Her thoughts jumped from one thing to another. She hadn’t felt this bereft since her parents dropped her at the dorm that first year of college. Then after college, she’d lived by herself for eight years. How had nine months of marriage reduced her independence to this? Then again, maybe it had nothing to do with independence and everything to do with being loved.
She flipped onto her back and began to pray for John and Bob and the people in Indonesia. The tension eased from her neck and shoulders. She yawned, scrunched the pillow and closed her eyes.
Cooper’s growl woke her. She lay still a moment, reminding herself where she was and that John was gone. The low rumbling in the dog’s throat sent a chill throughout her body.
Her bedroom door stood open, but the dog was in the living area where his bed was. She slipped from the bed and padded in silence to the door. Just as she reached it, Cooper surged forward in a scrambling rush and threw himself against the living room’s sliding glass doors. The vertical blinds flew apart under his assault, and his vicious yapping jolted her.
Someone was out there.
The dog leapt against the doors again, his barking drowning all other noises.
Sharee ran for the kitchen. Get a weapon, something, anything. She jerked open a drawer and snatched up the rolling pin and flew back to the bedroom. Grabbing her phone, she punched 911.
She thought she heard a voice. “Hello? Hello? I can’t hear over the barking.” A voice she couldn’t understand responded. “Someone’s trying to break in.” She gave her address and put the phone down. She stepped to the doorway and stared at the living room blinds, then hefted the wooden rolling pin. The blinds had stopped swaying.
The dog sat back, growling now, ears cocked forward.
“What is it, boy? What do you hear?”
Cooper ignored her. She stared at the blinds. They hung straight down now, giving privacy again.
What had happened to the outside, motion lights? They hadn’t come on. She frowned, then ran to the hall and flipped the switch. She’d forgotten to turn them on when she went to bed.
“Cooper.”
The dog didn’t move. His attention never left the sliding doors. She flipped on the other outside lights, then went to change clothes and wait for the police.
***
The Sheriff’s deputy checked outside but found nothing. He praised the dog, reiterated her need for the motion lights, and said he’d have a cruiser patrol the area during the night.
Sharee locked the door after him, walked back into the bedroom and stared at the bed. It looked big and lonely. She grabbed her pillows and a blanket and took them to the couch. Cooper’s bed was at the far end. Ridiculous, she knew, but she’d sleep better out here next to the dog. Except for the night the homeless group stayed in the house, the dog stayed out of their bedroom. As she tucked the blanket around her, Cooper got up from his bed and circled in front of the couch before dropping down on the wooden floor beside her. She put a hand to his head.
“You’re a good dog, Cooper. Thank you.” The dog nosed her hand. She patted his head, lay back, and stared at the ceiling.
Sunrise was a long time coming, but at last, the verticals began to glow with morning light. She changed, grabbed a leash, and took the dog out for his morning walk. He stopped on the deck sniffing, growling again.
“Come on, Cooper. Whoever it was is gone.” She pulled on the leash, but he stiffened and snarled. “It’s all right—”
The dog jumped forward, barking, and Sharee stumbled after him. A two-foot-long black snake slid off the deck. The dog tugged against the leash.
“It’s just a black snake, Coop. Leave him alone.” Sharee shook her head but grinned. Wait until she told John how Cooper had saved her twice. They went down the steps, and the dog lunged under the deck where the snake had disappeared.
She yanked on the leash. “Come on. Leave him alone.” The dog pulled and snarled, and she leaned over to look under the deck. Nothing but darkness. She hauled on the leash and stood. Something silver caught her eye. Light reflected. She leaned over once more and grabbed a roll of duct tape. Her brow furrowed as she straightened.
John had a place for everything. He would have missed a roll of duct tape.
The dog sniffed and growled. She stood staring down at it, and a cold chill ran up her spine.
***
John stared as the man hustled the girl out of sight around the end of the warehouse. The buildings here on Sumatra hadn’t received the damage that those on the outer islands had. He thanked God for that because it gave them a place to land the Cessna, a place where they could bring the injured from the islands off the coast. On some days, they’d also flown the dead. Mass graves on some of the smaller islands were impossible—too much debris, too much water. The sea had infiltrated before they dug three feet down.
He pushed aside the pictures that had accumulated in his mind the last four days and winced as he stepped onto the concrete. He’d injured his right ankle a couple years back, and the pain had returned this trip to haunt him.
His mind still turning, he moved out of the medics’ way. They climbed into the plane to check the injured. He bit the inside of his cheek. Just a year and a half ago, he and Bob had come to this same area on a mission trip to spread the Word of God. Now they’d come for a different type of mission.
The aerial view of the islands had shaken him. Some parts looked like a giant had stood on the islands, reached out into the ocean and dragged its huge fingers back onto the land, a mountain of water with it, toppling trees, huts, and any other structure in its way, gauging deep trenches in the land. It had not prepared him for the devastation and human loss he encountered once they landed.
His prayers since had consisted of requests and pleas for miracles—and he saw many—from a mother and child rescued from a fallen, mud-caked building to a young boy pulled alive from the top of a tree, his parents having strapped him to it before the tsunami hit.
The Islanders they talked to conveyed their fear and horror at the nine-foot tsunami triggered by a 7.2 magnitude earthquake. They described the deafening roar as the wall of water entered the bay and how it slammed ashore.
“We tried to outrun it, but we couldn’t,” one man said while they unloaded food and water from the plane. “I couldn’t hold on to my children. I couldn’t see my wife.” He broke down and cried while recounting his story. Of the two hundred people that lived in his village, only forty remained.
John reached forward to help take the makeshift stretcher from the Cessna to the waiting ambulance. The injured man on the stretcher had a broken leg and was covered with cuts and bruises. Two other people on stretchers waited for transport to the ambulance. The initial surprise to see three, four or more patients in an ambulance—or any vehicle that could be substituted for one—had disappeared. Any way they could get them to the hospital was welcome.
He glanced around as the medics edged him aside and slid the carrier into the waiting vehicle. At least this small, private airfield allowed them a place to land. On the smaller islands, the choice of airfields was limited at best.
Hunger and exhaustion gnawed at him—and discouragement. He stretched his neck to loosen the muscles. Combine the physical realities with the devastation and death he’d seen since they’d arrived, and no wonder he was having an emotional and spiritual battle. He wondered again where God was in all this.
He headed back to the plane and helped lift the next stretcher. At least something would be done for these and the others they brought to the mainland. And soon, a truck would arrive with food and water and medical supplies that were needed on the islands. They’d fly back with a heavier load than they’d brought. Hundreds of volunteers had come to work without much food or sleep to help people they did not know and would never see again.
All right, Lord, I see you working—in the midst of this tragedy.
As the wind circled them, the stench of his own body rose, and he handed his side of the li
tter to the paramedic. The injured man groaned, grabbed John’s hand and said something. John shifted his gaze to Bob and lifted a brow.
“He says thank you for bringing your plane. Thank you for what you’re doing.”
John swallowed, his heart squeezing, and he nodded at the man. The others pushed the stretcher into the ambulance, and John turned away.
Across the tarmac, he saw a figure break from the far building’s shadow and run forward. The girl he’d seen a minute ago, probably eight or ten years old, screamed something—he had no idea what. A burly man appeared and dashed after her. His red shirt flew wide open as he ran, showing a bare chest. The girl screamed again, the sound tearing across the pavement. The man moved fast, and the girl had no chance at freedom.
Why had he thought that? Freedom?
As the man grabbed her, she twisted and tumbled to the ground, bringing him with her. The girl fought and kicked and screamed. The man raised his arm and hit her across the face.
No other thought came. John sprinted the distance between him and the pair, yelling. The man yanked his head up, then jerked the girl to her feet. He shouted at John. John didn’t understand the language, but the meaning reached him. Stay away.
That didn’t slow him down. He skidded to a stop in front of the man. “Let her go.” John’s breath came in gasps, yet, his meaning, too, was clear.
The man shook the girl and said something to John. He spat on the pavement and turned as if to leave. John caught his arm. The man whirled, throwing the girl to the ground. He yanked something from his waist and lunged at John. Light on the knife’s blade sent John leaping backward. The tug on his shirt and the ripping sound came at once.
“Hey! Hey! What’s going on?” A shout came from behind him.
The man had the knife raised again but faltered when another shout reached them. He glanced past John, then spun and ran.
John stared after him, and footsteps sounded behind him, then someone gripped his arm.
“Are you trying to get killed?” Bob rasped.
John leaned down and drew the girl to her feet. She pulled against his hold, but John’s grip tightened. Was she okay?
The husband-and-wife team who had flown with them to care for the injured skidded to a stop beside them. The other American’s broad shoulders and height set him apart from the Indonesians just as John’s height did.
“Don’t you realize you can’t interfere like that?” he demanded.
“No,” the woman said. “Thank God you interfered. You saved her, although she won’t thank you.” She looked at the girl who still struggled against John’s hold.
Bob’s hand still rested on his arm. “You have nine lives. No, sorry, you must have nine angels watching over your one life.”
John’s gaze went to the girl. She drew back and kicked him hard in the shins. He grunted and dropped her arm. Whirling, she spat something over her shoulder and sped away.
“Hey! Come back! Wait!”
“She won’t come back,” the woman said.
Bob nodded. “Leave her, John. Julie’s right. She won’t come back.”
“And she won’t thank you,” Julie said. “Although you probably kept her out of a brothel for another day.”
“A brothel? Are you kidding? She’s a child.”
“You know about the brothels, don’t you?”
He heard the question but stared after the girl until she disappeared behind another building. “Of course, I…” He frowned. Of course, he’d heard, but did he know?
Julie jerked her head in a yes motion. “Brothels. After an earthquake, a tsunami like they’ve had here, many families are separated, or parents are dead, and the girls—boys, too, these days—wind up in brothels.” Julie’s face tightened. “Slavery is alive and well in the twenty-first century.”
John settled his gaze on her. “She’s still a child.” He digested Julie’s look and what she’d said and wanted to spit the taste of it out of his mouth.
Her husband stepped forward. “Let’s go back. There’s nothing we can do here.”
John shot a look Bob’s way. He indicated the plane with a tilt of his head, and they followed the other two.
“He’s right.” Julie slowed and fell in step beside him. “Nothing we can do today, and she wouldn’t come with you anyway. By now, she either hates men or just learned not to trust them. She doesn’t know you or know that you’re different from the others.”
A brothel? He still felt the distaste. Is that what her life would consist of? Being beaten, molested and sold? “Is anything being done about it?”
“Yes, but not enough. People are stepping forward to help, but the solution’s not easy. Human trafficking. It’s alive and well in America, too.” Julie stopped at the ambulance.
The medics glared at them. A string of Indonesian words followed. They still needed to transport one last person from the plane to the ambulance.
“It can’t be as bad in America.”
Julie threw him a look of skepticism. “Why don’t you find out when you get back? But right now…” She waved her hand toward the plane. “Right now, you’re doing what you can for these.”
He looked at her, the pit in his stomach tightening. “I need to do more.”
She nodded. “We all feel that way, but we can only do what we can do.”
Chapter 13
Lynn’s news about Maria and her interview with the detectives overshadowed Sharee’s scare from the previous night. Lynn paced up and down as Sharee dialed Pastor Alan’s number and talked with Daneen.
Sharee put down the phone a few minutes later. “Pastor Alan and Daneen are foster parents. Did you forget? I wanted to see if they can help with Lily, but they’re already on it. I should have known.”
Lynn stopped pacing. “I hadn’t thought about that. Lily has to stay with someone until Maria is better.”
Sharee paused and studied Lynn. “You look upset.”
“Oh, no. I like having friends of mine knifed.”
“Lynn.”
Lynn flopped onto the couch. “Sorry. The whole thing’s a disaster.” She looked away from Sharee’s gaze. “The only good thing is that they expect Maria to make it.”
Sharee sat in a seat across from her. “Why did they want your fingerprints?”
“Detective Carpenter said it was standard procedure—to eliminate mine from others.”
“That sounds right.”
“Well, Detective Richards made it sound like I was the killer.”
“He couldn’t possibly think that.”
“Oh, no? You should have heard him.”
“Lynn, these men are professionals. They would know you had no reason to kill anyone. Besides, when they do try to match your fingerprints and DNA, they’re not going to find anything.”
Lynn looked away from her again. Sharee studied her a moment, “Right?”
“Yeah, sure, right.”
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ve never been in Maria’s tent. Never touched her stuff that I know of, except…”
“Except?”
“Have you forgotten?”
“Forgotten what?”
“The bag, Sharee. The bag containing Victoria’s stuff.”
“The bag?” Sharee’s eyes widened. “You mean the one Maria gave you for me? That was a day or two before the banquet, and then John was leaving. I did forget. Completely.”
Lynn twirled her long hair, pulled it up, and secured it with a clip. “Well, I bet when we hand it in, we’ll both be thrown in jail for harboring evidence or something.”
“That’s ridiculous. We just let them know we forgot. We did. It didn’t seem important.”
“Sure. We’ll do just that. I hope it works with Detective Richards.”
***
Rich looked at the woman in the hospital bed. She seemed smaller and younger than when Lynn had introduced them. The beep of the machines, the attached IVs, the bruises on her face looked like sentinels of defeat. Y
et, the doctor’s prognosis sounded better than he’d hoped. When he phoned Keith with the news, the man didn’t try to cover his relief. They’d both seen too many homicides.
He raised his eyes to the girl. Lily Sanchez. Lynn’s pastor’s wife sat beside her now. Daneen Nichols, he reminded himself, recalling the name.
Other information filtered through his thinking. Pedro Gonzalez now lived in the motor home on the church property. From homeless to a job with housing in less than twenty-four hours seemed quite convenient. Why?
He caught Daneen Nichols’ eye. She nodded and smiled. “Good to see you again…Detective Richards.”
She’d stumbled over his name, but that was to be expected. He nodded at her. “The same, Mrs. Nichols. How’s Pastor Alan?”
“We’re both doing well. You know when God moved on us to become foster parents, we didn’t realize how our involvement with the homeless would work right into that.”
“You’ve taken a bigger role in helping the homeless these days?”
“Oh, yes. With Sharee, and now John, leading the way, we had no choice; and it’s been a blessing.”
He nodded. “I need to talk to Lily.”
The girl’s head rose, her eyes meeting his before sliding away.
“I just have a few questions.” He said, forcing a lightness he didn’t feel. He’d come to the hospital after the attack, probing her about what happened but careful in what he asked. She’d seemed fragile at the time. He understood that. However, some things needed to be revisited.
The girl’s gaze met his again, before jumping to Daneen. Daneen nodded and smiled. “Your mom’s still asleep. We can step into the hall.”
Rich backed through the door. “Would you like to go to the waiting room?” When the girl shook her head, he said, “Okay. We’ll just stay here. How’s your mom doing?”
“I…I don’t know. The doctor said the surgery went well.”
“Have you had a chance to talk with her?”
Splashdown: A Christian Contemporary Romance with Suspense (Dangerous Series Book 3) Page 9