The Perfect Husband - Lisa Gardner [2]
He never took his eyes off Theresa. She was the one.
He turned slightly and the sunlight glinted off the police shield pinned to his young, well-toned chest. One hundred feet from him, behind the chain-link fence, Theresa’s gaze fell to his badge. He saw her instant nervousness, her innate uncertainty. Then her beautiful brown eyes swept up his face, searching his eyes.
He knew the moment he had her. He registered the precise instant the wariness left her gaze and was replaced by vulnerable, tremulous hope.
And the power that filled him was unimaginable.
In his mind he heard his father’s voice, low and soothing as it had been in the beginning, before everything had gone to hell. His father was reciting a parable: There was once a tortoise and a scorpion faced by an incoming flood. Fearful, but wanting to do the right thing, the tortoise had told the scorpion he would carry the deadly creature across the raging waters to the opposite shore if the scorpion would agree not to sting him. The scorpion gave the tortoise his word and climbed onto the tortoise’s back. They set out, the tortoise’s short, strong legs churning powerfully, fighting to bring them to shore. The waves crashed over them, sending them reeling back. The tortoise swam and swam, struggling to bring them forward even as the water swept them back. The waves grew fiercer. The tortoise became tired. Soon, even the light weight of the scorpion began to seem like a heavy chain, threatening to drag him under. The tortoise, however, refused to ask the scorpion to jump off. He swam harder, and finally the shoreline appeared in view. It looked as if they would make it.
And then the scorpion stung him. Just dug in and jabbed the poison deep into his flesh. The tortoise looked back in shocked bewilderment, the poison burning his blood, his legs turning instantly to lead. He could no longer move. They both began to drown. At the last minute, with the salty brine filling his mouth and nostrils, the poor tortoise cried, “Why did you do such a thing? You have killed us both!”
The scorpion replied simply, “Because it is my nature.”
Jim liked that story. He understood. It was his nature too. He could not think of a time when he hadn’t known that he was better than everyone, smarter than everyone, faster than everyone, colder than everyone.
What he wanted, he got.
Now he smiled at beautiful seventeen-year-old Theresa Matthews. He let her see the Berkshire County badge he’d worked so hard to earn. And his hand lovingly stroked the billy club hanging at his waist.
Look at me, Theresa. Look at your future husband.
In the beginning it had been that simple.
In the beginning . . .
ONE
Five years later
J. T. DILLON WAS DRUNK. Outside, the white-hot desert sun was straight up in the sky, bleaching bones and parching mountains. Saguaro cacti seemed to surf waves of heat while sagebrush died of sunstroke at their feet. And all over Nogales, people hid in darkened rooms, running ice cubes down their naked chests and cursing God for having saved August’s apocalypse for September.
But he didn’t notice.
In the middle of the cool green oasis of his ranch-style home, J. T. Dillon lay sprawled on his back, his right hand cradling the silver-framed picture of a smiling woman and gorgeous little boy. His left hand held an empty tequila bottle.
Above him a fan stirred the air-conditioned breeze through the living room. Below him a Navajo print rug absorbed his sweat. The room was well maintained and tastefully decorated with wicker furniture and sturdy yucca soap trees.
He stopped noticing such details after his first day of straight tequila. As any marine knew, true binge drinking was art, and J.T. considered himself to be Tequila Willie’s first Michelangelo. Shot number one seared away throat lining. Shot number two burned away the taste of the first. Half a bottle later, no man worth his salt even winced at the sensation of cheap, raw tequila ripping down his esophagus, into his stomach, and sooner or later,