“No …” Rachel paused.
“What? Rachel?”
“Well, now that you mention it, I thought I saw someone in the woods behind my house a few days ago. I’d forgotten about it.”
“Keep your house locked up at night.”
“I don’t think you need to worry. I’ll stay safe and secure.”
“Maybe I should come over and check it out.”
“You know you’re welcome anytime, but I think all is well here.”
“I’ll visit you now. It’ll make me feel better to see you.”
“Wonderful. I’ll rustle up some food for dinner.”
Aaron’s stomach knotted up as he started up the Volvo. It’s probably nothing.
He called her again on the way. “I’m almost to your house. I should’ve offered to bring some food or drink.”
“That’s okay. I’ve got everything we …”
“Rachel? Are you there?”
“My eagle is making quite a ruckus out back. I’ll see you in a minute.” She ended the call.
Aaron gunned his car along the last stretch to Rachel’s house. He whipped into her driveway, jumped out of the car, and sprinted to the back yard.
Pulling up at the rear edge of the sanctuary fence, he spotted a figure jogging toward the edge of the forest with long hair flapping. Something was draped over the figure’s shoulder.
Aaron cupped his hands around his mouth. “Race, stop.”
Just shy of the trees, the figure slowed and turned around. Aaron ran up closer and stopped about ten feet away. Race’s eyes studied him, like a big cat examining its prey.
Aaron shook his head. “Please, don’t do this.”
Aaron didn’t blink as he focused on Race’s eyes, and the two men faced each other as still as statues. Aaron heard a whistling breeze from deep in the forest.
Race took several deep breaths, his eyes softening as his face furrowed into a frown. He crouched and laid Rachel on the ground.
Race cocked his head and studied the limp Rachel. “She’s not like the others, the ones that laughed at me.”
“Then why did you hurt her? Why?”
Race shot up and jabbed his finger at Aaron. “To get at you. To make you suffer, like I’ve suffered.” He snickered. “And I’m having a lot of fun doing it.”
A tremor passed over Aaron’s body.
Race sneered at Aaron. “I saw you were crazy for a while in the Big Thicket. But I want you as sane as me the next time we meet.” He cackled and fled into the trees.
Aaron put a hand to his forehead. What am I doing in this bizarre place? Maybe I should get the hell out of here.
Aaron hurried to Rachel and kneeled down beside her. “Rachel?” he said, but she didn’t respond. He noticed that her breathing was regular.
He hoisted her up in his arms, then he stared into the trees and listened. There’s no way I could catch that guy. I’ll let Constable Greevy know.
Aaron carried Rachel back to the house and laid her on the living room couch to look her over. That’s a nasty hematoma on her temple.
Aaron eased her into the back seat of his car and sped toward the hospital ER. En route, she moaned a few times and then opened her eyes and managed to sit up.
“What is happening? I have a pounding headache.”
“You were conked over the head. I want to get a CT scan to make sure you’re okay. Just try to relax now.”
After a few minutes, he looked back. Rachel was curled up on her side, asleep again.
“Rachel?” Aaron shook her foot. She didn’t respond. He pressed the accelerator. At least she’s breathing okay.
Aaron screeched to a stop in a parking space near the ER entrance. “Rachel?” he said as he turned to the back seat.
She was still unresponsive.
“Oh, boy. We need a CT scan stat.”
Several hours later, Aaron paced in a waiting room in the postoperative area.
He stopped as a surgeon walked up to him.
“We drilled a hole in her skull and drained a small epidural hematoma,” he said.
“So, she’s likely to recover all right?”
“Yes. These patients have a good prognosis, especially otherwise healthy patients like her that had a lucid interval after the injury. She had no other significant brain trauma.”
Aaron smiled. That’s what I hoped he’d say.
Later, Rachel was transferred to a private room. For the rest of the night, Aaron slept off and on in the chair beside her bed.
Aaron was awakened the next morning when a nurse entered the room. She checked Rachel’s monitors and touched her arm. Rachel opened her eyes, and the nurse smiled. “How are you feeling this morning, my dear?”
“Groggy,” Rachel said.
“She’s recovering well from the surgery,” the nurse said to Aaron, and then she patted Rachel’s arm and left the room. Aaron stepped over to the bedside.
“What happened to me?” Rachel said.
“Do you remember anything?”
“I was staring at my eagle. He was upset about something, flapping his wings and squawking like crazy. Then everything went black.”
“Race Taggett hit you over the head.”
Rachel’s eyes widened. “Race Taggett?”
“I stopped him at the edge of the Big Thicket. He was carrying you away.”
She shook her head. “What a nightmare.” She lifted her head. “I had to have surgery?”
Aaron leaned toward her. “You had bleeding outside the brain but inside your skull. It’s all over now. All is well. There was no injury to your brain tissue.”
“Whew. I’m glad to hear that. I do remember you were worried about me. I sure owe you one.” She laid her head back and sighed. “He must be really psycho. Do you think he’ll try again?”
Aaron looked out of the window. Appearing before him were Race’s face and eyes with that last mocking expression. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”
“Why did he do that to me?”
“To hurt me. He wants me, not you.”
Rachel lifted her head. “Why on earth does he want you?”
“For some crazy reason, he’s chosen me as someone he has to defeat.”
“Surely the police or the Texas Rangers can catch him and put him away for good.”
“Maybe they can.”
Aaron stood at the window as trees in the distance swayed in a stiff breeze.
After the tornado, Race said he needs to have me with him. What the heck did he mean by that?
Chapter 54
Earlier that night, someone was screaming outside. Buck Bogarty opened his eyes. Was that a nightmare?
He sat up in bed and listened. No, it’s not a dream.
Buck got out of bed, threw on clothes and shoes, and met his mother in the living room.
“Someone’s outside,” Buck said.
Sandra pulled her robe tight. “Are you going out there?”
“I’ll check it out.”
“Please be careful.”
Buck opened the front door and peered out. “Somebody help us,” a woman yelled.
Buck ran out into the front yard and saw two women standing in the street, several houses away. As he sprinted toward them, he saw one of the women gesturing and talking on a cell phone, and then he spotted flames shooting through the roof of a house.
“Please help me. My child and husband are in there,” a woman said to Buck. She coughed after she spoke. Her nightgown was burned black in several places and her hair was singed.
Buck ran to the house, stopped at the front door, and turned to the woman behind him. “Where are they?”
“To the right and down the hallway,” the woman said between coughs. “The two rooms off the hallway.”
Buck took a deep breath, lifted the bottom of his shirt over his mouth and nose, and ran in through the front door. He danced around a burning couch and avoided falling chunks of ceiling. His eyes burned from the hot smoke, and he cou
ghed as he made it to the hallway at the right of the living room. Holding his breath, he turned into the first room, which was filled with smoke. Feeling his way to a bed, his hand came across a small leg on the mattress. He forced his arms under the body of a child and jogged out of the room, bouncing off walls along the way. He dodged falling flames and weaved his way back to the front door and outside to the yard, where he stopped and gasped for air. As the woman took her child from Buck, the second woman ran up behind him and beat his back with her hands.
“Your shirt is on fire,” she said.
“Thanks.” He turned to the woman with the child. “You said someone else is in there?”
“My husband, in the next room over.” Buck jogged back to the front door.
“God bless you,” she said.
Buck took a deep breath, covered his mouth and nose with his shirttail, and plunged once more into the house. Smoke now filled the living room, and he could no longer make out objects in the room. An acrid smell burned his nose and eyes. Squeezing the shirt over his mouth and nose, he charged forward, trying to follow from memory his previous route. He banged against furniture and walls several times before feeling the doorway opening to the child’s room. Groping his way further along the wall, he tripped and fell through another doorway and landed on the floor on his stomach. He heard a siren outside approaching the house.
I need to breathe.
He rolled over on his back. Through watery eyes, he saw a flame falling toward him and then he felt a heavy weight crushing his chest …
Chapter 55
Aaron knocked on the door of Sandra Bogarty’s house the day after the fire. Several other cars were parked outside along the street.
“Come in,” she said and opened the door wide. Her eyes were red from crying.
Aaron stepped inside. “I’m so sorry about Buck.”
She started to sob into a tissue, and Aaron put his arm around her shoulders. They walked to a couch nearby.
“He had just joined the Army.” She could speak only a few words at a time between sobs. “He was so proud … He didn’t want to be like his father … He wanted to do good.”
“He was an amazing young man. He will be missed.”
“The firefighters said … they’re going to give him … give me … a medal for his courage.”
“He so deserves that honor. He was a true hero. He saved a child’s life.”
She nodded and smiled. “That’s just like Buck. He was my hero.”
Aaron leaned closer to her. “I think a lot of people are better for having known Buck Bogarty.”
Aaron walked out to his car through a light rain with his head down. Could I ever do anything brave like what Buck did?
Race Taggett’s eyes appeared before him, and a chill went through his chest.
Can I possibly be brave against him?
That night, Aaron lay wide awake on his bed. At times, he sat up and paced around the room. An owl hooted outside.
Why am I doing this? I should clear out of here. He nodded. I’ll take Rachel with me. We’ll start a new life.
He sat on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands. Face the truth, you idiot. You’re not brave like Buck Bogarty.
He slapped his thighs. Damn it, I went to medical school to be a doctor. I just want to be a doctor.
He moaned and clenched his fists.
What did I get myself into? I don’t want to die here.
Chapter 56
Two days later, Aaron had made his decision. He called Rachel, who was home from the hospital.
“How are you recovering?” Aaron said.
“I feel fine, just a little weak still.”
“I’ve made a decision. I have to get out of here.”
Rachel was quiet.
“Since I moved here, I’ve been shot at and almost killed with a machete, and I even lost my mind for a while. Then you almost died because of me, and that was the last straw. This place isn’t good for me.”
“You must do what you think is right,” Rachel said.
“It’s not about being right or not. I just don’t want to die. I’m not a match for Race Taggett. You understand that, don’t you?”
“I understand that many people would react the same way.”
“Please come with me, or join me later.”
Rachel paused. “No. I can’t do that. My place is here. This is where I belong.”
“But I want to be with you.”
“I know.”
Aaron sighed. “All right, but I’m coming back for you. I’ll call you later.”
That afternoon, Aaron left a voicemail message for Stella that he wouldn’t be in to his clinic the next day and that he’d call her later with an update. After boarding his dog, Red, at a pet hotel, Aaron fled from East Texas in his packed car, heading in the general direction of Connecticut. In the rearview mirror, he saw the Piney Woods recede and then disappear.
“Goodbye, Big Thicket, and good riddance.”
He left the radio off, as his mind was preoccupied.
I’m doing the right thing. I’m okay. Even Rachel said this may be something I should do. Isn’t that what she said?
He shook his head. She didn’t sound exactly excited for me. Maybe that’s because she’ll miss me?
After sunset, when the Big Thicket was far behind him, Aaron pulled into a roadside motel somewhere in the Midwest. His head was in a fog from recent sleepless nights as he jogged through a misty rain to the lobby door,
“Are you checking in for the night?” the registration clerk said.
“Yes, one night.”
The clerk studied Aaron as she typed on her computer screen. She leaned over the counter toward him.
“Can I ask you a question?”
Aaron glanced up. “Sure.”
“What are you running from?”
Aaron’s eyes flew open. Wow, I’ve heard that question before. It must be obvious.
He coughed into his hand. “A bad situation.”
“In my years here, I’ve seen many a person running from something.”
“I’ll bet you have.”
“Do you want to know what I’ve learned?”
Aaron cocked his head. What if I said no?
“Sometimes it’s for the best. Most of the time it’s not.”
Aaron checked into his room and fell onto the bed. He lay there for hours, staring at the ceiling. Faces of people he’d met in East Texas floated across his vision.
He sat up and placed his hands over his ears. But I can’t go up against Race. There’s no way I could win.
His thoughts kept coming back to Buck Bogarty, dying in the fire to save a life, and Rocky Donnigan, shielding Preston Benningham from a hail of bullets.
After staring at his reflection in the bathroom mirror for a while, his legs wobbled, his head started to spin, and he fainted onto the floor.
Aaron opened his eyes to the morning housekeeper shaking his body. “Sir, are you okay?”
He raised his head from a pool of clotted blood that spread over most of the tile floor in front of the toilet.
“I need to get you to the hospital,” she said.
Aaron stood and looked around the bathroom and felt his pulse. “No, I think I’m all right.” In the mirror, he saw the scar on his jaw oozing blood and pressed his hand against it. “I must’ve passed out and hit my face on the toilet. At least, the bleeding has slowed.”
“Don’t worry about the blood. I’ll clean everything up. Stay here, and I’ll bring you a bandage.”
Aaron changed into clean clothes, and the housekeeper returned in several minutes with a first aid kit and bandaged his jaw wound.
“You might need to see a doctor. I can call the ambulance for you, no problem,” she said.
Aaron studied the look of concern in her eyes. He smiled and shook his head. “That won’t be necessary. It’s not an emergency. You see, I’m a doctor. I know it looks like a lot of blood, but the bleeding has s
topped and I feel all right. I’ll drink a lot of liquids today.”
She led him to the bed. “Well, you rest here while I clean up the room.”
Aaron watched as she mopped and wiped down the bathroom. She brought him water and checked on him at intervals.
When she was done, she gathered her supplies and stopped in front of him. “I don’t know what happened to you last night, but if you’re in trouble, I pray you’ll be okay.”
Aaron nodded. “Thanks for helping me. You didn’t panic or wimp out or run away. You did the right thing, didn’t you? You did what needed to be done.”
She smiled. “I always try to.” She stepped toward the door and then turned back to him. “You take care. If you need anything, call the front desk and ask for me, Hazel.” She pointed to her nametag.
After the housekeeper left, Aaron paced around the room for a while and then sat down on the edge of the bed. He mumbled and groaned and rocked his body.
As time passed, he nodded or shook his head at intervals. Then his body became still, his head bowed.
Aaron slapped his thighs and walked to the bathroom mirror. All right. Running away won’t help. It would just make everything worse, for me, for my life, maybe even for Rachel.
He sighed. Besides, my enemies always seem to find me anyway.
Aaron stared at the man in the mirror. “I know what I have to do.”
Chapter 57
Later that afternoon, Aaron arrived early to Buck Bogarty’s funeral.
He surveyed the crowd and chose a spot on a pew toward the back of the church sanctuary. So many people showed up, the church had standing room only, and some folks couldn’t get in through the entrance doors. As Aaron had expected, the service was moving and many people cried.
At the end of the service, Aaron bowed his head and tightened his jaw. I’ll be strong like you, Buck Bogarty.
As he filed out with the crowd, someone tapped his shoulder from behind.
“Were you in a fight?” It was Grant Belkin.
Aaron touched his jaw bandage. “Oh, no. Just a minor accident.”
Grant walked with him along a short stretch of the sidewalk. He touched Aaron’s arm again and they stopped.
“There’s somethin’ different about you, Doc.”
Fractured Eden Page 23