Icky fixed his gaze on the bumpy road. Frozen trees flew by as the car sped through traffic. “What if I did set you up?” he finally said, breaking the angry silence. “Either way, you learned a valuable lesson.” He rammed the gears. “From the warm reception you got, isn’t it obvious folks don’t want you here? Your enemies outnumber your friends.”

“Which group do you fall in?”

Icky sighed. “Just stay out of my marriage, okay? We were fine until you poisoned her against me. She’s my wife.”

“That could change if you go postal on her again.”

Icky stewed for a minute, then made a hard left into the hospital parking lot. After we skidded up to the ER in a spray of sleet, he stared straight ahead, nostrils flaring. “Get out.”

I blinked slowly. “I won’t forget what you did today. Not by a long shot. And if you touch my sister again, I swear—”

“Fuck off.”

Biting back a curse, I went for the door, but Icky beat me to it by shoving it open. Once I got out, he dumped the pillowcase in the slush. I just stood there, eyes like slits, my anger spiking. Then he ripped into the glove box, snatched a tabloid magazine, and tossed it at my feet.

“Happy reading,” he said with a nasty smirk, then peeled away in a cloud of sleet, leaving me to glare after him as the tabloid pages fluttered in the wind.

TRACE

____________________________

I’d busted my chin. Almost witnessed a vehicular homicide. Quite possibly incited a lynch mob, and had alienated my brother-in-law. Then there were the five stitches, tetanus shot, and X-ray that had put me in debt for close to a grand. All this and I’d been free less than a day.

When would this nightmare end?

I sat in the lobby waiting on my cab. Thanks to the snow, ER patients from Willow’s Corner, Temptation, and New Dyer were crammed together like crayons in a box.

Between the crackling intercom, the coughing, and the wailing babies, I couldn’t decide which was worse: Temptation Memorial or prison.

My cut ached and my head felt like somebody had hit me with a shovel. I couldn’t wait to get out of here. ‘Course, the place was abuzz with gossip. The gaping and finger pointing started minutes after I’d signed in. Doctors and nurses, up to their elbows in patients, snuck peeks while exchanging whispers from behind their clipboards.

Nosy sons-a-bitches.

Boredom made me remember Icky’s tabloid—The Dirty Dish. I grabbed the damp magazine, peeled the pages open, and read the stupid headlines topping the pictures of stars, weirdos, and wannabes.

Then I saw it.

On page seven.

Society Scoop

By: Erica Davies, Senior Editor, The Dirty Dish

Darlings, twelve years ago Tracemore Dawson—the notorious “Butcher Boy” of Temptation, West Virginia—was convicted of second-degree murder in the stabbing death of Lilith Bradford. The victim, a former beauty queen turned interior decorator, was the widow of advertising magnate Harrison Parker Bradford.

Labeled a crime of passion, the case can still trigger a debate among the residents of this sleepy little town. Officially, 18-year-old Dawson worked as a handyman and chauffeur on Bradford’s multimillion-dollar estate. He also moonlighted as an exotic dancer at a few of the local nightclubs.

Some say he was Bradford’s glorified boy-toy. Others are convinced he’s a cold-blooded sociopath. There’s also the lunatic fringe who call him an avenging angel. They say Lilith “Mommie Dearest” Bradford only got what she deserved.

Charges of child abuse were leveled against Bradford at the time, but her 14-year-old daughter Shannon claimed they were false. The teen was the prosecution’s star witness, and her taped deposition helped convince a jury to return a guilty verdict.

As I reported last spring, Shannon Bradford, now a 26-year-old realtor, is engaged to former Dawson prosecutor Darien Montgomery. “Dashing Darien” as the press so aptly named him, is currently defending pop idol Kidd Mann in a scandalous murder trial that has rocked Hollywood to its core.

This doesn’t mean Montgomery skips playtime. On the contrary, a source claims he and Bradford are diehard swingers who dabble in S&M. The kinky stuff aside, their 22-year age gap does push the May-December envelope.

But what’s a little cradle robbing between satyrs?

Since Bradford’s cousin Mead is the frontrunner in the state’s gubernatorial race next year, one can only wonder if these juicy distractions will affect his campaign.

By now you’re probably saying, “Erica, what the #&%@ does all this have to do with the price of bonbons?” Well, darlings, Dawson, 30, will be released from Gainstown Penitentiary this week on parole, and my source confirmed Bradford is hosting an engagement party this month. What will Dawson do when he learns the two people who sent him to the pokey are getting hitched? I don’t know about you, but for Bradford’s sake, I hope the Butcher Boy isn’t a party crasher.

I gaped at the pictures. There, the bewildered face of the boy I used to be stared up at me. Fear abounded in his young eyes. I compared that photo with the one next to it—a recent picture of me in the prison yard. How the leeches got the shot was anyone’s guess.

Vintage photos of Lilith, Shannon, and that pissant Montgomery were beneath mine. Mr. Prosecutor. What the hell could she possibly see in that piranha?

“Well, looky here.”

The deep voice broke into my mental rant. I glared up to see Eddie Gray edging toward me like a hunter sneaking up on a wounded bear.

Wearing full rent-a-cop regalia, complete with a ‘GRAY SECURITY’ patch on his black uniform’s breast pocket, Sheriff Jackson Gray’s firstborn son held a billy club in one hand and a walkie-talkie in the other.

He was only three years older than me, but hard living had taken its toll on him. His thick blond hair looked as greasy as his pockmarked face. Back in the day, Eddie had been built like a linebacker. Now he was just a bloated, wannabe cop stuffed into a rumpled uniform.

Eddie muttered into his walkie-talkie. The static resonated around the lobby as he seated the black box into his belt clip. I dug out my iPod and put the earbuds in—my way of ignoring the asshole. First song up: Jamar Rogers’ “Hard Cold War.”

Quite fitting considering the circumstances.

“Heard you was back, Dawson.”

I pretended to read. The last time I’d seen Eddie, the bastard was grinning at the trial. Before that, he’d been at the other end of my fist.

He pointed the billy club at my chin. “What happened?”

“Shaving accident,” I mumbled.

“Always the smart-ass.” Eddie looked me over. “The Fontanas set you up real nice, didn’t they? A mechanic’s job at the old man’s garage and carpentry work at Cholly’s new club.” Then he said in a stage whisper, “But Cholly can’t even get a local contractor to renovate ‘cause of you. Got folks boycotting Mr. Fontana’s garage too.”

I flipped a page. It wasn't like I wanted to come back, but the conditions of my parole left me no choice. I needed a job and nobody but my best bud Cholly and his dad would give me one.

Eddie lurched closer. His eyes glinted like black diamonds. “Twelve years in the pen. I’m surprised they didn’t shiv your ass.” He tugged at one of my earbuds. “You must have a guardian angel.”

I lowered the paper. “Don’t do that again.”

“Or what? You gonna stab me?” He chuckled. “Nah, that’s not your style. Whack jobs like you only prey on helpless women.”

I ripped my earbuds out and shoved the iPod into my pillowcase.

“You ain’t mad, are you?” Eddie cocked his head and poked my shoulder with his nightstick. “I’m just trying to be helpful. Temptation trailer trash may ignore you for now, but they’ll send you packing soon enough. Hell, if you ask me, they should’ve rode your whole nutbag family out years ago, boy.”