Evidence of Mercy

  “Hello?”

  Lynda’s heart skipped a beat. “Is this Doris Stevens?”

  “Yeah, who wants to know?”

  “My name is Lynda Barrett. I live in St. Clair, Florida. Ms. Stevens, I’ve gotten to know your son, Jake. He’s here and—”

  “Whatever he’s done, I had nothin’ to do with it.”

  Lynda hesitated. “Ms. Stevens, why do you think he’s done anything?”

  “Because he’s got a heart of ice, that’s why. I ain’t seen the man in eight years. He got to be a big-shot pilot, and now he’s ashamed of me. Well, you know what? I don’t care. I’m ashamed of him, too.”

  This was harder than Lynda had imagined. “Ms. Stevens, Jake’s been in an accident. A plane crash.”

  “What?”

  The voice came through louder, clearer now, and she imagined the woman clutching the phone tighter. “That’s right. About three weeks ago.”

  “Three weeks?” She hesitated, and then in a softer voice said, “That’s about when he called me. He didn’t tell me nothin’ about no plane crash.”

  Lynda didn’t know what to say to that. Why would Jake have called her and not told her that he was lying in the hospital? “He was injured badly, Ms. Stevens. He has a bad back injury that has caused paralysis in his legs.”

  “He can’t walk?”

  “No. There is a possibility that the paralysis will go away, though. They think when the swelling goes down, the feeling may come back. But there’s no guarantee. And he also had a severe cut to his face and lost an eye.”

  Doris muttered an expletive then asked in a wobbly voice, “So what do you want from me?”

  The question took Lynda by surprise. “Nothing. I just thought you’d want to know that your son is in the hospital in a lot of pain. Ms. Stevens, he’s absolutely alone. He apparently doesn’t know many people here—”

  “What is he doin’ there, anyway? I thought he lived in Houston.”

  She couldn’t believe that Jake hadn’t told his mother he was moving. “He was in the process of moving here when this happened. Ms. Stevens—he needs you.”

  She laughed then, a bitter, cold laugh. “Oh, yeah? Well, where was he when I needed him? Huh?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Yeah, well, neither do I. Is there a lawsuit involved here? Is he suin’ somebody?”

  Until now, the thought had never occurred to her that Jake could sue her. Deciding against telling her that it was her plane and that she had been in the same crash, she said, “No, not that I know of.”

  “Then there’s no money involved?”

  “No. I haven’t heard him suggest suing, at all.”

  “Then there’s no need in my comin’, is there?”

  She didn’t want to believe that Jake’s mother was mercenary enough to see dollar signs in Jake’s accident, so she chose to believe that it was a question of how she would finance the trip. “Uh—if you don’t have the money, I’d be happy to send you a plane ticket.”

  The woman hesitated. “I wouldn’t have a place to stay.”

  “I’d pay for your hotel, too,” she said. “Will you come, Ms. Stevens?”

  Again a pause. “What’s the weather like there this time of year?”

  “It’s fine. Nice.”

  “Nice enough to go to the beach?”

  She closed her eyes. Surely she wasn’t looking at this as an opportunity to take a free vacation. “I don’t know, Ms. Stevens.”

  “How close are you to Disney World?”

  Reality began closing in on her. “I would think your time would be spent with Jake. Don’t you care about his condition?”

  “Let me tell you something,” the woman spat back. “I raised that ingrate by myself with no help from anybody. I was there for him until the day he skipped town without lookin’ back. When I was strugglin’ and needed a hand, he wasn’t there for me. So now, when he can’t walk and can’t see, I’m supposed to welcome him back with open arms so I can wait on him hand and foot? What’s in it for me?”

  For a moment, Lynda was quiet. “Maybe the knowledge that you did everything you could for your son?”

  “I already did that,” she said. “I don’t owe him nothin’ more.”

  Slowly Lynda set the phone back in its cradle and rested her face on her palm. No wonder he had lied about his mother. No wonder he hadn’t visited her. Their relationship was an endless cycle of blame and selfishness and anger, a cycle that Lynda wasn’t wise enough to break.

  But what would she tell Jake? That his mother wouldn’t come unless there was a monetary settlement involved or a trip to Disney World or nice weather for sunbathing?

  How could a mother have such contempt for her son?

  “Are you crying, Miss Lynda?”

  Lynda turned around and saw Brianna standing in the doorway, looking up at her with big, curious eyes.

  “Come here.”

  Brianna came slowly toward her. “Why are you crying?”

  “Because somebody just made me real sad.” She pulled Brianna into her lap, and the child kept gazing at her.

  “Did somebody hit you?”

  “No.”

  “Did they try to take you?”

  She realized then that Brianna was going down the list of things that made her sad, and Lynda felt a twofold rush of sorrow. Closing her eyes against the tears, she dropped her face to Brianna’s crown. “No, Brianna, no one tried to take me. I’m sad for someone else.”

  “So they won’t have to be?” she asked, as if trying to understand this new concept of surrogate sorrow.

  She smiled. “Something like that.”

  Brianna laid her head against Lynda’s chest, as if she knew that sitting still might be of some comfort to her, and finally, she looked up at her again. “Do you like to color?”

  Lynda smiled. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

  Brianna slid out of her lap. “Come on, then.”

  And Lynda realized that the child’s simple therapy might be just what she needed right now.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  * * *

  It felt like a burning, tingling sensation, just on the outside of his big toe. Nothing to get excited about.

  But Jake got excited anyway. He jerked the sheets off his legs and peered down at his feet.

  He’d been so exhausted when he’d gotten back from rehab today—where they’d forced him to work despite his indifference—that he had almost forgotten the scar and his eye. Maybe now he was just imagining the sensation. Maybe he just wanted to feel it so badly.

  But it felt real, and his surprise gave birth to a fragile hope.

  He started to call the nurse but changed his mind. What if he told the nurses, and they assured him it was just a side effect from the traction they’d had him on in the rehab room? What if he found out that it was nothing?

  He focused all his concentration and every ounce of his energy into that big toe, willing it to move. But it lay still, dead, not getting the messages his brain was sending.

  Was this no different than the pressure he felt when he was touched or pulled? Was it without meaning?

  He heard Lynda’s familiar rat-tat-a-tat-tat knock on the door and called, “Come in.”

  She came into the room all cheer and sunshine, and he debated whether to tell her what he felt.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi.” He kept staring at his foot.

  “How’d your rehab go today?”

  “Good.”

  She followed his gaze to his toe. “What are you looking at, Jake?”

  He didn’t answer for a moment then finally looked up at her. “My toe,” he said. “I’ve been feeling some pain in it. Kind of a burning.”

  She caught her breath and with wide eyes, went to stand at the foot of his bed. Touching the toes on both feet, she asked, “Can you feel this?”

  His eyes grew wider. “Just on that toe. But I feel you touching that toe!”

  She was trying to h
old back her excitement, just as he was. “Have you tried to move it?”

  “I was trying,” he said. “It hasn’t budged.”

  “Well, try again. Come on, Jake. Move it.”

  Silence fell over the room as he found his concentration again, and as though he could telekinetically move the toe, he stared down at it.

  “Was that a twitch?” she asked finally. “I thought I saw a twitch!”

  Jake wasn’t sure. He tried again, and this time the toe moved an eighth of an inch.

  “You did it!” Lynda cried, jumping up and slinging a fist through the air. “Oh, Jake, you moved it!”

  He started to laugh, and she ran around the bed and hugged him.

  “Call somebody before I forget how,” he said.

  With trembling hands, she found the button that called for the nurse.

  It was definitely cause for celebration, Dr. Randall said when he finally made it to the hospital to examine Jake. It might mean that Jake could get his legs back.

  But for all his newfound hope, Jake couldn’t escape the doctor’s qualifier that it didn’t mean he’d get all his feeling back, or get movement in his leg or the rest of his foot. But this was something.

  Torn between exhilaration and frustration, he asked Lynda to take him out of the hospital.

  Glad to be asked for anything, she wheeled him outside where night had already descended, and the stars lit up the sky with a magnificent brilliance. Jake leaned his head back and looked up, taking it all in.

  Lynda had gotten quiet, and he could see that something was on her mind. Maybe there was something she didn’t want to tell him. When they got to a small park near the hospital, she locked his wheels and sat down on a bench facing him.

  He met her eyes squarely. “What’s wrong, Lynda?”

  “Nothing. Why do you think something’s wrong?”

  “I could read it in your mood swings today,” he said. “As happy as we got, something kept bringing you down.”

  He studied her face for a moment. “She won’t come, will she?”

  Lynda couldn’t deny it. “No.”

  He took in a deep, ragged breath. “It’s okay,” he said, trying not to look crestfallen. “I told you it would be that way. What did she say?”

  He saw the turmoil on her face and realized that it must be bad, too bad for her to relate to him. He almost wished he hadn’t asked. “She’s just . . . busy right now.”

  Jake looked into the breeze and thought about the last time he’d seen his mother. He wondered if she had changed, or if the years of hard work, cigarette smoke, and nights spent in the truck stop flirting with the patrons had aged her. “When you told her about my injuries . . . What did she say?”

  “She was shocked,” Lynda said. “She said you had called her since the crash, and you didn’t say anything about it.”

  “She didn’t seem all that receptive.” He could see by her face that she knew what he meant. “There’s a lot of water under our bridge, Lynda,” he went on. “I haven’t been proud of where I came from, and I haven’t been particularly proud of her. I’ve said and done some hateful things. She has a reason for hating me.”

  As he spoke, he felt exposed, open, as transparent as he’d ever been in his life. But Lynda had already seen farther into him than anyone else ever had. “I think you’re changing, Jake.”

  He breathed a laugh. “Oh, yeah? You think so?”

  She smiled. “I don’t think the old Jake would ever have admitted guilt.”

  “Well, I’ve had a lot of time to think about it over the last few weeks.”

  Her smile faded. “Have you been thinking about going home, Jake?”

  He averted his eyes again and studied the trunk of the tree next to him. “Home where? I’ve thought of going back to Texas to finish my therapy there. There are people there I could probably stay with. That is, if they aren’t too repulsed by me. I haven’t even told them I’ve been hurt.”

  She wasn’t sure why that disappointed her. “Is that what you want to do?” she asked.

  He sighed. “I don’t know. It honestly feels like I’m somebody else now. Like the Jake Stevens they all knew is dead. And here I am in his useless shell, trying to figure out who I am now. And nothing against all my friends, but most of them are kind of—self-centered. I can’t see them wanting to help out an invalid.”

  “You’re not an invalid,” she said. “You’re just in transition. You need time.”

  Something about that sweet declaration made his heart soften, and he smiled at her. She leaned forward, her big, round eyes drilling into his, and he wondered how she had managed to make him risk more honesty with her than he’d ever risked with anyone else. Even himself.

  “I had an idea,” she said. “But I don’t know how you’ll feel about it.”

  “What?”

  She averted her eyes and studied her hands. “I’ve been staying at my father’s house, and there’s a garage apartment there that used to be mine. It’s got a small kitchen, a refrigerator, and a bathroom, and it’s pretty comfortable.” She made herself meet his gaze. “I was thinking that . . . maybe when they release you . . . you could stay there. I could take care of all your meals, transport you back and forth to the hospital for your therapy every day, and help you in whatever way you needed. But you’d still have your privacy.”

  A lump the size of Wyoming formed in his throat, and he gaped at her, not believing that he’d heard her right. “I couldn’t, Lynda. That’s too much of an imposition. You’re recovering, too. The last thing you need is somebody like me in your way.”

  “You won’t be in the way. You’d have your own place. You won’t have to worry about rent or food or anything for a while. I have someone else staying with me, a client of mine and her daughter. She’s hiding from her abusive ex-husband until we can get into court. Between his shenanigans and the stuff that’s already happened to me, we’re both a little paranoid. It might be nice to have a man around the house.”

  The word “man” shook him, for he hadn’t thought of himself as a man in a long time. “Not that I’d be of any use if anything happened,” he said. “I guess I could run over somebody in my wheelchair, but it’s not like I can defend you.”

  She smirked. “I don’t know, Jake. You were pretty dangerous the other day. If you had something to throw—”

  He took it as it was intended and chuckled softly.

  “Besides, we don’t need defending,” she said. “Her ex doesn’t know where we are, and the guy who was after me is still in jail. Your presence will just lend a little stability.”

  She didn’t mean it, he thought. She was just saying that to make him feel needed, but he had to admit he appreciated it. She was giving him the option of keeping his dignity, his masculinity. She was offering him a home, temporary though it might be.

  It was better than any other option he had.

  She saw his reticence. “Come on, Jake. Say yes if for no other reason than to appease my conscience. It was my plane that crashed. Let me make it up to you as much as I can.”

  Tears came to his eyes, and he struggled to hold them back. “You don’t have to buy my forgiveness,” he whispered after a moment.

  “That’s not what I’m doing,” she said. “The truth is neither your feet nor your hair needs washing, so I can do this instead.”

  “What?”

  She smiled. “Never mind. Just say yes.”

  He sighed. “You’re going to regret it.”

  “No,” she said with a smile. “I don’t think I will.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  * * *

  The sound of his heels echoed through the old, musty judicial building as Keith checked the sign on each door, looking for the county clerk’s office. He was tired of waiting. He’d spent most of several days watching the parking lot at Lynda’s law firm, but she hadn’t been there yet. Then he’d tried to get her forwarding address by sending something to her old address with a note to the post
office to return it with her new one. But the address they had returned was to a post office box. He had even tried staking out the post office, but he hadn’t been able to be there all the time, and if she’d checked her box, he’d missed her.

  But he wasn’t stupid. He had resources, and he knew how to use them. And he was going to start with public records. It had been worth the drive to St. Petersburg where the county records were kept, and though he didn’t know what he was looking for, he was sure he’d know when he found it. His goal for now was to find every public record that existed on Lynda or her family. Something there would have to give him a clue.

  He found the office and went into the dimly lit room that looked as if it could use a good electrician to update the wiring. A young couple was there getting a marriage license. Smirking, he leaned on the counter and thought of telling the poor guy to save his fifteen bucks and run like the wind. But the kid was young—too young to be reasoned with, old enough to make mistakes that would ruin his life. Just like Keith had been when he and Paige had stood there, giggling like this couple and anticipating the life they were planning together.

  But that was before he’d learned what a shrew she was.

  Now, on the battleground of their marriage, his daughter had become the spoils. Didn’t Paige realize what her obstinance was going to cost her? Didn’t she understand that when he got through with her, she’d have nothing left? Least of all Brianna.

  The couple blushed over their finished license, and Keith flashed them a saccharine, congratulatory smile then winked at the lady behind the desk. “Cute kids,” he said as they left the room.

  “Yes, they are,” she said. “I hope everything works out for them.”

  “I’m sure it will,” he said. “We’ve been married for ten years now, and we’re as happy as the day we came in here to get our license.”

  “Oh, that’s nice.”

  “Yes. Course, I realize that not everybody is as lucky as I am, but we work at it, you know? Teamwork. It’s the only way.”