by Lisa Bingham
P.D. slowly moved to the side of the dance floor, feeling a wave of exhaustion wash over her. For days now, she’d demanded more of herself physically than she’d done in years. Even the mental strain of deciphering clues and mapping out strategies had been taxing. She’d eaten whatever had been available and slept the bare minimum to keep going. Now that the contest was all but over, her strength was draining away like air out of a leaky balloon.
Suddenly, she became aware of every battered inch of her body. Her shoes rubbed in all the wrong places, the bruise on her back throbbed, and what little food she’d eaten sat in her stomach like a lump. Even worse, her corset felt far too constrictive, making it impossible to drag a full breath into her lungs.
Geez. Was that why the heroines in her beloved historicals were always fainting? Because they had someone like Helen gleefully yanking on their corset strings so they could fit into their clothes?
P.D. pressed a hand to her aching ribs and searched the shadows. Despite the fact that she’d hardly danced, her heart was beating quickly and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath.
Her gaze automatically surveyed the crowd. She wasn’t sure when the costume judges were supposed to observe them, but surely she could go somewhere on the outskirts and gulp some air into her lungs.
*
ELAM and his brothers jumped when Barry dropped a jagged rock onto the table.
“Can we open my present now? P.D. said we could hit it with this.”
Elam’s gaze bounced from the rock, to his little brother, to the room beyond.
“Where’s P.D.?”
“Outside. She said she’d be here in a minute.”
Unaccountably, Elam felt a prickling of unease. The competition might be in its last stages—and P.D. might be surrounded by people—but after everything that had happened …
“I’ll just go get her,” he said, pushing to his feet.
Bodey stopped him with a hand on his arm. “You’re the ‘jode’ expert. You help Barry; I’ll get P.D.”
Elam wanted to argue, but since Barry was eagerly watching him, he motioned for his little brother to follow him. “We’d better do this outside or the hotel people might have a coronary,” he said. “You take the geode, I’ll bring the bigger rock.” He pointed to a side door where there weren’t as many people. “We’ll go out there.”
Barry scooped up his rock and hop-skipped toward the door, the tail of his coonskin cap bouncing behind him.
Elam grunted as he hefted the boulder Barry had chosen. Clearly, it would do the job as well as a hammer.
Jace joined him, his ambling strides eating up the distance.
“You look good, Elam,” he said as they wound through the tables.
Elam’s brows rose. “What? You thought I couldn’t handle the competition?”
“No. I knew you’d be in your element.”
When he didn’t continue, Elam prompted, “But …”
“But I didn’t know if you were ready for … spending that much time alone with a woman who wasn’t Annabel.”
Trust Jace to lay it all on the line. Anyone else would tap dance around their concerns. But Jace, who was a man of few words, tended to make every conversation count.
“She’s a keeper,” Jace said after a beat of silence. “So don’t screw this up.”
Bam! Had he just been schooled by Jace of all people?
But before he could respond, Barry stopped at the sidewalk on the other side of the door. He was bouncing up and down in excitement. “Do it, Elam. Crack it open!”
“We need to wait for P.D.”
As if summoned, Bodey appeared. “I couldn’t find her. Helen went to see if she’s in the ladies’ room.”
Knowing that Barry was about to explode, Elam motioned for him to put his rock on the ground. “Stand back.”
Crouching beside the geode, Elam experimentally tapped it with the heavy rock without much effect.
“It didn’t work, Elam.”
“That was just a practice shot, Barry.”
“Give it all you got, Elam!”
This time, Elam allowed the rock to fall on it full force and they were rewarded with a sharp crack. When he lifted the boulder out of the way, Barry’s geode lay on the ground in two halves. Inside the gray, nondescript outer stone was a glittering inner landscape of jagged crystals in shades of violet, lavender, and white.
“Wow!” Barry said reverently, kneeling to pick up the two halves. “How did you know this was in here, Elam?”
“I was about your age when Dad showed me what to look for. He told me that people were about the same as this rock. They might look hard or plain on the outside, but inside, there’s always something wonderful.”
Barry held the halves, one in each hand, then extended one of them toward Elam. “You need this half to help you ’member. ’Cause for a while, you’ve been kind of scary on the outside. But now you’re my brother again.” He jumped to his feet and said, “I’m going to go show Syd.”
Then, he was gone, leaving Elam shaken to the core.
It seemed that the last few days he was getting a healthy dose of tough love—first with P.D., who’d let him know he needed to communicate more, then Jace, and now Barry.
When he looked up, he found Bodey with his mouth open, clearly ready to add his two cents.
“Shut up,” Elam said with a warning finger. “I get it already. I’ve been a bastard lately and I’m working my way out of it, okay? Yes, this whole arrangement with P.D. has been the catalyst, so thank you, Bodey, for breaking your ankle and setting us up. But from here on out, I’m going to go about things my own way. And no, I don’t plan on doing anything to screw things up,” he added, directing that comment to Jace. “Thankfully, I’m not so stupid that I don’t know how great she is and how much she’s grown to mean to me. So back off a little bit and let us get to know each other, okay?”
Bodey grinned openly while Jace’s lips twitched in silent satisfaction.
“Why don’t you two clean up this mess while I go find P.D. so we can dance again?” Elam deftly suggested, slapping the geode into Bodey’s hand. “Keep this for me, so I can hold my girl.”
*
P.D. followed the path that wound away from the carriage house. There, she found a spot where a small bridge spanned a fish pond full of exotically colored koi. Resting her hands on the railing, she closed her eyes and counted one, two, three … hoping that her quick, shallow breaths would help to ease the aches and pains that threatened to take root and spoil her evening. But with the tightness of the boning, her heart continued to flutter against the stricture of her corset as if it were a bird throwing itself against a pane of glass.
“P.D.!”
For a flashing instant, she thought it was Elam who had come to find her. But when she turned, she found Eddie Bascom, one of her former employees.
P.D. stared at him uncomprehendingly. It seemed as if a lifetime had passed since she’d become aware of a serious shortage of beef in the freezer. Had it only been a week or two since her manager, Bart Crowley, had proved it was Eddie who’d been stealing the meat, and P.D. had fired the young man?
“P.D., I didn’t do it, I swear.”
She lifted a hand to rub at the headache forming between her eyes.
“Eddie, we’ve been through all—”
“Why won’t you listen to me?” he shouted, his hands balled into fists. “Damnit, I need that job!”
“Is that why you took a tire iron to my Dumpster?”
He swore and visibly tried to calm himself. “That was a mistake. I—I was angry and …”
Eddie’s hands were still tight with rage and P.D. edged to the side so that she wouldn’t be pinned with her back to the railing.
“Look, I just found out my girlfriend was pregnant. I need that job so we can move in together and start saving for the baby and—”
“And you decided stealing was the best answer?”
“No! You’re twisting things
around.”
“I’m not twisting anything, Eddie, and I’m not going to talk to you about this. Your job has already been given to another person.”
“Damnit!” he shouted so loudly that P.D. jumped. “It’s not fair! You’ve got to hear my side of things!”
“No.” She began to back off the bridge. “I’ve already made my decision, and unless you want me to press charges, you’ll leave me alone from now on. And I’d better not see you anywhere near Vern’s either.”
Before Eddie could respond, she picked up her skirts and ran back toward the carriage house. Her heart was pounding now, and she could feel herself shaking from the confrontation. More than anything, she wanted to escape the Games—this party, these clothes—and return home to jeans and T-shirts, cupboards stocked with real food, and a familiar bed. She wanted her life to become normal again. Even if she wasn’t quite sure what “normal” had ever been.
She was just reaching the warm glow of the dance floor when she saw Elam stepping out of the carriage house. He was scouring the couples circling the polished boards when the band segued from a rousing swing number to a slower ballad. And to her horror, P.D. recognized the opening words.
Annabel, oh, Annabel. What I’d give for one more day …
No, please, no. After everything that had happened between her and Elam, she didn’t want him to be reminded of Annabel. Not now. Not when he’d pushed his grief to the side.
She tried to move toward him, but there seemed to be hundreds of people in the way. With the onset of a slower song, more dancers were joining the floor and the area had grown crowded. Turning the opposite way, P.D. tried to skirt the dance floor altogether. That way, she could circle back around to the carriage house.
She took a side path around a decorative clump of bushes. But just as she was out of sight of the dance floor, from the corner of her eye, she saw a figure trying to head her off. P.D. had only a moment to realize that he was striding purposefully toward her, his eyes narrowed, his arm raising. There was the glint of moonlight on the barrel of a revolver. She heard the explosion, saw the flash of muzzle fire.
Then her legs buckled and she fell hard, blackness swamping her.
TWENTY
ELAM saw the flash of P.D.’s skirts as she tried to get through the crowd—saw her dodge around a mound of pine trees and clumps of flowering bushes—and he knew immediately what she’d assumed. Only a week ago, the same song had brought him to his knees, drowning him in a tidal wave of memories. But this time, he’d barely noticed what the band had been playing. He’d been too busy looking for P.D.
If he’d learned anything since meeting P.D, it was that he had the strength to come to terms with the death of his wife. Although the past would always be with him—and his love for Annabel would be a part of it—he’d discovered that the heart was a powerful organ, one capable of stretching and redefining its capacity for giving. He would always love Annabel. His romance with P.D. didn’t diminish what he’d had with his wife; it merely added a new dimension to his present capacity for loving.
The feelings he had for P.D. were different.
And the same.
Weaving between the other couples, Elam headed in her direction, wanting to reassure her. But in that instant, when he heard the shot and saw her fall—then watched a figure fleeing into the darkness—Elam’s whole world collapsed around him.
“No. No, no, no!” he shouted, racing to P.D. Turning her over, he was horrified to see a gaping wound in her side. Blood was pouring from the spot, soaking into the fabric of her dress.
Laying her down, Elam stripped off his frock coat and wadded it into a ball, pressing it tightly against the injury.
“I need some help here!” he shouted. “Someone call 911!”
Attracted by the gunshot and his calls, several people ran toward him. A woman in a bustle and cape pulled a cell phone from her reticule and began dialing. More and more people were rushing out of the carriage house, the wind carrying snatches of conversation Elam’s way.
“Has she been shot?”
“What the hell!”
“Who would do such a thing?”
Elam raised one bloodied hand to point to the trees. “He ran off that way.”
Several men dodged in that direction.
Thankfully, Elam saw Jace break loose from the onlookers and race toward him.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Someone shot her.”
Jace offered a blazing epithet. “Who?”
“I don’t know. I couldn’t see who it was in the dark.”
P.D. was growing pale, her lashes dusky shadows against her cheek.
“An ambulance is on its way,” the woman in the bustle gasped as she approached. “I’ve told them to send the police as well.”
“Good.” Jace gestured to the main building of the hotel. “Can you see if they can get us some blankets and extra pillows? We need to get her feet up.”
The woman nodded, running to do as she’d been asked.
“Oh, my Lord!”
Elam looked up to see Helen breaking through the crowd. When he saw her panicked expression, his heart turned over in his chest. Her shock, more than anything, conveyed the seriousness of P.D’s condition.
It took an eternity before the distant sirens could be heard bouncing off the canyon walls. And where time had at first been so slow, it now adopted the speed of light as the EMTs cut P.D. out of her restrictive clothing, fastened her to a gurney, then sped off into the night.
Leaving Elam standing alone and dazed, feeling as if they’d whisked away his only chance at happiness.
He felt Bodey grasp his shoulder.
“Jace went with them?”
Elam managed to nod. “He … uh … he could do more for her than I could.”
“Where are the keys to your truck? We need to follow them.”
But Elam couldn’t move. He could only stare down at his hands.
So much blood.
P.D.’s blood.
Bodey shook him. Hard.
“Elam?”
Images flashed through Elam’s head. A missile exploding in a ball of light and sound. His buddies writhing on the ground. His wife pale and small in her casket.
God.
God.
“Elam!”
He finally became aware of Bodey holding him by the shoulders, staring at him, a muscle working in his jaw. “She’s going to be all right, you hear me?”
But she wasn’t all right. She was badly hurt. Bleeding.
Realization hit him like a lightning bolt. All week, he’d been so sure that he could never fully commit to another woman, that he’d been willing to throw away a good portion of the here and now. He’d held himself back. Not physically, but emotionally. He’d been willing to show P.D. how much she turned him on, but just as she’d accused, he hadn’t fully conveyed to her how he felt. He’d never admitted how her smile warmed him from the inside out, how her unabashed desire made him seem all but invincible …
How she’d brought him back to life again and shown him he could still care deeply for a woman.
In a blinding flash, Elam realized that lightning could strike a person twice. Sure, he’d only known P.D. a short time. But even in that short time, he knew that his feelings for Prairie Dawn weren’t superficial—and they weren’t a product of the Games. He wanted to get to know this woman, really know her. He wanted to spend time with her, learn what made her laugh, what made her cry. He wanted to wallow in the brilliance of her smile and explore the wild abandon of her lovemaking. He wanted more time with her—as much as she was willing to give him. He wanted …
P.D.
And she needed to know that.
Hell, with what little she’d told him about her childhood, she probably needed the words more than anything.
Spurred into action, he backed away from Bodey, heading toward his room. “I’ll drive to the hospital in my truck and meet up with P.D. But I need you to stop by
my house and do a few things for me. Please. It’s important.”
Bodey’s brows creased in confusion, but he quickly followed. “Sure. What do you need?”
*
ELAM paced the confines of the emergency waiting room like a caged mountain lion. The walls were closing in on him—and more than anything, he wanted to burst out of the beige waiting room into the beige hall beyond and tear aside every beige curtain until he found which one hid P.D. from his sight.
Within minutes of arriving, he’d discovered that since he was not a relative or a spouse, no one would tell him anything. He’d tried to explain that P.D. had no family nearby—that they were in a relationship with each other. But that didn’t seem to sway the hawkeyed nurse who stood guard at the main desk. A huge red sign on the wall behind her proclaimed, NO ADMITTANCE WITHOUT PROPER AUTHORIZATION.
The outside door burst open and Bodey stormed in. “Any word?”
Elam shook his head. Belatedly, he realized that he was still wearing his bloodstained period attire. No wonder the nurse thought he was a crackpot.
“Where’s Barry?”
“Helen and Syd volunteered to take him to the Big House and keep him entertained until one of us can get back. He’s pretty upset. He keeps saying something about buddies being like sisters and he has to have at least one. I can’t make heads or tails out of what he means.”
“What about the shooter?”
“They caught him,” Bodey said baldly. “Just after you left. Hells bells, you’ll never believe this. It turned out it was Bart Crowley, P.D.’s manager.”
Elam stared at his brother, stunned. “What? Are you sure?”
Bodey nodded. “Apparently, he’s been stealing supplies from P.D. for months now, and when she figured out something hinkey was going on, he managed to pin the deed on Eddie Bascom. But Eddie wasn’t about to take his lumps and move on. So Bart decided to cover his tracks. He paid a couple of teenagers to set fire to the restaurant, figuring that way, it would be his word against Eddie’s—and Eddie has already had some run-ins with the law. But the fire was stopped before it could get out of hand. Then, knowing how much P.D. needed the prize money, he bribed one of the groups into stealing your horse. When that didn’t work, the man lost his freaking mind and started trailing the two of you. He’s already admitted to pushing P.D. down that hill. And the rock that hit Jennifer Tompkins was his doing, too. She was dressed like P.D. and he didn’t realize it was Jennifer until after she’d collapsed.”
