Killing Lucas Read online

  Lucas tried first to shake the tree, but its trunk was too thick and no amount of frustration would move it. Trent was too far up to pull him out and Lucas, for all his upper body strength, was as bad at climbing trees as he was at dancing. Shame the idiot hadn’t climbed a birch; then Lucas could have pulled back the flexible trunk and flung him out like a sling slot.

  Looking around, Lucas saw a rock, picked it up, and palmed it for a second before flinging it to the side. He wanted to wake Trent, not maim him. In the end, he decided on a few pinecones. The first one missed Trenton entirely, the second one landed in his lap and was ignored, but the third hit him right on the nose.

  “What the—” Trenton came awake with a jolt.

  Throwing another pinecone for good measure, Lucas managed to peg that one on the side of Trent’s head. “Get your ass out of that tree now!”

  “Lucas?” Trenton squinting in the dark at him.

  “Who else would it be? Now get down before I find and ax and cut you down.”

  A few minutes and a ton of rope later, Trenton’s feet hit the leaf-covered forest floor and a second after that Lucas grabbed handful of Trenton’s ear. “Where are the rest of you?”

  Trenton batted at Lucas’s hand, desperate to get free. Lucas only held tighter. “Only me—ouch! Okay! They’re over that way.”

  “Through the woods?”

  “On the next property over there’s a retreat facility with cabins. Now would you let go of my ear?”

  Letting go of Trent’s ear, Lucas pushed his youngest brother away from him in the direction he had pointed. “Lead on.”

  “You didn’t have to twist so tight.”

  “What are you, two years old?”

  “It hurt!”

  “Good. Do you have any idea how dangerous that was? What if the guy stalking Kiloran had found you, what then? Damn it, Trenton, I can’t worry about your hide and keep Kiloran safe too. Sound familiar?”

  “We were just trying to make sure you were safe.”

  Stepping over the low stone wall between the properties, Lucas shoved Trenton one more time for good measure. “How much farther?”

  “In the field over there.”

  “Fan-fucking-tastic.”

  They walked the rest of the two hundred yards in silence, just the sound of the dead brush crunching under their feet as they approached the cabin. A simple building about the size of a two-car garage sat just past the tree line. Trent stopped. “They’re all sleeping. Why don’t you come back tomorrow?”

  “It is tomorrow, dumbass. And I was sleeping too, until the FBI woke me up to tell me my bat-shit crazy family was hanging out in the trees. “

  Trenton took a deep breath and carefully opened the door so as not to make a noise. Lucas shoved him out of the way and slammed the door open, banging it a second time to good measure. Running his hand over the wall he found the light switch and turned it on. “Which idiot wants to own up to this asinine plan, or do I have to beat it out of you one by one?”

  Beating them all up sounded really good to him right now. Not only would he get out his frustrations about the stalker, it might shake some sense loose in his brothers, who hadn’t shown any in years. Cracking his knuckles, Lucas waited for his punching bags sleeping in the bunk beds at the opposite wall to awaken.

  Tony was first to come alert, looking like he had been up the whole time, completely focused and his hair perfect. Yeah, Tony was going to get hit, if nothing else to end the perfection. Then, to his surprise, Spencer leaned over the top bunk.

  Shock ran through Lucas. One would think that finding his youngest brother asleep in a tree would have be surprise enough, but somehow these two in the same breathing space surprised Lucas more. “How the hell did you two manage to get in the same room without killing one another?”

  “Some things take precedence,” Tony said, as if that made any sense whatsoever. “No matter how much an asshole he is, we’re still brothers.”

  Lucas would have liked to argue that, but knew it was a waste of breath.

  Movement coming from one of two doors in the cabin got everyone’s attention. Hunter, looking like he hadn’t slept in months, stood in the doorway. “Hi, Lucas. A bit early to be traipsing about the woods, don’t you think?”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I was hoping to get a night of sleep—uninterrupted sleep. If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to close this door and go back to bed.” Hunter started to close the door but Lucas stopped him. Hunter just raised an eyebrow but didn’t try to move the door again.

  “So how the fuck did these idiots manage to talk you into their plan?”

  “Someone had to take your watch.” Tony looked at him with one of his duh looks.

  “Because we couldn’t ask you to do it.”

  “Trenton, shut up!” Spencer groaned and jumped off the bed. “Listen, you wouldn’t let us watch over you willingly. So what other option did we have?”

  “You could have trusted me to handle this.”

  “It’s not about trust,” Tony said almost under his breath. The whole room got quiet. And Lucas cursed the air blue in his head. Of course for Tony this wasn’t about anything other than needing to know his brother was safe. Amazing how five minutes in childhood could shape, and scar, a man. “Hunter needed sleep and a break from J.C.—I think we all understand that. Trenton wanted to sleep in a tree. Let’s face it, if we were really keeping you under surveillance, we wouldn’t have sent him out in his usual shift. I can’t speak for Spencer because I am the last person able to tell anyone what the fuck goes on in his fucking harebrained, idiotic, good for nothing—”

  Tony could come up with insults for Spencer all day long if they let him. Lucas interrupted. “We got it, Tony. Get to the point.”

  “Right—but for me, this was about being near if you needed us. Just in case. If Trenton hadn’t been here, you would have been in that car with Kiloran. God what if he hadn’t been here to rescue Kiloran…?”

  “Don’t say it, Tony.”

  “Then let me say something,” Hunter said from his leaning position in the doorway. “You’re an idiot, Lucas. First, because you honestly thought you could keep your brothers at bay. Shermans butting into other family members’ business is what you all do best. Second, there’s a madman on the loose after a woman you once loved. That doesn’t make for clearheaded thinking. Personally, I think you need us.”

  “I have the FBI and I loved her once, no more.”

  “That’s not the way it’s been looking to me.”

  Lucas was going to strangle his baby brother, wrap his hands around his throat and squeeze. “Shut your trap, Trenton.”

  “What if you found out the man she supposedly slept with all those years ago was gay?” Tony voice was low and held a hint of hesitation to it.

  “And how would you know that? I never even told you his name.”

  “No, but Kiloran did.”

  “When?”

  “In the police station.”

  “Again when?”

  “When she talked about the friend who was killed. They suspect the stalker did it but can’t prove it.”

  “So you think that because she mentioned a gay man, he had to be the same man she slept with?”

  “Well…” Tony looked uncomfortable.

  Spencer nudged him with an elbow none too gently. “Tony, tell him.”

  “Tell me what?”

  Tony reached into the pocket of his leather bomber jacket, hanging off the bunk bed, and pulled out a very rumpled letter. “You might want to read this.”

  Lucas looked at the envelope, then back at Tony’s face. He looked green around the edges. “What is that?” But Lucas already knew.

  “Kiloran came to my office back i
n January, you know that. What you don’t know is she gave me this to give to you.”

  “Which you didn’t.”

  “Of course he didn’t.” Trenton scoffed. “Right—shutting up now.”

  Tony offered the letter out farther. “I only kept it from you because at the time I thought it was for the best.”

  “I’m going back to bed,” Hunter said, closing the door to the bedroom.

  Spencer headed to the front door. “I think I’ll watch the sun rise. Trent—Trenton.”

  “Oh, right, me too.”

  “Well then I guess I’ll—”

  “You, Tony, will stay right here.” Lucas grabbed the letter and moved over to the lamp. Lucas took in a steading breath. In the end, did it matter what was in the letter? What would it change? Nothing, as he had told Kiloran it didn’t matter what reasons she had for doing what she did. But if the man was gay? If she hadn’t…looking down at the letter, Lucas knew it did matter.

  Dear Luc, or should I say Tony?

  Either way, if one of you is reading this, maybe there is a chance. Or maybe it’s really too late. In any case, this will help me clear my conscience and, I hope, ease some pain.

  Luc, I love you. I know you think that’s a funny way to start a letter after what I did, but it’s true. I will love you till the day I die, that is the only thing I am certain of.

  I guess the best way to do this is just to spit it out. I didn’t have sex with Mel. I know what you’re thinking, and yes it looked that way, but I didn’t do it. He couldn’t have done it even if I’d wanted to, which I didn’t. Mel is…was gay. And he died in a car accident under suspicious circumstances.

  So now you must be asking why, if you haven’t burned this letter already. For many years I have been the victim of a stalker. Not just a crazy fan, but someone out to hurt anyone who gets close to me. I’d been dealing with the police long before I met you and I had known I shouldn’t get close to you, but I couldn’t help it. I saw you and I just wanted a few hours of happiness. That had been my plan. A few hours, no one would know. But hours turned to days, and days to weeks. And when nothing bad happened, I let myself believe that the stalker had gone. Just disappeared or moved on.

  Then you proposed, and it was like a dream come true. I have never been so happy, but shortly after you left for work the following morning, the doorbell rang. I thought you had forgotten your key. When I opened the door I found a note written in blood on my front porch. I called the detective in change of my case, and he came over—as did Mel, who was concerned when I said I couldn’t make it in to run lines. The police did their thing around the house, took the letter, and left. What more could they do?

  Mel told me to call you to make sure you were okay. When I called your work they said you had just left, were on your way home. And I knew I had to keep you safe. The note had said, “Get rid of Lucas or I will.” Too many strange accidents had happened to random people who I had been photographed with for me to take it lightly. And at the bottom of the letter had been a picture of an engagement ring cut out of a magazine.

  So Mel and I hatched up the plan. I chugged whatever was left in my bottle of whiskey and striped to my undies and waited for you to open the door. The whole time I just wanted to throw up. I just wanted to have you hold me. I wanted you to say you would make it all better and I wanted the cops to call and say they’d caught the man and it was all okay now. But that wasn’t going to happen. And I have come to realize this might always be my lot in life.

  I don’t remember what I said to you exactly, but oh do I remember your face. I will always remember your face. I must have said all the right things to get you to leave and all the things guaranteed to make you hate me. When you left, I cried until I made myself sick. Mel held me for a while but eventually he left too. It wasn’t his fight. I thought there was no way the stalker could know what happened in the house.

  The night we finished shooting our last scene, a photo showed up at my trailer. It was grainy and in poor focus, but it didn’t take me more than a second to know it was of Mel and I in bed. That night Mel’s car went over a cliff, into the ocean. He paid a high price for trying to help me. The guilt I feel about his death is something I have to live with. And the hurt I caused…I know you can never forgive me, but I hope that maybe this will ease it just a bit.

  Tony, if you decide Lucas should read this, I thank you. If you feel it will only hurt him more, then I leave it to you. You have a keen way of knowing what your brothers need. And I don’t blame you for reading this. I expected you would.

  To Lucas: I am more sorry then you will ever know.

  Yours Always,

  Kil

  Lucas looked out the window at the soft pink fingers of sunlight reaching over the sky. Somehow, nothing in the letter had come as a big shock. He hadn’t known Mel was gay, but that didn’t change anything.

  “Was I wrong not to give you the letter?”

  “No. At the time I wouldn’t have read it and what would it have changed?”

  “I honestly forgot about the letter. I threw it out when Kiloran gave it to me, but Barbara dug it out of the trash and told me in no uncertain terms that I would regret it one day.”

  “Do you regret it?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  Lucas nodded. Barbara had been Tony’s secretary for years, and had even come with him when he’d started his own company. She knew him better than anyone, except maybe Haven. She certainly could see through all his walls better than his own family had. “Me neither.”

  “You’re not angry?”

  “Would it matter?”

  Tony shook his head. “Probably not, but it would be nice to know if I should expect a punch to the jaw.”

  “Watch out for the right hook, it’s a mean one!” Hunter yelled from the bedroom.

  Lucas looked at his brother and then they both looked at the door before bursting out in laughter. “Whose right hook?”

  “Any. Both. You Shermans are all the same. You sucker punch when someone least expects it.” Hunter would know, having been on the receiving end from both Lucas and Tony during his courtship and separation from J.C.

  “’Cause we’re smart that way.” Tony smiled. “So what’s the game plan?”

  “A great game plan would be for you two to take a walk so I can sleep and don’t have to hear you two through this paper-thin wall.”

  Lucas shrugged and headed for the outdoor porch. He leaned against the railing. “I suppose it would be a waste of breath to ask you all to leave?” He waited for Tony’s nod. “Perhaps one of you could drive Kil and me down to the hospital in the morning to see her assistant? And then we can play it by ear.”

  “That’s a good plan. Now will everyone shut the fuck up so I can get some ever-loving sleep?” Hunter growled behind them, slamming the outside door of the cabin.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “I can handle your brothers. I’ve dealt with worse.”—Kiloran to Lucas

  She must have worn a path in the carpet by now. Where was Lucas? The sun had come up an hour ago and he still wasn’t back yet. Ten more minutes, she told herself, ten more minutes and I am going out to look for him. She wasn’t as worried for him as much for his brother’s safety at this point. And if she was honest with herself, something she tried to be, she was curious as well. Hell, only Shermans would be arrogant enough to believe they would need to stake out a house the FBI was already watching.

  But they were dealing with Shermans, and when one or more got together there was no telling where they might end up. Kiloran just hoped no one ended up hurt. Ten minutes passed, and then another, and she finally had it. She pulled on a pair of soft pink running pants and a tank top before slipping on shoes and was making her way down the stairs when the front door opened. In came Lucas, looking annoyed. Behind him, Tr
enton looked sheepish, Spencer apprehensive, and Tony like he’d just walked off a photo shoot.

  “Hey, honey.” Lucas stopped at the foot of the stairs.

  “‘Hey, honey?’ That’s all you have to say?” When Lucas stood silent, she focused her attention on the younger brother. “Good to see you, Trenton. Couldn’t stay away, I see.”

  Trenton mumbled something under his breath and rubbed his ear. “Me and Fenway are going to head outside.”

  Kiloran raised an eyebrow looking at Lucas for an answer but he just shook his head. “Kil, you remember my older brother Spencer.”

  “I do. It’s good to see you again, Spencer.”

  Spencer rubbed the back of his neck as if conflicted. Finally, he just nodded and said, “Kiloran.”

  “Well then.” Tony clapped his hands to fill the awkward silence. “How about some breakfast? Through here?” He pointed down the hall but didn’t wait for anyone to answer as he walked down to the kitchen like he owned the place.

  “Can he cook?”

  “Of course. Doesn’t he do everything perfectly?” Spencer muttered. “I think I’ll join Trent outside with the dog.”

  Once they were all gone, Lucas sat on the second to the bottom step and leaned his head against the wall. “My family is exhausting.”

  Giggling, Kiloran joined him and put her head on his shoulder. “They are, but they also love you. Just like I do.”

  She watched Lucas close his eyes a look of pain washed over his face. “I—Kiloran, I’m…”

  “Shhh…you don’t have to say anything. I just wanted to say it and make sure you knew.” Standing up, she smacked her hands on her legs. “I guess I should go and set the table to five.”

  “Six.”

  “Six?”

  “Hunter should be trudging over eventually.”

  Hunter Brooks? “How the hell did they manage to talk Hunter into this?”

  Looking at each other, they both started laughing. “Tony!”