Night Stars and Mourning Doves (Dearly Beloved)

by Margo Hoornstra

  Walking out to the car a few minutes later another pleasant thought struck her and held.

  Angela was right. She really hadn’t been this happy since—never.

  Life had never felt so good.

  Chapter Eleven

  Eric hadn’t traveled more than a half mile from his parents when his cell went off again. With the receiver now linked to the speaker of his car radio, he pressed the necessary button to engage the call.

  “Are you that anxious to see me?” He asked then waited for Elyse to respond.

  “Say again? This is county dispatch.”

  At the abrupt male voice, he bolted straight up.

  Shit! His work phone was linked to the car as primary.

  “Oh. Sorry. I was—Matthews here. What’s—” He shook his head. “Matthews.”

  “Report to County Road 202 north of Parmeter. Single vehicle accident. One PI. Condition serious. Transported by air flight. Officers currently on scene.”

  “Got it. Uh. Copy.”

  Taking a sharp right, he listened to a description of the vehicle involved and license plate information. The blood drained out of him so fast, he was surprised a gallon or so hadn’t pooled at his feet. Eyes trained full ahead, he coughed then gasped. For a second, he’d quit breathing.

  “Copy,” he said again and ended the call.

  He didn’t feel anything when he pulled in beside the lone cop car. With the gear shift snapped into park, he killed the ignition and pocketed the key. Exiting the vehicle, he hardly saw the lights flashing a kaleidoscope of red, white, and blue. Didn’t register the rumbling of the diesel engine from a nearby tow truck.

  After the information he was given over the phone, he’d long ago gone numb. Fully prepared to go through the motions of what he had to do, he raised his eyes to make a silent utterance to God and decided to keep those thoughts to himself. Above all, he had to remain alert and in control. Keep his head clear, his mind focused. And let his heart fend for itself.

  Then he saw the car involved in the hit-and-run, the one that got the worst of it, crushed and mangled against the tree. A newly fractured heart ricocheted against his ribs and ice water took the place of warm blood coursing through his veins.

  The windshield was shattered and collapsed inward on the driver’s side, the door there all but obliterated. And Elyse’s crystal angel spun and whirled at the mercy of an early morning breeze, picking up the rays of sunlight it winked back at him.

  “Jaws of life,” someone said as they passed by. Someone who must have noticed him stock still and staring.

  He jerked into action like a motorized robot whose on switch had just been engaged. “Yeah, I can tell.”

  The immediate area had been cordoned off with the usual yellow tape with POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS in black lettering. Teeth clenched, ready to burst with the wild rant of obscenities pounding at the back of his throat, Eric calmly raised a section of tape to duck underneath.

  Diagrams, reports, angles, trajectory. He purposely filled his head with the cold and unfeeling terminology to crowd out everything else. Forensic documentation, kinematics, occupant motion analysis.

  “Looks like a one car incident. She might have been drinking.” The wrecker driver standing just outside the taped off perimeter surveyed the crumpled metal. “This early in the morning, could have been driving home from some all-night hoot.”

  That’s your opinion, asshole.

  Eric didn’t bother to look up. “Can’t speculate until we’ve gathered all the available evidence. Can’t rule out something or someone coming at her head on.”

  His teeth clamped together as he thought of Elyse being a helpless victim of that consequence. Scared and alone with nowhere to go but face first into a tree.

  Tasting blood, his tongue found the bite marks inside his lip. With the back of his hand, he brushed aside what may have dripped out.

  “Is that blood on the visor? Sure is. Musta bounced around some to hit way up there.” The driver carried on a solo conversation with Eric determined to ignore him.

  He ducked as best he could through the jagged metal of what had been the driver’s side and struggled to keep his voice detached and calm. “Let’s see what we got here.”

  A number of deflated air bags hung like once used shrouds. Head down, he ran his hand along the back of the seat. Closing his eyes, he accepted the scant connection to Elyse.

  It was taking all he had to stay on scene. To bring his mind around to ascertain facts and determine clues.

  So they could catch the bastard who did this and make him pay.

  The more he tried to shut off all emotion, the more his hands shook in his attempts to scrape off an adequate specimen. He put the meager contents he came up with into an evidence bag he sealed then marked.

  “Hard to believe anyone could survive a crash like this.” Spurred on by God knew what, the wrecker driver refused to shut up. “She was in pretty bad shape when they cut her out of it. Strapped to a body board and all.”

  Eric clamped down his thoughts. “All the more reason to be thorough out here.”

  “Yeah. In case we have a fatality on our hands.”

  His entire body vibrated with the effort to keep his mouth shut. And his hands from closing, hard and steady, around the loudmouth’s neck.

  “Be good if we can prove alcohol involvement,” the jerk continued. “This wreck would be a great visual aid for—”

  “Yeah, well.” Though he fought against it, Eric’s voice came out loud and gruff as he stood to meet the opinionated asshole eye to eye. “Without the physical evidence of the second vehicle, we can’t prove a damned thing right now, can we?”

  The unmitigated idiot had the balls to appear offended. “Sorry, man. Just shootin’ the breeze a bit.”

  Do it somewhere else.

  “I really need to concentrate here.”

  “Yeah. Sure. Let me know when you’re ready for me.”

  Breaking eye contact, Eric purposely slowed down to stroll around to the other side of the car. “Can do.”

  Dispatch had contacted him a second time while he was on route. When Eric asked, he was told the first responders hadn’t provided anything more about the victim. Only that she’d been sand bagged around the head and strapped to the stretcher before transport. They did know the name of the facility she was taken to. Unless some complication came up and they had to transfer her somewhere else. He’d refused to consider that a possibility.

  Chris and Angela would be with Elyse by now. He’d given his brother all the information he had—such as it was—when he called him. Angela would have to take care of Elyse and Chris would have to take care of Angela. His duty was here.

  Hitting the ground on his hands and knees to inspect the undercarriage, he pushed his forehead, hard, against the back quarter panel and let the cold seep into his brain. The combination of man and machine had to somehow give him strength as more facts he didn’t want to acknowledge slammed into his mind. He could easily lose Elyse—possibly already had—without a chance to say goodbye.

  Despite the rest of the horror they’d been forced to endure, he and Jan hadn’t been robbed of that luxury. They were together in the delivery room when their lifeless baby daughter was taken away. Shortly after, his arms had been around his wife as he felt her breathe her last.

  “You okay, Matthews?” A pair of department issue boots entered his field of vision, the small patch of barren earth beside the car. “I said are you okay?”

  Eric’s head jerked up and his body spontaneously followed. “Yeah. Doing great. Have you got anything else?”

  Face set with practiced indifference, the officer shook his head. “Very little.”

  Eric tried his best to mirror the same detachment, and could only hope he pulled it off. “This is a pretty desolate piece of road.”

  “Especially on a Sunday morning. The people who came upon this after the fact and called it in said a sports car, unknown make and model, came out of n
owhere and whipped around them a few miles north. Probably did the same here.”

  “Probably,” Eric muttered.

  “I just finished my interviews and told the witnesses they could leave. Got you names and numbers if you have any questions for them.” He handed over a piece of notebook paper Eric stuffed in his pocket.

  “Thanks.”

  “Here’s the vic’s info too.” This piece of paper Eric kept in his hand as he nodded another thank you. “Always a shame, huh?” the officer concluded. “These things.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you find any paint transfer from the vehicle that no doubt hit this one?”

  As if of one mind, both men surveyed the indented bumper on the back of Elyse’s car.

  Eric struggled to unhinge his jaw as he headed toward it. “Not yet, but I will.” You can be damned sure of that. I will.

  One hour later, it was a miracle he didn’t get in his own accident driving like a mad man to the hospital. Panic, anger, fear, dread. You name it, he was assaulted from all angles, but he wouldn’t let—couldn’t let—anything in.

  Wheeling onto the hospital grounds, he noticed several available parking spaces beside the door to the emergency department, but chose to pull into an empty spot several feet away.

  For the first time since this morning he began to question what exactly it was that had been pushing him so hard all day. Did he wake up yearning for a woman named Elyse? Or was it the warm, female body that had satisfied his needs the night before?

  He’d devoted himself, mind, body, heart and soul to one woman only to be forced to watch her die. Did he have it in him—was he man enough—to repeat the horrible process if it came to that? Elyse meant the world to him, but was he ready to vow ‘til death do us part—again?

  Out of the car, sure quick strides carried him across the parking lot and through the emergency entrance.

  “I’m looking for Elyse—” He wracked his brain for the rest of it. She retained her maiden name. “—Monroe.”

  The woman behind the desk looked up at him then down at some list. “Not here any longer.”

  “She’s what?” His body temperature plummeted and his heart staggered then stopped.

  Please God! Not again.

  “Your patient has been,” the woman went on calmly as if she were reading off a weather report. “Transferred to room eight sixteen in the west tower.”

  “Eight sixteen,” he repeated. “Got it.”

  “I—Sir? If you’ll wait a moment, I’ll give you a visitor’s pass.”

  “Thank you,” he called back as he sprinted for the elevator.

  At the door to Elyse’s room he stopped, tried without success to swallow the crater that suddenly clogged his throat and flexed his fingers into fists to make his hands quit shaking.

  And none of it worked worth a damn.

  Part of him was pissed as hell, another was afraid—no terrified—and with what was left he wanted to sit down on the floor, curl into a tight ball and cry like a baby.

  With his palm about to push on the handle that would open the door, he hesitated then dropped his hand. He was unsure what awaited him on the other side. Or if he really cared enough to find out.

  What about Jay?

  The question blasted into his mind where the words echoed and reverberated like machine gun fire on a battlefield. And he was powerless to make the clamber stop until he came up with the answer.

  Jay was fond of Elyse. It was obvious he had been from the very start. But was it because he saw someone he enjoyed having in his life? Or because events and circumstances in that same young life dictated he had to?

  Neither! He almost spoke out loud.

  Children were too pure and innocent to question and analyze what their minds took in. They didn’t heed asinine dictates. Like Elyse, they listened to their hearts.

  Forcing his head up, backbone engaged, he wiped all discernible emotion from his face and as soft flesh connected with hard metal, pushed open the door.

  From somewhere in the darkened interior, something emitted continual random beeps. Eric squinted into the gloom, eyes useless until his vision adjusted. When it did, a conglomeration of dials and sockets covered most of the back wall and different sized tubes and multi-colored wires led from there to where Elyse lay, still and silent, in the side-railed bed.

  Taking a few cautious steps forward, he focused on her face, particularly the lowered lids, in search of some movement—some sign of life—from behind them.

  “Most of these hook ups are just a precaution.” The kind, yet all business, voice by his ear made him jump. Attempting to pretend she hadn’t scared the hell out of him, his gaze followed the woman in bright green scrubs as she navigated expertly around the medical equipment to eventually pick up the wrist of her patient. “Until the CT scan results come back.”

  He stopped when he reached the end of the bed. Careful not to touch anything important, his fingers wrapped around the cold steel of the foot board where he squeezed tight and held on for dear life.

  A clear bag half full of some equally clear liquid hung on the metal pole by his elbow. The narrow tube at its bottom ran for some length down and across to the other end that was connected in some way to Elyse’s bare forearm.

  “How—” His voice came out thick and low. “How’s she doing? What’s—what’s the prognosis?”

  “Actually quite encouraging.” A man in a suit and tie, carrying a metal encased chart walked in and came to stand beside him. “I told her sister as much.”

  “They went to make some phone calls,” the nurse looked up to cut in.

  The man offered his hand. “I’m Doctor Baker, staff neurologist. You must be the—ah—significant other I was told about.”

  Eric didn’t miss a beat. “That’s right.”

  “There are no broken bones. Just a heck of a lot of bruising. She’s a very lucky lady.”

  “I’m what?”

  The nurse stepped back as the doctor moved closer to Elyse. Eric had all he could do to stay where he was and not rush over to the other side of the bed to gather her into his arms. Or crawl into bed beside her and never let go.

  “You’re going to be fine,” the specialist repeated. “Though you’ll be stiff and sore for a few more days or so.”

  “That you didn’t have to tell me.” Rotating her head to look directly at him, she winced then closed her eyes. “I have areas of me hurting I didn’t even know I owned.”

  At the physician’s nod, Eric came to the side of her bed then took his gaze off her face just long enough to make sure no tubes or needles were in the way before he took her hand. “I’ll do everything I can to make you more comfortable. Just tell me what it is.” His hesitant fingertips skimmed over the gauze and adhesive tape that completely covered one side of her forehead. “But, you’re okay. You’re going to be all right.”

  He couldn’t keep from repeating what the doctor had assured them. In fact, what he wanted to do was leap up, lift his hands skyward and scream the promise at the top of his lungs. Instead, he leaned in to bring his lips to rest in the center of her palm. Then rising, kissed a spot, ever so lightly, on her head just above the bandages.

  “I was going to that little store I told you about for bacon.” Elyse’s voice brought him back to earth. Hushed and strained, it was as if it took some effort for her to talk. “The first time I noticed anything was the roar of an engine that seemed so close it could have come from my backseat.”

  He rubbed her arm. “You don’t need to talk or even think about it if you don’t want to.”

  “The horn blared next. Continuous. Whoever was driving wouldn’t let up. He must have hit me, because my car lurched when he pulled around me, but by that time I was too busy trying to steady the wheel to notice anything else. Then I woke up in here.”

  His response was the one and only thing that came to mind. “And you’re going to be fine.”

  Closing her eyes, she let her hand rest in hi
s. “Did you ever get breakfast this morning?”

  Her question made him smile even as tears pushed at the edges of his eyes. “Not without you.” He lowered his voice. “Without you, eating, drinking even breathing would be a complete waste of time.”

  Chapter Twelve

  The sweet aroma of fresh cut flowers filled the anteroom of the small neighborhood church where Chris and Angela would become husband and wife. Elyse stood off to one side of the bustle and activity as boxes containing bouquets, boutonnieres and corsages were laid out on two long tables. Mostly roses with some chrysanthemums in soft pinks, bright reds, deep purples and pale yellows, the flowers were cushioned by tissue paper and arranged on backgrounds of green fronds of lily grass and dainty white baby’s breath.

  A slender florist flipped a shock of dark brown hair behind one ear as she consulted a small spiral notebook. “The father of the groom,” she looked up to announce. “I need the father of the groom, please.”

  A reluctant Sid Matthews stepped forward. “Right here.”

  “Good.” Putting a check mark on the list, she picked up a cluster of pink baby roses surrounded by a spray of miniature fern leaves. Wielding two large hat pins, she came toward him.

  “Don’t stick me with those things.” With his head bent at an awkward angle, eyes wide and wary, he followed her ministrations on his lapel.

  “I haven’t lost a customer yet, sir,” she said, attention on her work and stepped back when she was finished.

  Smiling, Elyse came over to put a hand on his shoulder. “That color compliments your eyes, Sid.”

  “It’d look a whole lot better on you,” he groused just before casting her a wide grin.

  “I have my flowers to carry, remember?”

  “You’re sure it’s not too much for you?”

  She studied the concern that clouded over the twinkle in his eyes. “If it turns out to be, I’ll have Eric up there to help me.”

  “If he doesn’t by God, I will. And stand up there in front of everyone to do it.”

  She couldn’t help a giggle in response. “I’m sure of that.”

  Leaving the chaos of wedding day preparations behind, temporarily, she entered the welcome quiet in the sanctuary and sank into the comfort of a deserted back pew.