know why he died.”
I watched her drive away. She’d been the last real companion of Trey’s life, as different from Sister as possible. Outwardly, at least. I believed they both shared a core of unsuspected strength that made them both survivors in a world that had been less than kind.
She’d given me plenty to consider. Some secret involving Louis Slocum, Mirabeau’s best horse trainer and drunk. Something that Steven, Hart, and Trey were all privy to. Had Clevey found out as well? He must’ve. He had to have known. And it got him killed.
Hart couldn’t have killed Trey. First, he cared too much about him. Second, he had an airtight alibi that Junebug had already confirmed-checking out horses on a farm miles away in Fayette County. But in our talk out on the back porch, Hart’d denied knowing why Trey had left six years ago. He’d lied. And just how the hell did Clevey fit into this? And the attack on Junebug?
I’ve never been a swift thinker. I stopped dead in my tracks, my hand reaching for the door. Steven Teague, if Nola’s story was true and she’d correctly interpreted the conversation she’d heard between Hart and Trey, knew the reason for Trey’s leaving. And here he was counseling Mark, giving me pithy advice on how to handle the trauma that’d nearly destroyed our family. While knowing all the while why Trey had forsaken us. And how the hell would Steven know-he wasn’t even living here six years ago! Someone had told him-perhaps Clevey, who he was counseling? God, that had to be it!
My face felt hot and a slow throb of headache started a surging pain in my temples. My mind felt dizzy, trying to trace the web of Trey’s life. I stepped inside and shut the door.
Clo sat with Mama in the living room, avidly watching a talk show with the sound turned real low. Mama doesn’t like noise much anymore. Clo glanced up at me.
“I wasn’t about to let that white trash in this house,” she proclaimed. “Be mad at me if you want.”
“I’m not mad at you. Where’s Mark?”
She jerked her head toward the kitchen. “Back porch, I think. How’d his therapy go? He feeling better?”
I didn’t answer her, heading out to the porch. It was empty, the rain the only sound, tapping like fingers on foil.
“He’s not there,” I called back to Clo, stepping into the kitchen.
“Well, he called Bradley Foradoiy and chatted with him a minute. Then he said he was going out on the porch and listen to the rain.”
Bradley. Oh, God, and Mark was so single-minded about discovering what was going on at the Foradorys’. I phoned Davis’s number. One ring. Two rings. Three rings. An answering click.
And then the screams.
18
I ignored the stop sign at the intersection of Heydl and Fifth where the Foradory house sat, screeching to a stop and spraying water. Mark’s bike lay sprawled in the yard, glistening wetly. I ran across the grass, vaulting his bike and leaping up the steps in two jumps. The front door was unlocked and I shoved it open, hollering for Mark. I heard a piercing cry from the back of the house.
I tore through the immaculate living room, ignoring the muddy trail I left in my wake. I burst through the kitchen, which opened up into a breakfast nook. And ran into a scene I hadn’t quite expected.
Mark, grimacing, was trying to drag a struggling Bradley back toward the porch door. Bradley kicked at the tiles, scuffing them with his cowboy boots, wailing and flailing his arms. The phone receiver, still off the hook, dangled above the floor and slowly revolved on its cord. Cayla Foradory, her eyes wild and her hair straggling in her face, held a metal broomstick in her hand, blood dotting one end of it. She was whacking the hell out of something on the floor. It was only after I’d taken four more steps in that I saw that she was beating the tar out of Davis, curled in a fetal ball on the kitchen floor.
“Uncle Jordy! Help us! She’s gonna kill him!” Mark screamed at me. I rushed toward Cayla and Davis. He didn’t appear to be moving.
I came up behind Cayla and grabbed the broomstick when she brought it back to have another go at her husband. I yanked it away and she spun toward me, her eyes filled with such blinding fury that I took a shocked step backward. She swung a fist at me and nearly connected with my jaw. Stunned with surprise, I seized her arms and shook her hard.
“Cayla! Stop it! It’s me, Jordy!” She struggled against me like she’d never seen me. I shook her again and she calmed, the berserker rage fading. She took a long, hard, shuddering breath and gasped, “Get out. Get out of here.”
“What did he do to you? Did he hit you? Hit Bradley?” I glanced at her son, but he seemed more upset than injured, crying and mewling in Mark’s arms.
“Hit her? Bullshit!” Mark screamed. “She hits him! She beats him! ”
Mark’s words oozed in. I glanced over at Davis; slowly, like a snake awakening to warmth, he uncoiled himself. I saw bruises on his forearms, his neck, and a vicious cut above the left eye. His tortoiseshell glasses lay broken by his elbow. He looked at me like a whipped dog, awaiting the next kick. This wasn’t my friend-this was someone else. Someone I didn’t know.
“Get out!” Cayla rediscovered her voice. “Get out of my house right… this… minute.”
I pushed her away from me and knelt by Davis’s side. He flinched away from my touch, burying his face in the crook of his arm.
“Get my boy out of here. Take Bradley and go,” he muttered into his arm, his voice barely audible. “Please. I don’t want him to see me this way.”
“She’s crazy, Uncle Jordy!” Mark hollered. Bradley wrestled free from him and crawled to his father’s side. I blinked up at Cayla; she didn’t look at any of us except for her son. She tried to take him by the arm, gently, but he squirmed away from her, holding his father’s hand. Bradley’s face was contorted with tears, his lips curling in anguish. Oh, God, what had this boy seen in this house?
“You stay away, Mom,” Bradley cried. “Stay away.”
Cayla straightened up and, without a word, turned and stumbled out of the kitchen.
“I saw it all,” Mark gasped, squatting by me. “She was whaling on him with that broomstick and also tried to hit him with a skillet. You want me to call the cops?”
“No! No police!” Davis seized my arm, pressing hard. “Promise me, no police.”
“Davis. You have to tell me what’s happened here.”
“I told you, Uncle Jordy-”
“Mark, please! Let Davis talk.”
Davis couldn’t look into my eyes. He ran fingers across his head and left a trickle of blood in the thinning blond hair. “Um, nothing really, it was just an argument-”
“For God’s sake, Davis, she was about to beat you unconscious. Now, what did you argue about? What did you do to her?”
“Nothing. I wouldn’t hurt her. Please, just take Bradley and go. Please.”
I took Bradley’s frown-locked face in my hands. “Bradley. Listen to me. What happened here?”
Bradley blinked back more tears. His breath came in ragged, aching gasps. His chin wobbled against my fingers, spittle smearing my hand. He wouldn’t look me in the eye. Finally he found his voice and whispered, “Ain’t supposed to tell. Mom said never tell. Never tell, never tell, never tell!”
“You can tell me, Bradley. You know you can.” I kept my voice low and soothing. If violence held sway in this house, God only knew what this poor kid had witnessed.
Bradley fixed his eyes on the floor, the unspeakable secret weighing hard on his heart. After a long minute he spoke, his fingers drawing nervous patterns on the tiles. “Mom. She gets mad. She hits Daddy. She hits him, and she hits him again.” He raised his face again, anguish painting his features. “I ain’t supposed to tell!” He collapsed against Mark, who looked at me with an accusing glare.
“Mark. Take Bradley back to our house,” I said.
“Won’t go! Daddy-” Bradley protested.
