Mean Streak(68)

“The emotions you’ve kept pent up over the last four days are just now surfacing.”

How wrong he was. Over the past four days, she’d had numerous outbursts of widely varied emotions, all of them passionately felt. But she gave him a weak smile. “I’m sure you’re right.”

Knight waited for her to compose herself, then said, “Would y’all please give us a few minutes alone with Dr. Charbonneau?”

“What for?” Jeff asked.

“We just need to clear up a few details for the paperwork we’ve gotta file. Also, the department’s PIO is waiting for clearance from us on the statement he’ll give to the media, and we need her input on that. Don’t want to say anything that’s incorrect. Shouldn’t take long.”

His rambling was a non-answer, but short of challenging the officer, Jeff had little choice except to comply. He leaned down and kissed her forehead. “I’ll be in the hallway if you need me. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

He shot the two law officers his frostiest and most disparaging look, then joined her two associates as they filed out.

Knight remarked on Jeff’s disdain. “He doesn’t regard us too kindly.”

“Can you blame him? You suspected him of God knows what.”

“Were we that obvious?”

“Apparently so. He told me you treated everything he said and did with suspicion.” During a private moment in a curtained-off area of the ER, while waiting for her CT scan to be assessed, Jeff had told her about the detectives’ preoccupation with him while she remained missing in a frozen wilderness.

“Well,” the older detective said now, “I’ll admit that Grange and me bounced around some theories. In situations like this, it’s often the significant other that’s the culprit. My apologies to both y’all.”

He pulled a chair nearer her bedside and sat down. Grange remained standing at the foot of the bed. He wasn’t as gregarious as his partner, but he made up for it by being extremely observant, which put Emory on guard.

Knight began. “We don’t know much more than we did while you were missing, Dr. Charbonneau.”

“I realize how frustrating that must be for you.”

“Let’s start with the man you can’t name.”

The mention of him filled her with such despair, she feared it would be detectable.

Knight said, “He told you he came across you laying on the trail, out cold.”

“While he was hiking.”

“And he carted you off to his cabin.”

She nodded.

“You can’t direct us to it?”

“No. For four days my universe consisted of a bed behind a screen.”

“Screen?”

“A folding screen of louvered panels. He set it up to give me privacy.”

“Decent of him.”

“Very.”

“But you don’t remember much about him?”

“Only that he treated me with extraordinary kindness.”

“Like a Good Samaritan?”

“Yes, whatever I needed…”

Sorry, Doc.

For what?

Keeping you awake.

I haven’t complained.

So, you don’t want me to stop?

No.

Don’t stop this?

No. God no. Don’t…don’t stop.

You’ll have to be the one who says you’ve had enough.

I’m not there yet.

Good. Because I can’t stop.

The deputies were looking at her curiously. She cleared her throat. “He was very thoughtful. Considerate.”

Neither of the men said anything.

She wet her lips. “He took care of my needs. I was aware. But not. Do you understand? Most of the time, he left me alone. To…to recover.”

Knight folded his arms across his sizeable middle. “In all that time, he never offered to call nine-one-one?”

She rubbed her forehead. “I don’t think so. Maybe. I don’t remember. Wasn’t there a storm? Fog? Weather that made the roads impassable?”

“Uh-huh.”

“He told me—he promised—that he would deliver me safely back once the roads cleared.”

“But he didn’t,” Grange remarked. “Most of the roads were clear yesterday.”

“I’m certain he would have if I had felt better.”

Jesus, you feel good. Sweet. Perfect.

Buying time before continuing, she reached down to reposition the ice bag on her elevated foot. “But I wasn’t up to it yesterday. Then I woke up this morning. My head was clear. I asked him to drive me here, to Drakeland, and he did.”

“Actually he dropped you outside of Drakeland,” Grange said. “Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why not drive you to the sheriff’s office?”

“I don’t know.”

“He could have collected the reward.”

“Maybe he didn’t know about the reward.”

Grange shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Knight ran his hand over his face. Grange said, “What kind of truck was he driving?”

“A pickup.”

“I mean Ford, Chevy, Ram…?”