Текст книги "Equal Access"
Автор книги: A. E. Branson
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Текущая страница: 12 (всего у книги 18 страниц)
Chapter Fifteen
If you are going through hell, keep going.
–Sir Winston Churchill
When Dulsie first became aware that she was hearing muffled voices, she wasn’t sure if they were just the beginning of yet another bizarre dream. Everything felt strange and unreal. Even when she began to make out whom each voice belonged to, Dulsie doubted this was reality. All the talking seemed garbled. So she opened her eyes to check.
She saw a ceiling, tubes, and the upper part of a wall.
“Oh!” Aunt Maddie’s voice actually made sense. “She’s awake!”
Aunt Maddie, Uncle Pax, Mom, and Dad all crowded around her.
“Honey?” Mom cupped her hand along Dulsie’s jaw, but Dulsie hardly noticed the touch. “Can you hear me? Can you say anything?”
Dulsie tried to focus on Mom’s face. Somewhere in the fog of her mind a single reality rippled to the surface. Dulsie tried to speak it, but her mouth seemed too dry to allow the words to pass. She swallowed, and managed to get them out in a squeaky croak.
“My baby?”
The relatives glanced around at each other. Dulsie took a breath and managed to speak more clearly.
“My baby ... okay?”
Mom pressed her lips together and she blinked a few times. “The baby’s fine for now, honey.”
“She already knew.” Dad almost sounded amazed. He placed his hand on Dulsie’s forehead and brushed back some of her hair as he did so. “Sweetie, you picked a heckuva way to tell us you were pregnant.”
Dulsie shifted her gaze to him. Images started flashing through her memory. The positive result on the pregnancy test, Shad’s reaction to her news, then her reaction to Shad’s news....
Something else struggled out from the fog that seemed to enshroud her mind. She couldn’t tell them about Shad. Dulsie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She opened them again to stare directly at the ceiling.
“I feel weird.” At least her voice seemed to be recovering. “Like I’m not really here.”
Uncle Pax’s voice conveyed certainty brought on by experience. “It’s the pain killers.”
Pain killers? No, she shouldn’t be taking pain killers! There was new life growing inside her. Dulsie was supposed to be a teetotaler consumed with label reading and eating nothing but organic and natural food right now. Her gaze shot back to her dad.
“Don’t let them give me pain killers. No more.”
Dad’s expression softened. “You may be needing those for a while, honey.”
“They aren’t good for the baby.”
Her father looked across the bed at her mom, who started stroking her thumb across Dulsie’s cheek.
“The doctors know you’re pregnant.” Mom’s voice had a consoling tone. “They wouldn’t give you anything that would hurt the baby.”
Dulsie closed her eyes again. “No more pain killers.”
She barely noticed her dad’s hand stroke through her hair again. “Dulsie ... do you remember why you’re here?”
Misty images staggered through her mind. Sadie was barking toward the road. The dog snarled and began charging. A shot cracked, and Dulsie saw the flashpoint. The dog wailed....
Her eyes opened. “Sadie?” Dulsie began glancing back and forth between her parents. “How’s Sadie?”
Uncle Pax, who was standing beside Dad, leaned forward and patted her gently on the knee. “I’m sorry, honey. Sadie ... was killed.” Then he looked across the bed at Maddie.
Her aunt also leaned forward and lightly placed her hand on Dulsie’s hip. “Dulsie, honey ... do you know where Shad is?”
Dulsie stared at her. More images began playing through the obscured screen of her mind. Shad walking into the bedroom and then coming out with a suitcase, Shad pausing in the doorway to answer her question just before he left....
“The motel.”
Aunt Maddie’s gaze shot from Uncle Pax back to Dulsie. “What motel?”
“In Linn.”
Aunt Maddie’s eyes widened and she looked at Uncle Pax again.
“What’s he doing in a motel?” Mom asked.
She couldn’t tell them about Shad. Dulsie closed her eyes again and struggled with this hateful haze that kept clouding her mind.
“Dulsie?” Her mom’s hand remained cupped against her jaw, but she was no longer caressing Dulsie’s cheek with her thumb. “Why did Shad go to a motel tonight?”
She couldn’t tell them.
A female voice Dulsie didn’t recognize at all broke into her muddled thoughts. “Excuse me, folks. We need to take a look at her.”
The Wednesday morning for Shad dawned bright and clear and as desolate as the previous morning. He brushed his teeth, got dressed as far as his gray slacks, light blue button-down shirt, and shoes, and then decided it was time to turn on his cell phone which had been sitting on the stand beside the bed.
No sooner did the phone beep upon returning to service than it chirped with the signal there was voice mail. Immediately Shad vacillated between hope and dread. Did Dulsie try to call him last night? If so, why would she have waited until after ten o’clock, when he turned off the phone? Then Shad saw it was Mam’s and Pap’s telephone number displayed on the readout of the screen he pulled up, and his dread thickened with perplexity.
What was even more disconcerting was the time the message had been received, which was after two o’clock this morning. Shad could feel his hands tremble as he selected the command to listen to the message and raised the phone to his ear.
“Shad? Shad, it’s Mam.” Her voice was tense. “If you get this message, you’ve got to come to the hospital. There was a prowler at your house tonight. He shot Dulsie. She’s going into surgery and we’re all going to the hospital now. Please, Shad, you’ve got to come as soon as you get this!”
Shad stood, stunned, for a couple of seconds as the phone started going into its automated query about how he wanted to respond. This couldn’t really be happening. This had to be an awful dream Shad would wake up from any second. Surely, but surely, the events of his life weren’t taking yet another turn for the worse.
Yet somehow, inexplicably, beyond his endurance and against all odds, they were. The weight of this new burden was crushing, so much so that Shad found himself back on speaking terms with the Other as he turned the phone back off and grabbed the keys to his pickup before striding out the door.
Paxton and Karl paced through the hall while Maddie and Jill stood beside each other and occasionally made comments about Dulsie’s welfare. Paxton glanced at a clock hanging high on the wall at the end of the hallway. It was a little past seven-thirty.
This was the second time this morning they had been thrown out of Dulsie’s room. The first time the medical staff evaluated her condition now that she was awake. Only twenty minutes after the family was allowed back in, not just one but two deputies arrived to interview Dulsie, so they were tossed out again. Unless the deputies were able to come up with even more questions than Karl, Paxton didn’t figure the interview would last much longer. It took Dulsie only about ten minutes to tell her father everything she could remember. Whenever anybody inquired about Shad, however, Dulsie would become silent.
The first time they were thrown out of the room, Maddie borrowed Karl’s cell phone and tried to call Shad again. And again it went straight to voice mail. So Maddie borrowed a phone book from the nurse’s station and got the number to the motel in Linn. When she called there, the front desk confirmed that Shad was checked in, but when they forwarded her call to his room Maddie still received no answer.
What the devil was going on with Shad? Paxton knew his son wasn’t involved in any wrongdoing, but right now the evidence was stacked against him. There was obviously something going on between Shad and Dulsie. Jill had been quick to point out how Dulsie asked about the baby, and then about the dog. Paxton tried to tell her it was just the effect of the pain killers muddling her mind. He remembered how they had messed up his own thinking, and because the doctors had just drilled into his head Paxton had been half afraid he’d be goofy like that the rest of his life.
The deputies came out of Dulsie’s room. Yep, it had only taken a little over ten minutes.
After the deputies confirmed with the family that Dulsie hadn’t revealed anything differently from what she’d told them, the officers left. The family returned to the room, but a nurse was starting to tell them that Dulsie needed rest. The group should go get some breakfast for a while. Jill asked if at least she could just sit in the room while Dulsie slept.
Maddie suddenly gasped, “Shad!”
All eyes turned to the doorway.
The only respectable appearance about Shad was the fact he was wearing suit slacks and dress shoes. His shirt was untucked, his dark hair was tousled, and there was a hint of stubble on his chin. But what Paxton noticed most was the haunted expression in Shad’s eyes.
Shad glanced at the family, and as he stepped into the room Maddie strode to him and placed her hands on his arms as she gazed into his face.
Shad raised his own hands to her elbows, but he immediately asked, “How’s Dulsie?”
“She’s awake,” Maddie murmured and stepped to one side.
Shad strode to Dulsie’s bed. The nurse seemed flustered to have yet another intruder in the crowded room.
Shad stood with his thighs pressed against the side of the bed, and he placed a hand on his wife’s right arm. “Dulsie?”
She looked at him, and there was something strangely ... distant ... in her eyes.
Shad leaned forward and placed his other hand on the top of Dulsie’s head. When he spoke again, his voice was hoarse.
“I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.”
The nurse scowled slightly. “You’re Shad Delaney?”
“Yes.” He never removed his gaze from Dulsie.
The nurse left the room without another word.
Paxton glanced at Jill. She was staring at Shad, and her eyes were smoldering.
But when Paxton looked at Shad he wondered how Jill could be so angry. As Shad gazed down at Dulsie his expression was part adoring, part heartbroken. His left hand began to slowly, gently stroke his fingers through Dulsie’s hair.
“I can’t lose you.” Shad’s voice cracked.
Dulsie slowly blinked, but perhaps because of the pain killers, that distant look was still in her eyes.
“But I don’t even deserve you.” His voice was still hoarse.
Dulsie still didn’t say anything, and Shad seemed at a loss for any more words. Then Jill spoke up.
“What are you doing here, anyway?”
Shad froze. He even stopped stroking Dulsie’s hair. His gaze never left Dulsie’s face.
Karl looked a bit exasperated at Jill. “He’s the father of her child, remember?”
With a hint of panic, Shad suddenly turned toward the family. “How is the baby?”
“The baby’s fine,” both Paxton and Maddie assured him.
Jill frowned. “So you did already know she was pregnant.”
Shad returned his attention to Dulsie.
Jill took a step toward them. “Why weren’t you home last night?”
“Not now, Jill,” Karl muttered.
Shad gazed at Dulsie and didn’t answer.
“Still working out your alibi?” Jill growled.
Shad’s attention was affixed to Dulsie, but his voice was still hoarse. “I wasn’t home because I’m a lowlife scum.”
Jill initially seemed to be a little surprised by his answer, but she quickly overcame it. “And what lowlife scum activities were you involved with?”
“No.” Maddie stepped forward and placed herself between Jill and Shad. “You can leave this room if you can’t hold your tongue, but I’m not gonna stand by and let you needle him.”
Jill folded her arms and calmly returned her sister’s gaze. “How much longer are you gonna make yourself blind to his faults?”
Maddie’s eyes narrowed. “Remove the plank from your own eye, first.”
“Stop it!” Shad’s voice cracked again as he turned toward the elder women. That haunted look in his eyes had only grown wilder. “I’m not worth tearing this family apart over. The last thing I want to do –” His voice cracked again. “– is tear my family apart.”
“You’re a few years too late,” Jill grumbled.
Maddie’s eyes flared.
Paxton started to step between the two sisters.
“Shad Delaney?” Both of the deputies were back, and all attention was diverted to them.
Shad stared at them for a couple of seconds. “Yes?”
For an instant Paxton was astonished they had returned. Then he remembered how the nurse confirmed Shad’s identity before leaving the room.
“Would you come with us, please? We need to ask you a few questions.”
Shad stared a while longer, and the wilder expression in his eyes subsided. He took a noticeably deep breath, nodded, and turned his attention back to Dulsie.
“I’m so sorry.”
Without another word or even glance toward their way, Shad walked past the family and followed the deputies into the hall.
Paxton’s heart sank. Somebody had almost killed Dulsie. And because he was her husband, Shad was the prime suspect.
Chapter Sixteen
The difference between a stumbling block and a stepping stone is the way you approach it.
–Anonymous
Shad decided that “We need to ask you a few questions” qualified as the understatement of the year.
The interrogation was somewhat sympathetic but quite thorough. Shad was cooperative with all the questions except why was he staying at the motel. Still unwilling to reveal his disorder to public light, Shad maintained his right to remain silent until consulting his own counsel, even though he really had no plans for such an arrangement. Shad also consented to search of his motel room, truck, and self. To his surprise the immediate search involved removing his clothes for a fairly cursory examination, but since the police didn’t press Shad on why he wasn’t home, Shad didn’t press for why they needed to see his skin.
The one thing Shad didn’t give them permission to search was his computer. There was incriminating evidence of a totally unrelated activity in its files, but it was an illegal activity just the same. He didn’t need yet another problem added to his growing list, although Shad suspected he was probably only delaying the inevitable. Odds were the sheriff would try to obtain a search warrant even though Shad used client confidentiality as his reason for refusing them access.
When the deputies released him, Shad was lost about where to go next, except he did finally call the office to notify Francine that he wouldn’t be coming in that day. Shad wanted to go back to the hospital and be with Dulsie, but after having seen how his presence affected the rest of the family Shad decided against it. When he noticed it was after nine o’clock, Shad realized that nobody had been home to feed the turkeys and Sadie. And he knew Dulsie would want them taken care of.
As he drove to the house, Shad was almost relieved to have something normal to do in the midst of all this destruction and chaos. In the last week and a half or so, he had discovered the identity of the man who molested him but couldn’t file charges against; experienced a relapse of the disorder he thought was eradicated; decided not to have children just before Dulsie told him she was pregnant; was facing the possible end of a marriage he’d always believed was secure; was suspected of a crime he didn’t commit; and in spite of his inclination to embrace death, had just missed out on the chance to be outright murdered.
Was God finding any of this funny yet?
When Shad neared the house he recognized Karl’s gray pickup parked in the driveway. His stomach knotted and fluttered, and for a split second Shad considered driving past the home. His reaction was inappropriate, Shad tried to tell himself. Karl had never done a thing to him to elicit such trepidation. Then again, this was just the sort of incident that might get Karl sufficiently provoked.
As Shad steered his truck into the driveway to park it behind the Wekenheiser pickup, he saw Karl standing on the porch. The man seemed to be watching him, and he also looked as though he might be talking on his cell phone. When Shad stepped out of the truck he saw Karl lower the phone and clip it back to his belt. The two men approached each other.
“Glad to see you here, Shad.” Karl smiled as he descended the porch steps.
Shad still wasn’t sure if he should take Karl’s greeting at face value, even though his uncle/father-in-law had never done a single unkind thing to Shad before.
“I’m ... surprised to see you here.” Shad glanced around, half expecting to discover that Karl kept a spare bratwurst in his pocket in conjunction with a secret army of starving dachshunds.
The two men came to a stop to face each other just a few yards away from the steps of the porch.
“You can’t go in the house.” Karl looked more solemn. “The sheriff still has it taped off.”
“I came to feed the turkeys and Sadie.”
“Beatcha to the turkeys, Bub.” Karl frowned slightly. “You don’t know about Sadie, do you?”
Shad regarded him with a sense of both inquiry and frustration. “All the police did was ask me questions. They didn’t tell me a single thing about what happened here.”
“Of course they didn’t.” Karl nodded. “Wanted to see if you’d let a detail slip that only somebody who’d been here last night would know.”
“So ... you don’t think ... I had something to do with last night?”
Karl smirked. “Of course I don’t. That’s the whole reason you aren’t swinging upside and naked from a honey locust tree about now.”
Shad drew a deep breath inspired by both relief and the need to calm his nerves. “What happened to Sadie?”
“She was shot, too. And it killed her.”
Shad felt a welling of yet more sadness inside him. He lowered his head and stared at the ground.
“Sheriff hauled her off for evidence,” Karl continued. “Luckily I got here just as they were finishing up their investigation of the crime scene. I told the sheriff I wanted her body back after they got what they needed. I’m gonna bury her on the farm.” Karl’s voice momentarily became just a little hoarse. “She might’ve saved Dulsie’s life.”
Shad looked back up at Karl, his gaze meeting the man’s eyes for a few seconds. He didn’t think he had ever heard Dulsie’s father get choked up before.
“Saved her life?”
Karl nodded, and took a deep breath himself before continuing in a normal voice. “Dulsie said she heard the dog barking, so she went out on the stoop back there with the rifle. Then Sadie suddenly became ferocious and started charging whoever was down there near the road.” Karl nodded toward the front corner of their yard. “That’s when he shot Sadie. Now, that right there tells me you weren’t the one skulking around with a gun.”
Shad was appreciative for the information, especially from someone as astute as Karl. “How so?”
“That dog was damn smart. She not only recognized people, she recognized vehicles. She never barked at anybody who wasn’t a stranger. So that means she wouldn’t bark at you.” Karl looked more pensive. “In a way, Sadie wound up being too smart for her own good. She was barking at a stranger, and Dulsie came out ... that must be when he aimed for her. The dog recognized an aggressive move on his part, so that’s when she got aggressive.”
A chill settled over Shad. “So he shot Sadie instead.”
Karl nodded again. “Dulsie acted instinctively. She told me she could remember swinging her rifle toward the flashpoint, but couldn’t remember if she got off a shot because ... that’s when she got shot.” A rueful smile curved his lips. “Well, I know for a fact she did.”
“How?”
“The advantage of being a distraught father is the sheriff was willing to share some information with me. They found a blood trail in your yard.”
Shad’s eyes widened.
“It’s just a few drops, but they led back to the end of your driveway. Apparently the bottom-feeder parked there, and the barking dog was causing him to approach the house with care.” A hint of pleasure crept into Karl’s smile. “Dulsie winged him. So he oozed back to his car and got out of here.”
That would explain the strip search. But Shad knew the fact he didn’t have a gunshot wound didn’t release him from suspicion. He wasn’t the trigger man, but the police knew he could have arranged for somebody else to do the job. But if Dulsie had wounded her attacker....
“Then the sheriff should catch him.” Shad felt an almost forgotten flicker of hope. “Medical institutions have to report all gunshot wounds to the police.”
“Assuming he goes to a doctor.” Karl shook his head. “It could be minor enough a wound he might reckon on patching it up himself. With any luck he’ll get an infection and die anyway. I just wouldn’t have the satisfaction of knowing he’d become maggot food.”
Shad regarded his father-in-law with a little renewed wariness. “You know ... one theory is I might’ve sent somebody out here to ... do the shooting.”
Karl tilted his head and pressed his lips together. “Shad ... I know for a fact you’d never hurt Dulsie. I got no idea what it is that’s going on between the two of you right now, especially outta the blue like this, and I’m not even gonna ask. A man deserves his privacy.” He drew a breath before continuing. “Jill wanted me to run you off when she found out you were dating Dulsie. But you know why I refused?”
Shad shook his head.
“I knew you’d be good to her. That was the most important thing to me, and you filled the bill. I know how Pax is with Maddie, and I saw he taught you to do the same. And I saw you in that room this morning.” Karl smirked slightly. “And I know you’re a terrible actor.”
Both appreciation and guilt swirled inside him. Shad lowered his head again.
Karl continued. “I also do realize that you have all the makings of a serial killer, except as far as I know you weren’t into torturing animals and wetting the bed during your childhood.” He tilted his head. “Although Pax did tell me that you took to fire building like a skunk takes to stink.”
Shad looked up to regard Karl a bit warily again. Not only was the man known to be insightful, Karl had his own penchant for feeling out certain aspects of a person. Just as Shad could empathize with other abuse victims, Karl was quick to determine how much of a threat someone else posed and the best way to deal with it. That probably influenced why his sons became a park ranger and a conservation agent. Shad had heard the stories. Another nervous flutter beat through his stomach as Shad realized that if anybody could figure out his secret, it could be Karl.
“But who am I to hold that against you?” Karl smirked. “Fact is, if you weren’t a little dangerous you’d just be a doormat, and Dulsie doesn’t need that either. You just know how to point that aggressive streak elsewhere, and it would never be at her.”
At least Karl seemed to be veering in another direction now, but Shad wanted to back him even farther away from the truth. So he decided to counter with another truth.
“I still managed to hurt Dulsie.”
“Whatever you did, I know it wasn’t intentional. It’s only if you set out to hurt her on purpose that I’d have to haul you out on a back road one night when the mother ship’s due to come in.”
Shad resumed staring at the ground. He didn’t feel worthy of the kindness Karl was extending to him. And that reminded Shad of something else he’d witnessed this morning.
“I’ve also hurt the rest of the family. Mam and Jill are fighting because of me.”
Karl let out an exhale before he responded. “Do you remember what the most dangerous animal in the woods is?”
“A mother defending her young.”
“And once a mom, always a mom. It doesn’t matter that you and Dulsie are all grown up now. Dulsie is the daughter Jill finally got.” Karl’s voice seemed to become even gentler. “And you’re the son Maddie finally got.”
And Mam and Pap were the parents Shad finally got. Had it not been for them, the trouble he was in right now would seem miniscule to the trouble he could have created entirely on his own. Yet this mess was the only reward he had to give them for their efforts.
Karl continued when Shad didn’t respond. “Jill and Maddie are evenly matched. They just have different styles. Their maternal instincts have got the best of them lately, but believe me, the bond that ties them isn’t any weaker. In fact, this could make it even stronger.”
Shad was familiar with the concept Karl was sharing with him, but this morning it sounded more like empty words of consolation than encouragement that all would work out for the better.
“It’s still all my fault.”
“Speaking of which....” Karl cupped his elbow in one hand and the other hand curled around his chin as he studied Shad. “You got any ideas why someone would be after you? I mean, besides the fact you’re a lawyer and somebody’s just starting on you before they get to the rest. Do you have any idea why somebody would want to kill you?”
Shad looked up with a start. “What?”
“It wasn’t just a potential burglar out here last night. He began shooting as soon as a person came out of the house. He was here to kill. Dulsie doesn’t have an enemy in the world, but – you are a lawyer. You have the potential to get people upset with you.”
Shad gaped at Karl in disbelief. The deputies had also asked him if Shad had any enemies, but the way Karl was phrasing it, especially when Shad finally had some information about the night’s events, the possibility seemed more concrete, except –
“I mostly handle family law. Wills, real estate, that sort of thing. The family’s more likely to get upset with each other than with me.”
“You handle a few divorces, too. And from what I hear, you pick out the dicey ones.”
Shad frowned. He didn’t handle many divorces, but it was true he gravitated to those that were highly charged, like Charissa’s case, for example. Yet it was precisely for children like her that he devoted himself to the insane goal of becoming a lawyer. Why else would someone as conflict shy as he was get entangled in such hostile affairs? It could only be that aggressive streak Karl mentioned earlier.
“Nothing immediately comes to mind,” Shad murmured, although the complexities of Charissa’s case naturally lingered in his thoughts. The next realization that surfaced was the possibility that Shad’s “choice” of career had contributed to Dulsie winding up in the hospital. A fresh wave of guilt surged through him and Shad wondered how Karl was managing to remain so benevolent toward him. He was really more deserving of the man’s vehemence, although Shad figured he’d rather face the mother ship than the honey locust.
“It might not be a current client.” Karl seemed to scrutinize him. “It might be a case you thought was all settled and done and over with.”
Shad shook his head. “Nothing seems obvious.”
“If they’ve got any intelligence at all, they want to not be obvious. Think about it. And I mean really think about it. You want the goon who did this to Dulsie to get what he deserves, don’t you?”
Something new flickered inside Shad. Actually, it wasn’t so much new as rather disused for a while. Somebody besides him had been instrumental in hurting Dulsie, and Shad had been so busy berating himself that Karl’s question was almost like a revelation to him. There was somebody else that justice needed to pursue. There was somebody else that needed to pay for his actions. And if Shad possibly held the key to identifying who that person was, then he owed it to Dulsie to utilize every means available to discover that person.
Before Shad got to express any of these thoughts to Karl, they heard the drone of an engine approaching them. Shad looked toward the road and immediately recognized Pap’s pickup coming toward the house.
Shad looked at Karl, who shrugged and smirked.
“Sorry, son. I finked you out.”
