Magnolia Dawn (17 page)

“I don't know.”

She saw Rush's excitement. She felt it. Her own adrenaline began to pump through her, leaving her light-headed and shaking.

He flipped quickly through the sketch pad until he came to another of the same boy, this time holding an infant on his lap. In this one the boy was smiling.

Rush looked at Anna. She narrowed her eyes and shook her head. “I'm not sure. About either of them.”

He muttered an oath and started flipping through the tablet again, in his haste ripping several of the delicate pages. He stopped as the little boy's face stared back at them once more. Again, the child held an infant, only this time Anna recognized herself as the baby.

“That's me!” she said excitedly. “I'm sure of it. Remember, there was a photo of me in the same bonnet.”

“What about the boy?”

“I don't know. I don't… Wait a minute.”

“What is it?”

She looked at Rush, stunned as a memory from her childhood sprang full-blown in her head. “I just remembered… I was maybe seven or eight, I'd been going through Mama's vanity. I remember finding a photograph of me and a little boy. When I showed Mama the photograph and asked who he was, she became very upset. Near tears, if I remember right. I guess I recall that now, because Mama didn't scold much.
She almost never spanked.”

“But she did this day.”

Anna nodded. “She took the photo away and sent me to my room. I never saw it again.”

“Did she say who the boy was?”

“No.” Anna shook her head. “But it might not even have been the same boy.”

“But it could have been?”

“Sure.”

They dug into the sketch pads, searching through each one, not taking the time to study or admire. The boy was never depicted again.

Frustrated, Anna tossed the last pad down. “Why didn't she label any of these? People label photographs, why not drawings?”

Rush gazed at that first drawing, the one of the boy alone. “Who do you think he was?”

Anna shifted her gaze to the drawing. “The child of a family friend. Maybe even one of the plantation workers. We can start checking my list of names and make some calls. Macy and Brady are due back from
Memphis. She might know.”

“You really think this boy was a friend of the family?”

“Sure.” Anna looked at her hands. They were filthy, dusty, her fingers smeared with charcoal and pastel. She stood to go wash them. “Who else could it have been?”

He lifted his gaze to hers. She saw what he was thinking and shook her head. “No way.”

“How do you know, Anna?”

“Because I do.” She took a step backward. “Daddy didn't have any other children.”

Rush stood and faced her. “But what if, Anna? That would mean you and I—”

“No!” She started for the kitchen, the adrenaline of panic pumping through her. When she reached it, she crossed to the sink and flipped the water on. Rush had followed her, and she looked over her shoulder at him. “Why would he send his own son away?”

“True.” Rush let out a long, frustrated breath. “Why would he? That would make him some sort of monster.”

Anna caught her breath. That was Lowell's description of their father. It always had been.

Stunned, she met Rush's gaze. In his she saw a similar thought. A similar fear. Her stomach turned. It couldn't be. It was too farfetched to be true.

But if it was true…

Rush would be her half brother.

Anna grabbed the bar of soap. She lathered her hands, furiously scrubbing at them, tears welling in her eyes. But it wasn't true. It wasn't.

“We have to find out, Anna.” Rush came up behind her. She felt his breath on the back of her neck, felt the heat of his body. She longed to lean against him. Longed to find comfort in his arms, his mouth.

Hysteria bubbled up inside her. But she couldn't—maybe never again.

He placed his hands on her shoulders, massaging the tight muscles. “We have to be sure, Anna. You see that, don't you?”

She whirled on him, shaking with anger. With helpless fury. “I see, all right. I see that you hope it's true. You hope Daddy is your father.”

Rush took a step back from her, his expression stunned. “What?”

“Finding out who you are means more to you than I do. It always has. Even if it means finding out I'm your…that we're…brother and…” Her voice broke, and she turned back to the sink, to scrubbing her hands.

It was too awful. Too terrible. But she had a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach that it was true.

Good God, what would she do? That would mean she was in love with her brother. That she'd…made love with…”

“This is crazy, Anna.” Cupping her elbow, Rush turned her to face him. “You're talking crazy—”

“Am I?” She lifted her chin, tears sliding down her cheeks. “You were always more interested in Ashland than in me. More interested
in your connection to this place than in me.”

He shook her. “Anna, stop it! This is a shock for both of us, but we don't know anything for sure yet. The child might be what you thought—a friend of the family. A distant relative. There might not even be a connection between me and Ashland.”

She pulled away from his grasp. “You don't believe that. I know you don't. Besides, that's not what this is about. I'm talking about us. I'm talking about your feelings for me.”

“Where is this coming from?” He closed the distance she'd put between them, and cupped her face in his palms. “Anna, the last thing I want to discover is that we're so closely related. My God, I don't know how I would live with that.”

She made a sound of pain and curled her wet soapy hands into his pullover. She pressed her face to his chest. She wanted to kiss him so badly the want clawed at her. She wanted to make love with him. But she couldn't. And she was afraid.

He pressed his lips to the top of her head. “We'll get through this, Annabelle. I swear we will.”

She lifted her gaze to his, tears slipping down her cheeks. “But what will be waiting for us on the other side?”

“I don't follow.”

She drew in a deep breath, her lips trembling so badly she could hardly form the words. “Do you love me?”

“Annabelle—”

“Do you?” He tried to move away from her; she tightened her fingers. “I love you. I've fallen in love with you.”

He shook his head. The panic in his eyes would have been laughable had it not cut her so deeply. “You don't love me,” he said. “You love what we do together. You love that you can finally be with a man and respond.” He touched her cheek, stroking gently. “You don't love me. I promise you don't.”

Anna fisted her hands against his chest. He didn't want her to love him, she saw that now. He didn't want the complication. The strings. “Like a patient who falls in love with her shrink? You think what I
feel for you is some sort of transference? Bastard!”

She lifted a hand to slap him; he caught it. A muscle jumped in his jaw but his eyes were dark with regret. With pain. “I didn't want to hurt you. I didn't mean to.”

Fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. “What are your feelings for me, Rush? Besides the obvious physical ones?”

He released her and crossed to stand by the window. For long moments he stared out at the black, then he turned back to her. “Wasn't I honest about my feelings, Annabelle? Did I once say something that led you to believe this was forever? I don't operate that way. Forever's not even in my vocabulary.”

“And that doesn't answer my question.”

“It's the best I can do.”

Anna drew in a shocked breath, seeing the truth in his eyes, but not wanting to believe it. She shook her head. “You don't even know, do you? You're so scared of feeling anything, you wouldn't know love if it smacked you in the face.”

He reached a hand out to her. “I like you, I enjoy being with you. Lord knows, I love making love with you. But I don't know where my feelings for you end and for Ashland begin. I don't know how to separate what we have between us from what I feel about being here. Maybe they can't be separated.”

Her breath caught in a sob, and she covered her face with her hands. Once again her relationship with a man had been tainted by Ashland. Once again, she hadn't been wanted for herself alone.

He took a step toward her. “I'm sorry, Anna. I didn't mean to hurt you.”

Angry, she backed away. “You said that before.”

“I don't know what else to say.”

Standing ramrod straight, she lifted her gaze to his. “If you can't say you love me, just say goodbye.”

For one impossibly long moment he hesitated, his gaze on hers torn. Then, without saying anything, he turned and walked away.

When she heard the front door snap shut, Anna curled her arms around herself and cried.

Chapter Twelve

I
n her dream the phone was ringing. Anna opened her eyes, realizing that the ringing wasn't part of her dream. Disoriented, she uncurled herself from her position on the settee, moaning as her muscles and spine screamed their displeasure.

Her foot was asleep, and she limped across the room to the phone. “Hello,” she managed, her voice sounding like sandpaper.

“Anna? Is that you?”

“Yes.” She cleared her throat. Her head pounded from crying and she didn't have to look into a mirror to know her eyes were swollen and red. “Who is this?”

“Pete Garner.”

“Pete?” She pushed the hair away from her face, her head beginning to clear, the memory of her last meeting with Rush filling it. Pain took her breath.

“Anna, listen.” For the first time, she heard the worry in the doctor's voice. “Riverview Memorial just called. Your brother's been brought into the E.R.”

“Lowell?” She shook her head. “At Riverview?”

“He's in bad shape. Apparently, somebody worked him over pretty good.”

They're going to break my legs, Anna. You've got to help me.

Her brother's words resounded in her head and she gripped the sideboard to steady herself. He hadn't been lying, Anna realized. He hadn't fabricated the story to try to manipulate her into selling Ashland. And she'd turned him away. She'd turned her brother away.

“Anna, are you still there?”

“Yes,” she managed. “What did they… How bad—”

He cut her off. “I don't know the specifics. I suggest you get there as soon as you can. I'll meet you.”

“No, Pete, wait! You have to tell me…. How bad is…”

The doctor had already hung up. Anna stared at the buzzing receiver, tears blinding her. She brought a hand to her mouth. Lowell had begged for her help. She'd turned him away.

Now, he was in the hospital.

A sob caught in her throat, and she dropped the receiver into its cradle. She needed her keys, she thought, looking frantically around her, hysteria clawing at her. She needed her purse. Where had she left them?

She raced to the kitchen, flipping on the overhead light, squinting and making a sound of pain as she did. She found her purse and rifled through it for her keys, swearing when they weren't there. She dumped the purse's contents on the kitchen table to be sure, then swore again.

Where were they? Where—

Rush, she remembered. Rush had used the truck that afternoon.

Throwing her purse back together, she ran out the back door and across the dark yard. She reached the overseer's house in moments and pounded on the door. “Rush! It's me, open up!” She pounded again.
“Please…open up!”

“Anna! My God, what's wrong?”

She swung around. Rush stepped out of the shadows and started up the porch steps. She looked at him through a veil of tears, wishing she could throw herself in his arms, wishing he could comfort her.
“The keys,” she managed. “Do you have the truck keys?”

“Yeah.” He fished in his pocket and pulled them out. “But what's—”

Anna snatched them from his hand. “I've got to go.”

“Go? Anna…” As she rushed by him, he caught her elbow. “It's the middle of the night.”

She jerked against his grasp. “It's Lowell. I've got to go.”

She freed herself and ran to the truck. She yanked the driver's side door open and climbed inside.

“Wait!” Rush caught up with her. He grabbed the door, preventing her from shutting it. “What do you mean, it's Lowell? What's going on?”

She gasped for breath as she struggled to fit the key into the lock. “He's at Riverview Memorial's emergency room. He's hurt…. I've got to go to him.”

“I'll drive you.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I don't need your help.”

“You're hysterical, Anna. Slide over.” When she resisted, he added, “How much good are you going to be to your brother if you end up in a ditch?”

She swore and acquiesced. He climbed behind the wheel and started the old vehicle up. “You'll have to give me directions.”

She did and within moments they were whizzing down the highway that connected the community of Ames to that of Riverview.

Anna stared out the window, unable to see for her tears.

“You want to talk about it?” Rush asked.

“It's my fault,” she whispered, not looking at him. “He told me this was going to happen. I didn't believe him.”

Rush glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “Told you what was going to happen?”

She filled him in, covering her face with her hands when she'd finished. “What am I going to do if he…? I'll never forgive myself if…”

“It's not your fault.” Rush reached across and squeezed her hand. “You didn't get him into trouble. You can't blame yourself.”

“You don't understand,” she said, slipping her hand away from his. “You just don't understand.”

Rush's jaw tightened into a hard line. “No, I guess I don't.”

They didn't speak again and by the time they reached the emergency room, Pete Garner was already there. He nodded at Rush and hugged her.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I'm fine.” She drew in a shaking breath. “What about Lowell?”

The doctor guided her over to a deserted grouping of chairs. He sat across from her, while Rush positioned himself behind her chair. “He's in surgery, Anna. He's bleeding internally. They have to find the source and stop it.”

“Oh, my God…” Anna brought a hand to her mouth.

“Luckily, a couple out necking found him in a ditch on Lovers' Lane. He was unconscious when they brought him in, and he hasn't regained consciousness yet.”

Anna curved her arms around herself. This couldn't be happening, she thought. Not to Lowell. Not to her baby brother.

“I'm not going to lie to you, Anna. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. Both his legs are broken, one of his arms. All his ribs are either broken or fractured. His skull looks okay, thank God.”

Pete Garner leaned toward her. “He's alive, Anna. He was found in time. You've got to focus on that.”

She nodded dumbly, struggling to get a grip on herself, her emotions. She felt Rush's steady presence behind her, felt his quiet strength. He dropped a hand onto her shoulder, reassuring, and she reached up and covered it with her own.

She drew in a deep breath. “How long was he…out there?”

“About twelve hours. It could have been a lot worse. Whoever did this, knew exactly what they were doing. They knew just where to hit him, just where to hurt him. They didn't want to kill him. Not immediately, anyway.”

I made enemies of the wrong guys, sis.

You've got to help me. I've got nowhere else to turn.

Her breath caught in a sob. She'd turned him away. Guilt and grief wound through her until she didn't know where one began and the other left off. If it even mattered.

The hours passed with excruciating slowness. Lowell made it through surgery, although he didn't regain consciousness. Night gave way to day, and finally they let Anna in to see him, but only for a moment. At the sight of his battered face and body, at the myriad of tubes and machines, she'd had to fight not to fall completely apart.

Rush stayed with her, although Anna found it a mixed blessing. He brought her coffee, forced her to eat a bite or two of a doughnut. His presence was comforting, but the distance between them was an agony. She wanted him to hold her; she wanted to lean on him, wanted to know he loved and supported her.

She wanted the impossible. And it hurt like hell.

Midmorning, Travis rushed into the waiting room. “Anna! I just heard.”

Anna ran to him, flinging herself into his arms. He hugged her tightly, and she pressed her face to his chest. “It's so awful, Trav. His face… He's so broken….”

“Is he conscious?”

Anna shook her head. “No, not yet. They've patched him up, found the bleeding and stopped it. He should have come around, but he…hasn't.”

Travis stroked her hair. “Have you called Macy?”

Again, Anna shook her head. “She's at her sister's. She'll be back in a couple of days. I thought that would be soon enough to tell her. We'll know more then.”

Travis muttered an oath. “Who did this to him, Anna? Who would want to hurt him?”

Anna started to cry—great racking sobs that she couldn't control. Travis stroked her hair, murmuring sounds of comfort.

Rush watched them, jealousy twisting in his gut, a biting sense of alienation with it. He flexed his fingers and dragged his gaze away. He wanted to be the one to hold and comfort her. He wanted to be the one she turned to.

He had no right. She wanted more from him than he could give.

“Miss Ames.” The nurse came into the waiting room, all smiles. “Your brother's awake.”

“Awake.” Anna squeezed her eyes shut and drew in a shuddering breath. “Thank God.”

“How is he?” Travis asked. “Is he…all right?”

“He's foggy yet,” the nurse replied, “but he appears to be lucid. Give us a few minutes and you can see him.”

Rush watched as Anna threw her arms around Travis once more, the jealousy and alienation growing and swelling until he had to fight for an even breath.

On the outside again. Always on the outside.

He turned away from the pair and crossed to the waiting
room's picture window. After their argument, should he expect anything else? He'd been unable to give her what she wanted—what she'd needed.
He'd been unable to love her.

He'd hurt her.

Love. He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. In the twelve hours they'd been at the hospital, he'd seen a myriad of emotions play across Anna's face: joy and grief, fear and hope. Anger.

The fact that she loved her brother was unquestionable.

Unquestionable, too, was the fact that she would do anything she could to help him.

Even after the way he'd hurt her, again and again.

Was that what love was?

Brother and sister. He looked at Anna, this time at her reflection in the glass. His chest tightened. Could they share the same blood? Could they unwittingly have committed such a grievous sin against nature?

Rush curled his fingers into fists, despair rising like bile inside him. He'd told himself no. He'd told himself he couldn't have responded so sexually to his sister. It should be a genetic impossibility.

He knew it wasn't.

The picture window faced the parking lot, and Rush gazed at the activity below, at people rushing in for care or to see loved ones, at the hospital staff coming and going.

After he'd left Anna the night before, he'd been unable to sleep. He'd been disturbed by their argument, haunted by the image of the young boy in the drawing. So he'd walked the plantation grounds, looking within himself for answers.

The boy from the drawings was him. He knew it in his gut, in his heart. When he had looked into that child's eyes, he'd seen himself, the man he would become. The one he had become.

And the boy hadn't been the child of family friends. Or even a distant relative. Rush had read that fact in the drawing, in the loving way the child had been rendered, in the emotional sensitivity the artist had seemed to have to the subject.

Rush frowned, his gut tightening. Anna's mother hadn't drawn outsiders. In all the other sketch pads, the only people depicted were those living on the plantation.

The answer seemed devastatingly obvious.

He hadn't pointed that out to Anna. He hadn't wanted to upset her anymore and besides, they would have proof soon enough.

But why, if he was Joshua Ames's son, had he been sent away? It had crossed his mind that Anna's mother might have been jealous; he'd discarded that notion the moment he'd really looked at the drawing.
Whoever the boy had been, Constance Ames had loved him very much.

Rush drew his eyebrows together. It was ironic. He'd waited so long to discover who he was, and now was so close to realizing the truth, yet he found no joy in it.

He wished he'd never started searching.

The nurse poked her head into the waiting room and called Anna. Rush looked over his shoulder, and Anna's gaze found his. She smiled brilliantly, and his heart turned over.

Had he ever loved? he wondered, turning back to the window. The way Anna loved Lowell? The way she professed to love him?

He tightened his fingers. He had. A long time ago.

Emotion choked him; he battled it. If this ache of helplessness and alienation was love, who needed it? If loving hurt so much, what was the point?

Rush stiffened. He should have left the past alone. He shouldn't have come here. Why had he cared about finding his past? It didn't matter—not really. It wouldn't change him, wouldn't change his life.

He would leave Ames, go back to Boston. As soon as Anna was on her emotional feet.

A woman came into the waiting room directly behind him. She was petite, with a cap of flame-red curls. Rush squinted at her reflection in the window. He would recognize her anywhere.

It was Marla from Small Miracles.

Rush caught his breath. What was she doing here?

He swung around, her name on his lips. The waiting room was empty except for Travis. The other man arched his eyebrows coolly.

“Where did she go?” Rush asked.

“In to see Lowell. He woke up.”

Rush shook his head, impatient. “Not Anna. The other woman. With the red hair. She was just here.”

“I didn't see anybody.”

“But I…saw her…in the…glass.” Rush frowned and shook his head. “Never mind.”

“I don't think so.”

Rush narrowed his eyes as Travis crossed the waiting room. “Excuse me?”

The other man stopped before him. “Hurt Anna and I'll kill you.”