Breathe (36 page)

hospital room was a spacecraft in a science fiction movie, and all the oxygen had

escaped with the truth.

The silence continued until Jay finally managed to suck in a ragged gulp of air.

“Have you talked to him?” Baldy asked. “Do you know who he is?”

“No.” Lincoln met Jay"s gaze again. “I don"t know him at all.”

Jay couldn"t take it any longer. He stepped closer to the bed, not caring that he

had to squirm past Tall and Silent. “I did not leave those notes. I did not shoot you.”

Lincoln scoffed and stared at the foot of the bed again.

“I would never hurt you.”

Tall and Silent glanced between Jay and Lincoln. “You"re the widower?”

Baldy flipped his notebook shut. “Let"s step outside and have a talk.”

When Jay didn"t move, Tall and Silent inched closer and gestured toward the

door with a wave of his arm.

Jay looked at one cop, then the other. “I did not shoot him.” He focused on

Lincoln again. “Lincoln? You can"t believe it was me?”

“You had the papers in your office. Pictures of me. The kids. Her inhalers were

in your house.” Lincoln"s jaw twitched as he clamped his mouth shut.

“The Shaws had the paper. You saw that. I found the pictures at my parents"

house. The inhalers were hidden in their closet. I left them there. I have no idea

how they got in my house.”

“Sir, I"m going to have to ask you to step out into the hall.” Baldy moved

toward the door. “This way.” Apparently these two cops thought Jay was a moron.

“I did not shoot him.” But he did know who had, didn"t he? Had it really been

his mom? He wanted to tell the cops about the gun in his parents" closet. He wanted

to tell them everything, but he didn"t know everything, did he? First he had to talk

to Todd, to his dad. If either of them knew anything they"d tell Jay. Wouldn"t they?

They wouldn"t cover for her? Or were they already?

“Sure you didn"t,” Tall and Silent said. He looked ready to grab Jay by the neck

and drag him into the hall.

Jay looked to Lincoln again before they forced him out.

“Now,” Baldy said, “I"m asking you one more time to come with us.”

“I"d never hurt you.” Jay pleaded with a single look, his words, his heart.

Lincoln closed his eyes again. Maybe the anesthesia was still in his system.

Maybe all the talking had been too much and the meds made him tired. Maybe he

had had enough of Jay.

How could he believe Jay had shot him? Had threatened his family? Had

stolen Jessica"s inhalers? Anger flooded Jay. He glared at Lincoln. After everything

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they had done, everything they had shared? Maybe it hadn"t meant to Lincoln what

it had to him. Maybe it had all been a way for Lincoln to get a piece of ass.

Jay had never had a casual relationship before. Had he seen things that

weren"t there? How naive and stupid and sappy could he be?

Maybe this had all been so Lincoln could get Jay"s help in finding out who sent

the threats.

No. It was more than that. And that"s why the pain in Lincoln"s eyes was

worse than before. He thought Jay had betrayed him.

“Sir, now!” Baldy said.

Jay forced himself to concentrate on the officer. He couldn"t get arrested. He

had to find a way to show Lincoln the truth. To keep him safe. To find out who had

shot Lincoln, even if it was his mom. He would not lose out on love for the second

time in his life. He took one last look at Lincoln and left with the officer.

The hall outside the room was empty. Baldy tapped his notebook on the back

of his other hand. “I"d like you to come to the station so we can get your statement

on record. Clear things up.”

“Okay.” They weren"t arresting him. That was something. “Are you leaving

him alone? I didn"t shoot him, but whoever did might come back.”

Neither cop answered.

Did they think he had shot Lincoln and stuck around to call 9-1-1 while he

tried to stanch the blood pouring out of Lincoln"s wounds and then had come to the

hospital to wait?

Maybe that"s how criminals did things—to draw suspicion away from

themselves. Maybe that"s what the Shaws were doing. He had just told them about

Lincoln. They were the ones who had the same paper used in the threats. The

stationery with the seal from the college where Stuart coached. They had hated

Lincoln for a long time.

Maybe they were hiding the evidence linking them to the threats. In his house,

at his parents". After Emily Shaw had seen him with Lincoln, she"d been pleasant to

Jay, understanding even. Could it have been an act?

Was it any better if she or Stuart had pulled the trigger?

Would they try again to kill the person who took away their only child?

“If we get more evidence he"s in danger,” Baldy said, “we"ll have someone

watch him.”

Jay eased toward Lincoln"s room. “I"m not leaving him by himself. Let me find

his sister first.”

Tall and Silent rolled his eyes. “Fags. Such drama queens.” He turned and

walked away, leaving Jay with the bald cop.

“I"m not leaving him like this,” Jay said.

Baldy tilted his head toward the hall behind Jay.

Breathe

189

Nancy rounded the corner, carrying two cups of coffee. “Is everything okay? Is

Lincoln—”

“He"s fine. I need to go to the police station to answer more questions. Can you

stay with him? He shouldn"t be alone.”

She glanced at the door to Lincoln"s hospital room. “You think he"ll be back?

The man who shot him?”

“Maybe.”

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Chapter Twenty-seven

“Nancy, sit down,” Lincoln said.

“Huh?” She stopped playing with the edge of the thin blue blanket draped over

his hospital bed. “Oh, okay.” She spun around and dropped onto the edge of the bed.

He groaned with the jostling.

She didn"t seem to notice. “Jay is Jacob Miller?” She faced Lincoln, swinging

her leg to rest her upper thigh on the bed. “Are you sure?” Her knee smacked into

his thigh. He moved over, and a stabbing pain exploded through his gut and up his

arm.

“Fuck!” He clutched his side and groaned again. “I"m sure.”

She stood. “I"m sorry.” She patted his leg before stepping backward and falling

into the chair beside the bed. “And you knew? The entire time?”

“Not the first time.”

“He
fucked
you before he told you?” She glanced at the curtain behind her as if

she could tell through the material if the guy in the next bed heard her words. More

quietly she said, “What was he thinking?”

“He didn"t know then either. And it wasn"t like that. We"d just met.”

“Why did you keep seeing him?”

“We were trying to figure out who was sending the threats.”

“You said that was all taken care of.”

“I guess I wasn"t clear on a lot of things.”

She shook her head, several strands of her hair falling from her ponytail. “You

really think it was Jay?”

“No.” He"d seen the inhalers in that drawer, and he"d been furious. At first he

had let himself believe it might have been Jay, but deep down he knew Jay wouldn"t

do that to him—to anyone. When Lincoln had awakened in the hospital, he"d

accepted that he and Jay had to be finished. Better to give Jay a push in the right

direction: away from him. Lincoln collapsed back onto the pillow and breathed deep.

He ached all over—his head, his stomach, his arm. His heart. The pain medication

was making him foggy. He wanted to sleep. Forever. “Jay doesn"t have it in him.”

“But you let him believe you thought he did it?”

“Jesus, Nance. Don"t you think I feel bad enough about all this?”

“I know you do. I just want this all over for you. I want you to move on. To put

this behind you.”

Breathe

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Sounded like a good plan, but how could he put it behind him—how could he

forget—when someone wanted him dead?

* * *

Jay entered the confines of Lincoln"s hospital room. The curtain around the

bed was drawn back, revealing a healthier-looking man than the day before. One

pissed-off, red-faced, healthier man.

The sparse well-wishes on the bedside table spoke of how few people Lincoln

could count on. Did it matter how many people a man had in his life? Or did it

matter more how much those he did have loved him? The colorful page torn from a

coloring book with
Love love love you, Uncle Lincoln
sprawled across the top in

purple crayon said a lot.

“I"m not going anywhere.” Jay moved to the edge of the bed and wheeled aside

a silver tray with its pitcher of water, plastic cup, and TV remote. “I need to talk to

you.”

“It"s been a long couple of days, Jay.” Lincoln gripped his left wrist with his

other hand as he sat taller.

Jay reached for the man"s shoulder. “You need to sit still.”

Lincoln shrugged away from him. “I need you to go.”

As much as Jay wanted to grab Lincoln and shake the stupidity out of him, he

gave in and backed away. He wasn"t about to leave, but he also wasn"t coming up

with the right words. The ringing of a phone down the hall and the low chatter of

visitors in nearby rooms did nothing to break the silence between them. Jay sat in

the chair beside the bed, and the scrape of the metal legs on the floor hid the

clearing of his throat. “You can"t believe I"d hurt you.”

Lincoln finally looked his way. “I don"t.”

Jay searched his face and found truth. In the expression. In the dark eyes.

Truth and despair and something more. What was it? “But you think I sent the

notes.”

“Did you?”

“No! They"re interviewing my parents, and the Shaws. My mom said it wasn"t

her. She just wanted me to stop seeing you. She said she didn"t send the notes or do

anything else. It has to be the Shaws. I think they might"ve planted all the

evidence.”

“Has to be, huh?”

“Yes. Someone sent my mom those pictures of you. Of the kids. Someone"s been

watching you.”

“When did you find this out?”

“When we searched my parents" house.”

“Figures.” Lincoln shifted again, wincing. “What an idiot.”

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“Me?”

“Me! For trusting you. For thinking this—whatever the hell we are—would not

somehow end up destroying us both.”

“You were the one thing that hasn"t—that doesn"t suck about my life.” Quieter

Jay added, “I want to keep seeing you.”

Lincoln laughed, the howl surging out of him until he doubled over, the pain

visible on his strained face. Jay ached to touch the man, but he held back.

When Lincoln could speak, he said, “This can"t go on. You have to see that.” He

reached into the drawer of the bedside table.

Jay stood. “What do you need?”

“I got it.” Lincoln opened a wallet and pulled out a newspaper clipping. He

unfolded it, the creases as worn as an old love letter he"d read many times

throughout the years. “At night, in bed, when you"re not there, she"s all I see.”

Lincoln laid the piece of paper across the blanket over his thigh, spreading out the

curling edges with his fingers in a careful caress. “She"s all I see. Bloody. Broken.

Dead.”

Jay took a step back. He didn"t want to see what was printed on the

newspaper. He stared at the pitcher of water on the tray, watching the slight

ripples on the surface. What caused the water to move? His movements? The flurry

of nursing activity in the room across the hall? The gurney a hospital employee

pushed by the open door? Funny how you couldn"t sense the ground shift under your

feet.

Lincoln removed something else from his wallet. Probably wasn"t anything else

Jay wanted to see.

“I know you don"t want to look,” Lincoln said, “but I need you to.”

The pleading of Lincoln"s voice broke Jay"s resolve. He looked at what Lincoln

held out. A photograph, folded in half, and crushed in at the corner. Jay closed his

fingers around it, brushing the tip of Lincoln"s thumb with his own. With that

contact, Lincoln jerked his hand away.

Everything in Jay told him not to look. Not to unfold the photo. If it was

enough to keep them apart, it had to be bad.

But he owed this to Lincoln.

He unfolded the photograph.
Katie
. She looked as she did when Jay had last

seen her. Pale. Lifeless. Dead. The blood rushed to his head and a sudden dizziness

swept over him.

Lincoln was talking, but all sound muted as if Jay had sunk into a pool of

water where all was still and quiet, where Lincoln was a far-off distorted vision

above the surface, in a different world, and so far from Jay"s reach.

“Listen, Jay. You have to listen to this.” Lincoln read the note in his hand. The

words “gash from her temple to her chin,” “blood stuck to her red hair,” “her left leg

twisted the wrong way,” were all Jay could comprehend.