The Wild Zone (7 page)

She thought of biting down, then quickly banished the thought from her mind. He’d kill her for sure.

Besides, it wasn’t enough to maim him. Not anymore.

Now she wanted him dead.

She thought she might have found the man to help her.

SEVEN

T
HE
FIRST TIME JEFF
tried to kill his brother, he was eight years old.

Not that he had anything against Will personally. Not that he wished him any particular harm. Just that he wanted him gone. Will was always there, always the center of attention, his every cry heeded, his every wish attended to. The Chosen One. He took up all the space of every room he entered, guzzling up all the oxygen, leaving Jeff abandoned on the fringe, gasping for air.

He was a colicky baby, and he cried often. Jeff used to lie in his bed at night listening to Will’s howls and feeling strangely comforted by the fact that, despite all the attention lavished on him, his brother seemed as miserable as he was.

Except for one crucial difference: When Will cried, everybody listened, whereas when he cried, he was told to stop acting like a baby. He was told to be quiet, to lie still, and not to get up, even if he had to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, because he might disturb the baby. And so he would lie there in the dark, his stomach cramping, surrounded by his stepmother’s meticulously hand-woven quilts that loomed up at him, like hostile ghosts, from every corner of the room. And then, one night he hadn’t been able to hold it any longer, and he’d wet the bed, and the next morning, his stepmother, the squalling baby wriggling in her arms, had discovered the still damp sheets and berated him, and Will had suddenly stopped crying and started gurgling, almost as if he understood what was happening and he was glad.

It was at that moment that Jeff decided to kill him.

He’d waited until everyone had gone to bed, then he’d crept into the nursery. Will’s hand-painted wooden crib stood against one pale blue wall, a mobile of delicate, brightly colored cloth airplanes lazily circling his head. Toys of all shapes and sizes filled the shelves on the opposite wall. Stuffed animals—giant pandas and proud ponies, plush puppies and furry fishes—sat everywhere along the soft blue broadloom. It was a
real
room, Jeff understood even then. Not just some makeshift space in a room originally intended for another purpose. Like
his
room, with its small cot pushed up against the plain, white wall. His stepmother’s former sewing room. Of course he was only supposed to be staying there temporarily. Until his own mother got her act together and came back to get him. Which couldn’t have been soon enough. At least that’s what he’d heard his stepmother confiding to a friend one afternoon, as they cooed happily over Will.

Jeff had stood over his brother’s crib, watching him sleep, then grabbed the largest of the stuffed animals—a smiling, moss-green alligator—and covered Will’s face with its fuzzy, lemon-yellow underbelly. Will’s little feet had kicked frantically at the air for several seconds, then stopped, his lithe little body going suddenly, completely still, whereupon Jeff had fled the room. He spent the night cowering under his cot, terrified the quilted ghosts would come after him and smother him as he slept.

The next morning, when Jeff walked into the kitchen, there was Will, sitting proudly in his high chair, banging on its tray with his spoon, and crying for his cereal. Jeff had stared at him in awed silence, wondering whether he dreamed the whole episode.

He still wondered.

Even now, more than two decades later, lying in the double bed he shared with Kristin, poised between sleep and consciousness, Jeff wondered. Not whether he was capable of killing. He knew the answer to that. He’d killed at least half a dozen men in Afghanistan, including one man dispatched at point-blank range. But that was different. That was war. Different rules applied. You had to act quickly. You couldn’t afford to second-guess yourself. Everyone was a potential suicide bomber. And Jeff was convinced the man had been reaching for a weapon, not lifting his arms in surrender, as his distraught wife later claimed.

Even now Jeff felt the sand in his eyes and the weight of the rifle in his hands. He heard the click of a trigger, followed by a woman’s hysterical screams, and saw the look of disbelief in the man’s dark eyes as an explosion of red circles suddenly splattered across the front of his white robe, like a pattern on one of his stepmother’s quilts.

Yes, he was capable of killing.

But deliberate, cold-blooded murder?

Had he really tried to smother Will?

And later, when Will was three years old and Jeff was pushing him so high on the backyard swing set that his stepmother had come running out of the house and snatched him off, screaming, “What are you trying to do? Kill him?” Had that been his intent?

Or had he merely been trying to get her attention?

Whatever his goal, it hadn’t worked. Will continued to thrive, no matter how nasty Jeff was to him. His father continued to ignore him, no matter how hard Jeff tried to please him. His mother never did get her act together or come back to claim him. His stepmother continued to shoo him out of her way.

And then, when he was fourteen, he’d met a tall, lanky bundle of angry energy by the name of Tom Whitman, a natural follower looking for someone to show him the way, and a lifelong friendship was born.

By the time Jeff was eighteen, rigorous daily workouts had added twenty pounds of well-sculpted muscle to his almost six-foot frame. The handsome face he’d inherited from his dad ensured that girls were as constant as they were easy. It seemed that all Jeff had to do was smile lazily in their general direction, and they came running.

Jeff grinned at the memory of those early conquests, opening his eyes to the warm sun pushing through the heavy blue drapes of his bedroom window. “Krissie?” he asked, feeling the empty space next to him in bed and glancing at the clock on the bedside table.
Two o’clock? In the afternoon?
Could that possibly be right? “Krissie?” he called again, louder this time.

The bedroom door opened. A man appeared in silhouette. “She went out,” Will said.

Jeff pushed himself into a sitting position, flicked a wayward lock of blond hair away from his eyes. “Where’d she go?”

“Publix. Apparently we’re out of toilet paper.”

“No shit,” Jeff said, laughing at his own joke.

Will laughed as well, although in truth, he didn’t find the joke that funny. “You feeling okay?” he asked.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I don’t know. You were pretty drunk last night. And it
is
the middle of the afternoon.”

“It’s Saturday,” Jeff reminded him testily. “I get to sleep in.”

“People don’t need personal trainers on Saturday?” Will tried to keep his voice light. He hadn’t meant to sound judgmental.

“I don’t need
them.
” Jeff climbed out of bed, not bothering to cover his nakedness as he headed for the bathroom, chuckling as Will averted his eyes. He relieved himself, washed his hands, threw some water over his face, and was back a minute later. “I don’t suppose there’s any coffee,” he said, standing at the side of the bed and arching his back, stretching well-cut arms above his head. If Will was uncomfortable with this seemingly casual display of nudity, too bad, Jeff thought. It never hurt to let the competition know what they were dealing with. A little subtle intimidation could go a long way. Jeff grabbed his jeans from the edge of the bed and pulled them up over his bare hips.

“I think Kristin made a fresh pot before she went out,” Will said, his eyes resolutely on the floor as he answered the question. He didn’t want Jeff to think he was staring.

Jeff walked past Will through the living room and into the kitchen. He poured some coffee into a flamingo-shaped mug, added a bit of milk, then sipped at it gingerly. “When did she leave?”

“About twenty minutes ago. Said she’d be back in an hour.”

“She makes a good pot of coffee.”

“She does everything well.”

“That she does,” Jeff said, thinking of last night.

“You’re really lucky.”

“Yes, I am.” Jeff caught a look of hesitation on his brother’s face. “What?” he asked warily.

“What?” Will repeated.

“You look like you have something you want to say.”

“No. Not really.”

“Yes, really,” Jeff insisted.

Will looked away, cleared his throat, looked back again. “It’s just that . . .”

“Spit it out, little brother.”

“Well . . . it’s just that . . . last night . . .”

“Last night?”

“She doesn’t mind?”

“Doesn’t mind what?”

“You know,” Will said. “About Suzy.” Her name felt like a prayer on his lips. It made him feel good just saying it.

“Nothing happened with me and Suzy.”

“She doesn’t mind that you
wanted
something to happen, that something might have happened if . . .” What the hell was he doing? Will wondered. Was he just curious, or was he purposely trying to antagonize his brother?

“ . . . if she’d chosen me?” Jeff said, finishing Will’s sentence for him. “Trust me, something definitely would have happened. But she didn’t choose me, did she? She chose you.” The Chosen One, Jeff thought, taking another sip of coffee, tasting it suddenly bitter on the tip of his tongue.

“That’s kind of beside the point.”

“Exactly what
is
the point?” Jeff asked impatiently. God, was it any wonder his brother had struck out last night? Was he always this damn tentative? “What are you trying to say, Will?”

“I just have a hard time accepting Kristin’s really okay with this.”

“She’s an amazing woman.”

“Then why cheat on her?” The question popped from Will’s mouth before he could stop it.

“It’s hardly cheating when the other person says it’s okay, now, is it?” Jeff said.

“I guess not. Just that . . .”

“What?”

“I don’t understand why you’d want to.”

“Hey, man. You know what they say. ‘Nothing smells like fresh pussy.’” Jeff laughed. “And speaking of which, what exactly happened last night?” He pulled up a kitchen chair and straddled it, enjoying his brother’s obvious discomfort.

Will remained standing. “You know what happened.”

“I know what
didn’t
happen. You didn’t—”

“Can we not have this conversation again?” Will asked.

“Did you at least cop a feel? Please tell me you got something out of last night besides a hangover.”

“We kissed,” Will admitted after a lengthy pause. He didn’t want to cheapen the memory by talking about it.

“You kissed? That’s it?”

Will said nothing.

“Did you at least get a little tongue action going?”

“It was a good kiss,” Will said, turning away and heading back into the living room.

Jeff was right behind him. “Aw, come on, little brother. You gotta give me more than that.”

“’Fraid that’s all there is.” Will sank down on the sofa. “Sorry to disappoint you.”

“Who says I’m disappointed? I saved a hundred bucks.”

Will shrugged. “Contest isn’t over yet,” he said quietly.

Jeff’s laugh filled the room. “Now that’s more like it. Looks like you might have a little of Daddy’s blood in you after all.”

There was a moment’s silence before Will spoke. “You speak to him lately?”

“Who?”

“You know who. Our father.”

“Our father who art in Buffalo? Why would I?” Jeff asked, wandering back into the kitchen to top up his coffee.

“Just to check in, I guess. Say hello. See how he’s doing.”

“He’s alive, isn’t he?”

“Yeah. Of course he is.”

“So, what’s left to say? I assume someone will notify me when he croaks.” Jeff returned to the living room in time to see his brother wince. “Not that I’m expecting to be named in the will or anything like that.”

“Trust me, there isn’t much of anything to inherit,” Will said.

Jeff nodded understanding. “I guess all those years at Princeton pretty much depleted the family savings.”

“That money came from my grandparents,” Will said defensively. “On my mother’s side,” he added unnecessarily.

“Lucky you.”

“I was really sorry to hear about your mom,” Will said after another moment’s pause.

“Don’t be.”

“Ellie says the cancer’s very aggressive, that she only has a few months left at best.”

“Yeah, well. These things happen. Not much you can do.”

“You could go home,” Will pressed, “see her before she dies.”

“No. I can’t do that.”

“Ellie says she’s been asking for you.”

“My sister’s quite the chatterbox. I didn’t realize you two were so close.”

“She’s
my
sister, too,” Will said.

“Half sister,” Jeff corrected sharply. “She ask you to say something to me about this? Is that what you’re doing here?”

“She asked me to mention it, yes. But no, that’s not why I’m here.”

“Just why
are
you here?”

“I missed you,” Will replied simply. “You’re my brother.”

“Half brother,” Jeff corrected a second time. This time his voice was flat, like a dull blade.

“I’d been going through a difficult time,” Will said, deciding to throw caution to the wind. Maybe if he took him into his confidence, Jeff would be more inclined to take him into his. “There was this girl I was tutoring at Princeton. Amy . . .”

“Amy?” Jeff made himself comfortable in the oversize beige leather chair, leaning forward, his elbows resting on his thighs, steam rising from the coffee mug in his hands, only partly obscuring the smile on his lips.

“She was in first year. I was tutoring her in logic. We hit it off. One thing led to another. . . .”

“You fucked her,” Jeff said.

“Jesus, Jeff. Is that all you ever think about?”

“Pretty much.”

“There’s more to a relationship than that.”

“You didn’t fuck her.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Did you or didn’t you?”

“Yes, I . . . I did.”

“Well, thank God for that. So, what was the problem?”

“There wasn’t one. Not that I knew of anyway. We were pretty solid for most of the year, and then suddenly, she broke it off. She wouldn’t give me a reason. I kept calling her, trying to talk to her, you know, to find out what I’d done wrong.”