Healing Sands Read online

  “It’s no problem, Dr. Crisp.”

  “When are you going to start calling me Sully?”

  “Sully,” she said.

  He knew she’d be back to “Doctor” five minutes from now, even though she, too, had a doctorate in psychology and fifteen years more experience than he had. His being the founder of the Healing Choice Clinics seemed to make it impossible for her to lighten up.

  “What’s first on the agenda?” he asked.

  She flipped open the leather portfolio. “The Hillman issue,” she said.

  “Bring me up to speed.”

  “I reported suspected child abuse when I was working with the Hillman girl, but CPS found no evidence.”

  “Oh, right, so Mr. Hillman has threatened to sue us.”

  Martha nodded stiffly.

  “You still maintain there was abuse?”

  “Yes, I do. I saw evidence of—”

  Sully put up a hand. “No need to explain. You wouldn’t have gone that far without good reason. Has Mr. Hillman’s attorney contacted you yet?”

  “No.”

  “Then let’s just file that one away. If and when the time comes, the ministry will back you up.” He fished a small voice recorder out of his pocket and said into it, “Put Hillman on the back burner and hope he doesn’t scorch his buns.” He grinned at Martha. “What else you got?”

  “Bob Benitez,” she said.

  “Ah—Bobby the Blogger.”

  Martha twitched an eyebrow. “A lot of people think everything they read on the Internet is gospel.”

  Sully crossed one long leg over his other knee and propped the bottle on it. “What’s his beef again exactly?”

  “His niece came in for counseling—she was one of Carla’s clients— and he says her ethnic background was not taken into consideration in her counseling.”

  “Was it family therapy?”

  Martha consulted her notes and shook her head.

  “So how did he know whether her counseling was ethnically appropriate or not?”

  “I couldn’t tell you.”

  “Do we care about what ol’ Bobby is blowing smoke about in his blob?”

  “Blog,” Martha said—and then gave him a quick look.

  He grinned at her again, and both her cheeks went pink to match her perfectly professional blouse. He’d caught her giving his Hawaiian shirts and chinos the eyebrow more than once since he’d arrived to get the clinic back on its feet.

  “Bob Benitez and his wife are influential in the social justice circle here in Las Cruces,” she said.

  “So—what is it he wants?”

  “From what I can tell, he just wants a case he can use to prove that the mental health care of Hispanics is inadequate for their special needs.”

  Sully refolded his legs and took another swig. Martha waited.

  “Well,” he said. “We could post a comment on his blog, explaining that at Healing Choice we show our clients that God loves them and can lead them to healing whether they are white, black, brown, or blue. Or we can refuse to dignify it with a response, and he’ll find somebody else to pick on. What say you?”

  She cleared her throat. “I suppose we should go for the latter.”

  “I like the way you think. Ignore Bobby,” he said into the recorder, then turned to Martha. “Anything else?”

  Martha glanced needlessly at her list again. “Carla Korman.”

  “I’m still not sure I understand what gives with that. I’ve read the file, but it doesn’t fit together somehow. You want to try to unmuddle it for me?”

  “I don’t even know if I understand it,” she said.

  “Give it your best shot.”

  “She had been working here as a therapist for two years when I came on board, and as far as I could tell, her clients thought highly of her.”

  “Except for Bobby Benitez’s neice.”

  “But he never filed a complaint. There were none until that flurry about two months ago. All of a sudden, four different people came out of nowhere saying she gave them counsel that led to this or that disaster. All of them complained to the Healing Choice head office— they’re the ones who removed her.”

  “That happened while I was out of the loop,” Sully said. “Rusty Huff was handling things then—and I don’t think he would have let her go without the juice to back it up.” He tilted his head at Martha. “What’s your take on it?”

  “She was completely devastated, and I can’t say I blame her. It just seemed to happen so suddenly.”

  Sully nodded and muttered, “Talk to Rusty about Carla Korman,” into the recorder. “So what’s the situation at this point?”

  “The PCMFT board is trying to decide whether to completely revoke her license. They want us to fill out some paperwork. You’re familiar with them, of course.”

  Sully nodded. He knew the Professional Counselors and Marriage and Family Therapists all too well. Part of his reason for being in Las Cruces, besides getting this particular clinic off of its ear, was to investigate the possibility of getting someone else’s license revoked by that same board. Until he’d found out she didn’t have one. He drained the Frap bottle. Just thinking about it made him want to bite the top off of it.

  Martha was still giving him the curious version of her smile. “How would you like for me to proceed, Dr. Crisp?”

  “Why don’t you follow up on the complainants if you will, see if you can get to the bottom of this. If Carla was struggling with something herself, I’d rather see her get help than the boot.”

  “I’ll get on it.”

  “Have Olivia help you. You already have a double client load until we can hire someone to replace Carla.”

  “That’s okay. Olivia is . . . I can handle it.”

  Sully felt a grin spread across his face. “Issues with our Olivia?” Martha glanced at the open French door. Sully nudged it closed with his foot.

  “Dish,” he said.

  “I don’t mind the chitchat and the burned popcorn in the microwave,” Martha said.

  She did, of course, but Sully just nodded her on.

  “But I caught her in a lie, and I don’t think we can have that.”

  “Seriously.”

  “I waited a half hour for a client yesterday, and when I went out to check with her to see if he’d called to cancel, she swore he hadn’t. I called him later, all concerned about him, and he said he’d notified Olivia two days ago. I confronted her, of course, and she melted like a pat of butter.”

  “Tears?”

  “Beyond. She said she was afraid to tell me she’d messed up.” Martha blinked at him. “I just don’t understand that.”

  Sully bit back the explanation that Martha could be as intimidating as a boa constrictor and tapped his recorder. “You want me to say something to her?”

  “No. I’ve got it handled. This is just FYI.”

  “And not a moment too soon.” Sully nodded at the French door where Olivia herself was approaching, hand already poised to tap on the glass. He stifled a grin when Olivia looked Martha’s way and turned a little green.

  “Come on out,” Sully said as she pushed the door open only far enough to speak through. “We were just talking about you.”

  Olivia’s eyes, which bore a strong resemblance to Bambi’s, widened as if she were staring into the proverbial headlights. Her face, already a powdery shade, went paler, leaving every fine freckle on her nose in bas relief. Sully could have predicted that both hands would go up to her brown straggle of hair and shove it behind her ears. Then they clutched at the long string of beads she wore with what Sully thought they called a peasant blouse. The lace on it had the same chewed-on-by-a-goat look as the ends of her hair.

  “Am I in trouble?” she said. “I am, aren’t I?”

  “Nah,” Sully said. “You’re just on a learning curve.”

  “Oh,” she said. “Okay—well—you said to tell you when it was almost time for your appointment—you know, with that guy who’s ap
plying for the job. And it is. Almost time.”

  “Good, then,” Sully said. “Just show him back when he gets here.”

  She skittered out without a glance at Martha, who closed her portfolio and stood up.

  “What I want to know,” Sully said, “is who hired her ?”

  “Carla,” she said. “She was a rescuer.”

  And Martha, clearly, was not.

  When Martha was gone, Sully went into his office, propped his feet on the desk again, and pulled out his cell phone. There was just enough time for a quick check-in with Porphyria before she left for Nashville.

  The connection to the Smokies was faint at best, but Porphyria’s voice was still as rich as molasses when she answered. He closed his eyes; he knew she’d have hers closed too. She did that with him, as if, as his mentor, she was shutting out everything else to give him all the space.

  “Don’t you ever work, Dr. Crisp?” she said.

  “I’m working right now. I’m calling for advice.”

  “You’re calling to check up on me, and I’m fine. I told you this is just my annual physical.”

  Sully chuckled. “Nothing gets by you.”

  “I didn’t get to be eighty-one years old by being a fool.”

  “Winnie’s driving you down to Nashville?”

  “You know she is.” Porphyria paused. “Sully?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I am fine. You worry like an old woman.”

  Sully let out a guffaw. “Just have your niece call me when you get down there.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “And when you get done with the exam.”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “And when you get back home.”

  “You don’t have anything else to do out there in New Mexico?” Sully imagined the dark face smoothed out like the countenance of an African queen.

  “Now that I’m here, I think I’m putting it off, Dr. Ghent.”

  “Your search for Belinda Cox.”

  “Yeah.” Sully dropped his feet to the floor and swiveled the chair around, his back to the door. “The trail led me here, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that this particular clinic needs me at this exact time.”

  “God doesn’t do coincidence. So have you looked her up, or are you just wallowing?”

  Holy crow. Even from thirteen hundred miles away she read him like a picture book.

  “The last place she worked as a counselor was at a church a couple of miles from here,” he said.

  “You’ve gone there.”

  “Not yet.”

  “And why are we dragging our feet?”

  “Because I’m still not altogether sure why I’m doing this.”

  “Well, I guess you better find out.”

  “You’re not going to cut me any slack, are you?”

  “None whatsoever. But I will say this.”

  Sully held his breath, in case the sound of his own air should cover even a syllable that came from those marvelous lips.

  “Just be sure you aren’t trying to out-God God. You know God won’t have that, now.”

  “And neither will you.”

  “Mm-hmm. Well, it’s not me you have to answer to, is it?”

  “Since when?” Sully said.

  “Mm-hmm,” she said again.

  When she hung up, Sully looked wistfully at the phone. If it weren’t for Porphyria Ghent, he might be in a psychiatric hospital or tucked, by his own choice, into a coffin. He wouldn’t be taking steps back into the life he’d had to leave behind for months while she helped him face his demons.

  His wife hadn’t been so blessed. She hadn’t had a Porphyria Ghent. She’d had Belinda Cox, and Sully had to find the woman and make sure she never did to another human being what she had done to Lynn. And to their baby girl. At least, that was the reason he’d given himself, until other possibilities had begun to muddy the waters.

  A tap on the door signaled Olivia and—what was that applicant’s name? Sully dropped the phone into his pocket and stood up.

  “Come on in,” he said.

  Olivia poked only her head in. “He’s waiting in the conference room.”

  “I think I’ll see him in here, Olivia.”

  She pressed her lips together until a deep dimple appeared on either side of them. “He’s cute,” she said.

  “That being one of the major qualifications, things are already looking good for Mr.—”

  “Kyle Neering,” she said.

  Sully didn’t know from cute in other guys, but the tall, slender, thirtysomething man Olivia showed in a moment later was definitely a sharp dresser. He also had a neat haircut and a firm handshake, and he looked directly into Sully’s eyes when he introduced himself.

  “It is a pleasure, sir,” he said.

  “It would be a pleasure for me if you wouldn’t call me sir,” Sully said.

  Neering shook his head as he took the chair Sully offered him. “Sorry. I just have a lot of respect for you and your work. I’ve wanted to meet you for a long time.” He gazed around the room as if he’d just entered the Oval Office. “So this is where it happens.”

  “Where what happens?”

  “The amazing things you do with people.”

  “I don’t see clients in here, if that’s what you mean.” Sully sank into the other client chair, which fit him the same way a necktie would. “In fact, I’m not seeing clients at all at this clinic. I’m just here to make sure it’s going in the right direction.”

  “And I’m here to convince you I can help with that.” Kyle leaned forward. “I’ve read everything you’ve written, studied your pod-casts— I even caught your seminar in Little Rock a couple of months ago. I’m a total admirer of your work.” His face glowed from handsome jaw to dark brown hairline.

  “Well, don’t stop now,” Sully said drily. “You were just getting warmed up.”

  “Look, I’m not trying to pump up your ego. I mean, I would love to have this job, but I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to tell you what your ministry has meant to me.”

  Sully slid Kyle’s file from his desk and opened it. He was already familiar with Kyle Neering’s fairly impressive credentials. He just needed an excuse to get away from that practically idolatrous gaze.

  “That your family?”

  Sully’s head came up. He followed Kyle’s point to the photo on the shelf behind his desk, and he felt the familiar cave in his chest.

  “My wife and baby,” Sully said.

  “They’re both beautiful. You’re obviously blessed.”

  Not by a long shot, pal, Sully wanted to say to him.

  Instead, he crossed one leg over the other knee and said, “Let’s talk.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  By the Sunday after Jake’s hearing, I had discovered that soccer can eat up your life the way termites consume your woodwork.

  I was at Burn Lake all Saturday morning and all Sunday afternoon. So, unfortunately, were the other soccer moms. I wasn’t sure at first whether Victoria and J.P. were there to watch their respective sons practice or to scrutinize my lack of understanding of team-motherhood.

  I got the snacks right, and I’d made a vow not to yell anything until I’d had a crash course in soccer terminology. But J.P. didn’t hesitate to tell me that Alex’s shin guards were too big for him and that she saw him picking his nose when he was supposed to be watching the ball. If it hadn’t been for Poco continually changing the subject while we sat, interminably, on the bleachers, I probably would have told her to take a look at her own kid.

  Because even with my uneducated eye, I could see that Cade wasn’t doing so well down there. He was a pudgy boy, for starters, and his cheeks remained an almost neon shade of red at all times, as if just walking were an exertion. He never had the ball longer than two seconds before someone else snatched it from him, and when one of the other boys yelled, “To you, Cade!” he was usually gaping off in the other direction and missed the thing completely.

  By Sunday, even
J.P. was admitting he was a mess. “I think he’s starting puberty,” she said.

  “At ten years old, J.P.?” Poco said, more gently than I ever could have.

  “I don’t know what else would cause him to suddenly turn into a complete klutz.” J.P. shoved the trickles of graying hair back from her forehead. “It could be his weight, I guess.”

  Whatever it was, it hadn’t improved since the day before. Halfway through practice, J.P. fretted that Dan was going to eliminate him from the team. I laughed out loud.

  “I don’t see what’s funny,” J.P. said.

  Poco put her hand on J.P.’s arm. “I think Ryan was just—”

  “I can speak for myself,” I said. “Dan would keep a quadriplegic on the team if it meant he could avoid a conflict.”

  “I don’t think that’s funny either.”

  “Anybody want a drink?” Poco said. “I brought a cooler.”

  J.P. shook her head and gazed dismally at the field. Victoria ordered a water. Poco grabbed my hand and pulled me with her. My plan was to tell her when we got to the bottom that I didn’t need her to play mediator—that J.P. could bring it on as far as I was concerned.

  Poco opened the cooler, thrust an icy bottled water into my hand, and had me sitting with her several sections over on the bleachers before I could protest.

  “I thought a little space would be a good thing,” she said.

  “Thanks,” I said, “but if I need space, I’ll make some.”

  “I wasn’t talking about you. I was talking about J.P. You intimidate her.”

  I grunted. “I don’t think she intimidates that easily.”

  “She doesn’t.”

  “So are you the protector of the psyches in this group?”

  “Yes,” she said simply.

  I found myself staring at her. She was a tiny thing, but there was something big about her spirit.

  “You’re probably right,” I said. “I’m spoiling for a fight.”

  “Is it because of Jake?”

  I homed in for signs of gossip gathering, but Poco’s black eyes were soft. As if she truly did give a flip.

  “How did you know?”

  “Dan asked a few of us to pray. I’d already read the article, but of course they didn’t mention Jake’s name.”