business. After tonight, he wondered if the smart thing to do was just to let things go. Make the break before they heaped more emotional debris on what they’d once had.
He crammed his black ball cap low on his head. Maybe when he got to his apartment, he would sign the damn divorce papers and be done with it.
That would be the smart thing.
Chapter 2
“It’s just a ding,” Danny Dewitt said after he returned Tory’s four-door Taurus to her garage the following morning.
Her gaze razored from the vehicle’s right rear to her brother. He was tall and lean with a lopsided smile and black hair worn in a stubby ponytail. His face was angular, and his eyes a dreamy shade of green. His looks, combined with a glib tongue and the cocky sense of self-confidence that accompanied youth, often had females falling over their own feet.
Females other than his sister.
“It’s a dent, Danny,” Tory pointed out. “The size of a dinner plate.”
He gave the Taurus another look. “A small dinner plate.”
She pressed her lips together. “You took my car without permission. All of my equipment is in there. My cell phone.”
“I didn’t mean any harm.” He shrugged. “A friend dropped me off here yesterday afternoon. You weren’t around—”
“I was helping Sheila on a case. It’s called working.”
“Figured you were doing something like that,” he said, ignoring her jibe. “I came out here and saw your car. I decided the least I could do was buy you gas, a wash and an oil change.”
“Gas, wash and an oil change take about an hour. Tops.” She wrapped her arms around her, gathering Bran’s Oklahoma Sooners red-and-white football jersey closer to ward off the cold. The jersey still carried the musky scent of his cologne and made her feel even more unsettled. Hollow. “If I had intended to let you drive my car, I’d have given you a key.”
Danny grinned. “You keep an extra set in one of those magnet things under the front bumper.”
“Not anymore.” She wiggled her fingers. “My keys.”
He handed them over with an amiable shrug. “When I got to the gas station I ran into Rocco,” Danny explained. “He had a line on a poker game, so I left your car at the fast lube. Jewell was at work, and I planned to hang at the game until time for her to get off, then pick up your car and bring it back. But I started winning and couldn’t leave. This morning, Rocco took me to get your car. The manager at the lube place said it got hit in their lot. Their insurance’ll cover it. He gave me a form to fill out. In triplicate. It’s over the visor.”
“Don’t take my car again. Ever.”
“Sorry, Tor. I was trying to make things easier on you.”
How many times over the years had she heard that? And always, Danny’s good intentions took a left turn, leaving a mess for her to clean up. In triplicate.
“Want to hear how I spent last night?” she asked. “After I wasted hours looking for you and my car, Bran dropped by.”
“Bran?” A hopeful look sprang into Danny’s eyes. “Are you guys talking again?”
“Oh, we talked,” she confirmed. “First about an escaped killer who might be gunning for Bran. Then about the messages he left on my answering machine and cell. Messages I never got.”
Danny winced. “Yeah, I checked the machine. I meant to write you a note about Bran’s message, but forgot.”
“Too bad. That lapse of memory just got you barred from the house when I’m not here.” She held out her hand. “House key.”
“Geez, Tor, you’re being kind of hard, aren’t you?”
“I wouldn’t have to be if you’d act like a responsible eighteen-year-old.”
After Danny handed her the key, she continued. “Bran and I also discussed your driving my car.” Her stomach knotted at the memory of how their tempers had flared. “You went to jail because you racked up so many tickets and didn’t bother to pay them. The judge who granted your bail suspended your license. If a cop had pulled you over last night, you’d be in a cell right now. Did that beating you got in jail teach you nothing?”
He arched his dark brows. “Taught me I don’t want to go back there a second time.”
“Then why take my car? You’ve got one week left until your license gets reinstated. Why chance driving now?”
“I didn’t think. But at least I won playing poker.” He grinned. “How could I not when I had the best teacher in the world?”
“I taught you to play when you were ten years old. We used toothpicks, not chips. I never intended poker to become your main source of funds.”
He pulled a layer of bills from the wad in the pocket of his jean jacket and handed it to her. “Here’s the first installment on the bail money you and Bran fronted me.”
Tory glanced at the bills. The bail had not come with Bran’s blessing. She’d told him after the fact she’d used a thousand dollars of their savings. In her mind, her doing so without telling Bran first had been justified—she’d had to bail Danny out of the jail’s infirmary. He’d been beaten so badly she was afraid he would be permanently scarred without good, fast medical care.
Even now she could still feel the heat of Bran’s anger over what she’d done. Still hear the harsh words they’d exchanged. Still see the grim look on his face as he packed his bags.
Water under the bridge, she thought. Right now she had Danny to deal with. She jammed the bills into the front pocket of her jeans then leaned a hip against Bran’s workbench.
“Listen up, pal. If you get arrested again, the money I used for your bail goes down the drain. That happens, it won’t be Bran who comes after you, but me.”
Danny looked at her car. “I guess you’re plenty steamed right now.”
When she didn’t answer, he rocked back on the heels of his scuffed running shoes. “I was hoping you’d give me a ride to Jewell’s apartment. She’s probably mad, too, over me being out all night.”
“You think?” Tory asked. All she knew about the woman Danny had moved in with was that she danced at some bar under the billing “exotic performer.” Stripper was more like it, Tory suspected. “You want a ride, call your pal Rocco.”
“Yeah.” Danny moved to the door that led into the kitchen, then paused. “Tor, I didn’t mean to make you mad.”
“You never do.”
She fisted her hands as he stepped into the house. Considering the way he’d been raised, she couldn’t totally fault Danny for assuming he could forever shirk responsibility.
Their mother had been brought up by overindulgent parents who had never seen the need for their only child to learn to deal with whatever complications life tossed at her. They’d just handled them all for her. And unwittingly raised a daughter who was codependent in every aspect.
Tory had no trouble picturing their mother clinging to their father, the air of helplessness hanging around the woman almost palpable in the air. Just as easily she could see her father’s face, transforming over the years until the only thing left was unbridled disgust for his wife’s pathetic weakness. He hadn’t even stayed around long enough to see his son born.
Tory had been nine years old when her father walked out, a young girl to whom her mother transferred as many burdens as possible. It was Tory who’d been saddled with making decisions about everything from finances to meal planning. Tory who’d learned everything there was to know about responsibility while their mother raised Danny into the mirror image of herself.