Page 35 of The Last Love Song
“I can help you think through a response. You know as well as I that your family’s reaction will frame the way the townspeople view the investigation. We could bounce around ideas. Come up with a planned media strategy?—”
“No.” She didn’t need any more of the mayor’s charismatic charm mixing up the issue. “I would prefer to discuss it with my family myself.” She slung the shoulder strap for her bag on one shoulder. “I appreciate the warning about the investigation, but it looks like it’s my turn to pull an all-nighter.”
She headed toward the door, not waiting to see if he followed.
Except his house was so big she realized she’d wandered into the wrong room.
“It’s this way,” he called.
When she turned, she saw he pointed at an open archway, which led to the breezeway attached to the garages.
She hurried to join him as he lifted the keys off a wrought-iron hook on the wall. So much for her plans to leave town tomorrow. No surprise that her dreams were being put on hold again. She’d never be able to leave her family in the middle of a crisis. This wasn’t some mood swing of her mother’s or a manufactured problem that her mom used to create drama.
At best, missing funds from Harvest Fest during her dad’s time in office would be a scandal and an embarrassment for all the Finleys. And at worst? It was the kind of thing that could send her mother into a dark, dark place emotionally.
As Heather slid into the passenger seat of Zach’s SUV, she found it ironic that she’d been leaving town—in part—to avoid stress and protect her health. Now, she had to stay for incredibly stressful reasons. She hoped she could keep the effects of her RA at bay long enough to help her mother weather the latest storm. With her one sister on her honeymoon and the other sister incommunicado, Heather turned to her phone to email herfriend Sylvia in Nashville. Better to have a cyberconnection than none at all.
But as she started typing out her frustrations, she erased them, unwilling to share the depths of her hurt with a friend she hadn’t seen in two months. Tucking her phone back in her purse, she stared out the window, feeling utterly alone.
Chapter Nine
“I’m sorry, Ms. Finley,” the nurse on the phone chirped early the next morning. “I double-checked your records and we haven’t seen you yet at our facility. Dr. Moab won’t write a prescription for medication without an evaluation.”
Heather closed her eyes and took a deep breath. No medicine if she didn’t get to Charlotte this week. She sat on her front-porch swing with a cup of tea and a blanket covering her lap and legs, keeping an eye on the time. Sam Reyes had invited her and the rest of the family to a press conference at town hall, set to take place in a few hours and—although Scott insisted she attend to present a united front—her stomach was in knots simply thinking about it.
She toed the swing into motion. The morning breeze blew cool and crisp, but the sun shone and the scent of autumn hung in the air. Too bad she felt like death warmed over on such a beautiful morning. She’d hardly slept last night after spending two hours at Scott’s house trying to figure out a way to break the news to their mother. In the end, her oldest brother offered to do it, and she’d been more grateful than she could say. By the time she’d gone to bed, she’d been emotionally drained and—she understood this morning—physically taxed. She was like a helium balloon with a slow leak.
She’d read online that autoimmune diseases depleted a person as their immune systems were continually engaged, providing sufferers with a constant “I’m coming down with something” kind of exhaustion.
Heather sighed. The nurse was waiting for her to speak. “I had my medical history released to your office. I thought since I was supposed to see Dr. Moab later this week, I’d be able to get a temporary prescription until I can reschedule.”
Not that she was taking much medicine anyhow. She’d had cortisone shots in Austin to tide her over, but the effects were wearing off. She didn’t know how much the anti-inflammatory drugs were helping, but she didn’t want to stop taking them in case she had another incident like the one that had sent her to the hospital in the first place.
Just as well that things hadn’t worked out with Zach, right? She wasn’t at a good place in her life right now.
Except that her time with him had been a bright spot in an exhausting string of days. It hurt that it had been tainted, first by his maneuvering to convince her to run for mayor and later, by hiding the truth of the missing funds.
“Have you tried calling your former doctor? Someone who treated you in the past would be in a better position to help, since we’ve never seen you at our office.”
Of course she’d tried that first and gotten nowhere. Doctors didn’t just prescribe medicines and leave you to your own devices. She needed follow-up care, blood work and a lot stronger treatment program.
“Hello? Ms. Finley?”
“Sorry. I’m still here.” Heather gripped the phone tighter and then winced when her knuckles throbbed in protest. She’dawoken in more pain today than yesterday. “I’ll try contacting my former doctor. Thanks.”
Disconnecting the call, she lifted her tea and stared at the table beside her. She eyed the green bottles containing her daily meds, each with five pills remaining. She hurt more every day despite her taking the steroid and anti-inflammatory doses. How would she feel when she ran out? She’d considered making a trip into the nearest town with a rheumatologist, but the two she’d tried were scheduling appointments months in advance.
She took another sip of cinnamon tea, then set the cup down, and debated closing her eyes for ten minutes. Maybe she could shake the exhaustion before she needed to get ready for the press conference. Ten more minutes and she’d call Erin to let her know about the new family scandal. Would her younger sister, Amy, care? She could call her, but things hadn’t gone well the last time Erin reached out to her.
Adjusting a pillow on the arm of the swing, Heather lay down just as the phone rang.
“Hello?” She sat back up.
“Heather, you’d better get over here.” Scott sounded tense. In the background, she heard the low wail of a woman crying. “Mom needs you.”
Can’t meet today.
Megan pulled on a cap with a red Owl’s Roost diner logo. She rechecked the last message she’d received on her phone earlier that day. The text from Ms. Finley, saying she couldn’t make their guitar lesson, had been the only one to come through the phone in twenty-four hours.
