Dawn's Light

by Terri Blackstock

  Now that the bodies were hidden, he might be okay. If the girl did talk, the authorities wouldn’t believe her without evidence. Maybe his threats had kept her quiet so far. If they hadn’t, he would have known — there would have been news of the murders, and people would be looking for the bodies. But there had been nothing.

  He looked down at the cross necklace he’d found on the porch floor. Maybe he could use this to find the infamous Beth.

  He had seen her ride east, up Tungsten Road. That meant she lived in one of those ritzy subdivisions halfway out in the country. There were probably ten neighborhoods in that area. How many blonde Beths of that age could there be? All he had to do was go ask around.

  He could pretend he was looking for her so he could return her necklace. And when he found her, one more problem would be solved.

  Then, with any luck, he could get back to his life.

  ELEVEN

  “MY KINGDOM FOR A WASHING MACHINE.” DENI STOOD in her bedroom closet, searching for a top that had come through the Pulses unscathed. With all the hand washing with well water, nothing kept its color, and all the whites looked dingy.

  Beth leaned in the doorway of her closet. “Your kingdom?”

  “It’s from Shakespeare, sort of. Never mind. Hey, maybe we can get our washing machine fixed. Or a new one, or whatever. I wonder when the water will be back on. Probably not before the electricity, since the pumps in the pipelines have to work. Well water has ruined my clothes.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I don’t know. Big date, but Mark hasn’t told me where.” She pulled out a red top that she hadn’t worn since before the Pulses started. Holding it up to herself, she shook her head. “Man, I’ve lost so much weight that nothing fits. Maybe I have time to take it in a little. Wish I could have gotten home earlier, but I had so many stories to cover for the paper. Going from a weekly paper to a daily one is killing me.”

  Beth straightened. “What kind of stories? Murders?”

  “No, but lots of muggings. There are some seriously upset people who had their cash stolen yesterday.”

  “But nobody was killed?”

  “None reported. Hey, did you get your papers delivered today?”

  Beth hesitated, so Deni turned around.

  “I got Jeff and Logan to do mine today.”

  “Then you’re sure they all got delivered? Because I’m working too hard for people not to read it. Why didn’t you do it?”

  “I don’t feel very good.”

  “Yeah, we’re all sniffing and coughing after being out in that storm all day yesterday.” She pulled her blouse on, buttoned it up. “So how do I look?”

  “Fine,” Beth said. Deni turned and realized she wasn’t even looking. She was staring out the window.

  BETH WATCHED THE STREET, STILL EXPECTING TO SEE THE KILLER. Why hadn’t the murder been reported? Could that mean the victims had been found — alive? The thought had never occurred to her. She should have gotten an ambulance to go and see about them. Guilt twisted her stomach.

  She went back to the walk-in closet. “Was anybody hurt in a mugging yesterday?”

  Deni dug through her jewelry box for some earrings. “Several people. A few were hit in the head. One was stabbed, but he survived.”

  “Were any of them shot?”

  “I don’t think so.” Now she looked fully at Beth. “Why?”

  She’d asked too many questions. She made a paintbrush out of her hair and whisked it against her chin.

  “I don’t know. I was just thinking that a lot of bad stuff might have happened.”

  “A lot of bad stuff did happen. Thank goodness it didn’t happen to us this time.”

  “Yeah, thank goodness,” she whispered.

  Beth went down to the kitchen. Her mom’s glance lingered a little too long, as if she were searching Beth’s face for a clue to her mood. She came toward her and kissed her on the forehead like she was checking for fever.

  Her father came out of the bedroom. He’d just changed from his deputy uniform to a pair of shorts and a pullover shirt. He carried his shoes on two fingers. He’d lost his middle-aged paunch since the Pulses, and all his hard work chopping wood and stuff had made him muscular. But he looked tired today.

  “Tough day?” Kay asked.

  “Yeah, really tough.” He pulled out a chair and dropped into it. “So did I hear Deni saying Mark was taking her out tonight?”

  Kay wiggled her eyebrows and shot him a knowing smile. “That’s right.”

  Beth didn’t know what the big deal was. Mark and Deni were always together. “Why was your day tough? Did you catch any criminals?”

  “A couple. This one guy robbed his next-door neighbor. They’d lived by each other for twenty-five years, and that night he broke into the house while they were sleeping and stole his neighbor’s money out of his pants pocket. Got caught, thank goodness.”

  Beth carried the plates to the table. “So . . . did you find any bodies or anything?”

  Kay turned and shot her a surprised look. “Beth, what a question!”

  Beth shrugged. “I just wondered.”

  Doug pulled his shoes on. “No. Thankfully, I don’t think anybody was killed. A few minor injuries, but it looks like most of the robbers weren’t from around here. I mean, think about it. They wouldn’t want to be recognized. So they go to the surrounding towns as their banks open, rob them, then disappear back where they came from.”

  Beth was baffled. Why would two murders not be reported? Could it be that no one had found the bodies yet? Wasn’t anyone looking for the two men?

  “Are there, like, any missing persons reports out?”

  Kay’s frown cut deeper. “Why do you ask that, sweetheart?”

  “No reason.”

  Kay came to the table, and stroked Beth’s hair. “Honey, go call Jeff and Logan to dinner.”

  Beth looked cautiously out the back window. She saw her brothers at the back of the yard. No way she was going out there. With her luck, the killer would pick that moment to ride by on the street behind them. She opened the door, staying hidden behind it, and yelled for her brothers.

  WHILE THEY WAITED FOR THE KIDS TO COME, KAY TURNED BACK to Doug. “I’m worried about her,” she said in a low voice. “She won’t so much as step outside. She wouldn’t deliver her papers today, and she never misses that. Since the paper hired her, she’s taken her commitment seriously. I asked her to go to the well for water, and she started crying. And this new fascination with murders and kidnappings . . .”

  “Well, she’s been through a lot in the last year. We all have.”

  “But she’s sensitive, honey. Maybe she’s been more traumatized than we’ve realized. Maybe she needs to see a counselor.”

  He looked in the direction she had gone. “I was wondering the same thing. But where will we find one? It can’t be just anybody.”

  “I can ask around.”

  “I doubt there are many of them working these days. The demand for counselors is probably about as great as the demand for stockbrokers.”

  “People still need help.”

  “Yeah, but who’s willing to spend hard-earned money on counseling when they can barely scrape together enough to buy food?”

  “We have some money now. If we can find a counselor, maybe we can afford it.”

  Doug nodded. “We’ll have to. But I want whoever it is to be a Christian. I don’t want someone who doesn’t understand the basic principles of life to be poking around in her psyche.”

  “You read my mind,” she said, bending over to kiss him. She touched his face, her fingers lingering on his stubble. “Do you think she’ll be all right?”

  “Of course,” he said. “But let’s try to make this happen as soon as possible.”

  TWELVE

  KAY COULDN’T WAIT FOR LIFE TO GO BACK TO NORMAL. The days never seemed to end for her, with so much to do. She longed for conveniences she’d once had: Pop Tarts and granola bars for q
uick breakfasts, a drive-thru hamburger for lunch, and microwaved meals or frozen food for supper. Paper plates for easy cleanup, and four ladies from a cleaning service who swarmed through the house like a SWAT team once a week to do the deep cleaning.

  Tonight she’d fed her family corn tortillas from the bags of agricultural corn feed she’d gotten with a previous FEMA disbursement. From the older neighbors in Oak Hollow, she’d learned a dozen ways to cook with corn. It had grown unappetizing, but the family had learned that food was for energy and not for entertainment.

  Now that the kitchen was cleaned up and the floor scrubbed of all the mud and dirt that were tracked in daily, Kay went outside to the side of the house, where she’d hung her laundry to dry. She found Judith there, pulling down her own family’s clothes. Her friend’s brown skin glistened in the humidity.

  “Girl, it took you long enough,” Judith said. “I was beginning to think you were gonna leave these all night.”

  “It’s not even dark yet,” Kay said. “I can cram a hundred more things onto my to-do list between now and dark. What on earth did we do with our time before?” She sighed and glanced at Judith’s nursing scrubs. “How do you do it? Working full-time and coming home to all the stuff you have to do?”

  “We make do.”

  When they’d opened the new hospital in Crockett, Judith had taken a nursing job there. The need was so great that she’d agreed to put in eight to ten hours a day. Amber Rowe, Kay’s other next-door neighbor, babysat her kids for her.

  Judith’s husband, Brad — a lawyer — had recently become district attorney in Crockett. He, too, worked long hours. Though they were all busy, Kay and Judith had grown close over the last year.

  “So how’s our Beth doing today?” Judith asked as she folded a pair of jeans that were as stiff as cardboard.

  “Not good. Still acting strange.” She filled her in on Beth’s paranoia and her morbid questions.

  “Sounds like it could be post-traumatic stress disorder,” Judith said. “I’m no psychologist, but she’s sure been through enough to have it. Remember how she sulked around for days after she saw Mark beaten? How she took the rabbits into her room to protect them? Maybe it was manifesting itself even then.”

  “But she seemed better in the last few weeks.”

  “Does she have bad dreams?”

  “Yes, but don’t we all these days?”

  “That’s the thing. We all have reactions to trauma. Some negative reactions are normal. But PTSD has lingering symptoms. People with it sometimes have flashbacks. Sometimes they have anxiety attacks as they relive the event.”

  “Which event?” Kay’s mind raced through all the traumatic things the family had been through in the last year. No wonder she was asking about murders and missing persons. Her sister had been a missing person, and then little Sarah — one of the children they were caring for — was kidnapped. Doug had been shot in their own home, and Zach — Jeff’s best friend — was almost killed. Then Mark was beaten half to death before Beth’s very eyes.

  It was a wonder they weren’t all losing their minds.

  “Do you know she hasn’t even gotten excited that the Pulses have ended?”

  Judith dropped her last armful of clothes into the basket. “Now that is bad. Sometimes patients with PTSD can’t think about the future. They have a sense of doom.”

  “We were thinking of finding her a counselor.”

  “Great idea. Do you know Anne Latham over on Bayor Street?”

  “Not very well.”

  “Well, get to know her. She’s a family therapist, or she was before the outage. Maybe you can get her to counsel Beth. I hear she was pretty good, back in the good ole days.”

  Armed with hope, Kay made a note to talk to her soon.

  Before she could head back home, Kay saw Mark walking up the sidewalk. He’d dressed up a little for his night with Deni. With his jeans, he wore a white button-down dress shirt. He grinned as he came toward her.

  Kay grinned back. “Big date tonight, huh?”

  “Got that right. She in a good mood?”

  “From what I can tell.”

  She thought of asking Mark if tonight was the night for the big proposal, but she decided to stay out of it. When the time was right, Mark would propose. She led him into the house, and called up to Deni.

  What she wouldn’t give for a working camcorder and the ability to go invisible tonight!

  THIRTEEN

  DENI TOOK ONE LAST LOOK IN THE MIRROR AND GAVE HERSELF a thumbs-up. At least the three-quarter-length sleeves covered her T-shirt tan. She slathered on some lip gloss, wondering where Mark was taking her. It wasn’t like they could go out to dinner or a movie. But Mark had promised her a memorable night in celebration of the burned-out star.

  She bounced downstairs and found him waiting like a prom date in the living room. He held a bouquet of pansies, the stems wrapped in tin foil.

  “Mark, are those for me?”

  He grinned. “I know they’re corny. But I wanted you to have them.”

  She took them and breathed in their scent. Mark’s eyes had that Cary Grant glint, like he had a secret.

  “You look like a movie star tonight,” she said. “Like one of those hunka-hunka heartthrobs who can’t go out without paparazzi.”

  “Wow. So do you,” he said, laughing. “You ready for the red carpet?” He pulled her close and pressed a kiss on her lips.

  She slid her arms around his neck and rose up on her toes.

  “Go ahead and tell me,” he said with a grin. “You love me, don’t you?”

  She laughed softly against his lips. “How could I not?”

  He stroked her hair and smiled.

  “So where are you taking me?”

  “How about a boat ride?”

  “That sounds fun.”

  He pushed off from the couch. “Well, let’s go, then. My yacht awaits.”

  His yacht, she knew, was a patched-up rowboat that hung in his garage. But that was yacht enough for her.

  As they went to the door, they heard a car outside. She looked through the glass. It was a white Malibu, one she hadn’t seen around before. “Is that car coming here?”

  Mark opened the door, and they both stepped out onto the porch as it pulled into their driveway. The driver got out. Deni watched as he came around the car. “Hi, babe,” he said. “It’s me!”

  Deni caught her breath at the sight of her ex-fiancé.

  FOURTEEN

  “CRAIG?” HIS APPEARANCE WAS SO UNEXPECTED THAT Deni froze. “What are you doing here?”

  He held out his hands, presentation-style. “I’m moving here!”

  “What?”

  “I’ll tell you all about it, if I can get a hug.”

  He looked like she remembered in the days before the Pulses — the young VIP in a tailored suit, hair cut short and jaw clean-shaven. But somehow those polished good looks didn’t appeal to her now. She didn’t need this twist in her relationship with Mark.

  When she didn’t step off the porch, he stepped up and hugged her.

  Deni glanced apologetically at Mark. Craig followed her gaze.

  Mark’s posture straightened as he shook Craig’s hand. He was a good four inches taller than Craig. “Nice to see you again,” he lied in a cool voice.

  “You too.” Craig’s tone was just as cool. Turning back to Deni, he said, “I was just appointed as a regional advisor for the Department of Energy, to work on the Alabama Recovery Team.” A self-conscious grin took over his face. “Man, you look gorgeous.”

  Mark looked at the ground, his jaw popping. The scar on his forehead seemed redder. Deni took Mark’s hand, laced her fingers through his. “Mark and I were about to go out. He’s taking me for a boat ride.”

  The tension in Mark’s jaw seemed to melt, and he looked up. Craig met his eyes. Challenging.

  “Nice night for it.” Craig glanced toward the door. “Hey, I’ve been driving since the wee hours. They deployed us a
s soon as they knew the Pulses had ended. You think your parents would mind putting me up for a few days?”

  No, she thought. That would be absurd, having her ex-fiancé living in her house while she dated someone else. “Wouldn’t you rather be in Birmingham? Surely your office won’t be in Crockett.”

  “Actually, it is. I convinced them to set up here.”

  The words spoke volumes, and Deni knew this wasn’t an arbitrary decision. He had come here for her. Hadn’t her rejection of his train ticket to Washington been enough to convince him she wasn’t interested?

  Apparently not.

  “You’ve always liked grand gestures, babe,” he said in a low voice, as though Mark wasn’t there. “How about this one? I could have worked in any state or stayed in Washington at the DOE. But I came here.”

  Mark took a step toward him.

  Deni stopped him. “You shouldn’t have, Craig. I’m with Mark now. I told you in my letter.”

  “Find another place to stay,” Mark bit out.

  Craig ignored him. “Come on, Deni. I hardly know anybody else in town. There aren’t any hotels open. Do you want me to sleep in my car?”

  “No, I don’t want you sleeping in your car. But you should have worked something out before you came.”

  “I thought we were friends,” he said. “I figured your family would be glad to see me since I’m going to help get their lights turned back on.”

  Deni’s heart jolted, and her defenses fell. “You are?”

  “Of course. That’s our main goal. And if I’m here, you can bet this part of town will be among the first to be restored.”

  He had her. She swallowed hard as visions of a refrigerator, overhead lights, television, and computers flashed through her brain. Could Craig really do that?

  Of course he could. He’d worked for Senator Crawford for two years and knew a lot of people in government. He could get things done.