A Fatal Romance

by June Shaw

  A shot rang out.

  “Eve!” I shrieked.

  My twin fell to the ground.

  Chapter 15

  My body shook like a hurricane was slamming against me. I shoved the door open wide and dashed outside. The shooter was running off.

  “Eve. Eve, be okay,” I cried through fitful lyrics, hating that I couldn’t stop, hating that my sister lay on her side, dying.

  When I stooped near on the patio, her back expanded. Eve reached toward me. “I wasn’t hit. Just give me a minute.”

  “You’re alive!” Joy shot through my trembling body. I looked up to see the man who shot at her was no longer around. I stayed with my sister, rubbing her shoulder, massaging her back, and whispering, “You’re all right.”

  She remained down. “Sunny, I’ll be fine. Just go call the cops, okay?”

  I’d dropped my purse in her house. “I’ll be right back.” Afraid to move her, I ran inside and punched 9-1-1 in her phone. I gave the information and rushed back toward the open door.

  That’s when I realized the burglar alarm I’d set hadn’t gone off.

  Eve was sitting up, moving cautiously. She sat with elbows on knees and was feeling the side of her head when I walked outside. “I have a little hickey and some achy joints. I’ll most likely have a few bruises,” she said. “But I’ll be fine.”

  I sat close, still gripping the phone, and wrapped my arms around her.

  Her tears wet my shoulder. “I’m sorry,” she said with a whimper. “That was so scary.”

  “Why should you be sorry?”

  She drew back her head and wiped her eyelashes. “You know.”

  I sucked air through my nostrils. “That wasn’t your fault.”

  A siren’s wail rang out, approaching. It would frighten away an intruder that might still be lurking.

  “Are you sure the bullet didn’t hit you?”

  She shook her head and winced, touching the knot growing on the side of her head. I inspected her face and lifted her hair in spaces to check her scalp, making certain I didn’t find blood beneath the red hair.

  The siren stopped near. A car door slammed, and a cop with freckles ran into the backyard.

  “I’m okay,” Eve told him. “My sister yelled, and then I saw a man across my patio pointing a pistol at me, so I threw myself down. I’m sure that’s why the bullet missed me. He ran back there.” She pointed to the slim pathway between the fences behind her house.

  Backups were on the way, the cop said, and more sirens approached. He and other police who ran up checked behind Eve’s house. Some scrambled around the neighborhood.

  Eve told me and the police she’d gone next door to borrow a couple of slices of bread, was heading back to her house, and noticed a man approaching on the opposite side of her yard.

  “Who was it?” I asked.

  “I couldn’t see his face. He wore one of those roll-down camouflage knit caps like hunters wear when it’s really cold, so I couldn’t see anything about his face or even tell you about his eyes. What I can say is I saw his arm raising a gun pointed at me, so I wasn’t checking his clothes.”

  “How large a man was he?” the cop asked, writing on a pad.

  “Medium. I don’t think he was anyone I knew. He was stepping on the other side of the patio when Sunny yelled.” She shivered and squeezed her arms around me. “Thank you.”

  I could only nod, my throat so tight it couldn’t release a sound. The backs of my eyes sizzled.

  Eve’s slight quiver intensified, building to violent shakes. She squinted, her face tightening as though she was experiencing extreme pain.

  “You need to go get checked,” I said, and the officer concurred.

  “No, I’m fine.” Shrugging out of our hug, she attempted to stand. Immediately she jerked her leg up with a grimace and sank back down.

  “You probably hit the concrete hard. Your ankle might be broken,” I said. “And you might have a concussion.”

  She swallowed. “All right.”

  “An ambulance is on its way. Are you sure you don’t know the man who was here, or can you tell me anything else about him?” the cop asked.

  She shook her head and touched the side of her scalp.

  “You saw him and warned your sister,” the questioner said to me. “What was he wearing?”

  “I just saw a pistol in his hand. Oh, he didn’t have long sleeves, I don’t think.”

  He jotted information, and I squatted next to my sister, touching her arm. “You need to stay away from this house.”

  To my surprise, she didn’t look ready to argue.

  “You should stay somewhere else for now,” the young man said. “And it’s probably best if you don’t remain anywhere close.” Approaching sirens shut off. Medics rushed near with a gurney.

  “Go stay with Nicole,” I suggested. Medical technicians tended to my sister, and I told the deputy, “Nicole is her daughter who lives in Houston.”

  “That’s probably a good idea,” he said.

  “Don’t call her yet.” Eve’s pinched expression pleaded with me. “Don’t tell her what happened until we know for certain how I am.”

  Against my better judgment, I agreed. I grabbed her purse so she’d have medical and insurance information and tailed the ambulance to the hospital, praying my sister would be all right. I sang out, then realized I was imagining life without her.

  “No!” I shouted and shoved aside the image of her dying.

  I needed to do something constructive. Mentally replaying the scene with the man’s hand and the gun, I worked to shove my picture farther to the right, to remember his clothes or his face. I imagined a pause button keeping him inside my view.

  Nothing else would come.

  Eve’s burglar alarm was faulty. That was a major problem. I grabbed my cell phone, called information, and connected with Dave Price’s office.

  “I’m sorry. Mr. Price isn’t here at the moment. Can I help you?” a pleasant woman’s voice said.

  “Yes. I’m Sunny Taylor. Mr. Price recently installed a burglar alarm at my sister’s house. Her name is Eve Vaughn. And the alarm doesn’t work.”

  “Oh. I’ll be sure to tell Mr. Price.”

  “Please do. And have him contact me.” I gave my cell number.

  For long moments after we disconnected, I gripped the phone. My mind returned to the scene that angered me so much last night. The scene of Mr. Price and my sister fulfilling her fantasy of him that she’d painted so vividly. I mentally apologized to her for those wayward thoughts right before an Emergency sign ahead at the hospital made my gut clench.

  The only thing I cared about concerning the man now was his product that was supposed to protect my sister but did not. I threw my truck into park and sprinted up the ramp behind her on the gurney.

  “Is she all right?” I asked the medics. “She didn’t get worse?”

  “I’m fine.” Eve lifted her head off her pillow.

  “Good. Lie back.” I trotted inside the hospital beside her, through a large number of people sitting in the emergency room, along with a strong odor of chips and sound of a crinkling bag. I moved beyond this into one of a number of smaller rooms, immediately assaulted by the sounds of fast-talking voices and suctioning on the floor from staff members’ soft-soled shoes.

  The phone I’d tossed into my purse warbled.

  “Sunny, this is Dave Price,” he said when I answered.

  I stopped. My sister’s gurney rolled past. A flood of emotions surprised me with their wallop. Fear for Eve. Contentment from hearing from this man? No way. I cleared my throat. “You sold my sister an inferior product. The alarm system she bought from you was supposed to keep her safe.”

  “She isn’t?”

  His tone made me recall that Eve and I had feared him. Should that concern still hold true? I didn’t think so.

  “No. Well, she’s not hurt badly, but your alarm doesn’
t work.”

  “That would be highly unusual. I’d like to check it out. Would that be okay with her?”

  I glanced ahead at her being rolled through a curtain. “Let me call you right back.” Disconnecting, I stepped to the curtain.

  A male nurse intercepted me. “They’re taking her for x-rays and other examinations. She’ll be fine. You can sit in the waiting room over there. We’ll let you know when you can see her.”

  Fighting the urge to knock him down and rush after her, I turned around and walked outside. I wasn’t ready to sit in a room and wait. Sunshine and coolness of the air felt strangely discomforting. So did mounds of lavender and white petunias slanting down from the sloping land the hospital was built on. Dark clouds should overhang this day. Cars pulled into a large apartment’s parking lot next door. A line of vehicles headed for the high school. How many of the locals who taught there and the people living next door knew my sister? Our town was normally safe. Would people who knew Eve believe what just happened at her house?

  I struggled with my singing instinct. No, this sister would not be taken. I refused to believe she would.

  Looking at Dave Price’s number, I called him back. “There’s a little complication with asking my sister about things being okay at her house. Let me get in touch with you later to tell you when you can come out there.”

  Without questioning he agreed, and I paced. I strode down one slope toward the huge parking lot and paced up the opposite end. On my third trip down, a woman I didn’t know well walked from the parking lot calling my name.

  “You look like an expectant father waiting for a baby to be delivered,” Sue Ellen Granger said. She gave me time to explain. I chose not to. She’d bought lacy black bras and body huggers from me. Now she wore her too-black dyed hair upswept, and her make-up too showy. Her dress and heels were the latest style, as always.

  “No. No baby today.”

  Apparently giving up on my telling who I had in the hospital and why, she said, “I hated to hear you left Fancy Ladies. You helped me the most over there.”

  “Thanks. It’s just that I learned your tastes so well, I could tell what you’d like in undergarments.” I’d also known she wanted the most expensive of everything.

  Sue Ellen leaned close. “Not like those ugly things your neighbor Faye Hawthorne wears, right?” She grinned, then glanced around like she was checking to make sure no one walked up behind and heard.

  “I prefer not to talk about what other people buy or wear.” I wouldn’t mention I’d heard that the woman in front of me way overspent on all her jewelry and garments. I was, however, glad to have her distraction. Chatting kept me from the constant worry. I glanced at the doors to the emergency room. The male nurse wasn’t coming out. Still, soon I would go in and check on Eve.

  Sue Ellen kept her head close to mine. “Jeanne Pearson saw her buying a horrible green bra from you.”

  She needn’t say anymore. Jeanne probably told half the town what my sweet neighbor bought. “If she did, she might not wear it anymore.”

  “Or maybe she never did. Just like that step-grandson of hers.”

  “Toby?”

  She leaned her head closer. “That man never did wear any underwear. Not when he was a boy and not even now that he’s a man.”

  I hadn’t known him when he was a child because they’d lived elsewhere. Some of my customers used to tell me their spouses went around commando. But him? “Surely he sometimes wears briefs or boxers,” I said. “He works at the funeral parlor. He does funerals.”

  “I know. He gives new meaning to hanging loose.”

  “I need to go. Nice seeing you.” I darted to the door before she could say anything more or ask who I had inside. And why did she bring up gossip about my neighbor and her grandson?

  “She isn’t in a room yet.” The male nurse sat at a desk with two others.

  “Do you know anything about her?” I asked, but he shook his head. “I’ll be in the waiting room. Please let me know as soon as I can see her.”

  I joined a dozen other people in the cramped seating area. My mind raced through events and people. My reaching Eve’s house. She didn’t answer. She was out back. I wanted to gripe at her. A man wanted to shoot her.

  And then there was Dave. Why hadn’t his alarm worked?

  “Your sister’s done. You can see her now,” the nurse told me.

  I scrambled to reach Eve. Instead of writhing in pain, she was sitting on the side of the bed. A bump had risen on the corner of her forehead. “Undo me,” she said the second I darted in, “and you can help me get dressed.” She pointed toward ties in the back of a hospital gown they’d put on her.

  Relief swept through me. “Is she okay?” I asked the nurse entering information on a laptop on a rolling stand near the bed.

  “I’m fine.” Eve untied the top strings on her gown and tried to reach the others without waiting for me. I grabbed the next two and pulled, getting her loose. A large plastic bag holding her clothes sat beside her. She put on her bra, which I hooked, then she carefully shrugged into her pullover shirt.

  “We didn’t find broken bones or anything else obvious,” the nurse said, focusing on me. “But she’ll need to be watched for a while, especially with that knot on her head. The doctor sent a prescription for pain pills to the drugstore she uses.”

  “You’re leaving town,” I told Eve without offering room for discussion.

  “Yes. I’m going to Nicole’s.”

  “Great.”

  A nurse wheeled Eve out, and I drove her to her residence, where she insisted on going after picking up the medicine at the drugstore’s drive-up window. Contentment and anxiety jumped through me, making my stomach relax but my arms and scalp tense.

  “I’m so glad you’re well.” I parked out front of her house. “But I’m concerned about bringing you anywhere near this place.”

  “If I’m going to leave town, I need to pack some things.”

  “I’ll drive you to Houston,” I said, and her eyes went from oval to round. She knew how horrible I was at driving in big cities. “But before we go inside here, let me walk outside your house and check.”

  Moments passed in which I imagined she feared what might be found around or inside her place. “Okay,” she said.

  Not extra brave myself, I grabbed my phone from my purse in case I needed to make an emergency call and dug a crowbar out of the long toolbox in my truck bed. I could swing the heavy tool or throw it at any threatening person I might come across.

  Creeping around the right side of her place, I didn’t find a person hiding or any windows broken. I turned to check the neighbor’s house. From what I could see, nobody watched. My body went into fight-or-flight mode as I crept toward the rear, ready to round the corner to the patio.

  Before moving there, I shot my gaze at the narrow space between the two fences in back where I’d seen the shooter run.

  No person came into view. A tune tried to come. More fully aware and needing silence, I stopped it. My shoulders and chest tucked themselves as I stood still. Didn’t breathe. Didn’t sing.

  No sound carried of footsteps or voices. The only thing I could hear was the water Eve’s angel poured into the fountain. Forcing courage to give me strength, I tightened my grip on the tool in my raised hand and rushed forward, ready to aim it or strike.

  Nobody stood back there. I swerved my head from one side to the other, searching for the slightest detail that might suggest someone was around who shouldn’t be. Finding everything as it was before, I checked Eve’s backdoors. The sliding door was locked, as was the entry to her kitchen. Satisfied, I rushed to the opposite side of her house and discovered no person or broken windows.

  “You can go in,” I told her out front at my truck.

  “Sunny, I can drive myself to Houston. I know the way to my daughter’s house.”

  “I know you do, and you’re a good driver. But you have bruised
areas that will probably start to ache more, and with that swelling on your head, you might have a concussion. What if you’re driving out there and black out? Besides, if you need to take pain pills, they could make you sleepy. I don’t want you driving.”

  Opening the truck door for her, I shoved my shoulders back, attempting to bolster my bravery.

  She stepped out, looking at me. My twin wanted to show courage, I could tell by the lift of her chin. “It’s really not encouraging to go inside with you standing there holding the crowbar like a guard with a sword.”

  “Sorry.” I still held the tool aloft. I shoved the crowbar back into the toolbox while she emerged.

  “If it’ll make you feel better,” she said, “when we go in, you can grab that gun from the drawer and keep it out while I pack.”

  I unlocked her front door and shoved it open. She and I stood in the doorway, peering inside, shoving our heads forward and turning them one way and the other to check for intruders in the area we could see.

  “It looks okay.” Rushing inside ahead of her, I yanked open the drawer holding the pistol near her sofa. “It’s still here.”

  “Does that surprise you?” Her face paled in a mask of fear.

  I shook my head and waved her on toward her room. I inched through the den, her kitchen, garage, and studio, my breathing much more relaxed once I found no one hiding and no signs of a break-in. Her voice lifted from the area of the bedrooms. She was probably talking on her phone, but I needed to be sure. I rushed down the hall to her room, praying I wouldn’t find an intruder there with her.

  “What’s with that?” Standing beside her bed that held a partially filled suitcase, cell phone in her hand, she pointed to the raised gun I gripped.

  “Sorry.” I’d rushed in with the weapon pointed, which made it automatically aimed at her. Lowering my hand, I shuddered at the possibility that I could have bumped my arm darting in that way and accidentally shot her. Good grief, I was no good with weapons.

  “Oh, I was just talking to Sunny, not you,” she said into the phone.

  I spun around and slouched away from her, keeping the pistol aimed down. Glancing into the other bedrooms and bathrooms, I made my way back to the den. There I yanked open the drawer for the end table, ready to drop the gun inside. But if I did, could it go off? Taking a breath, I used a gentle touch to return the weapon to its holding place, not shutting the drawer tight in case we needed it out.