by Alison Stone
A tree stump. A lilac bush. An overturned wheelbarrow.
An inexplicable chill made the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand on edge.
Was someone out there watching her framed perfectly in her front window?
She lunged toward the light switch and cast the room into darkness. There, now no one could see into her home.
She yanked the pull on the blind, letting it drop into place.
Would she ever feel safe again?
FOUR
Less than twenty-four hours later, James pulled up the long gravel driveway to Lily’s cottage. He parked behind Lily’s small sedan and stared at the bungalow-style cottage through the windshield. He could see it better now in the daylight. The empty porch dominated the front of the house. The landscaping was a little overgrown and the roof had lost a few shingles. If what Lily had said was true, she spent more time in the lab than at home. Not a lot of time to trim hedges and do minor home repairs. Lily’s determination to find a treatment for the disease that had cut short her mother’s life was admirable. However, it seemed unfortunate that it consumed her every waking hour.
He pushed the car door open and climbed out. He strode around to the back of his vehicle and popped the trunk. He scooped up the plastic grocery bags by their handles in one hand, then slammed the trunk closed with the other. The sun hung low in the sky, but a good hour of daylight remained. He had hoped to get here earlier, but he had gotten caught at the clinic. Even on Sunday.
A huge cobweb hung in the corner of the porch, but no sign of a spider. He rang the doorbell and waited. Rustling sounded from inside and he shifted his feet. The white curtain covering the window on the door pulled back a fraction, followed by the jangling of the locks.
Good girl. Keep the locks on until this jerk is behind bars.
Lily opened the door, her expression wavering between curiosity and concern. “What are you doing here? Did something else happen at the clinic today?”
Her casual ponytail and makeup-free face made her appear even younger than she was.
He hoisted the bags. “Brought dinner.”
Stepping back, she pushed the door open wider with her backside. “In that case, come on in.” She reached for one of the bags and he batted her hand away. “How did you know I was home?”
“I checked with Security at the lab. They said you left an hour ago.” He strolled through her house and put the bags on the kitchen island counter.
“Checking up on me?” Arching an eyebrow, she tilted her head to mock-glare at him through her thick lashes. The sparkle in her eyes contradicted the feigned annoyance in her body posture.
“Can’t believe you work on Sunday.”
She shrugged. “I usually go to the lab for a few hours after church.” She tipped her chin toward him. “What about you? You’re working Sundays, too.” She pulled down the side of the bag and peeked in.
“A lot of patients work during the week, so I like to have a few clinic hours on both Saturday and Sunday.” He unpacked a head of lettuce. “I don’t even have much time for church.” It wasn’t so much the time he lacked, but the desire. He had seen too much heartache in his lifetime to put much stock into church. An empty feeling expanded in his chest. His mother would be sad to know he had ignored the message she had traveled the world to spread. He shook away the thought.
He palmed the head of lettuce. “I need to make sure Medlink’s star researcher is well fed.”
“Ha. You assume I don’t eat.”
He slid a frozen pizza from the bag and smiled coyly. “I noticed last night you didn’t have much in your fridge. Unless you count leftover takeout of questionable age.”
She narrowed her gaze. “Why did you check my fridge? Hoping to find an intruder in the vegetable crisper?” She slipped her fingers into the pockets of her shorts, crossed her bare feet at her ankles and leaned against the counter. “Really, now?”
“I opened your fridge because I was thirsty. I was looking for water.”
She stretched across the counter and flicked on the faucet. Water flowed from the spigot. She held out her palm. “Ta-da...water.”
He smiled sheepishly. “I’m still acclimating to being back in the good ol’ U.S., where you can open the fridge for a midnight snack. After being deployed, it’s a luxury, you know?”
“I can’t imagine.” She dragged her lower lip through her teeth, then seemed to snap out of it. “So you’re going to cook me a frozen pizza.”
“I figured you could use a home-cooked meal.” In his world, heating up a frozen pizza counted. He opened a lower cabinet and found a large round tray.
Lily started giggling. Tears filled her eyes until they flowed down her cheeks. She swiped at them. “I’m sorry. I’m so tired, and the idea that you think a frozen pizza is a home-cooked meal struck me as funny.”
Holding the scissors poised over the plastic seal on the pizza, he tilted his head in mock confusion. “You don’t like pizza?” The scissors landed with a clatter on the counter. He started to stuff the pizza back into its cardboard box. “Then I guess I’ll just take my pizza and go home.”
She grabbed the box away from him, leaving him holding the pizza in its plastic wrap. “No, you’re not getting off the hook that easily.” She opened the recycling bin and discarded the box. She pulled out a chair from the table and sat sideways in it, resting her elbow on the back.
Something tweaked his heart at how comfortable she seemed around him. He pulled the plastic wrap from around the pizza. Small bits of cheese fell to the floor. She cleared her throat. “I went to the police station early this morning.”
He paused. “I thought I was going to take you tomorrow?”
“I pushed your friend Chief Farley. I didn’t want to wait.” She crossed her arms loosely in front of her.
James put the pizza down on top of the stove and turned to give her his full attention. “Were you able to pick out the guy in a photo?”
She threaded her fingers through the ends of her hair and examined them briefly. “No. The guy doesn’t seem to be in the system. They’re going to call in a sketch artist. I’ll have to go back when he or she comes in. Apparently, they hire a freelance artist out of Buffalo when the need arises.”
“Sounds fair enough, but I would have gone with you.” Part of him was disappointed she hadn’t needed him to go with her.
Lily waved her hand. “I was fine. Besides, you didn’t see anything. Well, except his mouth and chin under his baseball cap. I have to do this. I don’t want this guy trying to get into another clinic or pharmacy.”
“You did the right thing.” He rinsed his fingers at the sink and stared out at the large yard surrounded by trees. She was isolated out here. He grabbed the cutting board poking out from behind the cookie jar and slowly chopped the cucumber for the salad. Her arm brushed against his. He glanced down into her bright eyes.
“Need help?”
“I like my space when I cook.” He lifted his elbows and gently nudged her arm, earning him a fleeting, tired smile. “Sit. You’ve had a long couple days.”
She did as he’d requested and crossed her legs at the ankles. A bandage still covered her knee. He sighed heavily, thinking about what could have happened yesterday if he hadn’t heard the banging at the back of the clinic. He shifted his gaze to the window over the sink. The sun had dipped below the tree line, casting the yard in deep shadows.
His knife slid through the last piece of cucumber. Lily pointed at the cabinet over the fridge. “I keep a large bowl up there.”
“Thank you.” He found the bowl and scooped up the cucumbers, dumping them in. “When I’m finished here, I’ll replace the bulb on the front porch before it gets any later.”
“That would be great.” Lily grabbed plates from the cabinet and set the table. Just hanging out wi
th Lily reminded him of all the things he had missed when he was deployed.
The simple things.
He had to enjoy them now. He planned to reenlist. Too many people needed medical help, especially the locals of the war-torn countries.
Pushing aside the thought, James opened the oven door to check on the pizza.
And he had no right to begin a relationship that was doomed from the start.
* * *
Lily picked up a piece of pepperoni pizza. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was until now. “Mmm, this is good, especially for frozen pizza.”
James looked up from his plate. “Go figure.” As good as he looked in his army dress uniform, he looked equally handsome in blue jeans and a collared golf shirt. Lowering her gaze, she stabbed a cucumber with her fork.
“I’ve always thought it strange how circumstances bring people together.” She wiped her crumby fingers on the paper napkin.
He nodded. “I remember the first time we met.”
Lily lifted her napkin to her face and covered her eyes, embarrassment heating her cheeks. “Don’t remind me. Wasn’t I scrubbing the toilet?”
James laughed, tiny lines forming under his brown eyes. “And I thought, boy, Grandmother is certainly hiring them younger and younger.”
Lowering her napkin, she tried to suppress a laugh. “Sometimes on school holidays, I’d help my mom. I think I was fifteen then.” She glanced toward the backyard and let the memory wash over her. “Before my mom got that job, I had no idea people lived like that. It was like a fantasy.”
“My grandparents have done well for themselves. But my parents wanted something different for me.” James plucked a piece of pepperoni off his pizza and popped it into his mouth.
“You never really talk much about your parents. Other than what they did for a living.” For some reason, Lily suspected she was wading into shark-infested waters.
“What they did defined them. It defined me, too.” He wiped his napkin across his mouth. “When we weren’t traveling the globe doing missionary work and bringing health care to the underserved, we lived in the small apartment above the clinic. They didn’t want me to grow up with a silver spoon in my mouth. My dad grew up in the mansion where my grandparents live now. He didn’t want to follow in my grandfather’s footsteps. He insisted on carving out his own path.” He laughed, crumpling the napkin. “It drove my grandfather crazy.”
He took a long drink of water. “As a teen I hated it. I thought people would think I was poor because I lived in—” he lifted his fingers to form air quotes “—the poor section of town.”
“So, you moved into your grandparents’ home in the rich section of town?” His background seemed a little hazy.
“Not exactly. My parents split their time between the clinic and traveling to underdeveloped countries to provide health care.” He ran a hand across the back of his neck. “I wanted to be a kid. A normal kid. Go to school for a full year, you know? My parents finally agreed to let me live with my grandparents and go to the same public school I had gone to whenever we were in town.” He closed his eyes briefly as he talked. One eyelid twitched as if he was fighting an emotion. “My grandparents wanted to enroll me in boarding school. But the deal was I got to stay behind and go to public school with my friends.”
“It doesn’t sound unreasonable.” Lily didn’t understand the obvious pain in his expression. “Teens want to hang with their friends.” She remembered how much she’d relied on her friends growing up, but they had all come from a similar background. Poor as dirt.
“They’d be proud of you.” She reached across the table and stopped short of touching his hand.
“I imagine.” He pushed away from the table and refilled his glass at the faucet. She wished she could read his mind. He returned to the table and sat.
This time, she let her fingers brush across the back of his hand. “You’ve followed in their footsteps.” She glanced at their connected hands, then pulled hers back into her lap. “Is there something you’re not telling me?” His mood had definitely turned somber.
He turned toward the back window. “Near the end of my sophomore year, I was in a fight at school. I broke the other kid’s nose. The school was going to expel me.” He pressed his lips together and paused, as if trying to find the words, or maybe trying to compose himself. “My parents had decided to give up their missionary work to come home and give me the stability that I obviously lacked.” He sighed heavily. “The plane crashed.” His voice cracked over the last words. Slowly, he turned to look into her eyes. The sadness in his made her heart break. “They were on the plane—the one that crashed—because of me.”
Lily choked back a quiet gasp. The guilt James felt over his parents’ deaths was palpable. She wrapped her arms around her middle. A cold, hard knot weighed heavy in the pit of her stomach. She understood his pain, his loss. His guilt, even.
He leaned back in the chair and studied the ceiling. “I’ve lived with this guilt for years. I owe it to my parents to make something of my life.”
“You have made something of your life.” She smoothed her thumb along the edge of the table, unable to reach out to him. His pain was too real for her. “You can’t let guilt consume you.”
“My head knows that.” He pressed his fist to his chest. “But my heart...”
“What do you want to do with your life?”
“I enjoy working at the clinic here in town. Amazing how many people in this community can’t afford health care.”
Hope fluttered in her belly. What if he stayed in Orchard Gardens? Could she open her heart to him? Angling her jaw, she tempered her response. She had no right to consider a future with him.
Focus.
“But you feel a calling to reenlist?” she asked.
“Can I clone myself?” He laughed, meeting her gaze. “The clinic needs a new director. For now, it’s being staffed by one full-time nurse practitioner. The rest of the staff rotates on a voluntary basis. The clinic needs some consistency in their staff. I keep thinking it will be easier to find a new director for the clinic than for the army to find physicians. The army needs me.” He slapped his palm against the table, as if he had made a final decision.
“Maybe you should pray on it.”
Something flickered in his gaze she couldn’t quite identify. “I’m a little worried about Stephanie taking over as CEO of Medlink.” He ignored her comment regarding prayer. Perhaps Lily had struck a nerve.
James continued, “Stephanie may not be as generous when it comes to supporting the clinic. The clinic wouldn’t stay viable without Medlink’s financial help. Stephanie’s all about the bottom line. That’s why I’ve held off telling her I don’t plan to replace my grandfather as CEO until I can get some assurances from her—and my grandfather—that they’ll continue funding the clinic.”
Lily jerked her head back in disbelief. “Your grandparents have always been generous.” They’d supported her all the way through medical school and she was only the daughter of their former housekeeper.
“Yeah, the economy is tough right now. Even on Medlink.”
“I didn’t know things were tough at Medlink. Your grandfather was the first person to offer me lab space to work on a cure for a rare disease very few people have ever heard of. They’ve always supported my research, even before they realized my work may have wider applications to treat other genetic diseases, too.” Planting her elbow on the table, she rested her chin on the heel of her hand. “I still find it hard to believe they’d cut funding to the clinic. The work you do is so important.”
“If your research has the far-reaching applications that you think it does, it will go a long way to securing Medlink’s financial future.”
Lily laughed and rolled her eyes. “No pressure there.” She leaned back and crossed her arms. “I still can
’t believe my research for an orphan disease that only affects a small group has the potential to help scores of people with genetic-related diseases. It’s amazing, really.”
“And Medlink stands to gain financially.”
Lily waved her hand. “That’s fine by me. My goal has always been the same. To help my niece. If your grandparents reap the benefits of supporting my research all these years, that’s just icing on the cake.”
He studied her face for a moment, the intense gesture unnerving her. “I suppose we’ve both been driven by our pasts.” James pushed back from the table and stood. “Well, let me help you clean up and then I’ll replace the lightbulb out front.”
“Go replace the bulb. I’ll clean up,” she said, gathering the dishes into a pile while running his words through her mind. Driven by our pasts.
* * *
On Monday morning, James arrived at his grandparents’ house bright and early. Charlie, their landscaper and all-around handyman, was watering the petunias. “Morning, Dr. James.” Charlie had called him Dr. James since the day he’d graduated from medical school. He was like a proud papa of sorts.
“Morning. It’s going to be a scorcher.”
“You got that right, and you know how Mrs. O’Reilly is about her flowers.” He hoisted the hose, sending a soft spray of water over the pink and purple petunias in the far back of the flower bed.
“The landscaping looks great.”
“I could come by the clinic and put some flowers out front. Spruce up the place.”
James smiled. “Not that the clinic couldn’t use it, but you work too hard as it is.”
Charlie frowned. “Someone tromped all over the pansies in the garden near the pool the other night. I bet it was the crazy person who gave my Edna a start.”
“How’s Edna doing?”
The gardener shook his head. “My wife hasn’t been sleeping well. She keeps seeing shadows in the yard.”
“I’ve talked to Security a few times over the weekend.” James pointed to the side of the house. “The gate to the yard wasn’t secure Saturday night. Anyone had access to the pool area. From now on, everyone has instructions to use the keypad for entry into the backyard through the gate. You also have a security system on the carriage house, right?”