Sweet Hearts (18 page)

“Could I ask you to do
something?” she said. “When you hear from your FBI friend Jonathan again, could
you ask if it would be all right for him to speak directly to me? I could ask
my questions, maybe learn something helpful, and I wouldn’t have to involve you
every step of the way.”

Their bowls of stew arrived and
they ate silently, like an old couple who’ve run out of things to say to each
other.
We can’t start being like this already,
Sam thought. When Beau
set his spoon down she reached for his hand.

“It’ll get better,” she said.
“Maybe it
is
just some odd moon phase.”

He let his shoulders relax.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to snap. And, yes, I’d be happy to let you and Jonathan
work out this Fresques thing on your own.”

He jotted down an Albuquerque
phone number and she stuck it into her pack.

“I wish I had some of my special
chocolates for you,” she said with a flirtatious lilt. “That might be the way
to get your mind off the workday.”

His lopsided grin reassured her.
“Only problem with that is that you would also have to take your mind off work
for a day, and I plainly don’t see that happening.”

She tilted her head in
acknowledgement. He was right about that. If she could have skipped work this
week, they would be getting married tomorrow.

“We need some time to work out—”
Her voice trailed away as she caught sight of a whirl of bright purple at the
front of the restaurant.

Felicia Black stood at the open
door, a gust of frigid wind swirling the fabric of her long coat. Several
patrons looked up, annoyed by the chill but fascinated by the creature causing
it. Felicia stepped inside, letting the door coast slowly shut.

“Samantha, I was
so
hoping
to find you here,” she said, never taking her eyes off Beau.

“Really.” Sam toyed with the idea
of flicking the plastic bottle of honey off the table. She was pretty sure she
could aim it toward Felicia’s thigh-high suede boots.

“Yes.” Felicia’s gaze turned to
Sam about a nano-second before she could implement the honey move.

She pulled her hand back.

“You ladies excuse me a second?”
Beau stood and headed toward the men’s room.

Felicia’s eyes followed his moves
before she noticed that Sam’s hand was getting close to the honey bottle. She
picked it up and set it on the far side of the table, then sat in the chair
Beau had vacated.

“Sam, I’d like us to be friends.
There’s no reason for you to feel animosity toward me.”

Oh yeah? Other than flatly
stating that you’re back in town to get Beau, then sending him candy that you
knew to be an aphrodisiac, then showing up during our lunch. Pardon my
suspicions,
Sam thought.

“Now that I’m back in Taos, I’m
going to start entertaining again. I’d like to invite you and Beau to a little
party at my place. Tomorrow night. Six or so for cocktails, a little buffet
dinner. Dancing to a DJ until whenever.”

Sam stared at the redhead
levelly. “Felicia, things are really busy for both of us right now.”

Beau walked up to the table just
then and Felicia jumped up.

“All right, you two. I must go.”
She touched both index fingers to her lips, kissed them, and then leaned
forward to place one finger on Beau’s cheek then one on Sam’s. “Ciao!”

Pretentious little vixen. Sam
noticed that Beau’s eyes were wide with surprise.

“What did she want?” he asked.

“She invited us to a party at her
place.”

“What did you tell her?”

“That we were both pretty busy
right now.”

“I’m afraid my answer would have
been less diplomatic.”

Leaving cash on the table, he
took Sam’s elbow as they made their way outside. Down the block where she’d
parked her van he opened her door and closed it securely after her. She lowered
the window and he leaned in.

“I love you, darlin’.” The
half-wink and special smile warmed her.

“Love you too. And I’d rather
spend Valentine’s Day alone with you.” He patted the side of her van and walked
toward his vehicle.

His cruiser pulled away from the
curb before she remembered that what she’d started to say was that they should
plan some time to talk about rescheduling their wedding. And she knew that talk
would need to include her telling him about the powers of the magic box.

Sam ran through her mental
checklist of duties for the day. The shop was in pretty good shape, with the
girls keeping up the cookie and cupcake supply. Before closing time she would
have them pre-make more cookie dough and bake additional layer cakes for the
last minute shoppers. Women would do their buying today; tomorrow it would be
the men.

With her own wedding on hold, the
hours she might have spent having her hair done, putting together her
accessories, or making last minute phone calls were suddenly free. Almost on
its own, the van made a left turn at Kit Carson Road and headed toward Zoë’s
house.

Lights glowed from two windows at
the adobe B&B but the visitor parking area out front was empty. Zoë and
Darryl’s winter guests were normally skiers who slept there but vacated during
the day, spending their hours on the slopes nearly twenty miles away at Taos
Ski Valley. Sam pulled around back and parked beside Zoë’s Subaru near the
kitchen door.

“Hey, what’s up?” Zoë said,
looking up from a ball of bread dough that she was kneading into submission.

Sam dropped her jacket over the
back of one of the tall chairs at the breakfast bar.

“You okay?” Zoë paused and gave
her friend a firm look. “With the wedding cancellation and all that?”

“I’m fine. A lot more relaxed,
actually. I just feel bad that we gave you such short notice. Had you already
made a lot of preparations?”

Zoë plopped the ball of dough
into a bowl and covered it with a white cloth. Wiping her hands on a towel, she
smiled. “Nothing that won’t keep for another day.”

Sam drew little circles on the
shiny tile with her fingertip. “Beau and I need to figure things out.”

“Problems between the two of
you?”

“Oh, not at all. It’s scheduling.
We’re both absolutely swamped right now. My shop will slow down after tomorrow,
but then I’ve taken on this other thing.”

Zoë sent her a puzzled glance as
she turned on a burner under the tea kettle.

“A lady who ordered a cake . . .
we’ve become friends, and I learned that she’s very sick. And of course there’s
a mystery to be solved. Her son disappeared a few years ago and she’d like for
him to come back before she . . .”

Zoë made sympathetic murmurs as
she pulled tea cups from the cupboard. “Too bad you couldn’t send this lady a
big dose of that healing energy you used on me that time.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah. But Marla’s
case is a lot more serious than a pulled muscle. I wish I could . . .”

“Earl Grey or Chamomile?” Zoë
asked, holding up the boxes.

Sam pointed at the Earl Grey
automatically, her mind zipping off on the tangent that her friend had just
suggested. What if she
could
send some kind of healing power toward
Marla Fresques? Bertha Martinez, the old
curandera
who’d given Sam the
wooden box, said that its powers were many, that it could be used for good
purposes.

“. . . with just a few days’
notice.” Zoë’s words came to Sam and she realized she’d missed something.

“The wedding?” Zoë said. “Just
give us a heads-up and we can have everything all set up for you.”

Sam realized her tea was gone,
and when Zoë got up to check on her bread Sam shrugged into her jacket.

“Thanks. I appreciate the understanding.”

“You do seem a little distracted
right now. Better to wait until you can give Beau your full attention. I’d
guess that’s what he would prefer anyway.” Zoë laughed and gave her friend a
hug.

Sam found her mind zipping
forward as she started her van and turned toward the street. It might work. She
got to the end of Zoë’s lane and looked both directions. She really should turn
right and get back to the bakery. But a little stop by home first . . . A quick
visit . . .

It wouldn’t take very long.

She turned left, made the jog
over to Elmwood, and was in her own driveway within minutes. In her bedroom,
the wooden box sat in its usual spot on her dresser, the finish dull and
lusterless in the dim room. Sam slipped her jacket off and picked up the box.

Rarely had she ever specifically
called upon its powers; far more often she just happened to touch it and then
was amazed at the results. Amazed, or frightened. Sometimes this little
object’s powers could get pretty spooky. She sat cross-legged on her bed and
held the box in her lap, placing both hands over its top.

She closed her eyes and fixed a
picture of Marla Fresques in her mind, visualizing her friend well and
energetic. She saw Marla in her home, bustling about the kitchen preparing a
big meal. And at the table she saw a man—Tito. He sat across from Jolie, and
the young girl had such love in her eyes. Marla brought food, first some
freshly baked warm rolls with butter, then she pulled a ham from the oven and
began slicing the succulent meat and handing slices of it to her family.

All at once the box became fiery
hot. Sam’s hands shot back, her palms burning. She stared at the object. The
wood glowed with an intensity she’d never seen, its normally dull brown surface
changing from golden brown to orange to yellow-white. The small inset stones
shot blazes of light, like gems under an intense lamp. Her hands burned and she
blew on the reddened palms.

They cooled almost immediately,
and when she pressed them to her cheeks there was only a pleasant warmth. She
rose from the bed and placed the glowing box back on the dresser. The wood and
stones immediately began to settle down, losing their burning intensity in
minutes.

“Okay.” Sam said to the box. “I
have a purpose. I’d better get busy.”

During the drive to the hospital
she refused to analyze what she was about to do. Doubts tried to work their way
into her head—Would this do any good? Could she possibly harm Marla with this
power?—but she refused to let them take hold. And when she walked into her
friend’s room and saw her lying semi-conscious on the bed, Sam didn’t think
twice. She rushed to Marla’s side and picked up the cold, still hand that lay
on top of the blanket.

Marla moaned, half asleep.

“It’s okay. It’s me—Sam.” She ran
her fingers up the arm that felt thin as a skeleton’s.

“I want you to get well, Marla,”
she murmured. “I want to give you the power to feel better.”

Three times she coaxed warmth
into the right arm and shoulder, then she circled the bed and did the same
thing with the left side. She placed her warm hands on either side of Marla’s
emaciated face and held her skull firmly and gently, willing the energy to
enter Marla’s entire system.

The dark eyes opened and Marla
stared at her. “Sam? Why are you here?”

“Shush now, just relax. Just let
your body heal itself.”

Marla’s thin eyelids drooped
halfway closed. “That feels good, Sam. Thank you.”

Sam stared at her own hands. They
still felt tingly; the palms remained abnormally pink. What more could she do?
She pushed the bedcovers aside and took Marla’s chilly left foot between her
hands, performing the same strokes up to the knee and back. Same for the other
side. When she finished, her hands had cooled down.

She tucked the sheet and blanket
snugly around her friend and sat in the chair beside the bed.

Marla’s breathing was steady, and
stronger. Sam watched her. It seemed that much of the wan, gray hue had left
her face.

“I feel like I could sleep now,”
Marla said in a low voice. “Without pain.”

Sam glanced at the monitors near
the head of the bed. One machine whirred to a stop, but the patient’s breathing
became even more tranquil and stable. She reached out and laid her hands once
more on Marla’s shoulders.

“I’ll leave you to your rest. Be
well.”

She stepped out of the hospital
room and took a deep breath. What was done was done now. She could only hope
for the best. The hum that had reverberated through her for the past hour had
completely dissipated and she walked calmly out of the hospital.

Sam was about halfway back to
Sweet’s Sweets when her cell phone rang.

“Samantha Sweet?” She didn’t know
the male voice.

“My name is Jonathan Ernhart.
Beau Cardwell said I should speak with you regarding information about Tito
Fresques.”

“Yes, Jonathan, he told me about
you.” Sam steered to the right and pulled into the parking lot of a small
Chinese restaurant. “Is there new information about Tito?”

“Not much. But Beau said you had
a list of places he’d been, where he’d sent mail to his family?”

She pulled the page from her pack
and read off the locations and dates from the postmarks.

“Do you have these greeting cards
in your possession?”

“No, I don’t. His mother is
gravely ill and it seemed important to her that she be able to see them. I took
them to her in the hospital.”

There was a short pause on the
line. “That’s okay. I’ll work with this data. I’m having a hard time getting
the DEA to cooperate with us. They may have hidden him in a sort of witness
protection system or sent him on assignment to another part of the country, so
deep under cover that he’s not even allowed to contact his family. I don’t
know.”

Sam chafed, thinking that it
should be easy for two federal agencies to agree to share information but
apparently that wasn’t the way it worked.

“The man I’m talking to at DEA is
Clyde Jonah. He’s in the New Mexico division. You may hear from him, or you may
hear from his supervisor, a man named Wells.” He cleared his throat. “Neither
of them is going to share much with you, understand, but I’m asking them to let
you know if there is any way to get in touch with Tito Fresques. I’ve told them
there’s a family emergency behind the request.”