out,” Carlie protested. Heat climbed up her neck and she was suddenly aware that coming here was a big mistake. “Look, maybe Brenda and I should take off.”

  “You just got here.”

  “I know, but—” She waved in the air.

  “You weren’t invited.”

  “Right.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” His gaze held hers and her mouth turned to cotton. The sounds of the night, deep croaks from hidden bullfrogs and the soft chirp of a thousand crickets, were suddenly muted. The fragrance of wild roses soon to go to seed, filtered over the acrid odor of burning wood and exhaust.

  “Let’s go check out the action. That’s why you’re here, aren’t you?”

  “Brenda and I were just taking a turn in the boat. We heard the music….” It was a little bit of a lie, but she couldn’t admit the reason she’d shown up here was because of him.

  “You want a beer?” His gaze was neutral, and yet she felt as if he were challenging her.

  “I guess.”

  With a shrug, he turned and walked barefooted along the dusty path. Nervously, Carlie followed him to what had once been a backyard. Gravel had been strewn near a dilapidated garage, and several cars, pickups and motorcycles had been parked in the rutted lane. A stack of bleached cordwood partially covered with blackberry vines, seemed to prop up a sagging wall of the garage. Kids sat on bumpers of cars, on the drooping back porch or wandered into the house through an open door. A rusted lock was sprung and lay with an equally neglected chain that had slid to the floorboards.

  “Who owns this place?” she asked.

  “One of the guys here—” Ben took the time to point to a pimply-faced boy of about nineteen who was trying to build a fire in an old barbecue pit “—lives in Coleville and claims his uncle is the Daniels’s heir who ended up with the cabin. He says the uncle is trying to sell it.”

  “And he doesn’t care if your friend has a party?”

  Ben slanted her a sly grin. “What do you think?”

  “That the uncle doesn’t have a clue.”

  “Smart girl.”

  Ben introduced her to some of the guests, most of whom were a little older than she was—kids who worked in the mill or the logging company or the Dari-Maid, some with full-time jobs, others who were spending their summer back in Gold Creek until they returned to college in the fall. She knew some of them of course, but there were a lot that she’d never seen before.

  Brenda had already grabbed a beer and was trying to make conversation with Patty Osgood, the reverend’s daughter. Patty was a couple of years older than Carlie, but already had enough of a reputation to turn her father’s hair white, should the good reverend stumble upon the truth.

  Patty sat on the edge of a stump, her long, tanned legs stretched out from shorts that barely covered her rear end and a white blouse knotted beneath her breasts. Her flat abdomen and a flirty glimpse of the hollow between her breasts left little to the imagination.

  Patty wasn’t a really bad girl, but she liked to flaunt the gorgeous body the good Lord had seen fit to bestow upon her—and hang the consequences. She’d dated a lot of boys in town, but now her eyes were on Ben.

  “Well, well, well…” Erik Patton said when Carlie and Ben moved in his direction. Erik dragged on his cigarette and shot smoke out of the side of his mouth. “I didn’t think you’d ever show your face at a beer bash again.” Leisurely, he plucked a flake of tobacco from his tongue and eyed his friend, Scott McDonald. Both boys had been friends of Roy Fitzpatrick and believed Jackson Moore had killed Roy last fall. Most of the citizens of Gold Creek agreed, though Jackson had never been indicted. Only a few people in town believed in Jackson’s innocence. Carlie belonged to that small minority and it obviously bothered Erik, who had given her a ride to the Fitzpatrick summer home on that fateful night.

  Goose bumps rose on her arms. “I was just—”

  “Save it, Surrett,” Erik said through a cloud of smoke. “We were all there. We know what happened.”

  “Jackson didn’t—”

  “Oh, sure he managed to get Rachelle to claim they’d been together all night, but we all know that’s a pile of crap. She just made up the story to give him an alibi.”

  “She wouldn’t!”

  “Sure she would.” Erik let out a sigh of disgust. “She made it with him and she didn’t even know him, did she? Face it, she’s a slut.”

  “Shut up!” Ben ordered, but not before Carlie could lunge at Erik.

  “Don’t you ever—”

  Ben grabbed her arm. “That’s enough,” he said with quiet authority aimed in Erik’s direction. “Maybe you want to apologize.”

  “I just call ’em as I see ’em.”

  “Then you’re blind!” Carlie said.

  Eyes slitting as if he were sizing up the enemy, Erik glared at Ben but had the good sense to back down a little. “Forget it. Forget I said anything.”

  “That’s more like it.” Ben’s gaze could have cut through lead and the smell of a fight filled the air.

  Carlie could hardly breathe and she noticed that all conversation had died and a dozen pairs of eyes were trained on the two boys who were squaring off. She wanted to die a thousand deaths. “Leave Carlie alone, Patton,” Ben said loudly enough so that everyone got the message. “She’s with me.”

  Erik flicked his cigarette into the gravel and ground the smoldering butt with the toe of his boot. “Your loss, man.”

  Ben’s smile was crooked but self-assured. “I don’t think so.”

  Carlie felt Ben’s fingers tighten over her arm and her heart pumped a little faster.

  Scott spit into the scrub oaks, his eyes dark with disgust. “You can have her,” he muttered.

  Embarrassment rushed up Carlie’s neck as she remembered the pickup ride to the Fitzpatricks’ lakeside cabin. She and Rachelle had ridden in the cab of Erik’s truck and Carlie, because of lack of space, had been forced to sit on Scott’s lap. She’d giggled and flirted with him, unaware that what was to happen that night would put her at odds with almost everyone in town—including Erik Patton and Scott McDonald.

  She’d been naive then, younger and foolish and the thought that she’d actually been that close to Scott made her skin crawl.

  She should have learned her lesson.

  So what was she doing here hoping to catch Ben Powell’s attention? Didn’t she have enough trouble with Kevin?

  The fingers clamped around her forearm didn’t move and her skin tingled slightly. “You certainly know how to create a scene,” he said quietly.

  “Maybe I should leave.”

  With a lift of his shoulder, he let go of her arm. The warmth of his fingertips left soft impressions on her arm. “Up to you.” His silver-tinged gaze touched hers and her throat caught for a second.

  “We’ll stay…for a while,” s
he said, as the night closed around them and the fire cast golden shadows over the angles of his face. Someone had a portable radio, fiddled with the dial and the strong notes of “Night Moves” by Bob Seger wafted through the air.

  “Good.” Ben stuck close to her the rest of the evening, but he never touched her again and any little flame of interest in his eyes was quickly doused when he talked to her.

  She listened to music, nursed a beer, talked to some of the kids and always knew exactly where Ben was, whom he was talking to and what he was doing. It was silly really, but she couldn’t help the attraction she felt for him.

  “He’s interested,” Brenda told her when it was near midnight and the party was breaking up.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Definitely interested,” her friend maintained. “He watched you when he didn’t think you were looking.”

  “Really?” Carlie whispered just as Ben left a small group of his friends and approached the girls.

  “Need a ride?” Ben slipped his arms through a faded denim shirt. He didn’t bother with the buttons.

  “We’ve got the rowboat,” Carlie said, managing to hide her disappointment.

  “It’ll fit in the back of my truck.” His gaze touched hers for just a heartbeat. “It’s no trouble.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “We’d love a ride,” Brenda cut in as she glanced at her watch. “There’s no way we can row back to my house by curfew.”

  “But—”

  Ben wasn’t listening to any arguments. He followed them to the back of the house, waded into the thigh-deep water, dragged the rowboat to shore, then swung the small craft over his head. Lake water drizzled down his neck and the back of his shirt, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  “I don’t think this is a good idea,” Carlie whispered to her friend.

  “You wanted to be with him, didn’t you?” When Carlie didn’t answer, Brenda gave her a nudge. “Go for it.”

  * * *

  BEN SHOVED THE rowboat into the back of his father’s truck and told himself he was an idiot. Why borrow trouble? Why take Carlie home?

  Because you can’t help yourself!

  He now understood his brother’s fascination with Carlie Surrett. Reed-slender, with thick black hair that fell to the middle of her back, high cheekbones, lips that always looked moist and eyes that sparked with a misty blue-green intelligence turned his insides to jelly. No wonder Kevin had been so hot for her. But it was over. Kevin had said so himself.

  Ben might have felt guilty taking Carlie home a couple of weeks ago, but Kevin had sworn just the other night that he was over Carlie Surrett. They’d been down at the Silver Horseshoe, the local watering hole, tossing back a few beers after Kevin’s shift at the mill.

  “She’s too much trouble, that one,” Kevin had said, signaling the waitress for another round. “So I broke up with her and I found someone else.”

  “I thought you were in love with her. She’s all you could talk about for…what…two or three weeks.”

  Kevin snorted. “We only went out a few times.” He fished into his front pocket of his jeans for change and avoided his brother’s intense stare. “’Sides, you and I know there’s no such thing as love. All a big lie. Made up by women with their stupid ideas that they get from books and movies.”

  “You believe that?” Ben had known that Kevin had turned cynical over the years after losing his chance to play basketball in college, but he hadn’t believed his older brother could be so hard-nosed and jaded. A few weeks ago, Kevin had been on cloud nine, talking about Carlie Surrett as if he intended to marry her. And now he thought love was just an illusion.

  “Look at Mom and Dad,” Kevin said, as if their parents’ ill-fated union was proof of his opinion.

  Ben scowled and picked at the label of his bottle. His parents, Donna and George Powell, after fighting for years had separated and were now divorced. The battles had started long ago and had always been about money—the kind of money the Monroes and Fitzpatricks had and the rest of the town didn’t. For as long as Ben could remember, his family had been one of the many “have-nots” and this point only became crushingly clear when his father had lost all the family’s savings on some lamebrained investment scheme concocted by H. G. Monroe, owner of the sawmill for which George and Kevin worked, and one rich, mean son of a bitch.

  “So who’s the girl?” he asked his brother rather than think about the past. “The one who’s replaced Carlie Surrett?”

  Kevin’s lips turned down. “No one replaced Carlie,” he said defensively as a buxom waitress, wearing a skirt that barely covered her rear, left two more bottles on the glossy mahogany bar. In one swift motion, she emptied the ashtray and quickly picked up the crumpled bills Kevin cast in her direction. “Keep the change,” he said with a smile that invited trouble.

  “Thanks, sugar.”

  “No problem.”

  The waitress moved through the smoke to a table in the corner. Kevin took a long swallow from his bottle. As if they’d never been interrupted, he said, “I’m seein’ a girl named Tracy. Tracy Niday from Coleville. Ever hear of her?”

  Ben shook his head and Kevin seemed relieved.

  “Is she nice?”

  “Nice? Humph. I’m not lookin’ for nice.” Kevin’s eyes darkened a shade. “But she’s…simple. Doesn’t have big dreams of goin’ to New York, becoming a model or some such bull. She’s just happy that I take her out and show her a good time.”

  “And Carlie wasn’t?”

  “No way. No how.” Kevin scowled and reached into the pocket of his flannel shirt for his pack of cigarettes. “Carlie has big plans—thinks she’s gonna be some hot-damn model or somethin’. Didn’t want to be tied down to Gold Creek and…oh, hell, she was a load of trouble. I’m better off without her.” He lit up and shot a plume of smoke out of the corner of his mouth. “If you ask me, she was all screwed up over that Roy Fitzpatrick murder. Her and that friend of hers—Rachelle Tremont—are both more trouble than they’re worth.”

  And that had been the end of the conversation about Kevin’s love life. Ben hadn’t believed that his brother was truly over Carlie and so he’d questioned her when he’d first found her climbing out of the boat at the dock. But her story had been close enough to Kevin’s to convince Ben that they weren’t seeing each other anymore.

  He watched as she wiped her hands on the front of her shorts. “Hop in,” he said, opening the driver’s side of the pickup and wondering why he felt a twinge of relief knowing that Kevin wasn’t interested in Carlie any longer. He and Kevin had never dated the same girls—there seemed to be an unwritten law between them when it came to going out and heretofore maintaining their silent code hadn’t been a problem. Kevin was a few years older than Ben, and no conflicts had arisen. Until Carlie. Until now.

  Carlie was the youngest girl Kevin had ever taken out, and, without a doubt, the most gorgeous. He noticed the shape of her buttocks and the nip of her waist as she slid onto the old seat of the truck. He didn’t question that she could become a successful model and he didn’t blame her for wanting to taste more of the world than Gold Creek, California, had to offer.

  He wanted to get out of town himself.

  He rammed the truck into gear. “Where to?” he asked the girls.

  “My place,” Brenda said quickly. “It’s a little ways from the old church camp.”

  “Just point me in the right direction.” Ben shoved the Ford into first and the truck bounced along the rutted lane. Near a dilapidated mailbox, he turned south on the county road that rimmed the lake. Carlie reached for the radio, but Ben shook his head. “Hasn’t worked for a few months now,” he said, his fingers brushing her bare leg as he shifted into third. His fingers skimmed her thigh and he felt a tightening in his gut.

  Carlie f
elt the touch of his fingers, and her skin tingled. She pretended to stare out the dusty windshield, but she watched him from the corner of her eye. He squinted slightly as he drove and the planes of his face seemed more rugged in the dark cab. He was dark and sexy and dangerous.

  The porch light was burning at Brenda’s old farmhouse. Ben unloaded the rowboat, and, following Brenda’s instructions, propped the boat against the side of a concrete-block shed. “Thanks for the ride,” Brenda sang out as she ran up the cement walk. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow, Carlie!” She dashed up the steps and disappeared into the house as Ben climbed behind the wheel.

  “Now where?” he asked, glancing in her direction and noting that she’d moved to the far side of the cab, as if she didn’t want to chance touching him.

  “I live in town. The Lakeview Apartments on Cedar Street—one block off Pine.”

  “I’ve been there.” He slashed her a smile that was white in the darkness and caused her heart to flip.

  “Then you know there’s no lake and no view.” She relaxed against the worn cushions and rolled down the window. Fresh air blew into the cab, ruffling her hair and caressing her cheeks.

  A train was passing on the old railroad trestle that spanned the highway into town as the lights of Gold Creek came into view. They passed the Dari-Maid and turned at the corner of Pine and Main by the Rexall Drugstore, the store where her mother had worked for as long as Carlie could remember.

  Though she was nervous just being alone with him, she hoped he didn’t notice. Her palms were sweaty, her throat dry and her heart knocked loudly as the night seemed to close around them.

  He took the corner a little too fast and the truck’s tires squealed as he pulled into the parking lot near her parents’ apartment complex. Built in the thirties, the Lakeview was comprised of three six-plex town houses. On the exterior, the bottom floors were faced in brick while the upper story was white clapboard. Black shutters adorned paned windows and though the apartments weren’t very big, they still held a certain charm that her mother loved. “Just like home,” Thelma, who had been raised in Brooklyn, New York, had told her daughter on more than one occasion. “You can’t find quality building like this anymore.”