Tomorrow's Sun (19 page)

Her eyelids fluttered. Dark brown lashes with hints of gold settled back against high cheekbones. Jake’s breathing quickened, tight ridges formed along the tops of his shoulders.
Ben
. Ben Madsen was the reason he couldn’t pursue Emily. Ben Madsen was the reason his mother was in constant pain. His neck tensed, triggering an instant headache.

Ben Madsen was the reason his sister was dead.

Like tombstone dominoes, everything started toppling the day Abby married her second big mistake.

What was it about the way they were raised that made him and his sister want to save the world one hard-luck case at a time? He’d had the sense to walk away from Heidi. Abby never seemed to catch on until it was too late. Within six months of marrying Ben, she’d lost twenty pounds. She died a week before their third anniversary. Two days after the twins’ twelfth birthday.

Ben’s toxins spilled into his in-laws’ lives. His mother’s quick laugh silenced and, as if needing her own pain to share in Abby’s suffering, she’d developed fibromyalgia.

When Abby died, no one questioned that Adam and Lexi would come to live with Abby’s mother. Especially not Ben. The poor man’s dreams of making it big in the computer repair business were buried with the breadwinning wife he’d put in the ground. Who could expect him to care for two children while holding down an actual job? He was prepared to surrender his rights and allow his mother-in-law to adopt the children.

And then the first Social Security check arrived.

Jake’s temples pounded. Pressure built with each domino that fell in his mind. Parenting had not birthed the best in Ben.

The pale hand moved, bringing Jake out of his angry reverie. Fingers bent around his. Jake returned the pressure. In a different world, he might lift the hand once again to his lips and hope the magical kiss would wake her with a smile.

He rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. Enough with the martyrdom. No one had coerced him onto this path. Someone needed to stand in the gap for Adam and Lexi. His mother wasn’t strong enough. He was determined to be the one.

He loosened his hold on Emily’s hand. His time for thinking of himself would come, but it would be too late for holding hands with Emily Foster.

A shadow dappled the light from the hallway. A polite knock followed. From where he stood he couldn’t see the door. “Come in.”

The curtain swayed. His mother stepped through. Reddened eyes found his face and then his hand. A wisp of a smile tipped one corner of her mouth. “How is she?”

With artful nonchalance, he released the slim, soft hand. “You’re supposed to be sleeping.”

She shrugged.

Jake filled in her blanks. The house was too quiet.

His mother internalized and he made bad jokes. Like broken but usable gears, they’d learned how to mesh differing coping mechanisms since Abby died. Concern for the twins provided the grease.

He motioned toward the chairs. “Her fever’s gone down. She’s sedated because she was trying to pull out her IV. She has a hospital phobia.”

Gazing at the monitor, his mother nodded. “Who doesn’t?” She took a seat and smiled up at him. “You look terrible.”

He smiled back. Like fragile green shoots, there were occasional signs of life in her. “You don’t look so hot yourself.”

Running her fingers through shoulder-length brown hair that had sprouted natural highlights in the past year, she shrugged and pulled a magazine from her purse. “Go get something to eat. I’m replacing you.”

“You don’t …” He left the thought unfinished. She needed to be needed. “Thank you.” He walked around the end of the bed and kissed her on the cheek. The changing of the guard was all too familiar. “Push the call light if she wakes up.”

“I will.” She leafed through the magazine as he walked around the curtain. “Right after I ask her a few little questions.”

The cafeteria had stopped serving an hour ago. He bought a club sandwich from a vending machine, fought with the plastic wrap and finally won, then zapped it in the microwave until the Swiss cheese oozed onto the plate.

How many people have a favorite spot in a hospital cafeteria? He had two. One in the corner, facing the wall of windows, and the other near the cash register. It all depended on his mood and the kind of distraction he needed. There had been days when analyzing the lunch choices of the hospital staff had provided the perfect respite from watching the line of red blood cells flowing into his sister’s arm. Other days, he needed to be alone with God and the scrubby pines on the other side of the window. What he wanted now was air. Grabbing a pile of napkins, he tossed the plate and headed outside.

When the sandwich was gone, he broke into a run, convincing himself with every step that from now on Emily Foster was a job and a paycheck.

And nothing, absolutely nothing, more.

Laughter stopped him at the door to Emily’s room.

“… on my hands and knees to the bathroom. My dad had forgotten to mention he’d called a plumber to fix the sink.” Emily’s last two words dissolved with a laugh. “You can”—a fit of coughing interrupted—“imagine the look on the guy’s face, and mine, when I crawled in.”

His mother gasped for air as she cackled. “I can top that. So there I am at Pick n’ Save in an oversized shirt, standing in front of the milk cooler, and my mind goes totally blank. Fibromyalgia fog, they call it. I can’t remember who I am or what I’m doing there and the cold is making the pain worse, so I fold my arms over my middle to hold in the heat and do what I always do. Lamaze breathing.” She stopped to giggle. “All of a sudden, this woman throws her arms around me and tells me not to worry, she’s an OB nurse. Next thing I know, she’s yelling across the store for someone to call 911!”

Jake stood behind the curtain, his mouth gaping, his eyes stinging, afraid to move and break the spell. When a lull in the laughter finally came, he took several deep breaths and walked in.

“You two sharing your meds?”

His question triggered another fit of laughter, until Emily started coughing.

His mother patted Emily’s knee. “This was fun, but you need to rest.” She wiped her eyes and laid her hand flat against Jake’s chest. “I’m outta here. Your watch.” With a wink so exaggerated it looked painful, she walked out.

Jake stood helplessly as Emily held a tissue to her mouth and coughed. “Should I get someone?”

She shook her head. “No.” After a moment, it stopped. She brushed her hair away from her face. “They say … it’s good … for me to cough.” She blew her nose and lay back on her pillow. “I like your mom. She’s funny.”

“She hasn’t been for a long time. You seem to have brought out the best in her.”

“And vice versa. Haven’t laughed like that in centuries.” She nestled into her pillow. “I don’t think I properly thanked you for bringing me here.” Pale cheeks pinked then lifted with the muscles that bowed her lips.

Properly thanked? His ribs ached and the point of contact her foot had made with his thigh on the trip down her stairs was probably the same color as the bruise on hers. “Guess I’d have to say I don’t feel properly thanked.”

“I’m sorry.” She pushed the button to lower the head of her bed.

Did the medicine or his mother deserve the credit for this metamorphosis? “All’s forgiven.”

Emily yawned. “I was kind of mean.”

“You were.”

Her eyes closed. “I’ll make it up … to you.”

Dinner and a movie?
He sneered at his own inside joke. “No need.” He glanced at the chair by the window and parted the curtain.

She’d be fine on her own.

September 5, 1852

Waving Mama’s lace fan just inches from her face, Hannah conformed her spine to the unforgiving pew and willed her thoughts to rest on God and not on the empty space in the third row.

Liam was helping his father. She was sure of it. He’d made it home safe in the middle of the night. She’d heard the trapdoor close and tiptoed in the dark to get the letter. “All went well,” it read. “I am on my way home to dream of you.”

Only three miles to ride from her house. He’d made it home safe. He was just helping with the harvest. There were other empty spaces in the pews. Even the reverend said men often worshiped best in the field. When God sent the gift of a sunny Sabbath after days of rain, picking corn or harvesting wheat was a gesture of gratitude.

She pictured Liam, arms as strong as the iron he forged, grasping the plow handles. Next spring, on their own plot of land. Unlike some men, he’d talk kindly to the draft horses. Their massive feet would plod the ground, pulling the plow and turning the soil at the gentle commands from Liam’s lips. Those lips … if they were wed she would bring him lemonade and kiss away the parchedness. He would return to the plow with a smile. When the sun rose overhead, he’d slip off his shirt. …

Hannah Glennis Shaw!
Her fan fluttered like a nervous hummingbird. The prophet Jeremiah must have had her in mind when he penned, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.” Her thoughts were wicked, and how much more so that she entertained them in church!

No more. She would heed the apostle Paul’s admonition and bring every thought into captivity. Like a horse with blinders, she would follow the straight and narrow furrow— She bit her tongue.
Road
, she meant road. Not for a moment would she stray to that field of fresh-turned dirt or the man with the sun-bronzed back.
Lord, constrain my wayward mind!
She stared at Reverend Drummond with desperate intensity, as if her very life depended on following the rise and fall of his bushy brows.

“… shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind; and thy neighbor as thyself.” A hairy finger pointed directly at her. Hannah covered the smile that would not obey. She did not need to be told to love her neighbor. What she needed was a sermon on how
not
to love.

The message continued. “A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.”

Hannah pictured the men they’d hid for two days. Gaunt and tired, their feet raw and blistered. Her countenance sobered.