"You look sad." Joe bent his lanky body to make sure she could see his taunting smile.
"Don't tell me you finally realize that the man you've been protecting is really going to prison."
"Clay's innocent," she said stubbornly.
Joe laughed. "Face it, Allie. You lose." Grabbing her chin, he held it fast while he delivered a revoltingly wet, tobacco-tasting kiss.
"Get back!" She shoved him away, then grimaced as she wiped his saliva from her lips and cheek.
"How touching," he said, his hand over his heart. "You're saving yourself for Clay. You care so much about him. But if you think he cares about you, you're wrong. He's using you, babe.
Pure and simple. Beth Ann says he doesn't have a heart. Just a big dick."
Still laughing, he got in his truck and drove off.
As Allie watched him go, depression settled in, as deep as the surrounding darkness. She'd been wrong. The shooting wasn't connected to the Vincellis. Nothing she'd been chasing could help Clay.
Face it, Allie. You lose. And so did the man she loved.
Chapter 23
When Clay passed Joe on the winding road that led to the cabin, he didn't recognize him at first. It was too dark. But Joe's was the only vehicle he'd seen since leaving the highway, and the make and model soon registered, turning the unease Clay had been feeling into all-out panic. What was Joe doing up here?
Again, Clay wished he had a cell phone. He'd never seen a need for one in the past. He hadn't been interested in making himself accessible to people; he was usually at the farm, anyway.
But today he was handicapped without one. He'd been able to call Allie only once since he'd left his house--at a pay phone along the way. She hadn't picked up and he hadn't wanted to waste any more time. Something was wrong. He could feel it. And the sight of Joe's Explorer confirmed it.
"I'll kill him," he muttered. If anything could turn him into the kind of man everyone already thought he was, it'd be finding Allie hurt--or worse.
Tree branches slapped the windshield and scratched the sides of his truck as he barreled through the woods, indifferent to the potholes and rocks. He kept imagining Allie shot as he'd been shot, bleeding....
But when he reached the cabin, his headlights showed her sitting on the front step, staring at the ground. A light gleamed behind her.
She looked up as he got out, but didn't move.
"What happened?" Clay asked. "Why was Joe here?"
"They have another search warrant," she replied. Then she stared past him into the darkness, and he saw the sheen of tears in her eyes.
So the Vincellis and their friends had been able to discredit her father's handling of the investigation, just as Clay had feared.
Clay should've been used to such setbacks, numb to them. He'd battled the Vincellis since he was sixteen years old. But the news cut him so deeply, he knew he wasn't the same unfeeling man he'd been before Allie came back to town. Going to prison didn't just mean going to prison anymore. He finally had something to live for, something to hope for, someone to care about.
And they were going to take that away from him.
He didn't know what to say, how to express the emotions that were twisting his stomach and clogging his throat. "It'll be okay," he said, trying to convince her. The only thing worse than his own suffering was the thought that she was hurting, too.
"It's not going to be okay! You didn't do it."
He could tell by the conviction in her voice that something had changed. "How do you know?"
"Jed told me. He saw everything."
Jed. Clay had always wondered. "Why hasn't he told the police?" he asked.
"He was friends with Eliza. He thinks--" she paused to take a breath, "--he thinks Barker might have killed her."
He said nothing.
"That doesn't surprise you?"
"No. Nothing surprises me where he's concerned."
"I guess she was beginning to figure out what he really was. Jed's convinced he did it to shut her up."
"It'll break Maddy's heart if she ever learns."
"Barker's dead. I don't see why she has to."
Reaching up, she pulled him down beside her, and they sat there together. After a few seconds, she said, "Where are they?"
"Where are what?" he replied.
"Barker's remains."
He'd never told another living soul where he'd moved them. Not even his sisters. And he couldn't tell Allie. She meant too much to him. "I can't say."
"If they're at the farm, move them," she said. "Tonight."
The fact that she was still so ready to stand by him made Clay wish he could take care of her the way she deserved. But it was too late for that. It was too late for a lot of things. "It won't make any difference," he said.
"I won't give up."
Leaning forward, he wiped away the tears sliding down her cheeks. "Don't cry."
"It's not fair," she said. "That...that sick bastard."
He didn't have to ask who she was talking about. "I want you to step back from this and reconcile with your parents. Or move somewhere else. Find a new life entirely."
"You want me to leave you to face this alone? Why? "
Clay felt so weak and exposed, it made him angry. "Because I can't do anything to protect you from what's about to happen, dammit! Don't you understand that?"
"I'm not asking you to protect me!" she shouted back.
He jumped to his feet. "It'll be harder on you this way."
"So you want to forget about what we feel? Walk away and let them win?"
"What's our alternative?" he asked. "Do you want to marry a man who's going to prison?
Do you want to waste fifteen or twenty years waiting for me to get out? What kind of life would that be?"
She stood. "The life I want, if it means we can be together in the end."
The fight suddenly drained out of Clay. "Allie--"
"I just need to know one thing," she interrupted. "And it had better be the most honest thing you've ever said to me."
"What is it?"
"Do you feel the same? Are you willing to hang on regardless of what happens?"
When he didn't answer, her voice dropped. "Do you love me, Clay?"
He knew the unselfish answer would be to say no. Then she'd move on; she'd have to. She'd eventually get over the grief, fall in love with someone else, find a better life.
"Clay?"
Wrestling with himself, Clay let his forehead touch hers. He could smell her perfume, feel her breath on his face--and knew he wasn't strong enough to lie to her. "Yes," he said. And then he carried her into the cabin, where they were both crying and kissing and pulling off their clothes, as if this was the only moment that mattered.