Unseen (13 page)

Sara knew that Nell couldn’t fathom the amount of pain her son was in. “Did Jared say anything before they put him under?”

“Chief Gray told me he was unconscious when they brought him in. Do you know him?”

“Gray?” Sara nodded. “Jeffrey worked a case with him before we met. He trusted him. So does everyone else. Gray’s worked all over the state, received all kinds of awards.”

Nell wasn’t impressed. “For whatever that’s worth. Didn’t stop Jared from getting shot.” She started pulling things out of her purse. A hairbrush. Her pocket Bible. A tin of Burt’s Bees lip balm. “Where did I put that damn card?”

Sara asked, “How has Jared been lately?”

“Healthy as a horse.”

“No, not his health.” Sara didn’t know how to broach the subject, so she dove right in. “Has he been working a case he was worried about? Or has Lena been doing something?”

“Oh, he won’t say a word against her—not Little Miss Perfect.” Nell took out a blister pack of gum. She offered a piece to Sara.

Sara shook her head. “When’s the last time you talked to him?”

“He calls me every Sunday and Wednesday after church. Mind you, he’s not going himself. Stopped doing that once he met up with her.”

Today was Thursday. Sara asked, “So, you talked to him last night?”

“Nine o’clock and he was at a bar with his friends. What does that tell you?” Nell wasn’t looking for an answer. “Says something’s not right, that’s what it tells you. Wednesday night, he should be at home with his wife, not off somewhere drinking with his buddies.”

Sara kept her opinion to herself. Jared was a grown man. Married or not, he was entitled to a night out. “Did he say anything on the phone that sounded off?”

“No. Just the usual. ‘Work’s good. Lena’s great. Tell Daddy I said hey.’ Nothing but puppies and sunshine.” She snorted at the thought. “They didn’t even get married in a church. Did it downtown like they were signing a contract. You’ve met her uncle?” Sara nodded again. “He was the only one there on her side. That
tells you everything you need to know right there. No friends. Nobody from work. Just some old piece of beef jerky looks like he belongs on the side of the road harassing people for money.” She pointed to her bare arms. “Had needle tracks up and down his arms. Didn’t even bother hiding ’em. God knows if they’re old or new.”

Sara pressed her lips together, catching a glimpse of that bottomless pit she’d barely managed to pull herself out of. “Nell, it won’t do any good getting worked up like this.”

Nell was obviously reluctant to let go, but finally she said, “You’re right. If I keep talking about her, I’m gonna end up going in there and killing her.” Nell looked down at her purse again and concentrated on digging around for the doctor’s card. “He needs his pajamas. He’d hate waking up in one of those gowns.”

“We’ll get some pajamas for him,” Sara offered, knowing there was no point.

“I want to see the house. I’ve only seen pictures. What do you make of that? I’m less than four hours away, but she’s never invited me for Christmas or holidays or nothing.”

Sara wasn’t about to take up for Lena, but she doubted Nell had made things easy. “The forensic team is probably still there.”

“The forensic team.” Nell let the words settle. “I want to go by the house. I want to see where it happened.”

“That’s probably not a good idea,” Sara countered. “The police don’t clean up before they leave. It’ll look just how it did last night.”

Nell seemed shocked by the information. She recovered quickly, taking a small notebook and a pen out of her purse. “I’ll tell Possum to go by the dollar store. There’s one right off the exit.” She clicked the pen and started writing. “We’ll need a bunch of rags. Lysol spray. Trash bags. Some gloves. What else—bleach?”

Sara tried to reason with her. “There are services that take care of this kind of thing.”

“I’m not gonna let some stranger clean my baby’s house.” She
sounded appalled. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

Sara knew better than to argue.

“Why would anyone do this?” Nell asked. “He’s always been the sweetest boy. Never said a hard word against anybody. Always helping people. Never asking for anything in return. Why, Sara? Why would someone hurt him?”

Sara shook her head, though Lena’s name was on the tip of her tongue.

“His eyes are taped shut. He’s got all kinds of tubes coming out of him. They got this plastic thing looks like a Connect Four sticking out of his side.”

“That’s probably a Pleur-evac,” Sara guessed. “It helps keep his lung open to give it time to heal.”

“Well, you’ve just told me more than anybody else has, thank you very much.”

Sara doubted this was true. She’d seen the glazed look in Nell’s eyes before. In traumatic situations, it was hard to understand the information being conveyed by doctors, let alone ask salient questions.

Sara told Nell the same thing she told the families of her patients. “Write down all your questions as they come. If I can’t answer them, then we’ll find someone who will. All right?”

“That’s good. I should’ve thought to do that. I’ve just been so …” She couldn’t finish the thought. “I mean, seeing him all—” Her words were cut off by a guttural sound. She lowered the notebook and pen to her lap, the shopping list forgotten. Tears rolled down her cheeks. Sara wondered if she was wishing her husband would return. More likely, she was praying her son would walk through the door.

Sara took Nell’s hand again, but she couldn’t look at her. The pain was too raw. While Sara witnessed the possibility of death almost every single day, knowing Nell, knowing Jared, made it different. She had lost her outsider’s perspective.

“Well, this is useless.” Nell’s voice was filled with self-recrimination. “Crying never helped anybody.” She pulled a pack of Kleenex from her purse and dried her eyes. “I haven’t told Delia.” Jared’s sister, Nell’s youngest child. “She’s working in the Gulf. She’s a vet now. Did you know that?” Sara nodded. “They got her scraping oil off sea turtles. She says the whole damn coast is still a tar pit.”

“You need to tell her.”

“What do I say? ‘That bitch your brother married mighta got him killed’?” Nell shook her head, visibly angry. “I knew when I found out he was seeing her that nothing good would come of it.”

Sara said nothing.

“He kept it from me for a full year. He knew I wouldn’t approve. He knew why, too.” Nell blew her nose in the Kleenex. “You warned me, Sara. You warned him, too. There’s no harm in a big fat ‘I told you so’ right about now.”

Sara didn’t respond. She got no joy from being right.

“Jared just wouldn’t listen. Kept saying Jeffrey knew the risk when he put on the badge. Like she had nothing to do with it. Like she didn’t abandon him when the going got tough.” Nell’s mouth twisted with disgust. “Part of me wonders if I’d just shut up about her, maybe he woulda gone on to somebody new.”

The arguments were so familiar that Sara could practically recite them along with Nell. She’d tortured herself with the same recriminations after Jeffrey had died. Sara should’ve stopped him from working with Lena. She should’ve put her foot down. She should’ve told him that it was too dangerous, too risky, to get involved in Lena’s life.

But his focus had always been on saving other people, never on saving himself.

Sara told Nell, “You can’t second-guess yourself.”

“Can’t I?” She indicated the waiting room. “I got all the time in the world to think about everything I’ve done wrong.”

Sara forced a change in subject. “I saw Possum in the hall.”

Nell slumped back against the couch. She didn’t speak for a few seconds. “He’s just a wreck. Keeps breaking down. I ain’t seen him cry like that in five years. Won’t listen to the doctors. Won’t go into Jared’s room. It’s not because of Lena. He always got along with her. You know how friendly he is. The man would talk to a stump about its knots. But all this stuff—” She waved her hand in the air, indicating the hospital. “It just brings it back for him. You, too, I guess.”

Sara looked past Nell at the floral painting on the wall. Unbidden, she thought about Will. Lying on the couch with him. Watching TV. His arms around her. Their dogs piled around them.

Nell said, “We all went to the hospital that night.” She didn’t have to say which night. “Drove straight through without stopping. Like there was any use him being at a hospital. Nothing could be done for him by then. Hell, if there was something to do, you woulda done it.”

Sara felt the image of Will slip away. The vulture was back with its guilt, digging its talons into her flesh.

Nell continued, “I know we lost touch with you for a reason. It’s just too painful, isn’t it? And here I dragged you back down into all of it. I’m sorry for that, Sara. I didn’t know who else to call.”

Sara nodded. All she could manage was, “Jeffrey would’ve wanted me here.”

Nell said, “I wish to God I’d told him about Jared sooner. Given him a chance to know his son.”

“He understood why you didn’t,” Sara said, thinking that was only half a lie. Jeffrey had been trying to find a way to connect with Jared before he died. It was a tricky proposition. Nell could be a hard woman, and Possum deserved better than to have some other man come in and try to be Jared’s father.

Nell asked, “Do you remember the first time I met you?”

It felt like a hundred years ago, but Sara said, “Yes.”

“You musta thought Jeffrey was crazy drivin’ you down past where Jesus lost his sandals.”

Sara smiled. Sylacauga, Alabama, was the very definition of rural, but she had been so pleased that Jeffrey wanted her to meet his family, his people. “We crashed your garden party.”

“You told me you were a stripper.”

Sara laughed. She’d forgotten that part. Nell had prompted the response, asking Sara whether she was a stewardess or a stripper. They’d all had this idea of Jeffrey in their heads—the sort of man he was, the type of woman he dated.

And they had been so wrong.

“Anyway,” Nell said. “We’re miserable enough without digging up the past. I know you still deal with it every single day.” Again, she took Sara’s hand in her own, but this time, she smoothed out the finger where Sara’s wedding ring used to be. “I’m glad you took it off, darlin’. Someday when enough time’s passed, you’ll find a way to move on.”

Sara nodded again, forcing herself not to look away.

Five years.

She had mourned her husband for five years. She had been alone for five years. She had waited and waited for the ache to go away for five long, lonely years.

“Sara?”

Sara realized she’d missed a question. “Yes?”

“I asked could you go check on him? I know it’ll be hard with Lena in there, but maybe you can do some of your doctor talk and see if you can find out anything they’re not saying?”

Sara couldn’t think of a reason not to. It was why she was here, after all. To help Nell. To help Jared. To be her husband’s proxy as his son lay in a hospital bed. Even Chief Lonnie Gray had assumed Sara would play her part.

So she did.

Sara stood from the couch and left the tiny waiting room. She
was still dressed in her hospital scrubs. The nurses’ eyes passed over Sara as she pushed open the doors to the ICU and walked down the hall. The board behind the desk gave Jared’s room number, but Sara would’ve known where he was by the cop stationed outside. The officer was standing a few yards down from the nurses’ station, arm resting on his holster. There was a glass wall separating Jared’s room from the hall. The curtain was half-closed. The door was open.

The cop gave Sara a nod. “Ma’am.”

She didn’t respond, just stood in the doorway to the room, acting as if she belonged.

The overhead lights were off. The machines provided a soft glow to see by. Jared’s face was swollen. His body was still. Sara did not need to see his chart. The equipment in the room told the story. Pleur-evac connected to wall suction for the pneumothorax. Ventilator to assist breathing. Three IV pumps pushing fluids and antibiotics. NG tube to wall suction to keep the stomach empty. Pulse ox monitor. Blood-pressure monitor. Heart monitor. Urinary catheter. Surgical drains. A crash cart was pushed against the wall, the defibrillator on standby.

They weren’t expecting Jared to rally anytime soon.

With great resignation, Sara forced herself to look at the corner opposite the bed.

Lena was sleeping. Or at least her eyes were closed. She was balled up in a large chair. Her arms were wrapped around her legs, knees hugged to her chest. She was wearing hospital scrubs, probably because her clothes had been booked into evidence.

She seemed much the same. A yellowing bruise arced underneath her left eye. The bridge of her nose had a linear cut that had started to scab. Neither was unexpected. Sara could not think of a time when Lena didn’t have some visible bruise or mark that came from living her life so hard. The only thing different was her hair. It was longer than the last time Sara had seen her. At the funeral?
Sara couldn’t remember. No one in the Linton family could bear to utter the woman’s name.

Sara took a deep breath, then walked into the room.

In many ways, seeing Jared was much harder than seeing Lena. He looked so much like Jeffrey—the dark hair, the tone of his skin, the delicate eyelashes. He was built like his father. He walked with the same athletic grace. Jared even had the same deep voice.

Sara put her hand to his face. She couldn’t stop herself. She stroked her thumb along his forehead, traced the arc of his eyebrow. His hair was thick and surprisingly soft, like Jeffrey’s had been. Even the scruff of his beard felt familiar, was growing back in the same pattern as Jeffrey’s.

Lena still hadn’t moved, but Sara could tell she was awake now—watching.

Slowly, Sara took her hand away from Jared’s face. She would not let herself feel ashamed for touching him, for thinking the obvious thoughts, making the obvious connections.

Lena shifted in the chair. She unfolded herself, rested her feet on the floor.

Sara held Jared’s hand. The palm was calloused. Jeffrey’s hands had always felt smooth. His nails had been trimmed, not bitten to the quick. His cuticles weren’t torn at the edges. Sometimes, Sara had caught him using the oatmeal-scented lotion she’d kept on the table by their bed.