It was that she had been out of control when Jerry Ingalls had shot his way into her room, she thought. She still felt out of control. Part of that, she realized, had to do with Dan, who seemed to be moving back into her life. She didn’t understand his renewed interest, except that it had to do with his rescuing a damsel in distress—a role she hated playing. Why hadn’t he called her in the last several months? There had been nights that no one knew about, nights she’d spent at home, watching movies alone and feeling as if she was drowning. He hadn’t come to rescue her then.
She looked around at her messy home and realized she had lost control of it, as well. Nothing in her life was working very well. Now she wished the phone would ring, but she knew it would not. In the wee hours of morning, no one suspected that the big, bold attorney might need someone to hold her hand tonight. She coped. It was what she did.
The house creaked, and she grew more tense. Her eyes darted from corner to shadow. Her ears listened for a sound that broke the silence, a body that might burst through a door. But this was ridiculous. Jerry Ingalls was in jail, and no one was after her.
Oh, yeah. She was a big, bold attorney. Coping. But she couldn’t stand to be here alone.
Finally realizing that she wasn’t coping, that she was falling apart, she picked up the phone and dialed Allie Branning. She was her best friend, and she would understand more than most, even though Jill hadn’t even revealed her deepest vulnerabilities to her. Anyone would understand her paranoias tonight. Allie would let her sleep on her couch.
It rang four times before Allie picked up. “Hello?”
“Allie, it’s Jill.”
“Jill, are you okay?”
Jill hesitated a moment as emotion blocked her throat. Finally, she forced herself to answer. “No, actually. I’m having a hard time. Do you think I could come over there and sleep on the couch?”
“Of course,” Allie said. “Come on. I’m up feeding Justin anyway. I’ll turn the porch light on for you.”
Relieved, Jill hung up the phone, packed a quick overnight bag, and headed out to her garage. She got in the car and started the engine before opening the garage door. If someone was waiting there for her, she’d run over them, she thought.
Kicking herself for being so paranoid, she backed out, her eyes sweeping from side to side as the headlights lit up the front of the house. She closed the garage with her remote, backed out into the street, and headed for Allie’s.
The porch light was on when she got there, and Allie opened the door before she even had a chance to knock. “Come on in.” She was holding her eight-month-old baby in one arm, his little head on her shoulder, sound asleep, and she reached out to hug Jill with her other. “I’m so glad you’re all right. I was so scared, I didn’t know what to do.” She took Jill’s bag from her and led her into the den. “I was just about to put him down.”
Jill waited as Allie put the baby back to bed. She loved being in Allie’s little house. It smelled of flowers, probably because Allie and Mark owned a floral shop, and she brought fresh cut flowers home every day. She’d never been here when there weren’t flowers and knickknacks and bric-a-brac and trinkets everywhere. But she had to admit that there were fewer now than there had been before they’d had a baby. In fact, the Blooms ’N Blossoms Florist was for sale, but they hadn’t found a buyer yet.
When Allie came back in, she pulled her into another hug. “You look like you’ve been tied to the back of a truck and dragged for about a hundred miles.”
“Not that bad,” Jill said.
Allie laughed. “Well, maybe not. But you look awfully tired.”
“As tired as you looked the first few months after you had Justin?”
“Worse,” Allie said. “Come on. I’ve got your bed ready in the guest room.”
“The guest room?” Jill grinned. “Allie, this is a two-bedroom house. I told you, I’m happy to sleep on the couch.”
“No, there’s an extra bed in Justin’s room. I rolled his crib into our room so you could have the room to yourself.”
“Oh, Allie, you didn’t have to go to all that trouble.”
“I’m happy to do it,” she said. “Mark’s on duty tonight. I didn’t want you staying by yourself tonight, anyway. Jill, I’d be a wreck if what happened to you happened to me. No way I’d stay in my house alone.”
“But I’m supposed to be this tough attorney, who doesn’t crumble and copes with the best of them.”
“You are the best of them. And forget all that coping stuff. You should have come straight here and not gone home at all. Did you get to eat?”
Jill realized she hadn’t. “I ate before I checked into the motel.”
“And you didn’t lose it when…never mind. That was hours ago. Let me fix you something.” She went into the kitchen, and Jill followed wearily behind her. As Allie moved around in the kitchen, fixing her a sandwich, Jill sank into a chair at the table.
“So Mark calls to tell me to turn on the television, that you’ve been taken hostage. And he says that Dan ran out of the fire station, just disappeared and left them shorthanded, and next thing they know, he’s there at the Flagstaff. So are you two back together?”
“Hardly.” Jill propped her chin on her hand and closed her eyes. “Actually, I don’t know what to think.”
“Jill, I’ve been telling you for months that Dan is still in love with you.”
“He has a funny way of showing it.”
“Exactly,” Allie said. “He does have a funny way of showing it. When you were seeing each other, he was scared to death he was going to lose you.”
“So he went ahead and threw me away?”
“Something like that.” She handed her the plate and went back to the refrigerator. “It has a certain logic if you look at it from his point of view. I never said he was rational.”
“Well, it’s not like he’s just been sitting around alone all this time. He has been seeing other people.”
Allie poured her a glass of milk, then took it to the table. “Yeah, but he’s back to his no-more-than-three-date rule. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen him with anybody twice.”
“Well, that’s just peachy,” Jill said, taking the glass Allie handed her. “So many women, so little time.” She bit into the sandwich.
“You’re missing the point,” Allie said, pulling out the chair across from her. “You’re the only person I’ve ever known who could make him break his three-date rule. He never dated anyone over three times because he thought people would think of them as a couple. But he dated you dozens of times. He was the one thinking of you as a couple.”
“He wasn’t thinking of that when he decided to cool things down.”
“I know,” Allie said. “Right there in the hospital after I had Justin, he was mad at you for being so busy and leaving him out. I never thought that breakup would last.”
“It’s lasted eight months,” she said. “Whoever said Dan couldn’t keep his commitments?”
“Look, he could have stayed here today and monitored things from television. He didn’t. He was right there.”
Jill took another bite of her sandwich and stared into her glass of milk. “He cares about people. He would have been there if it had been you or Mark or any of his other friends.”
“That may be true, but so would a lot of other people, and you didn’t see them rushing to Chalmette. It was dangerous and we’d have been in the way. But that didn’t stop Dan.”
Jill realized she didn’t have much appetite. She pushed her plate away.
“Mark said Dan drove you home,” Allie said. “So did he talk about resuming things?”
“Not really. Well, sort of. In the context of a bargain he made with God.”
“A bargain?”
“Yeah. Something like, ‘God, if you get Jill out of there, I’ll date her again.’ Like the Lord has a dating service and Dan’s sacrifice helped things along.”
Allie wilted. “Jill, he didn’t really sa
y it like that, did he?”
Jill smiled. “Well, not exactly.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound so shallow. I just meant, wasn’t anything mentioned about how he felt, why he was there, anything?”
“Well, he did mention that he was scared to death.”
Allie’s eyebrows shot up. “Scared to death. That’s good.”
“But he seemed ticked off that I was going to work tomorrow, that I have to go back to Chalmette. He tried to talk me out of it.”
“And did he?”
“No, I have to be there. And once again, I’m too busy to do what he wants me to do, which is the reason we broke up in the first place. He was jealous of my time. Had a hard time believing I could be thinking about him when I was working hard.”
“I don’t really think that was all of it,” Allie said. “I think he was mainly scared of losing you.”
“Well, he did. He saw to it.” Jill slid her chair back and took her plate to the sink. “And as soon as the emotional surge wears off and the danger has passed, he’ll be back surfing his little black book and holding to his three-date rule.”
“What if he calls me and asks about you?” Allie asked.
“Tell him I’m tall and have blondish-brown hair.”
“I’m serious.”
Jill sighed. “I don’t know what to tell him, Allie. I don’t have the energy to worry about Dan right now. And I don’t feel like being in a relationship where I have to do double the work. Either someone wants me, or they don’t.” She rinsed out her glass and put it into the dishwasher. “Thanks for the food. I’m sorry I’m so cranky. I’m just tired and depressed…we drove by the post office on the way home. I saw all those teddy bears.”
That deep compassion filled Allie’s eyes again. “Yeah, I went to the hospital today to see Pete.”
“How is he?”
“Not good. He’s comatose, has a fractured skull, a broken arm, cuts all over him…Our biggest concern is that when he wakes up, somebody has to tell him his mother is dead.”
“Who’s with him now?”
“Celia.”
“Good. That’ll give him some comfort. And she has all those maternal hormones pumping through her. I’m glad she realized he needed her.”
She nodded and assessed Jill’s face. “You go on to bed. There’s an alarm clock next to the bed, but you’ll have to set it.”
“I will,” she said. “I’ll probably be out of here before you get up in the morning.”
“Wanna bet? Justin wakes up at the crack of dawn. Plus, I have a busy day at the florist tomorrow because of the deaths. I’ve got people working, but I feel like I need to be there. I’m taking Justin with me.”
“I’m going to get up at five.” Jill checked her watch. “That’s only three hours. I’d better get to sleep.” She squeezed her friend’s hand. “Thanks for letting me come over. I was really having a hard time.”
“Anytime. I’m always glad for company, especially when Mark’s at the station.”
Jill went into the baby’s bedroom. It smelled of baby powder, a scent that brought back those feelings of being out of control again…defeated feelings that her life wasn’t going the way she wanted it to. There were things lacking, things that would never be hers, things she could never count on.
But she did have good friends who loved her. Feeling more secure than she had in her own home, she got into the bed and pulled the covers up, wishing it was already morning.
Chapter Twenty-Three
As soon as Stan finished with Jerry Ingalls, he headed for the hospital in New Orleans, where Celia still kept vigil beside the bed of little Pete Hampton. Though he was in intensive care, they had allowed Celia to sit with him. A lot of exceptions had been made for the orphaned survivor of the post office bombing. She was exhausted, and her eyes were shaded with dark circles. When Stan walked in, she was lying on her side on the little vinyl sofa beside the boy’s bed, and she seemed to be sleeping.
He stooped down in front of her and pressed a kiss on her cheek. She woke up slowly. “Stan…”
“Honey, are you okay?” he asked, stroking her cheek with his knuckles. “You need to go home and get in bed. You and the baby need rest.”
“But I don’t know what to do about Pete,” she said, sitting up. “His family should be here soon. He needs somebody.”
“Has he woken up yet?”
“Not at all.” She burst into tears and reached out to pull Stan into a crushing hug. “I’m afraid he’s gonna die, Stan. I’ve been praying for him all day, but I don’t know whether to pray for him to live or die, because he’s going to be in so much grief when he wakes up. He’s just so young.”
“Do you believe he’s in God’s hands?”
“Yes, I do,” she wept. “It’s just so hard to see him like this and know about Mary.”
He could see that she had been battling these questions all night, and was exhausted with emotion, grief, and worry. Knowing that he couldn’t offer her answers right now, he got up and sat down next to her, pulled her against him so that her head was leaning on his shoulder. All he could give her was comfort, and he felt she needed that the most. “Tell you what,” he said, kissing her temple. “You go back to sleep, and I’ll just sit here and hold you.”
“Not yet,” she said. “Tell me about the bomber. The guy at the Flagstaff.”
Stan sighed. “His name is Jerry Ingalls. He and his family live in Newpointe, believe it or not. Nobody I’ve run into knows them, though. They moved here six months ago when Inez Pepper died. She was a relative of theirs and left them her house.”
“Where does he work?”
“At home. Has some kind of business designing websites. I guess that’s why we don’t know them. New in town, working at home, kids not yet in school. I’ll talk to their neighbors tomorrow.”
“Why did he do it?” Celia asked.
He let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t know. We can’t get anything out of him.”
She touched his stubbled jaw. “I’m glad you’re okay. Jill, too.”
“She’s fine.” He stroked her stomach gently. The baby wasn’t moving. “Go to sleep now.”
“Will you wake me up when his grandmother gets here?”
“Of course I will.”
“And if he wakes up…”
“Nope. Not going to wake you up if he wakes up. I’m going to play a game of Go-fish with him and keep you in the dark.”
She elbowed him hard. “You’d better—”
“Of course I’ll wake you up. Go to sleep, now.”
In seconds, he could feel her body relaxing into sleep, and he closed his eyes, as well.
It wasn’t more than a couple of hours later that Pete Hampton’s grandmother and uncle bustled into the room. Celia woke up instantly and sprang to her feet. They were tired, bedraggled, and their eyes were red as if they’d both been weeping much of the way.
Mrs. Lewis burst into tears as she saw her grandbaby lying there comatose with a tube running into his mouth. “What’s that in his mouth?” she demanded.
“It’s the ventilator. It’s keeping him breathing.”
“He’s on life support?” the woman cried. “No, that can’t be!” She leaned over the bed to gently touch his face, then kissed it, as tears fell onto it. “Pete, Pete! You wake up, you hear? You don’t need this ole contraption. You can breathe on your own, can’t you?”
The child didn’t respond.
“Is he gonna wake up?” she asked. “We’re not gonna lose him, too, are we?”
The uncle covered his mouth with his hands and bent over the bed. He began to sob, and Stan and Celia both felt as if they were intruders on a private moment. Finally, Stan touched the man’s shoulder.
“I’m gonna take my wife home now. She’s been here ever since Pete got here…”
The grandmother left the bed and hugged Celia. “Celia, thank you so much for taking care of him. I don’t know what we would have done if we h
adn’t known you’d be here.”
“I’ll be back tomorrow,” she said.
“You take care of your baby,” the woman said. “He needs his mama.” With that, she burst into tears again.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Frank Harper finished his manifesto and, while he still could, abandoned the sleazy New Orleans motel. He was certain that the police would surround the room at any moment, just like they had done with Jerry at the Flagstaff. They would pretend that he was the bad guy, make everyone think that they were trying to protect society. Then they would take him prisoner of war, and lock him up like they’d done for the past twenty-five years.
He headed for the bar across the street, its neon sign flashing in the night, and found a truck that wasn’t locked. Like a gift, it had a rifle in the gun rack on the back window, and a box of cartridges lay on the passenger seat. He quickly hot-wired it, a skill he’d learned in his teenaged years, and headed back to Newpointe. He had to find Jill Clark. She knew too much. He couldn’t let her ruin his plans, not when he’d finally gotten free and had the chance to save his country.
It was really very simple.
He would find her and kill her tonight.
In rapid-fire language, like some kind of holy tongue, he quoted the Bill of Rights as he drove, and tears came to his eyes as he thought of the sacrifices he’d made for his land. He wished the war would end. It had gone on for too long already, but the people were deceived, and didn’t know. They thought they lived in peace. They didn’t know of the battles being fought without their knowledge, the prisoners being held and tortured, the communist plans to get the people fat and lazy, then change their way of life into something that was intolerable.
He wouldn’t let it happen.
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