Secrets in a Small Town

by Kimberly Van Meter

  “We’re good. Thanks again, Owen,” she said, the sincerity in her voice hard to miss. He was pleased to help but he wasn’t accustomed to having two extra people, let alone those of the female persuasion, running around in his space. He’d deal but it would take some getting used to. No walking around naked he supposed. He chuckled at the idea of telling Piper that she wasn’t the only one who enjoyed walking around in the buff when no one was around.

  There was something to be said for the caress of a cool breeze on the backside, he mused with a smile of private humor.

  When he’d been a timber faller back in his early twenties he’d often come home covered in sawdust from the day’s work and instead of tracking all that mess into the house to clean later, he’d just shuck his clothes at the door and walk in naked as a jaybird. Usually he’d been so bone-tired from a day of falling trees that he’d tumbled, exhausted, to the couch. He’d often wake around seven in the evening to shove some food down his gullet, shower and go back to bed to start all over again the next day at the crack of dawn. He missed a lot of things about just being an employee but he didn’t miss the back-breaking work of being a faller. If he’d continued in that profession, he’d be listening to a surgeon tell him he was due for a hip and knee replacement at the ripe age of thirty-six.

  He climbed into his truck with one last glance toward the house, feeling odd to leave the girls alone, but he had to get supplies if people were going to be staying for any length of time. At the present time, he barely had enough to support one person, let alone three. Hell, he didn’t even know if he had a full roll of toilet paper.

  PIPER SLID THE BOX FARLEY BROUGHT onto her kitchen table and started to rummage through it. She found a few items she expected, such as dusty school projects and papers with good grades circled in faded red ink—she’d always been an overachiever, even as a child—and then she found something that was plainly out of place with her childhood mementos.

  She frowned as she lifted the stiff leather-bound journal and blew away the dust to get a better look at it. She knew for certain it hadn’t belonged to her. She opened it gingerly, staring at the odd collection of notes and photos. She thumbed through the faded pictures, her puzzlement growing when she didn’t recognize a single person in the bunch. She slumped in disappointment. Someone at the farm must’ve accidentally thrown this in with her stuff, mistaking it for their own box. She grabbed the stack of photos and prepared to return them to the safety of the leather volume but curiosity got the better of her and she started to thumb through the pages. She hadn’t become a reporter for nothing. The pages were dated but not by year or day-by-day. The penciled scrawl, faded almost to nothing, drew her attention. She flipped to the last page and read a barely legible scribble. She squinted at the script and made out M. LaRoche. Grinning with delight at her unexpected treasure, she settled in to read the private thoughts of a stranger, written long ago.

  Piper surmised it was written by a woman, someone who was in love.

  “Ohh, my favorite,” she murmured, grinning. “Let’s see what we have here…”

  But her grin faded as she continued to read. Soon it became clear this was not a love story. It was a tragedy.

  “It hardly seems possible in this day and age but there is hatred and prejudice alive and well in this town. I never thought I’d come face-to-face with such thinking but the “purists” came to visit me today. They’re disgusting, awful people and they scare me. I have to tell T but I can’t right now. He said soon, though, everything is going to work out. He’s got a plan. I trust him but I’m worried. Those people…if they find out what T’s doing…it could be bad.”

  The entries ended abruptly on May 25. Piper sighed, frowning in thought. The “purists” she imagined were another name for the members of the Aryan Coalition. From the research she’d done thus far, the members were zealots who believed only those with pure blood, as in no ethnicities, were superior. Ugh. The very idea, Piper thought. It was a good thing the Aryan Coalition had disbanded after the Red Meadows incident. She couldn’t imagine people with those kinds of beliefs still acting like this.

  It was difficult to picture the seething racial hatred that the Aryan Coalition supported flourishing in a place as easygoing in nature as Dayton. Yet, it had. In fact, there were people arrested that day who were grocers, postal workers, day-care providers…everyday people.

  And of course, there was Ty Garrett. Carpenter by day, and white supremist leader by night. She tucked the journal against her side and rose from the floor. She wondered if her parents knew who the journal might belong to. Her parents would likely chastise her for not dropping the research into Red Meadows like they’d suggested. Her normally placid father had actually spoken sharply to her the other day over her research. She bit her lip and her gaze went to the journal in her hand. No, she supposed she needn’t mention the journal just yet. She wanted to see what she could find on her own first.

  She checked her watch. There was still time to get to the library and check out the archives before she was scheduled to meet Owen at his place. Humming to herself, she grabbed her purse and stuffed the journal inside. Hopefully, she could find something that might tie the diary to someone in town she could identify. Maybe she could even return it to whoever this M. LaRoche was…it was a happy thought that made her smile. Imagine this mystery person’s surprise to have their long-lost journal returned. Perhaps, if she found the owner, she could ask why the entries stopped so abruptly. Her curiosity had been well and truly piqued. “I do love a puzzle,” she murmured as she locked up her house. Hopefully, if she managed to find M. LaRoche, she could get her to share her experiences with the purists. It might shed some additional light on what actually happened that fateful day at Red Meadows.

  TWO HOURS INTO READING back issues of the paper, looking for news clippings of the Red Meadows incident, Piper leaned back in the chair and stretched. She felt permanently hunched from poring over the small type. She’d found several small interesting tidbits but nothing groundbreaking. She checked her watch and her stomach muscles jumped in anticipation. It was nearly time to meet with Owen. She told herself the butterflies in her tummy were simply because she was finally getting the interview opportunity she’d been wanting, not because she was looking forward to seeing Owen himself.

  She gathered the copies she’d made with a pleased smile, yet when she started to lift the bound archive to return it to its shelf, a sudden thought came to her. Acting on a whim, she returned the volume to the table and opened it to May of 1984, the year of the Red Meadows raid. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for but when she read a small headline buried on the second page of the last issue in May, an uncomfortable tingle in her stomach caused her to plop down in her chair.

  A young, black woman was found dead in her home, the victim of an apparent botched robbery. Police found the home trashed and the woman, Mimi LaRoche, dead from a single gunshot to the head. She’d been six months pregnant.

  M. LaRoche. Piper was willing to bet her eyeteeth the M stood for Mimi.

  She was carrying the diary of a dead woman in her purse. She read on, noting the woman, Mimi, had been a student at San Jose City College, majoring in fine arts.

  “Are you all right, dear?” the librarian asked, noting her change in mood.

  “Do you remember the murder of a young woman who was six months pregnant right before the raid at Red Meadows?” she asked, hoping the librarian, who was a fossil in the town of Dayton, might remember something that wasn’t put in the newspapers.

  Mrs. Huffle, her facial features going slack as she searched her memory, suddenly came upon something and the recollection was enough to pull a sad frown. “Oh, dear, that was a sad, sad day. Nice girl. She used to come in to do her studying. She was going to be a painter or something. Something artsy, I remember that. They never found who did it. Right shame, I tell you.”

  “The police never had any leads?”

  “Oh, well, I don’t know abo
ut that. Nothing they were going to follow up on. Not during those times anyway.”

  Piper recalled the fearful passages in the journal and asked, “Was it because of the Aryan Coalition?”

  At the mention of the racist cult, Mrs. Huffle’s softly wrinkled face pinched in open disgust. “Oh, those people were for rot. Screws loose, all of them. Going on about the ‘pure race.’ Pure poppycock, if you ask me. I, for one, was relieved when the FBI came in and cleaned house. It was well overdue. They were ruining this town.”

  “Do you remember if Mimi LaRoche was seeing someone? I mean, she was pregnant. She didn’t get that way on her own.”

  Mrs. Huffle shook her head. “I never saw her with no one. I just assumed she might’ve had a friend at the college. Such a pretty girl, though. She had those Cajun looks, you know with that rich brown skin and pale green eyes? She was a looker, for sure. Sad business.” Mrs. Huffle sighed, then peered at Piper. “Why all the questions all of a sudden about this stuff?”

  “Just curious,” she answered, not ready to share her true intentions with anyone, not even sweet Mrs. Huffle. “I was doing research into something else and came across the news clipping.”

  Satisfied with her answer, Mrs. Huffle nodded with a twinkle. “You’ve always been a curious cat. Probably why you make such an ace reporter. I do love reading your work, though.”

  “Thank you. That’s nice to hear.” She accepted the compliment and made her way to the door until one more question popped in her head. “Mrs. Huffle…is there anyone who still lives here, aside from William Dearborn, who knew anything about the Red Meadows incident?”

  Mrs. Huffle cocked her head, a slightly puzzled expression on her face as she answered, “Why yes, dear…you ought to know the answer to that question. Your parents, of course. They were there when it all happened.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THE FALSE SMILE SHE’D PASTED on her lips fell the moment she hit the car. Mrs. Huffle’s bombshell had made her head ring with an explosion of denials and head shakes, yet she’d never known Mrs. Huffle to lie about anything. Besides, the old woman had assumed her parents had shared this whopper of a secret with her long ago, which obviously they had not.

  And why hadn’t they? Her parents had always been open and honest with her—at least, she thought so. This new information put things in a skewed light that she couldn’t make heads or tails of, no matter how she manipulated the angle. Her parents at Red Meadows? She thought of the time line. Back then, her parents were teaching at the same college Mimi LaRoche was attending. Had they known her? Would they tell her the truth if they had? Before this, she would’ve assumed that her parents never lied to her, but now, she wasn’t sure what to think.

  And the biggest question of all, why were her parents at Red Meadows? They openly hated racial prejudice and whenever the topic was raised about the incident, they reacted negatively. She thought of her father and how he’d changed before her eyes when she’d brought up Red Meadows and how her parents seemed to hate Owen Garrett. A sick feeling started to churn in her gut. It was all too much to fathom but tiny pieces were starting to slide into place, revealing a bigger puzzle that needed solving. But how? It wasn’t like she could just sit down with her parents over a cup of mint tea and ask about their involvement with a racist cult back when they were younger. Especially after her father’s initial reaction to her interest.

  For the first time in her life, she was afraid to go to her parents. She worried her bottom lip, unsure of what to do next.

  The distinct feeling overcame her that if she continued from this point, things might never be the same. She thought of her nearly idyllic childhood, the happy, carefree times spent at the farm surrounded by love and acceptance. She tried to imagine how her gentle, accepting, and totally nonviolent parents could be affiliated—in any way—to the Aryan Coalition and one question pulled at her: did she want to know?

  A long, agonizing moment passed before she had her answer. Her parents had raised her to ask questions. She couldn’t stop now. Whatever was lurking in the closets needed to come out. No matter what she found.

  OWEN HAD JUST PUT AWAY the supplies from his trip to town when he heard someone pulling into his driveway. His pulse jumped a little when he saw Piper’s little hybrid sedan parked neatly beside his giant truck. He couldn’t imagine driving that tiny matchbox of a car without losing some kind of manhood points. A decent-size dog, such as Timber, wouldn’t even fit in the front seat.

  He watched from his kitchen window, which fronted the drive, as Piper, wearing a peach skirt that flirted with her knees and dainty brown girly shoes, picked her way to the front door, navigating the gravel of his driveway gingerly. Damn, there was no denying she was prettier than a picture with never a hair out of place. He stared down at his rough and calloused hands, the seemingly permanently dirt-stained pads of his fingers, and felt like an ogre fantasizing about the princess in the castle. Hell, it was probably just as well. He liked his women busty, ballsy and uninterested in a commitment—Piper was the antithesis of those qualities.

  So why did just seeing her make his spine tighten? A sharp rap at the front door precluded the opportunity to give the situation much more thought, which was probably a good thing.

  He opened the door and there stood Piper, yet instead of the sunny sparkle of determination he usually saw in her eyes, he saw agitation even though she was trying to hide it.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “What makes you think something is wrong?”

  “Answering a question with a question is usually not a great way to throw someone off your tail,” he advised her, ushering her into his home. She glanced around his surroundings, but offered little comment. What could she say? He knew he didn’t have much to look at in the way of furnishings. He’d never cared before. Now, he wished he’d put a little more thought into the niceties.

  “Where would you like to do this?” she asked.

  The bedroom, his dirty mind supplied almost immediately. He was immensely grateful the thought hadn’t spilled from his head to his mouth. “The kitchen table?” he offered, and she nodded. “Can I get you anything to drink?”

  “I’m fine,” she said, taking her pen and pad out, all business.

  He heaved a silent sigh, not crazy about this idea of dredging up old memories but he figured if it helped prove his father wasn’t the devil the town thought him to be, he’d suffer through it. He pulled up a chair and gestured for her to start. “Let’s get this over with,” he said with a sigh.

  A tiny smile played on her lips. “Don’t be such a sourpuss… I promise to be gentle.”

  Their eyes met and he could’ve sworn electricity jumped between them in a flash. She must’ve felt it, too, because she straightened and seemed a little flustered, as if thrown off track for a moment. “Right. So, let’s start at the beginning….”

  Just then Gretchen’s voice floated in from the back bedroom and Piper’s head swung around in confusion. “Who’s that?” she asked, not missing a beat.

  “Ah, it’s Gretchen.”

  “Your office manager?” she said, her stare narrowing in suspicion. “I thought you said there was nothing going on between you?”

  “There’s not,” he answered gruffly as he rose to see what Gretchen needed. “Wait here,” he instructed, but Piper ignored his request and followed close on his heels. He gave her an annoyed look, saying, “Woman, don’t you ever do as your told?”

  “No,” she answered evenly. “Haven’t you ever heard of the saying ‘well-behaved women rarely make history’?”

  “Well, you’re well on your way to making a name for yourself, that’s for sure,” he grumbled as he entered Gretchen’s room. Piper followed without apology, as if she had the right to know why he was harboring a woman in his house. He found her actions mildly amusing but he wondered at her motivation. Was it possible she was jealous? That seemed improbable but it gave him a faint rise in his heart rate at the thought
of Piper feeling possessive over him. Ah, great. Things were going from bad to worse in that department.

  Gretchen’s stare registered shock, then narrowed in distaste as she saw Piper at his side. “What’s she doing here?” she inquired, not pulling any punches.

  Piper came forward. “I’m interviewing Owen about what he remembers from the Red Meadows incident,” she answered easily, not the least bit put off by the glacial stare coming her way. “Why are you staying with Owen?”

  “That’s between me and Owen,” Gretchen retorted, glancing away as if dismissing Piper. Owen had to swallow a grin at the open animosity Gretchen had for Piper. He knew it came from a protective place and he wouldn’t fault her for it. Besides, Piper seemed able to hold her own against the feisty blonde, so he didn’t see the need to intervene. And would it be totally wrong for him to admit, he was flattered by the attention? Yeah, it would. So he kept his mouth shut. Gretchen continued, saying, “I called the bus station and changed Quinn’s bus stop from our place to here. I hope that’s okay with you?”

  “Staying long, I see,” Piper said, inserting herself back in the conversation. She looked to Owen. “It’s fun playing house, isn’t it? Insta-family. Sweet.”

  “Yes, it is. Owen is a very good man,” Gretchen said, nearly baring her teeth at Piper before returning to Owen with an adoring smile. “What would you like me to make for dinner? I was thinking mashed potatoes and grilled pork chops. Quinn loves them.”

  “Girl after my own heart,” he said. “Pork chops sound good to me, just let me know what you need and I’ll help.”

  “How domestic,” Piper murmured, cutting her glance away from Gretchen, her mouth tightening just enough to give away her irritation. “Who knew your office manager was a regular Rachael Ray. I wonder what other talents she’s eager to show you.”