Walk Through the Valley (Psalm 23 Mysteries) (13 page)

“Is Kyle...How’s Kyle?”

“The same as yesterday,” Cindy said, moving to sit next to the bed.

Lisa bit her lip and refused to look up.

“He’s going to pull through, you’ll see. You know Kyle, he’s stubborn that way,” Cindy said, trying to cheer her up.

“He is stubborn,” Lisa admitted. “He asked me out four times before I said yes.”

“Really? What made you finally say yes?”

“I hadn’t wanted to date a celebrity. Kyle was cute, though, and funny, and romantic and the fact that he just wouldn’t accept the no and leave me alone was actually quite charming.”

“Nice to hear the word ‘charming’ as opposed to ‘stalker’,” Cindy said with a grin.

“No, he’s too sweet for that,” Lisa said with a sigh. “Before I knew it I had fallen for him. Hard.”

“The feeling seems to be mutual.”

Lisa touched her engagement ring. “Yeah, it does,” she said softly.

Cindy cleared her throat. “Lisa, I know this is going to sound a bit odd, but is there anyone in town who doesn’t like Kyle? I know he’s filmed here before and he does have this amazing talent for annoying people.”

Lisa looked up sharply. “You think someone would want to hurt Kyle?”

“I didn’t say that,” Cindy said, gingerly trying to backpedal. “I was just...thinking...you know.”

Lisa shook her head. “No one that I can think of would want to hurt Kyle. He’s a sweet guy. Arrogant sometimes, and totally obnoxious at times, but just a really good guy. He told me what happened on the cattle drive you were all on. You don’t think another of his coworkers is crazy like that, do you?”

“I doubt it. I’m just a bit paranoid,” Cindy said. “So, there’s no one you can think of that has an issue with him?”

Lisa shook her head. “I mean, my mother wasn’t as fond of him as I would like. She thinks I should marry someone more like my dad. She doesn’t get that I’m different than she is. She’d never hurt him, though.”

Cindy was now curious to meet Lisa’s parents. The information about her mom not liking Kyle combined with her father’s observation that they were strange made her very curious indeed.

“Cindy, if you don’t mind, I’m really tired and I’d like to sleep for a while.”

“Sure, no problem,” Cindy said, standing up. “Just let me know if you need anything.”

“Thank you,” Lisa said, before turning her head away.

Cindy realized it was nearly lunchtime as she walked back into the room where her parents were. “Anyone hungry?” she asked.

Her dad stirred and looked at her. “Will be in a little bit. Would you mind doing me a favor?”

“Sure, what do you need?”

“We left your mother’s pill case on the bathroom sink. Could you run back to the hotel and get it? I figure we’ll be ready to eat in about an hour and she’ll need it then.”

“Not a problem. I’ll go get it now,” Cindy said, eager not to have to sit and wait in that room any longer.

She exited the hospital and was hyper aware of her surroundings as she crossed the street to the hotel. She didn’t breathe a sigh of relief until she was safely in the room. She grabbed her mom’s pill case which was right where her dad had said it would be.

She tucked it into her purse and wondered how much time she could take on her walk back. As much as she didn’t want to sit in that room, though, she realized she wanted to be alone and vulnerable less.

Her phone started ringing. She checked it and saw that Jeremiah was calling. Her battery was nearly dead. She’d have to see if her parents had a charger. Otherwise she should be able to find one in the gift shop. She answered the phone. “Hi, could you call me on my room phone? My battery is going.”

“Sure, what’s the number?”

She walked over to the phone and gave him the number of the hotel. “I’m in Room 1412.”

“Okay, bye.”

The call ended. Seconds later her room phone rang. She answered and heard a series of odd clicking noises.

“Jeremiah?” she said.

“Get off the phone. Leave your cell in the room. Go find a payphone and call me,” he said, his voice tense. Then he hung up.

Cindy slowly put down the receiver, wondering what on earth that was all about. She left her cell on the nightstand and left the room. Down in the lobby she stopped and asked one of the bell staff who pointed her in the direction of a pay phone. Fortunately it was in a glassed-in booth with a chair so she was able to sit and close the door which cut out most of the noise from the casino.

She put several coins in the phone and then dialed Jeremiah who answered on the first ring.

“Hello?” he said, voice still tense.

“Hey, it’s me.”

“Are you on a payphone?”

“Yes.”

“Is there anyone nearby who can hear you?”

She looked through the glass doors of the phone booth. She could see people walking by, but they were all several feet away and none seemed intent on stopping.

“I don’t think so,” she said.

“Good.”

“Jeremiah, what’s going on?”

“I recognized the clicking sounds when you answered the phone in your room.”

“I heard those sounds, what do they mean?”

“It means someone has bugged your phone.”

11

Jeremiah grit his teeth in frustration. He should be there with Cindy, looking out for her, taking care of her. If someone had tapped her phone then they had big problems.

“You mean, someone is listening in on the phone upstairs?” she asked, sounding bewildered.

“That’s exactly what I mean,” he said.

“But why? Who?”

“I don’t know. What’s happened there since we talked last night?”

“Well, for starters, a thief grabbed my purse right after I got off the phone with you last night.”

“What?” he asked, emotions roiling within him at the thought.

“It’s okay. I got my purse back. Martin came into the lobby and I was able to shout to him for help. He tackled the guy.”

“Who is Martin?”

“He’s a salesman here at a convention. He was sitting next to me on the plane.”

Alarm bells went off in Jeremiah’s head. “And he just happens to be staying at your hotel?”

“Yes, it’s the one across from the hospital. It’s a medical convention and all the attendees are at this hotel.”

While that seemed reasonable, he still didn’t like it. It just felt too coincidental to him.

“But that’s not the weirdest part,” Cindy said.

“It gets worse?” he asked.

As she explained to him about her trip to the police station that morning he found himself tensing more and more.

“I don’t like any of this,” he said when she had finished.

“I’m not exactly loving it either.”

“I should come out there.”

He could hear her sigh on the other end of the line. “As much as I would like that, I’m still not ready to cope with having my parents and you in the same place. My dad was already under the impression from things Kyle had said that you and I are dating. I had to tell him that we’re just friends.”

Just friends
. Suddenly he hated those two words with a passion. “Did he believe you?” he forced himself to ask.

“I’m not sure. If you came out here, though, it would certainly complicate things. Given the state my mom’s in at the moment, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“I’m not sure leaving you alone is a good idea, especially given what’s happened already.”

“I’m not alone. My folks are here.”

“I should say it’s not good to leave you unprotected.”

“I’ll be fine, and I’ll call if anything else weird happens.”

A year ago she would have been happy for him to go there and keep watch over her. She had grown, changed a lot since they first met. Was the independence she was displaying a sign of her own growth or a way of proving that she didn’t need him anymore?

He was being crazy and he knew it. He heard the sound of her putting more change in the phone.

“That’s the last of my coins,” she said.

“I want you to check in with me twice a day, more if anything happens,” he said.

“Okay.”

“You can use the payphone, but go ahead and call collect.”

“Okay. Should I do anything about the phone upstairs?”

“No, just avoid using it. Same goes for your cell. Only use it when necessary and never give sensitive information out over it.”

“Oh, did you find out anything new about the Henry White case?”

“Yes, Lydia, the dead girl, was stalking him and I’m pretty sure that she was killed over something she took a picture of. We can’t find a phone or a camera at the crime scene or in her car.”

“Wow, okay, I’ve got to go. Bye.”

“Bye.”

He hung up feeling worse than he had at the start of the call. He didn’t like the fact that someone had tapped her phone, especially when he had no way of knowing who or why.

You could find out who.

The thought came to him and he squeezed his phone tightly in his hand. It was true. There were calls he could make and he could probably even get some answers. Once he opened that door, though, there’d be no shutting it. He wasn’t prepared for that. Neither was she.

Cindy sat in the phone booth for a moment, trying to digest what Jeremiah had just told her. Who on earth would want to bug her phone? She certainly didn’t know anyone
in the city and it wasn’t like this was a planned trip and someone could have known where she would be in advance. The room wasn’t even registered to her.

But it was registered to her parents. If someone had tried to hurt or kill Kyle it would explain their interest in his family. With Kyle under such close surveillance by doctors and family at the hospital it would probably be easier to eavesdrop than to get near him there. Maybe she was right and the theft of her purse hadn’t been a random act. Maybe they were targeting her because she was Kyle’s sister.

She still didn’t know what someone would want with her purse, though. Unless there was something Kyle had that they wanted and they thought one of his family members might be in possession of it now that he was in the hospital. If that was true, though, why wouldn’t the attackers have stopped even for thirty seconds at the scene and searched him while he was in the car? She should get the key to his hotel room at the Excalibur and see if it looked like anyone had ransacked his room searching for something. Maybe they would have assumed that he had left the item there and when they couldn’t find it they had then figured he’d had it on him. She’d also ask her father about that.

The only other thing someone connected to the attack on Kyle could have wanted with her purse was to plant some sort of listening device like they had on the phone in the room. Jeremiah was clearly suspicious of that since he’d told her to not give out sensitive information over her cell.

Her head was beginning to ache. She had some aspirin in her purse. The thought of it reminded her that she needed to get back to her parents with her mother’s medication. She stood up, clutched her purse tight to her body, and headed out.

She felt like she was being paranoid as she walked to the hospital, but reminded herself that it wasn’t paranoia if people really were out to get her. She’d seen a bumper sticker that said something like that once. Maybe she’d have to track it down and hang it up in her house as a reminder.

She breathed a little easier when she entered the hospital. She quickly made her way to the elevators. She was nearly there when out of the corner of her eye she saw someone coming right at her.

She tensed every muscle. Her hands wrapped more tightly around her purse and she could feel the tension thrumming through her arm muscles. Her leg muscles coiled, readying to run. She forced herself to take a deep breath and then she spun to confront the person.

A couple feet from her a pretty blond haired woman came to a stop, clearly caught off guard by Cindy’s quick movements. There was something vaguely familiar about her though Cindy was sure they had never met.

“Can I help you?” Cindy snapped.

“Um, I hope so,” the other woman said, her brow furrowing in confusion. “You are Cindy, Kyle’s sister, right?”

Cindy paused. The woman knew her name and she did look vaguely familiar, but she had no idea who she was. It was possible she was just one of Kyle’s many fans. Given everything that was going on, though, Cindy was suspicious.

Before she could say anything the other woman nodded. “Yes, you have to be. I recognize you from the footage of the cattle drive trip.”

Cindy blinked in surprise. “That show hasn’t come out yet.” She had always suspected, hoped actually, that it never would come out.

“Of course it hasn’t. I saw some of it while Kyle and I were in the editing room at the studio going over shots for one of the new commercials the channel is going to air.”