by Lynne Stevie
“Mrs. Lewis, I assure you, you’re not in danger. Everyone processes medicine at different rates. I just hope this was enough time for your mind to process the trauma you experienced last night. And that you will not have another violent episode.”
The doctor had his game face back on and his God complex was leaking out into the room.
“Now, please don’t try to get up too fast. We’re waiting for your blood work to come back. You need to rest. Even though you’re awake, you’re still under the effects of the sedative.”
With that, he took my chart and left the room. Alan helped me sit up, and I felt a little more like myself now that I had use of my arms and legs. As Alan adjusted the bed, I noticed his fat lip again and the bandage under his shredded sleeve.
“Alan, what did I do?”
As I said the words, I remembered. Alan had been hugging me, trying to provide comfort. It had the opposite effect. I’d lashed out, using my nails to tear at his arms and my head to bash the face of my attacker.
No, not my attacker. Alan.
“Oh, Alan, I’m so sorry, I thought you were…” I started to touch his face, but I didn’t trust myself. I tucked my hand under my leg. I’d never hurt anyone like that, let alone someone I love.
“What’s wrong with me?” I turned away. I couldn’t bear to look at what I’d done, not with his face showing only concern for me.
“Shush.” He gently turned me to face him. “I think it was a flashback to the attack, sort of like an aftershock. You didn’t know it was me. You were so strong. It took three of us to control you long enough for the nurse to give you a sedative. You seemed possessed. Wild.”
He shook his head. “No, that’s not right. You weren’t wild.” He put a hand up to his jaw. “Stronger, faster—yes. But definitely under control.”
I tried to turn away again. I was disgusted with what I’d done, but he wouldn’t let me.
“Don’t worry about that now. Just rest, and please listen to the doctors.” He let my chin go, and I turned away so he wouldn’t see the tear that trickled down my cheek.
“No, I will not wait in the waiting room! Hell, yes, I’m family!”
The booming voice brought my head around. I barely had time to wipe away the tears before Ottie thrust aside the curtain and burst into my little section of hell. I mean hospital.
Ottie, at 6'5" and 230 pounds is our most requested bodyguard at Haynes and Haynes Investigations. He is intimidation on legs, but to me he’s a big protective uncle. He’s been family ever since my dad hired him right out of the army at 26. The nurses didn’t stand a chance of keeping him out.
“Lexie, baby girl, how are you?” Ottie took in my appearance and smiled reassuringly. “Does the other guy look worse?” Before I could answer Alan spoke.
“I’m trying to get her to rest,” Alan said as he stepped out of Ottie’s way. “Ottie, why don’t we go out into the hall and I’ll bring you up to speed.”
“No,” I said forcefully. “Don’t try to hide anything from me, even if you think it’s for my own good. I need to know everything, Alan. Besides, you know as well as I do that Ottie will just tell me later.”
“That’s my girl.” Ottie winked at me. He knew how much I hated it when Alan got overprotective. Ottie treated me as an equal. I knew that that irritated the hell out of Alan. Usually the three men in my life get along well, but in a crisis, they always revert to their basic roles. Husbands want to shelter and protect their women. Friends tell it to you straight for your own good, and then…
“Sis!” My third man rushed up to the bed and bumped Alan out of the way.
“Ottie called me and told me you were mugged! I talked to Shane, the guy who found you. He’s still shook up. Said he caught you climbing down the scaffolding holding your shoe like it was all you had left in the world. He thought you were some drunk lady ‘til he saw your face and realized that you weren’t crazy. Are you hurt?” He scanned my face and body for injuries.
“No, Dennis, just a little shook up, I think.” I glanced at Alan; he looked ten times worse than I did.
“Sis, if you’re all right, why are you hooked up to IVs and in bed?” My brother isn’t usually this observant, but today of all days he’d decided to pay attention.
“They’re just checking me out. They’re doing blood work and stuff.”
Ottie glanced toward Alan for agreement, but his mouth dropped open when he noticed Alan’s busted lip and torn shirt. Dennis followed Ottie’s surprised gaze.
“What the hell happen to you, Alan?” Dennis asked. “You weren’t with her, were you?” He waited for one of us to explain why Alan looked like he’d been mugged and I looked fine.
Dennis finally pulled his gaze away from Alan to stare at me. “What’s going on?”
I cleared my throat and all eyes focused on me. “Alan wasn’t with me last night,” I said, shaking my head. I took a big breath.
“Everybody thought I should get checked out at the hospital, but when we got here, I sort of replayed the attack in my head. I don’t know…sort of reliving the fight and Alan tried to comfort me. I guess I flipped out. I don’t really remember.”
Alan took my hand and continued the story. “As soon as my arms went around her, she stiffened up, like stone. Then she thrashed and fought me. Nothing I said calmed her. The policewoman helped, and a nurse gave her a sedative.”
He looked in my eyes and said, “Honey, don’t worry about it. A fat lip is nothing as long as you’re okay.” He gave Ottie a look of concern that I wasn’t supposed to see.
Yep, they’d be talking about me as soon as they were out of sight, which made me doubly glad that I hadn’t told them everything I remembered. I sat back closed my eyes and tried to piece everything together. If I really had been bitten why wouldn’t I have a mark on my neck? Plus, what was that growling and why did I black out for so long? Oh, I have been reading too many fantasy novels for my own good.
Chapter 3
Home
I finally got a break—the planets were aligning to give me just what I needed. Some quiet time. Ottie left the hospital at eleven to relieve Riley. Poor guy had been on duty watching the Janeck’s residence since last night. Plus, he called Kim, our office manager, and let her know I’d be out today. So the office was in capable hands.
Dennis took off around noon—someone hit a water pipe in a multi-million dollar home. He’d be out of my hair today, too. Nice.
After several hours of medical poking and prodding, resulting in pitying looks from my men, the doctors said I could go home. They couldn’t really keep me, my blood work had come back normal.
In fact, better than normal, I’m in great shape. I should be relieved, but I was still fuming about the ride in that stupid wheelchair down to the car. Ridiculous, really. But the perky nurse gave me no choice. “Hospital regulations,” she’d said, smiling. Perky is not something I tolerate well even on a good day. I had visions of knocking her out and walking out the front door on my own two feet. But I held my tongue. Hell, I even took the referral slip for the hospital shrink, Dr. Beacon, without too much fuss.
Even Alan was being uncharacteristically quiet on the ride home. Words were his forte, but as I felt the waves of worry and confusion roll off him, I was grateful for his silence.
Digesting all that had happened in such a short time made me restless. My head swirled with questions to which I had no answers, so I closed my eyes and tried to calm myself using every new age-y breathing technique I could remember.
It didn’t work.
I was wired, coiled as if ready to spring like an old jack-in-the-box. Many people would still be groggy from the tranquilizer, but I’d processed it faster than most. At least, that was the doctor’s reasoning after he rechecked the dosage.
I just needed a little distance so I could look at everything logically, objectively. Really, most crimes are like old Scooby Doo cartoons. They look scary at first, but all it takes is one little crack and you see
through the disguises and smoke to the truth. Time and quiet, that’s all I need to, figure this out.
Shit, I’m not some soccer mom; this is what I do for a living. Still, how did he take me so fast? And why did I have so much strength at the hospital?
I had no clue.
Mentally I shook myself. This case would be no different than any other case. Once I figured it out, I’d wonder why I didn’t see it sooner.
I wondered how many times I’d have to say that to convince myself.
I could tell the moment we turned onto our driveway by the feel and sound of the gravel crunching under the tires. It felt like I hadn’t been home in days. I opened my eyes to the sight of the old live oaks that line our drive and hide the house from view. Scraggly gray moss hangs from huge limbs. Pines, covered in jasmine and wisteria, grow between the oaks and reach high above their canopy. Palm fans and azaleas flourish beneath the living tunnel of oaks. Our small, sunny lawn is jam-packed with shrub roses, magnolias trees, hawthorn bushes, and more azaleas.
The house, my big drafty southern belle, is two stories with huge white columns that are covered in blood-red climbing roses. The place needs painting, but the climbers bloom only on old wood, and they’re too beautiful to cut back. The large deep front porch has a painted white wood floor and a sky blue ceiling. The old wicker furniture sits on a braided rug and my grandfather made the wooden swing. Dennis salvaged the squeaky springs that make it bounce and I repaint it every year so it shines.
Dennis and I grew up in this house, and I love it. I’ve never lived anywhere else except for when I was away at college. It’s been in my family since my great-grandfather “Big Daddy” built it in 1920. When my grandfather died, Beatrix, my grandmother, came into some serious money and didn’t want to live here anymore, so she passed it on to Mom when Mom was only 18.
Still alive and kicking, Beatrix lives with her butler William, surrounded by her formal English Garden on a ten acre compound outside of Serevan in Burgis Springs. I think this house is too simple for her tastes. Needless to say, Beatrix and I don’t see eye to eye on many subjects. We haven’t spoken in years. And even when we did it was barely civil. Dennis and I call her B, just B. Basically, we do it because it bugs her. She never wanted us to call her grandma or any other relationship term, preferring that we address her by her first name, Beatrix. We decided on B. It’s sort of a little game; we even address the Christmas cards like that. It’s great, it still bugs her.
Some people wonder how I can live here. They assume that the constant reminders of my parents would make me sad, since they’re both gone now. What I feel instead is comfort. Dad’s only been gone for a few years and every time I see something of his I feel like he’s still here giving me advice or helping with a case. Mom died when I was five. All I remember is that she smelled like jasmine and every night she sang an old Thomas Dekker lullaby to me: While over you a watch I’ll keep. Sleep, pretty darling, Do not cry, And I will sing you a lullaby. Something like that, I can’t remember it all.
“Honey, we’re home.” Alan held the door open for me and anxiously waited for me to acknowledge him. WOW. I hadn’t realized that Alan had parked and come around the car and opened my door. Hmmm… maybe I’m still a little loopy from the tranquilizer. I let him help me out of the car and into the house. However, once inside, I sent him on a mission. I needed to distract him from worrying over me.
“Alan, can you run a bath for me? I just need to take a long soak and get back to normal. I’ll feel much better once I’ve gotten cleaned up and put some different clothes on.” My party outfit had certainly seen better days plus, I was still wearing dirty hospital booties instead of my Manolo Blahniks.
“Oh, sure, hon. Do you want me to help ya upstairs?” He held out his hands as if he was asking permission to touch me. Ugh! If he acts like this for much longer, I’ll go crazy.
“No. I’ll be up in a minute; I’m gonna check my messages and then call Kim and have her deactivate my phone.”
“Baby, I can take care of all that or Ottie can if you’re worried about work; why don’t you just relax.”
“Really. Alan I can take care of calling the office.” I spoke with as much force as I could without sounding too bitchy. At least I tried not to sound too bitchy.
“Fine,” he said and sighed, shaking his head as he went up the stairs. Obviously, he’d decided to let me win this one.
The familiar creak and moan of each wooden step as he made his way up comforted me. I let out a sigh of my own and turned toward the kitchen to find the phone. We both have cell phones so I’d wanted to get rid of our land line, but Alan had prevailed that day. He’d said that he liked having a phone number that only family knew so I could really be off duty when I was at home.
After searching for what seemed like an eternity, I found the cordless phone under a book on the counter and dialed my cell number to check voice mail. As I waited for my voice to announce I wasn’t available so I could enter my password, I loaded a few dishes in the dishwasher. When Alan’s in the middle of a writing project he becomes consumed by the characters; hence not much help around the house. The kitchen counter looked like every dish we owned was dirty. I opened the dishwasher…hoping…YES! The few dishes that were inside were dirty so I didn’t have to unload before I could load more in.
“Alexandria Marietta Haynes-Lewis,” a deep voice said, making my name sound incredibly exotic.
Who the hell has my phone? I felt myself stand ram-rod straight.
“Yes,” I said, before I could stop myself. Hoping, yet not really believing, that he was just an innocent bystander who’d found my discarded cell phone.
“Qadesh, my Goddess.” His voice felt like satin across my skin, and part of me wanted to close my eyes and feel that voice all over my body.
“What?” The voice that came out of my mouth didn’t sound like me.
“Qadesh, I am pleased to hear your voice. The fledgling who accosted you was very rash. I hope you were not harmed.” He paused, but I was too confused to respond. “Rest assured he will be punished.”
Panic rushed through my system. The glass I held broke in my hand; shards of the crystal dug into my palm. The pain brought my focus back. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
“Who is this? What did you call me?” I demanded through grinding teeth as I picked some glass out of my hand.
“My Qadesh, I will always know you.”
Self-preservation made me pull out another shard of glass. I winced as blood welled over the cut.
“Okay, let me rephrase that. Who are you? What do you know about the man who attacked me?”
My face felt hot, and a bead of sweat gained speed as it trickled down my back. The fire ants started marching inside me again, heating my blood. Desperate to control myself, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and concentrated on the pain in my hand. I couldn’t repeat the blood-boiling feeling or the blackout that followed the episode last night.
Just then somebody ripped the phone from my ear, startling me into opening my eyes.
“Who is this?” Alan demanded. And then the anger died from his face. I could tell from his expression that the line had gone dead. Setting the phone down, he gently picked me up and set me on the counter next to the sink. Then he took my hand and turned on the cold water from our ancient sink faucet.
“Sorry, this is gonna hurt, Lex.”
Alan silently cleaned my hand and bandaged it up with the first aid kit that we keep under the sink. Then he put his hands on my shoulders to make sure he had my attention.
“Lexie, I caught the end of that. Was it the guy from last night?”
“I’m not sure who it was. I just called my phone to check my messages and he answered.”
“Lex, please let the police handle this. I have a bad feeling that this is something different, personal somehow. Nothing adds up. It doesn’t make sense.”
I looked up into his eyes. He was so serious that he looked like h
e was in pain, his eyes pleading with me.
“As the detective in the family, shouldn’t that be my line?” I tried to lighten the mood.
“I’m serious, Lexie,” he said. “You’ve been threatened before because of the work you do, but this is strange.”
I couldn’t fight him on that, so I gave in. “Give me Maloran’s card.”
He found the card in his back pocket and held it out to me. But before I could take it, he pulled his hand back and asked, “Will you let me call for you?”
“Alan, I can still make a phone call. Stop treating me like a child. I’m fine.” As I said it, I caught a glimpse of the blood soaking through the bandage on my hand. Okay, so I wasn’t fine. But I still would make the call.
Alan reluctantly handed me the card and leaned in to kiss my forehead.
“I love you. Please try and ask for help when you need it. It doesn’t make you weak, it makes you smart.” He turned and slowly went down the hall. I picked up the phone and punched in the number on the card.
“SCPD, Detective’s office,” said the sunny female voice; I pictured the blond happy receptionist from that old cop show NYPD Blue.
“Officer Maloran,” I asked the nice phone voice. Alan had returned with a broom to sweep up the mess.
“Just a moment please.”
What was I going to tell Maloran? I had a strange feeling this was just the beginning of some very weird shit.
“Maloran,” his voice sounded tense. I wonder if he’s always wound so tight.
“I…this is Lexie Lewis.” I stammered.
“Mrs. Lewis?” He sounded as if he didn’t believe it was me.
“Lexie, please, detective.”
“Lexie, how can I help you? I heard about the episode at the hospital—did you remember something?”
“Um, no, but I think it’s gotten a little more complicated than a mugging.”
“What happened?”
“I dialed my number to check messages, and I think I talked to the attacker—or someone who knows him. I’m not sure.”