Trashy (18 page)

Buck

Shep’s waiting for me just inside the park. I don’t see his Camaro, so I know he’s hidden it somewhere. Smart. I’d had to hide the guns in a duffle as I left the trailer. There were still cops about, taking apart Anne’s trailer as they searched for evidence. I knew they were trying to find something to pin the murders on Shep. It was obvious in the way their eyes kept finding our trailer.

My mind’s been running over every awful scenario. I’m trying so hard to think of who could possibly have taken Vickie and killed her mama. Was it someone from the mine, trying to get back at Shep? Bill? Bill had a lot of reasons to hate Shep. More so now, because I knew he’d never look past his stump of a leg and realize Shep had saved his life.

I don’t have a lot of enemies. Maybe a few broken hearts in my past. Pre-Vickie. There were a lot of women. I didn’t treat any of them nicely, but by the way they used to scream my name, they didn’t want me to. I can’t imagine any of the girls I’d slept with doing something crazy like this, though.

Vickie? Could she have left anyone mad enough to hurt her? It feels unbelievable to me. She’s the sweetest, most genuine person I know. When we took her in, I was excited about the sex. I’m not an old man, not by any means. But there’s something about that eighteen-nineteen-twenty age that has me feeling nostalgic. It was when I was old enough to be more adventurous, but bills and life hadn’t chained me yet. Old enough to feel cocky, and young enough to feel free and a little crazy.

She brought that out in me. But then it had become more than sex. I think it did that first night as I helped her suck Shep off. It was like… it was like she’d opened a door in me and showed me that I could be
me
and still be grown. She made me feel like a man, and she made acting like a man feel like a good thing.

There were only three people I could think of that Vickie had problems with, and two of them were dead. Mikey, the third, had been playing pool. Yeah, I checked in on him on my way to the park. But he and his buddies were day drinking and talking shit at the local bar and pool hall. It wasn’t him that tricked Vickie.

Shep and I disappeared into the trees. Years of hunting together meant we knew how to be silent. Years of being there for each other meant we didn’t need to speak. I knew the pain, the panic he was feeling because I was feeling it, too.

As we moved, I handed him the rifle. He’s a better long shot than I am. I think it’s the patience. Shep can wait for hours and not move. I get too restless. I kept the shotgun. Close range, but it’d fucking hurt whoever it hit.

The way I’m feeling, I’m looking to inflict a lot of hurt.

It doesn’t take long to find Vickie’s trail. I mean, we knew where she was headed, but the fucker who tricked her out here may not lead her to the cabin. Shep nodded and I grunted. We were looking at her bike tracks through the broken ferns it’d left in it’s wake.

Before long we found her discarded bike.

But Vickie was easy to track. She hadn’t been trying to be subtle or stealthy. My nose flared as I started to experience the hype that comes from the hunt.

The tracks lead us straight to the cabin. We both freeze and stiffen at the sound of a loud
smack
and the muffled tears that follow. It’s Vickie, and my heart shifts into overdrive. Adrenaline pounds through me, and I am going to kill him. It’s not a question of it.

“Get closer. Try and lead him out if you need to, so I can get him.” Shep whispers before finding a flat place to lie down and get braced. It’s the
if you need to
that makes me want to kiss him. He wants this as much as I do, and he doesn’t care which of us takes care of it.

As I start to close, in Vickie’s scream rings out. “Run away! He’s got a knife!”

A knife to a gun show? Hell yes. “Vickie,” I bellow. “I’m here for you, baby girl.” Her wail of relief soothes me until it’s choked off. I hear a shuffle and see a flicker of the pink coat before Vickie emerges from the dark. There’s an arm wrapped tight around her and a knife at her throat, pressing in enough that if she breathes wrong, it’ll cut. When I see that her shuffling is from her pants, loose and shredded around her feet, I hiss. Red clouds my vision, and I know Shep’s seeing it too.

Clay. His mouth is twisted in victory. “Buck, bad timing, as usual. Once again you manage to step in when I was about to have my prize.”

“I’m generous like that.” Clay flinches briefly from the animal rage in my voice. “What’re you doing, Clay?”

“Getting what’s owed to me, Asshole.” He’s spitting, and his grip on the knife keeps tightening and shifting. It’s making me nervous as the blade flits across Vickie’s exposed, vulnerable neck.

“What’s that?”

“Vickie, Dumbass. And her stupid mom and pimp. And you and Shep. All of you tried to keep her from me, but she’s mine.”

Like hell. “Well you got all that except me. Shep’s in jail because of you.” Vickie’s sobs renew at this and I can’t tell her the truth to calm her. “But here I am.”

“Throw your gun down.”

“You won’t hurt her.”

But Clay surprises me. He moves fast, dragging the knife down Vickie’s cheek. The cut isn’t too deep, but the serrated blade makes it jagged and nasty. Her moans of pain almost cripple me, and I set the gun down and step away from it. “Okay, what now?”

“Now? I owe you a punch or two, I think.” Jesus, what a lunatic.

“Okay, so come hit me.”

Clay rolls his eyes. “Yeah, right. Vickie, reach in my front pocket and grab another zip tie.” Her face turns green, but Vickie does what he asks. He makes sure I see how she has to dig for it. “Oh, careful. You’ll be getting plenty of my dick soon. No need to be greedy now.”

I know what’s happening. Moving slowly, I hold my hands in front, crossed at the wrist, until I’m close to her. But Clay stops Vickie before she touches me. “You think I was born yesterday?”
No, but I think this morning you woke up a dead man
. “Turn around. Arms behind your back.”

I do as he says. Clay thinks he’s being smart, but being smart would have meant never messing with my family. The zip tie is yanked tight after a couple of sharp insults from Clay. It’s biting into my skin, and my fingertips are already going numb. I step back, away from Vickie, and drop to my knees, making myself look as weak as possible. “Okay. Come and get your shots.”

Clay stoops and pulls off Vickie’s shoes. Then he uses the strips of her jeans to tie her ankles. “Don’t want you running off now, do we? Besides, now you can watch me stab him.”

Wielding the knife like he’s won the champion belt, Clay lunges toward me, grinning.

Crack
.

The shot is loud, echoing easily. It’s the lightning, and the red bloom on Clay’s chest is the thunder that follows. He trips and his body skids in the dirt until it crumples near me. I know he’s dead by the time I stand.

Shep’s already up and running toward Vickie when another shot is fired. All three of us are like statues. The shout comes after. “Don’t move!” It’s Jake. I dare a glance behind me and see four cops weaving toward us through the trees, their guns trained on Shep.

Jake steps to me, and I brace myself. For what, I don’t know. He pushes Clay’s body over and grunts at the chest wound. “Well, that’s gonna make his confession hard.” My head is still buzzing with the past five minutes playing over and over in my mind, so that it feels like a lifetime.

“Shep, you got any other weapons on you?”

“No, Sir. They’re all over there.” He nods to where he’d been planted with the rifle and the duffle bag beside him.

“Peters, call an ambulance. Black, untie Miss Sampson, please. Shep, you ain’t in trouble, but you will be if you move, got it?”

Shep nods but his wide, gray eyes are pinned on mine. I know my face reflects his own confusion. He’s not in trouble? Confession?

Jake gets behind me and cuts my hands loose. Rubbing them together, the blue fades fast and stinging feeling returns to my fingers. “Thanks, man.”

“Y’all just had to call, you know,” he mutters, still eyeing the dead body at our feet. “We had men following you, Buck.”

“Yeah, but you were hoping I’d lead you to Shep.”

He shrugs. “We were, until we found Clay’s footprints outside the Sampson trailer. Hope you don’t mind, but we took a look in your trailer. You and Shep are some big guys, you know?” I can’t even be mad about them busting in. The grin on my face is stretched as far as it can go. One look at Clay’s feet explains it. He wears a nine, ten tops. Shep and I are each easily size thirteens. “Got the call as y’all were disappearing into the woods. We weren’t sure where you’d gone, until we found the bike and heard the shouting. If we’d have seen Shep on the ground, we would’ve stopped you.” The words were there, but Jake saw Vickie’s state. Black had her up and had given her his coat to cover up with. The bruising on her face made me wince. Jake’s tone sounded like he was happy Clay ended up dead.

“What now?”

“Vickie’s gonna have to go to the hospital. Get cleaned up, get a rape kit.” Each step was a punch to my gut. Maybe Clay had found a way to get me, afterall. “You and Shep’ll come down to the station and give statements.”

“Can’t I go with her? I’ll come after, but--”

“Sorry, Buck. No can do. Murders don’t exactly wait in the law.”

Things moved fast. Shep and I didn’t even get to hug Vickie, to touch her at all. The ambulance came, and she was whisked away by paramedics. It felt like my own chest was bleeding. We’d saved her life, but what if we hadn’t saved her heart?

They put us in separate cars, though neither of us were in cuffs. Maybe to keep us from talking, I don’t know. Maybe because the memory of Shep’s mouth on mine was still fresh in everyone’s mind, and things like that don’t get forgotten around here.

At the station I gave my statement, start to finish. I left nothing out. Not even the details of my relationship or the fight I’d had with Shep and Vickie. Jake just wrote it all down, though his cheeks tinged pink at some of the details.

“I’m glad he’s dead,” I say.

Jake gives a grunt.

And officer slides in and pulls Jake away for a moment. Sitting in the small interrogation room, it isn’t what I expected. They have an old couch in here that belongs on a curb or in a dump, but it’s comfortable enough if you don’t mind sinking in.

Jake returns, a small book in his hands. “So let me get this straight. You and Shep, friends all these years, and he never told you what happened to his parents.”

Heat burns in my gut. “Nope. Didn’t need to until I thought it’d hurt Vickie. I know they disappeared, but it wasn’t like when my folks did. It was obvious Shep’s parents were dead. I mean, I guess I always thought he’d did it. His dad was a real prick.”

“You thought he’d killed his parents, and you still love him?” Jake stumbles over the word ‘love,’ but I’m pretty impressed with how calm he is over something he obviously feels awkward about. If he’d kissed Shep like I had, I wonder if he’d be pink for other reasons.

“Yep, pretty much. Like I said, I was just worried about Vickie.”

“Well,” he muses, “You don’t need to worry anymore. This was in Miss Sampson’s jacket. It wasn’t Shep who killed his parents. He just protected the person who did. That boy can keep a secret.”

My mouth wants to hang open. “He always was loyal. Who did it?”

Jake shakes his head. “Naw. He can tell you if he wants. Seems to me a man who works so hard to keep someone’s secret deserves a bit of respect.”

“How… how does this affect him? Does he know?”

“He’s had a good chat with the Chief of Police and a department apology. But we’re letting the case stay cold. Opening it now ain’t gonna do anyone any good.”

Jake was saying they were going to break the law for Shep. Or at least ignore it. It’s something only a small town could get away with. This same small town that never accepted Shep, that made him feel like a stranger and a menace, is gonna protect him.

I’ll be damned.

“There was something else she had, but I’ll let Shep tell you about that, too.”

Vickie

The hospital gown crinkles each time I move. In the past few hours I’ve been swabbed, touched, patted, and hugged by strangers. But I told them Clay never raped me. It’s the only thing that’s helping me hold myself together. All I want is Shep and Buck.

Remembering Buck’s shout when Clay had me trapped… it made me feel light. Fluttery. They’d come. They’d come so fast, saving me, protecting me. Just like they said they would. Now I needed them.

There’s a rumble outside the sliding doors at the entrance of the hospital. I jump up when I see Shep’s Camaro pull to a stop. Both the driver’s and passenger’s doors open, and my breath leaves me. There they are.

The worry on their face crushes me. I know what they think. The same thing that everyone else here thought. That I’d been violated.

They’d come anyway. My love burst through me as I rushed through the doors, launching into Buck’s open arms. Shep came in behind me and we held each other. I was surrounded by love.

“Vickie--”

“I’m okay,” I say.

Shep’s voice growls in my hair. “You don’t have to worry. It doesn’t matter what happened to us. It matters that you tell us what you need, because goddamn, we’d do anything for you.”

I laugh and it feels good, so good. “I know. But you came just in time. I mean it.”

We cram into his car, me on Buck’s lap, and go home.

# # # #

It’s obvious the cops went through the trailer. There’s mud from their feet on my clean floors, and the closets were turned inside out. I don’t even care. Buck filled me in as we drove home, and, as long as my boys are free, I don’t mind.

The shower we take gets steamy fast. It ends with Buck in my pussy and Shep in my mouth and their hands everywhere, everywhere, everywhere.

When we’re out and toweled and sitting together eating cereal (I need to go to the store), it’s strange how easy it feels after such an ordeal. I mention this to them.

“Well, baby girl, they warned us about that. You might be in shock still. If it’s okay, I’d like to get you a therapist.” Buck looks at his empty bowl, like he’s worried I’ll be mad at him. I get it. Therapy isn’t something you do around here. It’s for city folks with too much money and time. At least that’s the general consensus. I’m interested, though.

“Okay.” I stir the milk in my bowl, turned pink from the marshmallows I haven’t eaten yet. I like to save them for last, like dessert at the end of breakfast. I realize something and my stomach drops. “Oh shit!”

Buck and Shep startle, and I blush, remembering that good girls aren’t supposed to cuss. “Sorry. I just remembered that I had something important for Shep, an envelope, and now I don’t know where it’s gone--”

“The police gave it to me,” Shep says, and I sigh with relief.

“What is it? Jake mentioned something, but he wouldn’t tell me, the bastard.” Buck looks accusingly at Shep, who’s smiling big.

“It’s something Grandma left me.” He goes and grabs the envelope from his jeans, which had been discarded on our way to the shower. Pushing it across the table to Buck, his smile gets even bigger.

“I found it. Your grandma had a hiding spot in a closet.”

We both watch, holding our breaths, as Buck opens the envelope and reads the letter. Then thumbs through the checks. His eyes grow wide. “Oh
shit
.”

“Exactly,” I joke.

“What are you gonna do with all this?”

“
We
are gonna do what we want. Whatever our dreams are now.”

He means it. It’s our future. Our dreams have been scattered, ever changing. Mine started with just getting out of the park.

Now, though? I just want to be with them forever.

Buck smiles and leans his chair back. “Well thanks, Grandma.” His grin turns devilish, and, as he sets his chair back and stands, it escapes no one’s notice that his large cock is hard again. My pussy starts to tingle.

“Vickie, baby. You know how I feel about cussing.”

Oh, I do. I
do
.