Laurel, p.25
Laurel, page 25
"If you came all the way from Texas to tell me that, you should have saved yourself the trouble."
"Okay, tell me why you should blame yourself."
"Don't ask stupid questions, George. You're too old for it."
"I want to understand why you blame yourself."
"No, you don't. You want to twist everything I say until it sounds like something else. Then you're going to use it to show me I was wrong. I'm not seventeen any longer. It won't work."
"Tell me anyway."
"Hell!" Hen stalked across the wash and through the trees until he stood at the edge of the desert. The distant rain clouds wouldn't reach Sycamore Flats for some hours. The heat from the sun engulfed his body like a wave of fire. He knew what George was trying to do, and he was grateful, but no twisting of the facts could point the finger in any other direction.
"I should have taken Allison's gun right from the first. If I had put him in jail, none of this would have happened."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because I wanted to teach him a lesson. He's not a killer yet. I thought if I could strip away the romance, show him what it really meant to kill somebody . . . "
"Would he have learned that if you'd put him in jail?"
"No. He'd have come after me the minute he got a chance."
"Will he come after you now?"
"He won't go after anybody."
"Then you succeeded."
"But it cost Hope her life. If I hadn't been so cocksure--"
"You could have been killed."
"He was too drunk."
"He could have shot me, or the saloon keeper, or anybody else."
"It was my job to see he didn't shoot anybody. Next to that, everything else was unimportant. Go back to the hotel, George. I'm not going to do anything rash, but I've got to be alone."
He turned into the desert. There was nothing out there, but the solitude drew him onward.
* * * * *
"What did the doctor say?" Laurel asked Horace Worthy.
"He doesn't know what to say," Horace told her. "She should have died within minutes, but she's still alive."
"How's Mrs. Worthy?"
"I can't thank you and Miranda enough, but I don't know what she would have done without Ruth. Grace holds onto her like she would go crazy if she let go."
The normally calm and capable Grace Worthy was still hysterical with grief. Laurel couldn't help but wonder how she would have handled this had it been Adam. Just the thought made her tremble. She was worried about Hen, too. She had never seen him look so desperate. She wanted to go to him, but she didn't dare leave Horace. Hope could die any minute. He would need all the support she could give him.
But even as she went through the motions of making certain everything was ready, her mind remained on Hen.
* * * * *
"I don't think you'd better come in," Horace said to Hen. "Grace has finally begun to get herself under control. Seeing you might set her off again."
"I just wanted to see Hope."
"Doc Everson says no one is to see her."
"Then she hasn't . . . She's still hanging on?"
Horace looked like he'd aged twenty years in the last few hours. "Doc says she can't last out the night." The admission was too painful to share, and he averted his eyes. "Now you'd better go home. It looks like rain. A gully washer if I'm any judge. You'll get wet through."
Hen wondered why Horace should think he would be worried about getting wet. "Is Laurel here?"
"She's with Hope. She hasn't left her side since they brought her home."
"Tommy?"
"Miranda took him home with her. Now I'd better get back."
A few drops of rain hit the dusty street as Hen turned away from the Worthy's home. But he didn't head toward the jail or his house. Or the hotel. There was nothing there for him.
There was nothing anywhere.
* * * * *
"I don't know where he went?" George said to Laurel. "Not even Jordy can find him. And he strikes me as capable of finding anything that walks, creeps, or crawls."
Laurel's smile was weak. She had stayed with Hope until Mrs. Worthy had become calm enough to rejoin her husband at Hope's bedside. After that, she felt she was intruding. Even worse, she couldn't rid herself of the suspicion the Worthy's somehow blamed her. If it hadn't been for her and Adam, Allison Blackthorne wouldn't have come to Sycamore Flats.
There was no question Grace held Hen responsible. Laurel could see it in her eyes. There was no warmth. No friendliness. There was nothing except the dread certainty her beloved daughter would die.
"Where was he headed when you last saw him?"
"Up the wash toward those mountains."
Like a wild animal, Hen preferred to lick his wounds in solitude. So did she, but tonight was no time to be alone. Not for Hen. Not for her.
The initial fury of the storm had passed, but a steady rain continued to fall. She pulled a scarf over her head even though she knew it would be soaked in a few minutes. She hurried across the muddy street and down one of the alleys until she came to the wash.
Sycamore Creek flowed bank-full tonight.
She looked up toward the mountains that rose abruptly behind the town, to the canyon it had taken several millennia to carve from the stone. He was up there somewhere. She would find him. He would not be alone tonight.
* * * * *
Hen stared out at the meadow with unseeing eyes. He was as unmindful of the deer and mountain sheep that grazed the wet grass as he was of the rain that soaked him to the skin, of the cold that leached the heat from his body until he felt chilled and stiff. His attention centered on the pain the gnawed at his insides until he wanted to rip it out with his bare hands.
For years he had refused to feel anything. That refusal had been his shield, his armor plate. But it hadn't always been so, and tonight's tragedy brought back memories of a time when he was more vulnerable, when there seemed to be nothing but pain.
Fourteen years ago he had stood at his mother's grave. Her love, her beauty, her refusal to forget the kinder world that had given her birth, had been his shield against his father's cruelty. He had been able to forgive her weakness as long as she lived. But her death, her fervent wish to die, had been the final betrayal. He had buried his belief in the goodness of life in that parched Texas grave along with her frail body. He swore then he would never feel anything again.
But he had changed since he came to Sycamore Flats. He knew it the minute he faced Allison.
He hadn't seen the gun, the danger to himself, the threat to the townspeople and their property. He had only seen a boy much like he had been years ago, teetering of the verge of the abyss, an abyss Allison didn't even know was there. Once you kill, something within you dies. It's impossible to go back to being like you were before. Hen knew. He had tried. He had seen others try. His only concern had been to keep Allison from crossing that line. But in allowing emotion to cloud his judgment, he had forgotten himself, George, Tyler, everybody. He nearly cost Tyler his life.
He had cost Hope hers.
He had come up here as much to escape hearing the news of Hope's death as to be by himself. In fourteen years, no one he'd taken under his protection had ever been hurt. Tonight he had failed twice.
He tried to shut out all thoughts of Hope, but it was as though his mind had been invaded by demons who delighted in torturing him with memories of Hope as she used to be, as she was when he last saw her, lying on the floor, the color drained from her, a ragged, blood-soaked hole in her chest, of Grace Worthy screaming at him, of Horace Worthy looking old and lifeless.
He started to his feet and lunged from under the protective shelf of rock overhead. The shock of cold rain stinging his face brought him to a standstill. He desperately wanted to run away, to hide until the hurt went away, to stay hidden until he could refortify his soul. But he knew it was useless. He wasn't running way from Sycamore Flats or anybody in it. He was trying to run away from himself.
From that there was no escape.
Weak. Just like his mother. He had known it all long. He had tried to deny it, but should have known he couldn't hide from something like that forever. The greatest irony was he had thought he was strong enough to love Laurel, to take care of her and Adam.
Almost as if by magic, a vision of her appeared on the far side of the meadow. She was walking toward him, almost obscured by the slanting rain. He cursed his mind for playing this cruel trick on him. He closed his eyes, but the image was still there when he opened them again.
Relenting, too emotionally exhausted to block out the cruelly taunting image, he wished the vision could be real, that Laurel was really coming to him. Amid the rubble of his soul, his love for her was the only constant, the only thing that made sense.
It was something to hold onto, to redeem him.
He stared at the mirage as it danced and hovered in the darkness. She was so beautiful. Not just beautiful of body, but beautiful of soul. She was the kind of woman who could make a man better than himself, make him dare things he never dreamed possible. She could make him believe he was worthy of redemption.
She was the kind of woman he wanted to be his wife.
Yet the very moment he knew he wanted to marry Laurel, he also knew it was the one thing he couldn't do. The weakness would always be there. On the surface things would seem okay, just as they had with his mother. But one day, when everything depended on him, he would fail her just as his parents had failed him.
He couldn't do that to Laurel. She was strong. She could stand alone. But if she ever started to depend on him, that might prove to be a weakness she couldn't overcome. No. If he loved her as much as he thought he did, he wouldn't add to her burden.
The pain of knowing he must back away from the only thing he really wanted was almost more than he could stand. Closing his eyes, he turned away, pounding his forehead to dislodge the vision that tortured him beyond his ability to endure it. He staggered forward letting the full force of the rain pommel his body. He must face reality. He must decide what to do, and visions of Laurel would play no part in that decision.
But the minute he opened his eyes again, he knew Laurel was no vision. She was real, solid, and she was coming toward him.
* * * * *
Laurel saw Hen standing in the rain, pounding his forehead with his fists, and wondered again if she should have come. He might feel she had no business here. She clutched the oil skin protectively to her chest. She plodded on, the increasingly heavy rain did not slow her steps or dent her determination.
She didn't know what she was going to say. She had no idea what to do. She didn't know what kind of demons he might be fighting, but she didn't want him to have to face them alone. She didn't know why she thought she could help when his family obviously couldn't, but her footsteps never faltered.
The man she loved was suffering. She would do just about anything to help him.
He was watching her now, staring at her. She felt the restraining hand of doubt tug at her footsteps, but she pushed it aside. Hen might turn her away, but nothing else would.
He didn't speak. He just watched. His clothes clung to his body. She had never realized he was so thin. She remembered Hope saying he ate very little. He ought to eat more. It wasn't good for a man to be so thin, especially not a man who demanded so much of his body.
He continued to stare at her. She could barely make out his features. Only the moisture reflecting light off the surface of his skin made it possible to see his expression. His face was blank, but his eyes burned like blue fire.
Laurel felt some answering flame leap within her. The chains were off. The thick leather hide that had encased his soul had cracked wide open, leaving him exposed and vulnerable. If she was ever to know the man she loved, truly know him, now would be tonight.
"I brought you some dry clothes," Laurel said. She held out the folded slicker.
"Why did you come?"
She knew he wasn't asking about clothes. Neither did he refer to his safety. His question went far beyond physical comfort. It reached to the very center of her soul.
"Because I love you."
That was it. All of it. Yet the words left so much unsaid. It was impossible to tell him of the ache deep within her that would never go away. It was impossible to explain how he had won her heart when so many before had failed. She didn't understand it herself. She only knew she couldn't imagine living without him. He was the part of her she had never found before, the part she hadn't even known was missing.
She held out the slicker. He took it, but his eyes never left her face.
"Why did you come?"
"Didn't you know I would?"
"No."
She could tell he meant it. It wasn't that he doubted she loved him. He didn't believe he was worthy of love.
"I'm a gunfighter, a killer."
"You have fought with guns, but you're no killer."
The two of them stood in the rain, staring at each other. Water dripped from his nose, ran in rivulets over his face like someone had emptied a bucket over his head.
"Where's your hat?"
He shrugged.
Laurel put her hand to his cheek. "You're cold."
He put his hand over hers. "You're warm."
She wanted to remain standing like this forever, his hand on hers, him looking deep into her eyes, conscious of nothing and no one else. But she had to speak. She had to find a way to help him through this dark hour.
"It wasn't your fault."
He dropped his hand and turned away. She hadn't wanted to say those words, to intrude on the feeling between them, but she knew why he had come up here. Avoiding it was cowardly. Besides, it wouldn't help Hen.
"I might as well have shot her myself."
She put her right hand on his arm and tried to turn him toward her, but he wouldn't move. She stepped in front of him. The rain hit her full in the face. "Nobody believes that," she said, wiping the water out of her eyes with her left hand. She could see the agony he was suffering. She would have traded everything she possessed to wash it away.
"Things seldom turn out as we expect. Allison could have shot someone else."
"But not Hope!"
"Would it have been any better if he'd shot Scott Elgin? Or Tyler. Or you."
She felt rather than saw the tears in his eyes.
"How would you feel if it had been Adam?"
She couldn't let herself dwell on that question. She had stayed inside because she was afraid Adam would run down the street. She still felt a little guilty about that. But she had to answer him. She had to be as honest as she could.
"I would be crazy with grief. I would be angry at the whole world. I would try to hurt you because of the terrible hurt I was feeling. But no matter what I did, I would know it wasn't your fault. I would only be trying to tear the pain out of my heart."
"You think Mrs. Worthy will feel like that?"
"After a while. The important thing is how you feel."
Hen turned away. "I'll leave as soon as they bury Hope." He stumbled over the words.
Laurel felt him slipping away. She tried to contain the fear of losing him forever.
"Where will you go?"
"It doesn't matter."
"Will you go home?"
"No."
Laurel pulled on his arm until he turned to face her. "Then it matters more than anything."
"Why?"
"Because you can't keep running from yourself, from people who love you."
"How can you love me when you know what I am?"
"Nobody knows what you are, not even yourself."
Why hadn't he been able to see that before? No one knew him because he wouldn't let them. "Aren't you afraid of who I might turn out to be?"
"Are you?"
"Yes." All his life he'd been afraid he would turn out to be like his father. All of them felt like that except Zac, who was too young to remember the bastard. Only he was also afraid he would be weak like his mother. "Nothing good went into making me. How could I be worth anything? Have you ever looked at yourself and been afraid of what you might see?"
"All the time. I'm petrified I might see my own father. He was always chasing dreams and ignoring reality until it was too late. A small part of me will always be like him" -- that's why she'd never given up hope of marrying Hen -- "but when I'm tempted to do something he would have done, the rest of me helps hold me back. I can't always make myself feel the way I ought, but it helps to have Adam. I can do anything for his sake."
Hen felt more alone than ever. He felt protective of his brothers, but he suspected Laurel's feeling for her son involved a kind and quality of caring that went far beyond anything he could feel. He thought of the way he had seen George and Rose look at each other. He'd seen it so many times he took it for granted. Sometimes it made him impatient, critical, even skeptical. But that had come from the emptiness inside himself, the inability to feel, not wanting to feel, of always wanting to distance himself from any emotional ties.
But he didn't feel that way about Laurel. Not tonight, not ever. Even as he had turned his back on the town and the people in it, he had retreated to a place that was hers, a place where he was very much aware of her. For the first time in his life he didn't want to be alone.
He looked at her with the rain streaming down her face, her raven hair clinging to her head and shoulders. She'd never looked more beautiful. The sheen of water gave her white skin a luminous quality. Pinpoints of light flickered in her near-black eyes. She seemed like an angel sent to pull him back from the brink.
"You think I have a better nature, that I can pull back from the devil inside me?"
"I know you can. You did it tonight."
He held out his hand. Laurel placed hers in it. "Why did you come?"
"Because I didn't want you to be alone tonight."
Hen's need to reach out, to share what he felt washed over him like a flash flood through a mountain canyon. His life suddenly seemed barren, dead. From that very first day he had sensed in Laurel a person who could touch the part of him that always seemed to be just out of reach. He had wanted to protect her and Adam, but he'd been selfish as well.
