“You need to rest—”
“Get him in here.”
“Fine.” Rob lifted both hands in defeat. “I’ll be right back.”
The door swished shut behind him with a soft thump.
“You are a lousy patient,” Vince said, his voice mild. His gaze tracked over the screen of his laptop.
“Yeah.” Ash eyed the two hundred thirteen dots on the acoustic tile directly above him. He’d refused the last round of pain meds, so he hurt, but at least his mind was clear. “You try this for a while.”
“Don’t think so.” A couple of keys clicked. “I’m smart enough not to get on a roof with Calvert.”
Ash avoided the chuckle that he knew would only make his chest seize up. “It wasn’t his fault.”
“All right, then I’m smart enough to hire someone else to fix the damn roof.”
True to his word, Rob returned in minutes, with Dr. Jay Mackey in tow. With minimal persuasion, Ash convinced the physician he could at least sit up and work. Once the doctor departed, Ash set about convincing Vince to loan him his laptop until he could send Rob for his own.
“I can check futures.”
Brows arched, Vince placed the slim notebook on the rolling table.
“Hey, hand me a pad and the phone too. I want to check my voice mail.”
Vince tossed the pad and a pen on the table, and the phone landed next to them with a thud. “Would you like me to fluff your pillow?”
Ash reached for the receiver. “That won’t be necessary, Jeeves.”
Rob unfolded his newspaper with a snicker and met Vince’s annoyed gaze over it. “He’s feeling better.”
With a glance at his watch, Vince leaned against the windowsill. “Maybe we’ll actually get out of here before two.”
“What’s your hurry?” Receiver tucked between his chin and shoulder, Ash punched in the access number.
“I have a dinner date, whose company is quite preferable to that of the farmboy cop my sister married.”
“You really have to…” Ash let the sentence trail away.
“What?” Rob looked up from his paper.
“I have twenty-three messages.”
“Probably well-wishers.” Rob folded over to the business section.
“I swear, if Tick put me on the prayer list at his church, I’ll kill him.” He lifted the receiver to his ear as the system signaled the first message. “Every little old lady—”
“Madeline…” The hissed whisper slid over the line. “Gonna make you spread that pretty little pussy for me…after I pound it a while, I’ll slide my cock down your throat…”
The reality of what he was hearing, the male voice, the words, wormed their way into his consciousness. “What the hell?”
He deleted the message without thought, rage and nausea settling into his gut as the second message proved more of the same. The third, the fourth…
“Fuck.” Anger firing through him, he slammed the table away from him. It careened over the floor, and the shiny black laptop tumbled to the tile.
“Ash.” Rob was on his feet, newspaper forgotten. “What’s wrong?”
Vince stared down at the ruined notebook and slowly lifted his glittering gaze. “Son of a bitch. I just bought that.”
Ash rubbed a hand over his hair as Rob bent down to retrieve the phone. “Don’t.”
Rob ignored him, receiver at his ear. Frowning, he extended the instrument to Vince. His eyes widened, brows arched. He slanted a look at Ash. “All of them like that?”
Jaw clenched so hard the stitches inside his lip pulled painfully, Ash nodded. “Yeah. Looks that way.”
“This doesn’t make sense. Why would she give out your phone number for—”
“She wouldn’t.” Vince replaced the receiver in the cradle and picked up the remains of his laptop. “Not that one.”
“You’re right. Not her.” Ash met Vince’s shuttered gaze. “Someone else did this.”
And he was pretty sure he wouldn’t have to look far to find a logical culprit. He gestured at Vince. “Hand me the phone.”
Brows lifted, Vince complied. Ash balanced it on his good leg and dialed for an outside line.
Rob jerked his chin at him. “Who are you calling?”
Ash flicked a glance in his brother’s direction. “Tick.”
At the mention of his brother-in-law, Vince grimaced. “Why him?”
“Because Madeline’s with him.” Ash waited through ring after ring. Damn it, Tick needed to answer the phone.
“And?” Confusion darkened Rob’s eyes. Ash sighed. For a savvy businessman who handled millions daily, his little brother was slow. Hell if he was going to explain. Tick’s voice mail picked up, and Ash ground his teeth, immediately regretting the action. Damn, his jaw hurt. “Tick, it’s Ash and I need to talk to you or Madeline, ASAP.”
He rattled off the hospital number and extension, and replaced the receiver. Now all he could do was wait. He closed his eyes.
Shit.
“Madeline Rachel Holton, how
could
you?”
Her mother’s screech seared Madeline’s eardrums, and she cringed. Seated at the kitchen table, hands over her face, Mama was in one of her full-fledged snits, full of screams, sobs and sniffles. A full-fledged
royal
snit induced by a combination of vodka and having a daughter who was, no doubt, the biggest slut in the state.
This was like high school all over again.
“Mama, I didn’t do anything.” Madeline strove for a peaceful tone, one she had no hope would actually work. “Please calm down—”
“Calm down?” Her mother lowered her hands, her face blotchy with tears and red with alcohol. “You have men calling here with that…that
filth
and you’re telling me to calm down? Thank the good Lord your daddy is dead and not here to see this—”
“Miranda.” In the adjacent chair Lenora Calvert laid a gentle palm on her shoulder. “Getting all upset is not helping. I really doubt Madeline is responsible for this.”
Nice to have someone with a little faith in her. They were few and far between. Madeline let her lashes fall, closing out the accusation on her mother’s face. She could just imagine what Tick was thinking, standing behind her with the kitchen phone in hand, silently jotting down numbers from the caller ID.
Nine obscene phone calls. Madeline shuddered. Nine men calling her mother’s home, detailing in graphic
Penthouse Letters
detail what they wanted to do to her. What they wanted her to do to them. Her mother thought she’d encouraged this, instigated this.
She seriously wanted to throw up.
“Miranda, let’s go wash your face, and you can lie down for a while.” Chairs scraped on the tile. Madeline opened her eyes and caught Lenora’s gaze, about to remind her that anything that posed a threat had to be removed from the bedroom. Lenora smiled on a wink and wrapped an arm around Mama’s shoulders. “Don’t worry. I know what to do.”
As they left and silence descended, Madeline folded her arms over her midriff, as tight as she could get them. The cold lump of emptiness was back in her gut. Behind her, Tick’s pen scratched on paper, grating against her raw nerves.
“Madeline?” His quiet voice ground over those same exposed synapses. “You okay?”
“I’m good.” Just peachy, actually, since he’d witnessed her mother’s drunken fit in all its glory, had taken the phone after Madeline had answered one of the calls and heard every gory detail as Bob from Nebraska described how he wanted to fist her. Hell, he was probably pissed off with her too, since his precious saintly mother had answered the phone and been exposed to everything earlier.
At least Ash wasn’t here to witness this. The man who wanted her to believe she merited good things in her life.
She closed her eyes. Good things. Right. She was never going to have those, never going to deserve those, not really. There would always be shit like this coming up, coming back to haunt her, and what decent guy wanted to deal with that?
The sooner she went back to Jacksonville, went
anywhere
, the better.
She sucked in a breath, sucked the pain down and locked it away. A couple more deep breaths and she was good. Back in control. Yes, this was better. Not caring, not feeling, complete and total focus on the job at hand.
The only way Allison could win was if she cared. If she didn’t, then nothing the little bitch did mattered. She couldn’t ruin a life Madeline didn’t have.
“Well, she’s resting.” Lenora set the water carafe and tumbler from Mama’s bedside table on the countertop, placed the little box that held her medication beside it. She crossed to stand by Madeline and rub a comforting hand over her shoulders. “This will be all right, Maddie. I promise.”
A tight smile made her face hurt. “I’m fine. Really.”
She didn’t miss the sharp look Tick directed at her. She met his gaze head on. Hell if she’d back down.
“Autry’s coming to pick your mother up.” Lenora continued sweeping little circles over Madeline’s back, comforting caresses that made her want to scream. “Miranda’s going to stay with her and Stanton a couple of days.”
A shudder passed down Madeline’s spine. Because when Tick had pulled up the website on his phone, her mama’s address had been there in full. Because who knew what man would show up at the door, thinking to fulfill the sick little fantasies posted with her name. God, her mama would
never
forgive her for this. Autry and Stanton’s lives disrupted by this… Yeah, that was good. Bet Stanton was thrilled to have hired her on now, even temporarily.
Tick shot her another of those assessing glances. “We’ll go by and get your stuff from Ash’s on the way back to town.”
She nodded. Even he saw it, that the best thing she could do was just…just…
Damn it, she would not cry. She wouldn’t. Throwing her shoulders back, she pulled in a deep, cleansing breath.
“Cait and I can take the guest room on the second floor, and you can have our room.” He snapped his notebook shut and tucked it in his inside pocket. “That way Lee won’t wake you. He’s not really sleeping through the night yet.”
What was he talking about? “I’ll check in to the motel.”
His brows dipped in a frown. “There’s no need, and I’d feel better if—”
“Are we finished here?” She ducked out from under Lenora’s easy touch.
His frown deepened. “Yeah, but—”
“Let’s go. I need a cigarette, and Mama won’t let me smoke in here.”
“Okay, just wait a second.” He leaned down, tugged up his pants leg and pulled a gleaming .22 semiautomatic from an ankle holster. As she watched from the door, he checked the slide and chambered a round before engaging the safety and handing it to his mother. “Lock up behind us.”
Outside, she slid a crumpled pack of stale cigarettes from her pocket and lifted one to her lips. She patted her jacket. Damn it, no lighter. With the foulest curse she could think of, she tossed it into her mother’s neat flowerbed.
One more transgression.
She stalked to his truck and waited for him to unlock it. He glanced at her as she fastened her seatbelt. “Madeline—”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“But—”
“Fuck, Calvert, do you not understand plain English? I do not want to talk about it.”
With a rough sigh, he fired the engine. Once on the highway, she ignored the looks he kept darting her way. With a deliberate movement, she turned away, staring out at the passing fields without seeing anything.
A buzzing filled the silence, and he tugged his cell free to lift it to his ear. “Calvert. What? I had it on silent. I haven’t checked it yet. I’m not…what?”
The truck swerved, and Madeline braced a hand on the dash. Shit, he was going to get them killed. Although…
She squashed the thought, but it tried to squirm free, taunting, tantalizing with the promise of escape. Was this how Jack had felt that last day as he’d headed up those stairs?
“You’re not serious. Yeah, listen, we’re about five minutes away. We’re on our way.” He tossed his phone on the dash.
Madeline released the dash now that her life was no longer in imminent danger. “Tell me that’s a lead on Kelly’s case.”
“No.” Mouth a tight line, he looked sideways at her. “That was Ash. We’re going by the hospital.”
“Drop me at the station.” She wasn’t going anywhere near the place. She focused on the scenery again. “I want to start looking at that rental list.”
“Madeline, I think you should come with me.” He cleared his throat, and foreboding flooded her. Oh, shit damn fuck, why did she
know
what was coming? “Ash called home to check his voice mail this morning and—”
“And I’m getting calls over there.”
“Yeah. He’s hot about it and—”
“I’m sure he is.” What man wanted to deal with that? God, Allison was clever. Madeline would give her that. Fast too.
Tick’s gaze darted her way once more. “I’ll call over and start the process to get us a warrant for any computer Allison has access to, as well as for the website itself too. They can tell us which ISP posted to them.”