“How long will this take?” she asked, not looking happy about the whole thing, or perhaps just her part in it.
“Five minutes tops,” he said.
“Then you’ll leave the poor man alone?”
“I’ll have no cause to bother him if he’s done nothing wrong,” he assured her. “And if it turns out he’s Sam Winston, hell, I’ll be the first to welcome him back from the grave.”
“For goodness’ sake! The things that come out of your mouth.” Gretchen’s face looked pinched, and she seemed about to turn him away.
Although she had to know it wouldn’t have done any good. Frank Tilby had been a small-town sheriff for twenty years, ever since his election to the post after his dad had retired his badge. So he was rarely deterred by a door in the face. Like sweet ants in the summertime, he’d just keep coming back. That was his M.O., always had been.
“Made up your mind?” He shifted on his feet, wishing he could scratch his back as perspiration slid down his spine.
“As if I have a choice.” Gretchen sighed. “Just be quick about it.” She waved him inside.
He nodded, telling her as he entered, “The boys are making good progress on the oak. They should at least have enough of it cut by later this afternoon so a car could get in or out.”
“Terrific,” she said, hardly sounding like she meant it.
Frank tried not to think that she might actually enjoy being stranded out here with a man who reminded her of an old flame.
“Oh, hey, and the power company’s arrived, too,” he went on as he followed her into the kitchen. “They’re aiming to fix the broken cables by day’s end. Although”—he hesitated as he glanced up at the brass fixture, its bulbs abruptly flickering—“I’m not sure that’ll make much of a difference since you seem to be powered by magic.”
“What about the phone company?” Gretchen asked. “Will they repair the line?”
“They should be on their way.” The sheriff stepped around the oak table. “Is it okay if I set up shop?”
“Just don’t get black powder all over everything.”
He laughed. “You’ve seen too many bad movies, young lady. I’m not going to dust for prints. I’ll just be using my neat little ink pad. A two-year-old could do it.”
“A two-year-old, huh? Well, in that case,” she said, giving him a look.
He ignored her sarcasm because she’d been giving him guff since they were teenagers. He liked to tell himself it was her way of keeping a safe distance between them.
“Can you fetch Sam Winston’s ghost for me, then? The sooner I do this, the quicker I’m out of here,” the sheriff said, plucking his hat from beneath his arm and catching it on the back side of a chair. He set down his field kit before running a hand over his sweaty pompadour. “That’s assuming he’s still around. He hasn’t taken off, has he?”
“No. He’s still here.” Gretchen had sent him upstairs with Abby, suggesting her daughter show him around the farmhouse. “I’ll go get him,” she offered, but she made no move to leave.
Despite her irritation, Frank could tell she was anxious. He imagined she was chomping at the bit to get the dirt on whether or not the prodigal Sam had returned. What if her mysterious houseguest didn’t recall who he was for weeks or even months? What if no one came looking for him, and they never really knew for sure if he was a soul come back to life or a con man with Sam’s gray eyes?
Frank only hoped she understood that his solution was the most logical one, and all he had to do was take some prints then run them through the computer to find a match. If all went well, they’d be able to identify the man in a virtual snap.
“It’ll be okay. Trust me,” Frank said and reached for Gretchen’s hand, giving it a damp squeeze. “You don’t have to look so petrified. It’ll be utterly painless,” he added, assuming that was the cause of her hesitation. Though why she was so concerned with offending a stranger who was taking advantage of her kindness, he wasn’t sure.
She tugged her fingers from his grasp.
“Give me five minutes,” she said, leaving the sheriff alone to wonder about the look he’d seen in Gretchen’s eyes. It was as if the woman was letting herself get attached to this guy.
“Nearly forty years gone, and he suddenly comes back,” Frank murmured to himself. “If he’s really Sam Winston, I’ll eat my hat.”
Fifteen
Gretchen smoothed her blouse, steadying her nerves, before she headed up the stairs. She skimmed her palm along the well-worn banister, remembering how it had felt to move in with Sam’s parents when she was pregnant with Abby, once Annika had forced her out after chastising her repeatedly for being a disappointment and a dreadful example to her younger sisters.
Gretchen had felt nothing but welcome living under the Winstons’ roof. Lily and Coop had treated her as kin from the moment they’d agreed to take her in. It was a magical time in so many ways, despite the worry. Sunshine had spilled through the windows most every morning, and each breath she took smelled as crisp and fresh as summer grass. Lily and Cooper Winston had inherited the farm from Lily’s parents, had added on to the tiny house, had hoped that someday Sam and his wife would make their home inside these walls, too.
But once that pastor had told them, “I’m sorry, Sam is missing and believed dead,” everything had changed and there was no going back. Gretchen had stayed that night with the Winstons, sleeping on the daybed in the tiny sunroom, awakening in the dark to the crash of thunder and lightning. A fierce storm had whipped through the farm with such anger that it had decimated the walnut grove. Lily described peering out the window and seeing walnuts raining from the sky. Gretchen had gone out with Cooper the next morning to find the ground littered with green hulls. The winds had sheared the leaves from every branch, and the walnut trees had never borne fruit again.
Like the trees, something in Lily and Cooper had died that day as well. Their hearts profoundly broken, their health had swiftly declined, Lily suffering chest pains and Cooper uncontrollably high blood pressure. The only thing that seemed to keep them going was knowing there was a grandchild on the way, and both held on long enough to see Abby’s birth. But before Abigail had turned one, Lily and Cooper Winston were gone, passing in their sleep, Lily just two days after her husband. “Heart failure,” the town’s doctor, who was also the coroner, had decreed. Gretchen figured that was about as good a way to describe it as any.
Because Lily and Cooper had no one else close, they had deeded the house and the farm to Gretchen and Abby, lock, stock, and barrel. Not long after, Annika showed up on the porch with Bennie, Trudy, and two suitcases and a few boxes. “Your father deserted me and so did you, the day you showed up pregnant,” she’d announced. “Now that you’re a mother, you’ll be stuck here in the middle of nowhere until the child is grown. You might as well tend to your own sisters, too, while I go do what I’ve always wanted. I’d say it’s high time I lived life for myself.” With that, Annika had left the twins and headed to an artists’ colony in Key West. Gretchen had never heard from her again. Perhaps even worse, she did not miss her.
Her father no longer kept in touch either, having replaced his family long ago once he’d married Miss Childs and she’d given him three new daughters. He’d had a thriving veterinary practice in Bozeman, Montana, according to a Christmas newsletter from years and years before, though Gretchen imagined he was probably retired by now. Perhaps even deceased. It was strange, she thought, how sometimes blood mattered less when it came to family than who loved you enough to stick around.
“ . . . yes, those arrowheads belonged to Sam Winston, and the feathers and the geodes. You can hold them if you’d like. I used to believe they had special powers, like they could transport me to somewhere else. Maybe they’ll spark your memories if you let them . . .”
As she stepped up to the second floor landing, Gretchen could hear Abby’s animated voice, telling the Man Who Might Be Sam about various objects cluttering her old room—once Sa
m’s room—that she’d never been able to part with.
“ . . . I love the finger paintings that Sam did in grade school. They’re really quite good and the use of color is amazing . . .”
Gretchen hung back, listening to the warm tones of the man’s voice as he turned the focus to Abby, inquiring about her work and her own ambitions. Abby was soon rattling on about the gallery in Chicago and a series of acrylics she’d started, all scenes that related to rain.
“It’s symbolic of our emotions, don’t you think?” she was saying. “How we can be mad one moment, our hearts rumbling like thunder, a storm raging inside, and, with one kind word or a gentle touch, it can all blow over in a second. The next thing we know, the sky has cleared, our pulse downshifts, and we feel like we’re given a clean slate to start again. Even the drops of rain left behind sparkle in the sun like diamonds.”
“Water’s worth more than currency in some places,” Gretchen heard the man remark. “People fight over it, die for it.”
“Is that something you remember? Being in a war zone?” Abby asked as Gretchen quietly approached the half-opened door, hanging outside to hear his answer.
“What I do recall seems more like random thoughts and ideas than anything concrete,” he answered. “There’s no rhyme or reason. They seem to come and go at will.”
“Maybe some of those thoughts will be about your past,” Abby suggested. “Maybe your brain is working to put the pieces together.”
“We’ll see about that.”
Gretchen took that opportunity to knock, pushing wide the door and announcing herself with a “Hey, you two, I need you downstairs, okay? Sheriff Tilby has to get something from—” She paused and looked straight at him. She had nearly called him “Sam.”
“Me,” the man filled in for her and rubbed at the back of his neck. “What could I have that he wants?”
Gretchen noticed then that the swelling on his brow was even less than it had been that morning. What was once a purple goose egg now appeared as a smaller pink bump. He certainly appeared to heal very quickly.
“The sheriff’s here for your fingerprints,” Gretchen said point-blank, avoiding any whitewash. With Frank Tilby downstairs waiting, there was no way around it besides. “He’d like to help figure out who you are.”
The man cocked his head, eyes narrowed. “You sure he’s not back to arrest me, maybe for trespassing or loitering? Just to keep me away from you?”
At that, Abby snorted. “He can’t arrest you for being somewhere you’re wanted, and we want you here with us. So he’s got no cause.”
“I appreciate that,” the Man Who Might Be Sam said and touched Abby’s arm.
The way Abby looked at him with such hope in her face made Gretchen’s heart hurt. What would Abby do if the truth wasn’t what she’d dreamed? What if this man wasn’t Sam after all? On the other hand, what if he was and what if he soon recalled enough to explain to Abs that he’d had no part at all in creating her?
Either way, it would be a blow. Abby would be furious with Gretchen for lying to her, and Gretchen would risk losing Sam again as well.
“Come on,” Abby said, tugging at the man’s arm. “Let’s get this over with. Think of it as pulling off a Band-Aid. It hurts more if you do it slowly. It’s quicker and less painful if you just yank.”
“Yank, don’t pull. Got it,” the fellow repeated. And though he still appeared guarded, the hard look on his face softened slightly. “This may be the only way to get to the bottom of things. If there’s anything I’ve done that I should regret, it’s best to find out now.”
“I can’t imagine that,” Gretchen said, and Abby chimed in, “Of course you haven’t done anything wrong.”
The man ducked his head, though his expression remained worried. “It’s nice to know you don’t share the sheriff’s assessment that I might be a criminal.”
“I don’t share Frank Tilby’s opinion on much,” Gretchen said and gave him a reassuring look. “You ready for this?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
Abby was the first out the door and the Man Who Might Be Sam followed closely behind. He brushed past Gretchen in the doorway, causing the hairs on her arms to prickle. Though Gretchen may have seemed calm on the outside, her insides had tied themselves into knots.
Bennie and Trudy had made their way to the kitchen already, settling into chairs at the round table, opposite where the sheriff sat. Gretchen put her arm around Abby’s shoulders as they stood a short way back.
“Just tell me what needs to be done, and I’ll do it,” the man said, approaching the sheriff. “I’d like to know who I am as much as anyone.” His brow creased and lips pursed, concern written there for all to see.
“This won’t take but a few minutes,” Frank Tilby told him, rising to his feet as the man stepped forward. “Give me your left hand, if you would, and we’ll get to it.”
Without a word, the man reached out his arm, and the sheriff proceeded to roll each finger and thumb over a tiny black ink pad. Then he guided each digit toward a white card lying on the table.
“Normally when we print subjects at a crime scene, it’s to eliminate them as suspects,” Frank explained as he positioned the pad of each fingertip onto a particular square, gently rolling and leaving behind a black smudge. “In your case, we’ll search the database for matching prints for identification purposes.”
Gretchen felt Abby’s fingers reach for hers and squeeze. She squeezed back. For the next few moments, no one spoke.
When he was done, Frank Tilby ripped open a packet no bigger than a matchbook and pulled out a moist towelette.
“This should get most of the ink off,” he said. “The rest will come off in time.”
“So that’s all there is to it?” the man asked, seeming surprised.
Before he answered, Frank picked up the card with the black smudges from the table. He walked toward a sunny window, tilting the paper toward the light and squinting at it as if his life depended on it. A noise escaped his mouth, rather like a disapproving sniff, before he patted his chest pocket, retrieving a pair of spectacles that he plunked on his nose. Then he squinted some more through his glasses, eyeing the smudges outlined by the black boxes, and he sniffed again.
Gretchen didn’t like the sound of it.
“You are done, right, Sheriff?” she repeated, sensing something was very, very wrong.
“Well, we would be, if the circumstances were ordinary,” Frank replied and looked at her over the rims of his specs.
“And by ordinary, you mean what?” Gretchen wanted to strangle him. This was hardly a time to be cryptic. “Is something off?”
“You could say that,” the sheriff replied, walking back toward the table and setting the card down with a flick of his fingers, as if it were meaningless. He crossed his arms, screwed up his face, and looked over at the Man Who Might Be Sam, busy cleaning his hand with the towelette. “What I’m wondering is how in the hell it so happens that our friend here’s got no discernible prints.”
No prints? Gretchen tried to digest what that meant.
Abby instantly jumped to the man’s defense. “He was struck by lightning during the storm! His hands have been burned.”
“Makes no difference,” Tilby told her. “Even if the burn is severe, the whorls should regenerate.”
The Man Who Might Be Sam stopped wiping the ink off his fingers, the tips of which now appeared a deep purple. His expression stoic, he bluntly asked, “What exactly do you want me to do, Sheriff? Clearly, I can’t give you something I don’t have.”
“He just wants to scare you,” Abby said and took another step toward Frank Tilby, anger turning her face beet red. “You don’t really care who he is. You just don’t like that he’s here with my mother.”
“Now hold on there, missy!” The sheriff shook a finger at Abby. “I’m just doing my job—”
“Don’t you speak to her in that tone, Franklin Tilby,” Bennie sharply uttered.
; “You bully!” Trudy shook a knitting needle at him, warning, “If you can’t behave, you can leave.”
“For God’s sake,” the sheriff muttered, “I’m only trying to do what’s right and proper—”
“Okay, enough,” Gretchen interrupted, waving hands in the air. She could hardly hear herself think, her pulse throbbed so loudly in her ears. “Everyone calm down. Frank”—she looked directly at the sheriff—“come with me to the parlor, if you would. I’d like to talk privately. The rest of you, stay put.”
Gretchen swept an arm before her, urging Frank Tilby to precede her. As he scowled and clomped out of the kitchen, she followed on his boot heels. Once in the front parlor, she directed him to sit on the sofa, precisely where the Man Who Might Be Sam had slept the previous night, but she didn’t take a seat herself. Unable to stand still, she took a few steps to the left and then to the right, all the while telling him, “I had a bad feeling about this from the moment you brought it up.”
“Don’t blame me for the fact that the man’s prints don’t exist,” the sheriff grumbled. “Although we could try to ink one of his feet. The county hospital should have his birth records—”
“The soles of his feet look burned, too,” Gretchen cut him off. “I noticed when I found him. It’s like he’s been walking over coals.”
“Or he’s a human lightning rod.” Tilby ran a hand over the shoe-polish black of his hair. “The whole thing’s just plain weird.”
“Have you found a car abandoned anywhere nearby?” she asked, keeping her voice low, concerned that the others might overhear.
“Not yet.”
“Any bulletin about a missing person matching his description?” she asked.
Tilby shook his head, rubbing his big hands on his dark-polyester-clad thighs. “No, ma’am, nothing.”
Gretchen exhaled gratefully and crossed her arms over her chest. “So what do you suggest we do now?”
The Truth About Love and Lightning Page 15