Redemption (Desire Never Dies)

by Clara Grace Walker

  As his group jogged across the concrete walkway, lightning struck nearby with a deafening roar. The groan of a tree ripped from the ground carried across the wind and an instant later crashed into an unseen part of the rehab facility. Breaking glass chimed like a thousand windows crashing.

  Scott stopped. “What was that?”

  Preston nudged him on. “Keep moving. We need to get inside the hotel before things get worse.”

  Nick staggered behind him, clutching his arm. Walter kept pace alongside, steadying him. Astrid and Walter’s wife were crying. Walter’s wife, the one who spent all day locked in her hotel room with her Bible and barely talked to anyone, began reciting the twenty-third Psalm. Preston heard only bits and pieces of the verse above the storm, but he heard the part about walking through the valley of death, and it chilled him worse than the stinging rain. A second later, Astrid lost her grip and fell.

  Scott tapped his father on the shoulder and yelled. “I’m going to give her a hand.”

  Preston nodded, watching as his son helped Astrid to her feet. He’d come a long way from the lost little boy who didn’t want to share the slide on the shelter playground. A remarkable change had taken place in six years, and it filled Preston with pride. Despite the challenges, he’d raised a good son.

  He let go of his tension in an exhaled breath, pressed forward against the wind and rounded the corner of the walkway as the hotel came into view. He stopped cold. Despair caught up to him at last. About ten yards ahead, five CRC security guards barred their path. Ryan stood in front of the others, his gun aimed in their direction. “I don’t know what they’re doing standing out here,” he said. “But we’re taking refuge inside that hotel.”

  Nick pushed up to his side, Walter scurrying to keep up. “Damn straight we are.”

  The surly tone in Nick’s voice almost made Preston think things would be fine. He’d known the man for close to fifteen years now. Ironically, all the things he’d thought made Nick dislikable were the very qualities he was now glad the man possessed. His aggressive, determined nature, that made him come off a little rough around the edges, also made him a tough adversary. While he would never have admitted it to Nick at the time, his stubborn bulldog nature was also the reason he’d chosen him to buy out his company and save it from a hostile takeover. When Nick said they were taking refuge inside that hotel, Preston never doubted him.

  “What are you people doing?!” Ryan shouted. “Get back to the treatment facility.”

  “It’s a fucking hurricane,” Preston yelled back. “And we’re taking shelter inside the building.”

  “That’s a lie!” Ryan’s voice carried above the wind. “There’s no hurricane. It’s just a thunderstorm. Now take those patients and get them back into their rooms.”

  “Are you crazy? This is not just a thunderstorm.” Preston’s calm finally snapped. He felt as hot-headed as Nick. “Get those doors open and get out of the way.”

  Ryan swung the gun in Preston’s direction. “Go back to the rehab center!”

  He stood legs planted wide, both hands gripping the gun. Even so, wind pushed at him sideways. Between the cloud-darkened sky and the sheets of rain, it was hard to make out the other faces, but Preston pegged Betty by the blonde bun on top of her head. Jim, Dex and Jerry stood in some order at her side. “A tree just crashed down on top of the rehab center. Didn’t you hear it? Now move and let us in.”

  Ryan stood firm. “Take those patients back where they belong.”

  Nick pushed forward. “They belong someplace safe.”

  “Get back!” Ryan’s eyes widened, staring at him as though he’d seen a ghost. “Why are you still alive? Where’s Dennis?”

  “He’s keeping Pauline company,” Nick shouted. “Or I should say what’s left of her after you killed her.”

  “Dennis is dead?”

  A peculiar, shrill note sounded in Ryan’s voice. Preston’s hair stood on the back of his neck. He’d heard that shrill sound before; the night Andy Clarke tried to kill Maggie. “Nick, wait.”

  He barely got the warning out before Ryan pointed the pistol in Nick’s direction and fired. The gun fired wide in the wind and hit the ground a few yards to Nick’s left, plowing into the ground and kicking up a pile of sod and mud that splattered the left side of Preston’s face. Nick slumped to the ground, losing his battle against his blood loss.

  “Ryan! What are you doing?” Belinda pulled away from Vince and rushed forward. “You could have killed someone.”

  “I already have!” He shouted, waving the gun from side to side. “Do you think I care about any of you traitors?”

  Preston gave Scott’s shoulder a squeeze. “Keep everyone back,” he said. “I’ll try and reason with him.”

  Scott nodded. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. Fear gawked in his eyes. He stepped farther down the walkway, motioning everyone else to follow.

  Kneeling beside Nick, Preston inspected his wound, looking at Walter. “Is he going to be okay?”

  Walter shrugged. He shielded his face with his hands, trying to keep the rain from his eyes. “The bullet exited cleanly. We just have to keep out infection.”

  “Don’t worry,” Nick said through gritted teeth. “I’ll live.”

  “You will,” Preston agreed. “These CRC kooks obviously don’t know what a tough old geezer you are.”

  “Old?” Nick yelled. “I’m only fifty.”

  “Isn’t that the same arm you got shot in last time?”

  “Yes.” Nick grumbled. “Same damn arm. Same damn island. Same damn time of year, give or take a few weeks. It’s like a fucking curse.”

  “Go on now!” Ryan yelled. “Get back to the rehab center. All of you.”

  “Ryan, please.” Belinda alone had refused to step back. She stood within a few feet of him, her sopping linen pantsuit plastered against her like a second skin. “You can’t do this. Give me that gun before someone gets hurt.”

  She took another step toward him and a second shot rang out. Belinda fell backward. Not slumping, just falling straight back, like a board falling over. She landed face up. Blood pooled from a hole in the middle of her forehead. Her eyes stared up at the raging sky. Vince wailed out an anguished cry.

  Even in the thundering storm, Preston could tell she was already dead.

  Chapter 82

  Jamie sensed the coming storm as the clouds moved in. The light rain that followed hadn’t surprised her. When the winds picked up and the sprinkles turned to rain in earnest and thunder cracked the sky, she hadn’t paid much attention. Thunderstorms were a normal occurrence in Florida. But when the winds screeched and rain slammed hard against the walls, and the overhead light from the single fixture on the ceiling flickered, apprehension trickled in. Lightning flashed in the distance, followed seconds later by the boom of thunder.

  “Shit!” She swore, temporarily forgetting her attempts to teach Charlotte proper language.

  Her daughter looked up with round eyes. “Mommy, you swore.”

  “Shit? What do you mean, shit?” Anthony asked. He jerked from the wall, glancing nervously around the room. “What’s wrong?”

  Maggie looked at him like he was wearing a dunce cap. “I suppose if the ground started shaking he’d recognize a problem,”

  “A problem?” His voice rose. “What the fuck’s wrong?”

  Charlotte tugged on the hem of Jamie’s shorts. “Mommy, he keeps saying bad words.”

  On the floor beside them, Isabelle awoke with a start. She blinked sleep from her blue-grey eyes. “Mommy, what’s the matter?”

  “Shhh.” Maggie soothed her. “It’s just a storm. It’s nothing to worry about.”

  “It’s obviously not just a storm,” Anthony said. “What is it? A fucking hurricane?”

  Jamie shot him a hard look.

  “Oh fuck.” Realization dawned in his eyes. “It is a hurricane.” He threw his hands out in front of him, as if that might ward it off. “What the hell are we g
oing to do?”

  Jamie bit back the fear growing inside. She ran to the door and banged with all her might, but several long minutes later, realized no one was on the other side to hear her. With its glass construction, the building was a death trap. “We should get in the bathroom,” she said.

  Maggie shepherded the girls in that direction.

  “Are you fucking crazy?” Anthony asked. “Someone help break the glass on these windows so we can get the fuck out of here.”

  “That may not be any safer,” Jamie said.

  “Why not?” His voice pitched higher.

  “The closer the eye gets to making landfall, the more dangerous it’s going to be out there,” Maggie explained. She sounded calmer than Jamie, but there was no masking her alarm. “We could have winds of 150 miles per hour turning debris and loose objects into projectiles. And as the eye makes landfall, it’s going to push that seawater surging up over the land. It could get as high as twenty-five feet.”

  Anthony’s mouth dropped open, his head nodding slowly to and fro. “So what do we do?”

  Jamie considered the alternatives. Stay inside the glass building or brave the storm. Neither option was good. A shaft of lightning struck nearby, so close it lit the room. The cry of a falling tree screamed over the roar of the storm. Jamie watched the buttonwood, some two to three feet in diameter, tear loose from the soil and hurtle toward them.

  “Get away from the window!” She swung wildly with her arms, but Anthony stood there fixed in place by his astonishment.

  In that stunned moment of silence the tree fell, crashing through the window, the wall and the roof, splattering glass in all directions and landing with a deafening thud on top of Anthony. His scream pierced the air, howling above the storm. The girls screamed. Maggie screamed. Jamie stood frozen, looking at the mere inch separating the tree trunk from her face. She stood there for less than a second, but the instant seemed frozen in time, as if it had already lasted forever.

  “Help.”

  Anthony moaned and Jamie snapped back to the present. Rain lashed in through the hole torn into the building, soaking through the thin fabric of her cotton shirt and linen shorts. Pelting her skin. Stinging. Chilling her to the bone.

  What illumination had been in the room from the overhead bulb was now gone. The tree branch had taken it out on its downward trajectory. Though early afternoon, an eerie darkness filled the room. Jamie made out Anthony’s anguished face lying beneath the tree bark. From the neck down he disappeared below the tree. A seeping pool spread out from his side that could only be blood.

  “Help me.” She called to Maggie. “We have to get this tree off him.”

  Maggie shuttled the girls inside the bathroom, closing the door behind them. “Stay in there,” she said, and joined Jamie at Anthony’s side.

  “Okay. Lift.” Jamie braced her arms under the branch and was shocked to find she might as well be trying to lift a semi. They both lifted, grunting and pulling, but the tree held firm.

  “It’s no use,” Maggie said.

  Anthony moaned again. Quieter this time. In the growing dark, Jamie could just make out the fear flickering in his eyes. They widened and closed, and she was afraid if she didn’t manage to pull him out, they might never open again. She scanned the room. There had to be some sort of tool they could use. “We need a lever, something to pry this tree branch off.” Reaching down, she slipped her hand below the branch, searching for his hand, wanting to give him something to hold onto. The rain poured in harder now, making everything feel wet and slippery, but she followed the contour of his shoulder down his arm. He lay almost perfectly aligned beneath the tree, covered from his right knee up to his left shoulder. Smaller branches sprouted off from the main trunk, their leaves damp and slick from the rain. A musty scent filled her nostrils. “Where’s your hand?” she asked. “Talk to me. You have to stay awake.”

  Anthony remained sickly quiet. Eyes closed, his head rolled to the side.

  Finding the crook of his elbow, she searched again for his hand. It was then she realized the smaller, tributary branch she’d thought was planted between his arm and the side of his abdomen was, in fact, digging into his chest. “Anthony.” She whispered his name softly, knowing it was already too late. Looking back at Maggie, she slowly shook her head.

  She didn’t know the man. Didn’t know if he was good, bad or somewhere in between. She didn’t know if anyone back in California, or someplace else, would mourn his passing, but she did. Her eyes filled with tears.

  “We should go,” Maggie said.

  “Go?” For a minute, Jamie feared Maggie had lost it. “Outside? In that? I think we should join the girls inside the bathroom.”

  In answer, Maggie merely pointed up.

  Raising her eyes toward the ceiling, Jamie noted a second, larger branch resting precipitously on the roof overhead, directly over the bathroom ceiling.

  “That thing could come down anytime,” Maggie explained needlessly. “We need to find a safer place to ride out the storm.”

  With the top of the tree branch ending just shy of the door, they had only one choice, climb over the tree, through the broken glass and brave the storm. Jamie nodded, willing fear to the back of her mind. “Let’s wrap the girls in the blankets to protect them from debris.”

  Maggie gave her hand a squeeze. “Thank God that wasn’t you.”

  Jamie stood, brushing tears from her face. Her legs swayed like wet noodles as she grabbed a blanket and threw it around Charlotte. “Let’s go.”

  Chapter 83

  With panic edging away his grogginess, Earl shoved Shirley, connecting with soft, squishy tissue. She squawked and he realized, with some disgust, they were both naked. Nude rolls of flesh pressed beside him, while she stared with startled, hungry eyes and cradled her left breast in one hand. His stomach churned. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “You don’t understand,” she whined. “I just wanted to be with you. You weren’t supposed to wake up. I knew Jim couldn’t be trusted to administer the proper dosage.”

  Fog cleared from his brain as the room around him came into focus. They were in a bedroom, furnished with an ornate canopy bed, painted white with gold trim. Mauve carpeting covered the floors and matched the paint on three of the walls. The glass wall to the outside had been covered by purple drapes. And though he couldn’t see it, he heard thunder, wind and rain raging outside. He felt weak and unsteady, but stumbled out of bed and found his clothes on a nearby dresser. He remembered Ryan’s warning about what would happen to Mindy if he didn’t toe the line and nearly faltered. “Where’s Mindy? What have you done with her?”

  “Mindy?” Shirley shrieked. “Why are you asking about that little tramp? She’s poisoned your mind, Earl.”

  Poison. He remembered the hypodermic needle jabbing into his arm. His panic intensified. “Is that what you’ve done? Poisoned me?”

  “Of course not.”

  She had the nerve to sound offended.

  “I would never choose such an unpleasant end for you.”

  “Choose an end for me?” He stepped into his slacks. “So you were just going to smother me then?”

  “Earl, you don’t understand.”

  He zipped his jeans and turned to face her. “I don’t understand what? That you had me drugged and were trying to kill me?”

  “It’s not like that.”

  It was exactly like that. The woman was insane. She’d gathered a blanket in front of her, holding it over her breasts. Her dark hair hung in a disheveled mess around her face, falling just above her shoulders. Her bottom lip trembled as she stared at him unblinking. It was creepy, the way she could just stare. “Where’s Mindy?” he asked again.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Bullshit!” Fear became outrage. “Don’t you lie to me! Tell me where she is! Right now!”

  “Oh, Earl, this is all going wrong.” Tears slid down her face. “This is not what’s supposed to happen.”

&
nbsp; “I don’t know what you think is supposed to happen, but I’m leaving.”

  “You can’t!” She squealed the words out in a high-pitched wail.

  “The hell I can’t. You just watch.”

  “But I’ve taken drugs.” Her tears fell harder now. “We were supposed to enter eternity together. It’s what fate wanted.”

  Earl turned away from her in disgust. “You mean it’s what you wanted.”

  “You don’t understand. I love you.”

  He shuddered. “Your kind of love I can do without.”

  “Earl, please. Don’t let me die alone.”

  “I love Mindy,” he said. Whatever sympathy he’d felt for her, she’d smothered in her attempt to end his life. “If you’ve done anything to hurt her I’ll kill you myself.”

  “No!” She cried. “You can’t possibly love that tramp. She’s all wrong for you. She doesn’t deserve you. She’s a weak, alcoholic whore.”

  He shook his fist at her tear-stained face. “She’s a better person than you could ever hope to be.”

  “You’re too late anyway.” She turned defiant, laughing. “Andrew’s got her and when he’s done having his fun with her, she’s going to be as dead as that stupid Mance girl.”

  “Andrew? You mean Dr. Belanger? Nick was right. Regina Mance’s death was no suicide.” Fighting back a wave of nausea, he headed for the door.

  “Wait!” Shirley ran to stop him, tugging desperately on his arm, her blanket falling to the floor. “You have to get help or the drugs will kill me.”

  He shoved her away. “And won’t that be ironic? For all your complaints about Mindy’s addiction, you’ll be the one dying of an overdose.”

  Storming off in what he hoped was the direction of Belanger’s quarters; he’d made it only a few feet before Shirley came after him. Still naked. “You asshole!” She screamed. “You mother-fucking, inbred piece of donkey shit. Don’t you dare walk out on me!” She fell on him with teeth and nails. Grabbing his arm, she bit into the muscle above his elbow. Pain jolted the entire length of his arm. He yelped and she kicked his groin. A dizzying wave of pain followed, knocking him to the ground. His breath stalled and she fisted her hand in his hair, yanking backward while she scratched his face and bit into his neck. Earl screamed. It was like he’d just stepped onto the soundstage of a zombie film, one utilizing the Meisner technique of method acting. He grabbed her by the throat, trying to push her away. “You bitch.”