“Talk to her. She responded to you that night. We all saw.”
Shooting to his feet, Ben snarled, “You think I haven’t been trying? That I just walked away?”
Gray’s eyes might as well have been steel. “Isn’t that what you’ve done before?”
An obscenity escaped his lips, but he couldn’t turn his rage on the other man, not when he deserved every brutal punch of it himself. Voice hoarse, he said, “I have continued to make myself available above and beyond what my job demanded. If you’re saying I didn’t start a personal relationship with Faith… Yeah, you’re right. I had my reasons. I don’t owe it to you to share them.”
Gray broke first, bending his head abruptly and pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. He cursed under his breath, then said, “You’re right. Hell. This is killing Charlotte. I shouldn’t take that out on you.”
After a minute, Ben sank back into his chair, which squeaked under the weight of his body. “I’ve been by to see her at least once a day. So far, she hasn’t been very receptive.”
Gray stared at him. “I didn’t know that. She didn’t tell Charlotte.”
“She doesn’t want me there. Faith seems to have a talent for denial.”
They both knew he wasn’t just talking about this past week, or even the past two months when Hardesty was stalking her and she didn’t want to believe he’d really hurt her. To all reports, during her entire marriage she had convinced herself over and over again that the son of a bitch was truly sorry he’d hit her and that he wouldn’t do it again. Black eyes, broken bones, God knows how many bruises she’d hidden from public view… Through it all, she had forgiven him and pretended for the benefit of her family that everything was fine.
Ben didn’t understand why. Could she possibly have loved the man that much? Had a capacity for forgiveness so vast?
It was one of many answers he intended to get, once Faith realized he wasn’t going anywhere.
“What if she collapses?” Gray asked.
“That might not be a bad thing.” Ben had been thinking about it. “She’s a stubborn woman. That may be what it’ll take to get her to realize she can’t go on the way she is.”
Gray swore again and finally went away. Ben guessed he was worried about Charlotte as much as Faith. She was likely running herself ragged, putting more hours into the farm business than she could afford and probably staying too many evenings, too, in hopes her sister would talk to her, lean on her, cry.
Ben had lost all ability to concentrate on the personnel schedule for November he had been attempting to draft. He finally shoved it in a drawer. If there was one thing he could do to help Faith Russell find peace, it was to figure out where Hardesty had been hiding and what his intentions had been. He’d felt he had to give Hardesty’s mother a few days to grieve before he pressed her again for what she knew, but he’d done that now. And maybe it was ruthless of him, but she might give up more now, while she was stunned and vulnerable, than she would if he waited too long and she managed to shore up her belief in her son’s innocence.
When he knocked on the front door of Michelle Hardesty’s modest rambler, he saw the curtains twitch and then waited for a good two minutes before he heard the dead bolt being turned. The door opened a crack, revealing half of a face almost unrecognizable from his other visits.
“Mrs. Hardesty,” he said gently. “May I come in? I need to talk to you.”
She stared at him for a painfully long time before opening the door and unlocking the screen. When she disappeared from sight, he took it as an invitation and stepped inside, the screen door creaking as it snapped shut.
He had always suspected that Michelle Hardesty was a nice woman who really did believe her son was being falsely accused. She’d wanted to hate Faith, but Ben had seen cracks in the facade a few times. In her midfifties, she’d kept herself up well, with soft brown hair cut chin length and likely colored at the salon, a round pleasant face and a tidy home. Today, her face was ravaged, her hair looked as if it hadn’t been washed in days and she wore a nightgown, down-at-the-heel slippers and a thin wrapper with a coffee stain down the front. By the time he followed her into the living room, she’d sat down on the sofa and seemed to have forgotten he was there. That thousand-yard stare, he thought, wasn’t much different than Faith’s.
Feeling manipulative as hell, he got her to talking about her son, reminiscing. She took out a photo album and showed him baby pictures and newspaper clippings of Rory in his high-school football uniform. He stopped her before she could reach wedding pictures; Ben didn’t want to know what he’d feel at the sight of Faith wearing white and gazing up with shining faith—yeah, damn it, he had to use that word—at the man who would be beating the crap out of her only a few months down the line.
Instead, he flipped back a few pages to a team photo and asked who the other boys were. “I suppose I know some of them,” he murmured.
“Yes, that’s Lenny Phillips.” She touched the face of a boy kneeling in the front row. “He has a Farmer’s Insurance office here in town.”
Yeah, that rang a bell, although Phillips had definitely put on some weight since high school.
She pointed out several others he’d met, including Ken Carlisle who’d fenced Ben’s backyard for him after he’d bought his house.
When he asked about Rory’s friends, she seemed to have forgotten who she was talking to or why he was interested. A couple of these boys had grown into men who still played slow pitch with Rory, maybe had beers after games, but Ben had already talked to most of them. One name was new to him—J. P. Hammond—but he didn’t take his notebook out; the last thing he wanted was to remind Michelle Hardesty that he was the cop who’d been trying to jail her son.
She turned another couple of pages and showed him a photo of Rory in a headlock, the boys both laughing.
“Rory still goes elk hunting with Noah Berger,” Mrs. Hardesty said, not seeming to notice that she was going to have to be changing verb tense. “Them and Jimmy Reese. I don’t know if I have a picture of Jimmy. They weren’t real good friends until after high school. Jimmy is a couple of years younger, I think.”
“Elk hunting, huh? That’s not something we have where I come from.”
“Oh, they go down to Oregon, camp for a week every year. Jimmy got one three, four years ago. They all shared the meat.” Her mind seemed to drift, and Ben could tell she wasn’t seeing the album open on her lap anymore. “Noah’s wife always went—nice gal—but I don’t think Faith went but for the first year. Rory didn’t like that.” Mrs. Hardesty swallowed hard, perhaps remembering what Rory did to his wife when he wasn’t happy with her. Or maybe all she was thinking about was that her son wouldn’t be getting together with his high-school buddies to elk hunt ever again.
“This Noah Berger and Jimmy Reese,” Ben said casually. “Do they still live here in West Fork?”
She shook her head. “Jimmy is over in Bremerton. He has a good job at the shipyards. Noah…well, I’m not sure. He was in Boise, but I think Rory mentioned him moving. I just don’t remember.”
Idaho. Ben felt a surge of exhilaration.
“Have you let Rory’s friends know what happened?”
She gazed at him without interest and shook her head.
“Have you gone through your son’s things?”
“I can’t,” she whispered. “I just can’t.”
He hardened himself enough to say, “Mrs. Hardesty, I have to ask again if you know where Rory has been staying since he left his job and his apartment.”
“I don’t know!” she screamed. “What difference does it make now? You need to leave! I’m done talking to you.” She covered her face with her hands. The album slipped from her lap and hit the carpeted floor with a thud. “I’m done.”
After a moment he stood, said, “I’m going now, Mrs. Hardesty. I’m very sorry for your loss,” and let himself quietly out the front door.
He felt like scum, as he ofte
n did when he was just doing his job, but he was also aware of the heightened sensations of a hunter who had just scented new spoor. He ran the names through his mind, including the first one. Hammond. J. P. Hammond. He could get the full name from school records. Three new names gave him something to work with, especially the last two. If Rory had stayed friends with Reese and Berger, why hadn’t Faith mentioned them?
With a glance at his watch, he saw that he’d have to get a move on if he was going to waylay her at lunchtime. He’d done so on Tuesday; Wednesday she must have scooted out the classroom door on the heels of her kids before the bell had quit ringing and hid for the next half hour. He sure as hell hadn’t been able to find her. Thursday he’d stayed away in hopes she’d lower her guard. He’d have stayed away today, too, if he had thought she would actually eat lunch.
After a stop at a new café on Park Street, he drove to the school, parked in a visitor’s slot in front, checked in at the office and then strode down the still-empty corridor to Faith’s classroom. He made it just as the bell clanged.
The door was flung open and kids poured out. Ben let them go by, then blocked the doorway. Faith came to a stop only a few feet away.
She wore chinos and a three-quarter-sleeve knit shirt that made him painfully aware of how prominent her collarbone had become. And her cheekbones—damn, they could cut glass. In contrast, her eyes were dull.
There might have been a hint of exasperation in her voice, though. “Chief Wheeler.”
He lifted the bags in his hands. “Lunch.”
A small frown knit her forehead. “Why do you keep trying to feed me? I bring a lunch from home.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I do.”
He advanced into the classroom and closed the door behind him, resisting the temptation to lock it. “Then where is it?”
“We have a teacher’s lounge.”
They did, but he’d learned the two days he’d gone hunting for her that she definitely didn’t spend her lunchtime in it.
“My lunch is better anyway,” he said. “Sit.”
A flare of rebellion on her face encouraged him, but it died too quickly and she turned and went back to her desk, sinking docilely into the chair behind it. He set the bags down on the desk and dragged the one other adult-size chair over.
“Smoothie.” He presented it to her. The café, called The Pea Patch, was into organic, vegetarian food. This smoothie, blended as he watched, was full of healthful ingredients. “Corn chowder.” He put the container in front of her and peeled off the lid.
It was damn good chowder, he discovered when he started on his own. After a moment, Faith picked up the plastic spoon and began to eat.
“You been in The Pea Patch?” he asked.
She looked up with vague surprise. “No, but they’ve been buying corn from us. And pumpkins. I guess Carol Lynn is making pumpkin pies from scratch.”
“So this is probably made with Russell Family Farm corn.”
She blinked bemusedly and gazed at her bowl. “I suppose it is.”
“Me, I tend to be a meat eater.” He kept a careful eye on her as he rambled on, his voice relaxed and unthreatening. “But corn chowder is one of my favorite foods. Guess I should learn to make it myself.”
After a long pause, she said, “It’s not hard.”
He smiled at her. “Why don’t you make it the next time I come over? Say, tomorrow night? The corn is almost past for the year, right?”
“Most of it is already.” She seemed not to have noticed that he’d lured her into accepting him as a dinner guest. “I suppose I could find a few ears in the maze. We don’t harvest that field.”
“I’ll count on it,” he said with satisfaction, even though he hated the fact that she couldn’t get worked up enough to tell him to go to hell. “You ever made pumpkin pie from scratch?” he asked.
“Well, of course.” Looking surprised, Faith paused with the spoon partway to her mouth. “It’s not the same out of a can.”
“I didn’t know people still did that.”
“That’s because you’re from a big city where no one grows pumpkins. When you live on a farm, you grow as much of your food as you can.”
He liked the idea of her making that pie for him, but supposed it was too early to hint at an invitation to Thanksgiving dinner.
She finished the chowder and started in on her smoothie, seeming to have forgotten his presence. He talked a little more, about the rainstorm forecast for the weekend, his worries about keeping the streets safe for trick-or-treaters come Halloween and Gray’s battle with the city council to get another couple of stoplights installed downtown. If Faith was listening at all, he couldn’t tell; her head was bent, her braid fell over her shoulder and that fragile collarbone, and her expression was far away.
He couldn’t decide if that distance was healthy, a sort of cotton batting she’d wrapped herself in, or whether she was trying to pull herself so deep inside, no one would be able to touch her. He remembered the way she’d grabbed the stool that day in the barn as if she intended to brandish it at him, and would have preferred her rage and anguish even if it was turned on him.
Suddenly frustrated even though he knew she needed patience most of all, he rose to his feet and bundled his lunch leavings in the bag.
“Thank you for lunch,” she said politely. “Was there something you wanted to ask me?”
“No. But I’m here, Faith, when you want to talk.”
“I’m fine,” she said automatically.
God damn it. If he heard her say she was “fine” one more time…
“I’ll look forward to that corn chowder tomorrow night,” he told her, and walked out.
SHE KNEW EVERYONE WORRIED about her, but she wished they wouldn’t. Couldn’t they see that what she needed most was to be left alone? Like a wounded animal crawling into a hole, it was instinct, her way of protecting herself.
Her father seemed to understand the most, but even so she felt his unhappiness like a weight. His eyes were so sad when he looked at her, as if he blamed himself.
Charlotte was…well, it was miracle enough that she was here. Faith never let herself forget that, even when she was ungrateful enough to wish that Char would go home to Gray. After ten years of near-estrangement, her sister was here and wanted nothing so much as to take care of her. But they were twins. Shouldn’t Char, of all people, understand that Faith didn’t want to talk about what happened?
And Ben. He was the most annoying, even though she saw him the least of the three. He came the closest to making her feel things she didn’t want to. Faith tried to convince herself that it was just because she wouldn’t have even known him if it weren’t for Rory stalking her. Everything he’d ever had to do with her was linked to Rory. She was only a loose end to be tied up. Or else he felt guilty; she wasn’t sure. Either way, the minute he was satisfied that she’d put it all behind her, he would be gone. And maybe that was why emotions stirred uncomfortably close below the surface when she saw Ben. She had wanted to be more to him. Now, it made her angry that she couldn’t get rid of him, when he’d had a way of always disappearing back when she wanted him to come around.
Saturday was awful. Faith worked out in the barn, and it had to be the busiest day of the year. But people came to gawk, not to shop, and she could hardly bear it. She slid away from questions, smiled emptily at sympathy and felt as if her skin was being peeled away from her body, one excruciating inch at a time.
Char would have taken care of today, Faith knew, but she’d worked all week and it wasn’t fair to her.
Dad hobbled over midafternoon, took one look at her face and said, “I can take over for a while. You need to go lie down, honey.”
“I’ll be all right,” she said, glancing at her watch. “It’s only two more hours until we close, and I can nap then if you don’t mind a late dinner. Or making do yourself.”
“Ben mentioned that you’d promised him corn chowder tonight.”
T
he dim memory swam upward. “Oh, God. I think he invited himself.”
“Go rest.”
“Really, I’m fine…”
“I can work the damn cash register!” Real anger crackled in Daddy’s voice. “Get out of here.”
She went. Remembering she hadn’t eaten lunch, she paused in the kitchen, but then continued upstairs. She never reached the second-story hallway without her gaze being drawn to the closed door of her bedroom, but she had moved into Char’s room. Some of her clothes were still in her old closet, but she had enough to get by for now. It was ridiculous not to be able to walk in there—Char had cleaned and aired the room, so there wasn’t even a bloodstain on the wood floor. But Faith just couldn’t. Even thinking about her room—even that brief, involuntary glance at the closed door—made her remember. Just a flash, before she buried it—the moment she’d stiffened when she heard the whisper of sound out in the hall, or the blacker darkness that filled the open doorway, or…
With a shudder, Faith mentally yanked the covers over her head, like a little girl sure she’d be safe if she curled in the dark, warm cavern of her bed.
Now I know I’m not safe.
She hurried into Char’s bedroom—no, her bedroom now—and stretched out on the bed.
Which was awfully uncomfortable. Char definitely had gotten the worst of the bargain when they were ten years old and Mom decreed that Faith would get the new mattress and Char the old, since she was the one who insisted on having her own room and not sharing anymore. That was nineteen years ago, and the mattress had been gently aging even then, having been Grandma Peters’.
I should buy a new bed, Faith thought, but knew she wouldn’t when money was so tight. But no matter what, she’d never sleep in her bed again, not after seeing Rory’s lifeblood pour out onto it. Feeling it shudder as his body fell against it on the way to the floor.
She lay there, eyes wide open, and pretended she was resting. She was desperately tired; she knew she was, and that it showed. But she had seemingly lost the ability to sleep. She didn’t think she’d slept soundly since those few hours on the air mattress at Gray’s house, when Ben had sprawled beside her. Somehow, even though she had been unconscious of his presence, he had made her feel safe.
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