“Well, I’d be inclined to believe you. My doctor was Carl Franklin, one of the best we ever had. At the moment, I am having some mighty harsh feelings toward the man who killed him. But that doesn’t translate to the man’s wife. I didn’t know the Meachams that well, on account they haven’t lived in Kings Ridge very long. But what I did know of them, I had nothing against—even John’s history of trouble with the medical board a few years back.”

Lou tensed. This was no hayseed sheriff. For however many years he had been the man in Kings Ridge, Gilbert Stone was not merely rattling about the town, procuring coffee and doughnuts. He was in charge of it. He also hadn’t hesitated to mention Meacham’s history to what should have been, until now, a total stranger. Either Stone was indiscreet to a fault, or somewhere in the course of gathering information about his fiefdom, Dr. Lou Welcome’s name had bopped across his desk.

Lou warned himself to stay sharp.

“I wish I could explain why John did what he did,” he said.

“Me and you both, son,” Stone replied. “It sure don’t make no sense.”

“I’m glad you understand my concern for Carolyn.”

“Oh, I do, I surely do.”

“So just a ticket, then?”

Stone put his campaign hat back on. “Like I said, I’m sure Carolyn’s been through hell today. Let’s make sure her car drives fine, and I’ll send her off with a warning to be more careful on these slippery roads.”

“Wonderful.”

Stone hesitated a beat, then locked on to Lou’s eyes once again. “And I’m going to send you off with a warning as well,” he said.

“Me?”

“If you know something about my town, or the people in it such as Carolyn and John Meacham, or anyone on the staff of our hospital, and you choose to keep that information hidden from me, you won’t find me to be so easygoing.”

CHAPTER 11

The president and First Family lived on the second and third floors of the White House—fifteen bedrooms and fifteen bathrooms, along with a sitting room, kitchen, dining room, and spectacular solarium. Darlene had done her best to make the master bedroom feel homey and familiar to her, but to no surprise, she had yet to completely succeed. At heart, she would always be a farmers’ daughter—a woman of down-to-earth taste in furnishings and art.

She and Martin slept in an 1820s four-poster tiger maple bed that she had chosen from notebooks of photographs that the Office of the Curator had provided to her. The rest of the room’s décor was more conventional and modern, although piece-by-piece she was changing it. Perhaps if they made it to a second term … at that moment, a big if.

Despite her well-intentioned efforts at bedtime meditation and yoga, Darlene still felt restless enough at times to accept some help from the vial of sleeping pills in her bedside table. Tonight, with continuous news coverage of the horrific events in Kings Ridge, Russ Evans’s sad visage embedded in her mind, her lingering anger over Martin’s decision to leave her solo at the Boys & Girls Club, and a full schedule facing her in the morning, she had little doubt there was an Ambien in her near future.