LOVE in a Small Town

by Janet Eaves

  “What they said about Rob couldn’t be true. I would have known. I would have sensed it. They were lying. You were lying.” Leaning against the cold concrete wall, she sobbed.

  “I’m sorry,” he replied. “I never meant to hurt you. I never set out to lose your trust, but the fact is that the things you heard on the news are true. I should have told you long ago so it wouldn’t have been so much of a shock, but Kate, they are true. Rob was smuggling drugs. Rob is…”

  “Alive.”

  She said the word so softly she barely heard it herself.

  “What?” Michael put his hands on the wall, on either side of her shoulders.

  She lifted her gaze to meet solid with his. “I said he’s alive. But I guess you already knew that, too.”

  “How long have you known? From the beginning?”

  Shaking her head, she struggled with the words. “From the beginning? You think I’ve always known he was alive? That I lied to you?”

  “Have you?”

  A pent-up breath whooshed from her lungs. She pushed at his chest. “That doesn’t even deserve a response.”

  He kept her pinned to the wall. “Kate…”

  She tried to sidestep. “Stay away from me. Everything we’ve had is based on a lie.”

  “You’ve seen Carpenter?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “He’s dangerous, Kate. Stay away from him. At least, if you can promise me anything, say you will call me if he tries to contact you.”

  She laughed. “Oh sure, so you can sweep on in and arrest him? He’s caught, Michael, and doesn’t know which way to turn.”

  “He’s a murderer. A cold, calculating criminal. He’ll use you and he’ll catch you up in his web and you won’t get out.

  “You’re saying that because you want me.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  Her gut hurt from the pent-up emotion. Her body shook, the palms of her hands lay flat against the wall behind her, sweating. Misty clouds enveloped her brain. She didn’t think there was any more tears left for her to cry.

  She dropped her gaze to the floor. Rob is not a murderer. I’ll never believe it.

  Michael continued, “Yes, I lied to you. I’ve been working on this case for two years. We’ve suspected Rob’s involvement since before he died. I was assigned to investigate you, but then, Kate…”

  His voice broke. “Kate, I fell in love with you. That is not a lie.” He touched her face with a thumb. “I have no reason to lie to you about that. I love you with all my heart.”

  She cried as his trembling hand swept her cheek. Confused, she needed to be anywhere but here, but couldn’t move. Not because of him, but because she was planted there on the floor, immobile. He leaned in and brushed a kiss across her forehead, then with agonizing slow precision, traveled down her face and softly kissed her quivering lips.

  “I do love you,” he breathed. “I want to marry you. I can’t make you love me or trust me. I can only keep telling you. If you need me, want me, just call. The choice is yours.”

  He dipped closer and nuzzled the side of her cheek. For several long seconds he lingered, and they stood there. Kate wanted both to push him away and hold on to him forever.

  “I only ask that you watch yourself, Kate. He is a dangerous man. Don’t let him get too close.”

  Then he was gone.

  ****

  She collapsed to the cold, tile floor seconds after he’d left. The last thing she remembered was a fog swirling around her head, sucking away all reasonable thought. It was like someone shrink-wrapped her brain and she was trying to see through it, desperately trying to make sense of everything around her, but it was impossible.

  Her body took over, helping her to forget.

  She heard voices, but the mist was still too thick to identify who they belonged to. Her body was limp, like a rag doll, her head top-heavy. Her eyes were glued shut. She tried opening them, but something cool and damp was laid across them. Her body was cold, and hot.

  Then later, looking up from the couch in Jim Hamilton’s office…

  “No, it’s all settled. You are taking the rest of the week off. I’ve already made the arrangements. Friday is an in-service day, anyway, so you’ll only miss two days of school. I’m sure your students won’t miss you all that much. They’ll be glad for the break. And you, my dear, need the rest.”

  Kate watched as Jim Hamilton paced back and forth. She sat up on the cracked leather couch, facing him. He could be a pain sometimes, but right now he was a dear.

  “But, I couldn’t possibly…”

  “No arguments. Your health is important. You need time off. You won’t be any good to yourself or your students if you don’t take it now. I insist.”

  Period. Kate could almost see the punctuation mark slice through the air as he spoke.

  “Oh, all right, but I guarantee I won’t pass out again.”

  He looked at her hard. “Better not.” His cheeks shook as he grinned back at her. “You scared the shit out of me. I’m not an old man yet, but this guy’s ticker can’t take much more of that.” Patti walked through the office door as he spoke. “Now, Patti will take you home. You can pick up your truck tomorrow.”

  “Okay.”

  Patti hooked her arm in Kate’s and they walked slowly out the school to her waiting car.

  She turned to her friend after Patti got in. “What happened here?”

  She ground the engine to life. “Where do you want me to start? From the time I found you unconscious on your classroom floor, or from when Mr. Hamilton gave you the week off?”

  “I was unconscious?”

  “Deader than a doornail. I could hardly revive you. We carried you all the way to the office.” She gestured with hands and her face as she talked, animating every other word for her.

  “We?”

  “Yeah, Jake and me. Boy, you’re heavy when you’re dead weight, you know that?”

  “Thanks, I needed that.” She got a mental image of Jake, their near seventy-year-old custodian, and Patti, carrying her to the office. No wonder Jim freaked.

  “So then, when I explained things a little….”

  “Explained what?”

  “You know, about Rob? And the stuff with Danny. And a little about Michael…”

  “Oh Patti, you didn’t.”

  “Just a little, Kate. I mean, I didn’t tell him Rob was alive and all, just about the news report.” Patti turned the steering wheel to avoid a pedestrian crossing to the post office, and then headed toward Patti’s apartment. “But I had to, you see? To make him understand that you needed some time off.”

  She stopped the car and looked to her friend. “And you do need the time. Kate you look awful. You’ve got to think this thing through. You can’t do it with twenty-five kids under your feet all day long. So, I’ve made all the arrangements.”

  Arrangements? What arrangements?

  “Well, I don’t even know what I’ve got a brain for.”

  They sat in silence for a moment. “Will you hear me out?” Patti pleaded.

  “All right. Let’s hear it.”

  Patti sighed. “Good. Here are my keys to my parents’ vacation cabin up in the mountains. It’s on the edge of the backcountry up in Legend Mountain, plenty of nice hiking trails.” She dangled the keys in front of her. “It’s quiet and secluded and peaceful. No one ever comes around. You’ll be completely alone. And I think that’s what you need right now.”

  “You’re not scheming something are you?”

  “No, I promise.” Patti crossed her fingers and her heart. “No one will know where you are. Except me, that is.”

  “I don’t know, Patti.”

  “You can leave early in the morning because you need to sleep tonight. You’ll have a good bit of the week left. Come on. It will do you a world of good. You’ll see.”

  She snatched the keys out of Patti’s hand and realized how lucky she was.

  “Oh all right.”

 
; ****

  Kate knew she had arrived when she saw the narrow gravel road leading into the mountain beside the store that displayed a hefty assortment of velvet Elvises out front, and a sign that said “Genuine Turquoise Jewelry” across the top of the porch.

  The SUV threw up a trail of dust as she turned off the narrow paved road onto an even narrower dirt road. The dry dirt soon covered her car with a dusting of fine brown powder. She turned on her windshield-washer and wipers to see where she was going.

  The road wound around and up through the mountainside. After a while, she was out of the hot sun and the dust subsided. The breeze coming in her window grew cooler as she ascended in altitude. The temperature must have dropped ten degrees. The lush green of cedars and oaks blanketed the area; thick-leafed rhododendron lined the road as she drove on until she came upon a clearing.

  A small stream ran in front of the log cabin. A footbridge served as the only method of crossing. Kate parked her car near the bridge and got out.

  She stretched her arms upward and then bent over from side to side, releasing the kinks that had gathered from sitting in one position for the past hour or so.

  Gathering her suitcase and a sack of groceries, she walked steadily toward the footbridge. As she crossed, a cool breeze wafted up from stream rushing over pebbles beneath her feet. A rock fence stretched out to her left and rounded the back of the cabin. Wildflowers wove their way around the chinks of the rock; tall willowy clumps of grasses grew behind in a natural, haphazard sort of way.

  She took the worn stepping stones to the rugged porch, and sat the groceries and her bag down on an old weathered rocker as she fumbled in her purse for Patti’s key.

  With a screech she opened the screen door and inserted the key into the lock. It turned with the ease of having done so at least a thousand times. She walked in.

  Patti warned that the cabin had not been used since early summer, but she was pleased to see that it was not very dusty. A few cob webs here and there, but with sheets covering the furniture, there was not much cleanup to be done. Kate walked through the one floor of the cabin, pulling off sheets as she walked, taking note of her surroundings.

  The furnishings were old and rugged, but functional. A sofa, which Patti told her made into a sleeper, was decorated with one of Patti’s mother’s famous crocheted throws. It served as a divider between the kitchenette and living area. Another rocker, similar to the one on the front porch, and an overstuffed arm chair sat near the fireplace. A small dinette set completed the furnishings, utilizing the large double window directly behind the sofa, viewing the mountain scenario that played out behind the cabin.

  There were shelves of magazines and books in one corner and fishing gear and a shotgun leaned together in another. A deer head protruded from one wall and some type of large fish hung opposite it on another. Kate knew that these items must have come with the cabin, Patti’s father loved to hunt and fish, but rarely came back with anything of any significance.

  A door led off to the right. Kate opened it and found the only bedroom. Off this room was also a bathroom. She laid her suitcase on the floor and stretched herself across the cool quilt on the bed. She sank deep in the old mattress and lost herself in its comfort

  “Finally,” she whispered. “Peace, quiet.”

  She hoped her demons stayed away.

  Her eyes grew heavy as huge raindrops began to plot against the tin roof above her head. First one, and then another, until at last they droned down in a musical rhythm, lulling her into a deep sleep…

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  At some point, days were no longer days and nights were no longer nights—they were only chunks of time tangled with dark moments and tiny points of light. Time lost. Moments intertwined with hours, hours intertwined with days. Bits of memory. Flashes of bad times and good times. Reality clashing with imagination.

  Danny’s universe was the cellar, dark and musty as it was. He no longer watched for the streak of light that burrowed through the cracked plywood across the cellar, or tried to count the days and nights he had been there. Or look for the man that sometimes brought food. He no longer did these things.

  His eyes could not stand the light. It pained to look, so he didn’t. And he was so tired.

  The crickets became his friends. No longer did he fear them. Though he hated the bugs that crawled around his feet. He had long ago given up stomping on them. He let the crickets crawl on his hands and up his arms, and one day, when he was very hungry, he pulled the wings and legs off one and ate it. He didn’t like it, but he decided if he had to, he would do it again. He’d read a book once about an air force pilot who survived on crickets and water for days. He figured at least he had the crickets.

  At night, though, they comforted him with their chirping. He thought it like music and sometimes even hummed along. He’d heard crickets were good luck. That was his best reason for not wanting to eat them.

  The last time the man came seemed days ago. Danny cringed with remembrance.

  “Here kid, better eat this.” The man opened the door, the light blinding him, his huge body silhouetted against the open doorway. “It might be some time before I get back.”

  Danny squinted and grabbed at the bag, but the man laughed loudly and jerked it out of his hands.

  “Not so fast, little one.” He dangled the paper sack out in front of him, a hairs-breadth away from his fingertips. “This is all yours as soon as I get a little info.”

  Danny was hungry. He hadn’t eaten for days. He leapt at the man, clutching at his legs in desperation, pulling himself up, trying to get the bag. “Please…” he whimpered.

  The man kicked him. Danny lost his balance and fell backward, his body crumpling down the stairs.

  “About through with you anyway,” the man sneered. “About through with them all.” Danny watched in agony as the man opened the bag of food and dumped its contents down the steps, then the drink. The last thing Danny remembered was the shaft of light disappearing above him as the door was slammed and locked—and of him scavenging for pieces of food in the dark, hoping that the ice cubes didn’t melt into the dirt floor before he found them all.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Patti glanced at her watch—three more hours. Professional development days were often long, boring, and insufferable. Sleepily scanning the room, she caught a glimpse of a man standing in the doorway and winced. She tried to duck into her seat but Michael Lehmann caught her eye and motioned.

  I will keep my word.

  Reluctantly, she raised herself out of her seat and snuck across the back of the room, hoping that she wouldn’t be missed.

  “Where is she?” he demanded as they stepped out the classroom door. Obviously, he was in no mood to fool around.

  “Who?”

  His eyes widened and his nostrils flared. Unshaven and disheveled, and out of uniform, he was a wreck. He probably hadn’t slept. Likely worried sick about Kate. “Damn it Patti, I’ve got to find her. She won’t answer her phone. I’ve sat in front of her house for twenty-four hours straight. She’s not home. She’s nowhere in Legend, I know it.”

  She stared straight ahead, chewing the inside of her lip. What should she do?

  “You’re not going to tell me are you?” Agitated, he paced left, the right, and finally jerked his gaze back to her. “Just tell me this, is she safe? I’m scared to death that he’s gotten to her. If you don’t tell me, I’m going to her parents.”

  Every nerve in Patti’s body sharpened. “No, don’t do that.” She swallowed hard and laid a hand on Michael’s arm. “I know where she is, and she’s very safe.”

  “Are you going to tell me?”

  “No, I’m not. I promised her Michael. I can’t break that promise.”

  He looked as if he could strangle her. Michael stalked off in the opposite direction. She watched his hands draw into tight, trembling fists. His left hand suddenly went airborne, smashing into the concrete wall.

  He whir
led back. “She’s not safe, Patti. Don’t you see? Rob Carpenter is dangerous. I don’t care what you know about him or what Kate has told you. He deals and he murders. Both seem to get him what he wants—money. If he thinks Kate knows anything about my investigation, he’ll try to get to her. I’m not sure what he’d do.”

  Shaken, Patti brought a trembling hand up to her mouth. “Oh, my God.”

  Michael stepped closer, put a hand on each shoulder, and searched her eyes. “Please, Patti,” he pleaded. “I’ve got to get this thing settled with her, so I, we, can get on with our lives. I love her. I need her…alive. Please, please tell me where I can find her. I’m begging you.”

  Patti searched his face for several long seconds. She could see the pain etched there, the lines creasing the forehead, the bags under his eyes. She believed he loved Kate, but she had promised not to tell. She couldn’t go back on that promise, could she?

  But what about Kate’s safety?

  “Okay,” she said, “I’ll tell you.”

  ****

  Kate holed herself up in the cabin most all of that day, feeling deeply saddened and depressed, wanting only to curl into a fetal position and sleep, but without dreaming. Lately that seemed impossible. Her body needed healing. Her heart needed mending. Her emotions and her brain needed time off. She didn’t want to feel or think or love.

  She didn’t feel much like hiking, either, but she wanted to go to the natural bridge. She was a teenager last time she’d been there—carefree and without a care. Even then, she felt so free standing so far up in the sky on that huge rock. Perhaps that was what she needed now. She was drained, physically and emotionally. Some fresh air, some peace and tranquility, would do her a world of good.

  The chair lifts were the easiest and fastest way up the mountain, so she chose that route, instead of hiking up, even with her slight fear of height. The sign said it would take approximately eleven minutes going up and the same coming down. The chairs ascended as she watched. Surely it couldn’t be that bad.