The Law of Moses (The Law of Moses, #1)(62)

I pushed the anger back. I shoved it hard so I wouldn’t shove her. And I wanted to push her, wipe the denial off her pretty face, push her head into the dirt until her mouth was filled with mud. Then she could order me to go. Then I would deserve it. Instead, I did as she asked and turned away, ignoring the little boy who trotted after me, sending desperate images of his mother to my brain, trying to call me back without words.

“What does he look like?” She called after me, and the desperation in her voice was so at odds with her rejection that I stopped in my tracks. “I mean, if you can see him. What does he look like?”

Eli was suddenly in front of me, jumping up and down, smiling and pointing back toward Georgia. I turned, still angry, still defiant, but willing to go another round, and Eli was there in front of me again, standing between me and the horse corral. I looked at him and then back at Georgia.

“He’s small. He has dark, curly hair. And brown eyes. His eyes are like yours.” She winced and her hands rose to press against her chest as if to encourage her heart to continue beating.

“His hair is too long. It’s curling in his eyes. He needs a haircut.” The little boy brushed a droopy curl out of his eyes as if he understood what I was telling his mother.

“He hated haircuts,” she said softly, and her lips tightened immediately as if she wished she hadn’t contributed to the conversation.

“He was afraid of the clippers,” I supplied, Eli’s memory of the buzzing around his ears making my own heart quicken in sympathy. Eli’s memories were shot with terror and the clippers were twice as big as his head. They resembled the gaping jaws of a Tyrannosaurus Rex, proving that memory wasn’t always accurate. Then the image changed to something else. A birthday cake. It was chocolate with a plastic horse in the center, rearing up. Four candles flickered around it.

“He’s four,” I said, trusting that that was what Eli was trying to tell me. But I knew. I’d seen the dates on the grave.

“He would be six now.” She shook her head defiantly. I waited. The child looked up at me expectantly and then looked back at his mother.

“He’s still four,” I said. “Kids wait.”

Her lower lip trembled and she bit into it. She was starting to believe me. That, or she was starting to hate me. Or maybe she already did.

“Wait for what?” Her voice was so soft I barely caught the question.

“Wait for someone to raise them.”

The pain on her face was so intense, I felt a flash of remorse that I’d cornered her like this. She wasn’t prepared for me. But I hadn’t been prepared either. It was aces as far as I was concerned.

“He would have been waiting a long time for you,” she said softly, taking a few steps toward me and then stopping, her stance aggressive, her hands clenched. The grieving mother was gone. She was the wronged woman now. And I was the man who knocked her up and left town.

“That’s how you want to play this?” I gasped hoarsely, all my anger back in full force, so angry I wanted to start ripping fence posts from the ground and flinging barbed wire.

“Play what, Moses?” she snapped. And I snapped too.

“The fact that you and I had a son. I had a son! We made a child together. And he’s dead. And I never knew him. I never knew him, Georgia! I never knew a damn thing about him. And you’re going to spit that shit at me? How did he die, Georgia? Huh? Tell me!” I knew. I was almost sure I knew. Eli kept showing me the truck. Georgia’s old truck, Myrtle. Something happened to Eli in the truck.

Anger zinged in colorful zags and streaks behind my eyes. I felt the water start to part, separating, splitting, and the colors from the other side started to seep down the channel. I pressed my hands into my eyes, and maybe I looked as crazed as I felt, because when I pulled my hands away, Georgia had jumped the fence and began to run, her legs eating up the distance swiftly, as if she thought I would kill her too. And instead of making me pause, her flight just made me angrier. She was going to answer me. She was going to tell me. And she was going to do it now. I went after her, over the fence, arms and legs pumping, rage narrowed on her slim back and on her pale hair falling out of her braid, running away from me like I was a monster.

When I pulled her down, I wrapped myself around her and took her weight on mine. We hit hard, her head bouncing off my shoulder, my head bouncing off the ground, but it didn’t slow her down any. She fought me, kicking and scratching like a wild animal, and I rolled on top of her, pinning her arms between us, pressing her legs down with my own.

“Georgia!” I roared, pressing my forehead into hers, controlling every part of her. I could feel her gasping for breath, crying, resisting me with all her strength.

“Stop it! You’re going to talk to me. You’re going to talk to me. Right. Now. What happened to him?” I felt the ice in my hands and flames at my neck, and I was reminded that Eli was there. I knew he was watching us, watching me restraining his mother. And I was ashamed. I didn’t want to see him and I couldn’t let her go. I needed her to tell me. I shifted so I wasn’t crushing her, but I didn’t lift my brow from where I pressed it into hers, controlling her head. When a horse gives you her head, she’s yours. Georgia’s words whispered in my memory. She wasn’t giving me her head. But I was taking it.

“Talk.”