Shadows on the Sand (29 page)

But he stayed with her until an orderly came to take her to a room. He walked with her as she was wheeled to the elevator, still clasping her hand. Her eyes were droopy with the painkiller she’d been given, and she’d be asleep the minute she was in her bed.

“I’d better go now and let you get a good night’s sleep.”

She smiled at him, an intimate smile that plunged him deeper into his own personal black hole. He didn’t deserve intimate. He couldn’t do intimate. What in the world had he been thinking?

He kissed her on the lips, a sweet, lingering kiss he thought of as good-bye. She smiled groggily at him as she was wheeled into the elevator.

“I love you,” she said.

He gave a stiff smile and watched the doors close. He turned for the exit. Lindsay and Mary P were already gone. He walked through the automatic
doors into the parking lot and flipped the remote to unlock his car. And flicked it again to relock it.

He turned and hurried back into the hospital. He rode the elevator to the third floor and walked down the hall until he found Carrie. A nurse was checking her vital signs as Carrie lay in the bed nearest the door in her semiprivate room.

He stood in the doorway.

Go home, idiot! She’s fine
.

When the nurse was finished, she clicked out the light over Carrie’s bed. She did one last check to make certain the call button was in place.

“Just push if you need me.”

But Carrie didn’t respond. She was asleep.

The nurse paused as she passed Greg. “Don’t stay long. She’ll be fine. We’ll take good care of her.”

He nodded. He walked into the room and stood by the bed. She looked so fragile. So beautiful.

He pulled the visitor’s chair as close to the bed as he could and sank into it. He reached through the bars and under the blanket for her good hand. He laced their fingers. He laid his head back and closed his eyes for a minute.

The nurse who came to check vitals at 4 a.m. woke him and made him leave.

B
y seven in the morning I was in surgery and by eleven I was back in my room, sporting a cast split on one side to allow for the swelling that was still present. At four in the afternoon, Lindsay appeared to drive me home.

“I thought Greg was coming.” I tried not to look too disappointed to see my sister.

“He asked me to come because he had some business stuff to take care of.”

That made sense. “He’ll probably stop by this evening. You can make us those stripers for dinner.” One-day-old stripers would still taste okay, wouldn’t they?

It was amazing how tired I felt after the ride home, and I snoozed on the sofa with Oreo as a blanket. When it was time to go to bed for the night, Greg still hadn’t appeared.

Was it because I’d blurted out that I loved him? I could blame the surge of honesty on the drugs I’d been given, but drugs or not, what counted was the way he received the news. Did the fact he hadn’t shown mean that he hadn’t wanted to hear any such confession from me?

But he’d spent the night in my room. The nurse had told me so.

“Held your hand all night,” she said with a smile. “He must be pretty special.”

I’d just grinned.

Now I was confused.

I had a fragmented night’s sleep, waking myself whenever I moved my
arm, taking pain meds on my schedule, not the doctor’s. When I woke Thursday feeling groggy and drained, I could sense that the apartment was empty. I glanced at the clock by the bed. Six thirty! We were about to open.

I dragged myself from bed and tried to get ready for the day with one hand. Since I wasn’t supposed to take a shower and get the cast wet, I tried washing up in the sink. I couldn’t wring out the washcloth except by pressing it against the sink, which was very unsatisfactory, so I dripped all over myself. I couldn’t hook my bra. I could barely pull up my underwear and khaki slacks. When I wiggled the slacks in place, I was panting from the effort. Then I couldn’t zip or button them. Shoes and socks were beyond me.

I did manage to brush my hair, though it still looked as if it would win a contest for the messiest rat’s nest. I put on some blush and swiped some mascara over my lashes so I wouldn’t look as miserable as I felt. I slid my left arm into a man’s jacket that had been left at the café and held it to my right shoulder. It was large enough to hide the clothing malfunctions so I could go downstairs without feeling like a stripper. I had to give my slacks several tugs to keep them on my hips as I descended the steps.

Pull up pants, lunge for slipping jacket. Pull up pants, lunge for slipping jacket.

I eased in the café’s back door and into my office. I peered out. The new server, Lou Reynolds, moved past, serving booth one. Lindsay appeared, four plates balanced in her hands. Mary P was seating a couple in booth five. I felt tears of gratitude and love as I watched my sister and my Godmother taking over my responsibilities for me.

I waited behind the door until Mary P began to turn away from the new customers. I called her name softly. She looked around, as if she was uncertain she had heard her name. I signaled to her, and she hurried to me. I shut us both in the office.

“What are you doing down here?” she scolded as she gave me a careful hug.

“Do me up. Please!” I dropped the jacket, turned my back, and hiked up my Carrie’s Café shirt, this one Caribbean blue with the unoccupied sleeve flapping forlornly. She laughed and stuck the hooks and eyes of my bra together. I turned around, and she zipped and buttoned me.

I handed her my old sneaks, the good pair having been reduced to a single shoe two nights ago. She went down on a knee and slid the shoes on one at a time, making me think of a shoe salesman back when shoe salesmen still helped customers try on shoes.

“Lindsay’s working tables.” The import of that fact finally penetrated my foggy brain.

Mary P nodded.

“And you’re here.”

She nodded again.

“That means no Andi.” Both anger and concern rode me. “Where is that girl?”

Mary P looked as concerned as I felt. “I don’t know, and I’m getting more worried all the time.”

“You think she’s not just being a temperamental teen? Something is truly wrong?” There was
Bill kill
and there was The Pathway. Either could put her in a very uncomfortable place. Dangerous even. “I need to call Clooney.”

Mary P patted my shoulder. “I’ve got to get back to work. The place is jumping. I think you’ll have to write Chaz a thank-you note.”

“What?”

“It’s all that Internet publicity, and he’s responsible.”

I snorted. “Like I always thank someone who almost kills people I care for. Go save the café from being overrun while I call Clooney.”

I didn’t even have time to punch in his number before he stomped into the cafe, looking like Chief Thundercloud wearing an Eagles sweatshirt instead of an Indian blanket. I walked out to meet him.

“She never came home,” he said without preamble. “I sat up waiting for her and fell asleep around two. I overslept. Is she here?”

Uh-oh. “I’m sorry. She’s not.”

“When I get my hands on that boy …”

I was glad I wasn’t Bill.

“If it is that boy.” And he looked even more worried.

“I’m assuming you called Bill’s home?”

“Several times. I got to speak to Billingsley Lindemuth Junior. That was a rare pleasure.” He glared at me. “Why would anyone name a child Billingsley? And why would others pass it on as if it were a name to be proud of?”

Keeping him on task, I asked, “And what did Billingsley Junior say?”

“The kid was home all night. If Junior was the only one who told me that, I’d disbelieve on general principles, but when I went to the house, his wife said the same thing. She was very sweet and helpful.”

“What? Moms don’t lie for their kids?”

He made a frustrated sound, stalked to the counter, and took the empty stool beside the ever-present Mr. Perkins. I followed him over. He looked so upset and angry that even the garrulous Mr. P didn’t try to talk to him.

“I don’t know why I’m worried,” he said. “It’s not like she’s my kid. And she got herself all the way across country from Arizona on her own.”

“You love her,” I said.

He snorted. “Right. I want pancakes and sausage, double syrup.”

I left him in Mary P’s care and went to the cash register, where I thought I could be of some service.

Wherever she is, Lord, keep her safe!

Greg didn’t come in for breakfast, and I thought of him at home, eating
cereal. I’d been right. He didn’t need me or the café anymore. He was never coming back.

“There’s a time to every purpose under heaven.”

Those words Clooney had quoted to me when he gave me the watch were from Ecclesiastes, though without doubt Clooney knew them from the old folk song. They were probably written by King Solomon. I thought Ecclesiastes and its writer very melancholy and pessimistic. You try your best, he wrote, and it’s all meaningless, a chasing after the wind. “All is vanity” was how the old King James Bible put it.

I’d like to find out if being in love was meaningless, if being loved was chasing after the wind. Was it heartbreak, or could it be like the romance novels said, just not quite so over the top? Real life as moonlight and roses? It was broken wrists and missing girls, that I knew. I sighed. Maybe the writer of Ecclesiastes was right.

A psalm that usually comforted me came to mind, and I all but snarled inside. It wasn’t what I wanted to hear from the Lord.
“Wait for the L
ORD
; be strong and take heart and wait for the L
ORD
.”

Lord, I’ve got to tell You, I’m getting very tired of waiting
.

Your times are in My hands
.

I blinked. This hearing voices was getting old fast.

The café door opened, and in walked my mother and her husband.

W
here were the people you could trust? You asked a simple favor or issued a straightforward order, and all you got was incompetency and questions. Had he asked for something difficult? He had not
.

“Take care of it,” he’d said
.

“Here’s my decision,” he’d said
.

“Find it,” he’d said. “Find her.”

But did his man honor his word or do as asked?

He would not live with the results of ineptness any more than he’d live with someone wrestling him for control. He was not a man who accepted halfhearted allegiance. He was the man in charge
.

He was the one with the skill and intellect to lead
.

He was the one who deserved the financial benefits of his leadership
.

He must not be challenged
.

He would not share
.

He was God’s archangel
.

A
ndi huddled in the darkness of the closet and listened to her stomach growl. She’d been here two days, and it felt like forever. At least she thought it was two days and today was Friday. She was so hungry, but there was nothing in this place but beer. What kind of a diet was that? And how long before you died of starvation?