Midnight Confessions

by Karen Leabo

  The obsession hadn’t eased much since finding her, either. He thought about her constantly, struggling to stay detached and professional. Yet where did he draw the line between professional and downright callous? Wasn’t he under some obligation, moral if not professional, to learn the whole truth before he endangered a child?

  Hell, he’d be happy to know the whole truth, if Jenn would tell it to him. Much as he wanted to, he couldn’t help her if she wouldn’t trust him. And she didn’t trust anyone right now.

  After two hours in the car, Cathy began to fret. Jenn gave her a bottle of apple juice to distract her, but the only thing that accomplished was that half an hour later she needed to use the rest room.

  “We have to stop,” Jenn said to Joe.

  He sighed. “We can’t be stopping every hundred miles for potty breaks.”

  “Excuse me? Oh, that’s right, you said you’d never traveled with a small child before. Unless you want to see an accident in the back seat of your precious Monte Carlo, you’d better find us a bathroom.”

  “All right, all right,” Joe grumbled. “Although I have no idea where.” They’d left the outskirts of Seattle a while back, and for several miles they’d seen nothing but trees.

  “I have to go now!” Cathy insisted five minutes later.

  “Fine.” Joe pulled the car over to the shoulder. “Now is as good a time as any to get back to nature.”

  “You mean we have to—”

  “It’s your choice,” Joe. said with a maddeningly smug smile. “You can go behind a bush, or you can wait till we spot a bathroom.”

  “Go out here?” Cathy shrieked. “Where everybody can see?”

  “No one will be able to see,” Joe assured her. “I certainly won’t look.”

  “Oh, yeah, like we’re supposed to trust you,” Jenn said.

  “I haven’t lied to you yet.”

  Jenn started to object, but honestly, she couldn’t dredge up a single lie he’d told her. He might be a lot of things, but she supposed he’d at least been honest with her.

  “C’mon, Cathy,” she said. “It’ll be okay.” When Joe started to open his door, she glared at him. “You’re not going with us.”

  “Yeah, you’re not going with us,” Cathy echoed her mother.

  “Then go one at a time.”

  “I can’t go by myself,” Cathy wailed.

  “All right, all right,” Joe said, raising his hands in surrender. “But don’t get any bright ideas about running off into the woods. Washington State is one of the most sparsely populated areas in the country. And it gets cold at night. You could wander for hours and hours and never find any sign of civilization. There are bears up here, too. Big ones. And wolves. And maybe even a Bigfoot—”

  “We get the picture,” Jenn said, helping Cathy out of the car. “We don’t particularly want to die of exposure.”

  “Leave your purse here, please.”

  Exasperated, Jenn dropped her purse into the front seat. Why was he so worried? Did the man really think that they would be stupid enough to head into the wilderness on their own? An outdoorswoman she wasn’t. But if he was worried, maybe it was because escaping wouldn’t be as difficult as he made it sound. Perhaps they weren’t really all that far from civilization. They’d only been driving a few hours. Maybe they could cut through the woods, double back to the road, and flag down a car.

  Yeah, maybe so! She hated to leave her money behind, but they’d manage somehow.

  She took Cathy’s hand and headed into the thick brush that grew up around the tall pines and cedars that dotted the foothills of the Cascade Mountains. When she judged that they were well out of Joe’s vision, she instructed Cathy in the fine art of tinkling in the woods.

  This was it, her moment of truth. Was she brave enough to try running for freedom? Did she dare?

  Just then she noticed a plume of smoke in the distance. It couldn’t be all that far away, she decided, maybe only a couple of miles. There was probably a cabin in the woods, and someone was burning a cozy fire. Hot damn, this was her lucky day.

  “Are you ready for a hike in the woods, Cathy?” she asked.

  “What?”

  “We’re going to run.”

  “And leave all our things?”

  “Yup.”

  Cathy didn’t look very happy. “What about the bears?”

  “Oh, he was just saying that to scare us.” And it had worked. “But see that smoke? There’s a house or cabin over there, and someone who can help us, I’m sure of it.”

  “Okay. But I bet he catches us again.”

  Silently, Jenn agreed with her daughter. Within minutes Joe would realize they’d taken off, and he’d be right behind them. But what could it hurt to try? Their situation could hardly get much worse. If there was even a chance of getting free, she was willing to risk Joe’s ire should they fail.

  “If we’re going to do it, let’s hurry,” she said.

  Jenn went first, clearing a path and pushing branches out of the way for Cathy. It seemed they were making very slow progress, and within minutes Jenn’s hands and even her face were scratched. It was cold, too, the way the wind whistled through these hills. She was beginning to wonder if this was such a brilliant idea.

  Then they came to the creek.

  “Mama, how do we get across?”

  “Um, let me think a minute.” The creek was narrow and didn’t look too deep, but the water was rushing quickly, and she bet it was ice cold. Jenn looked around for a log or fallen tree, something she could drag into the creek to make a bridge, but found nothing.

  Well, so her feet would get wet. They would dry eventually.

  “Climb on my back and I’ll carry you across,” Jenn said. “No sense both of us getting wet.”

  Cathy, who normally loved piggyback rides, was as enthusiastic about crossing the river as she was about eating spinach. Jenn felt a pang of guilt for putting her daughter through these various ordeals. As if toting her all over the country and living on fast food weren’t bad enough, now she was pushing the child through bathroom windows and dragging her across terrain they were not equipped for.

  But she had no choice, she kept telling herself. She had to do what she could to keep Cathy away from Dennis Palmer.

  When she stepped into the creek, the water swirled around her ankles and into her shoes. It was so cold it felt like needles pricking her skin. Her teeth began chattering as she waded carefully through the rushing water. It rose to midcalf. The creek bottom was slick with moss, and twice she almost sprawled headlong into the water, catching herself just in time.

  She breathed a sigh of relief when she reached the opposite bank.

  “That was neat,” Cathy said. “Can we do it again?”

  “I certainly hope not,” Jenn said fervently as she emptied her shoes and squeezed the excess water out of her jeans as best she could. Her feet were numb.

  They climbed up the bank and were soon back into the thick woods. Jenn became disoriented, unsure which direction they should head. Finally, after another thirty minutes, she stopped.

  “We’re lost,” she said. “Oh, baby, I’m sorry I got you into this. I think we should just stop here and wait for Mr. Andresi to catch up with us. The way we’ve been blundering along, our trail can’t be that hard to follow.”

  “Why don’t we ask that man to help us?” Cathy asked.

  “What man?”

  “Over there.”

  Jenn peered in the direction Cathy pointed. Sure enough, there was a little old man about fifty feet away. And he was aiming a shotgun at them.

  Holy Toledo, they’d found themselves an honest-to-gosh mountain man, complete with a foot-long beard and red suspenders. Jenn would have laughed if she hadn’t been so scared. Reflexively she stuck her hands in the air.

  “What do you think you’re doing on my land?” he demanded, wiggling the gun for emphasis.

  “We’re lost,” Jenn rushed to say. “My daughter and I got separated
from my husband while we were hiking. I don’t know how it happened. Now we can’t find our way back to where we parked, and we’re wet and cold....” Jenn hoped that if she sounded pitiful enough, the man would show some mercy and let her use his phone. She could call Mrs. Valenti, or Rudy, or even Phyllis, her fellow waitress.

  “Do you live around here?” she asked hopefully. “We sure didn’t mean to trespass.”

  The man continued to stare at them, sizing them up. “No harm done, I s’pose,” he said, then spat. “I ain’t one to ignore a lady in trouble, ’specially when she’s got a young’un. You all come home with me. I live about half a mile over yonder. I’ll fix you up with a fire and some warm soup, then we’ll figure out what to do with you.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” Jenn said. Maybe this was going to work out after all.

  “No trouble. Folks got to look out for each other.” He hoisted the shotgun over his shoulder and began walking back the way he’d come. Jenn and Cathy followed. He was surprisingly quick on his feet for a man his age—Jenn figured he was in his seventies—climbing over fallen logs and dipping under low branches with grace and ease, while she and Cathy bumbled along.

  When they finally reached the clearing where the man lived, Jenn’s heart sank. Calling it a cabin was giving it a lot. It was more of a hovel, a ragged conglomeration of mismatched wood and a couple of crooked windows, one of which was broken and had newspaper stuffed in it. In front of the house was a huge black cauldron any witch would be proud of, suspended over a fire. That must have been the smoke she’d seen.

  “It ain’t much,” he said. “You got a name?”

  “Brandi,” she said, falling back on her alias out of habit. “My daughter’s name is Cathy.”

  “M’name’s Otis,” the man said. He opened the front door, and three striped cats made an immediate exit. “Durn cats. You ain’t supposed to be in the house,” he shouted at them, then muttered, “Opal? Why don’t you make those durn cats mind?”

  “Your wife?” Jenn asked hopefully.

  “Yup. She’s been gone for almost twenty years.”

  “But...”

  “Oh, she’s still with me in spirit. The cats belong to her.”

  “I see,” Jenn said, not seeing at all.

  “Go on in, now,” Otis said. “I’ll stoke the fire and then check on the stew. Should be about done.”

  “Oh, we don’t want to put you out. If you could just let me use the phone—”

  “Don’t have one. Costs too much to string the wire all the way out here.”

  Jenn’s heart plummeted. “How far is the nearest phone?” she asked, still standing in the doorway.

  “’Bout five miles as the crow flies, across a river. But if you want to use a bridge, then it’s about ten.”

  “Do you have a car?” she asked desperately.

  “Nope.”

  “How do you get to the grocery store? And your mail? And what about...” Her words trailed off as she got a good look at the inside of the one-room cabin. And a good whiff.

  “I grow or kill just about all I need. Couple of times a year I lay in supplies.”

  Jenn was still staring gape-mouthed at the piles of old newspapers, empty cans and whiskey bottles, animal skins and broken-down furniture. There was no kitchen, no running water, no electricity. And no bathroom, not that she’d have used it.

  “I think we’ll stand by the fire,” Jenn said, hastily dragging Cathy outside before she saw the moth-eaten bearskin rug. It would give her nightmares for weeks.

  “Suit yourself, but it’s warmer inside,” Otis said. “I’ll just get us some bowls and dish up some of that stew.”

  “We’re not really very hungry,” Jenn said.

  “I’m hungry,” Cathy objected.

  Jenn cringed inwardly. She never in a million years thought she would be praying for Joe Andresi to appear, but that’s just what she was doing. Otis was scary.

  “I’ll fix you right up,” he said, disappearing into the cabin.

  “Cathy,” Jenn whispered as they stood by the fire, “do you have any idea what’s in that stew?”

  “No, but it smells good.”

  “I don’t know, either, but you can bet it’s not beef or chicken.”

  “Then what is it?”

  “Could be anything. Rabbit, deer, raccoon.”

  “Eee-ew,” Cathy said.

  “Just pretend to eat it,” Jenn instructed. “We don’t want to hurt his feelings.”

  Otis reappeared shortly with a stack of three stoneware bowls, a mismatched assortment of forks and spoons, and a huge ladle. The dishes looked marginally clean, much to Jenn’s relief. He handed all the bowls but one to her and began dishing up the peculiar-looking stew. He handed the first bowl to Cathy.

  “There you go, squirt. That’ll warm your insides.”

  “Thank you,” Cathy said politely, though she peered suspiciously into her bowl.

  Jenn took her bowl and sat down on the nearest stump. “This smells really good,” she said. “What’s in it?”

  “Vegetables and meat, some spices.”

  “What kind of meat?”

  “Oh. Venison. Killed me a deer last week.”

  Oh, God, they were eating Bambi. Jenn’s stomach roiled. Cathy looked alarmed, but she remained silent.

  “So,” Jenn said brightly, “how are we going to get in contact with my husband?”

  “Way I figure it,” Otis said, “you ain’t. You’ll just have to wait till he finds you.”

  “But that could take days!”

  He shrugged. “I got plenty of food and extra blankets. Fact is, I’ll enjoy the company, and it’ll be nice to have womenfolk around to wash dishes and such.” He chuckled. “I’m sure you noticed I’m not much of a housekeeper.”

  Suddenly Jenn had a vision of herself scrubbing down Otis’s cabin, skinning whatever animal he killed that day, sleeping in a bug-infested blanket while she waited days, weeks, years, for Joe to rescue her. No way. She was getting out of this place. She’d rather take her chances wandering the woods.

  Joe cursed Jenn Montgomery up one side and down the other as he hiked through the woods. The woman was nuts. Didn’t she know she could die out here? Hell, there might really be bears and wolves. For someone who professed to want to keep her daughter safe, she was taking a helluva risk.

  A branch slapped him in the face. He grabbed it and savagely ripped it off the unfortunate tree that happened to be in his way. He was beginning to hate Washington. It was cold and uncivilized, he decided.

  The only encouraging thing about Jenn’s escape was that she’d left a trail even a Cub Scout could follow—broken branches and mashed leaves a mile wide.

  When he reached the creek, he could easily see where they’d forded it. But he wasn’t about to get his boots wet. He walked upstream a ways until he found a place he could jump across, then backtracked and picked up the trail again where two sizes of footprints struggled up the creek bank.

  A few minutes later the trail became a bit confused, as if they’d walked around in circles. Or maybe they’d decided to change directions, and had taken a couple of false starts. At any rate, he soon figured out where they’d headed. He followed doggedly. When he got hold of Jenn, he was going to put his hands around that slender neck of hers and...

  The image that came to mind wasn’t one of punishment. He shook his head to clear it. How could he still want her when he was so furious with her?

  He smelled the smoke long before he saw the cabin and the fire and the three people sitting around it, eating. So, Jenn had found herself an ally, had she?

  Joe mentally rolled up his sleeves, ready to fight. What had she made him out to be this time? A crazed stalker? An abusive husband?

  Cathy saw him first. She tugged on her mother’s sleeve and Jenn looked up. Suddenly she broke into a huge smile.

  “Darling, you found us!” she cried as she jumped to her feet and ran toward him at full tilt. She threw h
er arms around him and gave him a smack of a kiss, right on the mouth.

  He didn’t think he’d ever been more surprised.

  Chapter 6

  “Get us out of here. This guy is crackers,” Jenn whispered urgently in Joe’s ear as she pressed the length of her body against his. He was a whole lot more aware of the body than the words, at first. She was warm from the fire and soft everywhere he was hard. Involuntarily his arms went around her, preserving the contact even when she started to pull away. She felt better than he’d ever imagined.

  He couldn’t believe the rush of relief that had washed over him at seeing her and Cathy safe. He no longer wanted to strangle them.

  “Daddy!” Cathy cried, running behind her mother. Before Joe knew what was happening, she’d leapt right into his arms and attached herself to his neck. The three of them were just a big tangled ball of family togetherness.

  Too bad they were only putting on a show for the old man. This trip would be so much more pleasant if the Montgomerys didn’t hate his guts.

  “Thank goodness you two are all right,” Joe said, meaning it. He let Jenn go, but continued holding on to Cathy. “Who’s your friend?”

  “Name’s Otis,” the strange little old man said, not bothering to stand. “I was just giving your wife and young’un something to fill their stomachs.”

  “It’s deer stew,” Cathy said, making a face that thankfully their host couldn’t see.

  “That’s awfully nice of you,” Joe said. “I was worried when they didn’t come back from their walk.”

  Jenn actually cringed. She knew that “worried” was no doubt an understatement.

  “There’s more stew if you want some, too,” Otis offered.

  “Uh, no, thanks,” Joe said hastily. “We have a long walk ahead of us before it gets dark.” They would get back to the car long before the sun set, but Otis didn’t have to know that.

  “Suit yourself.”

  “Could I pay you for the food?” Joe asked. He let Cathy down and reached into his back pocket for his wallet.