Long Gone Lonesome Blues

by Maggie Shayne

  A little chill raced up her spine as she realized that in all likelihood, they were both in town. But only one of them could be approached. Kirsten. She might be an enemy but Penny could handle her. The other must be avoided at all costs. Or she was sorely afraid she’d end up just like Michele Kudrow.

  Dr. Gregory Barlow hadn’t wasted any time once he’d discovered that his Jane—Penny Brand—had indeed managed to locate her family. He didn’t know how she’d done it. His files hadn’t been touched. And no one, not even his most trusted employee, had known her real name. Or anything at all about her, or any of the others.

  So there was only one answer. She must remember. And if she remembered, she might well remember things that could destroy him. Comatose patients often heard much of what went on around them. He’d known that. But it hadn’t mattered, or he’d thought it hadn’t mattered. Because he hadn’t expected her to ever recover from that coma. And even if she did, he hadn’t intended for her to ever leave his clinic. And even if she managed that, she should never have regained her memory enough to find her way back to her family.

  Somehow, though, the mite of a woman had done all of those things. And soon she and her family would manage to put it all together. She was a danger to him. A threat to everything he’d worked for, everything he’d accomplished. God, he was so close, closer than he’d ever been!

  Well, he simply couldn’t let her ruin it all. He couldn’t.

  Already he’d had to phone that unscrupulous attorney and make hasty arrangements. Sell the clinic, move the patients, set up again under a new name and begin seeking out new employees. Take care of anyone who knew too much.

  Michele. He’d been half in love with her. But she was soft. She’d have given it all up if pressed. He knew that.

  Now all that remained was his one-of-a-kind patient. The one who represented his greatest work so far.

  She was going to have to surrender to his care, come back with him. Or she was going to have to die.

  Ben stepped back into Penny’s bedroom, feeling worried as hell and trying not to show it. He expected to find her in the bed where he’d left her, but instead she was up and dressed. Bright eyes, though puffy from crying. Pink cheeks. Gleaming hair. She looked healthier than he did. What alarmed him was that she seemed to be packing. Methodically removing the clothes Chelsea had given her from the dresser, and stacking them on the bed. Maybe she was just sorting through them again.

  “Honey, you ought to rest,” he told her.

  “Resting is the last thing I want to do.” She averted her gaze when she said it, but quickly hid her distress, and opened another drawer.

  Ben was thoroughly confused. “But…”

  “But nothing.” She faced him, hands on her hips. “Look, I don’t know how this kind of news hit me the last time, Ben. I can only tell you how I feel now.”

  He stepped close to her, pushed her hair out of her eyes, loving the silkiness of it against his palm. “And how’s that?”

  “Like I have a whole lot to do, and maybe not a lot of time to do it.”

  He closed his eyes. God, to hear her say it so matter-of-factly….

  “Besides, if I’m going to be as sick as you say I was before…well, I might as well try to do what I want to while I’m still able.”

  He sighed, nodded. She was right. He’d tried to bring her around to thinking this way the last time. But she’d been so different, then. Sicker. In pain. Devastated. Beaten. She’d just given up.

  It was good to see her this way. The fighter she’d been before she got sick in the first place. But God, did she have to leave him? She’d told him she wanted to stay here. To find her old life while there was still time.

  “So…where are you going?” he asked her.

  She turned slowly, looking up into his eyes, almost startled. Then her eyes darkened with understanding. “I’m sorry, Ben. Did you think…?” She glanced at the clothes on the bed, then back at him. And then she smiled very gently, but sadly, and reached up to stroke his cheek. “Not far,” she told him. “Just one door down.”

  “One door..?” He blinked and searched her face, afraid to believe….

  “I thought…but maybe I should have asked first. I thought, Ben, if you still want me…I’d like to try being your wife again. I was going to move my stuff into your room…our room.”

  He smiled slowly, and felt a huge weight lift from his shoulders. Oh, plenty was still there, bearing down on him, but a little bit of it floated away. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her. And then he released her.

  “In that case, I have something to give you.”

  She tilted her head, studying him curiously as he slowly took the chain from around his neck. The one he’d been wearing since he’d lost her. Undoing the clasp, he slipped her wedding ring from the silver chain as she watched, and he saw her eyes grow moist. He brought the ring to his lips, then took her hand and gently slipped it onto her finger. Penny caught her breath when he lifted her hand and kissed the place where the ring encircled her finger.

  Penny knew she’d made this decision impulsively and under tremendous emotional strain. And yet she couldn’t quite bring herself to regret it. She spent that night in the arms of her husband. And the fact that he was a stranger to her, a man she barely knew, didn’t detract from the comfort he gave to her. It didn’t matter that she didn’t love him. She had once. She was sure of that. And right now he was the only thing she had besides an empty life, barren memory and the anticipation of an early death. He was here, offering to fill her brief time up with his love, and it was an offer she couldn’t refuse.

  And though she didn’t love the man…sometimes, when he held her, or looked into her eyes…it felt as if she could almost remember what loving him felt like. Almost as if it was still there in her heart, but faint and distant. A tiny voice, a whisper straining to be heard.

  The ring on her finger felt right. Warm and secure, and she knew it had been placed there with love.

  She woke up beside him, his strong arms holding her close, her head pillowed by his broad chest, his scent all around her. And for just an instant—that minuscule space between one heartbeat and the next, between sleeping and waking—it was as if she’d never been away. As if this was the way she woke up every morning. As if…as if she remembered it all perfectly.

  And then it was gone again, and she was left with a morning headache.

  “Good morning,” he said very softly when he felt her stirring.

  She managed to smile past the pain when she looked up at him. “Morning.”

  “How do you feel?”

  She thought about that for a minute. “Lucky, I guess. Sounds pretty strange, knowing I’m carrying this disease around in my body.” She looked into his eyes. “But I’m not alone anymore.”

  Ben smiled, his blue eyes twin wells of emotion as he stroked her hair. “You couldn’t be less alone if you tried.” And he sent a meaningful glance toward the foot of the bed.

  She followed his gaze to spot the white lump lying there, sound asleep. “At least she’s not snoring,” Penny said.

  He laughed. God, he was a saint He’d even put up with Olive in his bed, if that was what it took. She wondered if she’d ever been worthy of this kind of love. She wondered if any woman ever had.

  This room—it felt so familiar and yet somehow new to her at the same time. The curtains and bedspread were both a soft, piney green, and the photos on the walls were mostly of family members. But there was one shot with people she didn’t recognize.

  “Who are they?” she asked Ben, pointing at the framed photo on the wall. “Someone else I’ve forgotten, I imagine.”

  Ben’s eyes were clouded when he answered. “The man is John Brand. My father’s brother. That’s his wife, Sally, and their two kids, Marcus and Sara.”

  “Did I know them?”

  Ben nodded. “They used to come out to the ranch for a week or two every summer. Best time those kids had. But, um, they’re gone
now.”

  Penny blinked at him in shock. “Gone? You mean—”

  “Yeah.” Ben gazed past her at the photo, and she saw the tightness in his jaw. “John got involved with organized-crime figures, did money laundering for them and got greedy. I don’t really know the details, just that someone found out he’d been skimming. Some thugs went to their house…and….”

  “My God,” Penny gasped, looking at the photo again. The dark young boy, and the girl, little more than a toddler. “Even the children?”

  Ben nodded. “Wiped out the whole family. They never even found all their bodies.”

  “That’s horrible.” Penny looked at the photo until she couldn’t bear to look at it any longer.

  Ben pulled her into his arms and held her gently. “Too horrible to think about right now. We have enough to worry about, Penny. We shouldn’t be dwelling on old nightmares.”

  “You’re right.” She snuggled closer and let his warmth, his nearness, chase the horror away.

  “So, what do you want to do today?”

  Penny lowered her gaze. She’d been lying here awake thinking about just that, and though the task before her was not a pleasant one, she had to get past it. Get it out of the way so she could move on.

  Drawing a deep breath, she met Ben’s eyes. “I know you’re anxious to find out what really happened that day when I was supposedly in a car accident, Ben. I am, too. I want to know who took me away from the only family I had, just when I needed them most. And it seems like this…Kirsten…has some information that can help us. Maybe she had something to do with it, herself.”

  “Kirsten?” He searched her face. “She adored you, Penny.”

  Penny bit her lip. She thought the pretty Kirsten might just have adored Ben rather than his wife. She’d seen the glances the two had exchanged. Secretive and full of feeling. It bothered her, but she wasn’t about to tell him that.

  “Doesn’t matter,” Penny said. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m as eager to talk to Kirsten—find out what she knows—as you are. But there’s something else I have to do first, Ben. Because I just can’t focus on anything until I know.” She sat up in bed as she spoke.

  Ben sat up, as well, slipping an arm around her shoulders, nodding. “You want to see Doc,” he said.

  She turned to face him, surprised. “Know me pretty well, don’t you?”

  He nodded. “To tell you the truth, I’m not going to be able to think about anything else, either—not until we get this done. I want to know how you are. Inside, you know. How….” He lowered his gaze.

  “How much time I have,” she finished for him. “Me, too.” Her eyes tried to moisten, but she blinked rapidly. “However much that is, though, I’m not going to waste it crying over things that can’t be changed.”

  He looked at her, his eyes sad and admiring. “You’re stronger than you ever were before, Penny. You know that?”

  She cocked her head to one side. “Am I?”

  He nodded. “I’ll call Doc. I have no doubt he’ll come right over.”

  He was wrong about that, as it turned out Doc had back-to-back appointments at his office in town, but when Ben told him on the phone that Penny was not dead, that she was in fact at home with him right now, Penny could hear Doc’s surprised shouting all the way across the bedroom.

  She’d showered first, and was sitting on a chair that felt made for her, in front of a dressing table she felt belonged to her, brushing her hair with a silver brush that felt so familiar in her palm she could scarcely believe it. When she heard Doc’s shouts from the phone, she glanced up to meet Ben’s eyes in the mirror. He looked mildly amused, but there was a gut-deep fear underneath it. She knew. Because she felt it, too. Fear of what they would find out today. Fear of dying.

  “Okay, okay,” Ben said. “We’ll come over there, then. All right, fine, an hour.”

  Even as he hung up, Penny’s heart rate accelerated.

  “Doc can’t come to us,” Ben said. “So we’ll go to him.” He came over to stand behind her, took the brush from her hand and resumed brushing her hair for her. But she couldn’t relax beneath his soothing touch.

  As if sensing her turmoil, Ollie opened her eyes to peer at Penny from the bed. Then she stretched and jumped down to come sit beside her chair.

  “I’m not sure going out is such a good idea, Ben.”

  “Why not?”

  She didn’t answer right away, and Ben stopped brushing and frowned at her in the mirror. “Honey, you’re as white as a sheet. Look, I know it’s scary.” He set the brush down, squeezed her shoulders with his hands. “But we’ll get through this. Together.”

  “I know,” she told him. “It’s not that, it’s….” She bit her lip, lowered her gaze.

  “Okay, come on. Spill it.” Ben turned her chair around so she faced him. Then he braced his arms on either side of her and looked her in the eye. “What’s got you so shaken, Penny? Other than the obvious.”

  She drew a breath and swallowed hard. “I…I sort of overheard what you and Garrett were talking about outside my room last night.”

  Ben blinked. Then he frowned. “Not without bugging one of us, you didn’t. We were practically whispering. How…?”

  “Water glass to the door.” She peered up at him, shrugged slightly. “You’d be surprised how well it works.”

  Ben’s frown eased, his eyes sparkled and he cupped her face in both hands. “I should have figured. Hell, Penny, you always were into playing detective.”

  She lifted her brows. “I was?”

  “Yeah. Even took a course once. But then you got sick and….”

  “And what?” she asked him.

  “You let it go.” He shook his head. “But we’re off the subject, Penny. How much did you hear?”

  “Enough to know that Michele Kudrow is dead and Dr. Barlow has vanished. And I can tell you right now, Ben, that nurse did not kill herself.”

  Ben tilted his head. “How can you be sure?”

  “I knew her,” Penny told him. She got up from the chair and began pacing the room. Ollie paced along beside her. “Ben, she was Barlow’s right hand. If anyone might have known what he was up to at that clinic, it would have been her. And now she’s dead? Just like that? At the same time he vanishes?” She shook her head rapidly. “No, this was no suicide.”

  Ben stood still, leaning back against her dressing table, head turning to keep track of her while she paced back and forth. “You think Barlow killed her?”

  “Or had her killed.”

  “But why, Penny?”

  She stopped pacing and turned to face Ben. Ollie sat down, slightly breathless. “To keep her quiet about whatever was going on at that clinic. And, Ben, I’m afraid that’s the same reason he didn’t want me to leave that place. The reason he lied to me, told me I had no family, tried to make me stay there even when I knew I was well enough to leave.” She resumed pacing. This time the dog only sat still, head tilted to one side, ears cocked, looking quite puzzled by Penny’s antics. “I think I might know something about all this,” Penny went on. “Something I found out before the coma, and forgot when I came out of it. It’s the only reason I can think of for him to want to keep me there.” She reached the end of her circuit, turned and stood still. “And if that’s true, then Barlow can’t risk my remembering and telling anyone what he’s trying so hard to keep secret.”

  Ben blinked, then he came forward and gripped her shoulders. “You think he might come after you?”

  She met his gaze, held it. “He already has, Ben. The man your brother described, the one who was in El Paso asking about me at the Rangers’ Station…it was Barlow.”

  Ben searched her eyes, maybe saw the fear there. Then he pulled her into his arms and held her close. “We’re gonna get that bastard, Penny. I promise you that. And he’s not gonna hurt you. I swear to God, I’ll never let anyone hurt you.”

  Suddenly dizzy, and assailed by the sensation of her mind spinning endlessly, Penny l
ooked up at him. “Say that again….”

  “I’ll say it as often as you need to hear it, honey. I’ll never let anyone hurt you,” he told her.

  Penny lowered her head to his chest, closed her eyes…

  She was thirteen, and she had a flashlight in one hand, a shovel in the other. She was certain she would find Mrs. Murphy’s body buried in her own backyard if she dug long enough. Everyone knew she and her husband fought like crazy, and now she’d been missing for a solid week. Mr. Murphy’s tale that she’d gone out of town to visit her sick mother just didn’t hold water. Penny had seen the old coot out here earlier this week. Pretending to plant roses. He’d been planting roses, all right! He’d planted Rose Murphy, his wife—that’s what he’d planted.

  She couldn’t just go digging. First she had to determine the man’s whereabouts, make sure she wouldn’t be caught. So she slipped around the side of the house, and peered through the window, and clicked on her flashlight.

  That’s when she heard Mr. Murphy roar like a bear. She saw him lunge out of his bed and head for the front door, and even before she turned to run, that door was slamming and the suspect was on the front porch. Penny’s heart hammered in her chest as she realized she couldn’t escape without running right past him. But she did it anyway. Poured on every bit of steam she had, and she swore her Keds were flinging soil in her wake as she pounded out of there. Mr. Murphy was shouting after her all the while, and scaring the heck out of her. She could feel the cold sweat on her skin, and the tingle in her nape as if he was right behind her.

  She ran straight to Ben, knowing him well enough that she knew she’d find him at the makeshift basketball court in town with his brothers and his tomboy sister, Jessi. And just like always, he was right there when she needed him.

  She could still hear Murphy yelling, and the thought occurred to her that he might have grabbed his shotgun on the way through the house. She flung herself into Ben’s arms without even thinking about it.

  He was so tall for his age. Tallest boy in the seventh grade. But skinny as a scarecrow. His straw-colored hair, always too long, and the way his clothes all fit too loosely only added to that image. But his big blue eyes were just as warm as the Texas sky, and Penny had been in love with him since the first time she’d looked into those eyes and felt them looking right back. And it didn’t matter one ounce that she was only thirteen, either.