Quilt As Desired (18 page)

Mavis then changed the conversation to the safer topic of the quilt show for the rest of the trip.

It was just after one o'clock when Harriet drove down the wooded driveway and into the clearing in front of Mavis's cottage.

"I'll see you tomorrow at Pins and Needles,” Mavis said. “Try and get some rest."

"I'll do that."

Harriet realized she'd forgotten to ask Mavis how to get hold of Lauren to return her damaged quilt—Lauren did her own quilting, so Aunt Beth wouldn't have her in the business address book. She decided to swing by Pins and Needles on her way home. Marjory was sure to have contact information.

She glanced at her watch. There should be time for her to drop Lauren's quilt and still be ready for Sarah.

A class was in progress in the large classroom when she entered the shop. From the front aisle, she could see seven women sitting at sewing machines, their attention on a small dark woman at the front of the room. She headed toward the room; and as she got closer, she could see that Lauren was one of the students.

She retreated back to her car and got the quilt, folding it over her arm as she started down the aisle toward the classroom. She had planned to wait until the teacher stopped lecturing before she entered, but Lauren caught sight of her—and the quilt—before that happened.

Jorge at Tico's Tacos three blocks away could have heard the shriek she let out.

"What are you doing with my quilt?” she screamed, knocking her chair over as she leapt toward Harriet. “Why isn't it in Tacoma? You're ruining everything! Take it back there right now!"

She stomped her foot to emphasize her demand. Her classmates froze, and then all began talking at once. No one left the table to join Lauren.

She was shouting too loud to hear anything Harriet tried to say, so Harriet flipped the quilt open and held up the torn strip of rod pocket.

"How dare you! Is Avanell winning so important to you you're willing to destroy my work to insure it?” Lauren shrieked. Her face was a purplish-red. The thick veins on the side of her neck stood out like piping on a formal pillow.

"Would you please get hold of yourself,” Marjory whispered and pushed her into the small classroom. Lauren pulled Harriet along with her.

"What on earth is going on?” Marjory asked.

Lauren started to wail. Marjory put a hand on her arm and said, “Harriet first."

"Mavis and I went up to Tacoma to see what they were doing with Avanell's quilt. Apparently, Lauren had called them already and asked to have her quilt put where Avanell's had been. When we arrived, someone was trying to pull the quilt down. They took off, but they had torn the rod pocket. I couldn't see who it was."

"Could you not stitch the pocket back in place while you were there?” Marjory asked.

Harriet turned it over and showed her where the backing and stitching had been torn.

"Of course, we would have done a simple repair if that would have worked, but as you can see, the backing fabric is torn and some of the batting has been pulled out. Look how the quilting stitches are pulled tight in the area, too. And that shows on the front side.” She flipped the corner of the quilt back over. “It seemed like the best thing to do would be to bring it back to Lauren as quickly as we could and let her decide what to do."

"I'll be ruined,” Lauren wailed. “My patterns were going to be a sellout when my quilt won the best in show.” She looked at Harriet. “This is your fault. I'm ruined just so a dead woman can have one more win she wouldn't care about even if she were alive to see it."

"I think that's quite enough,” Marjory said.

"You'll pay for this,” Lauren snarled, her voice low. “You will definitely pay for this.” She pulled the quilt out of Harriet's arms and stormed out of the room.

"I'm sorry,” Marjory said.

"I guess she believes in killing the messenger."

"She's upset. She spent all her money finding a publisher for her patterns and then getting them printed. She really wanted that win. I've never seen her act like that. I'm sure she'll apologize once she's had time to calm down."

"I wouldn't count on it."

"I've got to get back to the class, but is there anything I can do for you before I go? A cup of coffee, maybe?"

Harriet declined the offer but on impulse asked for Misty's home address. The woman had filled out a registration card for the Thursday night group, and Marjory was happy to give her the address if she promised to let her know if she found her.

The address was an apartment number in the docks area of Foggy Point. It had been dark when she and Aiden drove through there before; but from what she had seen, it wasn't the kind of place a woman would want to go alone, even in the daylight. Then again, Misty lived there and presumably came and went unmolested.

Harriet pulled out her cell phone. She dialed Avanell's house. The phone rang eight times, and she hung up when Avanell's recorded voice came on. Of course, she realized. The family would be at the funeral home for the viewing.

She pulled away from the curb and headed for the docks. She turned toward the water and slowed as the road became bumpy with railroad tracks. She checked the address again then stopped and looked for a street sign.

She was about to give up when she saw a faded wooden sign that said River View Apartm. The end of the word was missing where the wood had broken. She eased down the unpaved street.

The apartment building was a single-level with a sagging roof and badly chipped paint. Six doors opened onto a broken cement sidewalk. Moss clung in green gobs to the roof, siding and any other surface it could penetrate. Cardboard and duct tape filled the spaces where windowpanes had broken. A faded artificial rose hung limply from a tack on the third door down. A stick-on sign underneath read Manager.

Harriet parked and stepped carefully on the broken sidewalk. She stopped at the door marked number four. She looked for a doorbell and, finding none, rapped sharply. She listened and hearing nothing, rapped again. This time, the door swung open slightly.

"Misty?” she called. “Can I talk to you?” She listened again. “Misty?” When she received no answer, she pushed on the door.

It opened into a dark, damp room. The fruity smell of rotting bananas assaulted her nose. She held her hand up to her face but stepped in.

"Misty, are you in here?"

She heard the rustle of movement behind her. She started to turn, and everything went black.

She woke up in her car. It was dark. She felt her head.

"Ouch,” she said out loud as her fingers found the goose egg at the back. She pulled her fingers away. They were slippery with what she assumed was blood. Her head was pounding, and she felt like she was going to throw up.

She groped around the console and found a partially full bottle of water in the passenger's cup-holder. She held it to her face and soaked in its coolness then uncapped it and took a sip. She found a napkin, dampened it and wiped her fingers clean. She wouldn't try to deal with the lump until she got home.

Whatever was happening in Misty's apartment, the woman was on her own. Harriet wasn't getting out of her car.

She wasn't sure how safe she was going to be driving, but she sure wasn't staying at the docks any longer. She straightened in her seat and buckled her safety belt. Her head throbbed, and a wave of dizziness was followed by a wave of nausea. She eased the car away from the sidewalk and slowly turned a wide circle. Turning her head was not an option, so she prayed no one had parked on the street since she'd arrived.

She completed the turn and breathed a sigh of relief when she reached the road. She drove toward town at twenty miles an hour.

It seemed to take forever to cross town and reach her hill. As she started up the incline, she realized there was a car following her.

Terror shuddered through her, causing the hammer in her head to pound with renewed energy. Her skin felt clammy, and her stomach contents threatened revolt. A part of her wanted to just stop and give in to whoever was behind her—anything to make her head stop pounding.

She looked helplessly around. She had several boxes and bags of fabric along with two books on tape, a travel mug and a half-full bottle of water. Her cell phone should have been in the center console, but was no where to be found. Her head hurt too much to think about whether she had put it somewhere else before going into Misty's.

She locked her doors and pulled into her circular driveway before she remembered you were supposed to avoid your own house and go directly to the police station if you were ever being followed. She sighed. She couldn't possible drive anywhere else, and in any case, she wasn't sure exactly which street the police station was on.

She picked up the travel mug as she parked. The mug had dregs of hot chocolate in the bottom. As weapons went, it was probably useless, but then again she'd done reasonable damage with a sprinkler.

The car behind her stopped. If she loosened the mug's lid, it would fly off and perhaps startle her stalker and then the muddy liquid would blind him. She wasn't quite sure what came next, but it was the only plan she had. Adrenaline coursed through her body as cold sweat trickled down her spine. She waited.

"Are you okay?” she heard through her closed window. She looked up without moving her head. A curtain of black clouded her vision. Anger quickly chased it away. Aiden stood beside her car, his hand on the door.

He repeated his inquiry. She clicked the locks, and he opened her door. He crouched down beside her

"What happened?” he asked.

Harriet slumped toward him and began to cry. He held her until she stopped shaking.

"You scared me,” she finally managed as she pulled herself out of the awkward embrace.

He was dressed in a black suit that had probably fit him before he'd gone to Africa. Now it was slightly baggy, but on his hardened body and with his tan and long hair, it made him look like he'd just stepped off the catwalk in Milan. Harriet's head hurt, but she wasn't blind.

"I was driving back home after Mom's viewing and I saw you creeping through town. It looked like you were kind of weaving. I got worried, so I followed you."

His voice was soothing. She could see why he made a good vet. He was used to dealing with patients who couldn't talk back or say where it hurt.

"Someone hit me in the head,” she rasped, her throat suddenly dry again.

"Where?” he said.

"Down by the docks."

"No,” he said, a small smile playing across his lips. “Where on your head?"

She pointed. “Don't touch it. It hurts."

He ignored her request and gently worked his fingers from the sides of her skull toward the bump. He stopped each time she gasped.

"Look at me,” he said.

She slowly turned, moving her whole upper body. He pulled his Mag-Lite out of his pocket.

Her eyes burned, and she blinked as he shone the light in each eye.

"Look at my finger,” he said and moved it across her field of vision. “Your pupils look okay, and your eyes are tracking, so that's good, but I think we need to get you to the emergency room. We'll take my car. Let me pull up beside you so you won't have to walk far."

He moved his car then supported her as she shifted from the driver's seat of hers to the passenger seat of his.

"It's going to take a little longer, but I think I'll drive you directly to the Jefferson County Hospital in Port Townsend. There's an urgent care clinic in Foggy Point, but I'm not sure if they can do a CT scan or not."

Harriet didn't have the energy to argue. She was so glad someone else was in charge at this point she would have gone anywhere with him.

She wanted to sleep during the hour-long drive, but Aiden said he couldn't let her sleep until she'd been checked over. She felt as though she were permanently stuck somewhere between asleep and awake. She knew Aiden talked to her but couldn't remember the next day what they had talked about.

At some point during their drive, he must have called the hospital. He pulled into the ambulance circle, where they were met by a nurse with a wheelchair. Harriet was pushed into the triage area while Aiden parked the car. She was in cubicle one when he returned. A white-haired doctor with a golf-course tan was examining her, pretty much repeating the tests Aiden had done.

"You're a very lucky young woman,” the doctor said. “That's a nasty lump on your head. We'll take a few pictures to make sure you didn't crack your skull and keep you overnight to see if we can knock that headache down a little. We can also give you something for the nausea. I don't expect to find anything. I think you'll probably have a headache for a few days, but that should be all. I'll leave you a prescription for some pain medication to help with that when you get to your room."

"Thank you,” she whispered.

The doctor smiled and left the room.

A nurse in teddy-bear-print scrubs came in and gave her an injection in her hip; Aiden turned discretely away. When the nurse was gone, he came over to where she sat on the gurney and gently put his arms around her.

She tried to talk. She wanted to explain why she'd gone to the docks and about Misty.

"Hush,” he said. “We can discuss this tomorrow. For tonight, just try to relax and let the medicine take effect."

Harriet's sleep was punctuated by hourly wake-up visits by the night nurse. The nurse would take her temperature and blood pressure, and by the time she fell asleep again it would be time for the next hourly check.

Each time she woke she saw Aiden, who didn't seem to be bothered at all by the night nurse, as evidenced by the slow, steady breathing she could hear coming from his chair.

When grey light filtered through the slatted blinds on the narrow window in her room she gave up all pretenses. The next time the nurse came in, Harriet was sitting on the side of the bed, her legs dangling over the side.

"Okay, I'm finished with this game,” she announced.

Aiden sat up. “What's going on?” he asked, and looked around as if he didn't know where he was.