Whispers Read online

Dominique lifted a silk-draped shoulder. “I did what I had to, and I’ve never regretted it. Well, except at times like this. I just don’t understand why this family can’t sit down and have a civil meal together.”

  Jack Songbird hiked the collar of his jean jacket closer around his neck. The wind was picking up, blowing in from the Pacific, a storm brewing. Good. He liked the fierce squalls. Bring it on! More than a little drunk, he glared at what remained of his campfire. Hot, red embers glowed in the night. He took a long pull from his fifth of whiskey and glanced upward, to the few stars visible through the clouds. Here on the ridge he felt above it all, the town of Chinook stretching along the inlet, lights sparkling as if to mimic the stars. Somewhere down there his father and mother were probably wondering where he was. Well, they could just damn wonder. He didn’t care.

  Slightly drunk, he pulled out his knife and smiled, remembering how it had felt to run the sharp blade along the car’s sleek paint job. It had felt good. Right. No one would ever know. No one could ever prove he was the vandal.

  His parents, if they ever found out, would be mortified. They seemed to accept their lot in life without any qualms. They had pride in themselves, in their heritage, but they didn’t seem to accept the truth—Native Americans had gotten the shaft big-time. They seemed to give a little lip service to their ancestors and the “ways of the people” but they didn’t do anything about it, they weren’t angry that they were reduced to living near the poverty level, accepting wages from pricks like the Taggerts and the Hollands.

  Shit.

  It just wasn’t fair.

  And then Crystal. Jesus, what was she thinking? Running around with Weston Taggert while he treated her like dirt. Such a waste. Crystal was smart and beautiful. Too good for Taggert.

  Jack glanced down at the blade of his knife and scowled. He marred the car, yeah, but gouging the paint had been the act of a coward. What he’d really needed to do was slit Weston Taggert’s throat—show the bastard what it meant to treat a good woman like a whore. He slid the blade between his index finger and thumb, testing it, knowing that he would never have the guts to kill the bastard, even when he was balling Crystal and treating her like dirt.

  You’re just mad cuz he fired your ass.

  Well, that was part of it. Jack dropped his knife onto his backpack then took a long swallow from his bottle. Maybe now he could blow this hick town. Take off in his pickup and head south. To California. Get away from Chinook for good. But first he needed to take a piss. Bad.

  He heard a noise in the trees just out of the light of the fire. The hairs on the back of his neck rose. There had been sightings of puma and bobcat a little farther up in the hills and bears had been known to wander in these parts . . .

  Jack cocked his head, his ears straining. Maybe it was nothing. A rabbit or possum or night bird . . . He heard nothing over the rush of wind, hiss of the fire and the dull roar of the ocean pounding the rocky shoreline a hundred feet below.

  It was just his imagination, nothing more. The wind.

  And yet . . . He felt the first few drops of rain and thought about leaving, going home, facing the wrath of his parents when they found out that he’d been canned. Jesus, Ruby would have herself a helluva hissy fit but the old man would be worse. From him, Jack would get the silent treatment. Yep, it was time to move on.

  As he stood, he heard another sound. A footstep? Turning quickly, he thought he saw movement in the shadows. Jack froze. “Who’s there?” he yelled, his eyes narrowing on the stand of fir just beyond the firelight.

  No answer.

  Hell, he was getting jumpy.

  Too much booze, not enough food. He needed to go back into town. Walk off the alcohol. Face the goddamned music. Stumbling a bit he walked to the edge of the ridge where he’d imagined his ancestors had stood hundreds of years before, where he’d peed into the sea every time he’d come up here. He reached for his fly when he heard it again. The sound of footsteps rushing toward him. He whirled quickly. Saw a flash of movement. A jagged rock the size of a softball slammed into his forehead. Crack! Hot, white pain pounded through his head. He reeled backward, his boots slipping in the mud, his hands scrabbling in the air.

  “Die bastard!” an evil voice hissed from the darkness.

  Panicked, Jack pitched backward, his body slipping and bouncing off the rocky face of the cliff as he plummeted headfirst toward the rocks and angry black sea.

  “You’re out of your fuckin’ mind!” Weston slammed his pool cue onto the table where he’d been practicing his bank shots before Harley had strolled down to the den and made his insane announcement. “You can’t marry anyone.”

  “Why not?”

  Weston leaned his butt against the edge of the billiard table and looked at his brother as if Harley were a bona fide certificate-bearing idiot. “Don’t you have some unfinished business with Kendall?”

  “It’s over.”

  “Is it?” Weston glanced to the hallway, where he noticed a shadow sliding down the stairs. Paige. Hell, that kid was always sneaking around, listening for gossip. Not for the first time Weston wondered how he could be related to his spineless moron of a brother and nutcase of a sister. In Weston’s estimation, Paige needed to see a shrink. And what about you? his mind teased, gnawing at him.

  Harley picked up the eight ball and started tossing it nervously in the air. It was fitting somehow, the kid was always in trouble. He just didn’t know how deep. It wouldn’t be long before Kendall dumped the news on him that he was about to be a daddy—well, really an uncle—if things went as planned.

  “Kendall seems to think that you two are still together.”

  “I don’t know how.”

  “Maybe it’s because you can’t stay out of her pants.”

  Harley actually blushed. Jesus, he had no balls. “I’m not seeing her.”

  “Good. Then you can marry Claire Holland and life will be perfect, is that what you think? Even though Dad will cut you off and college will be out of the question. Don’t you know you’ll have to get work as a grease monkey or a waiter, or a factory worker if you can hold down that kind of a job? And you’ll live in some crummy apartment in a bad part of Portland or Seattle or wherever it is that you finally find someone stupid enough to employ you. Dad won’t give you a reference, you can bet on it, and you’ve never held down a job in your life. As for Claire, she’ll have to work, too. As a secretary or receptionist . . . oh, no, she’s not good at that kind of thing, is she? Maybe she’ll train horses or give riding lessons or something. And everything will be just great. Perfect!”

  “That’s not how it’s gonna be.”

  “Sure it is, Harley. She’ll have no money and neither will you. Even your car is in Dad’s name. I don’t suppose you’ve broken the news to him yet, have you?”

  “When he gets back into town—”

  The phone rang shrilly and the shadow disappeared up the stairs. Good. Paige had a way of making Weston nervous. Why, he couldn’t figure. She was just a gawky kid. “When Dad gets back from Louisiana, you think he’ll embrace the fact that you’re going to marry one of the daughters of his archenemy? Sure Harley, that’s gonna happen. About the time I sprout horns.”

  “I’ve got news for you, Weston. You already have.”

  “Telephone for you, Weston!” Paige called down the stairs. “It’s Crystal.”

  “Shit!”

  Harley had the balls to grin. “At least I’m not banging some girl just for the hell of it. I’ll bet her brother isn’t too happy that you’re using her as a squaw-fuck. Isn’t that the term you use when you’re talking about her? Maybe someone should tell Jack.”

  “Jack Songbird is an asshole.”

  “I wouldn’t cross him.”

  “He doesn’t scare me. No one does.”

  “I said Crystal’s on the phone!” Paige’s voice was shrill as a screaming saw.

  “Tell her I’m out!” Weston yelled.

  Paige’s footsteps thundered d
own the stairs. “I already told her you were down here playing pool.”

  “Damn it all, Paige. Use your head.” He crossed to the bar, wishing he had a good stiff drink, and picked up the phone. “Look, I’m busy right now. I’ll call you back.”

  “Wait a minute. Did Jack show up at work today?”

  Weston’s gut clenched. “He was late.”

  “But he was there.”

  “Until I fired his ass.”

  “You . . . you what?”

  “He’s gone. History. Your brother was the worst worker on the green chain, Crystal. I let him go.”

  “But you couldn’t.” He heard the disappointment in her voice, and it got to him. There was something about her that got deep under his skin; that was why he doubted that he’d ever break it off with her, not completely. She’d be his mistress for life.

  “I did. Ask him.”

  “I would, but he hasn’t come home yet.”

  “I’d look down at the local watering hole. Sounds like your brother might just be drowning his troubles in firewater.”

  “You’re a bastard,” she said calmly.

  “Always have been.”

  Before she hung up, she muttered something in Chinook, an irritating habit she had that bothered him. He didn’t like not being able to understand what her gobbledygook language said, and though she probably just called him the Native American equivalent of an asshole, it worried him that she might have leveled a curse in his direction, not that he believed in all that tribal mumbo jumbo. Still, his skin crawled as he disconnected.

  “Trouble with the little woman?” Harley taunted. Christ, his brother could be irritating.

  “Not for me.” Weston grabbed his cue, took the eight ball from Harley’s weak fingers, and set up his shot again. He didn’t have to worry about his brother’s wisecracks, his sister’s weird antics, or some whore and her curse. After all, he was Weston Taggert.

  He could do whatever he damn well pleased.

  Fifteen

  His old man was drunk.

  Again.

  And tonight it bothered the hell out of Kane. Why, he couldn’t fathom, but ever since Jack’s revelation that Claire Holland and Harley Taggert were engaged, Kane had been spoiling for a fight. He itched to slam his fist into a wall, a tree trunk, and/or Taggert’s smug face, not necessarily in that order.

  “Son of a bitch,” he growled, reaching to the top of a battle-scarred chest of drawers where his keys rested in an ashtray. It was the middle of the month and Hampton had gone through his fifths of expensive booze. For the last week and a half all he’d been tossing back was cheap rotgut whiskey, while he groused about his ex-wife and what a conniving, self-centered bitch she’d been to leave him alone, crippled, and with a headstrong boy to raise.

  “You don’t know the half of it, Pop,” Kane muttered under his breath as he slid open the window. He heard his father’s wheelchair zip across the linoleum while the television blared, sounds of laughter for the late night’s talk show host’s monologue seeping through the thin plaster walls.

  God, Kane hated it here. Trapped with a bitter cripple who spurned any help neighbors or relatives had extended. Kindhearted, churchgoing people in town had offered Hampton jobs—at the hardware store, the fish cannery, the feed store, and even an insurance company, but Hampton Kane, ex-tree-topper, wasn’t about to take their charity. No, he was content to wallow in his misery and, when he did work, it was at his own form of chain saw art.

  The front lawn and porch were littered with sawdust and Hampton’s special kind of sculpture—unsold wooden sentinels that appeared to guard the place. Snarling bears, fierce-faced Native Americans, bowlegged cowboys with matches in the corners of their mouths, and rearing horses with wild eyes and curling manes were carved from the trunks of the kind of trees from which he’d fallen and lost the use of his legs. It was as if Hampton was engaged in a private war with the forests surrounding Chinook and Stone Illahee, and his enemies included every last stick of old growth timber as well as anyone with the last name of Holland.

  People who stopped to look at his wares often thought the scarred chunks of fir were quaint, and that Hampton was an eccentric artist, a man whose dark disposition was the result of his inner need to express himself rather than because he held on to his hatred as if it were a gift from God or that he soaked his brain in cheap alcohol.

  In Kane’s estimation, it was all crap.

  The front door banged shut and a minute later Pop’s chain saw roared to life as yet another unsuspecting stump was about to become a wolf or salmon or some other Northwest icon. Kane wasn’t about to stick around and find out. He lifted himself onto the window ledge, then slid to the edge of the roof and lowered himself to the ground. He wasn’t sneaking out. No, his father wouldn’t even miss him. He just didn’t want to explain himself to the old man tonight.

  And he wanted to see Claire. Badly. Even though he knew it was a mistake.

  Firing up his motorcycle, he left the house of pain behind and flew down the night-dark strip of highway. He put the bike through its paces, needing to hear the whine of gears and feel the rush of salty air against his face as he huddled over the handlebars and leaned into a tight curve. The Harley shimmied for a second, caught hold, and skimmed over the highway again. Faster and faster, as if the devil himself were on his tail, Kane maneuvered the bike around the lake. Through the trees and across the moonlit water he caught glimpses of her house, the warm patches of the dozens of windows and, barely visible, smoke curling from the chimney. Just like some damned Currier and Ives painting.

  The gate was open and he didn’t hesitate, just boldly drove through, the headlight of his bike guiding him on. Sliding to a stop near the garage, he gritted his teeth as he marched up the stairs of the porch and nearly rang the bell. But she was there, curled into a corner of a porch swing, her long legs tucked beneath her, her eyes, luminous in the moonlight, staring up at him.

  “What’re you doing here?”

  “Looking for you.” He didn’t move, just watched the play of starlight in her hair.

  “For me?”

  “I heard you’re getting married.”

  Her smile was stiff and forced. “Don’t tell me, you’re going to try and talk me out of it.”

  “Not if it’s what you want.”

  “It is.” She tucked her knees under her chin.

  He felt suddenly hot, and he imagined taking hold of her hand and running, as fast and as far as his legs would carry him, holding her close. If she couldn’t keep up with him, then he’d carry her. But they couldn’t stay here, not with the presence of doom huddling in the surrounding forest, glaring at them with hungry possessive eyes, as if there was no way out of this desperate, hateful situation. “Then I hope you’re happy.”

  “You don’t mean it.” She unwrapped those long legs. “You didn’t come here to wish me ‘good luck’ or ‘congratulations. ’” She crossed the short space that separated them, and he imagined she’d been crying, that there was just the hint of moisture in her eyes. Tilting her face to meet the questions in his gaze, she stood toe to toe with him. “What is it you want from me, Kane Moran?”

  “More than I can have,” he admitted, and he saw her lips twist downward a second. An owl hooted softly from a nearby tree, and farther away, from the other side of the lake, a dog, probably his dad’s sorry old hound, gave a soulful bark.

  “I’m in love with Harley Taggert.”

  “And that son of a bitch doesn’t deserve you.”

  “Why not?” she asked, so close he felt her breath, saw the anger in the sudden spots of color in her cheeks. “Why does everyone in this damned town think he’s no good?”

  “He’s weak, Claire. You need someone strong.”

  “Like you?” she challenged.

  He eyed her for a second as a night bird let out a long, lonely cry and a faraway train rattled on its tracks. “Yep,” he admitted. “Like me.”

  “You’re leaving.
”

  “Not quite yet.”

  Her sigh blew her bangs from her eyes, and it was all Kane could do to keep his hands where they were, plastered around his chest, holding on for dear life. He imagined taking her into his arms and kissing her, of cradling her so long and close that she couldn’t move, of bending her back so that her hair brushed the floorboards as he kissed her, but he didn’t move, didn’t dare. Instead he sweated and closed his mind to each and every erotic image that burned through his brain.

  “What do you want to do?” she asked suddenly, her voice softer.

  He barked out a laugh. “You don’t want to know.”

  “Sure I do.”

  “No—”

  “You came here for a reason, Kane.”

  “I just wanted to see you again.”

  “And nothing more?”

  He hesitated.

  “What?”

  His willpower fled on the salty wind blowing in from the ocean. “Christ, Claire, what do you think?”

  “I don’t know—”

  “Sure you do.”

  “No, Kane—”

  “Think about it.” His gaze held hers, then flicked to her lips. Heat burned through his blood and desire, smoky with want, controlled his muscles. He reached forward and his hands surrounded the soft skin of her bare arms. Her lips parted and his cock sprang to attention. His thoughts raced like the swift current of the Chinook River through deep mountain chasms. “Whatever you think I want, you’re probably right.”

  “Just say it,” she said, her voice breathless.

  He considered and decided what the hell. It didn’t matter what she thought. “Okay, Claire,” he said, fingers tightening over her arms. “The truth of the matter is I’d like to do anything and everything I could with you. I’d like to kiss you and touch you and sleep with you in my arms until morning. I’d like to run my tongue over your bare skin until you quiver with want, and, more than anything in the world, I’d like to bury myself in you and make love to you for the rest of my life!”

  She tried to pull away, but he grinned and held fast.