Equal Access

by A. E. Branson

  Paxton released a slow breath of relief. At least Dulsie’s condition wasn’t as bad as it could have been.

  “Sounds like he used a damn elephant gun,” Karl growled.

  The doctor shrugged. “We’ll turn over our findings to the police. I did want to find out, though, if any of you can tell me how long she’s been pregnant?”

  There was a split second of silence, and then all of them responded almost simultaneously “She’s pregnant?” The four members glanced around at each other as though trying to determine who among them had been keeping the secret.

  “I see.” The doctor made a note on the top paper on his clipboard. “I’ll presume from your reaction that she’s still very early in her term.”

  Maddie and Jill asked their questions in unison.

  “Will the baby be alright?”

  “Could this hurt the baby?”

  The doctor seemed to regard the two women a little warily before he responded. “That depends on a lot of factors. She did lose a lot of blood, but the female body is already hardwired to divert blood to the uterus during physical trauma. The fact it’s early in her term does give the pregnancy some advantage since it doesn’t need as many resources to sustain itself. But it’s too early for me to say for sure one way or the other.” He glanced at the clock on the wall. “Even after they wheel Dulsie into recovery, she might not awaken immediately when the anesthesia wears off. You folks should have time to go get a bite to eat or catch a little sleep or anything like that.”

  “I want to go there as soon as she gets to recovery,” Jill informed him.

  “Then we’ll make that arrangement.” The doctor nodded. “You folks take care.”

  Somewhat numbly, they thanked him as the doctor left, and then the four began to look at each other again.

  “Boy,” Karl muttered. “Dulsie could’ve come up with a less dramatic way of letting us know.”

  “My poor baby.” Jill seemed lost in her thoughts.

  Paxton looked at Maddie and she returned his gaze. He was glad this was one of those moments when neither of them needed to speak because their thoughts were as one. Maddie stepped toward Paxton to lean against his side and they wrapped their arms around each other. As they stood in silent embrace Paxton rested one cheek against Maddie’s head, and he contemplated what was supposed to be a joyous occurrence: Shad had given them another grandchild.

  But where was Shad?

  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 y
ear.

  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.