by Dana Mentink
“No, you ninny,” she told herself. “Just the regular ebb and flow of lunchtime traffic heading to and from Big Pines.” A black SUV with tinted windows pulled up closer and passed. Fingers tight on the wheel, her gut began the “what if” game.
If Tucker had eluded the police and stolen a car…
If he was determined to snatch the one thing, the only thing left of LeeAnn…
If he found out about Aunt Viv and where she lived…
She fought down the stampeding thoughts and pressed the gas pedal a little harder.
Arriving some forty minutes later, Keeley parked a block from the house and sat, watching the cars drive by. Nothing unusual, no sign of anything out of the ordinary for a sleepy suburb.
Walking faster with each step, she made it to Aunt Viv’s, knocked once and let herself inside, calling out a greeting.
Four toddlers looked up from their snack of apple slices and milk, which Aunt Viv was busily dispensing.
One little face with round cheeks and heavy-lidded eyes made her heart skip.
“Where’s my June?” she called.
The little girl wriggled her short legs and flung an apple slice into the air in her excitement. She did not speak, but Keeley saw it all in her eyes.
“Hello, Mama,” those luminous blue eyes seemed to say. The copper Brushfield spots in her irises, a hallmark of Down syndrome, twinkled like stars in a sapphire sky.
With a heart full of both joy and sorrow, Keeley went to embrace her.
THREE
Mick did his afternoon chores at the sanctuary in spite of the pain. His body was tired, arms throbbing, ribs creaking, when he found himself at the kitchen table, sitting in front of a roast-beef sandwich for which he had no appetite. His father, Perry, joined him, wearing an old pair of sweats. Mick was glad his jacket hid the cut on his biceps. His father had endured a boatload of worry that started some twenty years ago when a child was abducted on their property. His sister, Ruby, had recently found evidence about the case that had nearly got her killed and Mick thrown in jail. But now Ruby was happily married to Cooper Stokes, and Perry was enjoying some well-deserved peace.
“Got the brush cleared?”
Mick nodded.
“Must be tired after your trip.” Perry raised an inquiring eyebrow as he sat down at the sturdy kitchen table.
“Drove into Silver Creek to take care of some old business.”
“Old business? Like Tucker Rivendale?”
Mick couldn’t imagine how his father knew, but the man had been a competent private eye in his day. Old habits died hard, and sometimes not at all. “Yeah. He’s still at large.”
“Did you find him?”
“Got away, but LeeAnn’s sister is safe.” It hurt to say her name. “Cops are all over it. They want me out of the way.”
Perry sipped some water he’d poured for himself. “Think he’ll come back?”
“He’d be a fool to do that. Cops don’t think he will.”
“What does your gut tell you?”
Mick sighed. “Can’t trust my gut anymore, Dad.”
“You made a mistake.”
Mick got up and stalked to the window, bracing his palms on the kitchen sink. Justice and judgment, two of the most critical leadership traits drilled in as he was molded into a marine. He’d failed at both.
And at being a husband, to complete the list.
“It was more than a small error in judgment. I believed that Tucker was on the straight and narrow, that his days of jacking cars and conning people were over. I knew deep down he wasn’t prone to violence. My gut told me I could trust him, and I convinced the parole board to release him from house arrest. I was wrong. Dead wrong.”
“Too much blame for one man.” His father walked over and put his glass in the sink. He gripped his son’s shoulder. “Things are quiet around here for the next month. If you need to get away, do it.”
“I’m okay.” He sighed. “What’s the smart thing to do, Dad?”
“Stay out of it, just like the cops said.”
They locked gazes. But it won’t bring you peace, his father’s eyes added.
Perry gave Mick a final pat. When had his father’s hands gotten so old and gnarled? Perhaps twenty years of repressed fear about what had happened to the child abducted from their property had accelerated the aging process. Mick would swallow glass before he added any more grief to his father’s plate.
“And if you need my help in any way, ask.”
“I will.”
When he’d gone, Mick stared out at the forest that pressed in all around the old house. He wanted to run outside, deep into the woods, and lose himself in the pungent scent of pine and the comforting presence of birds overhead, but he forced himself to remain.
It took him an hour of pacing to make the decision. He scrawled a note on a torn piece of paper and put it under the coffeepot.
Be away for a few days. I’ll call you tonight. Kiss Ruby for me.
He tossed a bag in the bed of the pickup and started the long drive back to Silver Creek. When he stopped for gas, he listened to a message on his phone.
“You’re not answering, which means you’re driving back to Silver Creek. I decided to take a couple of days off and do a little fishing. I’m staying at a buddy’s cabin about six miles out of town on Wexler Road. Got a couch for you if you want it. Stay out of trouble.”
Mick chuckled as he drove to the cabin. A little fishing? Reggie Donaldson was a near-professional bowler and an excellent marksman, but an outdoorsy type he wasn’t. Mick knew that Reggie was also a guy who didn’t let things go, and Tucker Rivendale had made a mistake attacking Reggie when he’d tried to arrest him. Mick was grateful. With Reggie’s connections, they might be able to help the police lay their hands on the kid before he did any more harm.
Mick still wondered why Tucker had come back and what he’d said to Keeley that she refused to tell the police. Thoughts tumbled around in his mind until he arrived at the small wood-sided cabin. Reggie opened the door, soda and pepperoni-pizza slice in hand.
“’Bout time. What’d you do, crawl?”
Mick stepped inside. He almost let a surprised grunt escape his mouth when he saw his friend.
From under the ragged fringe of black bangs, where Reggie’s left eye had been there was now a sunken spot, the eyelid shriveled around the gap. He saw Mick’s expression and pulled the patch down over his eye. “Gets hot under there. Got to let it air sometimes.”
Mick recovered his composure. “I knew Tucker injured you when you tried to collar him. I didn’t realize…”
“Me, neither,” Reggie said, retrieving another slice of pizza from the box and handing it to Mick. “When we scuffled, he gouged me in the eye with his pocketknife. Wound didn’t heal. Infection got down in deep until there was no way to fix it.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not half as sorry as Tucker’s going to be when I catch up to him.” Reggie’s good eye glittered. “You know what they say,” he said, voice soft and dangerous, “about an eye for an eye.”
Mick had never realized how powerful his need for vengeance was until he saw his anger reflected in Reggie’s good eye. Mick had not lost his vision, but Tucker had taken a part of him just the same. Forgiveness was not, nor would ever be an option, in spite of what his sister’s well-meaning church pastor had told him.
Sorry, God. This one isn’t worth forgiving.
Mick tried to pull his emotions in check. “Haven’t seen you in a while. How’s Nadine?”
Reggie sighed. “She left me.”
“Again?”
“It’s going on six months this time,” he said, wiping his mouth. “She’s playing hardball, threatened a divorce and everything, but I’m making progress. After this adventure, I’m going to book us a cruise.”
Mick chuckled. “Might want to check with Nadine before you put your money down.”
“She’ll come around. She always does. I just h
ave to apply some grease to the skids.”
“Seems as though you greased the skids last time she left you. You bought her diamonds, didn’t you?”
He lifted a shoulder. “Turns out they really aren’t a girl’s best friend, because she insisted I return them before she let me back in the house. The cruise will be better. Quality time and all that.”
Mick figured he certainly had no better ideas where women were concerned, so he stayed quiet.
Reggie extracted a bunch of papers from a portfolio and slid them onto a banged-up coffee table with one corner missing. “The old paperwork. Trying to find some leads about where Tucker might crash, if he’s got any friends or such-like.”
“Did you find anything?”
“Yeah, I’m chasing that down. In the meantime, there’s something here you should see, something I dug up about the sister.”
“LeeAnn?”
“Yeah. A little tidbit that might explain why Tucker’s come to call.”
Mick felt a cold hand grasp at his heart as he took the papers from Reggie. “Am I going to like this?”
Reggie didn’t smile this time. “Read it, Mick.”
*
Keeley spent the day playing with June, relishing every word the three-year-old said and the ones Keeley imagined she was thinking. June didn’t say more than a few words due to speech delays, but each one was precious, like the biblical apples of gold. The best thing for June’s speech development turned out to be Cornelius, Aunt Viv’s parrot. The plucky African gray eyed June with curiosity and called her “Junie Jo” in an exact imitation of Aunt Viv. Cornelius would sometimes infuriate June by commanding her to sit in the time-out chair. Today he was singing “Yankee Doodle” to the delight of the toddlers.
Late in the afternoon when the other three children had been picked up by their parents, Aunt Viv finally plopped down onto the sofa, her slim hips jostling the cushions and setting June into gales of laughter.
“She said coffee today,” Aunt Viv said with a laugh. “I let her pour some creamer into my cup and it went everywhere, so now she says, ‘coffee, oops!’” Viv stroked one of June’s soft blond pigtails as the child examined the pages of the book Keeley had brought.
“How did the OT go?”
June had worked with Mrs. B., her occupational therapist, since before she was old enough to walk.
“She’s trying hard to pedal that tricycle. Almost there.” Viv looked Keeley over. “I’ll say it again. If you want to live here, I’ve got a closet-size extra room with your name on it. Not the Ritz, but clean, more or less.”
Keeley shot her a look. “Why are you bringing it up?”
“You’ve got that worried ‘my paycheck might not be enough to get us to the end of the month’ look on your face.”
Keeley turned the page, and June leaned her head against Keeley’s side. There was nothing more she’d like than to spend every moment with June. When LeeAnn gave birth, Keeley had been there through it all: the shock of finding out the baby had Down syndrome, the denial, anger and grief that followed. Keeley had paced miles around that small hospital room, each step bringing her deeper and deeper in love with her precious niece, those wondrous eyes with the beautiful flecks, the most perfect tiny mouth. Little did she know then that her role would change from auntie to mother when June was only a year and a half.
Tucker hadn’t wanted the baby, had urged LeeAnn to get rid of it and then promptly gotten himself into trouble with the law for stealing a car. A devastated LeeAnn had moved away to live with their mother in Colorado, never letting Tucker know she’d had their baby.
“Don’t tell him,” she’d begged. “Ever. He doesn’t want her, and she shouldn’t know her father is a criminal. Promise.”
Promise. The entreaty still rang in her ears. Even when LeeAnn had moved back to Oregon and she and Tucker had patched things up, LeeAnn had not told him the truth, leading him to believe June was Keeley’s. She’d waited and waited, to be sure Tucker was on the straight and narrow. She’d died still waiting. And now? Did Tucker have an idea? Had he figured out the truth about June?
I want what’s mine…
She pulled June closer. The little girl discarded the book and climbed onto Keeley’s lap, laying her plump cheek on Keeley’s chest.
“I have to make a life for us, Aunt Viv,” she said, rubbing circles on June’s back. “I need to get my business established, and I can’t take June with me on the shoots. By summer, if I take every job I can get my hands on, I’ll be able to hire someone reliable to watch her while I’m working until she’s ready to start the prekindergarten program.”
Just the thought of it made little flutters roil through her stomach. Would the public school understand a special-needs child? Could they see past the label to the amazing, exquisite person underneath? Would she be teased and tormented by the other children?
“Just remember, it’s an option if things get too hairy.” Aunt Viv reached out her arms. “Give that little sweetie pie to me. She’s sound asleep. I’ll put her down for a nap.”
Keeley smiled. She knew that meant Viv would lie down next to her and take a snooze, as well. Aunt Viv earned every moment of her rest time. The energetic fifty-five-year-old tended to four rambunctious preschoolers in her at home day care setting and toted June to her various appointments when Keeley was working. Since she’d retired from being an emergency room nurse when she’d moved to Colorado the year before, June had become her full-time work.
“I’ll put some chicken in the oven for dinner,” Keeley said.
“I won’t be noble. You can cook for me anytime.” She disappeared down the hallway, her long black braid trailing behind her.
After the chicken was seasoned with olive oil, a squeeze of lemon and a generous handful of crushed garlic, it went into the oven to bake. Keeley began gathering up the toys June and her friends had scattered about the playroom and swept and mopped the kitchen floor. Her phone indicated an email.
It was a request from a magazine she’d queried in the past. Short notice, but can you photograph the Quaker parrots? Our guy dropped out and we need it for a midnight deadline. Fred. Her pulse kicked up a notch. If she could deliver, it might mean steady work with Bird’s Away Magazine.
Hurriedly, she emailed her acceptance and checked her phone. Four o’clock. She’d have just enough time to drive to the industrial part of town the colony of feral parrots called home and take some pictures before sunset.
She tiptoed into the bedroom and found Aunt Viv snoring softly. June was rolled into a ball sleeping next to her. Something warm and soft settled into Keeley’s heart.
“Thank You, God,” she said for the millionth time. Nothing would ease the pain of what Tucker had done to LeeAnn, but there was June, sweet June. Each word she spoke was balm to Keeley’s broken heart, every boisterous laugh salve to the pain.
Keeley knew that every job brought her closer to being the mommy that LeeAnn would have wanted for her precious child. Keeley closed the door quietly. She packed up her gear while the chicken finished cooking, and left it cooling on the counter with a note.
“Job! Wild parrots. Back in a couple of hours. Save me some chicken. K.”
She sent a text to John, telling him she would not volunteer at the clinic that evening. It gave her a sense of relief, she was ashamed to admit. She’d taken over LeeAnn’s volunteer role of tending to the wild birds John rescued. LeeAnn had loved the birds so much, but being around John meant Keeley would feel both his pain as well as her own. It was too much.
She tiptoed out the door and hustled to her Jeep, stopping short as she saw Mick Hudson leaning on her front bumper. He straightened as he saw her approach.
Her stomach somersaulted. How had he known to find her here? She forced a calm pace until she reached him.
“I thought you’d left town,” she said.
“Came back.” His gaze made her squirm, as if he knew all her secrets.
“What do you want?”
Her cheeks burned. “Things happened fast. I can’t really recall exactly…”
“Do you have reason to think Tucker knows the child is his?”
The words sucked the breath right out of her, and cold gripped her body. She tried to go around him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He put a hand on her shoulder, heavy, strong.
“Yes, you do. The little girl your sister gave birth to. Tucker’s the father, isn’t he?”
“Who do you think you are?” she said, fear sparked into anger as she yanked out of his grip. “Coming into my life and spouting accusations and prying into private information that you have no right to. June is mine, I’m her legal guardian and her biological father is none of your business.”
“It’s Tucker’s business. He’s come back to take her and punish you.”
Coming for you.
Ice spread throughout her body. “June is my daughter.”
“You need to tell the police.”
“Tucker’s gone. He’s taken off.”
“Sure about that?”
The flat brown eyes, the arms folded across the broad chest infuriated her. “You have no right to interfere. You’re not a cop.”
“I’m trying to help.”
“The time to help was when Tucker should have been under house arrest. You helped then, didn’t you? You made sure he was a free man, and then he killed my sister.” The wide river of anger flowed out of her and caused him to flinch. He looked away. She would not, could not, stop. “The one thing I want more than anything else in this world is my sister back, but you can’t help with that, can you?” Her throat thickened.
“I…don’t want to cause you any more pain.”
“Then go away.”
He bent down and picked up a penny-size round bead. “This looks important.”
How did he know that black bead was super important to a certain little girl? “It belongs to Junie’s toy cow, Mr. Moo Moo.” She quickly snatched the bead and stashed it in her pocket. “Thank you,” she managed.