In the Heart of the Wind Book 1 in the WindTorn Trilogy (47 page)

“Let me tell you something about myself, Jamie,” she said in motherly sincerity. “Doc and I were stationed in Vietnam together back in the ‘60s. I was head nurse at the MASH unit where he was assigned. We worked together almost every day for eighteen months.”

She smoothed the back of her patient’s hand. “We saw some things, did some things, that no one should ever have to see or do.” She looked away. “It’s a difficult thing to amputate an eighteen-year-old boy’s legs. Harder yet to watch one die.” She mentally shook herself and lowered her eyes to his. She was pleased to see he was watching her. She smiled.

“Doc’s a good man, isn’t he?” She hadn’t expected an answer to her question and wasn’t surprised when she didn’t receive one. “He’ll do anything he can for a friend. I know that firsthand because when I got back to the States, I didn’t seem to fit into any of the hospitals where I worked. I went from one to another, angry that all the experience, all the expertise I had gained was being wasted.

“I knew how to suture and close an abdominal wound. I could operate with the best of them near the end of my tour. I had to make life and death decisions, delegate responsibilities, do things the nurses stateside were never allowed to do and weren’t trained to do. When I got back here, when my job became no more than a glorified handholder, I felt I was nobody. I felt I was being tolerated by the surgeons. Can you understand?”

His eyes flickered.

“I don’t think I would’ve stayed in the medical field if Doc hadn’t looked me up one day. Hadn’t gone out of his way to come to Adam’s Center to see me. When he found out just how miserable I was, he bullied me into going to medical school, and even paid for some of it with his own money.” She smiled. “I have him to thank for that shingle on the front door. Without him, I’d probably have stuck a gun in my mouth and pulled the trigger.”

The dark eyes that had been looking at her slid slowly away.

“I know what it’s like to feel worthless, Jamie. I know what it feels like to think your whole life is slipping away. I’ve been there. I’ve felt the pain. I’ve felt the loneliness.” She lifted his hand and threaded her fingers through his. “I know what it means to feel like you’re lost in a storm, unable to make your way back without help.” She squeezed his hands. “But I had Doc, just like you’ve got Doc, and I owe him one. For a long time, I’ve been waiting to pay him back and now I have the chance.

Her patient turned his eyes back to her.

“You can stay here as long as you like. For as long as you feel you need to. I’m not going to ask anything of you. I’m not going to make demands on you. I’m just going to let you heal at your own pace. And when you feel you can handle it, no matter how long it takes until you
do
feel you can handle it, we’ll bring Annie to you.”

His eyes snapped shut and he turned his head away from her. She knew she’d found the problem.

“Don’t worry about her, Jamie. She’s being protected.”

He snatched his hand out of hers and turned to his side, his back to her.

Dr. Cean let her hand fall to her lap. “You have people who love you, Jamie. People who were not content to sit by and watch you being hurt.”

“People who are going to suffer for helping me!”

The harsh words had come so unexpectedly, so forcefully, Janice Cean jumped. She watched her patient’s shoulders tremble and knew he was crying.

“I see,” she said quietly, and flinched as he flung himself over and glared at her with red-rimmed, tear-filled eyes.

“Do you?” he shouted. His face was twisted in an ugly mask of hate.

“I believe so,” she answered in a soft voice. “You’re afraid something will happen to the people who helped you. You think your family will go after them and—”

“I don’t think so, lady! I
know
they will!”

“So what are you going to do about it.”

She saw his eyes flare.

“What do you mean—me?” His teeth pulled back over his lips. “What the hell
can
I do about it?” His breathing became ragged and shallow. “They should’ve left me there. They shouldn’t have interfered. Now they’re in danger because they did.” He viciously shook his head. “I’m not worth it! I’m not worth them losing their lives over helping me.”

“They think you are.”

“They don’t know Liam Tremayne!” He pushed himself up in the bed, his back rigid against the headboard, his knees drawn up to his chest. “They don’t know what that son-of-a-bitch is capable of doing!”

“But you do.”

His eyes narrowed in pain. “I know all too well what he can do.”

“Then stop him. See to it he never does something like this to anyone else, ever again.”

He stared at her with astonishment. “How?”

“By going to the press. By telling them your side of the story. By letting the public see what they’ve done. Let people know just what kind of man your father is.”

“I can’t.” His voice had become a fearful whisper.

“Why not?” She watched him staring at her with true terror stamped on his tear-streaked face. “What are you afraid of, Jamie?” Her heart ached at the look in his eyes. “He can’t hurt you. We won’t let him.”

She looked on as all the anger in him dissolved to be replaced with a hopelessness she had seen many times in the young faces of soldiers who knew their lives were ending. She reached out to him, but he moved out of her reach.

“Leave me alone,” he whispered. His voice broke and his next word was so pathetic it ripped at her soul. “Please?”

“All right.” She got up, turned away from the bed, but stopped and looked back at him, not surprised to see his wounded eyes on her. “Things are going to work out for you, Jamie. We’re going to see to that.”

He watched her until the door closed behind her, then he slid down in the bed, folded himself into a fetal position and stared unseeingly at the door, never blinking, never looking away.

“Hi, Virgil,” Annie
James said in an excited voice. “Have you heard from him?”

Virgil laughed. “Doc called to tell me he and Carol are leaving for home this morning. He said to tell you everything’s just fine and our boy is coming along real good.” He stamped his feet in the telephone booth, shivered, then sneezed.

“How’s your cold?” she asked.

“A hell of a sight better than Urban’s.” His eyes lit with malicious humor. “That brother of mine’s got walking pneumonia! Serves him right since he caught more fish than me.”

Annie’s voice lowered. “Is he really all right, Virgil, or are they just telling me that to keep me from worrying?”

Virgil could hear the concern in her voice. “They say he’s entirely off the drugs, and he’s talking about you coming out in a few weeks. Doc says that’s good news because up until this week, he hadn’t been responding like Doc thought he should.”

“But he’s okay?” she pressed. “He’s not sick or anything?”

“He’s doing good, Annie. Doc wouldn’t have said so if he wasn’t. He wouldn’t be coming home neither. You know Doc. He’d stay there until summertime if he thought Gabe needed him.”

Annie chewed on her lower lip and her silence brought her name from Virgil. She shook herself. “Have you talked to Kyle?” she asked.

“Not lately. He’s been working on a case and he’s been so involved in that since he got back I haven’t seen much of him except to pass his house and see him getting in his cruiser. Why?”

“Nora got a call from Jake this morning.” She heard Virgil begin to sputter and cut him off. “He was calling from Grinnell, Virgil. Don’t worry. He just wanted to tell her things were doing okay at the house and he missed her.”

“He should’ve asked me before he called,” Virgil grumbled. “How can I protect you two women if—”

“Jake said he spoke to Kyle yesterday and Kyle didn’t seem like himself. He said Kyle was acting very funny.”

“It’s that case he’s on, probably,” Virgil tried to reassure her. “If something was wrong, I’d know it.”

Virgil Kramer was at a loss for words. How could he explain Kyle’s strange behavior to Annie? How could he tell her what Ellen had told him just the night before about Kyle’s moodiness and sullen silences? It would only worry the girl and make her wonder just what had caused this abrupt change in her old friend. It was bound to make her think things were not as rosy as everyone was trying to color them.

“They’re more’n likely giving him a hard time at the headquarters over his long absence, Annie. You know how bureaucratic government agencies can be. You know he’s probably as worried about Gabe as we are, and with all that on him, the man’s just trying to keep the bastards off his back by diving into this case. If anything was wrong, don’t you think Ellen would’ve told me? You just hang in there, kid, and before you know it, we’ll be shipping you off to wherever that old man of yours is hiding out.” Virgil said.

As she hung up, Annie had the strangest feeling the only place she was going to be going was back to her home in Rock Creek.

Alone.

James Gabriel
Tremayne slid out of his chair at the breakfast table and embraced Doc Remington, then turned to kiss the older man’s wife on the cheek.

“You’ll be careful?” he asked.

Doc nodded. “You’ll take care of yourself?”

Jamie shrugged. “As best I can.”

Doc looked into the bleak, despondent eyes of his young friend, but didn’t press the issue. Janice and her husband, Bryant, would take good care of Jamie.

“You won’t try driving all night in that thing, will you?” Bryant asked Doc.

“Not to worry,” Carol said and laughed. “Once we get down to Memphis and deliver the coach back to Ron and Emmie Lou, I intend to make sure we spend the weekend there, maybe rent a car and go to the Opry over in Nashville before we fly home. I think we deserve a little vacation, don’t you?”

“I do,” Jamie answered. “Just get back home safely. That’s all I want.”

“Jamie—” Doc began, but the young man stopped him.

“You’d better get going before the snow hits. I don’t want to worry about you on the road.”

Doc knew Jamie didn’t want to say goodbye to him anymore than he had been willing to say goodbye to the others, especially Kyle, because he sensed the word meant something far more painful to Jamie than the man would admit.

“I’ll call in every now and then to see how you’re doing,” Doc said. He grinned. “Make sure you’re behaving.”

Jamie nodded. He swept his eyes to Carol. “Take care of the old man, will you?”

Carol smiled. “I’ll try.”

Jamie gripped the older man’s hand in a firm handshake. “Thank you, Doc.”

“Any time, son.” He squeezed Jamie’s hand then let it go. “See you, huh?”

Jamie smiled, but the smile never reached his eyes.

“Let’s go, dear,” Carol advised, as if sensing the leave taking was becoming painful for both men.

From the big bay window in Janice Cean’s dining room, Jamie watched until the oversized motor coach disappeared from view. He was alone in the room, Janice and Bryant having felt his need for solitude. As he watched the first few graceful snowflakes drift lazily down to the lawn, Jamie felt more alone than he ever had.

“We picked up
that Giles Fontaine,” Thais told The Badger.

“You damned sure took your time finding the bastard. It’s been two weeks since I told you to get him.”

Thais sniffed, leveled his gaze with the black man’s, then cocked his head to one side. “He never left the state, Badger. No harm done.”

“Have you got anything out of him yet?” The Badger snapped, ignoring the offended look in Thais’s eyes.

“Nope.” Thais folded his arms over his chest. “You gonna question him?”

The black man shoved back his chair. “What do you think?” He skirted the desk and plowed past Thais. The door to his office slammed against the wall with enough force to rattle the picture of Martin Luther King on the wall.

“I wouldn’t wanna be dat Fontaine right ‘bout now,” The Badger’s partner remarked to Thais. “Badger gonna burn him a new ‘un.”

Thais sighed.

It was going to be a long, long afternoon.

Liam Tremayne
watched his daughter pouring a snifter of brandy and his eyes narrowed into thin slits of distaste.

“Don’t you think it’s a little early in the day for that, Bridie?” he asked.

He saw her stiffen, then watched as she lifted the glass and drained the amber liquid. His lips pursed.

Bridget set down the snifter before she turned to face her father. “We know he couldn’t be in Savannah and Atlanta and here all at the same time. Those calls came within minutes of one another.” Her eyes turned fierce with pique. “If you ask me, those calls were made by those friends of his.”

“Possibly.” He put his hand to his chest and pressed, feeling the monster inside him gobbling away huge sections of his flesh. His eyes watered and he moved to the desk drawer where the morphine was.

She saw her father’s hunger as he stared down at the desk drawer and knew the cancer was causing him intense pain, but she knew the old man was too proud—and too careful—to let her see how bad he was really doing. Pouring herself another brandy, she took the snifter to the sofa and sat down, curling her long legs under her as she looked across the room at her father.