Page 49 of Kiss an Angel

“Matt and Rob are as hard-headed as you. It’s one thing to teach two rowdy boys, but it’s another to work with a sensitive young girl. How can she learn anything with you snapping her head off all the time?”

“What the hell do you know about sensitive young girls? From what I hear, you used to suck arsenic straight from your mother.”

“Very funny.”

“Try telling me your old man mollycoddled you when he was teaching you to do the triple.”

“He didn’t have to mollycoddle me. I knew he loved me.”

His mouth thinned into a belligerent line. “Are you saying I don’t love my daughter?”

She slammed her hands on her hips. “You stupid jerk. Didn’t it ever occur to you that it’s more important for you to be Heather’s father now than her coach? If you’d stop pushing her so hard, she might be able to perform better.”

“All of a sudden I’ve got fucking Ann Landers here.”

“You watch your filthy mouth!”

“Look who’s talking. I’m warning you, Sheba, don’t screw with Heather. She’s having a hard enough time as it is without you trying to turn her against me.”

He stalked off, bristling with animosity.

She watched him for a moment, then unlocked the door of the red wagon and stomped inside. She and Brady had rubbed each other wrong from the beginning, but there was also a powerful sexual awareness between them that kept her on guard. Brutal experience had taught her to be careful about the men she chose as lovers, and the day she’d married Owen Quest was also the day she’d committed herself to never again going to bed with a man she couldn’t control. She had a self-destructive streak when it came to men, and twice it had nearly destroyed her: first with Carlos Méndez and then, far more brutally, with Alex Markov.

She’d made Carlos Méndez pay for what he’d done to her, and now she reminded herself that Alex had gotten his punishment, too. She went over to the window and saw Daisy Markov struggling with a bale of hay. Sheba almost felt sorry for her—if it had been anyone else, she would have—but Daisy was the instrument of Alex’s punishment. How humiliating this must be to him.

She was almost certainly pregnant; there was no other reason for him to have married such a useless woman. But as much as she hated Alex, the circus meant everything to Sheba, and it seemed obscene that the blood of the Markovs—one of the most famous circus families in history—would be passed on through that pampered little thief. Every time she looked at her, Sheba wondered how she could have held her head up if the truth about Daisy hadn’t come out.

Later, Daisy couldn’t remember how she endured the next week and a half as the circus meandered through North Carolina and then crossed over into Virginia. During the day, she and Alex were only together in the truck, and when he condescended to speak to her, she felt as if she were being pricked to death with icicles. They didn’t even share meals. Alex usually opened a can of something while she was in the bathroom getting ready for spec and then left a plate of food out for her while he dressed. He never asked what she wanted to eat or suggested she cook dinner for them, not that she had any energy left for cooking.

Sometimes she thought she’d dreamed that passionate kiss they’d shared. They no longer even touched except on those occasions when she fell asleep in the truck and woke up snuggled against him. When that happened, she would jerk away, only to feel the sexual energy pulsing between them, as palpable as the breeze that blew through the truck.

Or maybe it was just her imagination. Maybe she didn’t appeal to him at all. How could he find anyone attractive who had blistered hands, a sunburned nose, scabby elbows, and lived in filthy work clothes? Sometime in the past week, she’d stopped putting on makeup until she had to get ready for spec. During the day, she snagged her hair in a ponytail, with the uneven wisps that escaped the rubber band trailing down her neck and across her cheeks. In the space of two weeks, the grooming habits of a lifetime had been broken. She didn’t even know who she was when she looked into a mirror.

And she was always exhausted. She fell asleep on the couch before midnight, but once Alex came into the trailer, it was nearly impossible for her to go back to sleep. She’d toss and turn for hours, finally tumbling into a fitful dreamlike state only to have him growl her awake long before she was rested. She was drained, confused, and incredibly lonely.

Since everyone believed she was a thief, the members of the company continued to avoid her, and her relationship with the elephants hadn’t improved, either. Tater still acted as if she’d betrayed him. Several times Daisy had considered spraying herself with perfume, but she was more afraid of his affection than his dislike. When Neeco and Digger were around, the elephant left her alone, but if they weren’t in sight, he looked for opportunities to swat her, and he’d knocked her down so many times that she had bruises everywhere.

The other baby elephants had quickly realized she was an easy mark, and she’d become the target for all their mischief. They sprayed her with water, bellowed at her, and swatted her if she got too close. Even worse was the way they waited until she was standing next to them before they did their personal business. Digger told her that as long as she refused to use the bull hook on them, she deserved what she got, but she wouldn’t beat them.

Although she’d stayed away from Sinjun, she’d learned about him from listening to the others talk. He was an old tiger, about eighteen, with a reputation for being cranky. According to Digger, none of the trainers had ever been able to befriend him, and everyone regarde

d him as both unpredictable and dangerous.

Just like her husband. Alex confused her so much she didn’t know what to think. As soon as she made up her mind that he was nothing more than a sadistic monster, he’d appear at the elephant truck with a new pair of work gloves or a baseball cap so she didn’t get sunburned. And more than once, he’d happened by just in time to wrestle the loaded wheelbarrow down the ramp for her. Most of the time, however, he simply gave her grief.

It was an unseasonably hot day for mid-May. The temperature had soared well into the nineties, and the thick humidity made it difficult to breathe. They were playing in a parking lot again, this one in a small town south of Richmond, and the black asphalt intensified the heat. She’d been swatted twice already by the elephants, badly scraping her elbow the second time she fell. To make it worse, everybody in the circus seemed to be relaxing except her.

Brady and Perry Lipscomb sat in the shade beneath the awning of the Pepper family’s Airstream, enjoying a cool beer and listening to a baseball game on the portable radio. Jill spritzed herself with water and lay back on a lounge chair with the newest issue of Cosmo. Even Digger was taking a nap in the shade.

“Daisy, get your ass moving and do something with that hay!”

Neeco shouted out his order from the doorway of the trailer the showgirls used, then draped his arm around Charlene’s shoulder. Ever since their confrontation over the bull hook, Neeco had been hostile. He gave her the worst jobs and kept her at them for long, backbreaking hours until Alex appeared and told him she’d worked enough for the day.

As she began to move the hay, every muscle in her body burned. Her sweat-soaked T-shirt had a rip at the shoulder seam; filth covered her jeans; dirt, hay, and manure stuck to every inch of her damp skin. Her hair was matted to her scalp, and her grubby fingernails were as broken as her spirit.

Across the lot, Sheba sipped something cool from an orange plastic tumbler and painted her toenails. Perspiration dripped in Daisy’s eyes, making them sting, but her hands were too dirty to wipe them clear.

“Hurry it up, will you, Daisy?” Neeco called out, while Charlene giggled. “We’ve got another load coming in.”

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