Legacy Reclaimed

by Robin Patchen

  Lord, please help me.

  She felt around the bend for a handhold, a foothold, on the far side. Her foot touched nothing. Her fingertips skimmed… leaves. She could get there. She inched a little farther and reached around again.

  She found a branch. It was skinny but hopefully thick enough not to break. She grabbed the branch. Her right hand found a good handhold, and she hopped her right foot closer.

  Her left hand got a better grip on the branch, but she still couldn’t see it.

  She was going to have to trust it.

  Trust Me. Let go.

  Easy for You to say.

  She shook off the attitude. Sorry, Lord. You’ve gotten me this far. I trust You.

  With no other choice, she tightened her left hand and released her right. Her feet scrambled for a foothold as she swung her body around the corner.

  The branch was thin and bent with her weight. She swung low, her stomach lurching as if she were on a roller coaster.

  And then she smacked into another tree trunk. She wrapped her arms and legs around it. It was on the mountain’s slope, not the cliff face.

  Thank You, Father.

  She scrambled down the tree, then climbed, one painful step at a time, up the steep hill.

  She didn’t climb all the way to the trail. The murderer might be there. Instead, she found a branch, used it as a makeshift crutch, and picked her way through the woods to the hidden path to her home.

  Chapter Three

  It was an hour before Chelsea limped from the trees into her uncle’s backyard. She’d decided against going to her own house, fearful of who might await her there. Uncle Frank wouldn’t be home, but he’d always kept a spare key under the flowerpot on the back patio. She found the key, then knocked on the door, just to be safe.

  She heard a voice inside and, fear still pulsing in her veins, pressed against the house’s siding. Maybe the killer had come here?

  No. That didn’t make sense.

  Another moment passed, and then the door opened and Uncle Frank poked his head out.

  His eyes widened. “Chelsea?” He helped her inside and to a chair at his kitchen table. “What happened?”

  She was safe. She’d made it. Tears stung her eyes, and she hadn’t the energy to fight them.

  Uncle Frank crouched in front of her. He reminded her so much of her father, though Frank had aged a lot more than Daddy’d ever had the opportunity to. He’d kept himself fit and trim and stood nearly six feet tall. His hair was white, and his light brown eyes regarded her with gentleness, as always. “Can you walk to the car, or should I call 911? We need to get you to the hospital.”

  She didn’t want to go anywhere. She wanted to stay here and hide for the rest of the day. To crawl into bed and pretend none of it had happened.

  But Chelsea wasn’t one to shrink from a fight. And her foot was throbbing.

  “You can drive me.”

  Frank drove a bit too fast down the narrow road that wound around Mt. Coventry, glancing at her every few moments. As they passed her house, he asked, “What happened?”

  “I hiked up the path to the trail from my house.”

  “Did you fall?”

  Starting from when she’d left her house that morning, she told him everything.

  As she spoke, the color drained from his face. He sniffed, and a tear streaked down his cheek. He reached for her hand, then must’ve seen the cuts there and pulled back. “You’re the only family I have left. I can’t imagine…” He gulped, shook his head. “And you didn’t get a look at him?”

  “The hood shaded his face. I was crouched down.”

  “But if you hadn’t bent to tie your shoe…”

  She’d have been launched farther out. She wouldn’t have hit the crag. She wouldn’t have caught the branch. Her body would be lying at the bottom of that cliff right now.

  The image floated in her mind.

  “I don’t know how I’d have gone on without you,” he said.

  “The Lord protected me.”

  He shot her a quick glare. “Why didn’t the God you trust so much keep it from happening at all?” He stared forward, lips pressed together. “First your father, then your mother, now you. After all that tragedy, how can you still believe there’s a God who loves you?”

  “I won’t blame Him for the workings of evil men, nor will I blame him for an accident, but I will thank Him for my life.”

  Frank looked like he wanted to argue but kept his mouth shut. He pulled his phone from his pocket and handed it to her. “Call the police.”

  She did, asking to have an officer meet her at the hospital in Plymouth.

  They were nearly there when something occurred to her. “Why were you at home this morning? I thought you’d be at the office.”

  “When you didn’t show up at work, I went to your house to check on you. Your purse and phone were there, but you weren’t. I guessed you’d gone up to the mountain, like you used to as a girl. I was just killing time, figuring I’d head back to your house in a few minutes. I didn’t feel like I ought to loiter there when you weren’t home.”

  “You know you’re always welcome, Uncle.”

  He shrugged. “I’m glad I was home when you arrived.”

  “Me, too.”

  The ER wasn’t busy, and perhaps the hospital employees recognized her name. Chelsea’s wounds were tended right away. An X-ray of her foot revealed a broken bone, and she was given a boot and told to stay off it as much as possible.

  Frank and a Coventry police officer were waiting for her when she hobbled out. They found an empty corner of the waiting room.

  The officer, a woman in her mid-forties, said, “Start at the beginning,” and Chelsea told her the same story she’d told Frank.

  “Any idea why someone would want to kill you? Ex-boyfriend, maybe? Business rival?”

  “I haven’t lived in the States for thirteen years. And I’ve made no enemies in England or Paris, at least none that I know of. As I don’t yet work for the business, I haven’t any rivals.”

  Uncle Frank cleared his throat. “I might have an idea.”

  The officer turned to him.

  He focused on Chelsea. “There’ve been some rumors that you’re planning to relocate the factory to Mexico or—”

  “I heard those rumors yesterday at the memorial,” Chelsea said. “I assured Laura and all of Mum’s friends that I would never consider such a thing.”

  Frank patted her hand. “Other people don’t know you like we do. Maybe whoever did this thinks you’re going to take his job away.”

  “I haven’t even started at the company. How can people think—?”

  “They shouldn’t, obviously. But, you’re not a local anymore. You haven’t lived in Coventry for a long time.”

  “Not by choice.”

  “I know that. But a lot of people see you as an outsider.”

  An outsider, in her own hometown? “What have I done to earn their suspicion?”

  “Do you hear what you sound like?”

  She sighed. “So I picked up a bit of an accent. I’ve spent half my life in England. And my mother is English. The accent will fade.”

  “I hope not,” he said. “I like it.”

  The officer focused on Frank. “Who started these rumors?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve been trying to stop them, but nothing I do helps. Maeve’s death has everybody on edge.”

  “Maeve is…?”

  “My mother,” Chelsea said.

  Still questioning Uncle Frank, the officer said, “Any idea who might be angry enough to kill her?”

  Frank clenched his fists together in his lap. “I don’t know. If I knew, I’d tell you, but I have no idea.”

  “Okay.” The officer stood. “We’ll look into it. Where will you be?”

  Chelsea wanted to go home more than anything, but whoever had tried to kill her had known she’d be on the mountain that day. Had he been watching her?

  She wouldn�
�t be safe at home, and Uncle Frank’s house was too close.

  She needed to get to work. But first, she needed a place to rest, to think. The business could survive a few more days without her. “I don’t know exactly, but you can reach me on my cell.” She recited her number, and the officer wrote it down.

  “A detective will be in touch.”

  When she and Uncle Frank were on the road back to Coventry, her uncle said, “You remember that old Jeep I bought when you were a little girl? We used to go off-roading with it.”

  “I remember.”

  “It’s in my garage. Haven’t taken it off-roading in a long time, but I keep it running—sort of a hobby of mine. Why don’t you take it? It’s less noticeable than your mother’s car, and hardly anybody in town knows I have it.”

  He settled his palm over the back of her hand, barely touching. “I can’t imagine anything happening to you. With your father and mother gone… They would expect me to protect you. Right now, this is the only thing I can think to do.”

  “If I leave, won’t that add more fuel to the rumors? I bury my mother and then disappear?”

  “You can take over the business soon enough. The rumors are the least of your problems right now. Someone tried to kill you, Chelsea. We need to find out who it was and stop them.”

  Back at her house, Chelsea packed a small bag while Uncle Frank warmed some of the baked ziti one of Mum’s friends had brought. After they ate, he drove her to his house and loaded her suitcase into his Jeep.

  He wasn’t kidding—it was old. But he assured her it would run fine, and it was an automatic, so she shouldn’t have any trouble driving it, even with the broken foot.

  “Any idea where you’re going?” he asked.

  She hadn’t thought that far ahead yet. “I’ll let you know where I end up.”

  He pulled her into a hug. “Take care of yourself.”

  Tears stung her eyes. “Thanks for all you’ve done. You’re the only family I’ve got left now. I can’t imagine what I would do without you.”

  She drove away, glancing at Uncle Frank in the rearview mirror until she rounded the curve.

  Forty-five minutes later and after a quick stop at a drugstore for her pain meds, she parked in front of an old cabin her father had loved. It was located on the shore of Clearwater Lake in Nutfield. Daddy had brought her there to go fishing many times before he died. When he’d wanted to be alone, unrecognized, he’d chosen Clearwater over her beloved Lake Ayasha, where everybody in town knew him.

  She stopped inside the door. The walls were sixties-era wood paneling. The floor linoleum, stained and peeling along the edges. The plaid sofa and matching chair looked as if they hadn’t been replaced since the Kennedy administration. The place was clean, as Mum had continued to have the management company take care of its upkeep, but it was older and dumpier than she’d remembered.

  Good. Nobody would think to look for her here.

  Her foot throbbed, her belly where she’d hit the branch ached, and her scrapes stung. She took one of the painkillers, downed a glass of water, and collapsed in bed.

  She awoke a few hours later, showered, read a few chapters of her novel on her phone, and slept again.

  Tuesday morning, the injuries were a bit improved, but her stomach growled with hunger. She drove to the little grocer in town and filled a basket with food enough to last a few days. When she tried to check out, though, her credit cards didn’t work. None of them. She fumbled for her debit card amid grumbling from the people in line behind her. She rarely used it and thanked God she always kept a few thousand dollars in her checking account, in case of emergency.

  But the debit card didn’t work, either. She left the store empty-handed.

  She returned to the cabin to call the banks, but she had no service on her phone.

  How had she not noticed that the day before? She’d forgotten to call Frank and hadn’t thought it odd that he hadn’t checked in on her.

  The painkillers had done a number on her thinking.

  She left once again and found a payphone outside a McDonald’s on the edge of town. She connected to their Wi-Fi and searched how to make a collect call.

  She’d heard of such things on TV, though she’d never done it before. At the payphone, she followed the instructions and dialed Uncle Frank.

  No answer. Since there was nobody to accept the charges, she couldn’t even leave a message.

  She tried once more, but there was still no answer. Giving up, she called her credit card companies—toll-free numbers, fortunately—and discovered that fraud alerts had been placed on all of her accounts.

  What was going on?

  She explained to each customer service representative that it must have been a mistake, and each one gave her a similar answer. They’d be happy to send new cards—to the address they had on file. In Paris.

  It was as if the world were against her.

  Fine, then. Food was overrated. She returned to the cabin, allowed herself to become engrossed in her novel, took another painkiller, and slept fitfully.

  Wednesday morning, Chelsea rolled out of bed before dawn. It had been over thirty-six hours since she’d eaten. She knew people who fasted, though she’d never done it for more than a day. It wouldn’t kill her, but with her wounds healing, all the medication she’d taken, all the trauma she’d endured, and the grief of losing her mother, she needed food desperately.

  She couldn’t lie around any longer. She had to reach Uncle Frank. She didn’t want to complain and had been raised to be patient, not demanding or entitled. But she was the heir of a large fortune who couldn’t afford a fast-food hamburger. That would teach her not to keep cash on her. She’d never be without an emergency hundred-dollar bill again.

  She left the cabin before five. It was still dark, but the sun was already starting to brighten the horizon.

  She drove back to the McDonald’s and called her uncle collect again. No answer.

  It was not quite five-thirty. Where could he be that he didn’t answer the phone?

  She dialed again.

  Still, nothing.

  She slammed the phone down in frustration.

  Her stomach growled. She might not survive without something in her belly. There had to be somewhere, someone she could turn to for food.

  She scrolled through her phone looking for a food kitchen. It was a silly thought, her at a food kitchen. But at least she’d be fed. There were none in Nutfield, but there was a food bank there. Apparently, it was a place for low-income people to receive groceries. It was only open one day a week, and—she glanced at her calendar—today was the day.

  It felt like a gift from God. Thank You.

  Chapter Four

  Dylan O’Donnell had never entered the food bank through the front doors. Normally, he went in through the warehouse, where he helped stock shelves. He’d sat with patrons a few times, listened to their stories, and prayed with them. Today, he had to meet a client, and she’d asked him to meet her here. He pulled open the door and stepped inside, scanning the people seated in neat rows of chairs.

  An older couple, maybe mid-sixties, sat in the back, trying to wrangle a couple of toddlers. He’d been here enough to know that wasn’t an unusual sight, grandparents raising their grandchildren because the parents were addicts or mentally ill or in prison. They’d saved enough for their golden years, but not enough to provide for the kids who’d been abandoned to their care.

  A handful of twenty- and thirty-somethings were scattered, arms crossed, heads lowered. Many with sallow faces and sunken eyes—addicts, he guessed, who couldn’t hold down jobs but needed to eat. There were some young mothers with children, a few elderly people.

  One woman stood out. Blond, about Dylan’s age, attractive. She clutched a purse in her lap that looked expensive. He’d worked a robbery at a high-end department store when he was still on the force in Manchester, so he was vaguely familiar with fancy purses. If memory served, that brown leather with the w
eird little logos on the outside was a Louis Vuitton. Maybe it was a knockoff. She wore a long-sleeved shirt despite the warm June air. A couple of bandages on her hands weren’t fully hidden.

  At the counter, his client, Maryann, was checking in. She saw him, whispered something to Vanessa, the woman who ran the food bank, and then nodded to the door.

  He opened it for her. “Long wait today?”

  She stepped outside and to the bench set against the exterior wall. “An hour or so. Small price to pay for food.”

  He settled beside her. “He’s in Manchester.”

  He handed her a manila folder, and she slid out the pictures. She flipped through the first couple, taken from a sidewalk across the street from her son. When she got to the third, this one a close-up, she covered her mouth with her hand. “Oh. Oh. He looks so…” Tears filled her eyes as she traced the lines of the teenager’s pale face.

  Skinny, Dylan thought. Sickly and desperate, though not desperate enough.

  Her lip trembled. “I should never have made him go.”

  “You sent him to the best rehab facility in the state,” Dylan said. And she’d spent the bulk of her savings to do it. The kid had taken off without a word and disappeared. “If he didn’t get sober there, he was never going to get sober living in your house.”

  “But at least he’d be safe.”

  Safe. Except the boy wouldn’t be safe there or safe anywhere if he didn’t give up the drugs. “My mom has this friend who had a kid who was an addict. The lady never had the heart to kick him out or demand he go to rehab. She thought he’d be safe at her house. He aged but never matured. Lived under her roof, ate her food. When he couldn’t afford drugs, he’d lie to her, tell her he needed money for one reason or another, and she’d give it to him. She told herself that at least he was safe.”