by James, Sandy
Just the placebo effect? Times several hundred? How many of those people had written checks? How many had handed over cash in response to Hannah’s less-than-subtle suggestions?
The grounded-in-reality journalist in Josh asserted himself, warring with the tenderness he felt for Sarah. He’d let his emotional attachment make him blind to what was happening. He’d wanted to believe so badly, he’d somehow convinced himself the impossible had become possible.
The pictures dotting the walls of that bedroom were of people that Sarah Reid and Hannah Fanning had ripped off, not pictures of people Sarah had healed. Hundreds of sick people. Dying people. People just like Miranda Miller. No matter what strange attraction he felt to Sarah, no matter how he was stupidly fascinated by her, he couldn’t deny the plain and simple truth.
The woman was a thief.
While his anger still swelled, Josh decided to get back home as quickly as possible so he could write this story and get on with his life. He was going to stop this fraud. He was going to bring Sarah Reid down.
Chapter 6
“Damn it,” Josh grumbled as he shook his head in frustration. All he could do was stare at the blank screen of his computer.
The story simply wouldn’t come. His usual wealth of words and ideas had deserted him. His usual cool-headed logic was gone. His usual desire to quickly zoom in for the kill had vanished.
Two competing versions of what he’d seen in Indianapolis fought a war in his thoughts as they tried to spread from his brain to his fingers.
The first story came easiest. Sarah was a fraud. That story would practically write itself. It would be picked up by national services and he’d probably get some radio attention as a result, maybe even an interview or two. Talk show hosts ate shit like this for breakfast.
The second story was unbelievable, downright ridiculous. Sarah was a genuine faith healer. The real McCoy. No one would ever believe him. Oh yeah, he’d get plenty of radio attention with that version. And they’d make an utter fool out of him. If a hard ass investigative reporter like Joshua Miller suddenly gave in to the notion that the supernatural was real... He would never write again unless he wrote for the National Enquirer. Forget any chance at selling another book.
Josh hardly remembered his flight back to Chicago. The little Piper Cherokee might as well have flown itself, and he knew he hadn’t been horribly attentive. But he was more comfortable flying than driving, and people daydreamed as they drove all the time. He just mused in the air instead of on the ground.
He loved the freedom he had when he flew. Libby loved flying too. She had been begging him to teach her, and he knew he’d cave soon. His daughter would get her way. As usual.
The one thing he did remember was worrying about Sarah the whole trip. Was she awake? Was she well? How much had helping Shelly taken out of her? Would she see a new client today?
Damn it, he felt confused. Torn.
Stories never hit him on such a personal level. This one hung over his mind with a tenacity that unnerved him, clinging like static electricity in the winter.
Perhaps he couldn’t push the story aside because Miranda had wanted to believe a faith healer could save her. Maybe even now, he wanted to prove she had been right, that miracles could happen. Even if he didn’t believe it himself. It didn’t matter that it was too late to help her.
But he knew that explanation didn’t ring true. This whole mess wasn’t about Miranda anymore. Miranda was gone. Josh would have to let her go. Despite the little stone that followed him everywhere, he knew he was, at long last, going to have to move on with his life. If not for him, then for Libby.
No, this investigation wasn’t about Miranda anymore.
This was about Sarah Reid.
“You’re being ridiculous,” he grumbled to no one. “It’s just a...a stupid crush. Just a kiss.”
No, Josh realized. It was much, much more than that, and he would just be fooling himself if he thought otherwise. He cared for her. Quite a lot. More than he probably should considering how little contact they’d had.
Well, damn it, he wasn’t going to let his feelings for Sarah cloud his judgment. He was a journalist. He needed to write the truth.
Faith healers weren’t real. Because if they were, he’d missed his opportunity to save Miranda.
But what about the robin? What about Shelly? What about all the people in the photos on Sarah’s bedroom wall?
It was time for Libby’s help, to employ that special talent she had for ferreting out information, a skill she’d developed spending hours on the Internet when Miranda had been ill. An escape his daughter had employed when things got too rough for a girl that age to face. He would have Libby do some more thorough investigating into Sarah’s life.
Libby had a knack for finding things people wanted to hide. He also wanted her to help him dig up what they could find on Hannah and Doug Fanning—especially their finances. Or lack thereof. Where had all that money gone? Knowing he could do most of it himself, he had to admit that Libby could probably get the information more quickly. And it would make her feel needed.
Of course, she was needed, but Josh had a hard time confessing that. He didn’t want her following his footsteps. A prodigy like Libby was meant for greater things. Med school. Law school. A Nobel Prize.
The phone interrupted his mental wrestling match. Caller ID identified the feature editor who was underwriting the faith healer story. The man always reminded Josh of Jonah Jameson from the Spiderman comics. He was just as cheap and would probably worry himself into a heart attack before he hit fifty. “Hiya, Mack.”
“Well? Where the hell is it? I’m waiting.” The sound of fingers drumming against a hard surface accompanied the rude response.
“I’m great, how about you? How’s the wife?”
The responding grunt made Josh smile. Mack was the epitome of manners, as always. “I need that story now, Miller.” The speed of the steady beat increased.
“What story?” Josh teased.
Mack just grunted again.
“Editors have no sense of humor.”
“I need that story now, Miller.”
“I know. It’s just... It’s not as easy as I thought.”
“Of course it is. Faith healer. Rips people off. They die. I could write the damn thing myself,” Mack insisted. “She’ll be shut down as soon as it hits print.”
“It’s not that simple, Mack.” Josh couldn’t explain it to his editor. Hell, he hadn’t figured the whole thing out himself yet.
“We go to press in twenty-four hours. I better get an email before then with the article attached. And it better be good.”
“You’ll have it.” Josh clicked his phone off when Mack hung up without a farewell grunt. He put the handset aside.
Josh stared at the screen again. He poised his fingers over the keyboard.
Nothing came.
Shit, this was frustrating. Stories had always appeared so easily, had poured from him in an avalanche of words. All he had to do was shove a keyboard or his favorite green pen in the way. He’d never shown mercy on his targets, figuring they deserved as much compassion as they’d given their pigeons. But as he stared at the blank screen that suddenly morphed into a screen saver of pipes forming a pattern across the monitor, Josh realized he had drawn a blank. A big fat void. No words. No ideas on which direction to take.
Sarah Reid had blocked his gift with a gift of her own.
Wiggling the mouse to make the pipes disappear, Josh tried again. Perhaps if he wrote both versions of the story, he might find some agreement between the two. Or perhaps he could merge them and let his readers form their own opinions. Not of the same bent as most journalists, he believed his readers were intelligent.
So many other reporters preached that readers were ignorant. They often dummied down their articles to a middle school level, claiming if they used too many big words, people wouldn’t understand. Even worse, these pompous journalists tried to sway public opinion to bring it into sy
nch with their own.
That was bullshit. A reporter’s job was to report. Not to convince, not to sway, and not to induce. People should hear all the facts and form their own opinions. Josh knew that attitude had cost him jobs writing for network or cable. No one could clearly pin down his politics because his articles were statements of fact and incitements to have readers think for themselves. What network would hire a reporter if they couldn’t gauge what he would write? He wasn’t going to be controlled like that. Josh Miller was no man’s puppet.
He refused to be pigeon-holed, and he didn’t give a damn what people thought. He wrote to please himself, always doing what he thought was right. Screw the rest of it.
The words began to speak to him, and he started to capture them with his keyboard.
How much should it cost to save a life? How much would you pay to cure a loved one’s cancer?
Most people would cough up their last dime to help a husband, parent, child, or even a trusted friend survive a terminal illness. Sarah Reid understands this, and she uses it to her advantage. How? She lays her hands on people and “heals” them. For a price.
Ms. Reid is very convincing. Her big eyes and kind face belie the predator hiding just behind the mask. With hands she asserts were gifted by a freak lightning strike, she embraces a sick visitor and claims to removes his illness. After a convincing show of physical exhaustion from the “healing,” Ms. Reid bows out of the cozy scene as her sister demands a hefty payment. A common grift played to the hilt.
The story spilled out of him, fast and furious. Into the article, Josh poured all the hurt from Miranda’s passing, all his anger at not being able to help her, and all his disbelief in life holding mysteries such as faith healers. He was sarcastic. He was incredulous. He was merciless.
Portraying Sarah as one of the best con artists he’d ever encountered, he told Shelly’s story, right down to Hannah’s greed and Shelly’s hope that Josh was sure would be shattered when she saw her doctor. He figured he’d add the medical results after he received a call from Jay, a call he feared would bring nothing but bad news. His empathy went out to the man, his sympathy to Shelly.
The only mitigating information Josh included came from the interviews with a few of Sarah’s clients. People like Cheryl. Even these he tainted as he discussed the placebo effect, throwing in information about psychological studies done to show just how effectively the human mind could alter perception, even change physical findings such as lowering blood pressure or cholesterol. His words were dubious about the future of those poor souls.
Habitually saving the story to his hard drive, Josh shook his head, knowing he would never let it see the light of day again. But the simple process of writing it had purged some sickening poison from him. A catharsis of words. Once the past had been put to rest, he was finally convinced that every word he’d just written was entirely wrong.
Sarah Reid wasn’t a fake. She wasn’t a grifter. Hannah Fanning might be greedy, but Sarah obviously wasn’t profiting from the healings. Not if her house was any indication. Where were they spending the money?
They? Hell, no. He became more and more convinced Sarah didn’t see a dime of what Hannah took from the people Sarah helped. He was itching to get his hands on anything to do with the Fanning family finances.
Where was Libby? Harry Potter, he remembered. The girl might be a genius, but she was still thirteen. She’d already seen the new movie a dozen times since it was released, and he figured she was just getting a good start on the second dozen.
Josh wondered how Sarah was feeling. Then he winced, realizing she would probably be healing someone today. And she was slowly killing herself.
He wanted to be with her, to hold her close, to protect her—even from herself. Josh knew he was making a choice, a choice to stare life in the face again. A choice to quit running from the future and to come to terms with the past.
Sliding the little ebony rock from his pocket, Josh stared at it. Miranda would understand. Hell, Miranda would be pissed at him for not moving on sooner. She would want him to find love again, just as he knew he’d want her to have a meaningful life full of love and happiness had something happened to him. Josh stood up and followed his heart to Libby’s room.
Libby was so resilient. She’d loved her mother dearly. Josh had no doubt of that. And Libby had suffered through Miranda’s illness, just as he had. But Libby had also refused to stop living. Her little “Goth rebellion” aside, she still functioned, still spent time with friends, and still found a way to enjoy her life. The only real reminder she kept of Miranda was a black and white photo of the two of them taken a few months before her mother had been diagnosed with cancer.
Josh picked up the frame and stared at the picture of the two women who had always been his life, his focus. After a few moments, he set it back on Libby’s dresser and laid the black stone next to it. Then he finally let his grief for Miranda go.
Back at his laptop, Josh tried to start a new version of the story, a truthful version of what he’d seen happen back in Indianapolis. Yet his thoughts wouldn’t organize themselves. He was too busy thinking about Sarah. What was she doing? Who was she healing? Who was caring for her when she was done?
Not Hannah. Not Doug. And Sarah sure wasn’t protecting herself.
She needed a guardian. A champion. With all the affection for her he now realized he had, Josh appointed himself for the job.
Pulling out his cell phone, he sent a text message to Libby as he formulated some plans for what he could do to help Sarah.
* * * *
Sarah sat up, blinking against the piercing light.
God, she was tired. Always so damned tired.
Throwing her legs over the side of the bed, Sarah waited for the dizziness to pass. The last two healings had taken an unusually high toll. Shelly had been difficult. The poor woman had so little time left. Matt, the child Sarah had healed the next morning, hadn’t seemed horribly sick. His aura told her he needed her, but until she laid hands on the boy, the extent of his leukemia hadn’t been clear. Matt had only been a few days from death’s door. People that sick always knocked her on her ass. After two in a row, she was amazed she could manage to wake up at all. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten anything.
Taking a deep breath, she got to her feet. The room swayed, but she swallowed the nausea that threatened. How much more of this could she take?
Enough to pay for my sins? Enough to finally end it all?
Then she remembered Josh. He’d watched her heal Shelly. What had been going through his mind? How had he reacted? Had he believed what he’d seen with his own eyes? She would have to ask Hannah because she couldn’t remember anything after she’d touched Shelly. She could barely recall being up long enough to heal Matt.
Sarah didn’t figure Joshua Miller would ever be back. He was probably writing his story already. A weary sigh escaped her lips. The crazies would be back as soon as his words hit print. It didn’t matter where the article ran. It could be in a local fifty-cent rag and it would have the same effect. Thanks to the speed of the Internet, they’d find her anyway.
Tears sprang to her eyes. She scrubbed them away with the backs of her hands. She wouldn’t let them defeat her. She wouldn’t let the fanatics stop her from helping the people who needed her. At least for whatever time she had left. Nor would she hate Josh for doing his job.
Walking on shaky legs to the kitchen, Sarah found Doug and Hannah sitting at the table, nursing what looked like coffee as they read the paper.
“It’s not in here yet,” Hannah grumbled, folding the section she had been reading and slamming it on the table.
“What’s not in?” Sarah grabbed a ceramic mug from the little wooden cup tree and poured herself some coffee.
“Josh Miller’s story. I thought he’d write it right away. He seemed impressed when he watched you heal,” Hannah explained. “He knows what you can do now.”
Sarah pulled out a chair,
sat down at the table, and sipped her coffee. She wondered if caffeine could be delivered by I.V. because that was how desperately she needed a pick-me-up. “Impressed?” she finally asked.
Hannah nodded. “He stayed for a long time after you...fell asleep. Asked a bunch of questions.”
“A bunch of questions,” Doug repeated, causing Sarah to roll her eyes.
“What happened...after?” Sarah asked.
“He talked to the client and her husband. He wanted to know why I...” Hannah waved her hand in dismissal. “Never mind.”
Sarah immediately understood, and she wanted to cry in despair. “Oh, my God. You asked them for money, didn’t you? In front of him? Hannah, how could you?”
What must Josh think of her now? Didn’t Hannah know he could destroy all the good Sarah had done? All the good she could do for more people? Her sister was ruining everything.
Hannah didn’t reply as she stood up, dropped her cup in the sink hard enough Sarah was amazed it didn’t shatter, and started to walk away.
“Don’t you understand? He’ll...he’ll hate me.” Sarah tried to stop the angry tears. “He’ll think I’m a thief.”
“People need to know what you do isn’t free,” Hannah replied. “If the article tells them that, I won’t have to be so...pushy about asking them.”
Sarah felt sick, in more ways than one. Her body was exhausted. Her thoughts were troubled. She didn’t understand why Josh’s opinion of her mattered so much. But it did. It mattered a lot more than she had been willing to admit up until that moment.
When she’d healed the little robin, she’d watched his reaction closely. He didn’t want to believe, fighting it as hard as he could. Something had hardened his heart. Something bad.
Remembering the aura she’d seen when she met Josh, Sarah speculated at what loss still haunted him. Had he lost a person he cared about deeply? A friend? A lover? A wife?
That had to be what hurt him. He’d lost someone he loved. He was still angry, still working his way through the stages of grief. So common for men. Anger was an emotion much easier to accept than sorrow. With anger came strength. Rage. With sorrow came helplessness. Despair. He probably had a touchstone, something he kept to remind him of his lost love. Something to keep him tied to the past. A picture in his wallet. The newspaper clipping of the obituary. A pressed flower from a funeral wreath.