Fatal Burn (West Coast 2) - Page 75

It was time to raise the stakes. Tonight. He felt a surge of anticipation through his blood.

Oh, yeah, “the authorities” would soon be on their way.

Chapter 15

“That son of a bitch,” Mary Beth said, kicking off her shoes and watching the three-inch heels bounce against the scuffed wall of her walk-in closet, her half-empty closet. When she and Robert had moved into this house five years earlier, the walk-in dressing area had been one of the reasons she’d fallen in love with it. Now the space was a mockery, her “side” filled to the gills with outfits, Robert’s empty aside from his old letterman’s jacket hanging lopsidedly on a single hanger. She closed her eyes, remembering him wearing the jacket in high school, being such a jock. She’d fallen in love with him so easily and believed the dream of happily ever after.

What a laugh, she thought scornfully. All those Friday-night football games, watching him play, meeting him afterwards, spending more time than she should have alone with him wherever they could find a secluded place.

She’d waited for him through college and even bitten back her disappointment when he’d decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and join the Santa Lucia Fire Department.

Another mistake.

From that point on, her life had been hell.

On a sigh she snapped off the closet light. Jesus, it was stuffy in here. The air-conditioning was on the fritz again and Robert refused to pay to have it fixed.

What a jackass.

Mary Beth opened the bedroom windows, then slipped into the living room and did the same. There wasn’t much of a breeze, but at least some of the hot air inside the house dissipated into the night.

Robert, Robert, Robert.

Why couldn’t she get over him?

Should she divorce the bastard?

So what if her parents, the parish priest and her kids were against it. Would God really blame her?

No, but your children will. They will never get over it.

She blew her bangs out of her eyes and knew she was doomed to stay with her husband until death. And the way she was feeling tonight, that might not be long. God, she’d love to shoot the bastard dead!

Well, not really.

But she would love to scare the liver out of him.

From the get-go there had always been other women. Even as far back as her senior year, when he’d been in college, but she’d been certain once they were married his roving eye would return to her.

Of course it hadn’t happened. Then after a while, Mary Beth began to think that maybe a baby would change things—and it had. At least for a couple of years after Elizabeth was born. But the late nights of not knowing where her husband was had started up again. So she’d gotten pregnant again and this time had given him a son.

Surely that would do the trick!

But she’d been wrong. Again.

She walked through the kids’ rooms, threw some toys into the toy boxes and scooped up a few discarded clothes, which she carried down the long hallway to the tiny laundry room off the kitchen, just inside the door of the single-car garage.

After tossing the dirty clothes into a basket balanced on the dryer, and trying to swipe down a spiderweb with one of JR’s socks, she shut the door and made her way to the kitchen. She’d already decided to tap into the bottle of wine she’d opened earlier—her own special confidence booster

. The wine had certainly helped her confront her husband in the parking lot of that run-down, no-tell motel. Shit, what was Robert thinking?

“He’s not,” she said aloud. “Unless his brain truly is in his dick.” She didn’t trust him. Never had. Never could.

Oh, he’d sworn he wasn’t going to be with that bitch tonight. When she hadn’t believed him and had started screaming at him, even going so far as to slap him once they’d gotten home, he’d acted like it was all her fault.

He’d flinched, raised his hand, but hadn’t hit her back. He just stared at her, his eyes dark and unfathomable, and warned, “Watch it, Mary Beth. Don’t you believe in the Bible? What’s the quote that’s appropriate here? ‘As ye sow, so shall ye reap’?”

“If that’s the case, you miserable prick, then you’re going to spend all of eternity roasting in hell!”

Tags: Lisa Jackson West Coast Mystery
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