“What would you say to a simple consultation with a patient, then?”
“What does this have to do with Cecil?”
“Nothing at all. But, as you said, we can’t do much about Cecil at this point. So, doctor, a consultation?”
“I’m not on staff at the clinic, I’m not keeping patient files. Legally, I would need to have a file on any patient with whom I consulted.”
Austin gave a frustrated sigh. “You know what? I’ve always felt sorry for doctors who couldn’t escape their jobs. People come to them at all hours of the day or night with medical questions. They don’t have a life to themselves.”
“It’s been awhile since I’ve had that problem.”
“And I vowed to never do that to anyone, myself.”
“Good for you.”
“I’m about to break that vow.”
For some reason, Rex wasn’t surprised. That was the kind of thing a person usually said when they planned to become an exception to the rule. “Oh?”
“What would it hurt for someone like me, meeting you on the street, or right here in this dining room, to ask you a couple of questions that most docs could answer, but that us poor common saps don’t know anything about?”
“I don’t think there’d be anything wrong with that. Most folks like to talk about their work. As long as it’s a casual, general question.”
“Mr. Barlow.”
Both men looked up to find Karah Lee standing in the opening to the alcove, arms crossed. She looked stern.
“Cheyenne Gideon and I will be perfectly willing to make an appointment for you at the clinic,” she said.
“Well, you see, there’s the catch,” Austin said, spreading his hands apologetically. “I’m one of those uptight rednecks who don’t like to burden the women with his private problems.”
“We’re doctors,” Karah Lee said. “We treat patients, uptight rednecks or otherwise. It’s what Cheyenne and I have both chosen to do with our lives. I’m sure you don’t realize it, but when you say something like that, it’s a slap in the face to us.”
“I’m sorry,” Austin drawled, his Ozark accent more pronounced. “Sure didn’t mean to imply you weren’t good at what you do. I know for a fact Cheyenne’s good, because I’ve seen her handiwork. I don’t suppose anyone mentioned that I was the one who first invited Cheyenne to begin the clinic in an official capacity.”
“I did hear you weren’t too keen on the idea of a clinic,” Karah Lee said.
“That was before I saw the error of my ways…and I have to admit, I’ve always had that hang-up about having a female doc.” He turned to Rex. “Sure does seem like a waste to me, all that education, all those years of study and all the doctor shortages, and you not being in practice.”
“You recruiting for us?” Karah Lee asked. “Because if you are, I have it on good authority that Cheyenne likes to choose her own staff. You’d better check with her before you issue any rash invitations.”
The man closed his eyes and nodded. “Of course,” he said quietly. “Fawn going to be okay?”
“I’ll see to it,” Karah Lee said. “Bertie’s making her some hot chocolate right now. This will take her some recovery time.”
“Yes.” Austin looked around, as if he was missing something, and Rex noticed for the first time that he wasn’t wearing his hat. “Well, I guess I’d best get out of the way so the recovery can begin.”
“Why don’t you call us Monday for an appointment?” Karah Lee suggested.
Looking drawn and tired, Austin nodded, got up, left.
Karah Lee glanced at Rex. “What’s up with him?”
Rex watched through the glass door as Austin paused on the front porch, rubbed the back of his neck and glanced in the direction of the town square. He then stepped into the night.
“Good question.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Jill didn’t take the time to pull into her garage behind the house when she arrived home from Noelle’s late Sunday afternoon. It felt strange, parking in front like a visitor, but it had been a strange and horrible week. She felt like rebelling against the habits that so often imprisoned her.
Though relieved that Nathan was back from his conference, she felt somewhat…cut adrift.
On the drive back to Hideaway from Noelle’s, Jill had done some soul-searching and drawn a disconcerting conclusion that she wished she had discovered decades ago: all these years when she’d proclaimed that her sister needed her intrusive influence in her life, she hadn’t admitted to herself or anyone else that she needed to be needed. She needed Noelle as much as—or even more than—Noelle had needed her.
How many times had she intruded, over the years, when she should have kept her mouth shut?
She was brooding about that when she stepped onto the front porch and was startled to discover three more storage boxes stacked neatly beside the door.
They were larger than the ones Jonathan had brought her last week, and were shaped like the filing boxes in which the school stored old records. A sticky note stuck to the box on top was written in Doris Batson’s exquisitely beautiful script.
Honey, we officially elected you keeper of the files until the reunion. Sherry pouted and declined to vote, but I don’t think even she would be willing to see these bits of history—and ridiculousness—destroyed. I just happened to find a number for our former Miss Sheave, believe it or not, and she has her maiden name back. I never did think that silly old art teacher would make a good husband. I thought I’d let you do the honors with the phone call, since you’re the one who was curious. Maybe you could invite her to our reunion. It never hurts to ask these things, you know.
She had jotted a telephone number at the end of the note.
With a quick glance around, Jill unlocked the front door and lugged the boxes inside. She hadn’t asked for this responsibility. Why was Doris so bent on saving worthless old records? Especially private records that no one had any business reading.
And yet, there could be information in these files that she needed. In fact, if Jonathan had seen someone skulking around Edith’s house the night he arrived, that skulker might have been in search of these school records.
But what was he looking for?
By the time Jill had stacked everything in the sitting room, she was trembling, and not from exertion. What if someone knew she had the records now? Anyone could have walked or driven past her house and recognized the file boxes.
She closed the front door, locked it and sank into a rocking chair.
With another wary look at the boxes, Jill picked up her telephone and punched the number Doris had given her for Miss Sheave. The area code wasn’t in Missouri.
The call was answered on the second ring. Jill introduced herself.
“Jill Cooper?” came the reply. Miss Sheave had a pronounced Southern accent. “Why, yes, I remember you. Who wouldn’t remember the student most likely to become the next mayor of Hideaway,” she said with a chuckle.
“Oh, yes, I think that was a joke. Actually, Austin Barlow did that very thing.”
There was a short silence. “Who?”
“He was a classmate of mine. Perhaps you didn’t have any encounters with him.”
“Actually, I used to pride myself on my memory of all the students. I soon discovered I didn’t have perfect recall,” she said with a self-deprecatory chuckle.
“I’ve been asked to invite you to our class reunion in two and a half weeks, at the Hideaway festival.”
“Are they still having those events?” Miss Sheave exclaimed. “The one I attended was the most fun. I mean, talk about your hometown parties, that one was the best I’ve ever seen.”
“So you might be interested in joining us?”
“I would if I didn’t live all the way down here in Alabama now.”
Okay, Jill had known she was out of state. Now she knew how far. “I had a question for you that you may not be able to answer.”
“Well, you’ll
never know unless you ask.”
“I had a classmate named Mary Larson, who, according to old school records, apparently saw you during our junior year. We have a situation here right now.” She explained the deaths of Edith Potts and Cecil Martin.
“Oh, my goodness! How awful! Those two must have been, what, well into their eighties? But what would Mary Larson’s visits to me have to do with that?”
Jill hesitated. She didn’t want to explain everything. Not yet. “I’m just gathering information about some things that happened when we were in school, trying to come up with a connection. A student was killed in a practical joke gone bad the year after you left, and Edith and Cecil were the two adults most involved in that situation. I could be way off base here. I hope I am. But if I’m not, any information you could give me may be important.”
There was a long, expressive silence, and Jill held her breath.
“It seems to me you’re talking about more than an accident, Jill. Are you saying these deaths might have been…intentional?”
“That’s right. Do you have any records that might help me connect these things?”
Another long silence, then a sigh. “Can you give me time to do some research?”
Something alerted Jill to a change in the woman’s tone. She was holding something back.
But Jill had no choice. If she pressed Miss Sheave at this point, the woman might well shut down completely.
“Take all the time you want,” Jill said. Sometimes the prospect of living and working in a large, impersonal city appealed to her. Then she wouldn’t be so connected to half the town—and feel personally responsible for them.
Miss Sheave ended the conversation with a half-hearted promise to call Jill back when she found the information she needed. But Jill suspected the former counselor already had the information. If she’d prided herself on remembering the names of the kids who had never even stepped into her office for counseling, she would recall Mary.
Miss Sheave was holding something back.
Rex couldn’t help it. He was worried about Jill. He’d been unable to sleep last night, and so, after attending church this morning, he’d returned to his suite and dozed off and on for several hours. He had resisted the urge to call Jill again, but hadn’t resisted the frequent compulsion to glance up the hill toward her house.
Did she even know about Cecil? If she didn’t, she needed to.
It wasn’t until late afternoon that he saw her blue car in front of her house, and he frowned. Why was she parked in front?
He could stand the questions no longer; he called.
She answered on the first ring. “Rex? Is something wrong?”
Of course. Caller I.D. “Yes, I was pretty sure you’d been told about last night’s tragedy, but I knew that if you hadn’t—”
“I heard. I wasn’t home when it happened, but Noelle reached me on my cell phone.”
He frowned. “You weren’t home?”
“No, in fact I haven’t been home since late yesterday afternoon, so I’m trying to play catch-up with some…work.” She sounded distracted.
Something didn’t make sense. “You were gone last night?”
“Don’t sound so surprised. I do have a semblance of a life. Sometimes. You know, friends and things. Somebody has to plan our class reunion.”
He glanced out the window toward the house. “You weren’t in your attic with the light on…or a flashlight or something…early Saturday evening?”
There was a long silence.
“Jill?”
“You saw a light in my attic?” Her voice had tightened with tension, immediately confirming Rex’s worst fears.
“Yes, I did.” As he spoke, he walked out of his suite and locked the door behind him. “It was just before I heard Fawn’s cry for help at the general store. She’d just found Cecil in the back room.”
“Then there’s no way I could have been at my house.” The tension turned to fear. “I was at Big Cedar when Noelle called to tell me about him.”
He went down the stairs, rushed across the lobby and out the front door. “It might have been a flicker of headlights hitting your window. Or maybe a reflection from your neighbor’s television.” He didn’t believe that. He wanted to tell her to get out of her house, but that would be overreacting. Wouldn’t it? She already sounded frightened.
“You’ve been watching my house?”
“Don’t worry, I’m not stalking you,” he said dryly as he reached the road and turned to race up the hill.
“I mean, you’re sure it was my house where you saw the light?”
“The blue Victorian with navy and burgundy trim. I could have been mistaken about the light.”
“But what if you weren’t? Rex, I need to hang up and make a call.”
“To the sheriff?”
“That would be a waste of time. I’m calling a locksmith.”
As soon as she disconnected, Rex called the sheriff. He was disappointed with the response.
Heart pounding, Jill punched the number of her second cousin, Jimmy Dale, who lived down the road from Noelle and Nathan. She gave him the pertinent information and hung up. She expected to see him pulling up in front of her house in his panel truck in ten or fifteen minutes. He was the best locksmith in the four-state area. He also installed alarm systems, and if she knew Jimmy Dale, he’d have the whole house rigged with new locks, deadbolts and a top-of-the-line alarm system before the sun went down. He’d been pestering her to let him fit her out with that for years.
Why hadn’t she listened?
She clamped down hard on the panic that threatened to overpower her. Someone had been here, but she could be pretty sure no one was here now. An invader didn’t just enter someone’s home and set up residence, he got in, got what he was looking for, and got out again before anyone noticed. So what was he looking for? And why was he in her attic?
Rex hadn’t imagined that light in her window. She knew that, especially since someone had already been in this house recently.
The drapes, which had alerted her to an intruder last time, were hanging in place, undisturbed. She rushed to the back door. The strip of tape she had placed between the bottom of the door and the threshold was still intact.
She searched the downstairs rooms with her own style of compulsive thoroughness, then hesitated before starting up the stairs. Telling herself no one was here now, she was aware of every creaking floorboard, every swish of her clothing, and all other sounds. She heard nothing unusual.
Other sufferers of OCD could become so focused on a particular compulsion they failed to notice the rest of their surroundings. She, on the other hand, became so acutely aware of all the elements of her surroundings that it, indeed, became her obsession.
It was during times such as this that she questioned herself—how could a woman who belonged to God, who was a strong believer, continue to have such mental weakness? Why couldn’t she overcome that with her faith?
A woman in her church had once assured Jill that when she reached spiritual maturity, she would, indeed, be able to cast off OCD.
So, according to that woman, I’m still spiritually immature.
Edith had been livid when Jill had told her about the conversation. “Jillian Diane Cooper, let me tell you something,” she’d ranted. “You are beautiful in God’s eyes just as you are this moment in time. How dare that woman, or anyone else, imply there’s something lacking in you? Can she know God’s mind? She has a thing or two to learn about grace and perfection. And you, my dear, have some things to learn about suffering.”
Jill had been taught all her adult life that the state of suffering—which she had reached often in her life—was a discipline for a believer. But she was tired of that discipline. What had she done to deserve such overwhelming punishment?
Suddenly, a shadow moved against the white, gauzy curtains on the window of her front door, backlit by the sun. Jimmy Dale hadn’t had a chance to get here from his place.
; She sucked in her breath, prepared to scream, when the figure stepped forward, and she could see his face.
Rex.
Before he could ring the bell or knock, she had the door open. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to reach for him.
He caught her in his arms and drew her close. He was breathing hard, as if he had run the whole way. “Are you okay?”
She nodded, still shaking from reaction. He didn’t let her go. Instead, he held her more tightly. She didn’t want to look into his face at the moment, for fear she might see the same thing she had seen in Greg’s and Tom’s faces the last time they were here.
And yet, the way he held her, the way he was breathing, the concern in his voice reassured her.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I panicked.”
“You’re not the only one. Jill, I know how you feel about the sheriff, but I called him and told him about seeing the lights.”
She pulled away at last, feeling his reluctance to release her. When she looked into his eyes, all she saw was concern, tender concern.
No, there was something else….
She turned and led the way into the house, and he followed. “Is he on his way here?”
“No. I told him I was coming here, and he told me to call him again if I needed anything. Meanwhile, I’m to reassure you that you’re safe and everything is okay.”
“And his explanation for the light you saw?”
“A reflection of headlights from the road above the cliffs.”
She decided not to let it bother her. It was enough that Rex believed her.
“Have you called the locksmith?” he asked.
“Yes, and he should be here very shortly.”
“There has never been any sign of forced entry?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean much,” she said. “I never had the locks changed when I first moved in, and several keys could be floating around town. My grandparents had an open-house policy when they lived here, and it seems half the people in town had piano lessons from my grandmother at one time or another. For that matter, Noelle leaves her ring of keys in her desk drawer at the spa. Anyone who knows her habits could enter her office and lift a key from her ring, make a copy of it down at the general store, then return—”
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