by Lisa Jackson
He would never have her soul.
*
When Ruth returned home, she was dismayed to find the screen door of her parents’ house unlocked. “Hello?” she called, stepping inside the tidy house.
“In here,” Bev McFerron called from the kitchen.
Ruth locked the door behind her. “Mom, you left the door unlocked again.”
“That’s what folk here do,” Bev said as she peeled and pitted a peach with lightning speed and added it to a large pot to prepare for canning. “Living in Santa Barbara really put you in fear of your fellow man, Ruthie.”
With her short, over-dyed red hair and wide smile, Bev McFerron had an air of confidence and concern that served her well as a minister’s wife, though it wasn’t entirely genuine. Sometimes Ruth wanted to call her on it.
If you’d been paying attention, you would know that this has little to do with Santa Barbara. You would have noticed that I was nearly catatonic with fear my last two years of high school.
Shaking off her resentment, Ruth asked. “Is Penny upstairs?”
“She’s out in the potting shed with Jessica.” In the past few weeks, her eight-year-old daughter had begun to stick like glue to one of the neighborhood girls, and Ruth had been grateful for her mother’s pleasure at having the two girls over while she attended to business. “Penny wanted to put together some flower bowls for your front porch, and I let her have at the marigolds and petunias.”
Ruth pushed the starched white kitchen curtains aside to peer out back. She couldn’t see Penny from here, which tightened her stomach. She couldn’t help thinking about Addie Donovan, who would most likely turn up quickly, but what if she didn’t? Bev didn’t understand why Ruth rarely let her daughter out of her sight, but Ruth knew there were bad people out in the world.
“How’d your meeting go?” asked Bev.
“Great. Chrissy Nesbitt is a real go-getter. She got some funding for the hotline and has offered to volunteer her time. And Doc Farley was more receptive than I expected. He’s agreed to open his office, day or night, to treat any emergencies that come in through the hotline. Honestly, I didn’t think an old-school doctor would be that attentive, but he told me he’s had some very sad cases with women who won’t admit to being beaten. Doc suspects rape, but he thinks the women are too frightened to speak honestly.”
“It just breaks your heart, doesn’t it?” Bev shook her head sadly. “I would just love to reach out and help women like that.”
Her mother seemed sincere, but Ruth wondered how deep that compassion ran. Would it apply to her own daughter if Ruth told her about the events of that horrible night fifteen years earlier? Maybe. Or perhaps the shame of an ugly attack would overshadow Bev’s desire to be a do-gooder. “You know, Mom, you could volunteer on the hotline. Ultimately, I’ll return all the calls, but we need people to answer when I’m unavailable. We have a recording, but it’s so much better to get a real person on the line. We could use someone like you, a calm, soothing voice in the face of panic.”
“Oh, I could never do that.” Bev gave an exaggerated shudder. “You know your father wouldn’t approve. He’s not at all comfortable with the idea of you bringing attention to that sort of thing.”
“Right.” Ruth’s heart sank as she prepared to have one of her father’s platitudes parroted. “He doesn’t believe that rape exists.”
“It’s just that he thinks that talking about it only encourages the bad behavior.”
“But, Mom, women who’ve survived a sexual assault need to talk about it.”
“I know.” Bev patted her heart with a sad smile. “But it’s not my place to argue with your father. Are you and the girls staying for dinner? I can put burgers on the grill.”
“I promised the girls we’d go to Molly’s Diner. It’s taco night.”
“I can make tacos,” Bev insisted. “It’s no trouble at all.”
“But dining out is an event for them. How long have they been out there?” Ruth asked, stealing another glance through the kitchen window.
Bev shrugged. “An hour or so? I love the way they occupy each other.”
“I’m going to see if they’re about ready to go.”
“Ask them if they want to stay for dinner,” Bev called after her as she headed into the backyard.
Crossing the sun-dappled lawn, Ruth felt a tug of the old love she’d once known for this place, this yard, this town. Her parents’ yard backed up to three land-locked acres that the neighbors had shared for gardening and recreation, and she’d spent many an afternoon back here, barefoot and blissful, picking wild berries from the fence or playing kickball. This was the sort of joyful childhood she wanted for Penny.
Although the sun was low in the sky, the air was still baking hot, and gnats jumped from the grass as she rounded the garage. She saw the potting shed, a small hut covered in the same gray siding as the house. Its door hung open. Two plastic pots on the bench contained tender-looking yellow, purple, and red flowers that leaned gingerly against each other, as if ready to faint from the heat. Not the best day for moving plants.
The flower bowls were complete, but Penny and Jessica were nowhere in sight.
“Penny?” There was a catch in Ruth’s voice, and she braced herself to keep the panic out of her voice. Penny and Jessica were safe here, in their mother’s backyard, in the cradle of this slow-moving prairie town. Of course they were.
Then why was her heart pounding? Adrenaline electrified her nerves as she shouted for her daughter. Where could she be? Penny knew that she was never to leave without asking permission.
She was running now, tearing around the garden, tall blades of grass whipping at her legs as she tore through the community field and plunged into the garden between rows of cabbages and tomatoes.
“Penny, where are you?” she demanded, pausing to take in the lazy summer landscape of grass and plants, sweating shrubs and trees. “Where are you?” The words stuck in her dry throat.
She paused, listening, but there was no answer in the birdsong, the buzz of a distant lawn mower, and the pounding of her heartbeat. Should she return to the house and alert her mother? Call the police? Search the potting shed? Maybe they were hiding, playing a trick on her. Or maybe they’d gone to Jessica’s house without asking permission.
Ruth was headed back to the shed when the sound of voices and a child’s scream sent her wheeling around. Oh God, where had it come from?
There were two screaming voices now, shrill and young, and they seemed to be coming from one of the nearby yards to the west, where the setting sun was ablaze in the sky. These properties were fenced off, but she followed the fence lines, some of them post and rail, others six-foot wooden fences.
“No! Stop!” came a young voice, followed by another shriek.
It was Penny.
Oh God, something terrible was happening.
Memory jarred her, the darkest moments of her life replaying in her mind. It couldn’t be … not Penny.
Galvanizing herself against the memory, Ruth ran into the blinding sunlight to save her daughter.
Chapter 13
“Penny!” Ruth shouted, racing to the source of the sound. “Penny, where are you?”
She couldn’t see over the fence, but the gate sat ajar and unlatched. Rusted hinges screeched as she yanked it open and combed the yard for her girl. Her view was blocked by a fat oak trunk and an overgrown lilac bush that lent a sweet scent to the sourness in her throat. “Penny?” she shouted, skirting the bush.
“Mom?” The hesitant whimper squeezed her heart as she caught sight of her daughter, who stared at her, as if paralyzed. Penny clung gingerly to a small linden tree just beyond Jessica, who was flitting through the yard like a moth fighting a breeze. Her shirt was removed and her orange shorts clung to her, sopping wet as she dodged the spray of a hose held by a big bear of a cowboy type who acknowledged Ruth with a sultry nod.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Ruth demanded.
&
nbsp; “Well, that’s a fine howdy.” The cowboy pushed off the porch steps and went to turn the hose off. The hands that turned the spigot were thick and strong.
Wide girth, thick hands … His legs were covered by jeans, but the green T-shirt that stretched over his broad chest revealed arms furred with blond hair, and a tightly trimmed beard covered his jaw. He wasn’t overtly menacing, but somehow that made him all the more of a threat.
Ruth braced herself to control the trembling fury that threatened to overtake her. “Who the hell are you, and what are you doing to these girls?”
“Calm down, now. This is my yard, Ruthie.”
He knew her. He knew her, and he was trying to intimidate her. His smug grin chilled her, despite the humid air.
“I’m Cal Haney. I know your father from church. And these carpet munchers came to me, looking for water for some plants or something.”
“You told us we could have water. And then you sprayed us,” Jessica said, dancing in a puddle that had formed in a patch of dirt. It looked as if someone had turned the earth to plant sod and never completed the task. “That’s not fair, Uncle Cal.”
Uncle? Ruth looked from the man to the girl. “You’re related?” Or was it one of those sick relationships in which he’d asked her to call him uncle?
Jessica nodded, brown water splashing up her legs with each step. “He’s my uncle now.”
“That’s right,” Cal said. “I got hitched to Jessie’s aunt last month.” He pushed back his hat to reveal tobacco-stained teeth under amused blue eyes. The band of bare forehead suggested a bald head, and he was handsome in a high-energy salesman kind of way. “Then again, if I’d known you were coming back to town, I might have held out a bit longer.”
“Excuse me?”
His smile was begrudging, but a little flirtatious. “I been watching you over the years. Times you came home after college. I just never thought you were back to stay.”
Stalking her? She searched her mind for a memory of this man, Cal Haney, but she couldn’t place him. Had he lived here fifteen years ago? She had plenty of questions, but she didn’t want to spend one more minute than necessary with this man.
“Come on, girls.” She put an arm around Penny’s shoulders and extended a hand toward Jessica. “Where’s your shirt, Jess?”
The girl lifted her chin toward the back railing. “It’s wet.”
“Put it on for now. We’ll get you dry clothes.”
“Yeah, I got to get going anyways,” Cal said. “Meeting some guys at The Dog. Business contacts.”
Ruth couldn’t imagine a legitimate deal transpiring over a pool table at the saloon, but she didn’t pick up on his bait. Besides, she made it a habit not to converse with men who stared intently at her breasts, as Haney was now doing.
The bastard.
He’d ruined a beautiful summer afternoon, and she had to wonder if he was the man who had ruined most of her high school years here in Prairie Creek.
“I’ll see you around,” he called after them.
She sure hoped not.
As she guided the girls back through the common field, the truth emerged. The girls had wanted water for the plants—a liberty Bev McFerron had apparently denied them.
“Grandma said we would get all muddy,” Penny admitted, her orange hair brilliant as a penny in the bright sun.
“So we went over to my aunt and uncle’s to get water for the plants. But Aunt Val wasn’t home. And Uncle Cal tricked us with the hose.” Jessica pulled her sopping shirt away from her belly. “Still soaking wet. I’m going to catch my death of cold.”
“Not in this weather,” Ruth said, “but we’re going to have to get a change of clothes for both of you before we head out for dinner.”
“Can we still go to the diner?” Penny begged, on the verge of tears.
“After you get changed. And before we eat, we’re going to have a talk about where you can and can’t go on your own.”
“Am I in trouble?” Penny asked. She prided herself on following the rules and doing the right thing.
“No, but we need to keep you out of trouble in the future,” Ruth said, patting her daughter’s shoulder. And out of danger.
“I won’t get in trouble because Cal is my uncle,” Jessica said. “I can go there any time I want.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you.” Ruth knew she would have to talk with Jessica’s parents about the new uncle. Just because someone was family did not mean they could be trusted.
“He was very mean,” Penny said. “I’m never going back there.”
“But it felt good to get sprayed, right?” Jessica prodded.
“At first. But then he wouldn’t stop.”
They loaded the flower bowls into the car, then Ruth marched the girls two blocks to Jessica’s house, knowing there’d be hell to pay if she brought two wet, muddy ones into her mother’s house. Jessica’s mother, Fiona, offered to supervise the cleanup and find something for Penny to wear while Ruth went back to her parents’ place. She could have said good-bye in a text, but the matter of Calvin Haney was too big to cover by cell phone.
She frowned at her father’s Oldsmobile, parked in the driveway. She had hoped to scoot out before he got home.
Her mother was in the kitchen, chopping onions. Dad, she suspected, was off in the den they used as an office.
“Where are the girls?” asked Bev.
“They were a little too messy to traipse through here. I found them playing with the hose.”
“Those little stinkers! I hope you sent Jessica straight home.”
“I took them to Jessica’s to get cleaned up.”
“You are too lenient with Penny.”
“It wasn’t entirely her fault.” She told her mother about the alarming exchange with Cal Haney. “It’s a little scary to think of him living down the street. There’s something off about him.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Years ago, he was in a bit of trouble. The sheriff kept questioning him about those missing girls. What were their names?”
“Rachel Byrd. Erin Higgins. Courtney Pearson.” The names were an indelible part of Ruth’s memory. “Was he involved in their disappearance?” she asked, trying to hide the fear she could feel rising in her throat.
“He was under suspicion for a while, but then it eventually blew over. When the girls stopped disappearing, they said the kidnapper moved on.”
“Who said that?”
“You know. People at church. That was such a sad thing. It just destroyed the Byrds, losing their daughter that way.”
Ruth shivered despite the heat of the kitchen.
“But Calvin Haney has turned over a new leaf. He’s a married man now, and that wildcat business is tough, but he did get one well that earned him enough to buy a house.”
A wildcatter. That explained the cowboy costume. Cal Haney seemed far too soft to be a ranch hand, but Ruthie knew that a Stetson hat, jeans, and boots did not a cowboy make.
“A house and a wife might make him seem respectable, but that man is morally off center. I’m going to tell Penny to stay away from him, even if he is Jessica’s uncle.”
Her father came into the kitchen and, after a short nod of acknowledgment, asked his wife about his calendar in early September. The Reverend Robert McFerron had never deigned to accept his youngest daughter as a peer, and at the age of thirty-one, Ruth was beginning to accept that he never would. Still, she stood her ground in conversation with him, which he frequently perceived as a challenge.
“Your father has been approached to preside over the Dillinger wedding,” Bev said in a futile attempt to bring them together in conversation.
“You mean Sabrina and Colton’s?” Ruth had heard talk of the gala wedding.
“Oh, did you know them, dear?” her mother asked.
Ruth shook her head. “I knew of him. His brother Tyler was in my class, but everyone in Prairie Creek is talking about it.” Sabrina Delaney, a local veterinarian, was engaged to marry Colton D
illinger, one of the heirs to a huge local cattle ranch. It was the sort of event that sucked up the resources of local bakers and florists and sent women driving to Jackson in search of a decent dress. She knew her father would be pleased to be rubbing elbows with the wealthy Dillingers. Many of the local churches would be happy to have Rob McFerron as a resident preacher if he could draw wealthy patrons to the collection plate. “That’s great, Dad. You must feel honored.”
“Actually, I’m not even sure I’m doing it. There’s a moral dilemma here. I’m not sure I want to have someone with the scant morals of Colton Dillinger in my congregation.”
“What?” Ruth paused, miffed by the fact that her father would accept a creep like Cal Haney but reject Colt Dillinger. “You’ve always liked the Dillingers.” Translation: sucked up to them. Dad liked the Kincaids too, though it was never an easy task to straddle the breach between those two rival clans. Still, for the promise of generous tithings, the Reverend Robert McFerron made the effort.
“It’s about Colton’s son, Rourke.” Bev swiped at her brow with the back of one hand. “You know. Born out of wedlock,” she whispered.
“Oh, really?” Ruth tried to keep her annoyance with her father’s rigid views out of her voice. “It’s a life, Dad. Isn’t that what you’re always campaigning for?”
“Not out of the sanctity of marriage.” Rob McFerron pursed his lips. “This puts me in a compromising position.”
“Because two people want to get married?”
“I can’t condone the sins of the past.”
“But, Dad, who are you to judge?”
“I am a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ, and don’t take that tone with me.”
“But—” Ruth had to stop herself from lashing out against her father, who had always enjoyed goading her into these infuriating conversations. “I’m just saying—I don’t know how old this Rourke kid is, but if he lives in this town, I hope you’re nice to him. None of this is his fault.”
“As if I’m ever anything but nice.” He took a long swallow of lemonade. “Now that we’ve heard from liberal California, what’s the plan for dinner, Bev? I’m leading the men’s Bible study at seven.”