MIND READER
Page 26
“Where’d you get the blood?” Parker asked.
“Charity Hospital. I lifted a tube on its way to the lab.” Sandy looked down at his shoes. “It’s all in my report. A full confession of everything is on my desk. As soon as this is over I’m turning myself in.”
“We’d better go,” Parker said, looking guilty as hell.
Sandy had betrayed her. Worse, he’d betrayed himself. He’d go on paying during the lifetime he’d spend in prison.
Caron stood at the edge of the drive and watched them split up, Parker moving toward the back door, Sandy toward the front.
Moments later, she heard the back door split and give way. She started toward the back of the house. Before she reached the corner, the front door banged open.
Scuffling sounds had her hurrying her steps, but at the back door she stopped abruptly. It hung from one hinge.
Parker had Decker pinned in a chair at the kitchen table. A plate of food was in front of him.
Caron walked inside. Parker was no worse for wear. Sandy came through from the front, Ina following him.
“Are you okay?” Caron asked her.
She smiled, bobbing her purple-turbaned head and adjusting her pink robe. “Fine, child. Just fine.”
Decker glared at Sandy. “She was a tramp. You loved a tramp, Sanders. Keith was loaded. He gave her a ticket out. But do you think she did anything for me? Nothing. She gave me nothing but a hard time. And when I asked her for help, she refused. ‘Keith’s lost everything,’ she said. But she was lying. I knew she was lying, and I made her pay.”
Nauseous, Caron walked outside and inhaled great gulps of clean air. Too much, too fast. Too much to absorb.
Tires screeched to a halt on the street. She saw the red lights atop the car, heard the radio static coming from inside it, and sat down.
Leaning back against a magnolia, she looked up through its naked limbs. The sky was getting lighter. Dawn had broken. She closed her eyes and thought about Misty, about her students at Midtown, and then about Sarah.
“I’m sorry,” Caron said to the woman she’d failed. “I’m not perfect.” Plucking a blade of grass between her finger and thumb, Caron sighed. “I never said I was perfect. And I haven’t forgotten. But I can’t go on hating myself for making a mistake.”
“Caron?”
Parker stood in front of her, his legs spread, his hands dangling at his sides. She looked up at him and saw desolation in his eyes.
“You’re crying.” He dropped down to sit beside her. “I heard you mention Sarah.”
She heard the catch in his voice, felt the tremble in his hand on hers, and a dark shiver coursed up her spine. She’d been right, after all. “How do you know her name?”
He didn’t answer.
“I never told you her name, Parker.”
Parker was dying a thousand deaths. He loved Caron. Loved her more than he’d thought he could ever love any woman, especially after he’d seen in Harlan what loving could cost a man. And now he was going to lose her.
“Answer me.”
She tried to free her hand. He held on for dear life, willing her to feel all the love he had for her. He’d wanted to tell her privately—he’d started to tell her twice—but the time had come now.
“I knew Sarah for years.”
“What?” She tried to scramble to her feet.
“No, don’t go. Let me explain. Please, don’t run out on me.”
The words slapped her like a splash of cold water. She had been going to run. She dropped back down onto the grass.
“Her husband, Harlan, and I were partners. We started the business right after college. I was best man at their wedding.”
Parker wanted to see how she was taking this, but didn’t dare to look at her. If he did, he knew he’d never get through the telling. “I went with Harlan to the morgue that night—to identify Sarah’s body. When you and I went there, you asked what woman I was seeing—”
“And you told me she was someone special. She was the reason you got involved,” Caron said. “I remember when we first met, I sensed someone you loved had been abducted.”
“That’s true.” He forced himself to meet her gaze. “But that isn’t why I got involved.”
She frowned. She could stop him now. She knew he’d torched the building Sarah had died in, but Parker needed this; his conscience needed soothing.
“For a year, I’ve been on a case. Trying to prove a woman committed fraud. Harlan had a sixth sense about people. He was sure this woman was guilty. And he was sure that her interference had cost Sarah her life.”
Parker sighed. “I wasn’t sure. Not at first. But the longer I watched her, the more convinced I became...for a while. Then I got to know her. And the more I learned about her, the more certain I became that she wasn’t a fraud.”
He looked at Caron.
“You’re talking about me? You thought I was the fraud? You— Oh, no. Not you, too. Parker, not you, too!”
“Please, just listen. Please, Caron.”
“I don’t want to hear this.” She cupped her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to hear this!”
“I learned that you weren’t a fraud. I learned that you’re warm and loving and beautiful. That you’d never do anything to hurt anyone.”
He hated the hurt he saw in her, the way she clenched her hand into a fist and pressed it against her chest.
“Caron, please... I watched you in Midtown. I never saw any sign that you were psychic. If you’d been me, what would you have thought?”
She stilled. Stood so still that it frightened him. He wanted to reach for her, to beg for forgiveness, to do whatever he had to do to get them through this together. “Scream at me, Caron. Hit me. Do anything you need to do to get rid of the hurt. Just don’t leave me.”
“You said,” she began, then paused and swallowed. “You said that you didn’t believe it. Harlan did. Why didn’t he investigate?”
Parker hated telling her this most of all. He knew Caron. She’d feel responsible, which was why, he imagined, Sanders hadn’t told her before now.
But for this truth, too, the time had come. “Harlan called me one morning,” Parker said, feeling no desire to tell her that Harlan had called last Christmas. “He was reaching out for help, only I didn’t realize it. He loved Sarah very much. I thought the things he was saying were part of the normal grieving process. I thought it was the grief, Caron. I never thought...”
The last of the police cars pulled away from the curb. Guilt swirling in his stomach, Parker pressed their linked hands against his mouth. “Harlan committed suicide that day.”
She moved her hand to his face. Tears coursed down her cheeks. “It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know that now. But I felt it was then. That’s why I starting checking on you. That’s why—”
“I understand. It hurts, Parker, and I won’t lie and say it doesn’t. But you didn’t know me. All you knew was that your partner had lost his wife—a woman you loved. And then you lost your partner.” Caron gave him a watery smile. “You didn’t want anyone else to lose.”
A lump of emotion lodged in his throat. “You forgive me?”
“I’m not Peggy Shores.” She sniffled and stroked his jaw. “I love you.”
He pulled her into his arms, planted fast and furious kisses on her lips, her eyes, on the tears on her cheeks.
“Ahem.”
They both looked toward the sound and saw Mr. Mud Boots, who lived around the corner. “Ina says you two should come inside. She’s got breakfast ready.”
Her arms wrapped around Parker’s neck, Caron cocked her head. “Are you Mr. Klein?”
“Sure am.” He lifted a bushy gray brow. “Jasper.” He scratched his head. “My wife don’t know you two were the ones necking in the car out front of the house, though. And I told Ina not to tell her.” He winked and walked back toward the house. “That’ll be our secret.”
Caron smiled and predicted, “He’ll tell
her.”
“Yep.”
“Parker,” she said, rubbing that darling curl at his ear around her finger. “I’ve been thinking.”
“Oh?” He sounded wary.
“We make a good team.”
“Oh, no. No more partners for me, Caron.”
“Why not?” She gave the curl an indignant little flip. “We solved the case.”
“Yeah, we did.” He dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose. “But I don’t want you to be my partner.”
Her heart shattered. He didn’t love her. He really didn’t love her.
“I want you to be my wife.”
She snapped her head up. “You do?”
He nodded.
Her spirit soared. She bit the smile from her lip. “I don’t know about marriage, Parker. You bust a lot of doors.”
“Only when they’re locked.”
“Closed,” she said. “My bedroom door was closed, not locked.”
“Okay, closed.” He gave her a sheepish look that was totally fake. “But you were on the other side of it.”
“True.” She nipped at his chin. “Still, you’re awfully impulsive.”
“Impulsive?” He looked genuinely surprised. “Me?”
“You.” He was darling. So very darling. “Didn’t you charge over the night Sandy left that message on my door?”
“You were in danger. What would you have me do?”
“You forgot your shirt.”
“Geez, Caron.” He raked his hand through his hair, stopped midway, and slid her a suspicious look. “What are you doing?”
She laughed. “I’m giving you time, you big oaf, to remember the one thing you’ve forgotten to say to me that you’d better say soon or you’ll be breaking my heart.”
He cast her a blank look.
She rolled her gaze heavenward. “Tell me you love me, Parker.”
He shrugged. “Of course I love you. Would I want to marry a woman I don’t love?” He frowned. “Are you practicing faking being an airhead.”
“You’d better take that back–now.” She stood and dusted the grass from her rear.
“What did I do wrong now?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re tight-jawed.”
“Think airhead. Of course I’m tight-jawed.” She kept walking.
“I was teasing, okay?” He grabbed her arm and swung her around. “Come on, now. Let’s settle this,” he said. “What’s it going to take?”
Satisfied, she poked him in the chest. “We’re getting married.” Caron snorted. “Somebody’s got to keep you straight. You do have a knack for rationalizing deceptions, Parker. Stealing books and breaking into evidence rooms.” She grunted her disapproval. “I’m the only woman I know who can make you toe the line. Besides, your mother’s been great, letting me borrow her clothes and everything. The least I can do is to give her the grandchildren you‘ve neglected to give her.”
“Another haranguing woman, nagging me for babies. Just what I need.” He scowled. “How many?”
“Two, I think—after we’ve practiced for a while. We’ve mastered kissing, but we still have a long way to go.”
His eyes softened to that warm and wonderful dove gray. Melting inside, Caron plucked a dead leaf from his sleeve. “And we’ll work together, too. No, don’t bother glaring at me. It won’t change my mind. We will work together, Parker. But only when I image… probably.”
“That’s probably okay.” The scowl he clung tenaciously to faded.
“No other women. Not ever.”
He let out a frustrated sigh. “I love you, Caron, though at the moment I have to say I’m wondering why.”
“You love me.” She smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck. “That’s all I’ve been waiting to hear.”
He dipped his head toward hers. “Not true, and you know it. You’ve been waiting for convincing.”
“I have. Trust is a fragile thing, Parker.” She lifted her face for his kiss. “But I trust you.”
Ina called out from the back door. “Parker, Caron, you children come on in now, you hear? These eggs is getting cold and tough as shoe leather. I ain’t being blamed for no leathery eggs this morning, and I ain’t redoing ‘em. I got a Christmas dinner to get on the stove.”
“She recovers fast,” Parker muttered under his breath.
“She’s got a thing for Fred.” Caron fingered Parker’s lapel. “Where’s Fred spending Christmas?”
“Oh, no. No matchmaking, Caron, and I mean it.”
“Honey.” Caron wrapped her arm around Parker’s waist and slunk against him. “I want everyone happy today.”
Ina ducked out again. “Seeing’s how you’re the one what knocked it down, you’d best get this door fixed before dark, Parker Simms. Dang thing wasn’t even locked. Didn’t Charley teach you nothing about turning knobs, boy?”
“All right, Ina.” Parker laughed. “Just let me kiss my fiancee one more time. It’s Christmas, you know.”
“Fiancée?” Ina stuck her head back through the doorway. “Well, I’ll be switched. If that don’t make me as happy as a dead pig in the sunshine.” She cupped her hands to her mouth and shouted over the fence. “Did you hear that, Lily Mae? The smoochers are getting married!”
“She heard,” Parker told her. “Everyone in a five-block radius heard.”
“How happy is a dead pig in the sunshine, do you think?” Caron waggled her brows at him.
Ina stopped, then waved the dishtowel in their direction. “I’m old, not senile, and I ain’t deaf, either. I know good and well what day it is. It’s Christmas.”
“I’ll call Fred,” Parker whispered. “He’ll mellow her.”
“You’re a soft touch, Simms.”
“Yeah, I have my moments.” Parker rubbed her nose with his. “Merry Christmas, honey.”
It would be merry. Together, they’d moved beyond the shadows of the past and turned toward a future filled with promise. Sometimes life is just good—leathery eggs and all. Caron smiled. “Merry Christmas, Parker.”
About Vicki Hinze
Vicki is the award-winning author of 27 novels, four nonfiction books and hundreds of articles, published in as many as sixty-three countries. She is recognized by Who’s Who in the World as an author and as an educator. For more information, please visit her at:
Website: www.vickihinze.com
Facebook:http://www.facebook.com/vicki.hinze.author
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/vickihinze
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Table of Contents
DEDICATION
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
About Vicki Hinze