Detective Graves was in the room when they returned. “Where do these flowers come from?” he asked.
“From the gift shop downstairs usually or from outside sources,” Dr. Cavanaugh said as he wheeled Tia back to the bed.
“And how do they get delivered?”
Dr. Cavanaugh held out his hand and helped Tia stand and get situated back in the bed. “An orderly generally brings them to the floor and then either delivers them or gives them to the nurses to deliver.”
“Valerie brought mine in,” Tia supplied.
Detective Graves glanced over at her before turning his attention back to Dr. Cavanaugh. “I’m going to need to speak with her as well.”
“Fine, I’ll introduce you.” Dr. Cavanaugh turned back to Tia. “I’ll check on you before I leave for the night.”
Tia nodded, but she didn’t really feel like being alone. Even the security guard outside her door didn’t make her feel much safer. The flowers had still gotten to her, and what if they put anthrax or some kind of air borne poison on them next time? She supposed that was unlikely, but it could happen, right?
Plus, she had the information Dr. Cavanaugh had shared with her rattling around in her head. She’d had enough glimpses of her past to know that she had turned from a sweet Texas girl into a haughty nightmare of a woman, but she couldn’t believe she had tried to damage someone’s reputation. And while she agreed with Brody that it was important to remember her past for her current safety, she didn’t want to think about what an awful person she might have been. Was he right? Was this why this accident had happened to her? Was she being given a second chance? If she was, maybe it would be better if she didn’t remember her past.
“Hello, dear, would you like me to read to you some more today?”
Tia looked up to see Edith in the doorway. She held the Bible in her hands and a kind smile graced her face. “Do you come read to patients every day?”
Edith waddled into the room. “Not every day. I have Bridge on Mondays and square dancing on Thursdays, but I try to come on Tuesdays and Wednesdays and some Fridays if my health allows and I don’t miss the bus.”
Square dancing? This woman certainly seemed spry for someone so old.
“But you didn’t answer my question. Would you like me to read to you?”
Tia glanced at the book Brody had brought her yesterday. “Yes, but can you read me that?” She pointed to the book on the table beside her.
Edith picked up the book and raised an eyebrow. “True Love? Is this some sappy romance?”
“Maybe.” Tia shrugged. “I don’t know. It appears I wrote it, but I don’t remember it.”
“Well, I don’t normally read romances, but since you wrote it, I’ll give it a shot. If there are any heaving chests or panting of breaths in here, I stop though. Is that understood?” Edith flashed her a look that Tia imagined was the one she used when she reprimanded her children growing up. If she had any.
Tia nodded and smiled. “I don’t think I wrote those kind of romances, but agreed.” Having Edith read a scene like that out loud sounded just as mortifying to Tia as it must to Edith.
“Gayle climbed under her desk as the sound of her father’s angry footsteps carried down the hall…”
Suddenly, another piece of her past opened up. Tia saw herself curled under a desk where the chair normally sat. A blanket, held in place by the middle drawer, blocked the outside world and allowed her to believe she couldn’t be seen. A book lay open on her knees and she held a flashlight in one hand. She was reading. Reading under her desk to hide from her father.
Her father who had never wanted her. Who had told her she should have been a boy. Who had left when she was ten years old because he didn’t feel like being a dad any longer. Then her mother appeared. A woman with shoulders rolled forward from heavy work but kind eyes. A woman who had worked two jobs to provide for her and never complained. Tia saw the times her mother cried in her room when she thought Tia wasn’t watching. Cried because she didn’t have enough money to purchase groceries to feed Tia.
Tia sucked in a breath. That’s why she had started writing. She had hoped it would earn enough income that she could take care of her mother. Her teachers had always told her in school that she was creative - probably because she’d had to invent worlds to escape from her father’s angry words. So, when had she changed? When had she gone from wanting to write to help her mother to obsessing about her career so much that she was willing to ruin the reputations of other writers and throw herself at men in power just to boost her career?
But that’s where the memories stopped. She didn’t know. She couldn’t recall what had triggered her to become a woman she was now ashamed of. She couldn’t remember much after she had started writing except that, evidently, she wanted to be the most successful romance writer in the business, and the easiest way to accomplish that goal was to persuade herself to do despicable things.
Edith stopped reading and glanced up at Tia. “What is it?”
“I remember. I remember my past. At least most of it. My father hated me and left when I was young, and my mother worked hard to keep us fed. I remember wanting to write to make money to pay her back, but something changed. Somewhere along the way, I stopped caring about my mother and began only caring about myself.” Shame filled her. Even though she couldn’t remember every event, she knew there would be many she would regret when they surfaced in her memory.
“Fame can do that to people,” Edith said.
“But I don’t want to be that person any more. I want to go back to the girl who wanted to help her mother.”
“Then do it. You control what you do, and it appears you’ve been given a second chance at your life.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had a guest. I can come back later.”
Tia looked up to see an unfamiliar nurse in her doorway. She was slim with olive skin and dark hair. Had Brody reassigned Valerie then?
“It’s no bother. You come do what you have to do. I can read around your examination,” Edith said as she glanced briefly at the nurse before dropping her gaze back to her book.
“Um, okay. How is your pain today?” the nurse asked.
“It’s better,” Tia said, “but shouldn’t you be writing that down?” She found it odd that this woman didn’t have the clipboard that Valerie and Brody usually walked in with.
The woman’s eyes widened, and her gaze flitted around the room. “You’re right. I must have forgotten it. It’s my first week. I’ll go get it and return later.”
Tia watched the woman walk out of the room and wondered about her. Was she really new? Forgetting to bring in the clipboard seemed like a ridiculous error even for someone who was new. Perhaps she was affiliated with the people after Tia. Maybe she was disguising herself as a nurse, so she could take Tia out without suspicion. Tia shook her head. Her imagination was running away with her. Things like that only happened in movies or television, but perhaps if she couldn’t remember how to write romances, she could write thrillers.
“They really need to train these nurses better,” Edith said when the woman was gone. “She’s the same one who tried to run me out yesterday. I told Dr. Cavanaugh he needed to talk to her. Guess I need to remind him again.”
The topic of Dr. Cavanaugh distracted Tia from her runaway thoughts of killers in disguise and she found herself asking a question she didn’t dare ask anyone else. “Do you know Dr. Cavanaugh well?”
“As well as you can know a doctor I guess,” Edith said as her eyes returned to the book. “I read a lot to his wife during her last days.”
“What was she like?” Tia had an image of Dr. Cavanaugh’s wife in her head, and she wanted to know if the woman was as saintly as she pictured her.
Edith looked up at Tia with a scrutinizing gaze. “She was lovely. A real woman of God. Even when the cancer took hold of her, she always remained positive and friendly to everyone. Now, should I continue reading?”
Tia nodded, but her mind no longer listened as Edith continued reading. She had wandered through the past long enough for today. Now, she needed to figure out how to change her future.
“I hear you took your patient outside,” Nick said as he came up behind Brody in the locker room.
Brody shrugged, but he was curious who had ratted him out. “It’s not against the rules.”
Nick opened his locker and pulled out his bag. “No, it’s not, but it’s not something doctors normally do. It’s also very unlike Brody Cavanaugh who never dates and rarely looks at women. And it has the nurses in a fit. You know how they like to gossip.”
Brody hung his coat up in the locker. “They gossip about everything. I doubt I’ll be the topic of their gossip much longer. Some episode of a tv drama will have replaced me by tomorrow.”
“Mmmhmm, but I thought you said you weren’t falling for this girl.”
Brody sighed and sank down on the bench seat that filled the wall on the other side of the small locker room. He dropped his head into his hands. “I wasn’t, but I have to be honest that I am having a hard time getting her off my mind. Every moment I spend with her is….calming, if that makes any sense.”
“It makes perfect sense,” Nick said as he sat beside Brody. “Look man, I didn’t know Rachel well, but I have to think that she wouldn’t want this life for you. This throwing yourself into work and never having a social life. From what I did know of her, she would have wanted you to keep living, and part of living is not being alone. So, if you’re not pursuing this woman simply because of Rachel….” he shrugged, “I think you’re wrong.”
“Maybe.” Brody shook his head. “But she’s also a patient who doesn’t remember who she is. And someone is clearly after her. And the little I have found out about her past doesn’t paint her in the best light.”
“Maybe, she just needs something or someone,” Nick looked at him pointedly, “to have a reason to change.”
Brody smiled up at his friend. “I’ll take that into consideration, and I’ll think about it. Right now, I better get to the store though. My refrigerator is going to sue me for lack of support.” He grabbed his bag and headed for the door.
“That’s why you need a Berta,” Nick hollered after him. “I’ll send you her number.”
Brody was still chuckling as he pushed the back door open and found Jordan Graves leaning against his car. “Detective, did you find out anything more about the flowers?”
Jordan pushed himself upright and glanced around the empty lot. “Unfortunately not. They were purchased at the gift shop here, but paid for in cash. The clerk couldn’t remember who purchased them and there’s no camera that points that direction. We do have some new intel though. It appears Rico Rearden may be involved in drug trafficking over in Chicago. He didn’t come up on our initial radar because he doesn’t deal here, but it looks like he might hold meetings here and use his publishing business as a front.”
“Do you think Tia was helping him move drugs?” Just when Brody thought maybe he could fall for this girl, another piece of information rocked his heart. He had a hard-enough time imagining her sleeping with another woman’s husband, but moving drugs?
“We don’t know what to think. It’s possible she was involved though nothing in her background suggests it. It’s more probable she was there for the meeting she had scheduled and may have stumbled across a secret meeting. Either way, we need to keep a close eye on her. She may not be as innocent as we think.”
Brody shook his head. He’d had no idea one patient would turn his life upside down so fast. “Okay, thanks Jordan, I’ll do my best.” He shook Jordan’s hand and then unlocked the car and slid into the driver’s seat. But he didn’t start the car right away. His thoughts were a tangled web and he wanted to clear them before he started driving.
Tia Sweetchild certainly was a conundrum. His first assumption of her had been a snobby rich girl, but that image had softened as he’d spent time with her. Her past showed that she had deliberately tried to ruin someone’s career, but she had acted appalled when he’d told her about it. Was she a good con or had the brain injury changed her personality? Now there was the possibility of drugs? He didn’t want it to believe it. He felt an attraction to Tia. A connection he couldn’t explain, but how could he be attracted to a woman with such a shady past?
Rachel had been nothing like that. She’d grown up in a Christian home, and he was pretty sure the champagne they had on their wedding night had been her first taste of alcohol. Curse words never crossed her lips, and she always scolded Brody when he let one slip. And she’d been a genuine, generous, faithful woman. She would never have pursued men to get ahead no matter the circumstances. So, why would he feel an attraction to someone so unlike the love of his life? Or was there more to Tia than he knew?
He had no answers, and with a sigh, he turned the key and pointed the car towards home. Maybe some time in the word and a decent night’s sleep would give him some clarity.