by Wanda Dyson
Intense. More and more intense until she almost felt too overwhelmed by it.
She felt it withdrawing and cried out.
It’s not yet time, My child.
Time for what?
Time for you to be with Me.
“Zoe, don’t you dare die on me.”
JJ?
The light began to dim and the sensations eased away. No, don’t go! I want to know You.
You will. Each day you will grow closer until the day you are once again this close to Me.
“Start an IV drip.”
“Do we need to intubate?”
“Pulse?”
“Ninety over sixty.”
She tried to reach back for the light, but it faded to little more than a soft glow.
Please, come back.
I am always with you.
#
JJ pushed the car door closed and reluctantly headed up the sidewalk to the front porch. Matt followed close on his heels. For a moment JJ wrestled with what he had to say and how in the world he was going to say it. He looked at Matt and then at the front door.
“You could have let me or Gerry handle this,” Matt told him.
“No, I couldn’t.” Lifting his hand, he knocked briskly.
A minute or so later, Ray Timms opened the front door. His smile faded when he saw their faces. “It’s not good news, is it?”
JJ shook his head. “Can we come in?”
“Are you going to arrest my sister again?”
“No. Please, we just need to talk to her.”
Ray thought about it a moment before he stepped back and waved them in.
Karen Matthews was sitting in the living room, holding Jessica in her arms. Rene Taylor was seated in a chair across from her. Both women looked up with suspicion in their eyes as JJ and Matt walked into the room and sat down.
JJ fiddled with his car keys, summoning the words that seemed so hard to speak. Finally, he lifted his head and looked at Karen. “I wanted you to know that we found your husband.”
She went white. He saw emotion in her eyes, but he wasn’t sure what emotion it was. Fear? Hostility? Confusion?
“Is he. . .?”
JJ shook his head. “He’s alive. He’s in the hospital. We just came from there.”
“Alive.” Karen seemed to be testing the word to see how it felt.
“I want you to know that I’m the one who shot him.”
Karen’s eyes went wide, and Rene reached over to take her hand. “You shot Ted?”
JJ nodded. “He was trying to kill Zoe Shefford.”
She gasped and nearly dropped the baby’s bottle. “Why—”
Matt rescued him. “Mrs. Matthews. Your husband is the serial killer we’ve been trying to catch. He’s killed many children. Miss Shefford was getting too close to him.”
Karen seemed to sway, and Ray rushed forward, lifting Jessica from her arms. Rene jumped up and rushed to sit next to Karen, wrapping her arms around her.
“That’s. . .that’s just not possible. He wouldn’t. . .couldn’t have. . .”
“He did,” Matt said firmly. “There is no doubt. No question.”
“I see,” she said softly.
“Karen?” Rene rubbed Karen’s arm. “Are you okay?”
Karen gave her a blank stare. “He was a serial killer? He killed children? How could I not have seen such evil?”
“Evil hides behind many masks, Karen. It’s not always so easy to see.”
Karen stood up, swaying a little. Her face was drained of all color, unnaturally pale and translucent. “Excuse me.”
JJ stood to his feet as she walked stiffly out of the room. Matt also stood.
“I’m sorry, but we had to let her know. It’s going to hit the papers, and that’s not the best way to find out something like this.”
“I know,” Ray replied, cradling Jess in his arms. “Thanks for telling us.”
Rene continued to look down the hallway after Karen. “We’ll take care of her, Detective.”
#
Rene looked at her watch. “Karen has been in the shower for almost thirty-five minutes, Ray. I’d better check on her. I don’t like the feel of this.”
“You don’t think she’d do something crazy, do you?”
“I don’t know. She just got some horrific news. Just let me check and put my mind at ease.”
She hurried down the hall and into the master bedroom. At the bathroom door, she tapped. She could hear the water running. “Karen?”
Still no response.
She turned the handle, relieved to find the door unlocked. Steam hit her in the face as she stepped in. It rolled and tumbled toward the open door. Through the shower curtain, Rene could see Karen’s silhouette. She looked like she was scrubbing her arms. Hard.
Rene pulled back the shower curtain. Karen’s arms looked an angry red, as if Karen had been trying to scrub the skin clear off.
“Karen, honey. What are you doing?”
Karen continued to scrape the bath brush across her skin with furious intensity. “Gotta get him off. I have to get clean of it.”
Rene flinched and reached back for a towel. She shut the water off. Karen looked stunned, as if she had only at that moment realized that Rene was there. Rene wrapped a big bath towel around Karen and helped her from the shower.
“There’s nothing to scrub off, honey.”
Karen’s bottom lip trembled as she stood there shaking. “He touched me. So many times, he touched me. Evil. I didn’t know.”
Rene put her arms around Karen as Karen’s knees buckled and the two women sank to the floor. “It’s okay, sweetheart. You’re okay.”
“I lived with him. Had his child. Cooked his meals and did his. . .” She sniffed back tears. “Did his laundry. And all that time, he was. . .he was. . .”
Karen wailed and began crying hard, her shoulders shaking at the onslaught of heart-wrenching sobs.
Rene pulled her close and began to rock her like a child. “Shh, baby, it’s okay. Shh. He’s never going to touch you again.”
“I have to wash the evil away,” Karen cried out in a panicked voice.
“No, honey. Jesus already did that for you.” She rocked her closer, letting Karen collapse in her arms. “You’re all clean. Jesus made you all clean.”
chapter 34
Monday, May 1
Karen rocked back and forth, ever so gently, as Jessica slept in her arms. She stared down into the baby’s face, unable to get enough of seeing her. Holding her.
“Sis?” Ray set his suitcase down at the door and leaned against the doorframe. “I’m ready to go. Cab will be here any minute.”
Karen lifted her face. “Are you sure you don’t want me to drive you to the airport?”
Ray shook his head. “No. You need to stay home. Unwind. Relax. Regroup.”
Moving carefully, Karen stood up and laid Jessica in her playpen. She walked over and put her arms around her brother. “I can’t thank you enough for being here.”
He hugged her tight and then released her, setting her back at arm’s length. “You’re going to be okay, Sis. You’ve found out who you are.”
“I called the hospital this morning.”
“Karen—”
She cut him off, knowing he was going to disapprove. “I had to find out.”
“And?”
“He’s going to live. They said he’s paralyzed from the waist down, but he’s going to live. Do you think it will make a difference? That they won’t send him to prison because he’ll be in a wheelchair?”
“No. He will be lucky if they don’t sentence him to death.” Ray reached out and touched her cheek. “If you need anything, call me.”
“I know. And as long as we’re on the subject, I want my inheritance. I see no reason why I can’t take control of it myself.” She folded her arms across her chest, lifted her chin, and prepared to do battle for what was hers.
“I’ll take care of it first thing when I get ba
ck.”
Karen’s jaw dropped. “That’s it? No argument?”
“That’s it. It’s yours. You can take care of it now. I’ll go over everything with you.”
A car horn sounded. Ray picked up his suitcase. “My cab is here. Gotta go. Love you, Sis.” He wrapped one arm around her and squeezed her.
“Love you, too, Ray.”
She opened the front door and followed him outside, watching from the porch as he jogged down the stairs. Halfway down the sidewalk, he turned around toward her, walking backwards. “I forgot to tell you! Dad called.”
Karen groaned.
“He said he’d like to come over and see Jessica if it’s okay with you. Call him and let him know.” He turned and handed his bag to the cab driver. Then he lifted a hand to wave and disappeared inside the cab.
Karen waited until the cab was gone before she turned to head back inside the house. Her dad wanted her permission to come over and see his granddaughter. Permission! Well, would wonders never cease.
As she started to turn, she caught sight of Rene.
“Hey there.”
“Hi, Rene.”
“You look great,” Rene told her as she stepped up onto Karen’s porch.
Karen sighed heavily and then smiled. “It’s been a horrible path to get here, but. . .I’ve never felt better.”
“Tea?” Karen pointed to the door.
“Love some.”
“I heard you’re helping the McCaines.” Karen shut the front door and then led Rene into the kitchen.
“What a wonderful couple they are.” Rene sat at the table, her hands running over the quilted placemats. “One of the young men in our church’s youth group came to us, oh, must have been a month or more ago. His younger sister was in trouble—you know, pregnant—and didn’t know what to do. They come from a broken home, poor things. We talked to her, prayed with her, and her brother started bringing her to the youth group with him. Two weeks ago she accepted the Lord.”
Rene smiled at the memory and at Karen as Karen placed the sugar in front of her. “A couple days later, she called me and said she felt the right thing to do was to give the baby up for adoption and would I please help her find a nice couple. She didn’t want to go through an agency.”
“They were so good to Jessica.” Karen pulled two teacups down from the cabinet and reached for the tea. “I’d love to see them have a child of their own. They’ve been through so much.”
“Well, everyone signed the papers yesterday, so unless something happens and Leeza changes her mind, the McCaines will have a little boy in about four months.”
“That’s wonderful!” Karen exclaimed. The teakettle started whistling, and Karen pulled it off the stove. She reflected on the simple pleasure of enjoying a cup of tea with a friend in the middle of the day. No need to worry that her husband was going to get angry. No guilt that she might have forgotten to do something.
“Why the sudden frown?”
Karen’s face cleared, and she laughed. “Sorry. I was just thinking how wonderful this feels.”
“And frowning?”
“No. Frowning that I once lived in such fear of doing these pleasurable little things.”
“I understand.”
Karen set the teacups on the table and pulled out a chair. “Do you?”
Rene spooned sugar into her cup and stirred. “I never told you, did I? My first husband abused me. Physically as well as emotionally.”
“Then you really do understand.”
Rene lifted her cup and looked at Karen over the rim. “More than you can imagine, my friend. Which is why I’m so overjoyed to see you so happy now.”
Karen toyed with her spoon. “I want to thank you for what you did.” She lifted her head. “You’ll never know what that meant. To have someone care like that.”
“I was just worried about you. I don’t normally go barging in on people when they’re in the shower.”
Karen laughed and reached for Rene’s hand. “Well, we’ll let it slide this time.”
#
Zoe opened her eyes slowly, blinked, and then gently smiled up at her dad. “Hi,” she whispered in a raspy voice that sounded strange to her own ears.
The hospital room smelled of flowers and disinfectant. Sunlight streamed into the room between open drapes. To her left, monitors beeped and chirped, keeping an electrical watch over her vital signs.
“Hi, yourself. Feeling better?” He sat down on the edge of her bed, stroking her hand.
“Little.”
He nodded. “You had us worried there for awhile. I kept running from your room to your mother’s. Between the two of you, I think I’ve aged twenty years.”
A worried expression formed on Zoe’s face. “Mom? She okay?”
“She’s fine. A little dehydrated, a few bruises, but nothing to worry about at all. She was released last night and I took her home. Today she’s complaining because I won’t let her do anything but rest. She probably got up the minute I pulled out of the driveway.”
Zoe nodded, finding it easier than trying to talk. Her throat still felt raw, and it hurt even to think about speaking. It was worse when she tried to swallow.
“I just wanted to check in on you. Every time I’ve been in to see you, you’ve been asleep. I brought you some flowers.”
Zoe squeezed his hand in acknowledgment. “Go. Mom. . . needs you.”
Keyes nodded and stood up. “She wants to come in today and see for herself that you’re on the mend.” He reached over and kissed her on the forehead. “I love you, kiddo.”
She nodded, swallowing gently and flinching at the pain. Closing her eyes, she heard her father slip out of the room and the door click shut. Her mom was safe. Unharmed. That news made everything else worthwhile. So what if she couldn’t swallow without flinching? So what if she sounded like a frog when she talked? Her mom was alive. That was all that mattered.
Zoe couldn’t remember anything after the rope had tightened around her neck except for a few faint echoes of voices around her, urgent and authoritative.
There was a light. . . .
Suddenly it was a vibrant memory. Her heart soared as she recalled the sensation. He’d been there with her. God had been right there, holding her through the whole thing. And oh, how He loved her! Even as Ted Matthews was trying to kill her, God had been right there holding her in His arms.
Ted Matthews. The name sent shivers down her back. She couldn’t believe it when she saw his face. He looked nothing like the police sketch her mother had helped with. Either he’d been wearing a disguise, or he hadn’t been the man who was in the store that day, spooking her mother.
She’d met him just once as she was leaving Rene’s house. He was coming back from work and Rene had introduced them. Her only impression of him had been that of an arrogant, rude man. She’d never suspected the evil that lurked beneath the surface.
Did he get away? Did they kill him? Will he live to terrorize again?
“You’re supposed to be resting, but from the look on your face, you’re too busy worrying about something.”
Zoe’s eyes opened as JJ walked over to her bed. He shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at everything but her. “Matthews?” she rasped harshly.
He glanced at her quickly and then away. “He’s alive. Paralyzed. He’ll spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair. In prison.”
Relief came cool and sweet. “Thank. . .you.”
“You don’t have to thank me,” he replied. “If I’d been any kind of detective, he never would have gotten that close to you.”
She shook her head, reaching for his hand. He ignored her attempt, keeping his hands safely in his pockets. Her hand dropped and she frowned. “Not. . .your. . .fault.”
“And pigs fly with purple wings.” He snorted with derision. “He played me like a child, running me all over creation, chasing one lead after another, and he was right there under my nose the whole time, laughing at me.”
“Mom. . .me. . .alive. You did. . .that. You won.”
JJ yanked his hand out of his pocket, grabbed a chair, and slid it over close to the bed. He dropped down in it like a sack of flour. “I didn’t find Jessica Matthews. I didn’t figure out the truth about Ted Matthews. What kind of cop does that make me?”
“Human.” She reached out again. He was too close to avoid her touch this time. Her fingers curled around his wrist. “You didn’t. . . give up.”
“No. I couldn’t do that.”
“How. . .did you. . .find me?”
JJ rolled his eyes. “Of all the questions in the world, why that one?”
The corners of her mouth lifted in a smile as she waited for his answer.
“Okay. Believe it or not. God. I know—sounds crazy. But I was at the end of my rope. I told Him if He’d help me find you, then I would never deny Him again. He kept His promise, so I’m keeping mine, even though it sounds about as wacky as it can get.”
“Not. . .wacky.” She swallowed carefully. “How?”
JJ gazed at his hands. “I was looking at a map and thinking about what Matthews told you. About where Gina was buried. I made everyone turn around. On the way back past the cabin, I saw the storm cellar door open. I knew it wasn’t that way earlier.”
Zoe closed her eyes. Thank You, Lord.
“It wasn’t like with Macy. I mean, you weren’t.”
She opened her eyes and gazed at him, watching the emotions war in his eyes.
“You were right. Macy did look at me like I was some superhero. I needed her to. You said something to Matt that first day I met you—about how he needed women to stroke his ego. Macy did that for me.
“I didn’t take her instincts seriously. She kept telling me that she felt like she was being stalked, and I blew off her fears as nonsense.”
“Because a superhero. . .would have known. . .before she did.”
JJ glanced over at her, a wry smile twisting his lips. “Something like that.” He took a deep breath. “And then there you were, defying me at every turn, turning my ego inside out and upside down, and laughing at me all at the same time.”