And that scared Lena more than anything.
* * *
Selma sat in the rocker close to the fire, which Ryan had just stoked. She was wrapped in two blankets and still shivering, her expression making her look like a frightened little girl. Doc Cartwright was examining her eyes with a tiny penlight. He’d already listened all over with his stethoscope, taken her blood pressure and given her an aspirin, “just in case.”
The word “stroke” whispered through Lena’s mind like a monster through a child’s nightmare.
Sheriff Dunbar was outside looking over the car with a flashlight, or had been. Just then he was opening the door and ushering Bahru in, one hand on the old man’s shoulder like he was a suspect or something. “Lena, you know this fella?”
Lena left her mom’s side to rush to the door. Big Larry Dunbar reminded her of a large bear. Huggable, but fierce when he needed to be. He had a thick shock of black hair that never really did anything, just sat on his head like a woodland creature that had taken up residence there. His brows were like its smaller siblings. And he always looked vaguely sad.
Sheriff Dunbar had an old-school approach to protecting women and kids, and considered her to be both of the above.
Bahru looked frightened, and no wonder. He had no idea the man was harmless. “I saw the sheriff’s SUV and Patrick’s truck, and thought the baby might be coming,” he explained. “What’s happened to your mother, Lena?”
“We don’t know.” She sidled between the sheriff and the guru, slid her arm around Bahru’s and walked him further into the house, just a step or two, to get him away from the sheriff, who clearly frightened him. “Bahru, why don’t you make her a cup of tea?”
“Way ahead of you, Lena.” Ryan came in from the kitchen with a big dishpan full of steaming water in his hands, a towel over one arm. “But you can grab it off the counter and bring it to her, Bahru.”
The guru nodded, wiping his feet before heading into the kitchen to fetch the tea. Meanwhile Ryan lowered the dishpan to the floor in front of Selma, who was having trouble keeping her eyes open.
“Here you go. Just settle your feet right in there.” He helped her, and she sighed deeply as her cold feet sank into the warm water.
“Here is the tea,” Bahru said. His deep brown eyes were full of concern and that innocence Lena had always seen in them. It was partly the thick black lashes that gave him that little-boy look. But not entirely.
“Thank you, Bahru.” She took the mug, and held it to her mother’s lips, and her mom sipped automatically, not even opening her eyes.
Lena set the mug aside and turned to Doc. “What do you think’s going on?”
“Not a stroke, of that I’m certain. I suppose it could be a TIA, but–”
“No initials. Use words, Doc.”
“Transient ischemic attack. Kind of a ministroke, can be a precursor to the big one. But I don’t think it’s that, either.”
“Well, then, what the hell is it?”
He shrugged. “I feel like she either banged her head pretty danged hard—in which case I’m sure I’d see a lump somewhere—or ate or drank something she hadn’t ought to have. Your mom’s not a...well, she’s not into the wacky-tobacky or anything, is she?”
“Not for twenty years, anyway,” Lena told him honestly.
Doc looked to the sheriff. “You find anything in the car?”
The sheriff nodded and lifted up a bottle of wine Lena and Ryan had missed.
“Wine?”
“Label says Mead. Homemade, by the looks of it. It’s not sealed—not that I suspect your mother of drinking and driving, Lena. The bottle’s full. Just not sealed, like it would be if she bought it somewhere.”
“Her friends make mead sometimes,” Lena said. Doc and the sheriff both frowned. “It’s a kind of an ancient beer, made with honey, and fermented to—”
Doc said “Ah, that must be it, then.” His eyes shot to meet the sheriff’s.
“What must be it?” Lena was still waiting for an answer.
“Any kind of fermentation can go wrong, turn toxic. Whoo-boy, it can do a number on a person.”
“You think she drank some bad mead?” Lena asked.
“Can’t think of a better explanation,” Doc said. “Could’ve been a lot worse, hon. But I’ll tell you, it’s been long enough that it’s pretty much worked its way through her system by now. Best thing for her is gonna be a long, hard sleep.”
Lena shot a look at Ryan. He met her eyes, and she knew, just like that, that he was thinking that Doc was full of blue mud. She thought so, too.
“I think I’d like to get her to the hospital,” she said. “At least have some blood work done.”
“It comes back wrong, I’ll have no choice but to issue a DUI, Lena,” the sheriff said softly. “I mean, we’re friends, neighbors, and Molly would slit my throat if she heard me say so. But technically, this is an open container. Now, I’m not gonna write anything up, and far as I’m concerned, this can stay right here between us. But we start getting the E.R. staff involved and I’m not gonna have a choice.”
“I think we should err on the side of caution,” Bahru said slowly.
Doc and the sheriff sent him surprised looks. He shrugged and went on. “Smell her breath, Lena. At least then you will know if she drank the mead.”
Lena bent over her apparently sleeping mom, leaned close, sniffed as Selma exhaled, then backed away blinking. She smelled like she’d had more than a sip or two.
“I think your mother will be fine, Lena,” Doc said, sighing in apparent relief. “The mead might not even be bad. She might just have...overindulged.”
“And then driven herself home? No, no, my mother would never do that.”
“Well, either way.” He closed up his black bag with a snap. “You need help getting her up to bed?”
“No.” She was pissed and didn’t care if he knew it.
“Well, then, I’m glad everything’s all right.” Doc turned to leave. “You call if you need anything at all now, Lena,” Doc called as he jammed his hat down over his ears. “Offer you a ride back to the cottage, Bahru?”
“If I am not needed here?” Bahru said, turning to Lena and making it a question.
“It’s fine, Bahru. Go ahead, get some sleep. It’s late.”
Pressing his palms together, he bowed, then turned and followed Doc Cartwright to his pickup truck.
The sheriff grabbed his hat, as well. “Well, I guess I should be heading out, too.”
“Actually, Sheriff Dunbar,” Ryan said, “I was planning to head out to those woods, take a look around. Just...you know, to make sure nothing...weird is going on. Do you want to tag along?”
The sheriff frowned at him. “All right, son. All right.”
The two of them left, and Lena returned her attention to her mother. Drunk? Tripping on badly fermented grains? She didn’t freaking think so.
Kneeling, she found a soft cloth in the warm water—Ryan again. He’d thought of everything. She used it to wash the remaining dirt off her mother’s legs, and then her hands. Finally she coaxed Selma to her feet, and she managed to walk her up the stairs to her room.
Lena pulled back her covers, peeled the orange-and-yellow kaftan over her mother’s head, then unhooked her bra and noticed what good shape she was in. She didn’t look old. Hell, she wasn’t old. Fifty-four, and she looked ten years younger. What could have happened to her? Lena knew she wasn’t foolish enough to get drunk on mead and try to drive herself home. Aside from a few scratches on her legs, there were no signs of injury. She slid a soft cotton nightgown over her mother’s head, and then eased her into bed and tucked the covers around her.
Selma let her head sink into the pillows and closed her eyes. “Oh, this warm bed feels so good. And that soak, too. My poor feet were frozen.
”
Since she sounded coherent, Lena decided to see what she could find out. “Mom, do you remember anything that happened to you tonight?”
Selma frowned hard. “Well, there was the balefire. The ritual. It was very cold. And I think I was stung by a bee.”
“It’s January, Mom. There aren’t any bees.”
“Wasp, then. Good night, honey. This is a nice room, but in the morning I think we should go home.”
* * *
Ryan didn’t know what the hell to think about Selma Dunkirk’s condition. He hadn’t seen the woman in over half a year, and he’d barely had the chance to get to know her then. For all he knew, she might have been going on drinking binges for a long time now.
But he didn’t think so. He didn’t think so, because Lena would have noticed. Not much slipped by her. And because Selma just hadn’t seemed drunk to him.
Call it a hunch, but he didn’t like the odd feeling running through his head. The feeling that something was off. That something needed...looking into.
So he rode with Sheriff Larry Dunbar out to where they’d found Selma’s car, equipped this time with a heavy-duty flashlight. He directed the local lawman to the right spot. “Right there, see the tire tracks?”
“Sure do.” The sheriff pulled the big SUV over. He picked up his own flashlight, got out of the vehicle and slammed the door, which made Ryan wince. If there were anyone in the woods with something to hide, they’d just been forewarned.
Not that there was anyone in the woods with anything to hide. Probably.
Aiming their lights at the ground, the two men followed Selma’s footprints in the soft, wet earth and occasional puffs of snow, into the woods.
As soon as they entered the thick pines, where every breath was a sensory explosion, the tracks pretty much vanished. There were probably still impressions in the ground, but even with the flashlights they couldn’t make them out very well. Still, one of them would catch a hint of one every now and then, and so they moved slowly in the direction she had probably taken.
Ryan figured he could do a more thorough search tomorrow, by daylight. But if there was anything to hide, it would be hidden by then. If there had been any...foul play—God, listen to him. Foul play. He was starting to sound like a TV detective.
And yet there he was, traipsing through the woods in the dead of night with a lawman he’d just met, in search of...what? he wondered, moving the powerful flashlight beam over the ground.
Something flashed, a reflection, and he stopped, backed up. “Sheriff Dunbar, over here.”
“What have you got?”
“That,” Ryan whispered. Kneeling in the dirt, he picked up the dropped cell phone. Selma’s cell phone. He would bet money on it.
He held it out to the sheriff, who took it from him, bare-handed, and turned it over. “It’s a phone,” he said.
“Shouldn’t you...you know, bag it or something?”
The sheriff looked at him, tilted his head. “You’re from the city, aren’t you, son?”
“I don’t see what difference that makes.”
“Let’s see if I can explain it to you, then.” Ryan bristled, but took a calming breath and told himself to just let the man talk. “See, if this were the big city, then yeah, odds would be pretty good that something criminal was going on. And if that was the case, then yeah, I’d bag this cell phone as evidence. But that isn’t the case, ’cause this isn’t the big city. Out here, people don’t go around hurting each other that way. I mean, we get a teenager playing pranks now and then—but nothing like what you’re thinking.” He clapped Ryan on the shoulder. “It’s different out here. Not your fault at all that you’re confused, though. I’d be as apt to jump to the wrong conclusion in your neck of the woods as you are in mine.”
“So you think...?”
“I think the lady drank what she thought was a reasonable amount of that mead stuff, and it was stronger than she realized and knocked her on her keister. Probably didn’t even realize it till she was halfway home, then pulled over once she did, ’cause she’s a smart lady, and decided to walk the rest of the way, just to be safe. Thanks to the booze, she made the poor decision to take a shortcut. Fell in the mud, got disoriented, wandered around, dropped her cell phone, found her way to the road, end of story.”
Ryan nodded slowly. “I gotta tell you, it makes perfect sense the way you’re telling it. And I do get what you’re saying about that being a far more likely scenario, given the small-town lifestyle you all have going on here.”
“Reasonable. I like that about you.”
“There’s maybe something you’re not aware of, though. I hate to even think it, but...” They were still standing in the dark, in the pines. The night breeze was whistling through the highest boughs like a high-pitched whine, coming and going, then coming back again. It was icy on his neck and ears and face.
“What’s that, son?”
Ryan hunched his shoulders a little, turning his back to the wind. “My father is—was—Ernst McNally.” He didn’t think he would have to elaborate, and he could tell from the sheriff’s response that he was right.
“The Ernst McNally? The one who just— Aw, hell, I’m sorry for your loss, Ryan.” One big hand clapped down onto his shoulder, while the other clasped his other arm in a gesture of comfort and familiarity.
Ryan found himself liking the guy. He had a kind of John Wayne vibe about him. “Thanks. The thing is, he left a pile of money to the baby, and Lena’s the trustee.”
“Keeper of the purse strings. I get it.” The sheriff gave one last squeeze, then lowered his hands. “So then...you’re the father?”
“I am.”
“You gonna do the right thing? Marry her?”
Ryan’s jaw dropped. “Um, you know, I just— That’s not the point.” He bit off the rest of the explanation he did not owe the man. “The point is, there’s reason to be extra careful, maybe look at things extra close, because that money could be a motive for some nutcase to try to mess with them.”
The sheriff pursed his lips thoughtfully, shrugged. “Can’t see how that fits with this, though. How did he make Selma forget where she was, and how could that help him get access to the money?”
“The operative word was nutcase, Sheriff.”
The big man nodded. “Well, I’ll come back out and take a better look around tomorrow. You can join me then, if you want.”
“All right, I’ll do that.”
They turned and headed back for the road. But halfway there, Ryan stopped as an odd tingle of awareness whispered up his spine. He turned slowly, getting the strongest sensation that he was being watched.
“Sheriff, hold up.”
Dunbar stopped a few yards ahead and stood perfectly still, turning only his head. Ryan held a finger to his lips. And right then, he heard a distinct “crunch” in the forest, like a heavy foot coming down on a pile of dry twigs. He froze in place. The hairs on his nape prickled, and then, unable to resist, he turned around to look behind him.
Heavy pine boughs, swaying gently back and forth, filling the air with their scent. Leafless maple saplings springing up in between. Fallen, half-rotted trees with dinner-plate-size fungi and carpets of moss all over them. An owl soaring soundlessly in the distance. Nothing else. No one watching him.
Bullshit, he thought in silence. I know when I’m alone and when I’m not, and I am not alone out here.
Whoever was out there, though, was being careful not to be seen. But he was even more convinced than before that something just wasn’t right. His spine stiffening, he lifted his chin and set his jaw, as the strangest sensation seemed to spread through his veins, pulsing in every part of him. A protective instinct. It was all he could do not to shout a challenge to whoever was lurking out there, telling them to get lost, to stay away from his t
erritory.
The only thing that prevented him was the sheriff standing nearby, along with the notion it might be best to pretend he wasn’t on to them. Whoever they were.
Turning, he walked up to join the sheriff, who waited for him to catch up. “Probably a deer,” Larry Dunbar said softly. But Ryan didn’t hear much conviction in his words.
8
Ryan headed upstairs. The house was quiet, and he was glad. It had been such a full day, he hadn’t even had time to unpack. But he wasn’t in any hurry to do that just yet. He peeked into Selma’s room. Lena was sitting in a chair at the bedside, leaning over to one side. She’d fallen asleep holding her mother’s hand. A single tear glittered on her cheek.
For just an instant he stopped right there and experienced the sensation of a hot knife sinking through his butter-sculpture heart. The pain was that of an eleven-year-old boy who’d lost his mother. He’d loved his mom just like Lena so clearly loved hers. Just that much. But he hadn’t let himself grieve.
He had to look away fast. As much as he wanted to go to Lena and comfort her, he couldn’t. Not just then. He needed to give it a few minutes. He started to back away from the door.
Then she whispered his name. “Ryan?”
Closing his eyes, out of sight, he said, “Yeah?”
“Did the sheriff go home?”
“Yeah, he’s gone.” The burning sensation was gone from his eyes, so he stepped into her line of sight once more. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.” She sat up a little straighter in the chair, easing her hand away from her mother’s. “Do you think we’re doing the right thing? Not taking her to a hospital?”
He sighed. “I don’t know. I really don’t. I could make some calls, have the best doctors money can buy checking her out in no time.”
She thinned her lips. “Money can’t fix this. I was asking what you feel. In your gut.”
His gut was churning. “I think it wouldn’t hurt to get a second opinion. But I don’t think we’ll be able to do much about that until morning.”
She nodded, sighing. “I was thinking the same thing.”
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