by Edie Claire
In forty-five minutes, he was due to pick up Sarah at the library again. He would take her to Melissa’s office to have the monitor removed, and then he would take her home. What he would do after that, he had no idea. But he was certain he would have to do something.
When the intercom buzzed again, he jumped on it. "Yes, Ruby?"
"It’s Laurie. You have a call from a Cindy Tollison."
Her voice sounded practically gleeful.
"That rings a faint bell," he said honestly. "Is she Harriet Tollison’s daughter?"
Laurie’s voice sounded disappointed. "Oh, I’m not sure. Maybe."
He took the call, being careful this time to punch the right buttons. "Hello, Adam Carmassi, here."
"Reverend Carmassi?" A small voice squeaked. "Hi, my name is Cindy Tollison. I’m sure you don’t remember me, but I’ve visited your church a few times with my mother—"
"Harriet. Of course. I remember you." He did, now. A petite, mousy girl—unusually shy. Her mother had obviously been matchmaking when she introduced them. He hoped that wasn’t what this call was about.
"Okay. Well, the reason I’m calling is, you know Sarah Landers, right?"
His heart stopped. It took him a second to find his voice. "Yes, I do. She lives across the street from me. Why?"
"Well," Cindy continued, her tone even squeakier, "I work with her at the library, and I saw you drop her off a couple times, and I recognized you. I don’t know how well you know her, but—"
When his heart started up again, its pounding threatened to break a rib. "Did something happen to her? Did she collapse?"
"Yes," Cindy replied, sounding relieved at his familiarity with the situation. "She was walking down the hall with one of the other staff, and she fell down. She woke right back up afterward, but she hit her head pretty good. She kept saying she was fine, that it happened all the time, and she absolutely refused to let anybody call an ambulance or take her anywhere. But her supervisor is really worried about her, because she’s wearing that box thing, you know, and he told her to take the rest of the day off, but she wouldn’t go. And she won’t tell anybody what’s wrong—"
"Of course she won’t." He had shut down his computer while Cindy was talking. His keys were in his hand.
"She went back to work in her office, but she looks awful, very upset, and the supervisor asked us all confidentially if we knew whether she had family he could call, and I told him I’d seen her with you, and that you were a minister—"
He was standing now, one hand on the doorknob.
"Thanks for calling, Cindy. I’m on my way now."
Chapter 22
Sarah’s fingers fumbled over the pushbuttons on her cell phone. She didn’t use the device often; she didn’t talk much on the phone, period. Lately she’d been keeping it close by, as Melissa had advised, but there had been no need to call for help today. This time she had awakened to see herself surrounded by half a dozen people just itching to summon an ambulance. But she wasn’t going anywhere. Not until she made this call.
She looked from the keypad to the printout on her desk. Despite the time difference, she might have waited too late already. Contractors seemed to quit work mid-afternoon, and it was a Friday to boot. But her own day had been so consumed with meetings and public tasks, this was the first chance she’d had to be alone in her office. She had to make the call now. No way could she wait until Monday.
She finished entering the string of numbers and hit the call key. Her fingers trembled. She tucked the offending hand under her thigh.
After a few seconds, she heard ringing. Her eyes drifted to her door, reconfirming that it was closed all the way.
"Clifton Construction."
She cleared her throat. She had expended a great deal of effort in her college days to drop her Southern accent, but she could still reclaim it on demand. All it took was a little concentration and the sweet, lilting twang of the woman she was impersonating flowed easily off her tongue. "Hey there. This is Deb Jones calling. Our farm's over on Angus Road, across from where the bypass is cutting through. Y’all are doing that work, right?"
"Yes ma’am."
Sarah took a breath. She would beg her ex-boyfriend’s mother for forgiveness if the time ever came, but the scheme was the best she could come up with. The Jones’ farm hadn’t been condemned, but it bordered on several that had. Their interest would surely seem credible.
"Well, I was wondering if there was any way we could find out exactly where that road’s going to cut, because my husband is thinking of putting up another house for my daughter and her kids, but you know we don’t want to do it if it’s going to end up too close to the new road and all."
There was a pause. Sarah swallowed hard. She knew she was making a lot of assumptions. She was assuming, first off, that the man she was talking to didn’t actually know Deb Jones. She was assuming that if his phone had caller ID, he wouldn’t notice the unfamiliar area code. And furthermore, she was assuming that this unknown man would be friendly enough to go out of his way to help a stranger.
Papers rustled. She could hear the man mumbling to himself. "Um…are y’all out west of Angus Road?"
Her pulse pounded. "Yes. We’re right across from the Landers’ place, and then our property wraps around the south end of the Hankmans’ farm too."
Another pause ensued. Sarah felt herself break out in a sweat. "Is there any way my husband or I could take a look at the maps you’ve got? Or could you send us a copy, maybe? We’d be happy to pay for it."
"Um…"
She held her breath.
"Yeah, I guess we could do that. I’ve got the section that shows out by your place, but you’d have to see it yourself to tell what’s what. You got a fax machine?"
She released the breath with a gush. "Well, I don’t, but you can send it to my daughter. Her number’s 412-555-5411. Name’s Torey Braddock. That would be SO helpful. Thank you so much."
"No problem, ma’am. You have a good day, now."
"You too." Sarah hung up the phone. Good old Southern hospitality. The ploy about the daughter had been perfect. She hadn’t said where Torey was supposed to live; surely he wouldn’t think twice about the area code.
She would have the maps in her hands before she left today. Everything would work out fine. Really, it would.
She put her hand back up on the desktop and willed it to stay steady.
***
Sarah had just begun to make progress on some legitimate work when she caught sight of Adam out of the corner of her eye. She looked up, and their eyes met through the glass. Her pulse increased slightly, as it always did when she saw him. But this time he didn’t smile at her. This time he opened the door to her office and walked straight in. He seemed upset.
Her own face showed confusion. She didn’t think she was running late again, and a glance at her watch confirmed it. "Hello," she said tentatively. "You’re early. Is something wrong?"
He pulled up her spare chair and sat down. He didn’t say a word. He just looked at her.
All at once, she knew what was wrong. Her heart began to thump, and she cursed inwardly. Everyone’s heart thumped now and then, but hers couldn’t do even normal gymnastics without a ripple of panic shooting through her. "How did you find out?" she sputtered. "Who called you?"
His expression remained sober. "I have my sources."
She didn’t like that thought. Then again, maybe she did. "You didn’t have to come early," she insisted. "I might as well be here as anywhere else. Besides, in a way, it was a good thing. I was wearing the monitor, so I should be able to get a diagnosis now."
"You should have called me."
His tone made her breath catch. His dark brown eyes sparkled with moisture as he looked at her, and she felt a flush of warmth. The man really did care.
"I’m sorry," she apologized. "I didn’t want to worry you—not when I knew we were going in to get the monitor off today, anyway."
He looked skeptical.
"Would you have told me when I got here?"
She didn’t answer immediately. Lying to him was becoming more difficult. Knowing that he genuinely cared made it painful.
"Honestly, Adam," she began, "I don’t know. Surely you can understand why I don’t want you to worry about me. It’s bad enough I have to worry about me. Why should anyone else suffer if they don’t have to?"
He looked at her curiously. Then he stood and stepped closer. As his hand reached out toward her head, she realized what he had seen. She flinched, but his fingers were gentle as they drew back the curtain of hair on the left side of her face, revealing the monstrous goose egg on her temple.
He withdrew his hand with a sigh. "Come on. Let’s go."
She tensed. "Go where? I have a half hour of work left."
"You know where, and don’t give me that—your boss already told you to leave."
Sarah blinked. "How did you know that?"
"Divine revelation."
She narrowed her eyes at him. She didn’t want to admit, even to herself, how much this latest episode had frightened her. Rationally, she had been expecting it; she had even been hoping it would happen soon, while the monitor was in place. But having it happen at work…when she was supposed to be in her element, in control…waking up to find every one of her coworkers staring at her…
She realized her limbs were trembling again. Somehow, when her health problems had been a secret, they had seemed more manageable. Now that the entire library staff knew, her own perception of their significance had magnified.
She rose and fumbled for her purse. "All right, we can go. I just need to check for a fax before we leave." She threw her bag over her shoulder and walked around the desk. She attempted to sidle past Adam in her haste to get out the door, but she didn’t make it.
As their shoulders brushed something within her gave way, and without conscious thought she turned instead and leaned into him heavily, resting her cheek on his shoulder. Her eyes closed.
He wrapped one arm around her back.
"This one really scared me," she murmured.
His deep voice answered her in a whisper. "I know."
They stood still a few seconds more, then she drew in a shuddering breath and straightened. She didn’t look at him. She couldn’t bear to.
She knew that she deserved whatever punishment fate doled out to her—she had already escaped it longer than she could have expected. But knowing that didn't help. Why, oh why, did everything have to come crashing down around her just when, for the first time in her adult life, she’d finally gotten a taste of what it could feel like to be really, truly happy?
A wave of ire washed over her at the thought, tempering her fear. Hang fate. She was not going to give up. If her days were numbered, they were numbered, but she would not spend whatever time she had left lying in some hospital bed, idly wondering whether the grim reaper or the Alabama State Police would be the first to rip her out of it.
As long as her heart continued to beat, however erratically, she was going to continue what she had started, formulate a plan. All she needed was a little more time. Time without Adam hovering over her. He couldn’t have any idea what she was doing. He could never know the truth about her.
Not ever.
"Thanks for that," she said softly, pulling away from him and moving towards her office door. "I suppose we’d better get going."
Chapter 23
"If I pass out again," Sarah insisted, her voice firm, "I pass out again. I survived it four times already and I’ll survive it again. But I will not let you or Rose waste any more of your time babysitting me. You’re going to go back to your house and do whatever it is you ordinarily do on a Friday night, and you’re not going to worry about me anymore. That’s an order."
Adam showed no reaction. He remained standing just inside her door, looking toward her kitchen thoughtfully. "How about if I order some pizza?"
Sarah sighed. She didn’t want him to leave. But she had work to do, and she needed privacy. The fax she’d been waiting for had come through just in time, and it was practically burning a hole in her purse.
"Adam," she said, as seriously and intently as she could manage, "you know I enjoy your company. But right now, after three days of wearing that gnarly contraption and only being allowed sponge baths, what I really want is a long, hot shower. And if I also had the very comforting knowledge that you were, for at least one evening, getting to do whatever you wanted without worrying about me, I would have just the kind of relaxation I need right now."
He looked back at her with a studious expression, and she could tell he wavering. "And what if you pass out in the shower?"
She sighed. "Then I’ll try to remember to dip to the right, so my goose eggs will match." She reopened her front door. "I’m going to take a shower whether you like it or not, so unless you’re planning on taking one with me, you might as well be in your living room as mine. I’ll call you at nine o’clock, on the nose, with a full report. Now get out of here."
He blinked at her, as if his thoughts were temporarily misplaced. Then he shook his head and turned toward the door. "All right, I’m going. But I’ll expect that call at nine. And don’t bolt the door. If I can’t reach you by phone, doorbell, or window-pounding, I’m using Rose’s key."
She nodded. "Understood."
"Goodbye for now."
"Goodbye. Thank you."
He walked out, and she shut the door behind him. Then she made a beeline for the kitchen, withdrew the folded papers from her purse, and spread them out on the counter.
Her eyes roved over the sea of blurred solid and dotted lines, cryptic symbols, and meaningless numbers that covered the assorted sheets of fax paper. Her brow furrowed. The pieces were photocopies of sections of a larger map, and after some manipulation of the various puzzle pieces, she managed to rejoin them in what she thought was some semblance of the original. But she was still hopelessly befuddled.
What was she looking at? Did the angled lines to the left represent Angus Road? If so, what were the lines with the crosshatches? The circled letters? All those abbreviations with arrows?
She let out a muffled groan. Evidently, construction diagrams were written in a foreign language. But the setback was only temporary. She had taught herself to read French, Spanish, and a little ancient Greek—she could figure this out, too. All she needed was a translation guide.
She snapped her fingers, then started for the bedroom. Surely one of the construction books she had checked out would explain how to interpret such diagrams. She reached the pile, picked up the top book, and thumbed through the table of contents. Chapter two was pay dirt. She sank down on the bed, switched her brain into gear, and began to read.
***
Twenty minutes later, book in hand, she walked slowly back toward the map on the kitchen counter. Her feet dragged on the thick carpet. Her heart was shifting into overdrive again. She reached a stool, sank down onto it, and took a deep breath.
Calm. Just be calm.
She closed her eyes and counted to fifty. Her pulse seemed a little slower. She opened her eyes again.
She forced her gaze back over the patchwork diagram, and this time she found Angus Road immediately. She could also tell that the map was centered on the Hankman’s farm, with her parents’ land being up and to the left. But what she needed to see, she could see.
Her house and garage were small, nondescript boxes. The new, four-lane bypass was demarcated by a series of straight, bold lines. It swept across the southeast edge of her parent’s property like a knife blade, forever chopping off the ruins of the old barn and the stand of pines beyond.
The bypass did not go near the house. But the house wasn’t what Sarah cared about.
Her heart thumped against her sternum. She tried to slow her breathing again, but she couldn’t. Her eyes were fixed on one thin, squiggly circle. One small, insignificant-looking symbol that held her fate solidly in its grasp. The new road did not go on top of it.
But it came darn close.
She looked back at her book. The grid marks on the map. The numbers. She measured with a fingernail. She calculated.
Fifteen yards.
The book slid off her lap onto the floor.
Only fifteen yards separated the edge of the asphalt from the edge of the water. Only fifteen days might separate her life as she knew it from the disaster to come.
Fifteen hours.
Fifteen minutes?
The images stormed through her mind, torturing her. Punishing her. Come on, Sarah! Dee’s shrill voice had commanded her. Push!
The ground had been wet. The motorcycle was amazingly heavy.
Use your legs!
They could never have made it if the pond were not downhill. They had barely made it as it was. She could still feel the ache that had plagued her arms, her back, her thighs. It was all that had kept her from going numb.
It had been dark, except for the moonlight. Moonlight that glinted off every inch of the bike’s perfectly polished chrome. Every inch that wasn’t smeared with blood.
He’s slipping, Sarah! Stop a minute!
Bungee cords. Dee had strapped Rock’s body to the motorcycle with bungee cords. Every which way—whatever worked. Ten, at least. Maybe more. She’d used every one Sarah could find.
Okay, now push again. Harder!
The wheels bogged down in the mud. The weight kept shifting. Sarah’s muscles had felt like gelatin.
We’re almost there!
Down toward the pond’s edge. Steeper, soggier ground.
We’re going to have to run it in, or it’ll stop shallow. We’ll need lots of momentum. Are you ready?
Sarah had nodded. She could remember nodding, over and over again. She remembered the slick feel of the bloodied leather seat, the awkwardness of looking for a hand hold.
Grab his leg, Sarah!
She had touched him then. His cut-offs were around his thighs, and she had grabbed the denim. She would not touch his cool, sticky skin. She couldn’t bear to help her sister manipulate the stiffening limbs. She would look nowhere near the bloody mess that was his head. She had tried to look anywhere else.