Lost And Found

Then Peg asked a question that had been running around in her head ever since she arrived in OK City. "Robert, I know Pete, or Pedro, dropped you off at the homeless camp, but why did you stay there all this time? You're a smart man, with education and business acumen. Why didn't you get a job someplace and move into decent housing?"

"That sounds simple when you say it. But understand, just a short time before I was dumped here, I had been in a coma. I had a serious head injury, and at first, at least, all my synapses weren't firing. I had terrible headaches and dizziness and other concussion consequences. So, I really wasn't much better off that the druggies and mentally ill folks in the camp.

"As I regained my faculties, the things that had happened threw me into a deep depression. I was mentally so far down that my physical abilities suffered as well. I was so angry and upset with you and Charlie that all my energy went into feeling sorry for myself. And Mary did not arrive on the scent for a couple of years after I got there, so I really had nobody holding me up.

"A couple of times I almost fell into the drug abyss, but I had just enough judgment left to pull myself back from that. There was always pot around, so I did self medicate with weed, but steered clear of pills and needles. I figured I had enough problems without becoming a junkie."

Peg quietly wept. The pain and suffering her beloved Robert had endured was more than she could bear to hear about. She threaded her arms through the wires and tubes that remained and gave him a gentle hug. She held him as long as she could in the awkward position she was in, until finally he pushed her away. He still wasn't ready.

***

Lisa and Laura had an emotional reunion at the airport, thrilled and relieved to know their father had been found. Laura was astonished at all the revelations about "Uncle Charlie" that Lisa spelled out as they drove toward the hotel. And when Lisa told her that Charlie hoped to fuck her, she laughed - until it sank in that this was real, and then she fell silent.

"How could he have fooled us so long?" She finally asked.

"It's like Dad said, he's a salesman."

As they entered the hotel to drop Laura's luggage they did not see Pedro lurking behind a planter, watching the door. By the time they came back down to the lobby, Charlie was already in his car out front, dressed in his doctor costume, ready to follow them wherever they went. He wouldn't be tricked this time, he swore.

The sisters parked near the birthing center and walked in confidently, believing the ruse earlier in the day would have put Charlie off the trail. He waited a few minutes after he saw them go in, then followed, a syringe of fentanyl Pedro had scored for him in his pocket. It had cost him plenty, but for the payoff he was working toward, it was worth it.

Laura's reunion with her father was joyous and emotional. Both were overcome with happiness and at the same time sadness for time missed. Peg and Lisa stood back and let the two have time together. Just then Mary returned from the cafeteria. She had coffee for Peg, and a contraband pastry for Robert. Lisa had told Laura all about Mary, so introductions were easy.

Mary signaled to Peg that she wanted her knife back, and Peg discretely handed it off to her. Mary resumed her post in the chair by the door.

They had all been visiting amiably when a doctor appeared at the door. Nobody thought much of it at first. Mary was the first to notice something "off." First, she noticed his badge didn't look quite right. Then she wondered why he would be wearing a mask, since most of the other medical personnel no longer were masked unless they were with a sick patient.

As he advanced toward the bed he said, "I just have a special medication I need to add to the IV," and pulled the syringe from his pocket.

Mary was on her feet, knife out, when Peg recognized the voice.

"Charlie, what are you doing?" she demanded.

That was all Mary needed to hear. "You bastard," she screamed. She swung her right arm in a wide arc and jammed the knife into Charlie's groin. The sharp knife poked easily through the thin scrubs and sliced into his scrotum, cutting off one testicle. Charlie screamed and reflexively grabbed at the wound, stabbing himself in the thigh with the deadly syringe.

In the confusion, nobody was quite sure what happened next, and the four women each had different accounts from their various vantage points, but Robert - who had had the bandages removed from his eyes just the day before, blurrily saw Mary's left hand slap the syringe, pushing down the plunger.

Charlie looked down at the bloody mess and felt his detached testicle slide down his right leg inside the cotton scrubs. When the fentanyl hit his heart and brain a moment later, he collapsed onto the floor, his head cracking into the steel leg of the hospital bed.

The security officer had heard the commotion and Charlie's scream from the hallway, and rushed in just as Charlie fell. He grabbed Mary's arm as she bent over Charlie, yelling insults in his face and stabbing again and again. The officer called in the alarm on his radio. When a nurse rushed in a moment later and saw Charlie on the floor in a pool of blood she immediately sounded a Code Blue. Doctors and nurses poured into the room from all directions, but it was clear that Charlie was gone and would not be coming back.

An autopsy later confirmed that the fentanyl had killed him, but that the blow to the head when he fell probably would have been fatal as well. The stab wounds were dramatic, but inconsequential, other than the initial groin wound. The rest came after he was already dead.

The police conducted an investigation and took statements from all who had been in the room. Mary's status as a homeless person, and her possession of an illegal knife, almost inclined officers to charge her for the stabbing, but Peg and the sisters' insistence that she had only been defending Robert's life made them reconsider. Robert's cool, calm assurance that Mary's quick action had been heroic, and had saved his life, ended the discussion.

With the threat removed, Robert was taken back to his room in the main hospital. The events of the day had been traumatic enough that Peg and the girls took Mary back to the hotel to get cleaned up, and rest. "You are not going back to that camp to live," Peg told her. "We will drive you back there to collect your things, bring anything from Robert's cart that he may need, and bring it back here. You can tell your friends about what has happened, and tell them Robert will be coming back to Ohio with us."

"I don't know how things will be without The Mayor," Mary fretted.

"We'll talk to Robert about who can be trusted to take his place," Peg replied. After considering the idea for a moment, she added, "We'll give the ATM card to whomever the new "mayor" is to be so we're not leaving Robert's friends high and dry."

Later, while Lisa and Laura drove Mary back to the encampment to collect her things, and Robert's, it was finally time for Peg and Robert to have "The Talk." Peg had been dreading it, but knew it had to happen if there was to be any future with the man she loved.

Sitting by his bedside she could see that several of the bandages had been removed overnight, including all that had been hiding his face. She knew his vision was cloudy, but from where she sat his eyes had the same blue and penetrating look she had fallen in love with 24 years before.

"Darling, there are things I have to tell you about what happened while you have been gone. The first and most important thing is that there hasn't been a moment when I didn't love you and want you back with me. That said, there are things I need to explain."

"Peg, you don't have to do this. I know Charlie took my place. That was his plan all along. Beyond that, I just don't care. I have adjusted to my life here and Mary will help me get back to being Mayor."

"I have things to tell you and I'm going to do it. For one thing, Charlie never took your place in my mind or my heart. When you were hurt I was devastated - at first because I was afraid I would lose you, and also because Charlie had almost succeeded in seducing me. It was a close thing - too close. I was wracked with guilt and shame that I had let him get into my head. But while you were in the hospital imagining us going at it and discarding you, that didn't happen. I had no desire to cheat on you, and I guess Charlie was clever enough to figure out that his best play was to resume the role of platonic best friend.

"I had no idea what he and Pete had been up to, and I was mystified when you disappeared. Charlie put on an academy award-worthy performance, driving me up and down every street looking for you when he knew damn well that Pete had dumped you here. We had posters all over town with your photo, appeals on the radio and local TV stations. The girls cried themselves to sleep every night, and I was a basket case.

"When it got so bad people were afraid I might hurt myself, Charlie made his play. He started staying with me late into the night to keep me company, and after a while started spending the night. Not in our bed, I put him in a spare bedroom. But except when he was at work he was with me and the girls. And yes, he did step in and play surrogate father, going to their soccer games and even taking Laura to her school's daddy-daughter dance. And eventually I was so lonely, and he was so persistent, that I let him into my bed. I didn't know if you were dead or alive or if I would ever see you again...l"

"Peg, you don't have to do this," Robert said, gently.

"Yes I do! I am so ashamed and so sorry that I didn't wait for you, and that I was so totally deceived. God! Just before I got the call that you'd been found, he was talking about having you declared dead and us getting married. Now I know that as soon as we'd collected your life insurance he'd have arranged my untimely demise and cashed in. I should have the word 'sucker' tattooed on my forehead.

"It is important to me that you believe I never loved Charlie. Yes, I trusted him, and yes, I leaned on him, and yes, I had sex with him. Reluctantly at first, but after a while it became natural to get sexual release. But we didn't make love the way you and I always did. Charlie is - was - uncouth and uncaring. He didn't care if I got satisfied - although he was always smug when it happened."

Robert was quiet for a minute.

"I think you can understand why I have been staying away," he said. "While my perception of the situation may not have been completely correct, I was right that danger was never far away, and that I was being paid to leave you two alone. I could not know how far you had or hadn't fallen under Charlie's influence, but from where I looked, and based upon what Pedro had told me, it sure seemed the two of you were together against me. Maybe I should have trusted you more. But I have spent the last seven years believing not only that I had lost you, but that you were actively scheming against me.

"In spite of all your protestations, I find it's hard to leave that belief behind."

It was Peg's turn to sit silent. If Robert's vision had been clearer, he'd have seen the distraught look on her face.

Finally she brightened. "Well, we have the rest of our lives for me to prove my love to you. As soon as you are released we'll fly you home and we'll arrange your rehab in Columbus, and we'll go from there. I have already told Mary that she is coming with us. Even if you and I are not to be husband and wife again, you will have my love and your friend Mary will be with you as well."

"You told her she was coming with you? Did it occur to you to ask her if that is something she would like to do? As you did not ask me? I mean Peg, I am willing to believe your intentions are good, but you come sweeping in and all of a sudden you are dictating people's lives. People who do not necessarily trust you. Christ! Slow down! Back off a bit. Let us breathe.

"Hell - just yesterday I was almost murdered in my hospital bed, and your lover died trying! Think maybe I need a minute to digest all this? Oh, and by the way, it was not you who sprang to stop the killer, it was Mary.

"And dear Mary - you have seen her on good days. You have no idea what a mess she is on her bad days. Or how frequently those bad days come around! Slow down! Go to the hotel, spend time with the girls, go shopping or go down to the Riverwalk for a drink and let me get my head around all this. A few days ago I was in a coma, remember? I've been hiding out for seven years. And my head feels like it's going to explode. Please. Give me a break."

Peg looked at him with a shocked expression. "Oh, Robert, I'm sorry."

"Look, I know you guys protected me and saved my life. I'm grateful for that. I truly am happy to see you and thrilled to see the girls. Things are just moving too fast right now. I need a time out."

"Okay, I get it. I'll leave you alone. PT should be coming to work with you anyway. I love you. I'll see you tomorrow."

She waited down the hall for the girls and Mary. When they came off the elevator she intercepted them. "I think I've gotten ahead of Robert," she said, "and I've upset him. Girls, let's go back to the hotel and eat. Mary, would you like to join us?"

"No, thank you, I'll spend some alone time with Bobby," she said.

"Please talk to him about moving back to Ohio," Peg asked her.

With that Peg and her daughters went to get some dinner and relax. They needed some rest too. Over dinner the girls told Peg about their time with Mary, and Peg shared a little of her conversation with Robert. They all realized that their expectation that their husband and father would happily come home was premature. They also agreed that Mary had become a bigger part of his life than they had realized.

********

When Peg and the girls walked into Robert's room the next morning they were stunned to see Mary lying beside Robert, her head on his chest and her right arm reaching down to give him a hand job. She never missed a beat stroking his erect cock as the newcomers stood and gawked.

Lisa reached out her hand to cover her little sister's eyes, but Laura slapped it away, grinning.

"Bobby hasn't had any release since before the attack," Mary explained, smiling, "so I thought I'd better get him off. We don't want his balls exploding!" She laughed.

Seeing the shocked looks on his family's faces Robert explained, "There is no privacy where we live, so we are accustomed to an audience." That said, the idea of his wife and daughters watching him be jacked off gave him a bit of a thrill, and he quickly spewed cum onto Mary's hand and the sheets. Peg hurried into the bathroom and returned with a couple of towels, handing them to Mary so she could clean them up.

"What about you, Mary? Don't you get a release too?" Peg asked with a smile.

"Oh, Speedy's been taking care of me while Bobby's been here," she replied. "He isn't very good, though. That's why we call him Speedy," she grinned.

"But what about you and Daddy?" Lisa asked. "Aren't you 'together?'" (She made quote marks with her hands.)

Robert answered, "We're friends, but hell, we're not married. Where we live, a person gets what they need any way they can. I wasn't available, so when Mary felt a need, Speedy stepped up, so to speak.

"Besides, being married doesn't seem to still carry the weight it used to," he added, looking Peg in the eye.

From there they had a friendly visit, avoiding any discussion of what the future might look like for them all.

During the drive back to the hotel, Lisa verbalized what they had all been thinking. "Mom, I'm not sure Dad wants to come back to Ohio. And I am pretty sure he's not going to go anyplace without Mary."

"I think you're right," Peg replied. "He certainly has shown no interest in returning to our life together as man and wife. But whether he is with me or not, he needs the physical, occupational, and probably mental therapy that he can get in Ohio, and more than likely would not get here, given the lifestyle and lack of support system. I'm worried about those headaches. And I'm sure Mary would benefit from consistent high quality treatment for her mental health challenges. We can see that she gets that in Ohio, getting her to her appointments and making sure she takes her meds.

"We'll have to confront all this with them in the morning. I'm tired of living out of a suitcase and I miss my home. I do so want him to come back, but one way or the other I'm ready to go. Tomorrow I'm going to force the issue: Come home and let us help you, or stay here and you two fend for yourselves."

The three changed at the hotel, then went out to explore the riverfront entertainment district. They found a cool restaurant and enjoyed some quality mom-and-daughters time. Nearby was a club with drinks and music. They let their hair down, shared a bottle of wine, and fended off most of the men trying to pick them up. A few cute and charming men were treated to dances with Peg and Lisa. Momma Bear Peg kept the wolves away from Laura, who wound up watching the purses and saving the table.

They were back in their room by 11 o'clock; slightly buzzed, happy to have had some fun together, and virtue intact.

****

First step the next morning was tracking down Robert's doctor to see about his readiness to travel. They were told that while he'd need a wheelchair to navigate the airport, he was strong enough to walk onto and off of a plane. Stairs would be a problem, so he'd need to be someplace where he could stay on one floor. Otherwise, so long as arrangements were made for him to receive physical and occupational therapy, he should be good to go. And while it wasn't his place as an orthopedic surgeon to recommend it, he thought a mental health work-up would be a good idea, and he expected that there would be some sort of treatment to follow.

Armed with this information, the trio moved on to Robert's room. They were not surprised to see Mary curled up beside him on the bed. It didn't look comfortable on the narrow hospital mattress, but as Mary had observed before, it was better than sleeping on the ground.

Robert was awake when they came in. He had a very satisfied look on his face, and smiled at his wife and daughters.

"Good morning," he said. "Couldn't resist coming up for some hospital breakfast?"

"Good morning," they responded in unison. "No, tempting as that sounds, we ate at the hotel," Peg replied, smiling.

Looking at Mary's face and seeing what looked like dried cum around her mouth, Lisa said, grinning, "Looks like Mary already had her breakfast."

Gazing at Mary fondly, Robert said, "No, that was a midnight snack. I was just about to wake her up for 'breakfast' when you came in." He made a circle with his thumb and forefinger and poked through it with his other hand, winking.

"Robert!" Peg barked. "What a horrible thing to say in front of us!" The girls were laughing.

With that, Mary woke up. She looked around feeling confused, then took in the situation. "I need the toilet," she said, then slipped out from under the covers and took the short walk to the bathroom. She was naked, but seemed not to be bothered by the presence of the others. Seeing the stunned looks on the faces of his family, he explained, "Living as we have been, modesty gets left behind pretty quickly."

Peg did not fail to notice that Mary had a very nice figure - much better than she had imagined when seeing her clothed. The jealousy that she had first felt when she met Mary in the waiting room, and that had grown steadily as she had learned about her husband's relationship with this woman, now spiked. She realized that Mary was younger, prettier, and sexier than she had realized. "Damn," she muttered to herself. Only Lisa heard her, and looking from Mary to her mother, she understood. Her father would not be waltzing happily back into her mother's arms - at least not anytime soon.