Running Scared Part 23

"Fine," the boy said, his eyes trained on Daegan, daring him to say anything.

"He was thrown from one of my horses."

"One of your horses? horses?" The corners of her mouth drew down and the wariness he'd witnessed the other day appeared in her eyes. "Jon?"

"I'm okay."

"But you were supposed to be upstairs-I was in the kitchen-I didn't hear you leave..." Again her eyes, the color of whiskey in the sunlight, pinned Daegan. "What was he doing on your horse?" There was a small, involuntary tightening of her muscles. "For that matter, why was Jon at your place?"

"I think he came over to look after the dog. You'll have to ask him. I wasn't at the house when he decided to see if he could tame Buckshot."

"Buckshot?" Her eyebrows lifted a little. "Jon, what the devil's going on here?"

"I snuck out." He walked to the porch and leaned heavily against the rail. Sweat beaded on his upper lip. "So what?"

"So what?" She threw her hands to the heavens. "You're already grounded because of the suspension last week and the fight and-" She cut herself off, glanced at Daegan again, and blew a few strands of sun-streaked hair from her eyes. "Look, before I go flying off the handle again, I guess I owe you an apology," she said without much conviction. "I don't know what he was doing at your place, but I'm sorry if he inconvenienced you. Thanks for rescuing him."

"You might want to have his shoulder looked at. He landed pretty hard."

"It's fine!" Jon said.

"Maybe," Daegan admitted. "Could just be bruised."

"And he didn't rescue me, okay?" Jon glared at his mother. His color was all wrong-the summer tan now a milky shade and his lips were bloodless. He was hurting, whether he wanted to admit it or not.

Kate was having none of his martyrdom and show of false courage. "Let's take a look."

Eyes flas.h.i.+ng defiantly, Jon gritted his teeth as she lifted his T-s.h.i.+rt and gingerly touched his skin. He sucked his breath in a hiss of pain as his back and stomach were exposed. Obviously embarra.s.sed, Jon avoided Daegan's eyes as his mother examined him. A dark scarlet blush climbed steadily up his neck to burn in his cheeks.

Kate frowned. "Already bruised." Letting the T-s.h.i.+rt fall back, she said. "We'd better run to the clinic for a couple of X-rays. Get in the car, Jon. I'll find my shoes and purse."

"I don't need X-rays," Jon said vehemently. He scowled at Daegan as if he'd been betrayed.

"Better safe than sorry."

"I'm okay, Mom."

"What possessed you to go joy riding?" Turning to face Daegan, she folded her arms under her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "Or was this your idea?"

"He didn't know about it," Jon admitted. "I was just lookin' after Roscoe and I saw the horse and-"

"Oh, Lord, Jon, don't you know any better? Let me grab my keys..."

"Geez, Mom, I'm not a baby!"

Her temper snapped. "Then quit acting like one. Don't argue with me!"

"I'm not a little kid, all right?" An angry look crossed his young features, and Daegan gleaned that the war between mother and son ran deep. They might love each other, all right, but Kate was probably overprotective. The boy was trouble waiting to happen. A bad mix. Daegan knew it all too well.

It was time to leave. "I hope he's okay," he said, then pointed a finger at Jon's chest. "Look, Jon, you're welcome to come over and see the dog any time-but you might be a little careful around Buckshot."

"He won't be around Buckshot again."

"It would be all right, if I was there. Let me know what the doctor says." He touched the boy on his good shoulder, half expecting him to pull away. Instead, Jon froze, his eyes turned dark, and he stared at Daegan as if he'd never seen him before this split second.

Daegan's insides jelled.

"Who was the guy you killed?" Jon asked, and Kate, who was already opening the screen door to the house, paused.

"I told you. No one. The closest I came was a knife fight with my cousin years ago and it was b.l.o.o.d.y. That's how I got this..." He motioned to his ear, where the lobe was missing. "But-"

"He died."

s.h.i.+t. "I told you that before."

"But not later, like you wanted me to think, but right then and there."

Daegan saw the fear in Kate's eyes and knew he had to nip this in the bud. "That's not quite the way it happened. It was ugly. My cousin jumped me from behind."

"Why?" Jon demanded.

Daegan shook his head. "He was mad at me. We were both young and full of p.i.s.s and vinegar. He came at me with a crowbar and a knife, and by the time it was over, we were both busted up pretty bad. To tell you the truth, I was afraid I had killed him, with his knife." Kate was staring at him with wide, horrified eyes and a piece of Daegan's soul seemed to wither a bit. "As I said, we were both hurt pretty bad, but I made it to a phone and called the police. By the time they got there, he was dead."

"So you-you-"

"Dear G.o.d." Her hand flew to her mouth.

"No. I left him alive. But the police questioned me over and over again. Fortunately there was a witness who claimed he saw me run to the phone booth and another couple of men came along, two-bit thugs probably, who robbed my cousin and finished the job." He looked away and rubbed the back of his neck in agitation. "If I hadn't run to call the police, maybe I could have saved him. Maybe not. Maybe that makes me guilty of murder. All I know is I'd give anything to relive that night again," he said with conviction. "There isn't a day goes by that I don't wish I could change things. But I can't. I have to accept that."

"Jesus," Jon whispered, whether in awe or revulsion, Daegan couldn't tell. The boy's threat worked and Daegan dropped his hand.

Kate's breath whistled between her teeth. "Go inside," she said to her boy. "And I've already warned you about the language."

"Wait a minute, Mom. Didn't you hear what he just said? O'Rourke-"

"Go inside," she repeated. "Do it! Now."

Jon scrambled through the front door.

"I don't know what to say," she admitted, biting her lip. "Your story is-"

"Ugly."

"Yes, and to be truthful, it scares me." Wrapping her arms around her middle, as if protecting herself, she stared him straight in the eye. "I think it would be best, for all of us, if Jon stays here where he belongs. If he wanders your way again, please, just send him home."

Daegan stood his ground. "It's too bad you had to find out my deepest secret," he said and he meant it. Telling her too much about his fight with Stuart, giving her a glimmer into his private life, was dangerous.

"So is that it? Nothing else?"

One side of his mouth lifted. "You expect something worse than me being hauled into jail for questioning in a murder?"

"No...I guess not."

He didn't believe her. She had trouble meeting his eyes. Now, it was her turn. "What about you?" he asked.

"Me?"

"Any skeletons in your closet?" he asked as a lonely hawk circled overhead and the wind seemed to die for an instant. He counted out the beats of her heart in the pulse at the base of her throat while she hesitated and looked away toward the mountains to a spot only she could see.

"None that I can share," she finally said.

"What happened to Jon's father?"

"What?" She jerked. He had her attention now.

"How did he die?"

"An accident. Hit and run," she said, swallowing hard. "He and my little girl were walking and they were both killed." Her voice was the barest of whispers, and Daegan experienced the unlikely need to wrap his arms around her, to hold her and comfort her, to lie and tell her things would be better when he knew they were only going to get worse. Much worse. Instead he scowled at the ground and rammed his hands into his pockets. "Jim never even saw Jon."

"That's a shame. Your son's a good boy. His father would have been proud."

She stared at him as if he'd just said the world would come to an end in ten minutes. Her fingers fluttered nervously and she wiped them on her jeans. "Yes, well, I, um, need to get Jon to the doctor." She started to head to the house, but stopped. "You know, sometimes Jon, he-well, he says things he shouldn't."

"He's a boy. They tend to do that." Daegan saw the questions in her eyes, and behind her, through the screen, he noticed the boy's pale face staring at him through the mesh. "Don't we all?"

He started to turn back to the truck.

"Mr. O'Rourke?"

"Daegan. I thought we were past that. We're neighbors, remember?"

How could she forget? He could be a murderer. The criminal. The man who may have sired her son. His comment that Jon's father would be proud of him nearly caused her knees to buckle. Her throat so dry she could barely speak, she said, "Daegan, right. This fight with your cousin-where did it happen?"

"Back home."

She didn't let up. "Which is?"

"Canada. A little town in Alberta, near Calgary. Good luck with the boy." Daegan turned and walked back to his tired-looking pickup and Kate watched him leave, not moving, just staring after the battered old Dodge as gravel spewed from its balding tires and the engine growled, leaving a plume of blue exhaust in its wake.

Jon let out a long, low whistle, the pain in his shoulder momentarily forgotten. "Did you hear that? He all but admitted it."

"I heard," Kate said, rubbing her arms to get rid of the goose b.u.mps that rose on her flesh. She was suddenly cold as death. Who was Daegan O'Rourke really? Stranger, neighbor, s.e.xy-as-all-get-out cowboy, and possibly a murderer.

The criminal.

If so, why was he here? What did he want? If he'd intended to take Jon away, he'd had ample opportunity this afternoon.

Maybe he was just an innocent cowboy with a colorful, though shady, past.

Sure. And she was the Virgin Mary.

"My friend's still looking through some of the old doc.u.ments and files, but so far we haven't come up with much," Laura said, sounding as if she were in the next room instead of over two thousand miles away in Boston. Kate fingered the cord and leaned a shoulder against the refrigerator. Through the window she watched as Jon, his arm in a sling, threw the tennis ball across the yard for the puppy, who merrily gave chase. "There were dozens of kids born around Jon's birthday in the greater Boston area. I started with the date on his doctored birth certificate and went forward and backward a week, though you're certain he was only days old when you got him."

"Positive of it," Kate said. "The umbilical cord stump didn't fall off for days."

"Okay, so I'm sorting through, trying to find out if any of the infants were born to single mothers, but my guess is that whoever doctored the certificate somehow managed to get into the computer data as well."

"Wonderful," Kate said sarcastically.

"I'll keep looking."

"Thanks." She rubbed the top of a pumpkin she'd picked from the garden, the one chosen to be this year's jack-o'-lantern. "What about the cowboy?"

"Since he claims to be from Canada, I'll check with immigration to see if anyone named Daegan O'Rourke ever changed his citizens.h.i.+p. That'll take a while.

"As for him starting out around here, there were several Daegan O'Rourkes, if you can believe that, born in the greater Boston area thirty to forty years ago. None of them has a criminal record that we can find or a physical description. We're still checking to see if any have moved or stayed in Ma.s.sachusetts. It'll take a couple of days, maybe even a week or so."

Kate groaned and leaned her head against the wall.

"Sorry, Kate, but my friend and I have to do this on our free time."

"I know. Thanks."

"So are you still convinced that the cowboy next door is someone to avoid?"

"Definitely," Kate said, but wondered if it were possible. Jon already had developed an attraction-aversion to the man and even she found him interesting-in a purely male-female way. But that was crazy. She'd never gone for the faded jeans and worn-down boots type, never found any of the men in town overly attractive, but Daegan O'Rourke was different, he stood out in a crowd. She didn't admit her feelings to Laura, but otherwise she filled her in, including explaining about Jon's interest in the man, his accident with the horse, and conceding that they'd been lucky. Jon's shoulder had only been bruised, his pride wounded more than anything else. But then there was O'Rourke to deal with-whoever he was.

"Let me get this straight," Laura said. "You think that Daegan might be Jon's father. Why? Because of some silly premonition? Do they look anything alike?"

"A little," Kate said. "The coloring's about the same except Jon's eyes are a clearer blue. O'Rourke's are gray-flinty."

"Not enough, Kate."

"Okay, so there's some resemblance, I think. The shape of the face and skin tone. Jon's hair is a little lighter."

"Oh, for G.o.d's sake. That's not enough. Jon's left-handed-what about O'Rourke?"

"Don't know."

"And Jon's dimple?"

"O'Rourke doesn't smile much."

"Then you don't have much to go on and you might ask yourself something. a.s.suming that O'Rourke is Jon's father-and that's a h.e.l.luva a.s.sumption from the sound of things, but we'll go with it for now-why would Jon's dad show up all of a sudden out of the clear blue, fifteen-plus years after the fact? Wasn't he supposed to be some kind of violent lowlife? From what you're telling me, you have a cowboy who's maybe a little rough around the edges, who was jumped by his cousin and ended up hurting him-maybe even killing him by accident, but really, all things considered, he sounds like a good enough guy."