“My head hurts and I’m really confused. How long have y’all been here?”
“I contacted your sister after Sheriff Thompson called me,” Luke clipped his words. “I wanted Casey to know what had happened, but told her it wasn’t necessary to come to the hospital.”
“My sister’s been clubbed and possibly abducted, I have a right to be with her.”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “Abducted?”
“We don’t know you were abducted.” Luke laid a hand on my shoulder. “Casey’s speculating. When we need to keep Cherry calm.”
I turned to look up at Luke. “You have got to tell me what you know. Right now.”
“You made an emergency services call from Camille Vail’s house, although the dispatcher couldn’t hear you very well. Your phone was found under Vail’s body. And your, uh, sweater. The police found you in another room, unconscious. Because of the position of your body and some smearing on the floor, it looked like you’d been dragged.”
I felt the blood drain from my head and the pounding in my neck shot to the top of my skull.
“Camille Vail’s body?”
“She died of a gunshot wound that appeared self-inflicted. The handgun was found next to her hand.”
I pressed on my temples. “I don’t understand. What was I doing in her house?”
“We don’t know. But whoever knocked you out was interrupted from whatever they were planning to do.” Luke squeezed my shoulder. “At least that’s my belief. Your emergency services call brought the cruisers. It sounded like the perp left you and took off.”
I shifted in the wheelchair to study my family. Nik held Casey, whose store-bought tan had turned a sickly shade of gray-green. Todd’s leg tapping had gone to rapid-fire thrumming.
“Where’s Cody?” I said. “Did anyone find Cody?”
Nik kissed Casey on the cheek before fixing his attention on me. “I will find him. You don’t need to worry about your brother at such a time.”
My thoughts traveled back to Little Verona’s, my last memory. I glanced back at Luke. “Can you give us a minute? Let me speak to my family.”
His hand trailed from my shoulder. “I’ll be right back. Let me bring my truck around.”
Casey’s lips thinned, but waited to speak until Luke had passed through the sliding outside doors. “What are you doing with Bad News Branson?”
“He’s not a Branson,” I said. “He’s Luke Harper and he’s been helping me on this case.”
“Looks to me like he’s helping himself to more than a case,” Casey spat. “But we’ll deal with that later. Tell me what’s going on. Why were you under police custody?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Probably because they found me in Vail’s house. I don’t think I’m under arrest, but Luke told me not to say anything unless I have a lawyer.”
“Girl, how are you going to afford a lawyer? What were you thinking?” Casey dropped to a squat and took my hands. “Little sister, what are we going to do with you? I didn’t call Grandpa yet.”
“Thank you. I’d rather he not hear about this, although it’ll probably get out soon enough.” I looked over Casey’s shoulder to Nik. “Cody?”
Nik shook his head.
“I saw Shawna tonight,” I said. “She’s been home sick. You better add her apartment to your list of places to scout. I don’t think Cody would try to get in while Shawna’s at home, but if he stole the photos from her, there’s a good chance he might try to look through Shawna’s stuff again.”
“Did Shawna say anything to you about the photos?”
“Not this time, but she was eating dinner with Tara Mayfield. She wouldn’t want the publicity.”
Casey nodded and flipped her hair over her shoulder to exchange a look with Nik.
I bit my lip. “But there was an altercation of sorts. I accidentally pushed Shawna into a plant and she broke her shoe. She thinks I’m trying to get back with Luke.”
I heard Todd’s quick intake of breath, and I cast my eyes to my lap.
“But you’re not,” said Casey. “Harper’s just helping you on a case, right? Shawna’s jumping to conclusions.”
I studied my lap. “That’s what it seems. I certainly don’t want anyone to think Luke and I are together. It would break Tara Mayfield’s heart and make the town angry when I’m already on the outs.”
Todd dropped next to my wheelchair, running a hand along my arm. “Baby, don’t worry about any of this. You need to rest your head. Maybe I should take you home.”
“Todd, I am taking my wife to my boss’s house, then will go to this Shawna’s apartment to look for my wife’s brother. Do you join me?” Nik jerked his head to the door. “The policeman is back.”
I glanced over my shoulder. Luke strode through the ER doors, carrying a brown blanket. I turned my attention back to Todd. Almost hating myself, I willed Todd to join Nik and not make me choose between the two men. The wallop had knocked the fighting spirit from me.
Todd kissed my cheek and rose. “Sure, Nik. I’d be glad to join y’all.”
“Thank you, hon’,” I said, squeezing Todd’s hand. “And thank you, Nik.”
Nik gave me a weary Eastern European smile. “The family sticks together, eh? Blood matters. Remember this before you do the more stupid acts.”
“Just find Cody,” I muttered.
Casey rose, then bent toward my ear. “Nik’s right. This stays in the family. But I say Todd McIntosh is as good as blood. You’ve always been able to count on him.”
I flashed a look at Todd, who rocked back on his heels with his hands in his pocket.
He caught my look and offered me his easy Labrador retriever grin. “We’ll take care of everything, baby. I’ll check on you when I get home.”
Luke wrapped the blanket around my shoulders. “Ready to go?”
I nodded, my head buzzing and banging with uncertainties. What was Cody doing and where was he hiding out? Why was I in Vail’s house and what had happened to me? More importantly, what had happened to Vail? For some reason, the gun bothered me.
All I could recall beyond Little Verona’s was something dark, flapping in a breeze.
Back at my house, Luke made me wait in the kitchen while he poked through the rooms, assumedly checking for perps who knocked girls on the head and abandoned them in suicide victims’ homes. Befuddled, I stood at my back door with Luke’s warm, brown blanket wrapped around my shoulders. Upon his return, Luke read over my head wound instruction sheet while I disappeared into the bathroom, shed the nasty hospital gown, and rewrapped my bare essentials in the fuzzy blanket. I stumbled back into my bedroom, where my quilt had been turned down and ibuprofen and water waited on my bed stand.
“This says you shouldn’t sleep more than a few hours at a time,” said Luke. His eyes flicked from the blanket and back to the instruction sheet.
“So in exchange for a big goose-egg and limited memory, I get no sleep and OTC drugs. Just great.” I sighed, hugging the blanket around me. “Fine, I’ll set the alarm. At least my head isn’t hurting as much as it did.”
“I’ll set the timer on my watch,” said Luke. “I’m staying, then I’ll take you to the station tomorrow. I can sleep on your couch.”
“So I am under police custody?”
“No.” Luke laid the sheet on my nightstand and jammed his hands in his pockets. “I just want to take care of you. Is that all right?”
“Aren’t you mad at me after what happened with your cousin?”
“Of all the things to remember.” He scrubbed his curls, sending them into a disheveled frenzy.
I noticed my hair did not take well to clouts on the head nor hospital conditions whereas Luke’s silky hair appeared even sexier at three a.m.
“No, I’m not mad at you ab
out that,” said Luke. “Bewildered would be a better word. You ask me to prove that I mean what I say, I go to do it, and you stop me. Now Shawna’s going to make Tara a hotter mess and you appear even crazier than before.”
I shifted the blanket and dropped onto the edge of the bed. “Sorry. I didn’t want Tara to think I’m a home wrecker.”
“Sugar.” Luke dropped next to me and wrapped an arm around my waist. “You can’t wreck where there’s no home.”
I leaned a head on his shoulder. “It’s the appearance that matters. You never did understand that.”
“I understand something now.” Luke kissed the side of my head. “I am a miserable S.O.B. without you. And you scared the shit out of me once again. You have to stop doing that.”
“How much trouble am I in?”
“They can get an approximate time of death from the body, but the police really need to know when you arrived. They don’t know why you entered the house. Did you hear something, like a gun shot, and then enter? Or did Vail invite you in and something happened? Or were you planted there?”
“Planted? How would I be planted?” I sorted through the sludge in my brain, trying to imagine someone knocking me cold at Little Verona’s and carrying me to Vail’s house. “Why?”
“Evidently, your nosing around pissed someone off.”
“Hell,” I said. “I suspected Maranda didn’t kill herself. Or maybe she did, but was driven by the phantom’s message. Through blackmail? Guilt?”
Luke leaned his head against mine. “I want you to stop thinking about this. I’m sorry I brought it up. You need to rest. In the morning, we’ll talk to Herrera. I want to hear what he thinks before you give him any details.”
“Why?” Luke’s eyes had gone smoky, making it harder for me to concentrate.
“At the least, you’re a potential witness. At the most, a suspect. You have to be careful what you tell him.”
A shudder wracked my body, and Luke pulled me against his chest. I tensed, but my body fought to relax into the security of his embrace. Traces of his aftershave scented his skin and his t-shirt felt like down beneath my cheek. “Why are you helping me? You’re a police officer. You hate it when I get mixed up in these messes.”
“Because I know you and Herrera doesn’t. You’re not nosing into these crimes because you’re perpetrating them. You’re nosing into these crimes because you’re just nosy.”
I giggled. Which felt odd, considering the circumstances. Enjoying the steady pressure of Luke’s firm chest against my weary head, I allowed my arms to wrap around him. My blanket slipped from my shoulders. Luke reached for it, sliding his hands down my bare arms and pulling it back in place.
Most likely, we had just stepped onto that hell-bound road paved with good intentions. But my need for Luke bounded over my barriers of prudence and sound judgement. Of which, I had little. Heck, the man had offered to face down Shawna Branson for me. He was willing to stand up to our families. Why not me?
“How long do you think your family’s going to stay mad at me?” He slid a kiss on top of my head, then slipped his hands under me. Before I could object, Luke lifted me onto the bed, ready to tuck me in.
“I don’t know. You’re a Branson to them, whether you like it or not.”
“And you’re last name is Tucker, not Ballard.” Forcing his gaze off me, he pulled the quilt up, covering what his brown blanket didn’t. “But I don’t care about last names.”
He reached for the chain on my bed light, and I placed my hand on his arm to stop him. “You don’t care about last names at all? Not even preserving your daddy’s name?”
“You mean making new Harpers?” He released the chain and rooted his gaze to mine.
Heat licked my cheeks, but I held to my question by nodding.
“All in due time, sugar,” he whispered. “But I do like the practice.”
My breath quickened and the heat dropped from my face to my toes, then flashed up my body to burn my neck. “I want you to stay.”
“I’m not leaving.” The solemn gray eyes didn’t waver. “You’ve a head injury.”
“It’s not my head that’s hurting right now.”
“What about McIntosh?”
“He’s out with Nik.” I sat up and the blanket fell from my shoulders, leaving me in my tangerine bra. It had matched the fuzzy sweater I had somehow lost during the night.
Luke swallowed. “You’re exhausted.”
“I don’t feel tired.”
“You are wearing me down, sugar.” His hoarse whisper made my toes curl.
“I mean to.” I smiled, wondering if my inhibitors had been whacked. Evidently, hormones were a great pain reliever, because I no longer felt sore nor tired. Drunk on pheromones, I reasoned.
“Don’t tempt me.” He stood and pulled off his t-shirt, exposing his V-cut to Snug the Coonhound hanging above my bed.
I covered my heart with my hand, sure that Luke could hear it whumping as I took in his gloriousness. Taut, wiry muscle beneath sun-browned skin. I rolled on to my side and propped my head on my hand. He called to mind the ancient Greek idealized athlete or my favorite, Michelangelo’s David. With chin and cheekbones hewn with God’s own chisel and beautiful gray eyes that exposed Luke’s emotions against his will.
I was in deep trouble. More than “need a lawyer” trouble. Probably “turn your back on your family” trouble. Definitely “lose my heart” trouble.
Where was that dizzying headache when I needed it?
“We’re just sleeping. Until my timer goes off.” He pointed toward his watch, unaware I was memorizing his form for a future sketch.
Luke’s gaze swept from his watch to my curled position. His finger dropped from his watch to his side. Hitching a breath, he fumbled for his belt buckle. With his eyes on mine, he leaned over to pull off his boots and socks, then shimmied out of his jeans.
I sucked in a breath and held it.
He slipped into the bed and gathered me against his chest. Kissing my head, he reached for the pull chain, and cut the light. “You need sleep. Don’t worry about tomorrow.”
“What made you think I’m worried about tomorrow?” I looked up, trying to find his face in the dark.
“You’re trying to distract yourself.” He smoothed my hair and settled his chin on top of my head. “I know you. You’re riling yourself up any way you can to keep your focus off what happened at Vail’s. Just using me for my body.” He chuckled.
“Can you blame me? I might be a murder suspect. And somewhere out there, an evil lurker is sending malicious texts, driving people to suicide. Or murder.”
Luke stroked my cheek. “Do I need to distract you from thinking about this?”
“I was wondering. Do you think the texts were meant to make one person murder another?”
“I think you need distraction.” I felt his body shift, then his breath against my face as his lips sought mine. A tongue flicked, a hand soothed, and I pressed against him wanting more.
“I think you’re right.”
Twenty-Eight
The phone woke me. I shot to sitting, felt the earth shift beneath me, and grabbed my head to keep it from rolling off my neck. My eyeballs seemed to spin faster than a slot machine cranked by a blue hair on her annual pilgrimage to Mississippi. But the events of the night began sliding into place, my mind clearing out the concussed cobwebs. When the world stopped rocking, I released my head and found Luke slipping into his jeans, his phone stuck between his chin and shoulder.
Unless I had dreamed it, the same shoulder found above, below, and beside me at various times the night before.
Probably not recommended practice for a head injury.
I needed to purchase a football helmet.
“What’s going on?” I croaked. “Time for me to turn myse
lf in?”
Luke shook his head, patted my leg, and sank onto the bed, his attention on the phone and his socks. By his focus and indeterminate expression, I judged the call to be Forks County Sheriff business.
My foggy brain and wistful heart hadn’t yet attuned toward regret or happiness. I’d need coffee to make that decision. I slipped out of the bedroom, checked for Todd’s return, then stole into the bathroom. No sign of Todd, but I needed to hurry Luke’s walk of shame before the clan showed and started gathering shotguns and pitchforks.
Back in the bedroom, Luke had pulled on his t-shirt and was gathering his belongings. I crossed my arms over my oversized Talladega t-shirt and wished the bandage stuck to the back of my head didn’t make my hair look worthy of scarecrow stuffing.
“Come over here and let me give you a proper good morning, sugar.” Dimples popped in his cheeks to accommodate his warm smile. “But then again, maybe you shouldn’t. This time I’ll be the one distracted, and I’ve got to get to work.”
I told my hormones to simmer down. Keeping my eyes off his dimples, I used the pain in my head and my exhaustion to throw some cold water over the fires he set blazing with that smile.
“I remember better now.” Leaving off the good mornings, I headed straight for a cold shower topic. “I went to Camille Vail’s house because Olivia told me Dr. Vail had gotten on Maranda about seeing Ellis Madsen’s father. I wanted to talk to Dr. Vail.”
Luke’s dimples disappeared as his brows pinched. “Was she alive?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t answer the door. I went around to her back gate and thought I saw someone. It’s kind of hazy.” I closed my eyes. “I can’t remember who I saw. But I did enter Dr. Vail’s house. A door was unlocked. She had an original Miro print above her fireplace.”
I opened my eyes.
Luke had smoothed the worry from his face, but his body had drawn taut. He hovered next to the dresser, one hand gripping his wallet.
“There was a piano and a hand painted staircase. And a body on the floor.” I gulped and shivered. “Dr. Vail’s. She was bleeding. I took off my top to try and stanch the bleeding, but I couldn’t touch her wound. I should have done something more.”
DEATH IN PERSPECTIVE Page 23