The Heartbreaker (16 page)

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Authors: Vicki Lewis Thompson

BOOK: The Heartbreaker
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The Jeep moved steadily forward as the water lapped at the hubcaps. So far, so good. Then, abruptly, the right front tire plopped into a hole. The Jeep rocked and began to tilt.
“Oh, God,” Mike said.
“Hang on!” Beth shouted, her throat raw.
The water shoved at the precariously balanced Jeep with increasing force. It tilted farther to the right.
“Maybe there's a rope in the truck bed.” Mike released his grip on her arm and ran back to the truck.
Beth stood with her hands pressed to her mouth. Tears and rain coursed down her cheeks as the Jeep gave way to the rushing water and with a sickening splash went over on its side.
Mike's voice was frantic. “Can't find the damned rope!” he called. “I'll keep looking!”
The window unzipped, and Alana peered out. A sudden flash of lightning made her eyes glitter in her white face.
“Don't worry, we'll get you!” Beth screamed.
“Have you got a rope?” Alana yelled back.
“Mike's looking!”
The tow rope's under the danged seat
, said a voice right beside her that sounded exactly like Ernie's.
Beth spun in the direction of the voice.
Ernie stood about six feet away from her, his cigar jammed in the corner of his mouth, his Western shirt and scruffy jeans remarkably dry. The jaguar tooth was no longer around his neck.
Tell him where the rope is
, Ernie said.
He ain't gonna find it on his own. He's too rattled.
Beth kept her attention on Ernie. “The...the rope's under the seat!” she managed to call out as she stared at Ernie. The rain was still coming down in torrents, but he wasn't getting wet An icy finger of premonition slid up Beth's spine. “How did you get here?” she whispered.
Never mind that. Just marry that boy of mine.
“I—”
Promise me, now, Beth. I ain't got all day to hang around.
“I promise, but—”
“I found the rope!” Breathing hard, Mike loped up beside her.
“Mike...”
“Okay, here's what we'll do.” He handed her the end of the heavy nylon rope. “Tie this end to the truck. Get underneath and tie it to the axle. While you're doing that I'll get as far out as I can and throw it to Alana. She can tie it to the roll bar.”
“Okay.” Swallowing the lump in her throat, she hurried over to the truck, but once there she had to check the place where Ernie had been standing. Mike moved quickly past the spot without stopping. Her heart twisted in agony. As she'd expected, Ernie was gone.
She squirmed under the truck, grit from the road biting into her bare arms and legs, and tied the rope firmly to the front axle. By the time she wriggled out again, Alana was tying the other end to the roll bar as she balanced on the side of the Jeep. Mike stood knee deep in the water, and he staggered once as a piece of driftwood hit him in the back of the knees.
“Mike, come back a little!” she called as she started toward him.
“I'm okay! Once Alana's got the rope tied, I'll hang on to it.”
The rope grew taut.
“It's tied!” Alana called.
“I'm coming out to get you!” Mike yelled back.
That was the moment Beth heard the soft but unmistakable sound of the truck moving slightly.
Set the emergency
, Ernie said.
She looked around, but this time there was nobody standing there. She ran toward the truck, leaped in and put on the emergency brake.
Now get some big rocks and put 'em beside the front and back tires.
She hurried to do it, barely having time to notice that Mike was up to his chest in swirling water as he worked his way down the rope toward Alana. She heaved up rocks she'd never dream of trying to lift otherwise. For some reason, they weren't as hard to carry as she'd thought, almost as if somebody was helping her with them.
That should do ‘er, at least for the time bein'.
She ran to the water's edge and stood there panting as Alana climbed out of the Jeep onto Mike's back. Carrying Alana piggyback, Mike started working himself back along the rope. Once he stumbled, and Beth cried out.
Don't worry. He's gonna make it.
Beth swallowed. “He has to. I love him so much.” She stood rigidly waiting as Mike reached the point where the water was at his waist, then his hips. Finally, when it was at his knees, Alana took hold of the rope and climbed down in front of him. When she reached ankle depth, Beth waded in and took her into her arms.
“I'm sorry,” Alana sobbed. “I always knew he loved you. I thought I could beat you out. I almost d-did, too. But then you bought that d-damned red dress.”
Beth held tight to her sister and cried with her for all the years of deceit and competition that had raged unacknowledged alongside their incredible love for each other. At last she heaved a ragged sigh. “It's over now. We're going to be okay.”
“Yep,” Alana said with a watery laugh. “Nobody messes with the Nightingale sisters.”
“Nope,” Beth said, giving her a big hug. “Not even use.”
15
A
RANCHER WITH A WINCH on the front of his dualwheeled truck arrived soon after Mike rescued Alana. Mike and the rancher managed to get the Jeep upright and started hauling it back onto firm ground.
“Too bad that guy didn't show up sooner,” Alana said. She and Beth sat in the cab of Ernie's old truck while they waited for the men to finish pulling the Jeep out The rancher had given them a blanket and they'd wrapped it around themselves as they huddled together in the darkness.
“I think it's better he didn't show up until now,” Beth said.
“I guess you're right.” Alana tucked the blanket more firmly around them. “When Mike risked his life to save me and you were ready to leap into the water to swim out to get me, I was able to see what a jerk I was for putting us all in danger.”
“You were furious with us and couldn't think straight.”
“I know, but I didn't show much maturity in the way I reacted. While Mike was looking for the rope and my chances were getting slim, I realized how much the three of us mean to each other. I saw how dumb I was to give up the two people who loved me most in this world just because of wounded pride.”
“Only pride?”
Alana sighed. “I hate to admit that. But the truth is, I've always loved Mike like a brother. I wanted him mostly because he was the best catch around, and it fed my ego to be able to say he was my boyfriend, my fiancé. Especially when I knew you wanted him, too.”
“You
knew
that?”
Alana reached up and punched her gently on the shoulder. “What do you take me for? Stupid?”
“I thought I was keeping it a big secret.”
“Oh, sure. Like the way you'd challenge him to wrestling matches all the time, and always be around when he came to pick me up, and then that red dress, my God. You might as well have taken out a billboard advertisement. No wonder he finally kissed you that night.”
Beth's cheeks warmed. “You knew about
that
, too?”
“I saw you. That was one hot kiss. Mike and I never had that kind of chemistry, which is why it was no big deal for us to do the celibacy-before-marriage thing. I was ready to kill you that night, but bringing everything out in the open seemed like it would make the link between you two real, and I didn't want it to be. I figured I'd fight fire with fire and tried to seduce him later that night. As you know, it didn't work.”
Beth had accepted Mike's version of that story, but it still didn't hurt his credibility to have Alana confirm the truth. “You wanted me to hate him.”
“Sure I did. If you knew the truth, you might end up with him. Since you were already Dad's favorite, I didn't think that was fair.”
“Dad's favorite?” Beth stared at her sister. “What makes you think a crazy thing like that?”
“Why wouldn't you be? You worked with him every day in the glass studio, and I wasn't any good at that. He was always bragging about your creativity. I always felt like...an outsider.”
“Oh, Alana.” Beth hugged her tight. “You know what Dad talked about when we worked together? He talked about you! How smart you were, and brave.
That girl's going to see every corner of the world someday,
he'd say, and his eyes would be shining with pride.”
“You're making this up to make me feel better.”
“I'm not. Cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye. I used to be so jealous of
you
when he said that.”
Alana chuckled. “God, Bethy, were we a pair or what? Hating each other and loving each other desperately at the same time. Each of us trying to be number one with Dad. I figured I'd lost that contest, so I made sure I had Mike, even though he really belongs with you.”
Beth leaned her head against Alana's. “You're sure you're okay with that?”
“It's a relief, in a way. I've struggled so long to deny the attraction between you two. It was exhausting. I'm glad to finally give it up.”
“So you've always known what the stained-glass piece in my studio was all about.”
Alana nodded. “Many times I was tempted to have some
accident
happen to that piece, but it's so beautiful that even in my most jealous moments I couldn't destroy it. I didn't think either of us would get another shot at Mike, anyway, but when I heard he was back, and knew you'd spent time with him, I was like a fire horse hearing the bell. I had to get back here and try to get him, or at the very least keep you from getting him.”
“That's amazing.”
“It's stupid, is what it is. And he doesn't even turn me on, at least not the way a guy should if you plan to spend your life with him.”
“Then why haven't you fallen for somebody else?”
“More stupidity.” She laid her head back against the worn upholstery. “I really need a shrink. I thought if I let myself become seriously involved, maybe even get married, then I wouldn't be available if Mike did come back. And you might be. You married to Mike would be such a blow to my ego that I had to guard against that horrible possibility at all times.”
“And now your worst nightmare will come true.”
“Now that it's here, it feels just right Everything's the way it should be, with two people I love getting together at last. After all, you're the only family I've got—you, Mike and Ernie.”
Ernie
. Beth thought of what she'd seen and heard tonight. She wondered if she should tell Alana about it. If she did, she'd also have to tell Alana what she thought it meant. She could be wrong. The strain of the moment might have caused her to imagine something, to hallucinate. She'd read about such things, and maybe she'd just experienced the kind of tricks the mind could play when under tremendous stress.
Maybe she'd known herself where the rope was, and she'd only thought Ernie had been standing there telling her about it The emergency brake was a logical thing to think of, and so were the rocks. If they'd seemed lighter than they should have been when she carried them, that was probably due to the sort of adrenaline rush that allowed mothers to lift cars away from their trapped children and not to some ghostly presence lightening the load.
She'd be foolish to describe what she'd seen and get Mike and Alana all excited and worried for nothing.
“You know, when I was in the Jeep, I thought I heard Dad's voice,” Alana said.
Beth's head snapped around toward her sister. “What?”
“I couldn't be sure, and the water and thunder were making a lot of noise, but I thought I heard him say
You're all going to be okay.
” Alana's voice became choked with emotion. “I...um...probably imagined it.”
Beth felt her own throat constrict with impending tears. “Maybe not.”
“I want to believe he talked to me, Bethy,” Alana whispered.
“Then believe it,” she murmured, and swiped the tears from her cheeks. If their father really had talked to Alana, then maybe Ernie had really talked to her. “We...we need to go back to the hospital after the guys finish with the Jeep.”
“Yeah, we sure do. Poor Ernie must wonder what all the fuss was about. Here he finally gets us together again after eight long years, and then all hell breaks loose. But I don't think we should tell him how dangerous it was.”
“Probably not” Beth swallowed. “But he might know.”
“Yeah, not much gets past Ernie. I love that old guy. When he gets better I'm taking him on a canoe trip with me. The Ozarks were beautiful. Maybe he'd like to go there.”
Beth let the tears slide silently down her cheeks and prayed that Ernie would indeed see the Ozarks with Alana and the rain forest with his son.
Mike opened the driver's door. “I think that's about it,” he said. “We're going to leave the Jeep here if it's okay with you, Alana. Jonas offered to pull it into town, but I think he's done plenty for us already, so I said we'd arrange for a tow in the morning, after the rain stops.”
“Sounds fine to me,” Alana said. “Considering we're all alive, I don't care what happens to the Jeep.”
“It'll need some major time in the shop. There's sand in the engine.”
“Who cares?” Alana said.
“I agree,” Mike said. “I'll get Jonas's address and phone number so we can find him when we think up some way to say thank-you.”
“Maybe he needs a stained-glass window in his ranch house,” Beth suggested.
Mike smiled at her. “He just might. Well, I'll tell him goodbye and we'll be on our way.”
“Beth and I want to go back to the hospital and let Ernie know we're okay,” Alana said.
“Yeah, I thought we'd do that.” Mike glanced at the two of them. “Although when he gets a look at us, he may not believe a word we say. You look like a couple of drowned rats, and I'm probably not much more attractive.”
“Not much more attractive?
” Alana glanced at Beth. “Did you hear what this egomaniac just said?”
“Yep.” Beth laughed through her tears.
“Listen, Tremayne,” Alana said, shaking her finger in his face. “Never assume that you're even
somewhat
more attractive than the Nightingale sisters. Got that?”
“Got it,” Mike said, laughing as he closed the door and started over toward the rancher's truck.
Beth hugged her sister. “I love you, Alana.”
“And I love you, too.” She pulled back and gazed at Beth. “But you do happen to look like crap right now.”
“So do you.”
“But Mike looks worse, right?”
Beth grinned. “Right. Always worse than us. Because we are the one, the only—”
“Nightingale Sisters!” they shouted together.
 
ALANA AND MIKE remained in a cheerful mood all the way back to the hospital, but the closer they got to town, the quieter Beth became. She tried to tell herself everything was fine, but she didn't believe it.
Mike even resorted to some gentle teasing as they left the truck and started toward the hospital entrance. “Hey, Gloomy Gus. News flash, the good guys won.”
She managed a smile. “I guess I'm a little tired.”
“I think we're all running on fumes,” Alana said. “We'd better stoke up on caffeine before we head back to Bisbee.”
“And we're going to a coffee shop,” Mike said. “I've had enough of that stuff out of a vending machine to last me the rest of my life.” He ushered them through the door ahead of him. “You two beautiful ladies may go first,” he said.
“Now you've got the idea,” Alana said. “Training, right, Beth?”
“Right.”
Mike and Alana continued to joke with each other as they continued on toward Ernie's room, but Beth's stomach twisted with anxiety as they neared the nurses' station for Ernie's wing.
Judy, Ernie's favorite nurse, was there. She looked up as they approached.
When Beth saw Judy's expression, she knew. She put her hand over her mouth to hold back a sob.
Judy came toward them, looking directly at Mike. She held the jaguar tooth necklace in one hand. “I'm sorry, Mike. Your father—”
“No!” Mike roared. He pushed past her and raced down the hallway.
Beth ran after him, with Alana at her heels.
He burst into the empty room, where the bed was already stripped, then bolted out again, running straight toward Judy. “Where is he? Where have you taken him?”
Judy put her hand on his arm. “He's being kept...somewhere else. We tried to reach you, but we weren't sure if you'd be back tonight, so—”
“What do you mean,
being kept
somewhere?” Mike stared at her, obviously refusing to hear the truth.
Alana started to sob.
Beth walked over to Mike and slipped her arm around his waist, holding on tight. Fine tremors ran through his body. “We'd like to see him, Judy,” she said.
“Of course. Come with me.” Judy started down the hallway.
Beth tried to urge Mike to follow Judy, but he wouldn't budge. Instead he began to shake more violently. She wrapped both arms around him and held on as the trembling became sobs. At last he crushed her against him and buried his face against her neck. “Don't leave me, Beth,” he cried brokenly. “Don't ever leave me.”
She could barely speak, but he needed to hear her voice. “Never,” she whispered fiercely. “I love you, Mike. I always have, and I always will.”
 
BETH NIGHTINGALE officially promised to love and cherish Mike Tremayne, forsaking all others, on a warm afternoon in October. She suffered a few prewedding jitters, especially when she allowed herself to remember that her prospective groom had run out on a similar event eight years ago. But Mike showed no sign of leaving this time.

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