by Dee J. Adams
“Mama, s’wong?”
Terry looked down at the sweet concern on Jess’s face. “Nothing’s wrong, Peanut.” Besides the shirt she was wearing. “What happened to your other shirt?” She herded Jess toward her bedroom for a different top.
“Got diwty.”
“How’d it get dirty?” Terry saw the balled up shirt on the dresser. It had a massive grape juice spill on the front.
“I spiwt,” Jess said with the seriousness only a toddler could have.
“It’s okay, Boo. I spill things too.” Terry reached for a fresh shirt when something dawned on her. Marcella was outside with Jay. Alone. Sweat prickled along her back. She hefted Jess in her arms. The change of shirt would have to wait. “C’mon, Peanut. Let’s go check on Daddy.”
“Okay.” Jess wrapped her arm around Terry’s neck.
Terry didn’t want to freak out the baby as she rushed from the room. She spotted a long sleeve maroon sweater on the back of the sofa. A sweater with shoulder pads that would perfectly match Marcella’s white and maroon striped tank top. The same sweater she remembered from her dream. Panic seized Terry’s chest. She reached for the phone on the kitchen wall, but got no dial tone. Then she noticed the sliced cord dangling near the floor.
“Uh oh, Mama. S’boke,” Jess said.
“I see that.” Terry willed down the panic as she headed out the back door at a fast clip. “Hold on tight, Jess.”
Breaking into a run, Terry scanned the dense wooded area as she hurried to the lake. She didn’t see anyone by the boat and no one was on the small pier next to it. Her heart beat frantically as she ran faster. “Jay!” Terry called, trying not to sound too freaked out, but she failed miserably.
“Dada,” Jess called out in her high-pitched sing-song lilt.
Then Terry saw something on the water’s edge.
Jay! Lying still, half his body in the water and half out. “Jay!” Terry bolted toward him, hugging Jess close to her chest, the familiar feeling of that morning rushing through her. The panic, the fear.
“Jess, close your eyes and don’t open them until I tell you,” Terry ordered as she set Jess on the ground and knelt next to Jay. She turned him, knowing what she’d see, but still shocked at the amount of blood covering his face. “Jay!” She felt his neck for a pulse. Nothing.
“Mama?” Jess sounded as scared as Terry felt.
A massive wave of hysteria threatened to pull her under and Terry fought it with a muffled sob. “Keep your eyes closed until I tell you, Jess.” Tipping Jay’s head, she put her mouth on his and blew two hard breaths into his mouth. Then she clasped her hands and pumped his chest five times. Two more rounds and he gasped for air. Terry turned him on his side and he coughed up lake water.
Alive!
But so much blood. It streamed down his temple, down his cheek. What did she do first?
Oh God, if Jay was here, where was Marcella?
Her sixth sense screamed and Terry turned and ducked just in time to miss Marcella’s blow. The oar in her hand was stained with blood. Jay’s blood.
“Jess!” Terry screamed. “Run! Hide! Right now! Don’t look back. Run and hide!”
Jess took off for the trees, her arms and legs pumping, as Marcella swung again. This time she connected with Terry’s arm and sent her flying toward the water. The muddy bank sucked at Terry’s hands and she didn’t pull back fast enough. Marcella’s next blow caught her in the head. The world exploded in a shower of lights and pain and Terry fell back into the water. She splashed around to keep from going under and managed to get her legs beneath her. The flannel shirt pulled her down and it was just like her dream. She hadn’t even realized she’d put on the shirt in the darkened car. A sharp pop rent the air and someone was yelling. Terry came up from the water as Marcella turned and ran.
“You all right?” Someone yelled from behind her.
Terry saw the man from the grocery store standing in his boat, a gun in his hand and his fishing line hanging askew from the side. “Need help!” But the words barely made it out she was shaking so hard. “We need help!” she called again, wading toward Jay. “Jay?” His pulse beat strong, but he was barely conscious. Terry glanced up to see Marcella taking the same path her daughter had.
Jess!
Chapter Six
Leaving Jay’s side, Terry bolted for the path. Her wet clothes dragged her down and her jeans clung like ten-pound weights on her legs.
She came out of the curve in the path just in time to see Marcella scooping Jess into her arms and continuing toward the front of the cabin. It was happening like Terry’s dream and that same hysteria lurked in her head.
A guttural roar came from Terry’s chest, an inhuman sound that released every protective cell inside and pushed her faster. She heard an engine fire to life and rounded the corner in time to see Marcella’s car spit gravel and dust in its wake. She knew before looking that Jay’s tires were slashed and flat, but she checked anyway. All four flat, just like her dream. Her nightmare.
Terry ran after the car, going as fast as she could, ignoring the pounding in her skull and nausea that bubbled in her gut. Those tires would go flat, but how long would it take?
Air wheezed in and out of Terry’s lungs as she struggled to keep up an all-out sprint. She heard the tires squeal as the car hit the main road and saw it turn south through the cover of trees. Terry cut through the forest in hopes of keeping better track of it.
Tree branches reached out and sliced at her arms and legs, pulled at her hair. She heard the unholy sound of metal against road and saw smoke drift from the car. Terry cut toward the road, toward the blue paint of the sedan that had finally stopped. The faint whine of an engine filled the air.
Heaving for breath, Terry reached the highway in time to see Marcella pulling Jess, screaming, from the disabled car almost a hundred yards away. The rank stench of burned rubber and tire rims drifted in the breeze. Seeing her daughter gave Terry a fresh burst of adrenaline and she sprinted toward them even as Marcella tried running away.
Rage and panic kept Terry moving at an ungodly rate. Holding the wailing Jess slowed Marcella down, and she finally glanced over her shoulder and spun around, her hand out, her chest heaving. “Stop!” she yelled.
The whine of an engine screamed behind Terry and brakes squealed. She turned, shocked to see Jay on an ATV, his clothes muddy and wet, blood still staining his face and shirt. He stopped in front of Terry and wobbled off the three-wheeler, his hand out as he moved toward Marcella. Barely ten yards separated them.
“It’s over, Marcella. Put Jess down. It’s over.”
“No, it’s not,” Marcella yelled, her voice broken and ravaged. Her wide eyes blazed crazy and wisps of her hair stuck to her sweaty cheeks.
Terry caught up to Jay and they advanced together. The dream never got this far and Terry had no clue what to expect next. She’d tried so hard to change things, to affect the outcome, but now she was in uncharted territory.
Jess squirmed in Marcella’s arms and when she saw them coming closer, she let out a fresh eardrum-splitting wail. “MamaDada!” Over and over and over.
“Shut up!” Marcella shook Jess, but the toddler only screamed louder. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!”
Terry moved at the same time Jay did. Sprinting toward the woman who might very well shake their child to death before they reached her. The surrounding forest seemed eerily quiet as everything seemed to warp into some type of fantasy slow motion, but the blood running down her face and Jay’s was as real as the mad woman who had their child in her hands.
Marcella saw them coming and with an evil glare, she bent low with Jess in her arms as a big moving truck rounded the corner behind her.
“No!” Terry’s yell ripped through the quiet mountain.
Marcella flung Jess high into the air toward the road, right in front of the truck, and started running. Jay roared and dove, catching Jess at the last second before they both fell to the hard cement. The truck tir
es locked and burned rubber, the sound ripping through the air and the smell like acid burning her throat. Terry screamed as the truck skid to a halt inches from Jay, then she bolted for the crazy woman in front of her.
Every step brought her closer, every ragged breath had her muscles screaming for relief. Terry heard Marcella’s labored breathing and tackled her hard from behind. They both rolled onto the rough gravel shoulder. Rocks and dead pine branches bit into Terry’s skin. She came up in time to see Marcella scrambling to get to her feet. Terry pounced on her back and pounded her with a kidney punch that stopped her midcrawl. “You will not hurt my family.” She lifted enough to turn Marcella beneath her and landed a solid right hook to her face that sent Marcella’s head snapping sideways. A shock of pain exploded in her hand, but the satisfaction of delivering the blow made for a great equalizer.
“That was for Jay!” Terry seethed before winding up again. She delivered another punch that snapped Marcella’s head the other way. “That was for Jess!”
Marcella lunged upright and landed a sharp fist to Terry’s jaw. Fresh pain exploded in her head. The weight of the punch knocked her back and gave Marcella time to get to her feet. Terry rebounded and came at her again, this time with a sharp left that took Marcella to the ground. “That’s because you’re pissing me off and this—” Terry delivered one more hard jab that took Marcella out for good, “—is for me.”
Taking huge gulps of air, Terry bent over before she fell. She glanced up to see Jay holding tightly to a sobbing Jess who had her arms wrapped around his neck as he stumbled toward Terry. His gaze locked on hers and the mixture of love and relief made her heart swell. The picture he made holding their daughter tipped her over an emotional edge. She rarely cried, but the sting of tears threatened to become a full waterworks show if she didn’t take a deep breath and pull herself together. She didn’t want Jess to see her as freaked out as she felt.
“Police are coming.” He thumbed to the truck driver who had a CB receiver in his hand and was calling for help.
Terry might’ve fainted if Jess wasn’t there to see it. Her lungs burned, her legs wobbled and her head felt like it might explode.
In the next instant, Jay wrapped her up in his right arm as Jess sobbed into his shirt. Terry, her chest heavy with emotion, finally let go and felt hot tears stream down her face. She held onto Jay and Jess as tightly as she could. It took a second to realize that they’d collapsed to the ground, still in their huddle, a family shaken but strong despite the nightmare.
“Pretty nice left cross you’ve got working for you,” Jay murmured in her hair and Terry sputtered a shaky laugh, feeling the burn in her hand with Jay’s comment. “Any idea why she went off the deep end?” he asked.
Terry looked into his eyes and swiped a gentle finger beneath the cut that still bleed from his eyebrow. “I know she had a tough day, but this seemed over the top to me.”
He nodded and swallowed hard. “That’s the understatement of the decade. I thought you told me she was shy.”
“I’m rethinking that,” Terry said. “Maybe I mistook quiet for shy. I have no idea. Or maybe everything she did was an act.” She shrugged and shook her head. “I don’t know what was real or not.”
Glancing toward Marcella, still lying on the road, Jay patted Jess’s back. “This is most definitely real.”
A few minutes later, sirens blared closer. A police car pulled up with an ambulance, paramedics and fire truck right on its bumper. Terry looked down at the blood staining both her and Jay’s shirts and could only imagine the gruesome picture they made. But the most important thing stuck out. They were a family. He was the man she wanted to be with for the rest of her life so maybe it was up to her to take the next step.
EMTs checked them both out on the side of the road, taking vital signs, cleaning up the wounds and even helping to calm down Jess.
The light bulb went off in Terry’s head. Yes, they were finally engaged, but she didn’t want to waste another second. “Can we get married as soon as humanly possible?” she asked. She’d do anything for this man, go to the ends of the earth for him. And he’d do the same for her. She’d even live on the same property as his lying, shrew of a mother. They had the kind of love that would keep them together no matter what. “We’ll move into the guesthouse at your place. When the time is right and we can afford a place of our own, we’ll move, but until then, I just want us to be together. I don’t care where.”
The EMT cleaning the gash over Jay’s eyebrow gave her a quick glance and grinned. “She must love you if she’s proposing and you look like this.” His barb came with a wide straight-tooth smile.
Jay’s eyes narrowed a fraction before a smile cut across his mouth. “Yeah. Whenever you want,” he told her quietly.
More police and another ambulance arrived at the site. Red lights flashed and gave the evening a creepy, haunted feel.
The three of them took a ride in an ambulance together. Aside from being scared out of her mind, Jess seemed to have bounced back and even managed to make the nurses laugh as she played peek-a-boo with her dad in the treatment room to cheer him up. The cut across his eyebrow required four stitches, the same amount required along Terry’s hairline. Jess took turns sitting on each of their laps in the treatment room.
Two hours later, when it seemed none of their parents would get there before they were released, Terry heard the knock on the treatment room door. She looked up to find her future mother-in-law. Terry never dreamed she’d see the day when Lou Ann St. John didn’t have every hair in place or every bit of self-control intact, so when the woman with mascara lines tracking down her cheeks hurried into the room, Terry had to do a double take.
“Jess!” Lou Ann cried.
The anguish in Lou Ann’s voice struck a nerve in Terry’s heart. She knew that fear, she’d lived it earlier today when her daughter had been scooped up in the arms of a maniac. Terry held back a shiver.
Lou Ann flew to Jay’s bedside where Terry sat with Jess on her lap. Crouching, she wrapped her son and granddaughter in a big hug, her shoulders shaking with fresh emotion. The exclusion was like a hard slap to Terry’s face.
“It’s okay, Mom,” Jay said, resting a hand on her back. But Lou Ann just shook her head as she gripped him in the same bear hug. “I’m okay. Jess is okay. So is Terry,” he added.
Oh, she wanted to kiss him for that.
Lou Ann finally pulled away, her face contorted in agony. “When I heard what happened, I got so scared. The police said you both had head injuries and…” Her tears came too hard to talk and Jay just squeezed her hand as his father came into the room. At thirty-nine, with the same broad build and coloring as his son, Jesse Sr. looked like a model. It was easy to see where Jay got his good looks.
“Mom, we’re okay,” Jay said. Then he glanced up at his dad. “You made pretty good time for a Friday night.”
“I called in a big chip. Borrowed a helicopter.”
Jay nodded. “Gnarly.”
His dad grinned, flashing straight white teeth. “Totally.” Then he lost the smile. “I think this added about fifteen years to our lives.”
“Sorry about that,” Jay said, glancing at Terry. “Sure wasn’t anything we expected either.”
The police had found two large suitcases, cash and multiple wigs in the car. Marcella had planned a serious disappearing act with Jess. From what police had gathered so far from her ranting once she came to, Jess was the answer to her loneliness. Right up until Jess had started screaming in her ear like a wild hyena. A phone call to her aunt brought much more clarity to the picture when she discovered Marcella had quit taking her medication.
Marcella had been ranting about a voice in her head since she’d regained consciousness in the ambulance. Jess had shown her the kind of love and attention she craved. Marcella’s delusions had her thinking her only salvation was the love of a toddler. Jess. But with Jess so hysterical for her parents, Marcella had simply acted in hopes of escaping. No
better way to do that than to make sure the focus was on Jess.
“She just didn’t count on a few things,” Terry added. “Like the fact that I’d take the air out of her tires because of my dream. Or that Jay would remember what I told him about part of the dream and be looking out for something when he was by the water.” Though Marcella had made contact with the oar, Jay had managed to deflect much of the blow. It was sucking in lake water that had gotten him in trouble. “I think she meant to grab me in the house because when I went to the lake, her sweater was over the sofa, but when I saw her outside, she was wearing it like in my dream,” Terry said, cradling her daughter close for the twentieth time in the last couple of hours. “We got really lucky.”
“Once I coughed up the lake water and realized what was happening, I hopped on the ATV.”
“I totally forgot you told me about those on the drive up,” Terry said.
“I can’t believe those old things are still running,” Lou Ann said. Her words brought the focus to her tear stained face.
“So, Mom,” Jay said, staring his mother down.
Terry’s heart took a leap because she knew that look in his eyes. “Jay, don’t,” she said softly. “Not now.” Not in a hospital room with Jess sleeping in her arms and Jesse Sr. looking on. If he wanted to confront his mother it should be done privately.
“Now’s the best time,” Jay replied not even glancing at her. “Mom, is there a reason Terry should feel leery about living in the guesthouse?”
Lou Ann blinked a couple of times and her lips quivered in that way they did when she was about to speak. “Well, if this incident was any indication, we know she lacks judgment in choosing her friends. We don’t want any more deranged people coming into our lives.” She batted her lashes a few more times for good measure.