The Perfect Husband Read Online Free PDF Page B

more than you have to, never tell the truth if a lie will suffice.
    Maybe J.T. wouldn't remember. He hadn't seemed too sober. Vincent should've warned her about his drinking.
    She didn't know much about J.T. Vince had said J.T. was the kind of man who could do anything he wanted to but who didn't seem to want to do much. He'd been raised in a wealthy, well-connected family in Virginia, attended West Point, but then left for reasons unknown and joined the marines. Then he'd left the marines and struck out solo, rapidly earning a reputation for a fearlessness bordering on insanity. As a mercenary he'd drifted toward doing the impossible and been indifferent to anything less. He hated politics, loved women. He was fanatical about fulfilling his word and noncommittal about everything else.
    Five years ago he'd up and left the mercenary business without explanation. Like the prodigal son, he'd returned to Virginia and in a sudden flurry of unfathomable activity he'd married, adopted a child, and settled down in the suburbs as if all along he'd really been a shoe salesman. Later, a sixteen-year-old with a new Camaro and even newer license had killed J.T.'s wife and son in a head-on collision.
    And J.T. had disappeared to Arizona.
    She hadn't expected him to be drinking. She hadn't expected him to still appear so strong. She'd pictured him as being older, maybe soft and overripe around the middle, a man who'd once been in his prime but now was melting around the edges. Instead, he'd smelled of tequila. His body was toned and hard. He'd moved fast, pinning her without any effort. He had black hair, covering his head, his arms, his chest.
    Jim had had no hair, not on his head, not on his body. He'd been smooth as marble. Like a swimmer, she'd thought, and only later understood the full depth of her naïveté. Jim's touch had always been cold and dry, as if he were too perfect for such things as sweat. The first time she'd heard him urinate, she'd felt a vague sense of surprise; he gave the impression of being above such basic biological functions.
    Jim had been mannequin perfect. If only she'd held that thought longer.
    She'd stick with J. T. Dillon. He'd once saved orphans. He'd been married and had a child. He'd destroyed things for money.
    For her purposes, he would do.
    And if helping her cost J. T. Dillon too much?
    She already knew the answer; she'd spent years coming to terms with it.
    Once, she'd dreamed of a white knight. Someone who would never hit her. Someone who would hold her close and tell her she was finally safe.
    Now she remembered the feel of her finger tightening around the trigger. The pull of the trigger, the jerk of the trigger, the roar of the gun, and the ringing in her ears.
    The acrid smell of gunpowder and the hoarse sound of Jim's cry. The thud of his body falling down. The raw scent of fresh blood pooling on her carpet.
    She remembered these things.
    And she knew she could do anything.
     
FOUR
     
    J.T. WAS UP at the crack of dawn. He didn't want to be. God knows, it was stupid for a retired man to be up with the sun, but he'd spent too many years in the military to shake the routine from his bones. Oh-six-hundred: Soldier gets up. Oh-six-hundred-fifteen: Soldier does light calisthenics. Oh-six-hundred-thirty: Marine swims fifty laps, then showers. Oh-seven-hundred: Retired man pops open a beer in the middle of his living room and wonders what the hell he's doing still getting up at oh-six-hundred.
    Now it was after nine on the fourteenth of September. He'd survived another year, hung over, dehydrated, and sick of his own skin. No more tequila. He drank beer instead.
    He was drinking his third when Rosalita arrived for the annual post-binge cleanup. Born into a family of eleven children, Rosalita had used her survival instincts to become one of the finest whores in Nogales. J.T. had met her the first week he'd moved to Nogales, picking her up in the usual manner. Over the years their relationship had