Moonlight Road (Virgin River #11)(91)

“Maybe not, ma’am,” one of the deputies said. “We won’t have him processed in an hour.”

“You might want to use your head and think before you book him. Is there evidence of any kind? Because the woman’s a nutcase and he didn’t hurt her. He’d never hurt anyone. Be very careful with this. And if you hurt this physician’s hands, the county’s going to be paying for a long, long time.”

“Thanks for the advice,” the meanest of the three deputies said. “We know what we’re doing.”

“You better hope so,” Erin replied. “Because I never forget a face.”

The second the deputies took Aiden away, Erin made a few phone calls, then rushed to the sheriff’s department. A local attorney who turned out to be Jack Sheridan’s sister and well acquainted with the D.A. met them there. Brie Valenzuela interviewed Aiden, Erin, then sat down with the D.A., and it was agreed there wasn’t anything besides the woman’s word on which to charge Aiden, and not only did Aiden have a perfectly good alibi for the time in question, the woman seemed to have dropped out of sight. There was no victim. No victim, no crime. But it was a very long day before Aiden was released without charges being filed.

They were both exhausted by the time they got back to Erin’s cabin. Aiden wasn’t just tired, he was demoralized. There was nothing like being taken away in the back of a police cruiser and thought to be the kind of animal who’d beat a small woman to take the starch out of a man’s spine. He slumped onto Erin’s sofa.

“We’re going to figure this out,” she said to him. “I’m going to fix you a drink. I have scotch or brandy….”

“Pass,” he said, grimacing at the choices.

She looked into the refrigerator. “I have two beers and a tablespoon or so of Merlot. Really good Merlot, but we drank almost all of it,” she said.

“Gimme a beer,” he said.

She got two out and popped off the caps, taking one to him and keeping one for herself. Sitting down beside him, she leaned back as he did and put her feet up on the ottoman. She took a deep drink of her beer and let out a tired sigh.

Aiden’s hand came down on her knee. “Maybe you should go home, babe. I should go stay at Luke’s and you should go home.”

“No way,” she said. “Not unless you come with me. A, you need an alibi and I’m going to make sure you have one every second, and B, I don’t want to be away from you! If you feel you need to go to Luke’s for some reason, I’ll go stay there, too.”

He shook his head. “I want you away from this. I hate that you’re even involved.”

“You’d be in worse shape if I wasn’t.”

“I’ll make sure I always have someone around. Luke or someone.”

“You’ll have me around,” she said. “I’m not going to give you a hard time about feeling real low right now. After the way that deputy treated you, I’m hardly surprised. But as soon as you catch your breath, I want you to come out fighting mad. Aiden, she’s working you. I don’t know why or how, but she’s working you.” She gathered up her hair in a hand on top of her head. “God, how could she beat herself to make it look like you’d done it? Throw herself down the stairs? How?”

“I have no idea. Nor do I know why.”

The phone rang. Erin got up to answer it. Then she said, “Oh, Marcie, honey! I was just going to call you!” She threw an uh-oh look at Aiden. “No, no, of course nothing’s wrong—did you leave messages? Oh, baby, I’m sorry—we barely walked in the door. I haven’t even checked the voice mail. We were out all day—over on the coast. Didn’t I mention we were going to do that? Honey, I’m sorry—but please don’t ever worry. It’s my job to worry about you, not the other way around.” Then Erin laughed softly. “But, sweetheart, I’m not up here all alone anymore. I have Aiden, and we’re almost never apart. Yes, you can relax—I’m in for the night and exhausted from a very full day. I’ll be sure to call you tomorrow. I love you, too. Bye.”

She went back to the couch and slumped beside Aiden.

“You haven’t told her anything,” he said.

She took a drink of her beer. “I told her you were previously married. I told her that on Fourth of July weekend.”

“But none of this madness.” It wasn’t a question.

“She’s hugely pregnant and her baby can’t be born normally. I don’t want her upset. If she goes into labor now, it’s an emergency C-section. I don’t want her to have the slightest worry.”

“It might make sense to tell her the truth, in that case. And tell her we’re on top of it.”

“I did tell her the truth. There’s nothing to worry about and we’re almost never apart. I’ll tell her all about Annalee the whackjob after the baby’s born. And it will absolutely get her all hyper and wigged out, wanting every sordid detail. Marcie’s always been the only one in the room who didn’t close her eyes during the massacre scenes in bad horror films.”

Aiden turned to her and lifted his eyebrows in question.

“She talked me into going with her to see The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. She never missed a thing. I was nearly crawling under the seat, hiding my eyes.”