Chapter Thirty-Three

Jessie raised Lizzy to her shoulder and patted her back. “What’s the matter, baby? Lonesome or did that accident leave your tummy empty? We’ve got something that will taste really good. Let’s go get it. After you finish, Mom and Dad can have their dinner.” Using those wonderful words pleased her so much, but she shouldn’t get her hopes up. Jessie propped the infant in her lap and began to turn. A long shadow blocked the light from the hall, not like her husband’s shorter profile. “Teddy?”

“Wrong guy. Told you I owned a gun. Now put that baby back in her seat and get her stuff together. We’re going to see her real mama.” Wyatt Coffey looked the worse for wear, unshaven for days, hair greasy, clothes grimy, favoring one leg as he leaned against the doorway.

“Where’s Ella?” Jessie wanted to move her hand into the pouch where her pink pistol lay loaded and ready to fire. She hated to admit it made her feel safer after the assault, but she’d relished her lessons this week with Knox Polk, right down to keeping her firearm clean. Freedom, freedom from fear that anyone would think a woman in a wheelchair an easy target.

“None of your business. Do what I told you.”

“Was this Ella’s idea? She wanted Teddy to raise her child. What changed her mind?” Jess spoke loudly, clearly, hoping Teddy heard. “I’ll cooperate if you tell me Ella wants Lizzy back.”

With his dark, feral eyes focused on her, Wyatt growled, “I could just shoot you and take the kid.”

“You might hit the baby. Your hand looks none too steady. Or I could drop and injure her. What would Ella say then?” She kept her eyes on his, willing Wyatt not to hear the soft thud in the hall.

“Ella won’t say nothing. I had to drop her at a hospital in Little Rock ’cause she came down with a high fever, near delirious. Aspirin didn’t do no good. We had a fine hidey-hole in a mountain cabin we found down a backroad. Even had canned goods in it. I’m growing out my beard, and she was gonna dye her hair black so’s we could go into town when we ran out, but then she took sick.”

“Did you force her to have sex too soon? She had lots of stitches from delivering a big baby. I’ll bet you ripped them out and gave her an infection.” Keep him talking, keep him talking.

“Maybe I did, but I risked getting caught to find her a doctor. Couldn’t go back to visit, but I called. Ella Sue is crying and crying. Says the doc told her she’s all messed up inside and might have too much scar tissue to have more kids. After she mends, might be surgery will help. I don’t want no more kids anyhow, so I took her key and come to get the one we already have. Hand her over or I might just hunt down the other cripple that lives here. I know he’s around. Saw him take out the trash.” Wyatt’s eyes shifted from hers and took a nervous glance over his shoulder.

Jessie drew the attention back to herself. “In the bathroom changing his ostomy pouch.”

“Gross. My grandpappy had one of those, had to shit in a sack. Good time to catch Teddy unawares like a dog taking a crap.” Coffey half turned.

Teddy’s crutch slammed down on his left shoulder, but the other hand held Wyatt’s gun. He dropped the arm as the pain hit, but didn’t lose his weapon. Teddy whapped him across the kidneys and again across the back of the neck as the man sank to his knees. Whether intentional or not, the gun went off. Jessie felt her wheelchair tilt. She thrust Lizzy, screaming, onto the bed, and found her own pistol. She didn’t hesitate to shoot, higher this time, not his hip but his groin. Maybe the wound would kill him, maybe not. She didn’t really care as long as he never threatened to take Lizzy again. Setting her weapon back in the sack, Jessie picked up her baby…her child, and comforted her.

“Remind me never to make you angry.” Teddy knelt awkwardly and felt for a pulse in Wyatt’s neck. “Still alive. I’ll get a towel and put some pressure on the wound. Have your phone in that pouch as well as your gun?”

“Yes, where was yours?” Jess willed her voice not to shake, to stay calm for Lizzy’s sake as she pressed the baby to her wildly beating heart.

“In the night table drawer like always. I thought he’d hear me coming in the chair, and I can’t handle the pistol well when I’m up on my sticks. Call 9-1-1 and get an ambulance and the police over here.” Teddy pushed to his feet.

“I know the drill. I have both on speed dial.” She used a testy attitude to cover any hint of anxiety.

Teddy did the first aid. Jessie rocked the baby in her arms. Blood on the floor again. Another wheelchair out of commission. She waited until Wyatt Coffey was hauled away to request Teddy’s spare chair from the closet, calm as could be. The whole scene seemed like a repeat of the first with the endless questions and the crime scene people being called in again, only it ended differently.

“Guess we should call Child Welfare again,” Officer Nelson said with regret.

“No need. We had Miss Simms’ permission to keep Lizzy for the weekend. Considering the mess in here, we’ll take her back to the ranch.” Teddy did the talking. Jessie simply sat holding the baby, noting he omitted saying all the Billodeauxs were out of town.

Officer Nelson shook his head, not quite convinced. “How about we give you an escort down to Chapelle to make sure you don’t get lost on the way.”

Steady as ever, Teddy said, “We have no problem with that. We’ll get some things together and stay down there for a while.”

The police escort got them to Lorena Ranch in record time, but the squad car stayed outside as the gates opened, welcoming them home. The lights in the oaks popped on illuminating their way, but the mansion lay dark at the end of the lane until they rounded the curve by the kitchen to see that single window aglow. From inside the house, the dogs yapped, and Brinsley opened the door.

“Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Teddy. Mr. Polk entrusted the safety house to me in his absence, a rare honor. I did serve with the British Forces, you know, a batman to a high-ranking officer. Excellent training for a valet. I was just about to have a nightcap and a few nibbles. Would you care to join me?” The butler moved to get both wheelchairs out of the van despite the dogs milling about his feet.

“We have a cold pizza and wilted salads to share,” Jessie said as Teddy helped her down and put the sleeping Lizzy in her lap. He grabbed the diaper bag and gently pushed the curious dogs aside with the tip of his crutch.

“An excellent addition to the menu. Your rooms stand ready, the nursery also.” Brinsley balanced the pizza box topped by the salads on his fingertips expertly as if on a silver tray and followed them into the house.

Teddy and Jess headed straight for the elevator and put Lizzy down on her back in the nursery crib, keeping their voices and the lights low. Having downed a full bottle of Pedialyte while the police asked their questions, the baby slept soundly, worn out from her day. They scooped up a baby monitor to take downstairs.

“Frankly, I can’t see Brinsley as a batman, but definitely as an Alfred,” Teddy said in the privacy of the elevator.

“Not that one, a batman, like a servant to an officer.”

“Where do you learn these things?”

“Same place I learned about marriages of convenience—Regency novels. And Teddy, I’m so glad we don’t have one of those.” Jessie leaned over for a kiss. The terror of the day faded like the sunset. Sunrise would bring a better tomorrow. The elevator door opened and closed three times before they were done.

In the short interval they’d been gone, Brinsley had set the table with small bowls of nuts and mixed olives, a basket of breadsticks, their salads now in wooden bowls and revamped with goat cheese and raisins, and a sweating shaker of martinis. The timer dinged, signaling reheated pizza on the way. The butler poured the drinks and held out his hands. “Please, enjoy.”

Jessie relaxed after the first sip. “There really is no place better than Lorena Ranch.”

Teddy nodded to agree. Unfortunately, he thought so too, and could never provide Jessie and the baby with a life like this.