Since You've Been Gone (3 page)

“Sure, Doc,” the young man said and nearly fled from the room.

The doctor turned back to Rebecca. “Alvin's one of our
best orderlies, but his mind seems to be wandering tonight. Now, how did this wreck happen?”

Rebecca couldn't imagine saying, “I had a vision and I could only hear and see through the consciousness of a little boy who's probably been kidnapped.” Instead she improvised. “There was a terrible flash of lightning right in front of me. It startled me and I must have slammed my foot on the brake and then …”

“Hydroplaned right into Peter Dormaine's hundred-year-old oak tree.”

“Peter Dormaine?”

“Yes. You wrecked at Dormaine's Restaurant.” He frowned. “Didn't you even know where you were?”

“Oh sure,” she said quickly. “I forgot for a second. I was pretty shaken up.”

“No wonder. If you hadn't been wearing your seat belt, you would have been a mess, young lady.” He paused. “You don't recognize me, do you? It's Clayton Bellamy.”

Clay Bellamy? Her stepbrother Doug's friend who had sent her teenage heart racing and inspired a hundred ridiculously romantic fantasies?

Rebecca closed her eyes against the strong lights shining down on her. Her head hurt and she felt as if everything inside her was quivering. The rest of her body was remarkably free of pain, but she knew a dozen aches would kick into gear soon. “Hi, Clay,” she managed weakly.

She looked at him again. His gray-blue eyes still had a slight downward tilt of the outer lids, and he still wore his thick golden blond hair a bit longer than most men's. His even white teeth were wreathed by deep dimples. It could have been a pretty-boy face, with its near-perfect features, but his eyes held a trace of sadness and his face more lines than one would expect of a man barely over thirty. The whiskey-edged voice also added a few years. Clay had aged well, but he was definitely a man now, not the striking boy he'd still been at their last meeting when he was 22 and she 17.

“How did you end up as my doctor?” Rebecca asked.

“I have my pick of the patients.” Clay smiled. “It's good to see you, even under these circumstances, Stargazer.”

Rebecca had forgotten the nickname Clay had given her when she was eleven because of her fascination with astronomy. She had never been certain whether or not he was making fun of her.

“Good to see you, too,” she said weakly.

“You're in remarkably good condition given the seriousness of your wreck. We tried to call your family, but got a busy signal.”

“You know my stepfather is a workaholic. I think he makes calls until midnight. Besides, they didn't even know I was coming. Molly does, though. You remember my cousin Molly?”

“Sure. First cousins and best friends. She was always at your house when I dropped by with Doug. We'll call her in a minute. First I have a couple of questions. Who wrote
Moby-Dick?
”

“Are you kidding?” Clay shook his head. “Herman Melville.”

“Good. When did William Faulkner get the Pulitzer prize for literature?”

“You're being very strange.” Rebecca scrunched up her forehead in deep thought, then announced, “It was the Nobel Prize in 1949.”

“Nothing wrong with this noggin!” Clay crowed.

“You were testing me?”

“Have to make sure there's no memory loss.”

“As if he'd know when Faulkner won his prize,” the nurse joked.

“She sounded sure of herself and I do know who wrote
Moby-Dick.
” Clay stood up and took Rebecca's hand as if they'd seen each other only yesterday. “You're as pretty as ever in spite of those cuts on your face.”

He possessed the same easy charm, the tendency to flatter even when she was certain he was giving little thought to his words. In the space of a day he probably told several women they were pretty. “Thanks, Clay. Will I have scars?”

“No. The cuts are small and I'm a master of sutures.”

“And
modest.
” The nurse laughed.

Clay looked at Rebecca earnestly. “Stargazer, I get appallingly little respect around here. Sometimes my feelings are so hurt I have to go into the rest room and cry it out.”

“You poor thing!” Rebecca giggled. “Your sense of humor hasn't changed.”

“Certainly not.” Clay grew serious. “Now we need a CAT scan and then to call Molly.”

Rebecca rattled off Molly's number and the nurse wrote it down. “And please try to find out something about my dog. I know it must seem silly to you, but—”

“It doesn't seem silly at all,” Clay said briskly. “I have one of my own named Gypsy and I love her like crazy. You try to relax.”

Rebecca felt as if she would scream if she didn't get out of this place. She was shaken by the wreck, worried about Sean, and most of all rocked by her vision of a little boy being taken from his bed, then held captive in some awful place. Over the past eight years she had worked at suppressing her visions, shutting her mind to them until they had almost disappeared. But she could not have shut out this vision. It was too powerful, too insistent. Rarely in her life had she experienced one of such clarity.

Still, she didn't dare say anything to these medical people about her experience. She'd just been in a wreck; her tale would sound like rambling. They might decide she'd had some kind of brain injury not shown on the CAT scan and keep her overnight when she desperately wanted to leave and possibly unravel the mystery of what she had seen. Was a little boy in town missing? Was there something she could do? If she were alone would another vision come that might tell her more?

After what seemed an interminable time, the nurse reappeared and said, “Dr. Bellamy, may I talk with you for a moment?”

Clay, who had been frowning in concentration over his
stitches, looked up and smiled. “That's the sweetest tone you've ever used with me. What have I done right?”

“Nothing.” Clay raised his eyebrows. “Well, I'm sure you've done a few things right today, but I just need to talk to you.
Now.
”

Clay's smile wavered a fraction, then came back full force as he gazed down at Rebecca. “Don't look so apprehensive. This is no doubt about another patient. You're fine, I promise.”

A dozen thoughts raced through Rebecca's mind in the two minutes Clay was gone. Something was wrong and it had to do with her. As soon as Clay returned she demanded, “What is it? Did they find my dog? Is he dead?”

“Your dog?” Clay blinked at her. “No, the paramedics said they didn't see a dog. I told you it was about someone else.”

But his face looked tight and pale as he finished the suturing and he made no small talk. Rebecca's heart pounded. Where was her ESP when she needed it? Why couldn't she read his mind? The ESP seemed to have a will of its own and wasn't something she could command at will. It came and went as it pleased.

Growing more nervous as the minutes ticked by, Rebecca forced herself to sit quietly through the dressing of her two cuts as well as an injection of antibiotics and a tetanus booster. Then she gave an accident report to a policeman, carefully omitting any references to “visions.” It was after eleven-thirty when, dressed in her damp, blood-splattered clothes, she walked out of the hospital with Clay solicitously holding her arm.

“You don't have to take me home,” she protested.

“The nurse told me Molly isn't available, so we tried your house. Your stepfather isn't home, and your mother doesn't sound up to par.”

Up to par, Rebecca thought. A polite way of saying her mother had been drinking. Rebecca wondered how many people knew Suzanne had become an alcoholic over the
past five years. Most of the town? Word traveled fast in small communities.

“Of course, if insurance companies didn't dictate policy, you'd be staying within the hospital's hallowed halls tonight,” Clay said.

“I'm glad I don't have to. I just don't understand why Molly isn't around. She knew I was coming. Of course I'm later than I'd expected, but I promised I'd get here sometime today.”

“Well, lucky for you my shift is over, and I have a car.”

“Clay, this is nice of you but unnecessary. We have taxi service in Sinclair.”

“Not a taxi that will drive around and help you find your dog. What did you call him?”

“Sean! Oh Clay, will you really help me find him?”

Clay stopped at a black compact car. “I save lives and I help find lost dogs. I'm a full-service doctor.”

“I'll say. You can't tell me you give all your patients this kind of service.”

The remark sounded flirtatious and Rebecca regretted it, then told herself she was being too self-conscious because—much to her surprise—her old attraction to Clayton Bellamy remained intact.

“I've known you for years, Rebecca. If I can't help an old friend find her dog and then drive her home when she's hurt and without transportation, I'm a sorry specimen.”

Well, so much for my believing he thinks I'm anything special, Rebecca thought with a slight thud of disappointment.

“Now hop in and don't trip over the Styrofoam cups on the floor. I'm a slob when it comes to the car.”

Rebecca climbed in and immediately snapped on her seat belt. Belts had saved her life twice in auto accidents. She also noted that the car was spotless except for three cups and a candy bar wrapper on the floor.

“Clay, I don't know how to thank you for doing this,” she said as he started the car. “Sean is an Australian shepherd. They're usually gentle, good around children, but he
was clearly abused because he doesn't react well to most people. I think he was dumped in my neighborhood; for some reason he picked my house to seek refuge.”

Clay finally looked at her and smiled. “The first time I met you, you were taking care of a tiny bunny. Kept it in a hamster cage. You said the vet had told you it couldn't live, but you refused to believe him. And it did live. After that you took in every abandoned rabbit and robin you found and never lost one.”

“I can't believe you remember that.”

“I wanted to be a doctor, so your talent as a healer made a big impression. Besides, I remember quite a bit about you, Stargazer, particularly your sensitivity.” Rebecca felt herself blushing, then felt silly for blushing and blushed some more. “You also had quite an imagination. Of course you ended up writing a book. Murder mystery, isn't it?”

“That's what I call it. The publisher calls it ‘psychological suspense.' I was lucky to get it published, but it only came out a month ago so I don't know much about sales. That's why I'm not giving up my job teaching in a private school.”

“That's great. And I haven't read the book yet, but I will.”

Rebecca laughed. “You don't have to.”

“I
want
to. I also want my copy of the book signed. Deal?”

“Deal.”

The storm had let up, leaving only a slow, dreary rain to fall in its wake. Streets glistened moistly, streets that were nearly deserted, unlike the perpetual busyness of New Orleans. Most of the houses they passed were dark and none bore the security warnings so common in the Garden District where she lived. Sinclair hardly ranked as a high-crime city.

“Are you feeling worse?” Clay asked.

“No. Why?”

“You're frowning and biting your lower lip.”

“My head has felt better and the seat belt gave me quite
a jerk around my middle, but I'm okay. I'm worried about Sean.”

“Well, we're back at Dormaine's. There's your car. Good grief, look at that hood!”

“Do I have to?”

“Not if it'll make you feel worse.”

“It's a rental. I have no personal attachment,” Rebecca said in an attempt at lightness. “I just can't believe the damage I did.”

“Only to a car. When I think of what could have happened to you, when I remember how you looked when they wheeled you into the emergency room and told me who you were and that you might be blind …” Clay took a deep breath. “It scared the hell out of me.”

Rebecca was taken aback by the emotion in his voice. She hadn't seen him for eight years, and at their last meeting, she'd been wraith-thin, all hair and dark-circled eyes, still grief-stricken over the murder of her brother Jonnie. And before that she'd been a giggling, blushing, clumsy thing whose teenage crush glowed in her eyes whenever she looked at him. He probably remembered her, all right-remembered her as a strange being who claimed to have ESP.

“The storm must have slowed down the wrecker service or the car would be gone by now,” Clay said. “Where's your luggage? Trunk?”

“Yes, but you don't have to—”

“Why not? We're here. I'll bet the keys are still in the ignition.”

Apparently they were because in two minutes Clay had opened the trunk and was carrying Rebecca's luggage to his own. “Nothing to it, and you'll have your things with you tonight,” he said. “Now on to find Sean.”

They had the street to themselves and Clay turned the car to face the restaurant, allowing the headlights to sweep the side of Dormaine's. “No sign of a dog. Of course if he'd been right here, the paramedics would have found him. But Alvin said they claimed not to have seen a dog.”

A thought flashed in Rebecca's mind. “The orderly. Alvin. It's an unusual name. And he looked vaguely familiar tome.”

“Alvin Tanner. He's Earl's son.”

“Oh God,” Rebecca whispered, remembering. Earl Tanner had been stabbed to death outside a local bar called The Gold Key. Police had immediately arrested a male suspect. Circumstantial evidence piled up against him until twelve-year-old Rebecca had told her uncle Bill Garrett, a deputy on the police force, that Earl had been stabbed to death by a woman named “Slim” who had waited for him in an alley outside the bar. Slim Tanner was Earl's wife. Just as Rebecca had predicted, police had found a knife stained with Earl's blood buried beneath a rhododendron bush on the Tanner lawn. Slim had claimed she'd killed Earl because he was beating her and Alvin. Nevertheless, she was doing a life sentence because of Rebecca.