Once Shunned. Блейк Пирс

bed. That would mean stretching a nylon gel liner over her stump, pulling a couple of socks over the liner to compensate for the shrinkage of her stump, then fastening the prosthesis into place, putting her weight on it until she felt it pop fully into place.

      It hardly seemed worth the trouble right now—especially if she got lucky and the pain faded on its own and she could go back to bed and get some more sleep.

      Instead, she pulled on her bathrobe, reached for her elbow crutches, slipped her wrists through the cuffs and gripped the handgrips, then hobbled out of the bedroom into her kitchen.

      A pile of papers awaited her there on the Formica-topped table.

      She’d brought home a huge bundle of poems and short stories to read—submissions for Sea Surge, the literary magazine where she worked as the assistant editor. She’d read more than half of the pieces last night before she’d gone to bed, selecting just a few that might be worthy of publication while setting the many others aside for rejection.

      Now she skimmed through a batch of five especially bad poems by a remarkably untalented writer, the sort of greeting-card verses that the magazine too often received. She laughed a little as she plopped the poems onto the rejection pile.

      The next batch was altogether different, but also typical of the sort of thing she often had to wade through while sorting through submissions. These poems immediately struck her as dry, bloodless, obscure, and pretentious. As she tried to make some sense of them, her mind started wandering, and she found herself thinking about how she’d wound up living alone in this cheap but comfortable little rented house.

      It was sad to remember how her marriage had broken up early this year. Shortly after the accident and the amputation, her husband, Duane, had been attentive, caring, and supportive. But as time went on, he’d become more and more distant until he’d pretty much stopped showing her any intimacy or affection.

      Although Duane wouldn’t admit it, Robin had realized that he simply didn’t find her physically attractive anymore.

      She sighed as she remembered how wildly in love they’d been during the first four years of their marriage.

      Her throat tightened as she wondered whether she’d ever experience that kind of happiness again. But she knew she was still an attractive, charming, intelligent woman. Surely there was a wonderful man out there who could see her as a whole person, not merely as an amputee.

      Still, the shallowness of Duane’s love for her had been a blow to her self-confidence and to her faith in men in general. It was hard not to feel bitter toward her ex-husband. She reminded herself as she often did …

      He did the best he could.

      At least their divorce had been amicable and they still remained friends.

      Her ears perked up at a familiar sound outside—the approaching garbage truck. She smiled as she looked forward to a little ritual she’d developed on such sleepless mornings.

      She got up from the table, put on the crutches, hobbled over to the living room window, and opened the curtains.

      The truck was pulling up in front of her own house now, and the huge robotic arm clamped onto her bin and lifted it and dumped its contents into the truck. And sure enough, walking alongside the truck was an odd young man.

      As always, Robin found something endearingly earnest about him as he followed the truck on its way, gazing attentively in all directions as if keeping some sort of lookout.

      She figured he must work for the town’s sanitation department, although she wasn’t sure just what his job could be. He didn’t seem to have anything to do except walk along and make sure the big machine did its job and didn’t drop any stray pieces of garbage.

      As she always did when she saw him out there on the lighted street, she smiled, took an arm out of a cuff, and waved at him. He looked straight back at her, as he always did. She found it odd that he never waved back, just stood there with his arms at his sides returning her gaze.

      But this time he did something he’d never done before.

      He lifted his arm and pointed in her direction.

      What’s he pointing at? she wondered.

      Then she felt a chill as she remembered the moment when she’d woken up …

      I thought I heard a sound.

      She’d thought it might be breaking glass.

      And now she realized …

      He’s pointing at something behind me.

      Before she could turn around and look, she felt a powerful hand seize her right shoulder.

      Robin froze with fear.

      She felt a sudden deep pain as something sharp plunged into her ear, and the world around her quickly dissolved.

      In another moment she felt nothing at all.

      CHAPTER ONE

      The moment Riley plopped down on the sofa in the family room and kicked off her shoes, the doorbell rang. She groaned softly. She figured it was someone promoting a cause, wanting her to sign a petition or write a check or something like that.

      Not what I need right now.

      She’d just dropped off her daughters, April and Jilly, for their first day of school. She’d been looking forward to relaxing for a while.

      Just then she heard Gabriela, her Guatemalan housekeeper, call out to her from the kitchen …

      “No te muevas, señora. I’ll get the door.”

      As she listened to Gabriela’s footsteps heading for the front door, Riley leaned back and propped her feet up on the coffee table.

      Then she heard Gabriela chattering cheerfully with the person at the door.

      A visitor? Riley wondered.

      Riley scrambled to put her shoes back on as she heard approaching footsteps.

      When Gabriela escorted the visitor into the room, Riley was surprised and pleased to see who it was.

      It was Blaine Hildreth, her handsome boyfriend.

      Or is he my fiancé?

      These days she didn’t know for sure, and apparently neither did Blaine. A couple of weeks ago he had more or less proposed to her, then just last week he had said he wanted to take things slowly. She hadn’t seen him for a few days now, and she hadn’t expected him to show up this morning.

      As Riley started to rise from the sofa, Blaine said, “Please, don’t get up. I’ll join you.”

      Blaine sat down beside her and relaxed against the elderly family room sofa. Riley grinned and kicked her shoes off again.

      With a slight laugh, Blaine kicked his own shoes off, and they both propped their feet up on the coffee table.

      Being so comfortable with him felt really nice to Riley, even if she wasn’t quite sure where things stood in their relationship.

      “How’s your morning been?” Blaine asked.

      “OK,” Riley said. “I just dropped the girls off at school.”

      “Yeah, I just dropped off Crystal too.”

      As always, Riley could hear a note of affection whenever Blaine mentioned his sixteen-year-old daughter’s name. She liked that about him.

      Then with a laugh Blaine added, “She seemed pretty anxious for me to drive away once we got there. I guess she wanted me to get out of sight of her friends.”

      Riley laughed as well.

      “It’s the same with April,” she said. “Kids seem to be embarrassed to have their parents around at that age. Well, starting tomorrow, mine will be taking a bus.”

      “Mine too.”

      Blaine put his hands behind his head and leaned back and heaved a deep sigh.

      “Crystal