Close To Home (Westen Series) by Ferrell Suzanne

Author:Ferrell, Suzanne [Ferrell, Suzanne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Contemporary Romance Novel
Published: 2012-10-28T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

The autumn night sky blinked with the twinkling of a thousand stars. Emma gazed at them for a moment before pushing the front porch screen door open. After cleaning up both mother and child, she’d tucked Naomi and her son in for the night. Then she searched the downstairs of the clinic for Clint. She found him here, sitting on the porch swing.

Not quite touching him, she eased herself onto the swing. Once she was settled, his foot rocked back and forth, keeping the swing moving in a slow, steady sway. The chirping crickets joined the low buzz of the cicadas. Occasionally, a bullfrog’s big bass voice bellowed, punctuating the idle chatter of the insects. Soon frost would cover the ground then stillness would settle over the farmland.

Emma relaxed. Clint’s nearness no longer frightened her. How comfortable she’d become in such a tranquil setting amazed her. This was one of the reasons she’d returned to Weston—the peacefulness of the country. She wondered if Clint missed the city’s hustle. Or did he feel the restful calm here, too? Did the magic draw him in as it had her?

“Clint, why did you come back to Weston?” she asked as they rocked on the swing.

“I wasn’t enjoying life much. Burned out at work. No longer caring what tragedy rolled through my door, because it was always one tragedy after another.” She laid her hand on his arm. His hand settled on top of hers, and he let out a weary sigh. “I watched one more child than necessary die. And I wanted to come to a place and a time when I believed that nothing bad could happen to a child. I don’t want to watch another child die.”

“Who was he?”

Her perceptive question startled him.

“Johnny Wilson.” It felt odd to say his name out loud to someone else. “A boy who lived near the hospital.”

“What happened to him?”

Clint rubbed the back of his neck and took a deep breath. “He started showing up about a year ago. We’d look out into the waiting room on a Friday night, and there’d be Johnny, watching TV. He was all of six or seven. The nurses started giving him graham crackers and milk. Then we seemed to always order pizza or subs on Fridays, just so we could share it with the kid.”

“Didn’t you report it to the authorities?”

“We tried the police. But he somehow always seemed to disappear before they arrived. If we had them waiting for him, he didn’t show up that night. The little kid had a sixth sense about the cops.”

Emma shook her head. “He was much too young to be so leery of them.”

Clint ran his hand over his face.

“About six months ago, he came in during a snowstorm, no jacket, soaked clear through his T-shirt and jeans. The nurses went to put him in a dry gown. Suddenly, they called me in.”

Clint closed his eyes as the memories flooded over him. “There were old and new bruises on his body, across his ribs and his back.

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