Ties That Bind (16 page)

“But first you have to let me tell you about my newest fling. He’s a hottie.”

Sam could feel the smile fighting to get out, anxious to escape her life for a while and listen to Pamela’s wild escapades. She didn’t relax very often. Maybe tonight would be different.

TWENTY-ONE

Sam pulled into her driveway and shut off the engine. A small white sedan sat at the curb in front of her house, a shadowy figure in the front seat. As soon as Sam stepped out of her car, she saw the driver’s side door of the other vehicle open. She knew who it was before he even yelled hello and began walking briskly toward her. His stride was firm and his pace quick. He was lean and tall and very physically fit. She remembered back to their high-school years. He’d reached his height in their sophomore year, unlike many other boys. Maturity, at least physical, was not far behind.

“Hello, Paul,” she said, her voice restrained and calm. She immediately wondered if her breath smelled of vodka and cringed that she should be bothered what this man—this long-ago boyfriend—thought of her.

Man of God. Seminary teacher. Widower. Sam knew his wife had died in a car accident several years before. Her father shared all that news with her. And of course she’d read about the horrible accident in the paper. Even worse, the toddler with Paul’s wife had been thrown from the car and died and the baby inside her had lived only hours after it was delivered by emergency C-section.

One minute you have a family, and the next instant everything is just gone. How do you go on after such a thing happens? Sam had wanted to get on the phone, to call Paul, to ask him.

But she hadn’t. And now he walked toward her and if she really wanted to, she could just blurt it out. Just ask. Even though they’d barely spoken in more than ten years.

The last time they’d had a real conversation … Sam couldn’t even remember.

“Hey,” Paul said softly when he got close enough. She’d watched him walk up her driveway but hadn’t moved, still holding her keys in her hand. The moon was nearly full, and there was an eerie lightness to the evening, even though it was nearly 11:00 p.m. One drink had led to two, and then she’d drunk water for another hour while she watched Pamela drink herself into oblivion.

Sam had poured Pamela into a taxi and sent her home, listening to her mumble something about “exclusive.”

“Why are you here, Paul?”

“Well, my mother always told me my Heavenly Father had a plan for me.”

“Cute. But trite. What’s the real reason?”

“When did you turn so bitter, Sam?”

“The day I saw my sister hanging from a tree in our backyard, and heard all the nice church folks explain how God had other plans for her and needed her with Him.”

“You don’t know there isn’t a God, Sam.”

“You don’t know there
is,
Paul.”

“Well, I want to believe there is. I want to believe that He’s taking care of my wife and babies now, because I can’t.”

Sam swallowed hard as the grief and loss crossed his face.

“Why are you here?” she asked again.

“Because I wanted to talk to you. I couldn’t really do that the other night. I wanted to talk about what happened with us, what—”

“That was a long time ago, Paul. Our lives went different ways. Bygones, you know?”

He winced. “You make it sound like I didn’t matter at all.”

“Oh, it mattered. But that was a lifetime ago. We both moved on. I’m sorry about your wife, and your kids. I never got a chance to say that. I’m sorry you lost them. But we live in two completely different worlds now.”

“I didn’t just walk away from you, you know, Sam. You had a miscarriage. I offered to marry you.”

“You offered. I know; I remember. But it wasn’t what you wanted.”

“Can you blame me? I would have been the first male in my family not to serve an honorable mission.”

“No, I can’t blame you,” Sam said, and turned away to walk to her house. “I don’t think about it anymore. You and I were always different. You took your path, and I took mine.”

He grabbed her arm to keep her from moving away. “We were young, and I was dumb, and I’m sorry it happened. I’m sorry I hurt you.”

Tears came to Sam’s eyes, and she fought them back, angry at her own weakness.

“Why are you here, Paul?”

“I … I just wanted to talk to you. To see if you were okay.”

“It’s been a long time for you to suddenly start caring, Paul. What’s up with that?”

“Seeing you again—”

“I’m doing my job. That’s all. We just crossed paths again because I am doing an investigation that you are peripherally involved in. That’s it. Paul, I’m tired. I’ve had a long day and an even longer week, and it’s just going to get uglier. I don’t need this right now.” She turned to walk away.

He gripped her arm tighter. “Sammy, please. Please just talk to me. Seeing you brought back a million memories, and most of them are good. The pain on your face when you look at me, that hurts. I don’t want you to hurt. I’m sorry.”

Sam met Paul’s eyes and gently pulled her arm from his grasp. “I don’t believe what you believe. I don’t believe the Mormon Church is the only true church, and I don’t believe Joseph Smith was a prophet of God. That’s not hurt you see in my eyes. It’s sadness for you and everyone else who has lost people they love. And all those things that you are teaching to those kids—all the crap that they filled our heads with as kids. We don’t even know each other anymore. You married someone else, and had kids with someone else.”

“And I lost them, too.”

Sam winced at the thought of the baby-that-never-was, the pregnancy that had “spontaneously aborted.” It wasn’t really the same. She knew Paul’s wife, toddler, and unborn child had suffered a violent death. Nothing like the cramping, and then the bleeding: the magic potion to undo the sin, to change what had been done.

She’d never understood why she cried at the loss. Why it mattered, when it had been so wrong. When it would have caused so much trauma, destruction, and despair—and put her in the firing range of all the gossip, the pitying looks, the judgment calls. Why did she mourn that baby-that-never-was, even now?

“What if I want to get to know you again?”

His words shocked her, and she stared at him openmouthed. Then she furrowed her brow and said, “Did you just hear a word I said? I don’t believe what you believe. I am not a Mormon anymore.”

“Your name is still on the rolls. It’s your culture. You can shun the tenets, but you can’t remove the trappings. It’s who we are, Sam, no matter what level of obedience you practice.”

“I don’t practice any obedience. It’s your faith, and my dad’s faith, not mine.”

“You can’t just walk away from it. It’s not that easy.”

“I never said it was easy. I just said it’s the way it is. And who I am does not mesh with who you are. Apparently, it never did.”

“I remember us meshing together really well,” Paul said, sultry fire in his eyes, and Sam’s stomach fluttered.

“Look, Paul, this is not good for you. You’re a seminary teacher. The seminary principal no less. Flirting and sexual innuendo is counterproductive. And I’m never going back there.”

“Back where? Back to your home? To your roots? And who says I’m flirting?”

“You’re talking about us having sex back in high school. If it’s not flirting, it’s something close. Either way, I don’t think that’s in your job description, or conducive to my investigation.”

“Sam, I wasn’t talking about the sex act. I was talking about—”

“Paul, again, we went different ways. I’m sure there’s a nice Mormon girl out there for you.”

“What makes you think I want one?” Paul asked. Sam didn’t like the sudden spark in his eyes, the reminder he had not always been so pure, so good.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m not going there. You should go home.”

“Not very neighborly,” Paul said, his voice slightly harsh.

“We’re not really neighbors. I knew you once. Things changed.”

Paul turned and stomped away, and Sam watched as he got into his car and drove off. He slowed down, then raised his hand, but Sam didn’t do the same in response.

All Paul Carson brought back was memories and pain. She’d left this town to be rid of the pain, then returned when she realized that some old ghosts needed to be settled before she would ever be at peace.

The strident peal of Sam’s phone ringing made her jump. She pulled it out of her pocket and answered it quickly, glad for the reprieve from her thoughts.

“Hello?”

“Oh, Sam, please come. Please come now. It’s my Whit. Oh God, it’s my Whit.”

Susanna’s voice held a grief that Sam had only heard one time before.

TWENTY-TWO

Sam pulled in front of her sister’s house, threw the shifter into park, and jumped out of the car before she had even turned it off.

The narrow street in front of the Marcusen house was littered with police cars, lining the road on both sides, including several Durangos with the Smithland County logo on the side, two fire engines, and an ambulance. The Durangos meant paramedics, and Sam’s heart skipped several beats.

The phone call from her sister had been brief and panicked, and while Sam had tried to get more information out of her, Susanna had resorted to screaming and crying and then disconnected. Sam had tried to get a hold of Susanna repeatedly since then, but both her cell and house phone went to voice mail.

Sam knew something was horribly wrong. She felt it deep in the pit of her stomach, and Callie was screaming in her head.

Move, Sam. Go. Now. Go! She needs you now. Don’t let it end. Don’t let her come to me. It’s not her time. She’s too young. I was too young. It’s not what you think. It’s not the white light and the beautiful angels, and the singing. It’s just—

“You shouldn’t be here, Sam,” said D-Ray, who was already inside when she pushed her way through the door. His face showed pain and grief, and she knew it was bad. Worse than bad.

“Don’t even fucking think about trying to keep me out,” she said, pushing past him, knowing he was only trying to keep her from getting hurt. Knowing that this was real. That this was her family, once again, torn apart.

She ran into her sister’s house and found Susanna collapsed on the floor, a paramedic attending to her.

The main chaos came from a room at the back of the house. Whit’s room. Sam pushed her way through the wall of cops standing around, fighting off the arms that tried to keep her back, knowing only that she had to get to Whit and try to save her. To do what Sam hadn’t done for Callie.

Inside the bedroom Sam stopped cold. All sounds seemed to disappear as she viewed the montage before her. The smell hit her first: bitter and acrid, the coppery scent of blood, along with feces and urine. There was blood on the carpet, vomit, and other bodily wastes, and Whitney was already loaded onto a gurney, a portable ventilator breathing for her, moving her chest up and down. Her face was nothing but a white death mask.

Three-quarters of a pink satin tie hung from Whitney’s open closet door. The rest of it was nowhere to be seen, but the color and the similarity to Jeremiah Malone’s death hit Sam in the chest like a sucker punch. She found it hard to breathe as she watched the paramedics work over Whitney, try to keep her alive. She already looked dead.

A stepstool lay on its side at the base of the door. Sam breathed in and out as she considered the scene. It looked like a suicide attempt, but … She felt the arms around her and someone pulling her into his chest, strong, and a familiar voice said, “Your sister needs you.”

D-Ray pulled her from the chaos, and his words broke into her consciousness, making her realize the tableau before her was not a chimera but cold, hard fact. Her niece was near death and might never recover.

And Sam’s sister—the one who had cared for her for so many years—needed her. Now.

She turned and walked into the other room without saying a word to D-Ray, but she could feel his presence behind her. Susanna was sitting up, a blanket draped around her, shivering. She hadn’t stopped crying, and she looked up just as Sam came toward her, though she seemed to be seeing beyond her. Then Sam heard the noises and voices behind her and saw that they were wheeling Whitney out of the bedroom and headed for the front door.

Susanna jumped up and threw off the blanket. She headed toward the gurney, but Sam held her back.

“Oh my God, my baby. My baby. How could this happen? How could this happen? My baby.” Tears streamed down her face and she clutched her sister as though she were going to disappear into thin air and Susanna was going to do everything she could to stop that.

“You have to save her, Sammy,” Susanna said, turning to her. “She has to be okay. You can’t let her die. You have to save her.”

Sam knew that the words were not rational, that at this point there was nothing she could do for Whitney. That would be up to the paramedics, doctors, and nurses. But Sam held her sister closely and said, “I will. I will.”

“They’re going to Life Flight her to Primary,” D-Ray said, and Sam turned to look at him for the first time. Lind Harris stood behind him, a sour look on his face, his lips tight.

What did he feel as he witnessed this personal tragedy? Did it make him hate her more? Pity her? It didn’t matter. Nobody mattered right now but family.

“I have to go with her,” Susanna said, trying to control her gasps and sobs.

“You can’t, Sissy. They won’t let you.”

“I’ll take you both in my car. It’s outside,” D-Ray said.

“But she needs me. She’ll be so scared. She’ll—”

Sam knew that Whitney was completely unaware of everything that was going on around her. And possibly always would be, if she even survived. “Sissy, you can’t go in the helicopter. D-Ray will take us. We’ll get there fast. I promise.”

“We have to go now, then. Now please.”

Susanna started looking around for something and finally spotted it. She picked up her purse off the side table and headed for the door. She wore a pair of pajama pants and an old T-shirt. Her feet were bare. Her hair was standing on end, and there was a dark stain on the T-shirt, possibly from hot chocolate or something she drank to calm her nerves before bed.