He got into his car and headed for the interstate. Interstate forty was the quickest way to get to Southaven, Mississippi from Memphis and he needed to get there quickly before he lost his nerve.
CHAPTER 6
Ramsey found Jackson before he found her. He had fallen asleep on the love seat. His last thought had been to take a nap and talk to Ramsey the following day when she made her rounds. Worn out and just plain exhausted from dealing with his sometimes demented and sometimes not so demented grandfather, Jackson succumbed to sleep and was softly snoring when she finally located him.
Ramsey was glad he was asleep. She wanted to look at him. There was little resemblance left of the old Jackson. Although with his face relaxed in sleep and his guard completely down, she could see shadows of the boy she used to know. Her eyes roamed over his broad chest, thick arms and hands. He was a big man with an athletic build. He lay back in the corner of the love seat with one arm thrown up over his head and the other resting along his side. His lean hips rested against the edge of the seat with one long leg swung loosely over the arm of the couch and the other out toward the fireplace. He was a sight to see even to Ramsey's acutely non-libidinous gaze.
Skin as dark as Hershey's chocolate and just as smooth graced his face. Lips full and indecently moist drew her eyes and Ramsey felt herself growing warm and confused. She looked away and was about to leave when he moved. It was the first time she'd felt a full arousal. It hit her in the center of her stomach and spread like wildfire throughout her limbs.
She watched spellbound as Jackson shifted his hips further up on the couch and groaned deep within his chest. He slowly lowered the hand over his head to his flat stomach and rubbed his shirt up. Ramsey's eyes followed his movements and her lips parted at the sight of his stomach and the muscular V leading to the waistband of his scrubs. His hips moved again and she was lost. She could have sat on the floor and watched his innocent, but erotic, display all night. In fact, she was so busy watching his nether regions; she was totally unaware that his eyes had opened and he was watching her too.
Her gaze finally shifted and she met his stare. His expression was an odd mixture of curiosity and heat. Ramsey hid her embarrassment by speaking.
"I was looking for you," she said. She knew it wasn't the most creative thing to say to a man who had just awakened to find her ogling his private parts, but for the moment it was the best she could do.
Jackson sat up and pulled his shirt down. He stood and stretched like a cougar. Ramsey was too far gone to look away. She watched his arms flex and stared as his chest expanded. He let out a deep breath and then shook like a wet puppy. Placing his hands on his hips, he turned and stared down into her face. His eyes narrowed slightly and she knew she had put something on his mind.
"Is granddad okay," he asked calmly.
"Yes."
"So….what's up, Ramsey? I saw you looking at my body. What was that all about," he asked. He wasn't going to let her indiscretion slide. She had been looking at him like he was a piece of chocolate cake. Blood had instantly begun pooling in his groin. He felt overheated and slightly irritable. As beautiful as she was, he knew there was no shortage of men in her life. As a matter-of-fact he was sure, since she wasn't married, she had a boyfriend stashed away somewhere. Her credentials were too long for her to be manless.
"I'm a geriatric doctor. I don't get to see fine bodies too often," she chose levity as her weapon.
"Come on, girl, I know you got men knocking down your door," he said seriously.
"Actually, I don't," she said quietly.
"Ramsey, don't lie. You're a beautiful woman with a beautiful body and you're a doctor. What man could resist you," he said.
Ramsey was mortified that the conversation had taken such a pitiful turn. She'd never been exactly sure about her appeal. She had spent an inordinate amount of effort focusing on staying clear of men's sexual prowess to be worried about how they viewed her. But for some reason, hearing Jackson call her beautiful was doing funny things to her insides. She had an overwhelming desire to blink her eyes and look coquettishly up at him. She squelched it with an iron-like strength of will that only a woman her age could wield.
"It's not important. I'm too busy for romance anyway. I'm sure you realize with taking care of your granddad that elderly people are by far the most demanding of the population," she laughed.
Jackson didn't laugh. He grabbed her by the waist and pulled her against his chest. His experience with loose women had given him an inherent sense of when a woman wanted to be touched and kissed. Ramsey was screaming for it. He lowered his head and sealed his lips over hers. He felt her hands flatten against his chest and waited for her to push him away. She didn't. His tongue slid between her lips tasting and testing her. Slanting his head to the side he breathed in her essence and felt his own desire mix with her heat. It overwhelmed him. He drew back and pushed her away. He was so affected by the kiss, he didn't notice how stunned she looked and he didn't follow her or say a word when she backed away, turned and left.
#
It was eleven o'clock exactly. The cove was quiet and the lights were out in all the houses. It seemed Maple Cove was asleep. Herby wondered if Pam was in the bed. He smiled into the night. They had never divorced. He was still legally her husband. He'd paid for this house with the sweat off his back. He was a laborer in a factory making aluminum coils. He'd worked hard all his life and had met all of his responsibilities as best he could. He was not bitter, but he was fed up.
He opened the door to the car and took his first step toward his past and his future. He shook his head when the key fit perfectly into the lock. The woman had not changed the lock in the twenty-six years he had been away. He slipped inside the door and stood in the foyer listening. She must be in bed. The house was completely silent.
Herby knew exactly where the master bedroom was and he wasted no time heading in that direction. The gin and his own adrenaline spurred him on and made him reckless where he should have been cautious. He heard the pop first, then breaking glass, and finally his chest burned like someone was pouring hot lava straight from a volcano down the front and back of him. He heard his own hoarse scream before he fell into the floor.
Pam fumbled for the light switch and dropped the smoking gun. She didn't spare a look for the felled intruder as she raced for the phone. Dialing 9-1-1 she screamed into the phone, "Help me. Someone has broken into my house and I shot him!"
"Ma'am calm down. Help is on the way. Can you see the person," the dispatcher asked.
It was then that Pamela looked to the floor and saw Herby Laughterdale, her estranged husband, lying face down in a pool of blood. The wedding ring on his finger twinkled in the moonlight. She passed out with the phone still clutched in her hand.
CHAPTER 7
It was the only thing that could have shattered the riveting effect Jackson's kiss had had on her. One minute Ramsey was hiding in a dark corner of the doctor's lounge trying to tamp down a raging arousal and the next she was running full speed down the long halls and winding corridors of Baptist Memorial Hospital. When she finally reached the emergency room, she was out of breath and scared to death.
Ramsey reached Herby's side and held his hand as they prepped him for emergency surgery. He'd already lost a lot of blood and they feared that he might not make it. The bullet had entered through the left of his chest and exited through his back. There was enough blood to assume that a major artery had been hit.
He was unconscious and his lips were ashen-blue. He looked already dead. Ramsey felt the tremors begin underneath her feet and spread up her legs and throughout her body. She was more afraid than she'd ever been in her life. She looked down at her father's graying temple and wondered what he could possibly have gotten himself into since the phone conversation they had had no more than three hours ago. He had seemed distracted when he hung up on her. She squeezed his cold hand and prayed.
Within minutes they took him away from her and all sh
e could do was wait. Ramsey fumbled around for the cell phone and pager that were always at her hip. She had to call her mom and Talmus to let them know. It was twelve in the morning. Her mom was in bed and Talmus was in some woman's bed.
But before she could dial the number, a police officer approached her. He was a short man with a fat stomach. His police uniform was too tight and when he opened his mouth to speak, the first thing she noticed was the wide gap between his two front teeth. He was very unappealing, but what he began saying was even less palatable.
"Your mother, Pamela Laughterdale, is being held at headquarters for shooting Mr. Herby Laughterdale. We need to ask you some questions, because your mother is hysterical and incoherent at the moment. She called 9-1-1 at approximately five minutes after eleven saying an intruder had broken into her house and that she had shot him, but when we arrived on the scene she said he was her husband. The man had a key. There was no sign of a struggle or a break-in. We need to know if your mother had any motive for trying to kill her husband."
Ramsey's mind seemed frozen. Had she somehow incited her father to hurt her mother with her stupid confessions? She was a woman full grown and she had called her dad about some childish misfortune and now he was dying and her mother was in jail.
"I don't know how he had a key, because they have not lived together since I was three. They divorced twenty-six years ago," she said hoarsely.
"No ma'am. They are not divorced and his name is on the deed to that house," he said deliberately. He shifted on his feet and let out a loud exasperating sigh. "Listen, my name is Detective McClaren. William McClaren. I have been in this business for too many years. Most of the time I know the answers before I ask them. So, please, be truthful with your answers."
Ramsey felt a sense of helpless desperation rise in her chest. There was so much she didn't know about either one of her parents. Who was she to claim either one of them? She'd gone to school and then on to college and obeyed every directive her mother had given her. She hadn't asked questions or even tried to understand where Pam was coming from. She had never bothered to look deeper. She was too busy protecting herself from Pam. She just didn't know her own mother.
They were still married? Why? Her dad had a key to the house on Maple Cove? Why? His name was on the deed to the house? How? The questions went on and on as Ramsey stood dumbly, while Detective McClaren stared into her face, waiting.
"I…I guess I don't know the whole truth about my parent's relationship. I do know that they've been estranged for years. She wouldn't have been expecting him to come tonight. Not so late in the night anyway," she said. She couldn’t hide her embarrassment.
"Well, if Mr. Herby dies, your mother will be in a lot of trouble. This will be considered a homicide and with him having a key and owning the deed to the house and no sign of a break-in, she may end up in prison for a long time. I'm going to leave my card with you. You need to call a bails bondsman for your mother. We will go from there. Oh, and Ms. Ramsey, make sure your mother does not leave town."
Ramsey had two distinguishing thoughts as Detective McClaren walked away. One was that the walls of Jericho fell in one night and the other was that Mr. McClaren's butt was even more unappealing than his face. She decided she would be superficial and hate him first for the way he looked and secondly for the highly disrespectful and insensitive way he had talked to her.
She pulled out her cell phone and called Talmus. He answered after the third call and by then she wasn't trembling in fear anymore. She was trembling in anger.
"Talmus, this is --," he cut her off.
"I know this you, Ramsey. What you want," he mumbled.
"Get out of whatever slut's bed you're in and get up here to the hospital now! Momma shot daddy and he's in surgery now. Momma is in jail and I need you to come up here so we can decide whose going to do what! You have ten minutes or I swear I'll make you regret taking your time. Meet me in the ER waiting room."
She ended the call and shoved the phone back into its case at her hip.
CHAPTER 8
Talmus was not in 'some slut's bed.' He was in his own bed where he slept every night. He knew his mother and sister thought he was a merciless womanizer, but he was anything but that. It had been months since he had been with any woman. He was slow about forming close relationships and commitments. When he got the itch, he'd go to a club and spot a nice chic that was looking for a one-night stand, but here lately that sort of life had grown increasingly distasteful to him and his sexual ardor had done more waning than waxing.
His mom and sister also thought he was no more than some weightlifting jock that spent his days preening and primping his hard body, but once again he was something entirely different. He was a fitness trainer for postpartum women. He had a clandestine relationship with the obstetrical department at Baptist Memorial Hospital. Anyone interested in training after six weeks of giving birth were often referred to him and he would have her back in shape within six to twelve months.
Most of the women in his life were married, breastfeeding, and juggling babies, husbands, and full-time jobs. There was nothing especially glamourous about any of it, except the attention. Women of every size, race, and economic level adored him. His pretty boy image boosted his appeal, but the real diamond in his armor was his personality. He was patient, empathetic and motivational. His curly black hair, deep dimples, and honey brown skin was a treat for the low-spirited and emotionally drained women who spent hours in his company laboring to get their bodies back while underneath his tutelage. He secretly enjoyed the esteem they held him in and cherished it.
Pam had been disdainful of him ever since he had reached puberty. Unlike Ramsey, Talmus understood clearly where his mother was coming from. He had no idea of what exactly had happened in her past to make her so militant and suspicious of male people, but he knew fear when he saw it. Talmus had an inherent understanding of people and what made them human. He knew early on that his mother was a basket case. She was just filled with negative emotion that stemmed from someplace neither he nor Ramsey had ever visited. They were like babies walking in the dark with her.
But Talmus had done the same as Ramsey. He'd dealt with his mother's proclivity for emotional control and abuse in his own way. He was always ready to love her when she was ready to accept him, but he didn't ask questions. He had his suspicions, but to be honest, Pam had left no opening for either him or Ramsey to really know her pain or where it came from. She'd just made darn sure they did exactly as she asked and had found some comfort in thinking all her efforts would keep them safe from some unknown monster. It had worked to a degree, but she had forgotten there could be more than one monster in a child's life and hadn't bothered to check herself. As a result, Ramsey was afraid of men and Talmus was afraid of women. Neither one had ever married nor showed any signs of ever doing so.
Talmus chewed on his bottom lip as he drove to the hospital. He was upset, but in control. He didn't know anything about his father. He didn't even know where the man lived. Why would Ramsey still be at the hospital with him instead of down at the station taking care of their mother? Talmus had the strangest surreal feeling that he was still in the midst of a nightmare and that if he pinched himself he would wake up.
He'd never known his socially correct mother to carry a gun. He'd never in his life seen one in her possession. He had only seen his father once from a distance. The story was that he had left just before he was born. Talmus couldn't draw up any sympathy for someone he didn't know or for a man that had not been a father to his only son.
His grip tightened on the steering wheel when he thought about his poor mother. He had to protect her and he would do whatever it took to do just that. He loved her and he knew she would only shoot a man out of fear, but never to kill. So, his first point of business would be to find out what Herby Laughterdale had tried to do to his mother.
#
Ramsey sensed Talmus' hostility the minute she saw him. He walked through the emergency
room doors in his white T-shirt and gray sweats with a frown and a question on his handsome face.
"Ramsey, why you still up here when momma in jail?"
"I have to make sure dad is okay. He may die and if he dies momma is going to be in a lot of trouble."
"Dad?" he said unbelievingly. "You calling this man 'dad?'"
"Talmus, I don't have time to explain everything, but I know him and I know that there has been a horrible mistake. Did you know that he and momma are still married and his name is on the deed to momma's house?"
"That's a lie!" Talmus said. "I don't know what he been telling you, but you need to be careful about what you believe."
"He didn't tell me this. The detective that was here told me. He has already found enough information to make it look like momma had reason to kill dad. Please just go to the bail bondsman and get her out. Bring her right up here so I can talk to her. Do you need any money?"
Talmus cringed at the question. Ramsey and his mom had no idea that he was financially stable. They didn't know that he had more than one home and that he was a financial wizard. He knew how to make money and he knew how to keep it. He'd let them think what they wanted to think of him, because he hadn't wanted their interference. They were a dysfunctional family despite and in spite of all of Pam's posing and posturing. So, he smiled and waited on Ramsey as she pulled out a debit card and gave him the pin number. He laughed when she threatened to cut his knees off if he didn't bring her a receipt.
Ramsey watched as Talmus headed towards the emergency room doors. She frowned when he stopped and seemed to be staring into the glass door. Just as he slowly turned back to face her she felt a hand wrap around her forearm. She turned to look up into Jackson's face.
"Ramsey, I heard what happened. Do you need me to do anything?"
The Shocking Truth About Ramsey Page 3