“We were lucky,” he said softly. He glanced at me then, his eyes full of pain. “I can’t lose Sam, too, Lucy.”
Ah, the heart of the matter.
“You won’t,” I said.
“Why is someone doing this?” he asked, anguished.
“I don’t know, but we’ll find out.” I cupped his chin. “We will find out.”
He nodded and rested his forehead on mine. “I’m sorry I worried you.”
“No more disappearing acts, okay?”
“Okay.”
“Promise.”
I felt his smile down to my soul. “I promise,” he said.
“Cross your heart.”
“Now you’re pushing it.”
I laughed and he kissed me. Heat spiraled through me, settling low in my stomach.
When we finally broke apart, he said, “Let’s go. I’ll make you dinner at my place and you can tell me all about this skateboarding incident of yours.”
I was about to explain to him the problem with his suggestion—that he didn’t have an apartment of his own any more—when my cell phone rang.
I glanced at the readout. Preston.
I wasn’t going to answer until Sean pointed out that she wouldn’t let me be until I did. Annie Hendrix had nothing on Preston when it came to persistence.
I was more than a little shocked when a man’s voice came over the line. “Lucy?” he said.
“Who’s this?”
“It’s Paul. Paul McDermott.”
Cranky Dr. Paul. Great. “Why are you using Preston’s phone?”
“She asked me to call you.”
“Why?”
He sighed. “It’s best if you just come down here.”
“Where?”
“The emergency room. There’s been...an incident.”
Chapter Thirteen
The hospital was located in Quincy, just south of the city. I found a parking spot in the visitor garage, and Sean pulled his car in to a spot nearby.
At first when Dr. Paul said Preston had been involved with an “incident,” my imagination had run wild with theories ranging from her breaking a patient out of the psych ward to her raiding the pharmacy. One never knew when Preston was involved.
But then he’d knocked the wind straight out of me by saying that Preston had collapsed and was currently in the ER having testing done.
My heart hammered as I threw the car into park and leapt out of my seat. Only when my foot hit the cement floor did I remember that I’d hurt it. My leg nearly buckled with the pain.
I swore a blue streak under my breath, inhaled deeply, and stumbled toward Sean’s Mustang. The oppressive heat settled over me like a wet blanket. The rain showers only increased the humidity in the air and hadn’t knocked down the temperature at all.
Sean cursed when he saw me limping so badly. “You’ll get that looked at while we’re here.”
It hadn’t been a suggestion. I brushed him off. “Em will look at it later.”
“Only if she’s here looking at it.”
I narrowed my eyes on him.
He tipped his head, his eyes daring me to argue.
It was hard to squabble when pain was shooting up my leg. “Then you’d better give her a call.”
He was nice enough not to gloat as he reached into the car and scooped out Thoreau. How we were going to sneak the dog into the hospital, I had no idea, but there was no way we were leaving him out here. Even with the windows down in the car, the temperatures would be unbearable within minutes.
“I called Andrew on the way over,” Sean said. “He’s coming by to pick up the company car and take Thoreau.”
“Take him where?” I asked, trying to ignore the pain in my foot.
However, it wouldn’t be ignored. In fact, it was screaming like a barely-dressed groupie at a rock concert.
Sean reached out and wrapped his arm around my waist. “Put your arm around my shoulder.”
“Bossy.” I barely managed to smile.
He kissed my temple. “Watch it, or I’ll let you go.”
“You’d never,” I countered.
Emotion clouded his eyes. “Not willingly, Lucy Valentine. Not willingly.”
“Good to know,” I said softly.
Warm lips pressed against my temple. “Andrew is taking Thoreau to Dovie’s.”
Dovie’s halfway house for the wayward.
Between Ebbie and Thoreau, she could open some sort of shelter. And although she loved animals, she was going to spin her good deeds into asking favors from us. Undoubtedly, she was going to ask, yet again, that I procreate. Immediately. She was relentless in her quest for a great-grandchild.
Sean and I made our way into the emergency room, and surprisingly no one blinked twice at my gimpiness or at the dog. The waiting area was crowded, nearly every seat taken. Young, old, wealthy, homeless. The emergency room was a great society equalizer.
Sean propped me against a wall, handed off Thoreau to me, and strolled up to a registration desk to a stoic-looking older woman.
Her take-no-prisoners look melted away the more Sean spoke to her. He wasn’t beyond using his charm to get what he wanted, and before I knew it he was leading me into a maze of trauma rooms.
“You have a way with older women,” I said, hobbling along. This wasn’t the first time he’d had a no-nonsense matronly type eating out of the palm of his hand. The last one was a librarian who hadn’t wanted to give me the time of day.
“You have your gifts, I have mine.”
“It’s the dimples,” I said. “Irresistible.”
He smiled, and the dimple in his right cheek popped. “You think so?”
“Put that thing away before the women in the geriatric ward swarm and carry you off.”
Laughing, he led me down another hallway, and I was amazed at how relaxed he appeared to be.
Sean hated hospitals with a burning passion. He’d spent so much time in one after his heart surgery that even the smell of rubbing alcohol sometimes brought out anxiety.
We dodged a man being wheeled toward the elevator, and I threw a glance at Sean. I knew well that appearances could be deceiving. Especially where Sean was concerned. He used to be able to hide his emotions from me easily. Not anymore. I now could see through all his shields, and it had nothing to do with being psychic and everything to do with being in love with him.
“Thanks for coming here with me,” I said.
“How could I not? It’s Preston,” he said simply.
Preston.
At some point over the last few months she went from being a thorn in my side to holding a piece of my heart. I wasn’t altogether sure how it had happened, especially since she was a pain in the ass, but there was just something so...lovable about her.
And apparently Sean thought so, too.
I loved him even more because of it.
“There,” Sean said, motioning with his jaw since his arms were full of hobbling woman and happy dog.
Dr. Paul stood outside a room reading a chart. He glanced up and his forehead wrinkled as he took in the sight of us.
His gaze dropped back to the chart. “I need a vacation,” he said, shaking his head.
“Preston has that effect on people,” I joked.
He didn’t even crack a smile. “She’s in there. Talk to her, will you?”
“About?” Sean asked.
Dr. Paul stared at Thoreau, opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again. Finally, he said, “She’s refusing treatment. Won’t even let a nurse put an IV in her arm.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Not sure.” He wiped his forehead with the palm of his hand. “One minute she’s interviewing one of my patients, the next she’s on the floor. Scared the hell out of the patient.”
“But not you?” I asked.
“People fall at my feet all the time,” he said, straight-faced.
I stared at him.
He cracked a smile. “I’m joking.”
“Ah,” I said.
Dr. Paul frowned. “Anyway, talk to her. People don’t usually collapse for no reason.”
He had a point.
“What’s with your foot?” he asked, bending down for a closer look.
“My shoe went one way, my foot another.”
Dr. Paul stood up and said, “The shoe won.”
Sean gave me a confused look. “I thought it was a skateboarding incident?”
“I was chasing the skateboarder,” I explained.
“I need more details, Lucy,” Sean said.
I thought about my missing wallet, and how Graham had seen my license with a bullseye on it. As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t keep information like that from Sean. If our roles were reversed I would want to know. However, now wasn’t the time or place to talk about it. “I’ll tell you later.”
Dr. Paul glanced at me, at Sean, at Thoreau, muttered, “Vacation,” and turned to walk away. His lab coat flapped as he turned a corner and disappeared.
Sean said, “Personable fellow.”
I smiled. “Tell me about it.”
I tapped on the closed door.
“Go away!” Preston shouted.
Talk about personable. “I think that means we can go in,” I said.
Sean agreed. I turned the handle and pushed the door open. Preston sat, fully dressed, on top of the bed, her arms crossed, her eyes blazing. Her gaze widened as we came in.
“Thank God you’re here. Now I can go.” She hopped off the bed.
“Whoa!” I said. “Slow down.”
“I promised creepy Dr. Paul that I would stay only until you showed up. You’re here. Let’s go.”
“Wait, wait. I need to sit down for a minute.” Sean helped me to a chair. I wished that I’d been faking my relief at sitting down, but it had been one hundred percent real. My foot was killing me.
Preston tapped her heel. “Okay? Can we go now?”
I leaned back in the chair. “Aren’t you even going to ask me what happened?”
“You can tell me in the car. Let’s go.”
“Actually,” Sean said, “We’re probably not leaving for a while. I need to call Em to come and take a look at Lucy’s foot.”
Preston paled. “You’re kidding.”
I unwrapped the bandage and winced at the sight. “Does that look like I’m kidding?”
For a brief second, sympathy flashed in her eyes. Then she held out her hand, palm up to Sean. “Give me your keys. I’ll come back for you.”
“Preston,” I said, “sit down. Tell me what happened.”
“What happened?” she echoed, gaping. “What happened? I’ll tell you what happened. Creepy Dr. Paul is trying to kill me. That’s what happened.”
Sean sat on the edge of the bed. He still cradled Thoreau, and if the smirk on his face was any indication, he was enjoying Preston’s theatrics a great deal.
“He said you passed out. Is that true?” I asked. I studied her closely and noticed she looked a little pale. No, not a little. A lot.
“Lucy, I swear he’s the angel of death or something. The Grim Reaper. Did you know he collects tiny skulls?”
“Real ones?” Sean asked.
“Porcelain, but still. That’s weird,” Preston said, her voice high. “You can’t tell me it’s not.”
It was a bit...odd. But Dr. Paul was a bit odd, so it didn’t seem so strange to me. Wisely, I kept my mouth shut about it though. Sometimes it was best just to let Preston get it all out of her system.
“He’s weird,” she rattled on. Pulling a small notebook from her pocket, she consulted her notes and added, “He has to wash his hands a certain way, he does this skip-walk thing that makes me nuts, he always takes the stairs. He won’t let his food touch; his favorite TV show is Dexter. And, even though he’s almost forty-five, he still lives with his mother.” Her bright eyes flashed between me and Sean. “The man is clearly a serial killer.”
“And you’ve clearly lost your mind,” I said.
Jabbing a finger on her notebook, she gaped at me. “Didn’t you hear a word I said?”
I needed to redirect her thoughts. “It makes for good fodder for your article, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, especially after the police dig up his basement and find dozens of bodies.”
“Preston...” I said.
“I have good instincts,” she insisted.
It was true, but I still wasn’t buying that Dr. Paul was the angel of death.
Sean said, “Which of the Whiners are you following tomorrow?”
Ah, I loved that man. He knew exactly how to divert Preston. Work.
“Graham,” she said. “And all week I’d been dreading it, because he’s kind of sleazy, but after today, Graham is looking pretty good. He doesn’t give me the serial killer vibe at all.”
“Good to know,” I said, adjusting my tote bag on my lap.
Preston glowered at me. “I don’t appreciate your sarcasm.”
Biting back another “Good to know,” I said, “Dr. Paul says you passed out? What happened?”
She paced. “He must have slipped me something. I don’t know when, because I haven’t had anything to eat or drink...”
“That could be the problem,” Sean said.
She spun on him. “Whose side are you on?”
His dimple popped. “How about I get you a snack?”
“How about no?” she countered.
Unfortunately for him, his dimples had no effect on her.
I took my cell phone out of my tote and started dialing.
“Who are you calling?” she asked.
“Cutter.”
She grabbed for my cell, but I pulled it out of her reach.
“Are you out of your mind?” she asked.
“Are you?” I said. “You passed out, Preston. And Dr. Paul is not trying to kill you. So that means something is wrong. Maybe it’s dehydration. Maybe it’s something else. We don’t know because you’re being irrational.”
She gasped. “Irrational? You did not just call me irrational.”
“And since you won’t listen to us, maybe you’ll listen to Cutter.”
“Do not call him about this,” she warned.
“Then sit your skinny little self on that bed and let Sean get you something to eat and drink.” I’d push for some blood work in a little bit.
Brows furrowed, she folded her arms. Stubbornly, she stood firm.
I continued to dial.
“Fine!” She stomped to the bed and sat next to Sean. Thoreau licked her arm.
I casually put my phone away.
As Sean headed out to find sustenance for Preston, she said, “That was low, Lucy Valentine. Low.”
“He’d want to know that you’re not feeling well.”
“Whatever,” she huffed.
I eyed her carefully. “Is something going on with you two?”
She shook her head.
“Preston? Is there?”
When she glanced at me, I was surprised to see a shimmer of tears in her eyes. “I—”
Just then a nurse rolled a wheelchair into the room. “Lucy Valentine?”
“Yes?”
“Hop in.”
“I don’t understand,” I said.
The nurse wheeled the chair closer to me. “Dr. McDermott ordered x-rays for your foot.” She handed me a clipboard. “I also need some information from you.”
“There’s been a mistake. This can wait,” I said. “I’m fine.”
She stared at my foot. “I don’t think so.”
“Really, it can.”
“Doctor’s orders,” the nurse said firmly.
“Maybe I could have a word with Dr. Paul?”
“He said he’d meet you in radiology.”
“I don’t thi—”
“Now Lucy,” Preston interrupted, “don’t be irrational.”
I threw daggers at her.
She grinned at me.
“Fine,” I said
through clenched teeth. “But just to prove a point to you.” I slid into the wheelchair and was suddenly feeling a little anxious. Preston usually had good instincts about people. Maybe it would be a good idea to have someone with me. “Preston, why don’t you come along?”
“Uh-uhn. No way. You’re on your own.”
I clutched my tote for dear life. “Well, you’d better be here when I get back.”
She continued to smile. “If Dr. Paul wants to order your favorite food and call your family, make a run for it. Oh, wait. You probably can’t run with that injury... I’ll give you a good eulogy, I promise.”
I groaned as her laughter followed me down the hallway.
Chapter Fourteen
The dimly-lit radiology room was freezing.
My teeth were starting to chatter as I sat atop a table and waited for someone. Anyone. When I couldn’t provide proof of insurance, the technician had disappeared. And Dr. Paul had yet to show up.
So I was alone.
Surrounded by humming machinery.
I wanted to jump up and turn on all the lights, but I didn’t see any light switches. The room was darkened, and the arms of the machines threw shadows on the walls.
It was eerie, and I was trying not to get creeped out.
Glancing around, I tried to occupy my mind with something else. Anything else.
I tried concentrating on Preston, and what was going on with her and Cutter, but as I sat here in all this eerie wonder, all I could picture was my driver’s license with a big red bullseye on it.
I shuddered and thought about making a run—well, a limp—for it when my phone rang.
Glancing around, I looked for any signage that said I couldn’t use it, and didn’t see any. Pulling my phone from my tote, I had to smile when I saw the Caller ID.
Suz.
“Let me guess,” I said after I answered. “Annie Hendrix is flooding our office voicemail.”
“What on earth happened, Lucy? She’s in hysterics. She’s left dozens of messages ranging from teary apologies to cussing you out. All usually end with her begging you to call her back.”
“You might want to shut off the voicemail system,” I said.
“Are you kidding? Her calls are pure entertainment. I’m thinking about putting them on YouTube. Can I?”
“No.”
“You’re no fun.”
Perfectly Matched Page 10
