Save the Last Dance (14 page)

P
ROPPED UP AGAINST A
pile of pillows in her hospital bed, Kate stared at her new daughter in awe.

Until this day, every thought about her pregnancy had been tainted with worry about money. How she’d manage her vet school schedule in the fall. Whether or not she and Jared could make it through two more grueling years of school.

Who knew it would be like this—this instant, primal rush of fierce protectiveness and love? The unimaginable joy of holding this warm, feather-light bundle of soft blankets?

A perfect, tiny hand tightly clutched her finger, while those beautiful dark eyes were wide and fixed on her face, as if determined to memorize every detail of the one who’d brought her into the world.

Tiny, perfect toes, like small pink pearls, peeked out below the end of the receiving blanket.

Casey was the name she and Jared had agreed on if the baby was a girl, and the name seemed just right.

On a rush of emotion as swift and unexpected and overwhelming as a fierce summer storm, Kate’s hot tears came again, spilling down her face. Uncontrollable sobs racked her body, sending deep, physical pain slicing through her belly.

One pink and perfect child in her arms.

The other—their precious son, Collin—had grown cold within her embrace not two hours ago, his life slipping away on a faint, almost soundless sigh.

The highest, most unbelievable joy.

Then, in a heartbeat, that joy had shattered against the razor-sharp rocks in the deepest valley of grief.

The agony of it welled up inside her until she could barely breathe, and she lifted her arms to snuggle Casey closer to her chest, needing the child’s warmth as solace…though she knew nothing could ever replace the one who was gone.

“Do you want me to take her for a while?” Jared asked, his voice raw and his face so ravaged with grief that he was almost a stranger.

“No!”
A keening wail rose in the room from a voice she barely recognized as her own.

He jerked back as if she’d slapped him.

“You aren’t the only one hurting here.” The sharp voice came from the open doorway and both
of them startled at seeing Sylvia standing there, her face pale and strained, her mouth tight.

She’d actually come? In disbelief, Kate watched her mother-in-law come across the room to give Jared an awkward hug.

“You should have called me sooner,” she admonished him as she stepped back. “This can’t have been easy.”

“It’s been the best—and the worst—day of my life,” he said wearily. “I don’t know whether to celebrate or just sit down and cry.”

“Let’s take a look, then.” Sylvia turned and took the baby from Kate’s arms, pulling the blanket back to get a better look. “She’s lovely. She looks just like your sister, except for the eyes—and those are definitely yours.”

“But they’re so dark.”

“All babies’ are, but they’ll change. Just look at the shape, and those long, thick lashes. Most definitely yours.”

The aching emptiness in her arms made Kate want to launch out of bed and snatch her baby back.

“It’s such a terrible shame the other baby didn’t make it,” Sylvia continued, reaching out to rest a hand against Jared’s cheek. “I’ll bet he was just as beautiful. With a little more rest, less stress…
well, maybe things would have turned out much differently.”

Kate blinked as the words registered, then sliced through her heart one by one, as neatly as any surgical blade.
Less stress. More rest.
Was it her fault that their son died?

She drew in a strangled breath as the implications settled inside her, threatening to crush her under a massive anvil of guilt.

Oh, God—what have I done?

C
OLLIN HAD SEEMED PERFECT
in every way, and the autopsy revealed no specific cause of death…which compounded her guilt.

Had it been her lack of sleep?

Those endless, long hours of study?

The stress of striving for a top GPA?

The hours on her feet at the store, where she might’ve lifted too many heavy boxes, and maybe put some sort of stress or torsion on the umbilical cord, briefly depriving him of oxygen?

The reassurance of the labor and delivery nurses, her doctor and later her best friends about not taking blame for Collin’s death did little to ease the piercing grief that dogged Kate month after month after month.

That dark, endless tunnel seemed to stretch
onward forever, offering no hope of ever reaching sunshine. How could it, when nothing in this lifetime could bring her precious son back?

As the weeks and months passed, Jared grew more silent, more distant, more tentative when he spoke. He’d been lost in his own sorrows, too…though his highs and lows never quite paralleled Kate’s, so they retreated into themselves rather than turning to each other.

The first ten months had been terrible…yet they’d grown closer, too, in the dark of night, while sleeping wrapped in each other’s arms.

And while loving Casey, playing with her, trying to keep up a happy front, so she could have a childhood with normal parents instead of ones who were mired in sadness.

Parents who looked into her sweet, beautiful face and also saw the son who was gone.

But now, with Casey’s first birthday tomorrow, Kate took her out of the bathtub for their nightly game of peekaboo with the bath towel and realized—with dawning surprise—that it had been weeks since she’d had to turn away from her daughter to hide her tears.

Kate hid behind a corner of the towel, then popped out again, and Casey’s belly laugh washed
over her like a healing balm. “Are you Mommy’s best girl?”

Casey threw herself into Kate’s arms, laughing and planting damp kisses on her cheek.

“Looks like fun,” Jared said, his low voice filled with amusement. “Wish I could play.”

“You and I can play later,” Kate teased. “When Miss Giggles goes to bed. But if you’d like to take her right now, it would be a huge help. Eight or nine storybooks would just about give me enough time to straighten up this bathroom and finish the dishes.”

He stepped into the room and hunkered down next to Kate as she dried Casey with the towel, then put on her diaper and soft cotton jammies.

Even without looking at him, Kate could feel his warmth and catch the faint scent of his aftershave, and she felt a familiar tingle of awareness spread through her.

The moment she set Casey loose, the little girl raced to her toys in the living room, her chubby bare feet slapping against the hardwood floors, her wide-stanced gait sending them both into laughter.

“She is the light of my life,” Kate murmured as she and Jared stood. “Maybe that pregnancy was a surprise, but I wouldn’t give up one moment with her for all the gold in Fort Knox.”

They fell silent for a moment, as they always did at moments like this, and she wondered what he was thinking. If he had regrets. If he longed for the freedom most of his law school buddies still enjoyed…without all the emotional baggage she and Jared still carried.

Collin’s death had changed her forever, leaving her a far different person than the one he’d married in such a white-hot fever less than two years ago. Did he regret that now?

Jared wrapped his arms around her and pulled her backward against his chest to nuzzle her neck. “We’re going to make it, you and me.”

She closed her eyes and savored his warmth, the beloved feeling of his strong arms around her. “I hope so.”

“That book we read said that losing a child is like the worst kind of ‘trial by fire’—that it can end a marriage. I think it made us stronger.” He kissed her cheek. “If we’ve gotten through this year, we can get through anything.”

A brief image of his mother flashed through her thoughts. The subtle implication of blame Sylvia had laid at Kate’s feet on that first day in the hospital. Her cool distance at the tiny, private funeral, when Kate had needed solace more than any time in her entire life.

“Even my mother,” he whispered, as if reading her thoughts, and she could feel him smile.

“Even her.” She turned in his arms and lifted her chin to accept his kiss. “I want to end up in rocking chairs together at some nursing home when we’re over a hundred. I love you, Jared, and I always will.”

Present Day

W
HEN
K
ATE REACHED
the hospital, she hurried to the emergency department doors, nodded at the nurses standing inside and headed straight for the elevators.

She’d been silently praying the entire trip back into town, steeling herself for what might lie ahead.
Poor Casey, there all alone…

And Jared—what about Jared? Why had she listened to the nurses who had encouraged her to leave for a while?

Upstairs, she strode straight to the ICU but stopped there, her hands braced on the door.

Through the windows, she could see the area was quiet. Several nurses were charting on the computers at the desk. Did that mean…

“Mom!” Casey came out of the waiting room to the left and launched herself into Kate’s arms. “Where have you been?”

“I’ve been here since your dad was admitted. I only ran home and out to the clinic because the nurses said he was stable. Your dad…is he…”

Casey pulled Kate over to a chair and sat down, and Kate followed suit. “The nurses came out just a few minutes ago and said he’d stabilized, but we can’t go in for another hour. He was in res…” She thought for a second. “Respiratory distress. Something to do with his medications and a coma.”

Kate breathed a deep sigh and felt her tense muscles go weak with relief. “Thank goodness he’s doing better.”

“But if he’s in a coma, will he wake up?” Casey’s voice lifted in alarm. “Will he be okay?”

Kate gently took Casey’s cold, shaking hands within her own. “He has a number of injuries. The most troubling right now is some swelling of his brain. That’s why they dropped him into a coma with barbiturates—to help reduce the pressure. It won’t be for long.”

“I—I feel so bad.” Casey swallowed hard, her head bowed. Strands of long blond hair had escaped her ponytail and trailed over their joined hands like molten gold. “I should’ve been here. M-maybe I never should’ve moved away.”

“Oh, sweetheart. Of course you should have—
this is the time to spread your wings. You wanted so badly to go to school in Fort Collins, right?”

When she didn’t answer, Kate freed a hand and reached over to gently cup her cheek. “I miss you terribly, of course. And so does your dad. But it wouldn’t be right to hold you back.”

Casey’s head dropped lower. “Y-you didn’t go so far away.”

“Are you homesick? Has it been difficult for you?” That last phone call played through Kate’s memory. The tension in Casey’s voice. The hesitance. “If there’s anything at all that you need to talk about, this is a perfect time. We only want you to be happy.”

“I—” The elevator dinged softly, and Casey fell silent as footsteps came slowly down the hall.

Kate looked around, realizing now that the old man was gone. Her heart caught. Had his wife died? Or had she been moved to the cardiac floor instead? Or perhaps he’d just taken a short break, as well.

But it wasn’t his deeply lined face that appeared at the door. It was Sylvia, looking ashen and weak. She was accompanied by a nurse, who had her elbow crooked firmly under Sylvia’s arm to steady her.

The nurse frowned at Kate and shook her head.
“Mrs. Mathers has been discharged, against medical advice, and she refused a wheelchair to come up here. We tried, believe me. But—”

“I am perfectly fine. I’m going to sit right here, and I’ll be far better off than I was downstairs on that blasted gurney.” Sylvia’s eyes flashed fire as she disengaged her arm and eased into a waiting room chair. “So just let me be.”

The nurse gave Kate a helpless look. “We wanted to keep her a while longer, or at least arrange for transport home so she could rest. But she said she’s staying at a hotel and refused to go there. Said she has to be up here for her son.”

“I’ll keep an eye on her. If we need any assistance, I’ll call downstairs.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Sylvia snapped. “If I get tired, I can nap here, or I can take my own car.”

Kate met the nurse’s eyes and gave a slight shrug. “We’ll manage.”

The nurse hesitated in the doorway, then mouthed
good luck,
before disappearing down the hall.

Casey sat back in her chair. “Hi, Grandma. Were you sick, too?”

“No, I was not. Just a little stressed, but anyone would be in this situation.” Sylvia shifted and straightened her spine. “The nurses were quite wrong in ordering me down to the E.R.—
but I suppose that’s how they try to bring in more revenue.”

For a woman who “wasn’t ill,” Sylvia looked remarkably pale, and Kate wished she could run down to the E.R. and ask about her condition. There’d be no point, though, given today’s privacy laws. She considered the best approach, and mentally crossed her fingers before speaking. “What sort of adjustments did they make with your meds?”

Sylvia pursed her lips.

“Did they order a stress test?”

Silence.

“An MRI?”

Sylvia’s gaze shifted away and her lower lip quivered for just an instant, but at that brief glimpse into her soul, Kate saw her for what she was, behind the hard mask she always kept firmly in place.

An old woman in fragile health.

Alone.

Her only daughter away at school, her only son badly injured and lying in ICU—yet she was still too stubborn and prideful to welcome an olive branch of peace and comfort.

Decades of bitterness had carved those lines so deeply in her gaunt cheeks. And while Sylvia would probably never change, maybe it was time for everyone else to try a little harder.

“I know you aren’t tired, and that you feel perfectly fine,” Kate said. “But when you do want some rest, our house is closer than the hotel and no one is there.”

Sylvia shot her a disparaging glance. “Thank you, but no.”

“It would be quiet and peaceful, and the guest rooms both have comfy beds. Casey could probably use some sleep, too. How long have you been up, honey?”

Casey flashed her a quick look of understanding. “A good thirty-six hours, but I don’t really want to go home alone. Unless maybe Grandma would go with me.”

“Dr. Mathers?”

All three women jerked around to face the doorway, where one of the ICU nurses stood.

“Sorry,” she said with chagrin. “I didn’t mean to alarm you. If one of you would like to go back in to sit with Mr. Mathers, it would be all right. He’s doing better. He’s still asleep, but the doctor has tapered those new meds. And Dr. Mathers—you have a call on line four. You can take it in here, if you like.”

“We should let Grandma go in first, don’t you think?” Kate asked Casey. “I believe you must have seen him last.”

When Casey nodded, Sylvia silently rose and left the room to be with Jared. Kate went to the desk phone on an end table to pick up her call.

“It’s me,” Amy said, her voice shaking. “I’m at the clinic and there’s been more trouble. The sheriff is on his way over to see you. Tom, too, because he stopped in when he saw the patrol car out front.”

What next?
Kate took a deep breath. “I was in the clinic just an hour ago, Amy, and everything was fine. At least as far as I know.” But had she looked that closely? Had the intruder been hiding inside, even while she was there?

“I was late for work this morning, because my truck had a flat when I got up this morning,” Amy said. “I just walked in maybe ten minutes ago. The sheriff was at the café having breakfast, so he came right over when I called. Someone trashed your office—threw papers everywhere, then must’ve walked through your lab and pharmacy and swept everything off the shelves. There’s broken glass all over. And this time…” She swallowed audibly. “This time, there was a note.”

Kate felt her blood chill. “Do you have it?”

“The sheriff does. But I remember what it says.
‘Back off or you’ll be next.’
Next for what? And
why?
”

W
HEN
S
YLVIA RETURNED
from her five minutes at Jared’s bedside, she looked even more exhausted. “His color seems better, and he gripped my hand just a little when I talked to him.” She sank into a chair. “Maybe I should take that rest, after all.”

Thankful for her change in attitude, Kate tossed the Bravada keys to Casey. “Can you bring my car up to the back entrance, so your grandmother doesn’t need to walk so far?”

“I could walk,” Sylvia sniffed after Casey was gone.

Kate nodded. “I know, but I just wanted a moment to talk to you alone.”

The old woman’s eyes flared wide with alarm. “About Jared? Is he worse than they told me?”

“No. I just wanted a chance to tell you how much we all love you…and how much I wish that there was a way to mend all the hurt between us.”

Sylvia stiffened.

“I know you were against Jared’s marriage to me. I know you had high hopes for something different. But,” Kate added with a gentle smile, “we’ve made it for twenty years now. I love him with all my heart. And it would mean so much to both of us if we could all be a closer family.”

Sylvia sat upright. Her rigid spine might have
been made of granite. But after a long moment, she turned her head away, her lower lip trembling.

“Please? You never know what the future might bring for any of us…or how much we’ll need each other.”

Sylvia clenched her hands in her lap until her knuckles whitened.

“I wish Casey could get to know her only grandmother better. She would love that. And it would mean so much to me if we could all start building some good memories…together.”

Sylvia’s mouth worked, as if she were trying to force words that just wouldn’t come, then she turned away, her back rigid.

Ten minutes later, Casey appeared at the door. “I’ve got the Bravada at the entrance. Are you ready, Grandma?”

The older woman hesitated.

“Go on home and rest, you two,” Kate said on a long sigh.

“You…you’ve been a good wife to my son,” Sylvia managed after a long silence.

The words were stilted, still edged with ice, but it was a start. “I’ll call immediately if there’s any change. Okay?”

With a nod, Sylvia started to follow Casey out the door, then she turned back. Her face was still
lined with fear and exhaustion, but there was a flicker of something new…as if those steel-gray eyes had softened, just a little.

Maybe there was hope after all.

J
UST MINUTESAFTER
Casey and Sylvia left, the sheriff arrived, his keys jangling in one hand with every stride and a scarred leather notebook in the other. Tom trailed behind, red-faced and breathing hard.

Kate gripped the arms of her chair and stood up. “The clinic has been broken into twice in twenty-four hours. Did you find any clues this time? Fingerprints?”

“I have a deputy going over the scene with a fine-tooth comb.”

“I was just there—right at the clinic.”

“I know. One of the deputies drove by earlier and saw your car.”

“How could it happen so fast?” But even as she said the words, she felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. “I was being watched?”

“That’s my guess. But it gets even more interesting than that.” The sheriff glanced at Tom, then opened the notebook in his hand to review some notes. “When Jared’s SUV was pulled out of the ditch, we didn’t notice anything at first…as a lot of the paint was burned and the vehicle was badly
damaged. And part of one side was buried in the damp ground.”

Her sinking feeling turned into a cold, hard fist that tightened around her stomach as she thought about the dead woman and the evidence that might have been discovered.

“We think we found evidence that the vehicle had been sideswiped—there’s some green paint residue. Do you remember you or your husband having any sort of minor accident when that could have occurred?”

“No. Never.”

He nodded, his lips pursed, as if she’d just confirmed what he’d believed all along. “Then we can look at the possibility that a second vehicle was involved—either accidentally, or intentionally.”

“And given the other threats, and the break-ins at the clinic, it seems likely that it would be the latter,” Tom interjected. “I’m worried about your safety, Kate. And about Jared’s, as well.”

Kate drew in a sharp breath. “I just sent Casey and Sylvia home. Alone.”

The sheriff tapped the microphone clipped at his shoulder and rattled off orders to a dispatcher, then signed off. “I’ve sent a deputy over there to keep watch, and we’re having that paint sample analyzed to determine the make and
model of the car that might have been involved. I also have a deputy questioning people in town to see if anyone saw a suspicious vehicle at your clinic this morning as they drove by. But in the meantime, we need to talk about the possibilities here.”

Tom nodded. “The sheriff and I went through Jared’s records at the free clinic, Kate. There are a couple that look suspicious—a large farming corporation accused by a neighbor of illegally contaminating Silver Creek with feedlot runoff. The neighbor guy came to Jared for help when the county wasn’t taking quick enough action, I guess. There have been a lot of heated words—even some threats—back and forth between these two guys.

“Another case Jared has taken on is against a small meat processing plant in the next county. Two of the employees are trying to sue over being fired—unfairly, they say. Other than that, most of Jared’s pro bono cases have been domestic disputes, or wrangles between neighbors.”

She blinked, taking it all in. It wouldn’t set well with those business owners if those little guys were now armed with a determined lawyer. Could someone from the corporation or processing plant have been desperate enough to attempt murder?
And were they determined not to stop until no further threat remained?

Tom rested a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll keep looking through the records, and the sheriff’s department is continuing its investigation. But be careful, Kate. There’s someone out there who’s wanting payback. When your husband wakes up, do everything in your power to make him back off from those cases for a while. Understand?
Everything
—before something worse happens.”