Desperation on Wildflower Island

by Michelle Files

  “You were really young when she was born. It’s entirely possible that you don’t remember me being pregnant. That’s not really unusual,” Jeanette replied.

  Up until that point, Jacob had said nothing. He sat there, listening to Jeanette try her best to maneuver her way around his questions. It wasn’t working.

  “Stop. Just stop,” Jacob said, holding up his palm to face Jeanette. “Tell him the truth. He deserves that, doesn’t he?”

  “Jacob…I don’t know.” She looked at her husband with wide eyes. “It just seems like a really bad idea to get him involved in this whole mess.” Jeanette was quite apprehensive.

  “What mess?” Sawyer asked, looking back and forth at his parents. “I don’t understand. Was she adopted or not? And why would there be a mess?”

  Jacob and Jeanette looked at each other and came to an agreement. No words were necessary.

  “I’ll tell him,” Jacob volunteered. He looked down at his feet as he struggled to come up with the right way to explain the whole debacle to his teenage son.

  “No. It’s all my doing. I need to be the one,” Jeanette interrupted. “Sawyer, please understand that I thought I was doing the right thing at the time. I love you and I love your sister.”

  “Mom, you are scaring me. What did you do?” Sawyer was already pretty certain that Isabella was adopted. He had no inkling of the lies and deceit behind it all.

  “Remember how I told you that I used to be a nurse? And that I gave that up to raise the two of you?” she asked him.

  “Yes.” Sawyer scooted forward on the couch and listened intently.

  “Part of that is true. I was a nurse. But there’s a lot more to the story.” Jeanette looked at her husband with an apologetic frown before continuing. “On the night Isabella was born I was working in the maternity ward and taking care of a woman. She told me about her husband being in prison, and about how he killed some people, and about how she was homeless. The story broke my heart for that baby. After much thought, I just couldn’t let the woman take a newborn baby into that mess. How would she survive on the street with a mother that couldn’t even take care of herself?”

  The shock on Sawyer’s face was undeniable as the realization hit him. “What did you do?” He already knew the answer, but needed to hear it directly from his mother.

  “I took her. I couldn’t help myself. I told the woman that the baby died and I faked her medical records. I committed all sorts of felonies that night. Your dad and I took the two of you and moved here immediately.” Jeanette lowered her head in shame.

  “That’s what I remember. We drove up to the hospital and you gave us Izzy. I remember that. I don’t know why, but it just came to me last night. I guess I had completely forgotten everything until now.” Sawyer paused for a moment, as he thought about it all. “Then we moved right after that. I remember being mad that you made me leave my school and my friends.”

  “I know. I’m very sorry for that,” Jeanette replied. Her voice was barely above a whisper.

  Sawyer jumped up off the couch. “You had no right to do that! You hand no right to take a baby that didn’t belong to you and no right to take me from my life just because you wanted to steal someone else’s baby!”

  “I know.” Jeanette replied, looking down at her feet in shame.

  “What are you talking about?!”

  They all turned to see Isabella standing against the far wall, crying.

  “You aren’t my real parents? You stole me?”

  “Oh honey, no, you misunderstood.” Jeanette walked over and hugged Isabella. “What did you hear, sweetheart?” Jeanette put her index finger under Isabella’s chin and tilted her head up to look at her.

  “I heard you say you took me from a woman in the hospital. Then we moved here so we could hide. Is..that..true?”

  “Well…” Jeanette started to say.

  “Just tell her the truth, Mom. Stop lying to everyone,” Sawyer interrupted. He knew she was going to lie to Isabella. He could see it in her face.

  “Okay, okay.” Jeanette bent over so that she was face to face with her daughter. It took all the composure she could muster to not burst out in tears herself. She had to be strong for her children. She couldn’t come across as weak.

  “Yes, Isabella, it’s true. I was working as a nurse, and right after you were born I took you from the woman that had you. It was wrong of me, I know, but…”

  “So who is my real mother?” Isabella interrupted her.

  Jeanette straightened up and looked over at Jacob as if to ask him if she should tell her. She didn’t have to actually say it, he knew the question. He nodded his head.

  “Well, honey, do you remember that woman that I was talking to in the parking lot of the Wildflower Cafe the other day? The pretty blonde one?” Jeanette asked her.

  “The one you were fighting with?”

  “No, not fighting, just a disagreement. But yes, that’s the one. She’s your biological mother. She came here looking for you and just found out where we were and was angry with me. That’s why we were arguing.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” The hurt look on Isabella’s face broke Jeanette’s heart in two.

  “She and I talked again another day and she said you could stay living here with us,” Jeanette explained.

  “So she doesn’t want me?” Isabella’s voice was sad when she asked the question.

  “Um, well, she…just wants you to…continue living with us. That’s all.” Jeanette stuttered over part of the answer, because she wasn’t really sure how to explain it all to a 10 year old. She didn’t think Isabella would understand it all.

  “I don’t believe you. Why doesn’t she want me? Why did she come here to the island looking for me if she doesn’t want me?” Isabella was starting to sound agitated and her voice was getting louder.

  “I just told her that she couldn’t have you. I told her that you were my daughter and you were staying with us. Isn’t that what you want?”

  Jeanette thought that if Isabella felt that she had fought for her, she would be happy about it. But who can predict what goes through a young girl’s mind, especially one as tormented as Isabella was. There was a desperation in Isabella’s voice.

  “I hate you!” she screamed as she ran across the living room and into the kitchen. They heard her open a drawer and slam it shut, but they couldn’t see what she was looking for from where they were. Then she ran past them and out the front door.

  “Isabella, wait!” Jeanette yelled after her.

  “Jeanette, just let her go,” Jacob demanded. “She needs some time to think. She never goes far. She’ll be fine.”

  Jeanette relented and sat down on the couch to wait for her daughter to return. Sawyer stormed out of the room without another word.

  “I think it’s time I called our lawyer,” Jacob said. “This is going to get messy.” He walked into the kitchen to sit at the table to make the phone call.

  Jeanette didn’t argue with him. Now that the kids both knew, there was no way the secret could be kept for long. Someone was going to jail, and she knew who that someone was. She was resigned to that fact.

  Chapter 23

  After an hour of waiting for Isabella to return, her parents started getting worried. She could be a moody kid and often walked around the neighborhood when she needed to feel better. It was a safe area and they normally didn’t worry about her. However, she was never gone more than an hour, at most.

  By then it was almost lunchtime and they hadn’t heard a word from her.

  “We need to go look for her,” Jeanette told her husband and son. She had been pacing the floor for the last 30 minutes and had had enough.

  “Yes, let’s go,” Jacob agreed.

  The three of them spread out and searched the neighborhood. They knocked on the doors of everyone they knew and no one had seen her. Each of them had their phones with them and promised to call the second she was found. No calls came. They met back up about 45 mi
nutes later.

  “We need to call the sheriff,” Jacob announced, with a worried frown on his face.

  He made the call while Jeanette made another call. She called Catherine. She felt that Catherine should know, even though she was not going to be involved in Isabella’s life at all. Still, she was on the island and Jeanette felt a duty to tell her.

  As soon as she hung up from her talk with Catherine, Jeanette’s phone rang. She did not recognize the phone number. She normally didn’t answer the phone when she didn’t recognize the number, but she made an exception that day.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi, Mrs. Hale? This is Piper Carmichael.”

  Jeanette was surprised to be getting a call from Piper. She had never called her before. “Hi Piper. What can I do for you?”

  “Mary and I are here at the Ridge Path with Isabella.”

  “You are?” Jeanette asked. “Is she okay? We’ve been looking everywhere for her.”

  “Yes. Hold on a second.” Piper put her on hold while she walked a few yards away from Mary and Isabella. “Okay, I’m back,” she whispered into the phone. “I just wanted to tell you that Isabella is acting strangely. She’s going on and on about how you aren’t her parents and you don’t deserve her, and other stuff. I think you should come get her. Like right now.” Piper was still whispering.

  Jeanette could hear the urgency in Piper’s voice and knew that it was serious matter. “Of course, we will be right there. Thank you, Piper.” Jeanette hung up the phone, gathered Jacob and Sawyer, and they drove as fast as they could to the Ridge Path.

  Since Jeanette was driving, Jacob called the sheriff back while they were on their way over, to let him know that she had been found.

  When they arrived, they found the twins there, which they expected, but Lola was also with them. They were not expecting her. The Hale’s had heard all about the accusations Lola had made about Isabella at the town meeting and were very upset with Lola. None of it mattered at that moment though. They were worried about their daughter.

  The four girls were standing near the cliff that had a sharp drop to the rocks below. They were a little too close to the edge for Jeanette’s comfort, especially after Beth’s tragic death recently. They still didn’t know exactly what had happened that day.

  “Isabella, are you all right?” Jeanette asked as she walked toward her daughter.

  “Stay over there. I don’t want to talk to you!” Isabella yelled at her, stopping Jeanette in her tracks.

  “Okay, sweetheart. I’m staying right here. We just want to make sure you are all right,” Jeanette replied as calmly as she could.

  Mary walked over to talk to the Hales, while Lola and Piper stayed with Isabella.

  “I just wanted to let you know what is going on,” Mary started. “Lola called us when she found Isabella here at the cliffs. She said Isabella was screaming at her and acting weird. She doesn’t know Isabella very well, so she called us to see if we could come over and calm her down.” Mary was keeping her voice low so that Isabella could not hear what she was telling Jacob, Jeanette, and Sawyer.

  “Did it work?” Jacob asked.

  “Not really, no. She was yelling about how you guys aren’t her parents and stuff. But, it gets way worse than that. Lola should tell you what she said. Lola come over here,” Mary called to her.

  When Lola walked over to them, Mary told her to tell Isabella’s parents what was going on.

  “Okay, but this is really serious. You have to believe me.” The tone in Lola’s voice told them that what she was about to say was extremely important.

  “What is it?” Jacob asked.

  “Isabella is the one that has been killing people in town,” Lola said.

  She watched the reactions on the faces of Jacob, Jeanette, and Sawyer, and didn’t like what she saw. Her parents both had a ‘yeah right’ look on their faces, as they shook their heads back and forth in denial. Sawyer was listening intently with no expression. He seemed to be really listening to what she had to say and Lola felt he would be more open to what she was telling them.

  “Lola…” Jeanette started to say, when the teenager interrupted her.

  “I can see that you don’t believe me, but it’s true. She just told me she did it. All of it.”

  Lola was a bit perturbed that they just dismissed what she said without even giving her a chance to explain. But really, what did she expect? What parent would believe a teenager that looked like Lola did and was making the crazy accusations that she was making. She couldn’t blame them, but needed to make them listen. And needed to make them believe her. People’s lives were at stake.

  Jeanette turned to Mary. “Did you hear Isabella say anything?”

  Lola rolled her eyes in disbelief when Jeanette did that. Obviously they would believe anything that cute little normal, boring, Mary would tell them.

  “I didn’t hear her say that she killed anyone. But, I heard the rest of it, the part where she was freaking out and saying you aren’t her parents. Something’s definitely wrong with her,” Mary told them. “She was almost hysterical.”

  “Also, you should know that she tried to kill me the other day,” Lola told them. That got their attention.

  “What do you mean?” Jacob asked her.

  “I was talking to her on the street.” Lola hesitated a moment. “Okay, I was confronting her about my suspicion that she killed those people. She denied it, of course, but then she pushed me in the street just as a car was coming. I wasn’t expecting it and I came extremely close to being hit by that car. And I hurt my wrist when I fell. See.” Lola held up her arm to show them the bandage.

  Both Jacob and Jeanette had doubt written all over their faces. Jeanette was pressing her lips together and Jacob was running his hands through his hair. It looked like a nervous gesture to Lola. She knew they didn’t believe her. And she was right. They both had a difficult time believing someone that looked like Lola did. Her appearance didn’t instill a lot of trust.

  Jacob may have looked to Lola like he didn’t believe her, but that was not entirely true. His mind suddenly landed on a day, just a couple of years ago, that a boy on a bicycle with a broken arm accused Isabella of pushing him into the street. His face turned ashen as realization dawned on him.

  “You should just go ask her. She’ll tell you.” Lola stepped aside and gestured toward the spot where Isabella and Piper were standing.

  As the Hales were walking over, they heard car doors slamming. They looked over to see the sheriff and Catherine walking toward them. The Hales didn’t care about them though. They had one task in mind and that was to get their daughter away from the ledge. The rest of the it could wait. Isabella was distraught and dangerously close to that cliff. Neither of them wanted to state out loud what they were both thinking.

  Jeanette walked over to the spot where Isabella and Piper were standing. Isabella didn’t try to stop her, but stared icily at her. Jeanette paid no attention to the look on her daughter’s face and continued with her task of calming the situation down, and getting everyone away from the cliff’s edge.

  “Piper, thank you. You can go back over there now,” Jeanette told her, motioning with her head to where the others were standing.

  The sheriff and Catherine joined the others and stayed quiet. They didn’t want to interfere and possibly cause more harm than good.

  Once it was just the two of them standing there, Jeanette started trying to get Isabella away from the ledge. Isabella wouldn’t budge.

  “Sweetheart, did you kill Beth?” Jacob asked her. Though he wasn’t standing right there with them, he was only a few feet away.

  “So what? Who cares about her?” was Isabella’s answer.

  It sounded as if everyone in the group gasped simultaneously.

  Tears started falling down Jacob’s cheeks. “Izzy, why would you do that?”

  “She took you away from Mom. I couldn’t let her do that.” Isabella’s answer sounded cold, as if there was n
o feeling whatsoever behind it.

  “No she didn’t,” Jacob explained. “Your mom and I were already split when I met Beth. She had nothing to do with it. Izzy, I loved her. I can’t believe you did that.”

  Jeanette gave her husband the ‘not right now’ look. They could have that discussion later. There were more pressing things they needed to deal with.

  “You wouldn’t move back in with us if Beth was still your girlfriend. Now you can, right?” Isabella asked. She had hope on her face for the first time in a long time.

  It was a strange question to ask. Apparently, in her 10 year old mind, now that Beth was gone, her father could move back in and everything would go back to normal. Forget about the fact that she shoved the woman to her death. It appeared to all that Isabella had no concept that what she did was wrong…and that there would be consequences for her actions.

  “Tell them about Eric,” Lola nudged.

  Isabella’s demeanor changed immediately. There was no longer hope on her face. It was animosity they saw.

  “That boy was rude. He almost ran us over on the sidewalk. Remember Mom?”

  Jeanette nodded. “I remember.”

  “Then he wouldn’t apologize. I didn’t like him. I picked one of those pretty flowers by the cafe when we were waiting in line. I remembered that Dixie’s cat died after I gave him some when I was five.”

  “Oh my god, I can’t believe what I’m hearing,” Jeanette let out a wail.

  “There’s more,” Lola jumped in. “Tell them,” she demanded.

  “I don’t want to,” Isabella replied, looking out toward the ocean.

  “Why not?” Lola asked her. “You already told them everything else.

  Isabella turned back toward her and shrugged.

  “Fine, I’ll tell them,” Lola said. “Isabella told me that she was mad at the two of you for fighting.” Lola was speaking directly to Jacob and Jeanette then. “She said she was outside pouting and deliberately rolled her bike in front of the car that jumped the curb and killed that woman in her yard. She didn’t mean to kill the woman, but did want to see the car hit something, like the bike.”