Breathe (39 page)

“She doesn"t have to stay?” Lincoln asked.

“No. They don"t think she breathed in much smoke. All the excitement

probably triggered the attack.”

Lincoln smothered the scream that wanted out. “I"m sorry about your house,

Nance.”

“This wasn"t your fault.” She removed the hand she had on Jessica"s arm and

gripped Lincoln"s fingers in hers.

Sure it wasn"t.

204

Sloan Parker

Jessica removed the mask again. “Can we go home? I"ll be good and rest in bed.

I promise.”

“Oh, hon. I think most of our stuff is gone. The house is—” A sob tore through

Nancy.

Lincoln rounded the hospital bed and drew her into his arms. “It"ll be okay.”

She cried as she held on to him, and he said, “You"re not alone in this.”

Jessica tugged on his pant leg. “Mr. Wuzzie?”

What was so hard about breaking the news of a stuffed animal"s demise? When

it was a five-year-old"s best friend—everything. “In the house,” was all he could say.

Her lower lip quivered. “I"m sorry.”

Nancy let go of Lincoln and went to her daughter. “Sorry for what?”

“I wasn"t supposed to have Kitty in my room.”

“It"s okay.”

“You saved her life,” Lincoln said.

“I did?” Jessica stared at him. “I saved her?”

“Sure,” Nancy said. “We wouldn"t have had time to find Kitty if you hadn"t had

her with you. And you held on tight until you got out of the house.”

Lincoln patted Jessica"s knee. “You did great, kid.”

A tear slid down her face. “Maybe when the fire"s over, we can find Mr.

Wuzzie.”

“Maybe,” Nancy said. “We"ll see what"s left later, okay? Just please keep the

mask on.”

Jessica stopped her mom"s hand from moving the oxygen back over her mouth

and nose. “It wasn"t his fault. He didn"t do anything wrong.” More tears streamed

down her cheeks. “I didn"t mean to drop him.”

“It wasn"t your fault either.” Lincoln stroked her hair and buried another

scream.

“I didn"t mean it.” She coughed and cried, and Nancy held her.

“He knows you didn"t mean it. You still have me. Your brothers. Uncle Lincoln.

Kitty and Sparky. Think about what you still have, baby.”

Tears filled Lincoln"s eyes. He still had his family. And he was going to make

sure nothing happened to them. He checked the clock on the wall. 3:00 a.m.

Plenty of time.

Breathe

205

Chapter Thirty

“Adam! Adam!”

The kid turned around with the scream of his name. Jay waved his arms in the

air to get Adam"s attention. Damn cops wouldn"t let him any closer to the house.

The fire was long out, but the fire department was still on the scene. Both the

garage and the house were destroyed. What was left behind would probably be torn

down when all was said and done.

It had taken Jay twice as long as usual to get to Nancy"s. His Jeep kept

stalling, finally dying two streets over. He"d sprinted the rest of the way.

Adam spotted Jay and jogged over. A small black-and-white kitten lay inside

the crook of his arm, and Sparky ran alongside them.

“Are you okay?” Jay asked.

“Yeah. The house isn"t.”

“What about everyone else? Your uncle?”

“Fine. Jessica had trouble breathing. They took her to the hospital, but she"s

okay. Davy went with them.”

Jay bent and gripped his thighs, letting in the deep breaths he"d been denying

himself. He stood upright. “She"s okay?”

“Yeah. Mom called. They said it wasn"t bad at all.”

“What happened?”

“I don"t know. I woke up when I heard Uncle Lincoln screaming. The place

smelled like smoke. Like someone was burning something outside but stronger than

that. The whole kitchen was on fire when we ran out. The smoke alarms didn"t even

go off. Mom"s always bitching at us not to steal the batteries, and they didn"t even

work.”

“I need to talk to your uncle. Are they still at the hospital?”

Adam glanced at Jay, then at the kitten, then at the destroyed house behind

him. “Someone started the fire, didn"t they?”

“Yes.”

“You know who?”

“Yeah. And I know who shot him. He"s not safe. I guess none of you are.”

Adam swung his gaze back to Jay. “What should I do?”

“I"ll take you with me to the hospital.”

206

Sloan Parker

“Mom told me to stay here with Sparky and the cat.”

“We"ll drop them at my house.”

“Okay.” Adam pulled on Sparky"s collar and walked toward Jay.

“Shit. My Jeep won"t start.”

“You could borrow Uncle Lincoln"s pickup. He never drives it.”

The large black truck sat in the driveway, unharmed by the fire. It looked

enormous, a monster Jay didn"t think he"d be able to approach, let alone climb

inside and drive. “I suppose the keys were in the house?”

“Yeah,” Adam said. “But there"s a spare set in a magnet thing by the front

tire.”

Okay. He could do this. He could drive a couple of miles in that truck—he had

to.

* * *

stared at him from farther down the emergency room corridor where he sat with

Adam and Davy.

Nancy shook her head. “I don"t believe you had anything to do with all this, but

I promised him I wouldn"t say anything. Not to the police. Not to you.”

“He"s not safe. Adam said the smoke alarms didn"t go off. You know this was

on purpose. Someone wants him dead, and apparently they don"t care if you or your

kids get in the way.”

Nancy gasped and clasped a hand over her mouth. When she"d regained her

composure, she spoke. “He said he could handle this. He promised me he"d call the

police when he figured out who it is.”

“Nancy, he"s not planning to call the police.”

“He said as soon as he saw who, he"d call for help.”

“Did he even have his cell with him?”

She shook her head again.

“The police couldn"t help last time,” Jay said. “And Lincoln doesn"t believe

they"ll do anything based on his word.”

“What are you saying?”

“He isn"t taking another chance with your lives. I"m guessing that"s why Paul"s

here—to make sure you"re safe while Lincoln"s gone.”

“What…” She glanced toward Paul and the kids. “What is he going to do?”

“Whatever he has to. This time he"s protecting you.”

She looked at Jay, searching his eyes. “He said there was another note. I don"t

know where—”

“He"s at the Pleasant Valley Cemetery.”

Paul"s voice startled Jay. “How do you know that?”

Breathe

207

“I asked him where he was going. I don"t think he wanted to lie to me. He said

he had to meet someone. I thought he meant you. I thought he wanted to tell you

what happened that night.”

Jay took off for the exit. Goddamn motherfucking stubborn man was going to

get himself killed. And in the process, Jay might also lose another person he cared

about.

Screw that. He knew who was behind it all. No matter how the night ended,

he"d already lost too much.

* * *

front, to look at the name etched in stone.

Birds chirped in the tree overhead. Didn"t they sleep? Weren"t they used to

disruptions at four in the morning? Not if a cemetery was their home.

He"d been at Pleasant Valley many times during the weeks leading up to his

time at the jail, and more since he"d been back. The vast expanse of green grass, the

occasional tree, the sweet scent of flowers always hanging in the air—even in the

winter months, even at four o"clock in the morning—gave the place a peaceful vibe.

Serene. Tranquil. Had Jay picked out her final resting place?

Lincoln stopped pacing and stared at the back of the stone.

Where would he have been buried if he"d died in the accident? Nancy would"ve

done the best with what she could"ve afforded, but it wouldn"t have been Pleasant

Valley. And that made sense—at least Katie Miller wouldn"t have had to share

space with the man who"d taken her life.

A slight breeze cooled the air but not enough to chill him. The next breeze that

blew through his hair was warmer, like the caress of a palm over his cheek.

“You come here a lot.”

The female voice shouldn"t have surprised him, but it did. The only thing he"d

been sure of was that whoever showed, it wouldn"t be Jay. Despite all Lincoln had

said, Jay wasn"t vindictive, wasn"t a liar, wasn"t a man who did anything but love.

He wore the truth and compassion like a tailored suit. Whoever hated Lincoln—it

wasn"t Jay.

Emily Shaw stood in the darkness on the opposite side of the headstone. She

wore a skirt and jacket, a silk blouse underneath, her posture straight, her hands

clasped in front of her. Her hair was styled into loose curls that framed her face but

didn"t move with the wind. Odd, how proper she looked at four in the morning, as if

she were on her way to a prayer meeting. Did her fellow churchgoers know she tried

to kill little kids in her spare time?

Moonlight lit her face. The uneasy look didn"t mesh with the reason she"d

come, with the notes she"d left, with the way she wanted to kill Lincoln.

Why? Didn"t she like seeing him at her daughter"s grave?

Fuck it. This was her choice. “This isn"t your private property.”

208

Sloan Parker

“No. I"ve just never seen you here at night.” She crept closer to her daughter"s

grave marker. Without taking her gaze off the front of the stone, she said, “I may

not have always understood my daughter, but I knew her well enough to know she"d

be touched that you took the time.”

This was what she wanted to say? She was better at letter writing. If she

hadn"t been a woman in her late forties, dressed like she was heading to church, he

would"ve already punched her out. But things were more complicated than that.

Always had been.

“I get what you think of me,” he said. “I get how much pain you"re in. But—”

“I"m not sure you do.” She stared at him and cocked her head to the side, her

hair moving in a single stiff block like a helmet she wore for protection. Funny how

she had come alone to face him. Or maybe she hadn"t.

Many of the headstones surrounding them were like monuments. They could

easily hide a full-grown man crouched behind them. Lincoln forced himself to look

at her again as she spoke.

“I may not be able to let this go. I may not be able to forgive you, but there are

things you should hear.” She dropped a hand to the corner of her daughter"s

headstone and didn"t look at him as she continued. “She wouldn"t want everyone"s

lives destroyed because of her death. My daughter would want you to forgive

yourself. That"s who she was.” Emily let go of the stone and stepped around it.

Lincoln wouldn"t have let her get so close to him if he weren"t so damn confused, if

he didn"t want to believe her so badly.

She stopped a foot from him. “If she were able to say it, she"d tell you she

forgives you.” Emily Shaw laughed. It sounded joyful and sad at the same time.

Was this woman crazy?

He shivered. Wasn"t it supposed to get warmer as the morning approached?

“Don"t ask me how she got that way,” she said and laughed again. “Not from

her father. Not from me. I"d say she learned to be so accepting, so forgiving from

Jay, but she was like that before she met him, since she was a little girl. For a long

time I let myself forget that about her. I know now, she"d never blame you for her

death.”

He scoffed.

“You don"t believe me?”

“I"m not believing much of what you"re saying.”

She nodded and walked to the front of the grave. “I didn"t want Jay and her to

get married. I thought they were too young. That he was too naive to appreciate my

baby, to take care of her.” She played with the wedding band on her finger, and then

touched the stone again. Was this some sort of therapy for her?

“I didn"t think he was good enough for her. Not until the day I saw you with

him at the grocery store. Then I knew. He"s just like her. I may not understand how

or why, but I know what he"s doing with you isn"t something she"d be angry over.”

Emily looked up at Lincoln. “He doesn"t blame you, doesn"t hate you. He"s letting it

Breathe

209

go, moving on with his life, not letting the grief destroy him. He"s honoring the

spirit of who she was.” Her eyes filled with tears. “He"s the best of us.”

Lincoln swallowed down the anger. She wasn"t deserving of it. She never had

been. “You didn"t ask me to meet you here, did you?”

“No. I come when I can"t sleep. To be close to her. To be alone with her. My

husband doesn"t even know.” She paused. “I"ve seen you here sometimes, but…I

wasn"t ready to talk to you before now.”

That had been his fear every time he had made the visit. He didn"t want

anyone to see him, didn"t want her family faced with him at her grave. “Why now?”