Where There's Smoke

“I was born here,” Key said evenly. “This is my home. Or it used to be. Aren’t I welcome here anymore?”

“Of course you’re welcome, Key,” Janellen said urgently. “Mama, do you want bacon or sausage?”

“Whatever.” Jody gestured irritably, as though brushing off a housefly. As she lit another cigarette, she asked Key, “Where’ve you been all this time?”

“Most recently Saudi Arabia.” He sipped his coffee, recounting for Jody what he’d told Janellen earlier, omitting that it had been Janellen’s request that had brought him home.

“I was flying wild well-control crews to and from a burning well. Hauled supplies every now and then, had a few medical emergencies. But they were finishing up there, and I didn’t have another contract pending, so I thought I’d hang around here for a spell. You might find this hard to believe, but I started missing Eden Pass. I haven’t been home in more than a year, not since Clark’s funeral.”

He sipped his coffee again. Several seconds passed before he realized that Janellen was staring at him like a nocturnal animal caught in a pair of headlights and that Jody was scowling.

Slowly he returned his coffee cup to the saucer. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” Janellen said hastily. “Do you need a refill on coffee?”

“Yeah, but I’ll get it. I think the bacon’s burning.” Smoke was rising from the frying pan.

Key hopped to the counter and poured himself a coffee refill. He needed another pain pill, but he’d left them upstairs in his bathroom. In spite of the doctor’s orders, he’d washed down two of the tablets with a tumbler of whiskey before going to bed. That had gotten him through the night.

Now, the pain was back. He wished he had the gumption to take the bottle of brandy that Janellen used for baking from the pantry and lace his coffee with it. But that would only give Jody another reason to harp on him. For the time being, he’d have to live with the throbbing pain in his side and the heavy discomfort in his right ankle.

As cavalier as he’d been about his injuries, he winced involuntarily as he hopped back to his seat. “Are you going to tell us how you got so banged up?” Jody asked.

“No.”

“I don’t like being kept in the dark.”

“Believe me, you don’t want to know.”

“I have little doubt of that,” she remarked sourly. “It’s just that I don’t want to hear the sordid facts from somebody else.”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s not your concern.”

“It’ll be my concern once it gets around town that on your first night home you wound up in the hospital.”

“I didn’t go to the hospital. I went to Doc Patton’s place and found a lady doctor there who’s pretty as a picture,” he said with a wide grin. “She treated me.”

Janellen dropped a metal spatula, which clattered onto the top of the cooking range. At first Key thought that hot bacon grease had popped out of the skillet and burned her hand. Then he noticed the hard, implacable expression on Jody’s face and recognized it as fury. He’d seen it often enough to know it well.

“What’s going on? How come y’all are looking at me like I just pissed on a grave?”

“You have.” There was a low, wrathful hum behind Jody’s words. “You’ve just pissed on your brother’s grave.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Key—”

“The doctor,” Jody said, angrily interrupting Janellen and banging her fist on the table. “Didn’t you notice her name?”

Key thought back. He hadn’t been so badly hurt that certain attributes had gone unnoticed—things like her expressive hazel eyes, her attractively disheveled hair, and her long, shapely legs. He’d even made a mental note of the color of her toenail polish and the fragrance she wore.

He recalled these intimate details, but he didn’t know her name. What could it matter to Jody and Janellen? Unless they were prejudiced against all women in the medical profession because of one.

As he considered that thought, he began to experience a sick gnawing in his gut. Jesus, it couldn’t be. “What’s her name?”

Jody only glared at him. He looked to Janellen for an answer. She was nervously wringing out a dry dish towel, misery etched on each feature of her face. “Lara Mallory is the name she goes by professionally,” she whispered. “Her married name is—”

“Lara Porter,” Key finished in a low, lifeless voice. Janellen nodded.