In a Heartbeat

by Tina Wainscott

  Mitch expected the man to hear his bike and come out, but he didn’t. As they walked up to the door, he said, “Stay close to me, all right? I remember the man having a temper.”

  When Alan answered the door, his hair was wet, as though he’d just come out of the shower. The man was in his fifties, but he looked a lot older. He stared at Mitch, eyes suspicious.

  “I’m Mitch Elliot,” he said. It had been a long time since he’d had to clarify who he was, Mitch, not Paul. Then he looked over at Jenna. Maybe not that long after all. “This is Jenna Elliot. Can we talk to you?”

  Mitch pushed forward, and Alan stepped aside, seemingly surprised and off-guard by their visit. The house was large inside, but messy and neglected. Alan obviously camped out in his worn easy chair; it was surrounded by newspapers, cartons of food, beer cans. He dropped down into it and lit a cigarette without indicating that they should sit also. It didn’t appear that Alan had many visitors; the couch looked dusty. Mitch led Jenna over to it and sat down on the edge.

  “We came to talk about Becky.”

  “Becky’s dead,” Alan said in a dead-pan voice.

  “I know, and I’m sorry.” He turned to Jenna. “Jenna was Paul’s wife.” Alan’s expression grew hard at the mention of his brother. “Paul died in a car accident. In Maine. Nine months ago.”

  He watched Alan put those facts together, eyes growing a harder shade of blue with every second. “So?”

  “Don’t you think it odd that both he and Becky died in the same place, and around the same time. In fact, they died fifteen minutes apart, twenty miles from each other?” He’d checked the maps and times at Jenna’s. “It’s not a coincidence, is it?”

  The man’s beefy fingers tightened on the worn arms of the chair. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Why’re you comin’ here bothering me?”

  “We need to know what happened ten years ago, the night my parents were killed.”

  Alan’s face shuttered. “Sheriff already asked me … ten years ago.”

  It was Jenna who asked the next question. “Had Becky been in contact with Paul recently?”

  “No. Jerk left her, after all she done for him.”

  “What did she do for him?” Jenna asked.

  Alan hesitated, then said, “Standing by him after the murders and all.”

  “Did she lie about him being here that night?” Mitch asked.

  “No. He was here, just like we said.”

  “What was Becky doing in Maine?”

  “She traveled. Wrote articles about places.”

  The man was lying; Mitch could feel it. He was still protecting his daughter. “You don’t need to lie for her anymore. She’s gone.”

  “I know she’s gone!” Alan stubbed out his cigarette, jumped to his feet, then seemed to get hold of himself. He sat back down and lit another cigarette. “I know she’s gone,” he repeated in a low, even voice.

  Jenna was staring at the silver lighter case with the turquoise stones. Even when Mitch asked, “Can we see some of her travel articles?” Jenna hadn’t taken her eyes from the case.

  “I don’t have anything. I threw them away when she died.”

  Mitch looked around the room, finding more than two dozen pictures of Becky during her growing years. Her mother had died young, Mitch remembered. It had only been her and her dad for a long time. It wasn’t too hard to believe that her dad had lied to protect her and her lover. It was harder to believe that Alan would have thrown the articles away when he’d kept all of her pictures.

  “All right,” he said, not willing to call the man a liar just yet. He listed off the dates and locations when Paul had taken money from his account and wherever he and Jenna had lived at the time. “Was Becky traveling during those dates?”

  “I don’t remember. That was a long time ago. Listen, I don’t know what you’re after, but you ain’t gonna find it here. My girl didn’t do anything. She didn’t deserve to die.” His voice had grown thick. “She was a good girl.”

  Mitch actually checked himself before pushing Alan. Jenna had done that to him, made him think about what he said, about being too brusque. But Alan sure as hell wasn’t Jenna, and he didn’t deserve any kindness if he’d lied to protect his daughter. “But my parents didn’t think she was good enough.”

  Alan again shot to his feet. “I want you to leave now.”

  Mitch and Jenna got to their feet, too. She was still looking at the lighter Alan held in his fingers, his thick fingers rubbing the stones.

  Mitch led Jenna to the door, standing between her and Alan. “My parents were trying to break them up. Maybe Becky and Paul decided to get them out of the way. Then they’d be rich, and free to love each other. Is that what happened? Maybe Becky convinced Paul to do it, and then convinced you to give them an alibi.”

  “Get out of here!”

  “The only thing I can’t figure out is why Paul left Becky behind. He must have felt bad about it. He gave her money to keep their secret.”

  Alan advanced toward them, his face flame red. Mitch opened the door and nudged Jenna outside without taking his eyes off Alan. The man reeked of rage and guilt. Mitch was convinced he knew the truth, and he wasn’t afraid of pushing to get at it.

  “That where you got the money for this place, Alan? Hush money?” Blood money.”

  “Get out of my house!” he roared, pushing Mitch back a step.

  He didn’t want to get into a physical altercation with the man, not with Jenna there. “The truth needs to come out, Alan. Paul and Becky are gone; they can’t go to jail now, can’t pay for their sins. The truth needs to come out.”

  Alan shut the door in his face. Mitch turned to walk with Jenna back to the bike.

  “Good thing you’re not a cop,” she said. “Subtle you’re not.”

  She’d put the white dress back on after her shower, and she looked incredibly feminine and soft. Her blond hair curled beneath her chin and grazed her bare shoulders. He focused on the door that had been closed in his face instead, muscles bunching up. “I just want the truth. I hate liars, and the man’s lying through his gap-teeth.” He turned back to Jenna. “Did Paul … talk to you? Did you sense anything? You kept staring at Alan’s lighter.”

  She nodded. “Well, he looked familiar, but not necessarily in a Paul kind of way. I know I’ve seen his face before.”

  “Where?”

  “I don’t know exactly.”

  “Could he have gone with Becky when Paul gave her money? Maybe you saw him once.”

  “I don’t think so. Maybe I’m wrong. But the lighter …” She shook her head, making her hair shine in the sun. “Something about it bothered me. That felt like it came from Paul.”

  He was still in her heart, or in her head. Mitch pushed away that thought, focusing on the truth. The truth would set him free, had to set him free. “What bothered you?”

  “I don’t know. When I first saw it, my heart started pumping faster. It was like …” Her eyes glazed over as she stared at a patch of dirt. Then she shook her head. “Do you know if Becky did travel a lot? Or if she did write travel articles?”

  “Dunno. Becky wasn’t someone I wanted to know better. I didn’t trust her, especially after the murders. After Paul took off, she came over and asked if I’d heard from him. She looked pretty broken up about it, but all I could wonder was if she had anything to do with my parents’ murders, and did she use Paul’s love to convince him to kill them?

  “A year later, she came by asking again. I’d heard that Alan was sick, but I didn’t know what was wrong with him. Even if I’d heard from Paul, I wouldn’t have told her. I couldn’t get it out of my head. My parents were pretty mean to her, trying to scare her away. She had reason enough to hate them.” He glanced back at the two-story house. “Let’s blow.” He could see Alan standing at the living room window watching them. The man was on edge enough to come out and brand a shotgun.

  When Jenna and Mitch returned to Bluebonnet Manor, she di
scovered a startling truth: Betzi had Sunday nights and Mondays off, and she and Etta had driven to Fort Worth for a couple of days. Which meant Jenna and Mitch would be alone in the house. Perfectly, totally alone.

  The thought sent ripples through her body. She wanted to be alone with him; she didn’t want to be alone with him. He wanted too much … no, demanded too much. But he gave as much as he took, that much was true.

  While Mitch had gone to check on the horses, particularly the very pregnant Boy George, Jenna had gone on to the house. She’d gone into Mitch’s parents’ room by herself. Now she was in control. She didn’t want Paul to lead her around anymore.

  And hadn’t she told Mitch she wanted to face the truth alone? To face shedding her anger by herself? She’d survived Paul’s death and her transplant by herself. She could handle the truth, too. She placed her palm against the wall and closed her eyes.

  The images came again, as vividly as before. She saw his parents in their bed, felt Paul’s agony and shock, smelled the blood. But as he stepped forward, she felt that curtain again. The image faded, and she leaned against the wall as her knees went weak. She turned to the doorway, almost expecting Mitch to come in. Hadn’t he always found her, here before and in Paul’s room? Hadn’t he been there when she needed him?

  She opened her eyes. Did she need him? Oh, my, she did. She wanted him to appear and take her into his arms, to assure her without words that everything would be all right. She pressed her hand over her heart; this was her need, not Paul’s.

  “Jenna?”

  Mitch’s voice in the distance melted over her like warm honey. She left the room and walked to the kitchen. “I’m here.”

  When she turned the corner and saw him, he looked relieved. He smiled. “You all right?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  He shrugged. “Dunno. Just had this feeling …” He turned away and picked a brownie off the pile on the crystal plate. “Want a brownie?”

  “No, thanks.” Had Paul told Mitch she needed him? Mitch had said he didn’t feel Paul’s feelings anymore, but how much of what Mitch felt for her was real?

  “Boy George is getting closer. She keeps lying down and getting up again, moving around a lot. I told Tawny to keep an eye on her and get everyone ready to mobilize. What’s wrong?” Mitch bit off the corner of his brownie, but he was looking at her.

  She leaned on the counter, rubbing her temples. “I wish I could get another heart. No, that’s not right. That would mean someone else dying. That was one of the worst parts about needing a new heart; knowing that someone had to die so you could get it. You hoped you got one soon, but then wasn’t that hoping someone would die?”

  Mitch set his brownie down and walked over to where she stood. “Why do you want another heart?”

  She couldn’t meet his eyes, instead staring at the place where his black shirt tucked into his blue jeans. “I want to know who I am.”

  “And how much is Paul?”

  She nodded. “And how much of you … us is Paul.”

  He pointed to his chest. “Me? There isn’t any Paul in me.”

  “But you once felt things from him. Maybe you still are and don’t know it.”

  He tilted his head. “Is that what you think?”

  “I don’t know what I think anymore.” She stood up straight and walked around the end of the counter, fighting the need to pull close to him, to beg him to prove that what he felt wasn’t Paul. But she couldn’t give him that same assurance.

  “If you’d gotten another person’s heart, you wouldn’t have found us. Is that what you really wish? That you hadn’t come?”

  She walked over to a picture in the family room, one she hadn’t noticed before. “There was a time when I would have said yes. But now . . .” She shook her head. “I’ve lost my memories with Paul, but I’ve gained other memories. I’ve grown.” She smiled. “I’ve played football.”

  She focused on the picture, the whole Elliot family leaning and sitting along one of the short brick walls in the back yard. The twins were teenagers, standing together with Mitch’s arm slung over Paul’s shoulder. They were dressed alike, but Mitch had untucked his shirt. “You look like a happy family.”

  He came up behind her, surrounding her with that sweet, spicy scent she would always associate with him alone. “We had to. Just before that picture was taken, dad ordered us to smile, and …” His voice went lower. “‘Look happy, dammit. You have everything you want. You owe it to me to be happy.'” His voice went back to normal. “We were the Elliots, the royalty of Ponee. We were supposed to stand out, to be different. Paul hated being the center of attention, and I just wanted to be normal. My dad didn’t care if I was the fastest runner at school, the best football player or the top hitter on the baseball team. I wasn’t like him, and that’s all that mattered. Paul and I were disappointments to him in the long run.”

  “Just because you weren’t snobs?” Jenna turned, finding him too close behind her.

  “Yep. ‘You want people to respect you, to envy and revere you,’ he’d say. Sure people respected and envied us, but what was the point? Jealous kids are mean kids. I didn’t want to be different or revered. I wanted to be respected, yes, but mostly I wanted to be liked. Being revered is lonely business.”

  “Is that why you work with those kids? Training them to ride, I mean?”

  He gave her a one-shouldered shrug. “Actually, I started that because it felt good to give something back. My dad likened himself to Lyndon B. Johnson. The President. Heck, my dad wasn’t modest. L.B.J. was born poor Texas, and he made it all the way to the White House. But my dad didn’t give anything back when he was sitting pretty. He just kept taking.”

  He started to reach for the picture, and she put her palm against it. “No more throwing pictures!”

  He gave her a sheepish grin. “I was going to straighten it.”

  “Oh.” She let go and turned around. “If you didn’t like your dad’s snobbery, why do you keep so much of your parents’ gaudy furniture? It’s not you.”

  He looked around at the gilt coffee table, the dinette set. “Something wouldn’t let me give it away.”

  “Maybe you thought you’d be letting your dad down again if you got rid of it all.”

  “Are you analyzing?”

  She laughed. “I’m the worst person to analyze, aren’t I? I don’t even know what’s going on inside my own head.”

  He looked at the top of her hair, sliding his fingers back through it for a moment. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s time to make this place a home.”

  She felt her heart tighten at those words. Home, the thing she’d wanted for so long.

  When can we go home, mommy?

  We don’t have a home anymore, honey. These people are our home now. Wherever we’re needed, that’s where we live.

  He placed a palm against the wall next to her head. She tried to blink away what she knew must show in her eyes: need. But she was tired, so tired of fighting everything inside her. She reached out, threading her fingers around his neck beneath the softness of his hair. Her mouth opened, but the words wouldn’t come.

  Finally she pushed them out. “Mitch, I need you to love me. I mean, to make love to me. I need you,” she said simply.

  He laced his fingers through hers, then lifted her hand to his mouth. “Jenna, I don’t want to share you with him. Not for a kiss, not for anything.”

  Her body was trembling, shaking from the inside out. “It’s just me, just you.”

  He looked into her eyes, and she hoped he saw the truth in them. Whatever it was that he saw made him lean forward and cover her mouth with his. The kiss was long and sweet, but he broke away and led her upstairs. He snapped on the light beneath his ceiling fan.

  His bedroom spoke of Mitch, from the simple, dark wood furnishings to the parquet floor and enlarged, framed photographs of what must be his own horses. There were clothes strewn over one chair, and a fireplace split the French doors leading to the
balcony.

  She took all this in within an instant, but her attention stopped at the huge unmade bed. His bed where he slept every night. She started reaching over to turn the light back off, but he halted her midway. “Lights on,” he said. “Won’t be the first time.” He let go of that hand, trailing his fingers down where her scar was hidden beneath her dress.

  She dropped her hand. There was no need to hide from Mitch. Their hands were still linked, and as soon as they reached the bed, he pulled her into his arms and into another long kiss, this one not so sweet. She felt herself fall into a deep chasm, far from the safety of her strength and anger. For tonight, she could reach out to him; tonight she would let herself need him.

  “You’re shaking,” he said. “Cold?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know why I’m shaking.”

  He ducked his head, threading his fingers across her collarbone. “Are you afraid?”

  Only of the deep, dark places inside her, the places she needed a light to see into. “No, no, I’m not afraid. Just hold me.”

  He pulled her close, and she melted against his body. Reaching out wasn’t so hard. All those months she’d stood alone seemed like some far away, cold place. Mitch made it all go away, just by holding her, by running his hands up and down her back. He gave her strength and warmth, and all she’d had to do was ask. She would have never thought to ask Paul for something so simple as to be held by him. She closed her eyes and pressed her cheek against his chest. Mitch, Mitch, Mitch. She didn’t want to think about Paul now, not ever. She wanted to lose herself in Mitch.

  “Jenna,” he whispered next to her ear. “I want to love you … God, do I want to love you, but if all you want is this, that’s okay, too.”

  She moved back, only far enough to see his face. He was serious. Her hands tightened their hold on his waist. “Would you believe me if I said I loved you?”

  His mouth slackened. “Do you believe it?”

  “Right now I do. Right now I don’t even know who Paul was. I was married to him, but I know you better than I ever knew him. I’ve only known you for, what, a week, and I knew him for over five years. It’s crazy, it’s —”