Loving the Texas Lawman_A Texas Lawman Romantic Suspense

by Mary Connealy

  “That’s a fact,” Tru said with a glum shake of her head. She lifted her hand to her cheek.

  “Do you have aspirin or something, Eleanor? Tru has a headache.”

  “He calls you Tru-Blue?” Eleanor asked. “And you’re okay with that?”

  “How do you know I have a headache?” Tru turned her narrow eyes at him and shot him with a quiver full of blue arrows. “I haven’t complained.”

  “You got smacked in the side of the head and you’re bleeding. I guessed.”

  Eleanor frowned at her boss. “I’ll be back in a minute with something to clean up that scrape and some ibuprofen.”

  “This ice bag isn’t cold anymore, can you bring more?” Ben asked.

  “Yes.” Eleanor studied Tru, frowning. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”

  “I’m fine. Just shaken up.”

  “Would you answer the same if the policeman weren’t here? I can toss him out if you want.”

  “Good luck with that.” Ben grinned at Eleanor as he imagined the stout little lady ejecting him. He didn’t underestimate her.

  Eleanor shook her head. “I don’t think it’ll be necessary. Take her through there and get her settled.” She pointed at the third door on the left, then nailed Tru with a scowl. “And when I get back, you two are telling me everything.”

  Eleanor steamrolled down the hall in a huff.

  Ben guided Tru into a room that was bigger than his house, although if he included his tiny fenced yard, he thought he had her beat.

  “We’ll tell her everything except why you’re calling me by that ridiculous nickname.” Tru sank onto the couch.

  “It just rolls off the tongue. Your idealistic books, the classes you teach at Bella Vista, your kind treatment of everyone…” Ben paused for a moment. “…except me. Your bruised, bleeding cheek from where you turned it. You are Tru-Blue. You put your money where your mouth is, Doc, which is dumb but honorable. I admire that.”

  “You admire that I’m dumb?”

  “I didn’t say that, exactly,” Ben protested, pretty sure he’d said exactly that. And he wasn’t going to take it back neither. Not until Tru toughened up.

  Eleanor bustled in, pills and a bottle of Evian in one hand and a small first aid kit in the other. She handed the medicine to Tru while she broke the seal on the bottle of water.

  Ben watched Tru read the medicine bottle, shake her head, and set the small container on a side table.

  “No, Eleanor, not these.”

  “They’ll help. Take them just this once.”

  Ben had a vision of a domineering, Svengali-like housekeeper, feeding drugs to poor little Dr. Jennings. Eleanor didn’t look the part but, as a cop, suspicion came naturally to him. Or maybe he was just a snoop.

  “No, I don’t want to start that.”

  “This isn’t starting anything. It’s late. You’re hurt. This will help.”

  He picked up the bottle of pills.

  “Hey.” She grabbed for the bottle. Ben had pleasant visions of her wrestling with him again. He held onto the pills.

  “Ibuprofen P.M.?” He pried open the lid. The tablets inside were what the label said they were. He looked between Eleanor and Tru. “Not exactly crack cocaine, so what’s the problem?”

  “I have a little problem with insomnia.” Tru said as if it hurt to admit it.

  “And these help?” Ben asked.

  “Not really.” She snagged the bottle back while he was distracted.

  Eleanor wet a fluffy white wash cloth with Evian and gently dabbed Tru’s battered face. “They might. You’ve never tried them.”

  “So the rich wash their cuts and scrapes with Evian.” He winced every time the housekeeper touched the wound.

  Tru glared at him.

  As she fussed over Tru, Eleanor added, “Give them a chance tonight. It’s late and you’re tired. You’ve had a shock. If you get wound up from this, like you do sometimes in the night, you might never get to sleep.”

  “I don’t want to depend on medication. It worries me.”

  “It’s not habit forming.” Eleanor soothed some antibiotic cream on Tru’s scrapes. “It says so right on the bottle. I think there are laws that say they can’t lie about those things.”

  “How can it not be habit forming? If it works, I’ll need them every night. That’s a habit.”

  “It’s not like you’ll go into withdrawal if you quit taking them. You’ll just lay awake—just like you do now. How would you ever know you’d become dependent?” Eleanor clucked as she frowned over Tru’s cheek.

  “It’s a crutch.” Tru’s pout came close to resembling a petulant two-year-old. Ben bit back a grin.

  “I promise I’ll drive you to the Betty Ford clinic myself if there’s trouble.” Eleanor studied Tru’s wound with an intensity worthy of an ER nurse. “Give them a chance.”

  “Take the pills, Tru-Blue.” Ben handed her the water. “You can always go on the wagon tomorrow. For now, it’ll take some of the swelling out of your cheek.”

  Eleanor pulled out her own instant ice bag, crushed it between her hands, wrapped it in a small towel, then pressed it gently to Tru’s cheek. Tru held it. Eleanor backed up and seemed satisfied with her nursing. She sniffed at Tru and gave Ben a ‘thank you’ smile. “I have some decaf coffee in the kitchen, Mr…?”

  “Detective. Ben Garrison. I’m a homicide detective with Long Pine PD.”

  “Homicide.” Eleanor’s hand went to her throat.

  “He’s a student in my class, Eleanor. There is no homicide in any way connected with this mess. I got pushed around a little by a man after class…”

  “A lunatic shoved her against the Psycho building.” Ben gave Tru his best gunslinger look.

  She didn’t flinch. “The man caught my arm to get my attention.”

  “He tried to kidnap her,” Ben added.

  “He begged me to go with him,” Tru insisted.

  “He grabbed her hair and ripped out a handful.” Ben pushed Tru’s disheveled hair back from the scrape on her cheek.

  She jerked her head away and grimaced. “He tried to make me listen to him.”

  “He smacked her face against a brick building…” Ben turned to Eleanor.

  “I misunderstood his intentions.” Tru caught her housekeeper’s arm. “I struggled and injured myself in the course of trying to get away.”

  “Injured yourself?” Ben shouted. He fought to remain calm. “He was going to take her with him, who knows where.”

  Eleanor gasped.

  “We weren’t going to upset her, Ben.” Tru dumped two pills into her hand and swallowed them like she was a starving African villager.

  Ben wondered how bad her head hurt. He regretted that he was probably making it worse. “We were absolutely going to upset her. I distinctly remember deciding to upset her.”

  “No, you were going to worry me.” Eleanor looked upset and worried. “But upsetting me is fine, too. Go ahead, Detective Garrison.”

  “It’s Ben.”

  Eleanor nodded.

  “Psycho Building?” Tru asked. She drank a few delicate sips of the Evian. “You mean the Psych Building?”

  Ben ignored her. He hadn’t meant to use his private nickname for the Gehring Building. Of course, she’d slipped up with Koffman, so he owed her.

  “After I dragged him off of Tru, the man claimed he wanted her help to reconcile with his wife. He’d approached her before, and he wasn’t satisfied when she referred him to another doctor. He admitted he was abusive.”

  “Dragged him off of her?” Eleanor rested her hand on Tru’s shoulder. “Trudy, I want to hear every word, right now.”

  “You’ve already heard every word, plus a bunch of stuff Ben is making up.”

  “It’s true and you know it.”

  “He didn’t admit to abusing his wife.”

  “He didn’t deny it when you accused him of it.” Ben looked at Eleanor. “That’s the kind of thing I’d deny in a heartbeat if some
one accused me of doing it. Tru refused to work with him and offered him a colleague’s name.”

  “Poor Dr. Pavil,” Eleanor said. “You do keep that man busy.”

  Tru sank against the back of the couch. Ben was on his feet, ready to scoop her up and head for the hospital.

  “Knock it off.” She waved him back. “I’m just tired.”

  “Maybe the pills are kicking in already. I’d better go. I’ll run Watson’s name through NCIC, to see if he has a criminal history.”

  “Leave the poor man alone. Let Dr. Pavil help him.”

  Watson was beyond help and anyone with half a brain could see that. Ben shook his head. An idealist. Nothing more annoying. “You’ll check on her every two hours, all night, Eleanor?”

  “I don’t expect you to stay up all night watching me,” Tru insisted.

  “Every two hours,” Eleanor said. “Done.”

  “I don’t think she has a concussion, but she took quite a hit, so we’d better be on the safe side.”

  “Don’t talk about me as if I’m not here.”

  “If you can’t wake her,” Ben told Eleanor, “call an ambulance.”

  “There will be no 911 calls from this house for a scratch.” Trudy insisted.

  “An ambulance,” Eleanor listened with the kind of concentration most people reserved for memorizing scripture. “Absolutely.”

  Ben smiled down at Tru.

  She glared up at him. “You’re obsessed with ambulances.”

  Ben jerked his shoulder in a tiny shrug. “I’ve been accused of worse. What time do you have to be at the college in the morning?”

  “Nine.” She tried to sit up.

  Ben knew he had to leave. She needed rest. Insomnia? He hoped she could sleep. “I’ll be here at eight-thirty.”

  “Why?” She sat straighter, her eyes narrowed.

  “You need a ride to work.”

  “I’ll call a taxi.” She stood and braced herself against the couch’s overstuffed arm.

  Ben studied her and decided she was handling herself all right. “I’ll be here at eight-thirty. I’m not letting you ride in a taxi until I’ve run a check on this nut case.”

  “He is not a nut case.”

  “I’m the reason—,” he cut her off. “You don’t have your car. Indulge me. I need to talk to campus security anyway.”

  “What about?”

  “And you’re not to be alone in that building late at night.” He headed toward the door, hoping to escape before she could say…

  “I’ll get to work myself, Detective Garrison.”

  “Eleanor, have her ready. I’m a busy man.” Ben grabbed the handle of the frivolous, unsafe door and hustled to escape before he could be privy to any more of Tru’s stubborn ideas about how she should conduct her life.

  He jogged down her four perfect stone steps. He wheeled his black truck around her perfectly circular driveway, and headed toward her wrought iron fence. It magically opened for him. Or maybe Eleanor pushed a button in the house. Either way, it was all perfect. Too perfect.

  On his way home, he swung into a Wal-Mart and walked around until he remembered how real people lived.

  He pushed a shopping cart, hunting for pork rinds and generic shampoo as he mulled over what was so fascinating about Tru Jennings.

  Sure, she was pretty—a special kind of pretty that tapped into all his protective instincts.

  Sure, she smelled great. It lured him, made him want to be close to her so he could smell her again.

  Sure, she was vulnerable and that called out to him. He was a cop, and she was in danger.

  She was an optimist, and had awakened the idealist in him that he’d buried long ago. He’d joined the force to serve and protect, to fight for truth, justice, and the American Way.

  No, wait…that was why he’d wanted to be Superman when he was six.

  When he’d joined the force, he’d wanted to save every troubled person he met. The years had passed and he’d grown up and exchanged idealism for common sense. He’d figured it was a trade up.

  Tru had a long way to go.

  If there was a balance scale functioning in his head, Tru would come out as a lost cause.

  TSTL. Too Stupid To Love.

  5

  TSTL

  Trudy lay awake and fumed. That overbearing Detective Ben Koffman.

  Too Stupid To Live.

  She tried to put him out of her mind by staring at the Monet prints on her bedroom wall. She’d decorated the wall for sleepless nights like this, with a low wattage light within easy reach that shined on the delicate watercolor impressions of garden flowers.

  A floral cloth that matched the Monet draped the huge bedroom window that showcased a spectacular view. Straw flower wreaths bursting with soft pastels and rough earthy texture brought out the same gentle colors.

  It was only for her. Only to please her burning eyes when they would not close.

  She did deep breathing exercises and prayed. No closer to sleep, she opened the window to invite the night breeze, to lull her to sleep.

  But tonight, the sights and sounds did nothing to soothe or entice sleep to overtake her.

  So, she played her word games and when her mind wandered from them, she outlined chapters for future books. This usually worked, but not tonight.

  Memories of Watson’s savage grip on her arms and his rabid hysteria twisted her stomach. Common sense told her she’d made a mistake not pressing charges. Ben was right: at least there would have been a record of his abuse. If something else happened, the police would look closer.

  Trudy shuddered when she imagined ‘something else.’

  Twice, she decided to tell Ben she’d changed her mind about pressing charges. Twice, she heard Watson’s sincere regret and decided to forget the whole thing.

  Or she would have, but for the nagging fear that he’d be back.

  Trudy pushed back the covers and got up. She felt fuzzy from the sleep aid she’d taken. Instead of putting her to sleep, it merely made her stupid.

  So, she decided it was the perfect night to start her new book on bullies.

  What better condition to be in to write about bullies than when she was loopy on pain and sleep medication, and in pain from being pushed around by one?

  Tru Intervention: Bullies.

  She could hear the screams now from the psychiatric community. But she could also hear the applause from the common folks. It was her knack for throwing conventional wisdom out the window and replacing it with a Christian approach, cloaked in psychological terms, that had catapulted her modest works into bestsellers.

  Trudy wanted to apply her pacifist philosophy to children who were bullies. Many of them acted out the lack of love they received at home. She hoped her turn-the-other-cheek ideas would change hearts all across the school yards of America. But before her ideas did that, there would be the usual screams of protest.

  Trudy smiled as she imagined the indignation among psychiatrists, most of whom preferred a mental health label, medication, and years of talk therapy, which guaranteed a six-figure income.

  She walked to the laptop on the desk in her bedroom and tapped the keypad. The black screen dissolved into bright blue. She left the room lights off, except for the spotlight on her Monets. The darkness gave her a feeling of intimacy with her subject. She could write her private thoughts into the book, her beliefs in the perfect truth of the Bible, her dreams of a loving world.

  Writing energized her. Once started, she’d face at least another two hours of sleeplessness, which meant a three o’clock bedtime.

  She’d been tired before; she’d be tired again. She needed to write a book about how overrated sleep was.

  Of course, she’d been thinking that for years, but she was always too tired to write it.

  Before she opened the new file for the book, she checked her e-mail. She deleted the Viagra ads, the offers to see famous people naked, and the second mortgage pitches.

  Next, she read her
fan mail. Most of it convinced her she was doing the right thing. She touched the screen as she read one poignant letter that talked about her book planting seeds that had blossomed into a brand new faith in Jesus Christ. Letters like this made everything—the critics, the sleepless nights, the pressure of fame—worthwhile.

  A chill ran up her spine when she saw the subject line of the next e-mail: Give me what I want.

  She quickly deleted it. The next one popped open when the one she deleted disappeared.

  “Give me what I want, or I’ll take it.”

  She’d been deleting the same e-mail for a month. She got her share of fruitcakes, no big deal. But she’d received letters saying the same cryptic sentence, and had told her personal assistant Liz to toss them. As she deleted the e-mails without opening them, her skin prickled and bumps rose on her arms. It sounded familiar.

  She closed her eyes. She could see Watson’s face, pressed close to hers. She could smell his breath, hear his whispered words in her ear: ‘Give me what I want, or I’ll take it.’

  Had he said those exact words?

  The darkened room had been serene a moment ago, now danger lurked in its dark corners. The soft wreaths on the wall transformed into huge eyes watching her. The draped fabric on her windows, her closet, her ruffled bed skirt, all became hiding places.

  Trudy trembled deep inside at the memory of those terrifying moments with Watson.

  She should have let Ben call the police.

  No, Watson was distraught, desperate. He needed her help. All the damage had been caused by her struggles against him.

  Her hand strayed to her arms. She could feel the welts from his crushing fingers. She looked at the menacing e-mail.

  Was her advice naïve? Did only a fool not fear evil? Did only a fool turn the other cheek? In the sinister gloom, Trudy decided God could warn of danger. To ignore fear was an act of unfaithfulness.

  “I’ll ask Ben about it tomorrow.” She printed out the e-mail.

  She replied to the people who talked about the changes in their lives since they’d read her book. By the time she finished, she’d shaken off the fear of those odd e-mails.

  Then she spent a long time in prayer. Centered in her faith and sure of her message, she began to type, secure in her belief that God would approve.