Where There's Smoke

“The turkey?”

She rolled her eyes, letting him know her estimation of his joke. “I like your brother-in-law very much.”

“Yeah, so do I. I particularly like him because he’s touchy about folks thinking he married Janellen for her money. He works like a Trojan to prove he didn’t. He’s inspecting every Tackett well for safety violations. He’d blame himself for the disaster caused by well number seven, only Janellen won’t let him. He knew something was out of kilter. Time ran out before he located the problem, is all.

“Anyhow, they’re gaga over each other. I feel like a fifth wheel. Once I’m gone, they’ll have the house to themselves. I’ve deeded over my half of it to her.”

“That was generous.”

“That house didn’t hold any good memories for me. Nary a one. Maybe they’ll make it a happy place for their kids.” Shaking his head, he chuckled. “Who’d’ve ever thought Janellen would elope?” In a quieter voice, he added, “Her timing was off a bit. She’ll go to her grave blaming herself for not being here when Jody had her stroke.”

He was back to calling his mother Jody, but Lara remembered the tenderness with which he’d held her, calling her Mother as she died. “Did you tell Janellen about Clark?”

“No. What would be the point? It was hard enough on her to learn that Jody had murdered your husband.”

There’d been an inquest. Key had cited Jody’s dementia as the cause of her violent act. In her confusion, he told the judge, she’d linked Randall Porter’s sudden reappearance with Clark’s death. She killed him, thinking she was protecting her child. The court bought it. In any event, the killer was dead. Case dismissed. Sometimes the good ol’ boy system was the fairest.

He turned his blue stare full force onto Lara. “You could have told the truth at the inquest.”

“As you said, what would be the point? No one would have believed me five years ago. I couldn’t prove anything then or now, and besides, it would only have dragged things out indefinitely. I was glad to finally see an end to it. The important thing to me was that Ashley’s death was avenged.”

She’d had Randall’s body cremated. Since there had been a formal funeral for him years earlier, she didn’t feel she owed the public another spectacle. She’d held a private memorial in Maryland for him. Only a handful of former colleagues had been invited to attend.

“What about the scheme Porter cooked up with Sánchez?” Key asked.

“When the president called to extend his condolences, I told him that I didn’t agree with my late husband’s assessment of the situation in Montesangre. I said that you and I had witnessed firsthand El Corazón’s brutality to his own troops as well as his enemies. Speaking strictly as a citizen, I told him I wouldn’t want my tax dollars to support his regime.”

“He called me, too. I told him the same thing, in language a little more blunt.”

“I can imagine.”

He leaned against the rugged pickup parked beside her and raised one knee, flattening the sole of his boot against the dented door. He looked like he belonged there, comfortable in his Texas uniform—denim jeans and jacket. The brisk autumn wind tossed his dark hair around his head. His eyes were a few shades deeper than the sky.

She yearned for him.

“I thought you were leaving Eden Pass, Doc.”

“I changed my mind and reopened the clinic. The people here have accepted me now. Business is so good, I’ve rehired Nancy. She’s asking for an assistant.”

“Congratulations.”

“Thank you.”

During a noticeable lapse in the conversation, neither knew quite where to look.

“Marion Leonard is pregnant,” she told him. “She wouldn’t mind your knowing. They announced it immediately. She was among my first patients after I reopened.”

“Ah, that’s good.” He nodded sagely. “Then there was never anything to that rumor of a malpractice suit?”

“I guess not.”

They didn’t go into the role Jody had played in starting the rumor.

“Did you read the TAF’s report when they published it in the newspaper?” he asked.

After weeks of investigation, the federal agency had released their findings. The explosion at The Green Pine Motel had been caused by an illegal gas line running from Tackett Oil’s well number seven to the motel. The gas was being used to heat and cool the motel. A leak in the line had filled the infrequently used honeymoon suite with odorless natural gas. It had compressed to a highly combustible level. The spark from the electrical short was enough to cause the blast.

Fergus Winston, against the advice of his attorney, pleaded guilty to all charges and was now weeks into his life sentence.