Page 70 of Mountain Freedom
“What do you mean?”
“Stop telling yourself the story that you’re Russell Sharp’s son. And decide who you actually want to be.”
“I’ll try,” I said. It was the most honest answer I could give her.
She patted my knee. “That’s all I ask. And about those nightmares. I’ll bring you some tea tomorrow. A blend of herbs to encourage sleep and calm the nervous system. Something to remind your body that you’re safe now.”
Was I, though? Because even though we’d be putting Russell in the ground tomorrow, I didn’t feel safe. In fact, something nagged at me, like there was something I hadn’t put together quite yet. A piece of the puzzle I was missing.
Maybe it was paranoia, but I didn’t feel safe at all.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Allison
Much to my disappointment,Jackson left before I could say goodbye. Shortly after asking me to take over, Fiona came back into the bedroom looking as refreshed and energetic as ever. I slipped out, planning to talk to Jackson, but he was gone.
After there was truly nothing left to be done and even Fiona was getting ready to leave, I reluctantly packed myself up and headed toward home. A car pulled out of Trudy’s neighborhood behind me and followed as I wound my way through town, heading toward the highway. My nerves prickled with fear. I stopped using my blinker and sped up, trying to put some space between us. The car sped up too, keeping pace.
When I got to the lonely road where I lived, I contemplated driving straight past my house and taking the loop back to Jackson’s apartment. But then I rolled my eyes, realizing what my brain was probably doing. I missed Jackson, so it was probably just inventing an excuse to see him again. Russell wasdead. There wasn’t a threat anymore. I was safe, and it was just a coincidence that someone was taking the same route as I was.
When I turned into my driveway and the other car kept going on the main road, I breathed a sigh of relief and shook my head, annoyed at how very silly I had become.
Tuesday morning broughtgray skies and the threat of rain. It felt fitting for a day when Jackson would be putting his father to rest. With the exhaustion of yesterday finally setting in, I had to force myself out of bed. All I really wanted to do was pull the covers over my head and sleep. But I had only canceled my afternoon patients for the funeral. Everyone expected me at the clinic for the morning slots.
For about three minutes, I debated about calling in sick. But I knew if I did and Beverly found out I went to the funeral, I would never live it down. She’d make sure every patient I had knew I had lied. So I finally groaned, threw the covers off, and rolled out of bed. After a much needed cup of coffee, I admitted to myself it was good that I was staying on routine—for my own sake as much as my patients.
Right now, I needed to feel like things were as normal as possible. With everything that had happened, it felt like things had changed between me and Jackson. He was putting distance there after all. I could feel it. It felt like something was missing in my life without our normal routine.
I shook my head as I turned the shower on to get the water heating up. I didn’t miss our routine. I missedhim. I missed my best friend. And it killed me that I wasn’t sure I was going to ever fully get him back.
I went to my dresser to grab fresh underwear, but I paused when I opened the drawer. Something was off. I wasn’t sure what at first, but I quickly realized what the problem was. Iorganized my underwear drawer by type. But today, some of the pieces were in the wrong sections. One of my strapless bras was stuck in with my sports bras. And unless I was mistaken, my panty section looked…sparse. I could almost swear some of it was missing.
Had Mike gone through my underwear drawer while he was here? The thought made me shudder. He was absolutely gross, and I was so glad he had left town.
I closed the drawer, hit the shower, and tried to put all of it out of my mind. There was no reason to worry.
I almost believed it by the time I walked out the door to head to work.
When I gotto the clinic, Beverly was waiting for me outside my office. “Morning,” I said, raising my thermos of coffee to her.
“Good morning, Dr. Bell,” she said in the most respectful tone I’d ever heard come out of her mouth. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
“Sure,” I said as I unlocked my office door and motioned for her to go on in. “Have a seat. What’s up?”
She sat and fiddled with her fingers, looking down at the ground. “Well, this isn’t easy for me, but I guess I’d like to apologize to you.”
I blinked rapidly, wondering if I had heard her correctly. “You’d like to…apologize?”
“Yes.” She looked up with genuine remorse on her face. “Trudy Hamilton is my best friend. She called me last night and told me what you did for her. How you drove her home in your own car, even though she was a mess, and stayed there with her. How, even though you’re a doctor and Fiona isn’t, you let Fiona run the show and followed her orders.”
“Fiona knows a lot more than I do about delivering babies. It made sense to let her take charge.”
“Yeah, but”—she swallowed hard—“I think what I’m trying to say is that… Maybe I was wrong about you.”
“Thank you for saying that,” I said softly. “Beverly, I’d like for us to have a good working relationship. I’m here for at least two years. We might as well get along, right?”
“Right.” She nodded. She hesitated, then spoke again. “I’m sorry if I misjudged you. I just thought that, since you were from the city, you’d think you were better than all of us. And you were this pretty little blonde thing looking like you’d stepped out of a fashion magazine and not really having anyexperience,and well, we all knew you’d, you know, ‘pulled strings to get the job,’ and—”
