The Midnight Rider Takes A Bride

But right then she could have cared less about window treatments. And monograms were the last thing on her mind. Right then her own sweat felt erotic. And Jed Ryder’s sweat looked delicious. And even the air seemed, somehow, to be humming in a way that set every nerve she had singing. Her body felt heavy. And yet quick and ready at the same time.

It was not yucky. Not yucky at all.

It must be the champagne.

But she knew that it wasn’t. The trek along the trail had banished the glow she’d felt back at her apartment. She was now plain sober. As well as sexually aroused.

Jed said, “Come on.” He continued to smile, and he looked right into her eyes. “Let’s see if you can stand up.” He held out his hand.

Adora took it. He had never removed the fingerless black gloves, so all at once her hand was engulfed in leather and heat. Her whole body seemed to tingle, from the moist skin at her hairline to the pink-enameled toes inside her pink tennis shoes. With a small groan at the effort, she stood.

“Okay?” he asked softly.

She coughed—and ordered herself to pull it together. “Sure. Fine, just fine.” ,

He released her hand. Smiling like an idiot, she brushed off the back of her shorts. He gestured for her to take the lead, so she did.

They started down the trail. Right away she wished she’d let him go first. Her bottom felt numb, and her insides quivered like jelly. It took all the concentration she could muster to walk with some degree of dignity.

They went on as before, not saying anything. And with the silence between them, the wild sounds all around seemed suddenly magnified. From the rude call of a mockingbird to the croaking of the creek frogs, every sound had a sensual intent. Even the buzzing of the honeybees that swarmed the blackberry bushes on either side of the trail struck her as louder, more intense somehow.

Which was ridiculous. The bees were not buzzing any louder than before. It was just her imagination. And nothing had happened between her and Jed Ryder. She’d fallen on the trail and he’d helped her to her feet. End of story.

Now they would find Lola and go their separate ways. And the next time she saw him, she’d smile politely, say hello and walk on by.

The path had leveled out, and they were very near the creek. Then they rounded a sharp bend in the trail. It took Adora a minute to realize what she saw on the ground ahead of her. A woman lay there, on her back, in the arching shadow of a birch tree.

It was Lola.

Two

She lay faceup, with her eyes closed. Adora thought that she looked peaceful, except for the bloodless pallor of her skin. A dented tin pail had rolled a few feet away from her, spilling a shiny trail of blackberries out across the ground.

“God. Ma...” The gentle voice wasn’t much above a whisper, but Adora’s heart stopped at the anguish in it.

He shoved around her, ran to Lola, dropped to his knees at her side. “Ma...” Frantically he felt for a pulse. “Ma. Come on, Ma...” He tipped her head back, checked beyond her pale lips for any obstruction and then began to breath into her mouth.

Adora stood rooted to the spot, feeling outside her own body somehow. As if she weren’t really there. As if the desperate man kneeling on the ground wasn’t Jed Ryder. And the still form of the woman wasn’t anyone she knew.

Because that pale, lifeless figure just couldn’t be Lola. Not Lola, who worked for her. Lola, with her scratchy voice and dry sense of humor. Lola, who took care of all the older ladies on Senior Citizen Discount Day, who was so funny and patient with them, giving them the same boring cuts every time and never getting fed up because they wouldn’t even spring for a set or a blow-dry.

Jed looked up at her. Now he was calm. A terrible calm.

“Jed?” she asked, hoping for reassurance, hoping he would tell her that Lola wasn’t really dead.

“Get help,” he said in a whisper that rang in her ears like a shout. “Run like hell.”

And she did. She turned and ran back the way they’d come. She tore along that trail, shoving branches aside, scrambling upward when the trail climbed, half sliding. half running when the trail cut downhill. Each breath burned in her lungs, and her blood pounded so loud through her body that she could hear nothing else. She stumbled often but somehow managed to keep herself from actually falling.

The going got easier once she staggered up the bank that led to the bridge. From there, she ran on pavement, which wasn’t nearly as tough as running on the rocky, uneven trail. She tore down the street as fast as her shaking legs would carry her, her heart working so hard it felt as if it might explode in her chest.

Tilly Simpson, who worked as Doc Mott’s assistant, nurse and EMT combined, was standing behind the little counter on one side of the waiting room when Adora burst in the door of the clinic.

Tilly’s mouth dropped open.

Adora pressed a hand to her side, gulping for breath, noticing distantly that there were no patients waiting. The big clock on the fake-wood-paneled wall between the two Norman Rockwell prints said it was 2:39.

Tilly started sputtering. “Adora, what—?”

“It’s Lola,” Adora got out between starving gulps for air, “Lola Pierce. Down the Trout Creek Trail. Oh Tilly, I think she’s dead.”

They allowed Adora to ride in the ambulance, a very short ride, down the street and around the corner with the siren blaring. And then they let her carry the lightweight, roll-up stretcher, since both the doctor and Tilly had plenty to carry themselves. They tore down the bank to creekside as fast as they could go. But they weren’t more than a few hundred yards along the trail when Jed came loping toward them with Lola’s lifeless body cradled in his arms—and desolation in his eyes.

A few minutes later, right there on the trail, Doc Mott pronounced Lola dead. He looked at Jed with weary regret. “It was a stroke, I think. Or possibly a heart attack. There’ll be an autopsy. And then we can be sure.”

Jed said nothing, only nodded. They’d already laid Lola on the stretcher. Doc Mott took one end, and Jed took the other.

A small crowd had gathered near the ambulance when Jed and Doc Mott reached the top of the bank. Carefully, the two men hoisted their unmoving burden over the low railing onto the bridge. Adora and Tilly followed close behind, laden with the equipment that, in the end, had been of no use.

“Stand back, folks,” Doc Mott said, as they put Lola on the cot in the back of the ambulance. “Please, folks. Stand back.”

Adora could hear them whispering.

“It’s Lola. Lola Pierce.”

“Gone?”

“Yeah, it sure looks like it.”

Deputy Don Peebles, whom Adora had known since grade school, had just emerged from his big, sheriff’s office four-by-four. “What’s the story here. Doc?”

“Lola Pierce has died.”

“Of what?”

“I can’t say for sure at this point. Looks like a stroke or a heart attack. The autopsy will tell us more.” Doc Mott closed the double doors on Lola’s still form.

“Who found the body?”

“Jed here.” Doc Mott nodded in Jed’s direction. “And Adora Beaudine.”

Don turned to Jed. “I’ll have a few questions for you, Ryder.” He looked for and found Adora. “And you too, Dory.”

“You can ask your questions later,” Jed said. “I gotta get to my sister.”

“I’ll ask my questions now.” Don spoke in a tone of unyielding authority.

Adora stepped up. “Can you make it quick, Don? Please? Tiff’s only eleven. Jed should be with her.”