by Lisa Wingate
I knew I’d stepped into something large and earthshattering, but there was no going back now. “Are you Alex Beck?”
Exhaling, she crossed her arms over her loose-fitting work shirt. “Why do you want to know? What business is it of yours? Did someone say something about it? Someone around here?” A quick glance toward her truck made me wonder if she was thinking of walking out on the conversation. Unlocking her arms, she rammed her hands onto her thin hips and muttered something under her breath.
“No one said anything to me.” What was going through her mind right now? What was she feeling? “I saw a piece of mail yesterday when I drove your truck. It was …”
She stiffened immediately, whirled toward me, her eyes flaring. “So, I loan you my vehicle, and you snoop through my private papers, stick your nose into things that have nothing to do with you? Search my mail?” Her accusation echoed across the barnyard, shredding the morning quiet. In the tree overhead, a peacock cried out and flew across to the orchard.
“Hang on a minute. First of all, I wasn’t snooping through your mail. It fell out of the truck, and I picked it up.”
“I’ll bet.”
I clenched my fingers, determined not to tumble over the precipice of emotion that had been looming ever since Jack’s accident. “Whether you want to believe it or not, that’s the truth. I saw the name. It rang a bell. I asked my brother-in-law about it when I called him about Mason West. He refreshed my memory a little. That’s it.”
“And now you’re talking about me to other people. Nice.” Al’s lips thinned, the creases alongside her mouth deepening. “Real nice. That’s what I get for helping you. I should’ve left you on your own to get by here in Moses Lake.”
My stomach sank. Something between Al and me had just been broken beyond repair. “Listen, it’s not that I’m not grateful. I just need to know that …”
“Some things aren’t your business.” She stabbed a finger in my direction, and I stumbled back a step. By the yard gate, Pecos stood up, growled low. Al ignored the warning. “That name doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
“Doesn’t it?” I pressed, anxious to finish the conversation, to be done with it, whatever the result. “That’s what I need to know. Does it have something to do with us? Are you here because … ? You’ve mentioned Jack and the murder case to me before. Is that more than just idle curiosity?”
“Oh, so now you’re accusing me?” Al threw her hands up, then let them slap to her sides. “Of what?”
“I don’t know, Al.” The anxiety that had been caged for almost a day now burst forth, wild, uncontained. “All I know is that there’s one man in a hospital bed, and you don’t think it’s an accident, but you won’t say why. My brother-in-law is telling me I’d better watch my step, and my husband is camped outside the ICU, trying to protect Jack, and everywhere I turn there’s a new secret. Yes, I’m worried. There’s something going on here, and I don’t know what it is. I just want the truth. About something. The questions you’re always asking me about Jack and about Mason since he got here … Are you working on some kind of story? I’m not accusing you of anything. I’m just asking for the truth.”
Spitting air, she turned and started toward the truck, then stopped and spun around, her chin jutting out. “You want the truth? The truth is, you don’t belong here, Mallory. You never did. Go home to DC, where all that matters is face value, and you never know who your friends are. You must fit right in there.” Her voice echoed through the empty farmyard, bouncing off the trees and the barn, slowly slipping into silence as she slammed the door of her truck, started the engine, and peeled out, sending a shower of gravel bouncing against the milk buckets and my legs.
My heart rapped in my throat as I watched the dust settle on the milk, the pale caliche drawing tan swirls on the surface. Somewhere in the distance, a peacock let out a long, lonely call as Al’s truck disappeared down the driveway.
You never know who your friends are … you must fit right in there … The words stung. I didn’t want that to be true of me. I didn’t want to be someone who didn’t trust, who nursed suspicions, who dug into backgrounds while greeting people with a smile.
But I couldn’t afford to be naïve, either. I had a family to think about—Nick, Daniel, and the baby coming.
Last night’s dream haunted me.
Maybe Al was exactly right. Maybe we should leave. Even if Jack did recover and come home, who was to say that there wouldn’t be another accident, and that the next one wouldn’t involve Daniel? If Mason had something to do with this, if he was willing to attempt the murder of his father, why would he even think twice about Daniel’s life?
The laboratory was literally full of dangerous chemicals—ammonium nitrate, chlorine compounds, diesel, and other fuels—everything needed for an explosion. Daniel had joked a time or two that, if Homeland Security found out about the place, he and Jack would end up in jail. Someone with Mason West’s connections and his access to the ranch could arrange an accident in a heartbeat… .
Before I’d even considered what I was doing, I was on the way to the hospital with Nick strapped unhappily in the backseat. We met Daniel in the downstairs lobby, where Nick settled in at the Lego table while Daniel and I talked nearby. The news on Jack’s condition was as good as could be hoped for. The doctors had been able to control the swelling in his brain without surgery. He was still unconscious. When his medications were reduced, perhaps later today, we’d know more about what condition Jack would wake up in, or whether he would wake up at all.
“Mason is in there every chance he gets, but the nurses are keeping it pretty limited. They have Jack under close supervision, thank God.” Daniel glanced toward the elevator, as if he was planning to storm the ICU. “Mason isn’t letting anyone else in. I think he wants to make sure he’s right there, if and when Jack wakes up. He’s worried about whether Jack will remember anything about the accident, I can tell. One of the first responders stopped by late last night to see how Jack was doing. I heard Mason talking to him, trying to find out whether Jack was conscious during the rescue or in the ambulance, and what he might have said. Mason was working really hard to play the good ol’ boy card, but the volunteer fireman was really cagey. He’s suspicious, and Mason didn’t miss that, either. He was sweating bullets after they talked. He really wants me to stop dogging him, too. That’s clear enough.”
Daniel walked away a few paces, then came back, checking the lobby and leaning close to me. “After the fireman left, Mason kept trying to persuade me to go home. He actually patted me on the shoulder and said it was above and beyond the call of duty for me to stay here. When I wouldn’t leave, he lost it for a minute, said he was in charge now. He all but fired me. I told him that when Jack wakes up and fires me, then I’ll go. I thought he was about to wind up and slug me right there in the hall. I wish he had.” His shoulders squared, the muscles in his forearms tightening visibly. I imagined the confrontation, imagined Daniel’s lightning-quick anger making him brash and careless with his words. If Mason had any doubt about Daniel’s reasons for hanging around the hospital before, he probably knew for certain now.
Daniel ran his tongue along the edge of his teeth, as if he were relishing the fight, tasting it. “I’m going to keep pushing him until he cracks. He’s close.”
I reached out and caught my husband’s arm, thought of everything that was at risk. I thought of Corbin’s warnings. “Daniel, listen. You have to go to the sheriff’s department and turn this thing over … or … or tell Mart McClendon and let him relay the information the way he thinks is best, but get out of it. Please. I have a terrible feeling about where this might end. Corbin told me that Mason has powerful connections to people you don’t want to mess with. We need to leave. Go back to DC. The job isn’t worth this. There are other jobs.”
He drew back indignantly, his eyes a metallic gray in this light. “I can’t just walk out. The guy who gave me this job is flat on his back in a hospital bed, for
heaven’s sake. What kind of a man would I be if I left now?”
“The kind who puts his family before his job.” My voice rose enough that Nick looked up from the Lego table. Clenching my teeth, I took a breath. Everything was running through my head—Corbin’s warnings, the fight with Al, the dream, the passage from Grandma Louisa’s Bible.
He keepeth back his soul from the pit, and his life from perishing by the sword …
If I told Daniel about the dream, he would only mollify me. He’d say I was being pregnant and emotional.
He craned away, his shoulder brushing the rough plaster of the hospital wall. “Where’s all this coming from?”
“I hate this place, Daniel. I’m sorry. I know that’s not what you want to hear. I hate all the drama, the unpredictability. All these people and their secrets.” Al’s words repeated in my head, the volume ramping up. She was right, I didn’t belong in Moses Lake. “We’ll never have a normal life here. It will always be like this. I want a normal life—regular work hours, weekends off, a house that’s ours, and friends down the street for Nick.”
“Nick loves it here.” His brows pinched together, his expression conveying that he thought I was being silly. “And the last time I checked, you were starting to like it, too. What happened to working on funding for the gardening program and taking on the hunger problem in Chinquapin Peaks? What about helping kids like the ones you’ve been writing about on the blog? What about showing the rest of the world how the odds are stacked against kids growing up rural and poor?” His gaze drilled into me, pierced me, called up memories that made me ache inside—the garden, the kids, Sergio, Sierra, Birdie, and Len. My husband, this man who understood me like no one else, knew those things were inside me, even as I tried to deny them. “All that fire just … went away?”
My throat stung and tears gathered in my eyes. “I’m scared, Daniel. I’m afraid for us. We don’t know what we might be dealing with here. If Mason did do this to Jack—to his own father—what would stop him from coming after you? Us? We have Nick to think about, and the baby. What if Mason really was involved in the disappearance of his stepmother and that little boy …”
“Shhh.” Daniel took me in his arms, pulled my body close to his. “I’m going to take care of us. I promise, Mal. I will.”
I clung to him, gulping back tears, trying to gain control as he tucked me under his chin, his arms holding me tight, his heartbeat pulsing against my ear. The depth of my love for him, of my need for him poured over me, both painful and sweet, both comforting and frightening. If anything happened to him, I didn’t know how I would keep going. Couldn’t he see that? Couldn’t he see that we were what mattered most?
Finally, I straightened and wiped my eyes. I didn’t want Nick to look over and see me this way.
Daniel smiled down at me, stroking a tear from my cheek with the pad of his thumb. Something was on his mind. The downward squeeze of one eyebrow betrayed it. “You know what? Maybe you and Nick should go—just grab a few suitcases and take a little vacation back to Maryland. There’s plenty of room at your mom’s, and you’ve been missing your sisters. By now Trudy must be about ready to tell everyone that the in vitro was a success this time. You could be there for that. You can compare pregnancy notes together.”
I pulled back, my mouth dropping open. “You’re … trying to send us away …” In that instant, I understood everything. Daniel knew how risky this game of cat and mouse with Mason was, but he wasn’t willing to give it up. “You won’t go, but you’re sending us away. You know how dangerous it is here.”
He lifted his palms, held them out to fend off my accusations. “I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to. I can see it all over your face.”
“Mal, don’t read more into it than there is. I thought you’d enjoy a vacation, that’s all.” His gaze darted away, then back.
I stood there staring at him, a cold tide of disbelief and resentment filling all the warm places where love and trust had been a moment before. “Yeah, thanks a lot.” Taking a step away, I turned from him, strode across the lobby, and gathered Nick.
“Mal, hang on …” Daniel stopped in the entryway.
“You know what, never mind,” I shot back, and behind the reception desk, the greeter paused in her work, sending a look of concern our way. I was beyond caring who heard. “If you decide we matter more than whatever it is you think you need to do, we’ll be at home. Packing.” I didn’t wait for an answer but just turned away and left.
Mercifully, Nick was easy to distract with a hot dog and a movie when we reached home. By the time it was over, he was dozing on the sofa. I tucked him into his bed for a nap, then went after the suitcases we’d stored in the old garage. I’d dusted them off, done a batch of laundry, and packed the suitcases half full of clothes before Nick woke up. The sound of his bare feet coming down the hall brought the feel of precious, quiet mornings when Daniel and I lingered in bed, listening to the doves in the cedars, the loons on the water, the cows lowing to their calves in the fields, the roosters in the barn singing up the sun, and then finally the soft stirrings of Nick in his bed before he came padding into the room, dragging his favorite blanket behind him.
I realized that I’d been imagining the new baby’s life this way—filled with slow, sunny mornings, the music of the loons, the scents of damp, hidden canyons and flowers sprouting in the leaf litter. I’d been imagining our life here, in this wild, strange place that was like nothing I’d ever planned.
I stood with a shirt half-folded in my hands, watched Nick come into the room and climb onto the bed. Cuddling his stuffed Dalmatian under his chin, he regarded me with big, drowsy eyes, his static-filled curls hovering around his head like a sunny halo.
I finished folding the shirt and set it in the suitcase.
“What you doin’?” The last word came out in a long, slow drawl that reminded me of Birdie and McKenna. Do-een.
“Packing some clothes so we can go on a trip.” I walked to the closet to look through the shoes, because I couldn’t face Nick anymore. Why was I so conflicted about this? Why was I torturing myself with doubts? Daniel was the one who was wrong. I was right, wasn’t I? Shouldn’t our family come first? We weren’t some kind of vigilante squad. We were just regular people, and we were out of our league here. “You remember the rumpus room at Grandma Hale’s—with all the toys? Where you slept on the little sofa? We’re going there. And maybe we’ll drive on out to see your Nanbee and Grandpa Everson, too. That’ll be fun, won’t it?”
The bedsprings squeaked as Nick bounced closer. “We can’t go dere, silly!” Grinning, he straddled the stuffed puppy and lifted his hands. “I gotta go to school tomorrow in two week.” Two fingers demonstrated his understanding of the number. Nick was beyond excited that we’d signed him up for the preschool program at Moses Lake school. He was literally counting down the days.
Guilt nipped at my heels as I moved to the closet to sort through shoes. “Well, we don’t have to worry about that right now. We’ll get on a plane, and we can be there in no time.”
Get on a plane …
If I was really serious about this, I’d have to do something about plane tickets and a ride to the airport. Maybe Chrissy or Tag could drive us. I didn’t even know where the closest airport was… .
I was serious about this, wasn’t I?
I had to be. Someone had to think about Nick and the new baby. Someone had to be rational.
“I’m hungry,” Nick complained, and I was glad he’d gone off the topic.
“Let’s take a break and go get something to eat.” I’d been in such a spin since Al’s visit that morning, I hadn’t even thought about the fact that I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and other than the hot dog with his movie, neither had Nick. He was probably starving.
“I want onion wings!” He squiggled happily off the bed. “And a fwies and a lollypop!”
I realized that Nick thought I’d meant go, as in to the Waterbird. Th
e idea didn’t sound too bad all of a sudden. In reality, it was too late in the day to wrap my mind around booking a flight and figuring out how to travel to the airport. I needed to get out of the house, to really think. Maybe the drive would clear my head, and when we came back, I’d be ready to look for airport information and tomorrow’s flight schedules.
But I knew why I was delaying—why I was putting off the inevitable. The fact was that no matter how upset I was with Daniel at the moment, I couldn’t leave him behind. Somehow, I had to persuade him to come with us. “Let’s go to the Waterbird.” I held a hand out to Nick, and he slipped his fingers into mine, small, fragile, and filled with trust. Daniel and I needed to be worthy of that trust.
On the way to the Waterbird, I tried to sort out the muddle in my thoughts—to untangle facts from feelings. But they all were so twisted together, so inseparably interwoven. Daniel was putting his job ahead of Nick and me again, even to the point that he was willing to separate from us, to put himself in danger. To put us in danger of losing him. The truth of that dredged up a sludge of resentments that made it difficult to see anything else.
I wanted him to consider us first. Was I so wrong to expect that? Was it selfish? Was I asking for too much, demanding too big a sacrifice? Was I reacting like the spoiled, catered-to caboose baby who’d had everything her way, who’d been on her own all her adult life and never had to compromise with anyone?
But hadn’t I compromised these last months—compromised almost to the death of everything that made me who I was? I’d left a job I enjoyed, my life, my family, my comfortable apartment, my dreams for myself. I’d become a mother, a laundry washer, a house fixer, a peach-pie baker, a support system, a cow caretaker. The suits and shoes and purses I loved were still in a box in the corner of a closet, because I had no place to wear them. I had no identity outside the house, the ranch life, the everyday activities that comprised the mythically idyllic life of The Frontier Woman.