Chapter Sixteen
Max opened his eyes and blinked. The curtains were drawn, the room dim, yet he knew he was in a hospital room. Just as he knew he wasn’t alone. He could make out the shape of a figure standing on the far side of the room. His pulse jumped, making the machines he was attached to come to life.
It wasn’t until she turned that he recognized her, startling him.
Esther Mason made her way to his bedside. “You’re awake.” Her smile did nothing to change her dour expression. “They said you almost died. Lucky for you, the bullet went right through. Seems you’re going to survive.”
His mouth was so dry he could barely get the words out. “What are you doing here?” He saw then that she had picked up something. A pillow. She had a pillow in her hands as she moved closer.
He tried to lift a hand, but he was so weak from the gunshot, the surgery. He looked around frantically for the call button, but he couldn’t find it. He opened his mouth to call for help, but it was too dry. Barely a sound came out.
It had been Esther. She’d told Grimes about them. How did he know that? Had Cordell told him that? It didn’t matter. He had to stop Esther. The pillow dropped over his face. He couldn’t breathe and yet he couldn’t fight her off. She was going to kill him.
The door of his room opened. He jerked awake and blinked. A nurse stood silhouetted in the doorway. “Nurse!” He’d barely gotten the word out. But even the sudden light she turned on couldn’t chase away the nightmare. “She was here. She was—”
He looked around frantically. There was no one in the room.
Had Esther hidden under the bed? “There was a woman here,” he said as the nurse came over to attend to the devices attached to him.
“She—” Was Esther really going to smother him with a pillow?
He felt so weak and vulnerable, he wasn’t sure he could have stopped her.
It was that feeling that had followed him so much of his life because of Roger Grimes.
“There was no woman here. You aren’t allowed visitors,” the nurse said. “Your brother was in earlier, but there has been no one else. I suspect it was just a bad dream.”
He closed his eyes, feeling foolish, but still wanting to ask her to check the bathroom and under the bed. He hadn’t felt this insecure and afraid since he was a child living with Grimes.
The nurse got him a cup of water and a straw. He took a drink, cleared his throat and handed it back. “Maybe she went into the bathroom,” he said.
She patted his arm and smiled. “Let me check.” As she moved to the closed bathroom door, he wanted to warn her that Esther could be dangerous. She opened the door. “Empty.”
“Then I guess she’s not under my bed, either,” he said, pretending it was a joke.
She laughed. “Not there, either. That must have been some bad dream.”
She had no idea.
Josie still felt as if she were in a fog. She remembered being checked over in the ER after they’d rushed Max to surgery. Her shoulder had been dislocated and she had a slight concussion. She’d given her statement to the state police. By then it was daylight.
The nightmare was over. Grimes was dead. Cordell and Goldie were safe. Max was still in the hospital, but his condition had been upgraded from critical to stable. Both she and Cordell had been questioned at length. He’d saved not just Josie’s life, but Goldie’s, as well.
Rumors ran wild in town. No one really understood why it had happened except that Roger Grimes had been Max’s and Cordell’s stepfather and had spent most of his life behind bars.
“You aren’t going to work? Surely you can take a day off after almost being killed!” Amy Sue said, shaking her head as Josie came downstairs dressed to go to the office.
“I’m fine.” But even as Josie said it, she knew she wasn’t. It was as if everyone in Dry Gulch had taken a relieved breath—except her because she knew better. Everyone kept saying at least it was over.
But it wasn’t over.
Josie couldn’t explain it, the danger she still felt looming on the horizon. She wanted to blame her concussion. She kept waiting for the frightened feeling to go away, but it still had her looking over her shoulder, jumpier than she’d ever been.
She kept reliving what had happened. Her grandmother would have been disappointed in her. She had the chance to stop the man. If Cordell hadn’t taken the shot he had, they could all be dead.
Cordell had saved her life. But he’d also endangered it by having loved her. She told herself that he’d no doubt be gone once the state police were through with him.
“You’re just going back to work at your office as if nothing happened?” her sister demanded as she watched her reach for her coat and purse.
“What would you have me do? Take to the couch?” Josie demanded, knowing she was more irritable than usual, but unable to help it.
She didn’t know what to do until the next horror hit town.
All she knew was that it was coming. She’d tried to see more, desperately needing to know so she could warn everyone and prepare this time.
It felt closer, more personal, and that scared her even more.
At the same time, she kept hoping she was wrong. Maybe this was just an aftershock to how close she’d come to dying. How close she’d come to losing her best friends and Cordell.
As she reached for her purse, she misjudged how heavy it was now. It slipped from her fingers and hit the floor hard. She saw her sister’s eyes widen as she looked from Josie to the purse.
Amy Sue got to the purse first, picking it up and not even bothering to look inside.
She knew by the weight of it what made it so heavy.
“You’re carrying a gun now?” There was fear in her voice, the same fear that pressed against Josie’s chest, making it hard to breathe at every waking moment because her “gift” told her the threat wasn’t over. She was afraid and hated it.
Grimes had been a bully, a big man who took his misery out on his wife and his stepsons.
He liked hurting and tormenting people, but nowhere on his long list of crimes was there the portrait of a cold-blooded killer.
Although according to Cordell, Grimes had pushed his wife down the stairs.
He hadn’t purposely killed her, but he had lied and buried her in a shallow grave up the road.
Max and Cordell had gone to Rawlins and identified the dress she’d been wearing the last time they’d seen their mother alive. So it should have been over.
But the danger Josie saw coming now was different.
This person was a cold-blooded killer—and it was personal—just like she’d seen that first day out on the porch.
It was still coming and, for the life of her, Josie couldn’t understand it—let alone see who it was.
How was it possible after what they’d already been through?
“I have to go,” she said as she took her purse from her sister and left the farmhouse.
Amy Sue followed her out to the porch. “You’re scaring me.”
She was scaring herself. How could she explain the sense of foreboding she still felt, the blackness, the evil?
Unlike her grandmother, she couldn’t give it shape or reason.
All she could do was sense the horror that was about to be unleashed.
She couldn’t even warn anyone. All she could do was wait.
When she reached her office, she found Cordell sitting on the front step. They hadn’t had a moment together since the Grimes nightmare. He’d been taken into custody, questioned and released. Grimes’s history and their statements would help to get the investigation closed quickly, they’d been told.
* * *
“Good morning,” Cordell said as he rose. One look at Josie and he didn’t have to inquire how she was doing. He could see it in the dark shadows under her eyes, in the haunted look.
She pulled her purse to her and dug out her keys. “I thought you’d be gone by now.”
“About that,” he said. “That’s why I’m here. I need some legal advice.”
“If it’s about the shooting, you need a criminal lawyer.”
“Nope. It’s about those old warrants. I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to leave town after all.”
She had drawn out her office keys but was having trouble getting the key into the lock. Cordell took the key chain from her and opened the door. “After you.”
Josie entered, realizing she was glad he was here. She turned on the light and looked around before she stepped in. It felt cold and uninviting compared with the farmhouse. She wondered why she’d insisted on coming here today.
“We had a deal,” she said to Cordell as she went behind her desk, put her purse in the second drawer and, after removing her jacket, spread it on the back of the chair before she sat down.
“I can’t leave because I bought the hotel.”
Her gaze shot up to his.
“Why would you do that? That place has been boarded-up for years.”
“Because I need some form of employment and I’m looking forward to the challenge of bringing the place back to its earlier grandeur, or at least getting rid of the dust and mice.”
She shook her head. “That’s a terrible idea. The smartest thing you could do is get your money back and return to Florida or even somewhere farther away from Dry Gulch.”
He stared at her. “Wow, it almost sounds like you want me gone.”
“I’m serious.” Her throat ached and she felt as if she might cry. “You don’t want to stay here. For whatever reason, this is a dangerous place.”
“Is this about Big Blue?” he asked as if hoping to lighten the mood. He knew her, knew she was fighting tears, and she hated it when he moved behind her desk to comfort her. “You know why I brought the horse back. I wanted to show you that I’ve changed. I’m determined to prove myself to you.”
“Oh, Cordell, you already have,” she cried.
The moment he drew her up from her chair, she was in his arms again.
She leaned into his chest as if needing this as desperately as he did.
She didn’t want him to leave town. She never wanted him to ever leave again.
He could feel it in the way she hugged him back.
She seemed afraid of what would happen if he stayed.
She was fighting this for some reason he didn’t understand.
She stepped out of his arms and sat back down. “The judge isn’t going to be happy about this.”
“Josie, I’m not leaving. Please, do whatever you have to do, but I’m here to stay.”
* * *
Josie realized how desperately she had wanted to hear those words.
She swallowed before she turned to look at him.
He’d grown into such a handsome, strong man.
Most of his bad-boy persona was gone, but there was still some mischief in that gaze.
It pulled at her heartstrings, playing them like a symphony.
She wanted him to stay. She loved the idea of him opening the hotel, although she couldn’t imagine he would make any money.
Few people had a reason to come to Dry Gulch.
What she also saw in his gaze was stubborn determination. That made him even more handsome. She desperately wanted him to succeed as she met his gaze and nodded. “I’ll talk to the judge.”
“Thanks.” He grinned, exposing that darned dimple again, and she felt herself weaken. They’d survived Roger Grimes. Wasn’t it possible that together they could survive even worse as long as they all stuck together?
“I’d better get to work and let you do the same,” he said. “Maybe we could have dinner one night.” He held up a hand to keep her from answering right away. “Just think about it.”
With that, he left her with her heart aching. Wasn’t this what she’d always dreamed of? Cordell coming home, settling here, making a life, being the man she needed in her life.
* * *
Goldie hadn’t been allowed in to see Max.
Family only. Those words broke her heart.
After giving her statement to the state police, she went down to the café and began to clean up the mess Grimes had left.
Max was going to live. She took strength in knowing that, even though she felt as if she were sleepwalking through her day.
The fact that he might not want to see her lodged itself in the back of her mind.
She told herself she would visit as soon as she was allowed.
She had to make sure he was going to be all right.
At least that’s what she told herself. In truth, she wondered if any of what had happened had changed his mind about their being together.
Ronnie had suffered a concussion and would be back to work soon, she was told. In the meantime, his mother had volunteered to cook until her son recovered.
Maggie was already in the kitchen cleaning up when Goldie arrived.
“I didn’t expect you in today,” the woman called to her. “I can get my daughter Lindsey to work if you need more time off.”
Goldie shook her head. “I need to get back to work.” It felt surreal, what she’d been through.
It had happened so quickly and ended just as fast, leaving her feeling off-balance.
She couldn’t imagine how Josie was feeling since it had to be much scarier for her.
The two of them had talked a little earlier, but both were still a little shaken.
Dry Gulch had always felt so safe. Hardly anyone she didn’t know came into the café unless a tourist had wandered in off one of the main highways in the state and gotten lost.
But now she knew she’d never feel safe here again. It didn’t help that she couldn’t see Max and that no one knew when he’d be back to work. The state police had left. Things should have felt normal again, but they didn’t.
Goldie felt as if she was waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“You okay?” Maggie asked.
Letting out the breath she’d been holding, she smiled at the older woman. She realized that she’d been standing staring at the mess, unable to move. “I will be,” she said, though she wasn’t sure that was true as she shook herself. “I just need to work.”
Across the street, she caught a glimpse of movement and stopped. Cordell was removing weather-grayed sheets of plywood from the front of the boarded-up abandoned Dry Gulch Hotel. Vaguely, she wondered what that was about before she went to get a broom and a dustpan.