Deadly Deception by Gilbert Morris

Author:Gilbert Morris [Gilbert Morris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781441239907
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2012-12-27T16:00:00+00:00

11

The Hit

* * *

You couldn’t lay off the stuff for one day?” Frank glared down at Rosemary.

Rosemary was trying to tie the bow of her sash, but her fingers were numbed by too many sips from the bottle of Scotch. She looked up at Frank and tried to smile. “I—I only had one or two, Frank,” she excused herself.

He walked over and opened the drawer of her vanity. Pulling out the fifth of whiskey, he stared at it, then exclaimed, “You’ve had more than that!” In a sudden explosion of anger, he threw the bottle across the room. It shattered and left an ugly blotch on the pale ivory wall, but he paid it no heed. “The kids have been looking forward to this,” he barked bitterly, turning to face her. He had no idea how he looked to her at that moment, with his face iron hard and his voice cutting like a razor. Until her marriage to him, this gentle woman had been shielded by loving parents. She could not remember the day or the month when fear had come to take her by force. Her romantic ideas of marriage had not lasted long, and though she had never been a drinker, within six months of her wedding she had started seeking a refuge from fear in the bottles of liquor so readily available in the Lanza home.

As she looked up at her husband, Rosemary remembered how gentle he had been when her drinking problem had first started. She lifted her hand and whispered, “Frank—don’t hate me! I—I don’t want to drink—!”

He avoided her hand, thinking of all the promises she had made and broken. He was a drinking man himself, but it held no compulsion for him. There was something shameful in the way she clung to the bottle, and he could not understand it. “You keep saying that, but you always go back to it. Do you want the kids to grow up knowing their mother is a drunk?”

She began to cry, shaking her head. “No! No!”

Then Frank made a mistake. Without thought, he burst out, “Why, Dani is a better mother than you are to the kids!”

The words shook Rosemary’s nerves, and she raised her tear-stained face to stare at him. “And I suppose she’s a better wife to you than I am? Is that what you’re thinking, Frank? Do you think I haven’t seen the way you look at her?”

Frank blinked at her words, for they stung him. “Nobody would blame me for looking at another woman!” he shouted. “You’re no wife—and no mother!” He whirled and left the room, slamming the door.

Rosemary got up, ran to the bed, and collapsed on it. She lay there, sobbing, for a long time. Finally, she sat up, took a deep breath, and got to her feet. The scene had sobered her to a great extent, and she walked to the mirror to examine her face. As always she hated to see her own reflection. But she set her jaw, went to the bathroom, and began to wash her face in cold water.

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