by Sharon Sala
“That’s all well and good,” Ben said. “But we need more than an apology from Miss Simmons. We still need to know where she was that night.”
Ariel smiled, although in truth she wanted to scream. This was all Finelli’s fault. If the stupid little bastard hadn’t chosen to meddle in things that were not his business, none of this would be happening.
“I was here, in my home,” she said, and then the tears that were glittering in her eyes began to slide soundlessly down her face. “I was preparing my sermon for the Sunday broadcast, and I’m afraid my only witness was God.” She leaned forward. “Will you take God’s word, Detective English?”
“Of course,” Ben said. “Tell him I’m listening.”
A dark flush spread across her cheeks. “You jest about God’s word? How dare you?” She looked to her lawyer, holding out her hands in supplication. “Langley, how am I to deal with unbelievers?”
Ben’s patience had been thin when they started this conversation, but it snapped when she started to emote.
“Look, lady, can the drama, okay? My religious beliefs are not on trial, but you very well could be if you don’t come up with a better alibi than that.”
Ariel stood abruptly, her saintly persona gone. “I have nothing more to say to you. Either arrest me or get out of my home. And be warned, I intend to go on the air and tell the world of the evil that is trying to drag me down.” She was in full swing now, beginning to pace back and forth in front of them the way she did onstage. “That picture you have of me is a fake. Someone has put my face on another’s body. Langley says it’s a simple matter to do such a thing nowadays, and I won’t be railroaded into submission. God is my strength. I accept this as a trial of my faith. God will be with me through the wilderness of this horror, and I will prevail.”
Ben stood. “Sit down, Miss Simmons. We’re not through until I say we’re through. Yes, faking photographs is easy, but it’s also easy for an expert to detect, and so far, our experts haven’t found any discrepancies. The only abnormalities are what the pictures depict.”
Ariel sat, her fury evident. “Langley, do something,” she muttered.
“Are you going to arrest her?” Langley asked.
Ariel shrieked. “You’re supposed to be helping me, not them!”
“Shut up, Ariel, you’ve said enough,” Langley said. The woman’s shock was evident, but she hushed. Langley looked up. “Okay, men, we’ve all got our cards on the table. Miss Simmons was in her home preparing her sermon. She can’t prove it, but can you prove otherwise? Do you have any witnesses who say they saw her in Oakcliff that night? No, you don’t, or she would already be under arrest. So where does that leave us? In the clear, that’s where.” He stood. “Now, my client has cooperated fully with you people, and if you aren’t going to arrest her, then I suggest it’s time you take your leave.”
Both men stood. Ben gave the preacher a calculated look, then left her with a parting shot.
“We’re going, but I want you to remember something, lady. Lies have a way of coming back and biting you on the ass, so you better watch where you sit.”
When Langley got up to follow them out, Ben stopped. “Don’t bother,” he said. “We can find our own way.”
Ariel Simmons was arguing with her lawyer before they got out the door, and when they were halfway down the hall, they heard her starting to shout.
Red grinned. “Right about now, old Langley’s earning every penny she pays him.”
Ben shook his head. “There isn’t enough money on earth to pay me to work for a woman like her. She’s lying, Red. But how in hell can we prove it?”
“Do you think she did it?” Red said.
“I don’t know,” Ben answered. “Only China can help us with that one. Yesterday, when I went to see her, she talked to me for almost five minutes before she went back to sleep. I keep wanting to push her for answers, but then I remember how she looked that night, all pale and still, with the snow falling on her face.” He shuddered. “I thought she was dead.”
“She came close,” Red said. “But that’s the operative word. Close is not the same as over. You said it yourself, she’s getting better every day. When she’s ready to do more, you’ll know it. Right now, be grateful for small favors. At least we know the shooter was a woman. Now all we need is a name.”
***
China was awake when Ben came into her room. The sight of his smile did things to her heart that she would rather not face. No use wasting time caring about a man ever again. They were full of pretty words—until they were through with you.
“Hey, there,” Ben said, as he reached her bedside and set a little Santa Claus doll on her table. “It’s just a feel-good thing,” he said, pointing to the doll. “Good to see you awake. How have you been doing?”
“All right,” she said, and when he touched the side of her face with the back of his hand, she told herself he was only feeling for fever. But when his hand turned and he cupped her cheek, she didn’t know what to think.
Ben was elated that she was recovering, but there was a drawback he hadn’t expected. Before, he’d touched her without thought. Now she was obviously not receptive to the notion and while he understood her distrust, it hurt him just the same.
“That’s good,” Ben said, and took off his coat and laid it at the foot of her bed.
China wiggled her toes beneath the weight and decided it felt comfortable after all.
“Do you feel up to taking a look at a few pictures?” he asked.
“Of what?” China asked.
“Possible suspects.”
China’s eyes widened as she stared at the pictures he took out of his jacket pocket. She wanted the woman found, but the thought of seeing her again made her sick with fear.
Ben saw the look and instantly understood. “It will be okay, honey. They’re only pictures.”
China bit her lip and then reached for them. “Yes, I’ll look at them.”
“Good.”
He laid them in her lap, spreading them out until she could clearly see all six. Almost immediately, she pointed to three of them.
“Not her, or her, or her,” she said.
Ben picked them up and put them back in his pocket.
“What about the other three?”
China picked them up one at a time, looking intently. One was of Shelly Milam. There was a resemblance, but she couldn’t be sure. Twice, she went back to two of them—one of Ariel Simmons, one of Connie Marx. Finally shook her head.
“I can’t be sure. There’s something about these two that looks familiar, yet not exactly right.”
Ben knew that a lawyer would have a field day with that remark. Both women were recognizable in their own right, which could be why China was confused.
“Take your time,” he said. “Try to remember what she—”
She looked up. “I don’t have to try. That woman’s face is forever etched in my mind.”
“Sorry,” Ben said, and then picked up the pictures and put them back in his pocket. “It was worth a try.”
“No, I’m sorry,” she said. “But their hair is different, and it was dark, and the woman was wearing some kind of evening dress under a full-length fur coat.”
Ben took Ariel’s and Connie’s pictures out of his pocket again and laid them back in her lap.
“Picture them wearing a wig like the woman who shot you and then tell me if the features fit.”
China looked again, fingering one, then the other. Finally, she shook her head.
“I just can’t be sure.”
Ben’s hopes fell, but he didn’t let on. “That’s all right. Don’t think this brings anything to a halt, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Well, I’d better get back to work. Red’s at the dentist. I promised to pick him up before noon, and he reminded me earlier that it’s my day to buy lunch.”
China listened intently but without comment. It would seem that Ben English kept his promises to eve
ryone, not just to her.
“You going to be all right?” Ben asked. “Is there anything you need?”
“No, thank you, I don’t need anything.” Except peace.
Ben hesitated, wanting to hug her goodbye, but having to settle for a smile and a wave instead.
“We’ll talk soon.”
She nodded, glanced once at the smiling Santa doll, then drifted off to sleep.
Outside, the holiday spirit was in full swing. Nurses went about their duties wearing Santa Claus hats, and a group of children from a private elementary school sang carols out in the hall.
China awoke just as a little boy began his solo verse. His voice was clear, a pure tenor that would one day give way to maturity, but for now it wrapped around a verse with such purity that she felt shattered all the way to her soul.
Away in a manger,
No crib for a bed,
The little lord Jesus,
Lay down His sweet head.
The stars in the bright sky
Looked down where He lay.
The little lord Jesus,
Asleep on the hay.
The image of a baby—any baby—was too much for China to bear.
“Oh God,” she whispered, and then she started to cry.
***
Two days later, China was sitting up when Ben walked into her room. When the door opened, she flinched, relaxing only after she recognized who it was.
“You startled me.”
“Sorry,” Ben said, and strode quickly to her bedside. “Should you be sitting up like that? You don’t want to—”
“I walked from the bed to the bathroom today.”
Without thinking, he cupped the side of her face. “Oh, honey, that’s wonderful news!”
The familiarity of his palm against her cheek made China nervous. It wasn’t the first time he’d touched her in this way, but today it felt different—less impersonal. She looked at him, frightened by the power in his gaze, and caught herself holding her breath.
For a moment, neither of them moved. China was the first to look away, and she shivered as she fidgeted with her sheets. This was something she wasn’t ready to handle—might never be able to handle again. Right now, any intimacy with a man, no matter how innocent, was impossible. There was nothing left inside her but the need to get well and the need for revenge.
Ben saw the look on her face. At that moment, if Tommy Fairheart had been within reach, he would have beaten him senseless. Damn that man to hell and back for what he’d done to China Brown. He decided that a change of subject was in order.
“Has your doctor been in today?”
To his surprise, she hesitated, then began to tremble.
“China?”
“What?”
“What did Dr. Pope tell you?”
“That he will release me in two or three days.”
Ben frowned. “And that bothers you?”
She shrugged.
He eased down on the side of her bed and laid his hand on the covers. Her legs were shaking beneath them as if she’d gotten a chill, but he knew she wasn’t cold.
“China, we’ve come too far in this together for you to quit trusting me now. What’s wrong?”
She bit her lip and then looked up at him. “After all this time and no notice, I know I’ve lost my job. I have no money or home. When they release me from the hospital, I will have no place to go.”
He wanted to take her in his arms and kiss away all the pain, but it would only make things more complicated than they already were.
“I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner,” he said. “That’s already taken care of. I’m taking you to my mother’s until I’m certain you’re safe.”
“Oh, but I couldn’t impose on—”
Ben shook his head and patted her leg. “If you knew my mother, you’d know better than to say that. She’s a widow, and I suspect she’s often lonely. She lives by herself in a great big house out in the country and will welcome the company, trust me.”
She shook her head, still not convinced. “What if that woman—the woman who shot me—what if she comes looking for me?”
“You’ll be fine. I have someone who’s going to play bodyguard for the both of you. He’s an ex-cop and an old friend of the family. He’ll be happy to have an excuse to hang around my mother, anyway.”
China was intrigued in spite of herself. “He’s in love with her?”
Ben grinned. “Probably, but I’m staying out of that. Now don’t worry. You just concentrate on getting well. I’ll have Mom call you before you leave the hospital. You can say hello over the phone, and maybe you won’t feel like such strangers when you do finally meet.”
She hesitated, then sighed. “It shames me to admit that I don’t really have a choice.”
Ben tilted her chin to meet his gaze.
“We all have choices, China. Some are better than others, but none of them are wrong, they’re just choices, okay?”
She nodded, and when he moved his finger from her chin, she felt as if her gravity shifted. The thought made her angry, but only with herself. He didn’t really mean anything to her except a means to an end. He was a cop. He was sworn to protect her. The fact that he was willing to go a few steps farther was good for her. As her mother used to say, she shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
“Then tell your mother I’m grateful,” she said.
“Tell her yourself when she calls,” Ben said. “Now I’d better let you get some rest. I’ll see you the day after tomorrow.”
Her heart skipped a beat. A whole day without seeing him? In spite of her unwillingness to admit he mattered to her, he’d become her safety net.
“Okay, sure,” she muttered, and willed herself not to cry.
Ben started to leave, but there was something about her silence and posture that bothered him.
“Is there anything you want to tell me—anything you need?”
She didn’t answer.
“China.”
She looked up.
“You can trust me. I promise,” he said.
Tears welled anew. The promise man. He had yet to let her down.
“No, nothing is wrong. I’ve been crying a lot the last couple of days for no reason. Dr. Pope said it’s my body readjusting.” She bit her lip and then met his gaze. “You know, after the baby and all. I guess my hormones are all messed up.”
If she’d punched him in the belly, he couldn’t have been more dismayed. What the hell had he been thinking? Of course something was wrong. She was grieving for her child.
“Another thing I should have told you. I found where your mother is buried. Tomorrow your daughter will be beside her.”
China started to shake. “Thank you,” she mumbled. “I—” And then she covered her face with her hands. “Please let this be a nightmare and please let me wake up.”
Ben groaned. Seconds later he was at her bedside and cradling her in his arms.
“Ah God, honey, your grief is breaking my heart. You might not need to be held, but right now, I need to hold you.”
She cried herself to sleep in Bennett’s arms.
***
Ben stood on the porch of the ranch house where he’d been raised, listening to the occasional bawl of a cow searching for her calf and the sound of the big rigs shifting gears on the highway a few miles east. Last night had been great. His mother had been so happy to have him, cooking all his favorite foods and dragging out picture albums and talking about his childhood as if it were yesterday. He’d waited too long to come visit and wouldn’t do it to her again.
Tomorrow he would report back to work, which also meant that he would see China again. Although he was less than an hour from Dallas, he could easily imagine himself in another world.
He folded his arms across his chest and then leaned against the porch post as he looked up at the sky. The night was cold, but the sky was clear. The lights from the house behind him made patches on the floor of the porch
like cold pats of butter on dry toast. The television was on in the other room, and he could hear his mother chuckling at the antics of the situation comedy she was watching.
A fresh wave of guilt hit him gut first. His mother laughed alone every night. He should be in there sharing the laughter with her. But there was a loneliness inside him that not even a mother’s love could heal. He would crawl into his bed tonight and sleep alone, as he slept every night. He was thirty-six years old and had been engaged only once, twelve years ago. The engagement had lasted six weeks. To this day, he couldn’t remember who’d broken up with whom. All he knew was, it was the smartest thing he’d ever done. He wanted a family, but with the right woman, not just because he was lonely. He wanted a marriage like the one his parents had shared.
Immediately, his thoughts moved to China. He didn’t know a damn thing about her except that she’d put her faith in someone who’d let her down. He didn’t know if she liked to dance. He didn’t know her favorite color or what she liked to eat, and yet he’d bonded with her in a way he’d never done with any woman before. However, what he felt—or thought he felt—for her was moot.
“Bennett, darling, you’re going to freeze.”
He turned. His mother was standing in the doorway with a worried expression on her face.
“You’re right, it’s colder than I thought,” he said, and followed her back inside.
Mattie English paused in the hallway to look at her son. There were shadows beneath his eyes and a grimness to his mouth she couldn’t remember ever seeing before.
“Son?”
“What?”
“Is everything all right?”
“I’m fine, Mom. Sorry I’m not better company. I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
She slipped a hand beneath his elbow and walked him back into the living room.
“Put another log on the fire, will you, honey?”
“Sure,” he said, glad to have something concrete to do. He moved the fire screen aside and dropped another log on the fire. When he turned, his mother was on the sofa. She patted the cushion beside her.
“Come sit with me,” she said.
He sat.