“It’s okay. She’s up. What’s going on?” Obiwan dashed past her to the kitchen and his food dish and Andrew looked around the room for Rebecca.
“Where is she?”
“She’s in the bathroom. What’s got you all in a dither?”
“The vandal did it again!”
“What? What happened?”
“Eliseo found it. He and Doug and Billy and Jason are cleaning it up right now.”
“What did he find?”
“They got someone’s trash and dumped it all along the backyard by the tree line. Eliseo said not to worry about it, though. They’re wearing gloves.”
Polly ran through the house to the back window. Sure enough, the boys were out there with garbage bags. This just made her sick to her stomach. She rapped on the window, but they couldn’t hear her.
“You stay here. I’ll be back. When Rebecca comes out of the bathroom, tell her we’ll get breakfast in a minute.”
Polly ran downstairs and out through the garage. Eliseo looked up when he saw her come across the yard. “I told Andrew you shouldn’t worry. It will only take a few minutes to clean up.”
“How bad was it?”
“It’s gross,” Jason said. “Eliseo thinks it’s from Joe’s Diner.”
Polly took her phone out and photographed the remaining mess, as well as the three of them doing the cleanup. “Thank you for cleaning this up,” she said. “Doug, pizza is on me tonight.”
“Cool! No worries. You do enough for us.”
“Polly, we’ve got this,” Eliseo said. “Don’t worry.”
“It’s just so weird,” she said. “There’s no sense behind it.”
“You’re right, it makes no sense, but go on upstairs and take care of the kids. I’ve got Jason today. We’re going to spend time hitching the horses to the wagon since it’s a beautiful day. Jason is ready to learn.”
“Thanks, Eliseo. I owe you.”
He shook his head as she turned around and went back inside. The laundry was ready to be dealt with, so she tossed another load in and folded the towels Rebecca had brought from their house, setting them in another bag.
When she got back upstairs, Andrew and Rebecca had moved the air bed into her room, and put it up against a wall so it was out of the way. They were on the couch watching cartoons.
“Are you calling the police?” Andrew asked. “Will the Chief come over this morning?”
“I’ll call them and see what he wants to do, but since it’s garbage, I suspect he won’t bother with it. What would you two like for breakfast?”
Andrew turned to Rebecca, who shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said.
“Then it will be salad and tomato juice,” Polly announced and walked into the kitchen.
She opened the refrigerator and pulled out bacon and milk, then chuckled when she heard Andrew say, “She’s kidding. I promise.”
“Pancakes and bacon?” she called back into the living room.
Even Rebecca giggled at that.
Polly opened the email app on her phone to see if something had come in from the vandal. Sure enough there was something new from igotyou.
You’re trash, pretty girl. He’ll see.
That was a new take on the whole thing. Polly flipped the pancakes on the griddle. What if this wasn’t about her, but about Henry? All along she’d been trying to come up with people who might hate her. What if they’d been looking at it all wrong?
She called the police station and asked when Ken Wallers would be on duty again. The dispatcher told her that he’d contact Ken and have him call her.
“Are you ready?” Polly asked and put the pancakes and bacon on the dining room table. The kids ran over and sat down. “I’m going to keep making pancakes until you can’t take it anymore,” she said. “Don’t stop until you’re stuffed.”
When they slowed down, she turned off the griddle and joined them, finishing what was left on the platter. They’d left her a few slices of bacon and she nonchalantly reached over and rubbed Andrew’s back. “Do you want to take Rebecca downstairs to your nook under the stairs while I clean up? Make sure you take your coats. We’ll leave from there.”
Andrew jumped out of his seat, but stopped before dashing away and looked at the table.
“I’ve got it, Andrew,” Polly said. “You go, I’ll clean up.”
“Thanks Polly. Come on Rebecca!” He took her hand grabbed both coats, and pulled her through the bedroom. They were giggling as they hit the back steps.
“I love having that kid around,” Polly said to Obiwan. He put his head on her lap, pleading in his eyes. “No, you beggar-butt. This last piece of bacon is mine.” She started to put it in her mouth and sighed, then broke off two little pieces and dropped the bigger piece on the floor in front of Obiwan. The other two she offered to the cats. Being the tough mama wasn’t easy.
Once the kitchen was clean and the dishes were in the dishwasher, Polly snagged a jacket and scooped up the laundry to head downstairs. The kids were looking at some of Andrew’s books, so she folded another load and got more started.
“Are you ready to go?” she asked.
“Andrew has really cool books,” Rebecca said. “He says I can borrow some.”
“Do you have a library card?” Andrew asked. “We should go sometime.”
Rebecca looked down at her shoes. “No.”
“Can we get her a library card?” He looked up at Polly.
“I will talk to her mother about it and then I will talk to Mrs. Mikkels. I think that would be a terrific idea. Now, let’s go over to Henry’s job site and see what he’s up to before we go to Boone.”
The three of them climbed into Polly’s truck. When she backed out of the garage, she turned to look at the back yard, but everyone was gone. It hadn’t taken that long to clean up the mess and she was thankful, but she became infuriated once again when the garage door came back down and she saw the red spray paint.
“What’s that?” Rebecca gasped.
“That’s someone’s idea of a really bad prank,” Polly spat.
“Who would do that?” she asked.
“I have no idea, but when I find out, I’m going to make them clean it up with a toothbrush.”
“That would take forever.”
“Uh huh.” The sight put Polly in a bad mood and she needed to shake it, so she took a deep breath and drove. It didn’t take long for them to get to the job site. Henry’s truck was parked in front of the trailer along with several other vehicles.
“Where did you find the body?” Andrew asked.
Polly gave a general nod toward the pile of brush.
“Can we go look.”
“No!” she said sharply, then said more gently, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I don’t think either of your mothers would want you to be focused on where a man was found dead.”
“But it’s cool!” Andrew said.
Polly gave him her best firm-mommy look. “It’s not cool.”
“It’s kind of cool,” Rebecca smiled and said softly. “You’re pretty cool.”
“Come on. Let’s see what’s going on here.”
“Can’t we at least go over and look? What if we saw something the police missed?” Andrew pleaded.
It wasn’t as if the police would have left any clues lying around and it wasn’t as if the kids could mess anything up. Polly nodded. “Don’t go into the trees and if I stick my head out of the trailer and don’t see you, you’ll be in trouble. Got it?”
“Thanks!” They ran over to the brush pile and began lifting branches off and setting them to the side.
Polly knocked on the door to the trailer and then whipped around when she heard tires screeching down the street. A red sports car spun into the lot and pulled to a stop beside her truck. Annalise Stephens got out and ran to the driver’s side to wait for a young man to emerge. She was laughing and flirty and Polly wondered who in the world she was with.
Henry came out of the trai
ler, followed by J. J., Ryan, and Patrick. Henry’s father came down the steps and one more man that Polly didn’t recognize also came out. She tried to ignore the images she had of a clown car erupting.
“Hi Polly, what’s up?”
“I wanted to come over and see what you were doing here today. I didn’t expect to interrupt a big meeting.”
“We were just going over last minute changes before Monday morning. Have you met Wayne Phillips?” Henry nodded toward the stranger from the trailer.
She put her hand out and the stocky blond man shook it. “Nice to meet you, ma’am.”
Patrick had gone over to greet his wife, who ignored him, dancing around the young man who had been driving the car.
“Who’s that?” she asked quietly.
Wayne Phillips answered in a low whisper, “Her brother, Simon. He’s decided to be part of this little enterprise.” He shook his head. “There isn’t enough money to support so many people, especially when no one is willing to work.”
“When did he come into town?” Polly asked.
“It’s been a week or so. They were here looking over the vines and making plans. I think he read a few websites and went to a couple of other Iowa wineries and decided that he was an expert. Bruce and I had to kick them out of the laboratory.” Wayne sounded frustrated.
The building which housed the heart of the winery was a simple structure, tucked behind the trees. It had been erected several years ago, far enough from the site of the lodge to be out of sight. She glanced down the dirt road leading to that building. One of these days she was going to have to spend more time interrogating Sheriff Merritt. This was driving her crazy.
Andrew and Rebecca had come up behind them. “There isn’t anything there,” Andrew said. “Not even any blood. I thought there would be a lot of blood.”
Wayne looked down at the kids. J. J. and Ryan were standing by the front of the trailer and they had heard the comments as well. Both of them smiled at Polly and then turned back to the entertainment provided by Annalise and her brother.
“But we want to see the plans for the lodge,” she whined. “Simon has ideas on how to make it better. I told him what you were thinking and he said that there needs to be more than one tasting room. If he’s going to be part of this, he gets a say in it.”
Polly looked up at Henry with a grin. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “Come on,” he said. “Let them deal with this. All I have to do is build what they tell me to build.” He led her to the back of the trailer. When they were out of sight of most of the group, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her.
“I missed that,” he said.
“Me too!”
“Somebody dumped trash all over Polly’s back yard,” Andrew came running around the corner, pulling Rebecca by the hand.
Henry squeezed her close and said, “They did what?”
“The vandal struck again, but this time they didn’t tell me first. I got the email this morning and I think it’s something you and I need to talk about.”
“What do you mean?”
“Because I think it’s someone from your life, not mine.”
Henry’s face lost all of its color and he leaned against the trailer. “Someone I know is doing this? How is that possible?”
Polly opened her phone and showed him the message. “They want you to know that I’m trash.”
“Polly, I promise you, I have no idea who this could be.”
“I know that. But it kind of changes how we look at this.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Stop it, Henry. That’s not why I showed this to you. I want you to start thinking about it from a different perspective.”
“That just makes me sick. I don’t know anyone who’d want to hurt you.”
“Henry. Maybe it’s someone who is trying to get to you. We’ll talk about it later. I’m not worried. So far it’s only been minor damage. It makes me mad, but it hasn’t hurt me. And who knows, maybe he’ll go away again. The last time he pulled a couple of stunts and then was quiet for several months. Don’t panic, okay?”
“It’s not okay. It’s not okay at all. Have you told Ken?”
“He’s going to call me later. Please calm down about this. We’ll work it out. That’s what we do, right?” Polly thought it was ironic that now things were on the other foot, she was the one taking care of Henry. He was usually her rock.
“Yes. That’s what we do,” he said.
She looked down at the two kids who were watching them closely. “You two go get in the truck. We’re going to leave pretty soon.”
“You want to kiss him again, don’t you,” Andrew said.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I do. Now scoot.” Polly waved them away and waited until they rounded the trailer. Then she leaned in and kissed Henry. “It’s going to be okay. I promise.”
“I just got really angry,” he said.
“I understand that. I’ve been really angry about this several times. But you have things to do today and anger isn’t very productive.”
“Can I be really angry later?” He gave her a weak grin.
“Sure. We’ll deal with it later.”
“What are you three up to today?” Henry took her arm and they walked back around the trailer.
Polly was about to say something when she looked up and saw Annalise Stephens throwing a tantrum. Her face was red and she was stamping her feet while Patrick tried to placate her. Simon was standing with his arms crossed, looking furious, while J. J. had an immense grin on his face. Ryan Williams had settled down on one of the steps of the trailer with his head in his hands and Wayne Phillips was pacing.
“What happened?” Henry asked his dad, who was still standing by the trailer watching the action.
“The little vixen couldn’t talk her husband into changing the plans. That brother of hers is madder than a wet hen that he doesn’t get to play with the big boys and these other two are waiting for things to get back to normal. They act like this is nothing new.”
“Well, this is going to make for an exciting job site.”
“Don’t you worry, son. As soon as she gets her mind set on something else, you’ll never see her again. And that young man is going to take whatever money he can get his hands on and run off to something more exciting. You won’t see much of them after this weekend. I guarantee it.”
“I hope you’re right. If you’re wrong, you get to come out and manage this thing.”
“I’m never wrong about people.”
Henry patted his dad on the shoulder. “That’s true,” he laughed.
He took Polly’s hand and walked with her to the truck. “What are you doing this morning?”
“We’re going to see Rebecca’s mother. Then after I take the kids to the bookstore, we’ll find some lunch. Call me later?”
“You bet. Drive safely.” He gave her a quick kiss and held the door as she got into the truck.
Polly drove around the parked cars and the trailer and then away from the job site.
“She was really mad,” Andrew said. “She screams a lot.”
“Yes she does. We all need to take some deep breaths and not think about it anymore. Okay?”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Henry hadn’t said much when Polly rushed the kids into her truck. She’d intended to spend a little more time at the job site, but Annalise’s tantrum had caused Polly to focus on only one thing - escape. They drove into Boone and she headed for the hospital, hoping that Sarah Heater would be alert enough to see her daughter. She parked the truck and led the children inside. Sarah had been moved to a room and Polly took Rebecca’s hand.
“Your mom is going to probably be hooked up to machines that put medicine and fluids in her body. It might be a little frightening, but all of this is going to make her better, okay?”
Rebecca nodded and clutched Polly’s hand tightly.
“What about me, Polly? Where should I go?” Andrew asked.
“Do you have
your book?”
“Right here!” He brandished a well-worn book. “I never go anywhere without one.”
“Why don’t you sit here in the waiting room and read. We’re going to be right around the corner.”
Andrew sat down on one chair and then moved to another. “This is more comfortable,” he announced.
“Good. Let’s go find your mom, Rebecca.”
Polly pushed the door open to the hospital room and led the little girl in. Sarah’s eyes were closed and she looked just as awful as Polly imagined. There were bags of clear liquid hanging and dripping into a line leading to the woman’s arm and other machines were beeping and whistling.
“Sarah?” Polly asked quietly.
The woman lifted her eyes and tried to smile when she saw her daughter. “You came. Thank you.”
Rebecca hung back until Polly stepped behind her and gave her a gentle push.
“Rebecca, come here. I want to hold your hand.”
“Mom!” The girl let out a cry and rushed forward, then dropped her head onto her mother’s stomach. She lurched back up, “I’m sorry. Did I hurt you?”
“No, Rebecca. You didn’t hurt me. I’m just sick.”
“Are you going to get better?”
Sarah Heater took a deep breath and looked at Polly, tears filling her eyes. Polly felt her knees get weak. This wasn’t a simple flu. Something was desperately wrong with the woman.
“Mom? What’s wrong?” Rebecca looked at her mother and then back at Polly. “What’s wrong?”
“Would you like me to step out?” Polly asked quietly.
“No. Right now you are the only person I know who has shown us any compassion. This isn’t easy.”
“Mom!” Rebecca cried out. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
“Sit here on the bed beside me,” Sarah said. “I need to talk to you and I need you to be strong and listen to everything I have to say. Can you do that?”
Sarah moved a little to the side, making room for her daughter. Rebecca hopped up on the bed beside her and then took her hand again and put it in her lap.
“Polly, would you sit here, please?” Sarah asked, pointing at the chair beside the bed.
Diane Greenwood Muir - Bellingwood 06 - A Season of Change Page 11