Page 3 of Fatal Vision

Colton couldn’t say he blamed him.

His phone went off again. He left the door open. “S’up to you, pal.”

Snatching the phone from the couch, he saw it was the same unknown number. Didn’t this asshole know normal people were sleeping right now?

The click-click-click of the dog’s nails sounded behind him as Colton slumped onto the couch. On the TV screen, a spaceship was being shot at by the enemy.

Colton knew the feeling.

Might as well have some fun. He had nothing else to do but aggravate whoever was calling.

“Hello, gorgeous!” He tipped back and ran his tongue over his teeth. “Where have you been? Y’know I’ve been waiting for you to call. What are you wearing?”

A slight, uncomfortable pause met his ears and he grinned. Yep, this was going to be fun.

The dog jumped up on the sofa and sniffed the cushion, then made three turns in a circle and harrumphed down, his dark eyes settling on the TV.

“Colton?” a woman’s shaky voice asked.

A lightning rod shot down his spine and he straightened. The dog’s hairy brows danced as his gaze shifted to Colton.

“Martha?”

Her voice was low and slightly muffled, as if she were covering the receiver. “Yes, it’s me. I’m sorry to call so early in the morning, but it’s the only time I could sneak away from Jack.”

“What is it? What’s going on?”

But he knew before the words came out of her mouth—the one and only reason anyone from Oklahoma, from his past, would be calling him. “It’s Shelby,” Martha said. “She’s awake.”

The bolt hit both of his legs and he stood. “She’s out of the coma?”

“She’s asking for you.”

My God.“Is she okay?”

“She’s…” Martha’s voice hiccupped. “She’s still my daughter, Colton. Tough, bullheaded, and opinionated, but she’s not the girl she used to be.”

Three months in a coma could do that to you. “How bad is it? The brain damage?”

“The doctors believe she’ll make a full recovery. For now, her vision comes and goes and she has trouble forming the correct word sometimes. Jack put her in Premiere Therapy in Tulsa, and yesterday, she walked all on her own. It’s a miracle, but…”

She was walking already? “How long has she been awake, Martha?”

Another hesitation. “Six weeks.”

“Six weeks! And you’re only calling me now?”

Salisbury sat upright, fully on alert.

Martha’s voice rose. “You know I couldn’t call you. Jack would kill me. I’m only contacting you now because Shelby begged me to.”

Jack could go to hell. “This isn’t about the reverend. This is about Shelby.”

“Oh, Lord, my angina…” Colton could almost see Martha rubbing her chest. Grandma P might not be the only one in need of an ambulance tonight.

His own heart wasn’t beating all that normally either.

He rubbed his gritty eyes, images of Shelby lying on the steps of their house, bleeding from the bullet wound in her head, flashed behind his lids. “How much does she remember? About that night?”