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“I think I’ll come back home and dig into the Crowley story again,” she said, hoping Connie would fill her in on the details.
“I’d expect it.”
“Just where did everything end?” Nikki persisted, her hands twining in the telephone cord. “What with getting married and all, I barely had time to think about it.”
“Like I said, he’s keeping a low profile. If he’s into anything shady, he’s hiding it well. Anyway, it’ll wait until you get back. Besides, you know we agreed we shouldn’t talk about it on the work lines.”
“Oh.” So this was big enough that they didn’t trust other people at the paper overhearing their conversations? What could it be? Try as she might, she couldn’t remember.
“You know, all this talk about the senator started about the time you met Trent.”
“I…I…know,” Nikki said, though she felt as if she’d been hit by a sledgehammer. Was there a connection between Trent and Senator Crowley and if so, what? What was going on?
“Look, I’ll talk to you when you get home. And if you want, I’ll nose around.”
“That would be great.”
“Consider it done!”
Nikki was more mystified than ever. Who the devil was Senator Crowley?
They talked for a couple of minutes longer, and Nikki explained that she’d be home in a few days. She didn’t have a lot of time before Trent showed up again, but she was still reticent to sever the connection to her friend and her past.
She hung up and sighed. So Trent hadn’t lied. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. One thing was for certain, she couldn’t give up trying to remember everything she could about her life before the accident, and the two items at the top of her list were Trent McKenzie and Senator Crowley.
Glancing at her watch, she decided she had time enough to talk to her mother. If she could get through. Her luck held and in a few minutes, her mother’s high-pitched voice echoed in her ear. Eloise seemed genuinely glad to hear from her. Though the background noise was loud, and more than once her mother had to cover the mouthpiece to shout at one of her teenaged sons, she seemed relieved to hear from her youngest daughter.
“Thank God you finally called,” she reprimanded gently. “Your father phoned. Told me about your accident, but didn’t know where you were staying. Then dropped the bomb that you’d gotten married to some stranger. Nikki, I just never thought you would do anything so rash. Now, Janet, that’s a different story. When she married Tim, I knew it was a mistake. I wouldn’t be surprised if she called me up from Reno or some other place like that and told me she’d gotten
married again. But you…well, you were always the sensible one. You know I was awfully fond of Dave….”
“I know, Mom,” Nikki said, hating the deception. “But it didn’t work out.”
“And this Trevor, he’s—”
“Trent, Mom. Trent McKenzie.”
“I could’ve sworn your father told me his name was Trevor. That man, I tell you…” she grumbled, then let the rest of her thought die. “Look, just come down to L.A. as soon as you can. I’d love to meet him and so would Fred. He thinks of you girls as his own, you know.”
Fred’s affections, Nikki remembered, were anything but directed at his stepdaughters. And her mother knew it. Why she continually tried to deceive them all was beyond Nikki. Fred Sampas had never given any of Eloise’s daughters a second glance. “Extra baggage,” he’d once complained to a friend, and Carole, Nikki’s middle sister, had overheard the comment. “Tell Fred I said hello,” she said, hiding the sarcasm in her voice.
“I will, honey, but first you tell me all about your accident. Your father was sketchy but he said you’re all right. He wasn’t lying, was he? He wasn’t just trying to spare my feelings.”
“No, Mom, I’m okay. I’ve still got a few scrapes and a couple of bruises, but I’ll be fine in a day or two.” She filled in most of the details of her fall and recovery, and her mother, over the crackly long-distance wire, seemed satisfied.
“Thank the Lord you weren’t hurt any worse! You know, Nikki, I don’t know why you can’t slow down a little. Now that you’re married, you should take things easier, quit trying to prove yourself to that darned paper.”
“Is that what I do?”
“Well, you want them to treat you like a man, and you’re not one. I guess you know that now.”
“I just want to be treated equally.”
“There is no equal. Not in this world. Just like there’s nothing fair. You know that as well as I do.” Nikki didn’t bother arguing, but she realized that she wasn’t close to her mother and probably never had been. They talked for a few more minutes before Nikki’s half brothers commanded her mother’s attention and they had to disconnect.
Nikki fell back on the bed and tears burned at the corners of her eyes. Her mother and father had never been happy together, that much she knew, and the divorce had been, for them, a relief, but there had always been a bit of pain, and a little prick of guilt that Nikki had never dislodged. She was old enough to know that she hadn’t caused the deep, angry rift between her mother and father, and yet she’d felt real jealousy that Eloise seemed so content with Fred and her new sons. She let out a slow, shuddering breath. “Quit feeling sorry for yourself,” she chided.
This wasn’t the time to dwell on the sorrows of her past, so she pushed her painful memories—tiny as they were—of her mother aside and concentrated instead on the call with Connie. Their conversation had served to whet her appetite to know more, find out everything she could, and the most certain way of throwing off the dark shadows of her nightmare was to face her past and the accident. The first step was the mission.
