Nightwind (35 page)

“And every other man, as well,” the doctor reminded her.

Maxine flinched. “I was just trying to protect her.” She looked up. “I only did what I thought was best.”

The physician shook his head. “You stunted her growth: psychologically and spiritually. You did

everything you could to turn her against men and the town against her.”

The flush of shame crept down Maxine’s neck. “I did what I felt needing doing.”

“And in doing so, helped create the problem Lauren’s facing right now.”

She jerked her head around. “How did I help create a problem for her?”

Dr. Mayheaux drained his coffee and pushed the cup away. “When that man came to town, he went

looking for the most vulnerable woman he could find. A woman he knew he could twist right around his

finger.” He folded his arms over his chest. “That woman was Lauren. She wasn’t used to coping with a

man’s advances. She was so damned naive, she took him at his word that he cared for her.”

“He does,” Maxine mumbled. “He married her, didn’t he?”

“Yes, and he left her.” There was a hint of disgust in the man’s deep voice. “Left her pregnant with his

child.”

From everything people had been saying to her since she had returned home, Maxine knew the town

had turned against Syntian Cree as it had once been oblivious to Lauren. The entire populace of Milton

seemed to view him as some despicable libertine who had despoiled the town’s favorite virgin, and in the

doing, destroyed the girl forever.
If they only knew,
Maxine thought, standing up.

“Are you going to keep her here?” she asked, looping her handbag over her arm.

He nodded. “At least for the night. I want to get some nutrients into her system with that IV.” He pushed

himself up from his chair. “I might even keep her a bit longer. I don’t like the idea of her being out there in

that house alone.”

Maxine’s chin lifted. “I will be taking her to my house when she leaves here.”

Dr. Mayheaux shrugged. “I’ll leave that decision up to Lauren.” He walked to the door and opened it

for her.

Walking out into the hall, Maxine saw Ben Hurlbert standing at the Nurses’ Station. When he saw her,

he came hurrying forward.

“I heard on the radio that an ambulance had been sent out to get Lauren.” He jerked his head toward

the nurse he’d been questioning. “They wouldn’t tell me what had happened.”

“She fainted,” the doctor told him. “Nothing to get upset about, but we’re going to keep her overnight.

Maybe run some tests in the morning.”

Ben studied Mayheaux’s face. “She’s all right?”

“As far as I can tell, yes.” He slapped the Sheriff on the shoulder. “We’re going to take good care of

her, Benny.”

Ben Hurlbert blushed, thinking he should never have told Danny he was in love with Lauren Fowler. He

ducked his head. “Can I see her?”

“When we get her up to a room,” the doctor answered. He turned to Maxine. “Are you going to stay or

do you want me to have someone call a cab?”

Maxine frowned at him. “I’m staying, Daniel.”

“Suit yourself.” He’d never liked Maxine Fowler and today he liked her even less. With a friendly nod to

Ben, he sauntered off.

“What brought on her fainting, Miss Maxine?” Ben asked. He was twisting the brim of his uniform hat

around and around in his hands.

“The doctor says she hasn’t been taking good enough care of herself,” Maxine informed him. She let out

a long breath. “It’s all this mess with Syntian.”

Ben looked at the room where he had been told Lauren Fowler was being kept. “What do you think

happened to him, Miss Maxine?”

“I think you should ask Angeline Hellstrom that question, Sheriff,” she told him. When he shook his head

and answered that he already had, Maxine snorted. “She knows precisely where he is, but she isn’t going

to tell you unless you get a warrant and search her place.”

Ben’s head snapped up. “Search her place?” He stared at her, recognized the steady look she gave him

as brutal honesty, and stopped toying with his hat rim. “You think he’s staying with her?”

“I know he is,” Maxine snapped. She jabbed a finger into his chest. “And I’ll tell you something else,

Benjamin Hurlbert: He isn’t there because he wants to be, either!”

There was something compelling about the woman’s conviction, but the implication that she was making

with her bold words, was too hard to credit. Ben’s face hardened.

“What you’re saying is that Syntian Cree is being held there at Miss Angeline’s against his will. That’s a

libelous statement, Mrs. Fowler.”

“Get a warrant and go out there and see.”

“I can’t just ask for a warrant without proof that something’s going on!” Ben grumbled. “What reason

am I supposed to give Judge Clarke for a search warrant?”

“Angeline Hellstrom and Syntian Fowler were lovers,” Maxine snarled. “She worshiped the ground that

man walked on.”

“How do you
know
that, Miss Maxine?” Ben countered.

Maxie’s jaw clenched. “I just do, Sheriff! She got madder than snot when Syntian married my daughter.

If you ask me, Angeline was just biding her time, trying to figure out a way to get him back. She probably

called him, harassed the man, and when he made it clear he wanted no part of her, she had him

kidnapped and taken to—”

“Miss Maxine!” Ben said in an exasperated voice. “Do you hear what you’re saying? Miss Angeline is

one of the most respected women in Santa Rosa County. Escambia county, too! With her looks and her

money, she could have half a dozen men dancing attendance to her. Why would she want to go after a

married man who didn’t want her?”

“Because she don’t like to lose!” Maxine hissed at him, jabbing her finger into his chest to emphasize

each word. “He was hers and Lauren took him away from her. So she took him back!” She jabbed him

once more, more painfully and she smiled as he winced with pain. “Get yourself a warrant and go over to

Gulf Breeze. That’s where you’ll find him!”

Ben threw his hands in the air. “Ain’t no man worth going to jail over, Miss Maxine. If he’s with Mrs.

Hellstrom, he’s there ‘cause he wants to be, not ‘cause she snatched him. She’s got better sense than

that.”

“The hell she does!” Maxine exploded. She jabbed at him one more time. “Are you going to help me get

him back from her or not?”

The Sheriff shook his head. “I just can’t go out there and—”

“Yes or no?”

“No, ma’am!” Ben shot back. “I ain’t!”

“Fine,” she snapped. “That’s just fine.” She spun on her heel and headed for her daughter’s room. “I’ll

do it myself!”

Ben couldn’t believe the conversation he had just had with Lauren’s mother. He looked about him, not

surprised to see several of the nursing staff looking his way. How much of his talk with Maxine they had

heard, he had no way of knowing, but by the looks on several of the women’s faces, he knew they didn’t

like the Fowler woman any more than he did. After one more look at Lauren’s closed door, he jammed

his hat on his head and muttered to the nurse at the desk as he passed that he would be back in a few

minutes.

“Taking kinda particular interest in that little lady, don’t you think, Linda?” the head nurse asked one of

the lab technicians who were gathered around her desk.

“Seems to me that he is,” Linda Wainsworth answered. She hefted her rack of specimens and walked

toward the lab. “Make her a fine new husband, I reckon.”

“Benny Hurlbert’s a good man,” one of the orderlies remarked to no one in particular. “He’d do right by

her.”

“Wouldn’t leave her for the likes of that Hellstrom broad,” another orderly snorted.

“You think that’s what he did?” asked the head nurse, Diane Bickerstaff.

The orderly snorted again. “Wouldn’t surprise me none.”

Outside, sitting in his overly warm cruiser, Ben snatched up the mike from his radio and called into the

station.

“Go ahead, twenty-four.”

“Yeah, Marie. Have somebody from over in Gulf Breeze go by and question Angeline Hellstrom again

about Syntian Cree’s disappearance. Tell whoever goes over there to see if he can’t look around the

place; see if maybe somebody’s living there with her.”

“Like that philandering husband of Lauren’s?” Marie Halbach, the dispatcher answered back.

Ben frowned. “Yeah, like him.”

“Ten-four.”

Ben racked the mike and sat staring across the parking lot of the hospital. It was close to ninety degrees

outside and the underarms of his khaki shirt were wet with sweat. He swung his legs out of the car and

still sat there, thinking. If it was true Syntian Cree was staying with Angeline Hellstrom, he reckoned it

damned sure wasn’t against the man’s will.

Cursing under his breath, more furious with the vanished man than ever, Ben slammed out of the car and

stomped toward the emergency room entrance.

Lauren lay inthe hospital bed and stared up at the tile ceiling. She was tired, feeling numb and weak and

listless. Her stomach growled, reminding her that she hadn’t been eating right the last few weeks.

“You’ve got to eat, Lauren,” Doc Mayheaux had warned her. “If not for yourself, at least for the baby.”

The baby.

Lauren lifted her arm, the one with the IV catheter in it, and placed her hand on her belly. The roundness

was already showing and she felt the changes taking place in her body. She caressed her stomach, took a

long, deep breath, and sighed contentedly. She couldn’t let anything happen to her baby.

To Syntian’s baby.

The smile left her face and she turned her head on the pillow, tears gathering almost immediately at the

thought of her missing husband. In her heart, she knew he had not simply left her. That would have been

like admitting he had never loved her, and she knew that he had. It was more than just the simple,

desperate fear for his safety that made her so ill, that drove her to restlessly roam the house at night,

depriving her of sleep. It was the awful thought that he was hurt and suffering and that he might need her.

That he might be lying somewhere, unable to call for help, in pain or not remembering who he was. That

he might be at the mercy of someone who meant him harm.

“Lauren?”

She jumped, startled, and swiveled her head around. She smiled. “Hi, Benny.”

He came shyly into the room, twisting his hat in his hands. “How ya feeling?”

“All right.” She pushed herself up in the bed and told him to sit down.

“I can’t stay,” he said, glancing around him. “I’m still on duty, but I just wanted to make sure you were

all right.” His lips twitched in a self-conscious apology. “I was worried about you.”

“There’s no need to be,” she told him. “I just fainted.”

Ben nodded. “If there’s anything you need, I told them out at the desk to give me a call.”

Lauren’s face showed her surprise.

“I gotta be going,” Ben stammered, seeing that look of surprise on her face, misunderstanding it

completely. “You rest, okay?” He backed toward the door. “Is it all right if I come check on you again in

the morning?”

She scrunched up her forehead in answer. “I guess so.”

Ben smiled, stumbled into the door, looked around as though expecting the obstruction to attack him,

laughed nervously and then made his way through the door. “I’ll be seeing you,” he informed her.

“Okay?”

Lauren smiled. “Okay, Benny.”

She listened to his boot heels ringing against the terrazzo floor of the hall as he stomped away. He was

proving to be a good friend and she knew when Syntian returned home, he would want to thank Benny

for trying to take such good care of her.

“When you come home,” she whispered to the silent room and the tears welled once more.

She was beginning to think she would never lay eyes on her husband again.

Already, the hotFlorida sun was beating down with relentless perseverance as the orderly wheeled

Lauren out to her mother’s car two mornings after Lauren had been admitted to the hospital. The asphalt

of the parking lot was steaming and the chrome on the car’s door was like molten lava.

“Gonna be a scorcher,” Hank Varner, the orderly, joked with Lauren. “Must be close to a hundred by

now.” He helped her into the car and then stood there. “You take care now, Miss Lauren,” he advised

her. “Don’t want nothing to happen to that little fella in there, now, do we?”

“No.” She waved at Hank as he closed her door and stepped back from the emergency ramp, pulling

the wheelchair with him.

“Hank Varner knows enough about children,” Maxine scoffed. “He keeps his wife’s belly filled with

them.”

Lauren sighed. She had not wanted to ride back to her house with her mother, but the older woman had

insisted, saying she had something she needed to talk with Lauren about and that it couldn’t wait. She sat

silently, listening to her mother complain about the traffic on Berryhill Road; about the traffic light at the

corner of Berryhill and Glover Lane that she had seen no earthly reason for the city to have installed; at

the slow drivers, the heat, the funny taste the drinking water had of late.

“Mama,” Lauren finally said on a long breath of frustration. “Do you think we could talk about something

else.”

Maxine glanced at her daughter as she braked for the light at the intersection of Bypass and Park. “Like

what?”

Lauren looked out the window and waved at the Pavlo boys who worked at the Winn-Dixie across the

way. “How much do you think it would cost to hire a private detective to find Syntian?”