For the Sake of Their Baby

by Alice Sharpe

  As he descended, he calculated distance and angles. If only the fog would clear! Wrapping the rope around a stanchion and securing it with a clove knot, he tied a bowline loop to act as a seat and crawled between the railings, pushing himself away from the cliff with his legs, paying out rope through his tightly gloved hands.

  Muscles honed first in the army, then in firehouse workouts and lastly with self-imposed training at the county jail came to his aid as he carefully made his way down the cliff face, letting out rope as needed, careful not to dislodge any more dirt and rocks than necessary.

  He called Liz’s name and felt his heart practically launch itself into orbit when she answered. Within a few minutes, he caught sight of her bright red sweater. Soon after he began the task of moving into perfect position, maneuvering himself below and to the right of her.

  The world came together when he felt his arms go around her and knew that her fate no longer depended on a clump of tenacious weeds and a piece of rotten wood. He buried his face in her damp hair and felt her whole body shiver.

  “It took you long enough,” she mumbled, looking at him over her shoulder. Her eyes were huge and green and wet. Salt encrusted tears trailed down her dirt smudged cheeks. He was busy looping the rope around her which proved more difficult than he’d anticipated.

  “Don’t let go of that weed yet, sweetheart, but move your other arm. I can’t get the rope around you.”

  “I’m holding Sinbad. He’s hurt. In fact, I’m not even sure he’s still alive.”

  “Then turn slowly toward me. It’s okay, I’ve got a loop of rope under your leg, let go of the wood. I’ve got you.”

  She did exactly as he asked. The wood she’d been depending on swayed back toward the stairs and broke away, falling into the fog, crashing onto the rocks below, a reminder of what could have happened and might still happen if he wasn’t sure and quick and strong enough to prevent it.

  The ache in his shoulders disappeared.

  By the time she’d moved to his side, the cat swaddled in her sweater and ominously still, he’d secured the ropes.

  “I knew you’d come for me,” she said.

  “I’ll always come for you.”

  Their lips met in a soft kiss that mingled tears and fog and brine. It was a moment he wished he could freeze and save and lock away because it was pure, untainted by anything but need. “Let’s get out of here,” he said huskily.

  “Sounds good.” She sniffed and squared her shoulders. “What do I do?”

  “Hold onto me and follow my example. I’m going to need to use both hands to pull us up this rope.” Hand over hand, using his legs to help, he started the arduous process of scaling the cliff. Liz helped as much as she could. It took a lifetime or two, but eventually, the first landing came into view. He helped her climb onto the structure, praying it was in better condition than the mess at the bottom. Then he pulled himself through the railing and plopped down beside her.

  Casting him a look he would never forget, she murmured, “You saved me.”

  He couldn’t think of an answer so he kissed her again.

  She carefully folded back her sweater.

  Sinbad lay ominously still in the nest of red wool, his eyes closed, his neck raw, his mouth slightly open and his side moving up and down with shallow, rapid breaths. “His back leg is hurt,” she said softly.

  “Looks as though he’s in shock,” Alex said, untangling Liz’s feet from the rope. He stared hard at her tearstained face and added, “First things first. Are you okay? How about the baby?”

  “I feel okay. It doesn’t seem to have affected either one of us. I’ll go see my doctor, but not until after the cat is taken care of,” she added firmly as he helped her stand. “I’m fine, Sinbad isn’t.”

  There was no arguing with her and for that matter, she did look and act as though she’d survived everything very well. He’d keep a close eye on her for signs that an adrenaline rush wasn’t the only explanation for her current vigor. He helped her into his truck, then went inside and finally found her cell phone in her office, grabbed a thick blanket for Sinbad and hit the road. By the time they got to the vet’s office, everyone there was prepared for their arrival and Sinbad was whisked away like a patient in an emergency room, which was exactly what he was.

  Alex and Liz sat side by side on the green vinyl couch in the waiting room, and for the first time, Alex got a good look at his wife.

  Her hands were scratched and dirty, the nails broken, bits of weed and rock clung to her sleeves, dangled from her hair. Her gaze never left the door to the examination room.

  “He’s going to be fine,” Alex said, removing a piece of damp moss from her shoulder. “He’s young and healthy.”

  “Did you see his neck?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did he get tied up in that twine?”

  “What twine?”

  “There was twine around his neck, knotted twine.”

  Alex gently tugged a small twig from her hair, too stunned to speak. Liz studied his eyes, and then the ordeal finally seemed to hit her full force, and she dissolved into body-wracking sobs. He felt his rotting staircase theory crumble away. When the tears subsided, she began explaining the sequence of events that had preceded the catastrophe, and he felt an even greater surge of alarm.

  He had a million questions to ask her, starting with the window and ending with the stairs, but just then the door opened and their vet came into the waiting room. Alex had never seen a vet actually come out to talk to a patient’s owners. Was this good or bad? He mentally crossed his fingers, as much for Liz as for Sinbad, and took Liz’s cold hand into his.

  “How did this happen?” the vet asked. A sidelong glance at him suggested she’d seen last night’s newspaper and recognized him as the man with the hung jury, the man the police were determined to bring to justice. She wore a small pin on her smock engraved with the name, Victoria Kippling, DVM. She was almost as tall as Alex, slender and pretty with dark brown hair and eyes.

  “I don’t know,” Liz said. “I can’t figure out how he broke his leg and then ended up tied to a stair. Maybe he fell, but then that doesn’t explain the twine….”

  The vet shook her head. “He didn’t break his leg,” she said. “At least, I don’t think so.”

  “It’s not broken?”

  “Yes, it’s broken, but not in such a way that suggests he had much to do with it. The right femur suffered a point of impact fracture. There’s a lot of bruising. I can only think of one way that could have happened that wouldn’t have incurred additional injuries. If a dog had caught him, for instance, you’d expect to see puncture marks or if he got tangled in a machine, you’d find abrasions and cuts. With a car, his nails would be frayed. There was none of that.”

  Alex met her gaze. “So what do you think happened?”

  She stared right into his eyes and said, “Frankly, I suspect a human kicked him. I think they aimed at his hind quarters. The femur is tucked up right against the belly.”

  Her voice left little doubt about which human she thought capable of this deed. Liz gasped and Alex turned his attention to her. “It’s okay, honey. We’ll figure this out,” he assured her.

  “I hope you do,” the vet said.

  Alex was thinking fast and hard. If someone tied something around the cat’s neck to keep him from running away, then someone had staged this incident.

  “Sinbad must have fought like crazy to get free,” the vet continued. “It’s amazing he didn’t choke to death.”

  Liz’s eyes were wide with alarm. She leaned her head against Alex’s shoulder and he felt her tremble.

  “It’s okay,” he repeated into her soft hair.

  Liz said, “Is Sinbad going to make it?”

  Touching Liz’s arm, the vet said, “I’ve started him on antibiotics and sedated him. I’ve treated the gouges on his neck. He’s been X-rayed. After you leave, we’ll operate to set the bone and secure it with a pin. He’ll be kept
very still and warm. I’m cautiously optimistic at this point. Why don’t you call in the morning?”

  Liz dissolved into more tears. The vet let them go back and see Sinbad, which calmed Liz down. The cat’s side rose and fell slowly and if you didn’t look at the raw wound around his neck, he appeared to be sleeping peacefully.

  Alex felt his heart wrench at the brutality of the act that had been perpetuated on the little animal and worried sick about why it was done. What was to be gained but to get one of them to go down those stairs, and how could anyone have anticipated the stairs giving way unless they’d been rigged to do so? The evil behind such a plot was numbing. He could feel Kippling’s eyes on him, but he didn’t care. Let her think what she wanted. Finally, she moved closer and spoke so softly only Alex could hear her.

  “I’ll take good care of the cat,” she said. Nodding in Liz’s direction, she added, “You take good care of her.”

  “Do whatever you can to save Sinbad. He means the world to my wife.”

  The vet smiled. “About before, about the way I thought it might be you, I’m sorry. I was upset, but—”

  “Forget it.”

  The vet nodded, squeezed Liz’s hand and left. Soon after, Alex coaxed Liz away from Sinbad’s side. Within minutes, they pulled up in front of Liz’s doctor’s office. By the time they straggled home with a clean bill of health for Liz and the baby, it was dark.

  Alex unlocked the front door and a small card fell to the porch. He took it inside and checked it out. Liz was taking off her shoes by using the toe of one foot to dislodge the heel of the other, holding on to the door-jamb for balance. She looked at him curiously. “What’s that?”

  As he read, a cold spot formed in his chest. “Sheriff Kapp’s business card.”

  The look on her face caused the chilled spot to spread. He flipped the card over. “There’s a handwritten note on the back. Kapp says he’s sorry he missed you both times today. He asks that you call him tomorrow.”

  Liz swore under her breath.

  Flicking the card with a finger, he said, “You want to tell me what’s going on?”

  “Not particularly—”

  “Damn it Liz—”

  “Calm down. I’ll explain everything, just let me wash up first.”

  He looked at her bedraggled figure and concern for her well-being pushed aside some of his anger. “I’ll heat a can of soup while you shower,” he told her though his own stomach was now as twisted as a country road.

  She nodded and disappeared down the hall.

  Chapter Six

  Liz ate without appetite. The ordeal on the cliff followed by a hot shower had left her incredibly sleepy but she knew she owed Alex an explanation. Halfway through the clam chowder, she caught him staring at her. Might as well get it over with.

  “I was going to meet the sheriff here at the house,” she began, halfheartedly crumbling a cracker into her soup. “I didn’t tell you because I knew you’d come unglued. I can handle Roger Kapp and I can handle you but I don’t think anyone can handle you and Kapp at the same time. Certainly not me and certainly not in my condition. So I kind of lied about it. There, are you happy?”

  “I thought we agreed that you wouldn’t see Kapp alone,” Alex said, his voice a controlled slow burn.

  “No,” she said, setting aside her spoon. “That was your idea. I didn’t agree to it.”

  “But you didn’t disagree.”

  “Honestly, Alex—”

  “Because you almost died today, Liz. If I hadn’t come home—”

  “I know,” she snapped, and then softening her voice, added, “but that had nothing to do with meeting Roger.”

  “After what Dave told me about him—”

  “What? What did Dave tell you?”

  Alex stopped pacing long enough to look at her. “One of the guys walked in on Kapp and Chief Montgomery. He heard the chief accuse Kapp of blackmail.”

  She shrugged. “Maybe you and your friends are being too literal.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean maybe he used it as an expression. Maybe Kapp said something mildly annoying and the chief said, ‘Are you trying to blackmail me?’ Like that.”

  “Apparently their body language made it clear how serious Kapp took the accusation. I don’t think they were playing around. The point is, maybe he blackmailed your uncle, too.”

  “Oh.”

  “I wonder if that’s why your uncle backed Kapp during his campaign for sheriff. I could swear I recall him complaining about Kapp before and after he was elected but he sure was gung-ho for the guy during the campaign.”

  “You’re right. And now Roger is running for sheriff again and Uncle Devon is dead. What does that mean?”

  “Well, your uncle can’t hurt Kapp’s chances by endorsing someone else, that’s for sure. Tell me about the sheriff’s intended visit. Tell me how he arranged it and why he said he missed you twice today.”

  Doing her best to ignore the irritable edge in his voice, she told him about meeting Kapp outside the restaurant, about her frustration with Alex for refusing to ask anyone for help, about her certainty that Kapp wasn’t a crook and how he’d ultimately be interested in the truth. As she spoke, Alex looked at her like she was the most naive woman to ever walk the face of the earth. Maybe she was.

  Then she told him about the sheriff’s office rescheduling the appointment that day. The rest he knew.

  “So Kapp reschedules, thus making sure that you were away from the house. He uses that time to kidnap our cat. The stairs could have been rigged days ago.”

  “Then you didn’t leave the bathroom window open?”

  “No. I’ll check the outside tomorrow to see if I can tell if it was jimmied. Anyway, after Kapp kidnaps our cat and breaks Sinbad’s leg, he tampers with the stairs. Everyone knows what a softy you are for Sinbad. Then he pretends to be across town when he’s probably hiking back to his car—who’s to know where he really is? You come home, do exactly what he had planned, you die.”

  “Why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why does he want me dead? That doesn’t make any sense. And hiking around to his car seems dangerous—anyone could see him and how would he explain it?”

  Alex had plopped down on a chair by now and he ran a hand through his hair. He shook his head.

  “Suppose the sheriff is guilty of this crime,” she continued. “What if what he really wanted was for you to climb down the stairs instead of me?”

  “The only reason the man would want either one of us dead is to cover up his murder of your uncle and when he killed your uncle—”

  “If he killed my uncle—”

  “If he killed your uncle, he took pains to frame you. Remember the scarf.”

  Liz rubbed her eyes. “Maybe.”

  “I think the first step is for me to go down those stairs tomorrow morning and see if I can tell for sure if someone tampered with them.”

  “Isn’t it dangerous?”

  He grinned. “Probably. I’ll use my handy dandy rope. If the stairs have been messed with, then I guess you’re right, I guess we better tell the cops.”

  Liz said, “No.”

  Now he looked startled. “What?”

  “The sheriff tried to scare me by making me think you were after my uncle’s money and that you might try to hurt me. If he’s innocent, his first thought is going to be that you did this. If he’s guilty, then he’ll make sure it looks like you did it because right now, an attempted murder charge would be a nice way for him to get rid of you again.”

  “There’s your safety to consider,” he said firmly.

  “Let me win this one,” she said, rubbing her eyes again. The stress of the day was beginning to take its toll. “Promise me you won’t go down that cliff until I’m awake and can help you,” she said, rising.

  He stood as well and smiling, smoothed a lock of hair away from her face. “You look bushed.”

  “I am.”

 
“In the future, we have to work together, Liz. Everything depends on figuring this out and finding a way to prove it. When I think about what could have happened if I hadn’t gotten here in time—”

  She put her fingers against his lips. “But you did. You saved me.”

  He kissed her fingers and looked at her in such a way that she felt her insides melt. He’d always had a way with her and she was pretty sure he knew it. But he didn’t push his advantage and she was half relieved and half saddened.

  He said, “You resent my having saved you, don’t you?”

  “Don’t be crazy. If you hadn’t come along, I probably would have fallen and broken my neck. I can’t imagine what would have happened to our baby.”

  He nodded, but there was a look in his eyes she couldn’t identify.

  “I thanked you,” she said softly. “I meant it.”

  “I know you did. But part of you resents needing me.”

  Part of her was afraid that through no fault of his own, he wouldn’t be around to be needed, so maybe he was right, maybe part of her resisted becoming too dependent on him. She bit her lip.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I think I understand. But I’m not going away. Just remember that.”

  “It’s not that easy and you know it,” she said.

  He grinned the old Alex grin. “I know. Good night, try not to worry.”

  “What do I have to worry about? Almost dying today? Sinbad living through the night? Or maybe about which one of us is going to wind up in jail for killing my uncle?”

  He shook his head.

  Long after she’d slipped into bed, she heard him prowling the house, inside and out, checking windows and doors. His concern both frightened and comforted her. She fell asleep wishing he’d knock on her door, or maybe just break it down, wishing he’d demand she let him in, taking the decision to be wise and cautious away from her, putting her destiny in his hands where in her heart of hearts, she knew it belonged.