“I’m talking about,” Troy moved in nose-to-nose, “what I see in your eyes. The fear. You’re afraid. I want to know why. Don’t even think about playing the Violet card. That shit won’t fly.”
Keith closed his eyes for a moment and dragged in another of those labored breaths. What the hell was wrong with him? Troy didn’t get this. His stomach heaved. Maybe he was hallucinating.
“It’s my alibi . . .”
“Your daddy said you were home in bed,” Troy recalled. “What about it?”
“That wasn’t exactly right.”
It was Troy’s turn to feel the fear. He stamped it out.
“I was with another woman.”
Troy felt his gut roll and then clench. “You were cheating on Heather?”
Keith gave a reluctant nod.
“You son of a bitch.” Troy took a swing at him.
Keith ducked just in time, or maybe Troy’s reflexes were off. He wanted to kill Keith; that’s what he wanted to do.
“You were out with another damned girl when my sister was being murdered?”
“Yes.”
“Damn it all to hell.” Troy walked in a circle, couldn’t wrap his mind around this ... this was crazy. It had to be a mistake. He suddenly felt far too sober. “She loved you, you sick bastard!”
“Don’t you see,” Keith urged, “I can’t keep doing this to Austin when I ... I did what I did.”
Troy looked at him, tried hard to figure his cockeyed reasoning. “You’re dead right what you did was wrong, but your screwing around didn’t kill my sister.”
The silence that thickened between them ... the look in Keith’s eyes told Troy there was more.
“What’s the rest of it?” The voice didn’t even sound like it came from him. Hollow ... afraid ... afraid of what he was about to hear.
Keith wouldn’t look Troy in the eye anymore. “I had too much to drink. I passed out.”
Troy didn’t move, prayed that if there was a God in heaven he wouldn’t let whatever Keith was about to say be as bad as it felt like it was going to be.
“The other woman ... she said she woke up that night and I wasn’t in the bed. Then, the next morning I was. I ...” He looked at Troy then. “I had blood on my clothes ... on my hands. We didn’t know where it came from.”
Red flashed in front of Troy’s eyes. He didn’t remember moving, but suddenly he had Keith pinned to the ground. Images of his sister’s slashed face and throat ... the cuts on her arms where she’d fought her attacker floated before his eyes.
“Are you telling me you killed my sister?” Troy growled, his teeth clenched, his fingers digging into Keith’s throat.
Keith gagged, made a choking sound. Troy let up on his grip. He could feel Keith’s heart pounding in his chest. He could smell the blood rushing through his veins. He didn’t ever remember feeling this kind of rage before.
“Answer me!” he screamed, his voice echoed in the empty quarry.
“I . . . I don’t know.”
The bastard was crying. Troy wanted to kill him. “Damn you.” Troy got up and walked off. He wrestled with the rage that had possessed him like a demon. The air sawed in and out of his lungs. This couldn’t be happening.
Keith pushed to his feet, came up next to Troy, his head hung in defeat or humiliation. “I don’t know what happened. I can’t believe I would have hurt her ... but I just don’t know.”
Troy turned his head, met Keith’s gaze with fire starting to burn in his belly all over again. “Who was she? I want to talk to her. I want to know what time she woke up. Exactly what she saw or heard.”
Keith looked away. “I can’t tell you. If I tell you—”
