“Stormie, I know that we don’t know each other that well, but if you need someone to talk to, I’d be more than happy to listen.”
“Nathan, I came to Charlotte today to speak to a divorce attorney,” she quickly blurted.
“I can’t believe I just said that to someone I hardly know. I’m so embarrassed!” She announced as she continued to dry her eyes with the tissue.
“There’s nothin’ to be embarrassed about,” he assured her.
“Thank you. But it’s just...” She started to say.
“It’s just nothin’. I’m gonna be in town for a while, and I think we should have lunch again,” he said.
Then he thought to himself, what did I just say? Did I just ask this beautiful woman out? This married woman?!
“I think I’d like that.”
“I’ll be on Taylor Creek tomorrow with Pastor Turner’s sons, but maybe later, we can meet and talk some more.”
“You’ll be on Taylor Creek tomorrow with Willie and Sam?”
“You know the Turner boys?”
“Of course, everyone knows them. They’ve helped me in the yard in the past. What are you doing with them? Surely those two adventurers didn’t convince one of J. Edgar Hoover’s finest to go looking for Blackbeard’s treasure, did they? I think treasure hunting and fishing is all those two ever do on Taylor Creek,” she quickly said as she put the tissue back in her purse.
“No, nothin’ like that,” he replied as he stood up from the car.
“Although treasure hunting or even fishing sounds a lot better than what I’m gonna be doing tomorrow.”
“Agent Emerson, do you mean to tell me that you’re gonna have those two young boys working on Taylor Creek all day tomorrow?”
“Well, I don’t know about all day, but yes, I’ll be with those two young men for a better part of the day.”
“Well, that’s settled then. I expect all three of you to be at my dock at precisely noon for sandwiches and snacks.”
“I don’t know what to say…”
“There’s nothin’ to say. It’s come to my understanding that the FBI is in Beaufort on official business, and as a citizen of Beaufort, it is my duty, along with Willie and Sam, to assist the FBI. Willie and Sam know how to get to my place. I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said as she quickly pulled away from the curb before he could object.
***
Stormie sat at the last traffic light before leaving downtown Charlotte and getting back on the road, the very road that would take her back home and back to her life. A home and a life that she now considered absent of love. A home that was filled with a husband’s lies and abuse. For a moment, she thought about escaping that home and that life. All she had to do was simply turn the car in the other direction and go back to Alabama. Back to her childhood home, the same home she still owned, but more importantly, the home where she was once loved and felt safe.
I could do it. What about Sissy? I could just send for her later. Ben wouldn’t hurt her. Would he? How could I have been so foolish to allow a man like Ben Arrington into my life so many years ago? Why couldn’t he be like Nathan Emerson? Who is Nathan Emerson? Why did I follow him into the restaurant when I saw him crossing the street after going to see the lawyer? Why did I share so much with a man I barely knew? Well, he was a good listener, polite, and handsome. Oh my! What am I thinking? What are you doing, Josephine? Yep, that’s precisely what Momma would say right now if she knew what I was thinking, Stormie thought.
For some, it may have been only an afternoon, but for Stormie, it was an afternoon escape with a man she felt attracted to. Deep down, Stormie knew it was not an appropriate situation that she allowed herself to fall into, but it was a situation that made her feel free and excited at the same time. She imagined his deep blue eyes, perfectly combed black hair, and his rugged yet handsome face. Not to mention his laugh that seemed to fill the room. She also noticed that he put out an air of confidence.
Stormie had allowed her thoughts to escape once more and failed to notice the light change to green. The horn honking from the motorist behind her brought her back. She politely waved at the other driver and then moved through the intersection and onto the interstate back toward Beaufort. Once she was on the open road, she leaned over and turned the volume up on the radio and began singing along to Petula’s Clark’s hit Downtown.
The impatient driver who honked at her earlier decided to go around her in his beat-up truck. Stormie paid him no attention and turned the radio up even louder as the Corvette roared, and the wind whipped around her.
It was a good day! She thought.
***
The drive back to Beaufort was beautiful, and Nathan estimated that he would be back in Beaufort and in his room by nine o’clock. He reached up and pulled down the visor and then leaned over and took his sunglasses out of the glove box. In all, he had decided that the trip to Charlotte was a lucrative one.
As he drove, he thought about the case and figured that he now knew that the relationship between Judge Ridge and Ben Arrington went back to Charlotte when Arrington was getting started as an attorney. That was around about the same time Judge Ridge sat on the Eugenics Board. Subsequently, the same board that had approved all the girls’ sterilization surgeries.
There were still a lot of things he had some questions about that he didn’t have the answers to, and he started to run over each one in his mind.
Who was my new tail?
What’s the connection between the Horsemen, the girls, and the Eugenics Board?
What was their interest in the girls?
How does Sheriff Carter and Jack Walter fit into all of this?
Damn it! How is everyone connected?
Did one of the men kill the girls? Which one and why?
And, then there’s Stormie Arrington…
What if she was setting me up?
Did I really lose the tail this morning?
Was she sent to the diner to speak to me?
Is she part of all this?
No, she can’t be… But wait, her husband is Ben Arrington. What about the divorce attorney she went to see, and the crying? She couldn’t be part of this.
I know that Ridge, Arrington, Walter, and Carter are bad people because I’ve seen bad people, and all four of them fit the mold.
“Stormie isn’t like them. She’s a good person and genuine. I know it,” he said out loud as if he were trying to convince someone in the empty passenger seat.
As the sky grew darker and he got closer to Beaufort, he tried to think about the case and all the questions he had. Stormie was all he could think about, and that’s all he could see as he cruised closer to the familiar convertible in front of him.
***
Nathan moved closer and closer to the car in front of him. Stormie looked in her rearview mirror and saw the white car with the blue stripe on the hood getting closer, and at first, she was concerned. Within seconds the other car was so close to her that she could no longer see its bumper. However, she did recognize the driver, and that made her smile. Nathan questioned whether she would or would not do it. Once the oncoming lane was empty, he quickly entered it and punched the accelerator. As he caught up, he looked over at her and saw a grin on her face that said, let’s do it.
Stormie pressed her foot down hard on the accelerator, and the powerful car’s front end lifted slightly, and then almost immediately, it started to pull away from the Shelby 350. She laughed loudly and gripped the steering wheel tight. Approaching the curve, Nathan saw a sedan barreling toward him. He eased off the gas, pressed the brake, and got back behind her once again. She raised her hand in the air, indicating victory.
The race ain’t over! He thought to himself.
Nathan shifted to a lower gear and applied the brake slightly as the two entered the curve. Coming out of the curve, Nathan saw his chance, and once another car had passed in the opposite lane, he pressed the accelerator hard and quickly passed Stormie on the left.
“Dang it!” She declared out loud.
“I got one more shot before we get to town!” She said to herself.
Once out of the curve, she checked the oncoming lane, and when it was clear, she moved into it, downshifted, and hit the accelerator. The front end rose even more than the last time, and Stormie’s heart raced as the Big Block started to gain on the Pony car. Nathan saw her coming up on the side, and he saw the truck in front of him. He took his foot off the gas pedal and let her fly by him and then the truck.
“You can have the win,” he said quietly as he too entered the other lane and passed the truck seconds later. Nathan smiled the rest of the way back to town. He liked her determination and spirit.
Chapter 21
Charlie stood in the phone booth and used a large knife to sharpen a small twig into a toothpick. He ran his thumb over the tip and then placed the knife back into his boot. He put the sharpened twig between his lips while retrieving a dime from his pocket. He cautiously looked around the area before sliding the coin into the coin slot on the phone. Then he dialed the number that he had written down on a piece of paper earlier. While he waited for the phone to be answered, he leaned against the booth and used the makeshift toothpick to get the remainder of a roast beef sandwich out from between his teeth.
“Hello,” Charlie heard Emma’s familiar voice announce on the other end of the line.
“Let me speak to Ben,” Charlie ordered.
“Just a minute, please.”
“Hello, this is Ben Arrington?”
“It’s me.”
“What took you so long to call?”
“It wasn’t my fault. The son-of-a-bitch drove to Charlotte.”
“Why?”
“How am I supposed to know that?”
“Because you were following him, that’s how, you ignorant bastard,” Ben said as his patience with Charlie was wearing thin.
“Well, I lost him before we got to Charlotte.”
“So, we know nothing! Because you’re incompetent! Is that what you’ve called to tell me?”
“No! You best watch how you talk to me! I called because I thought you might want to know who I saw in Charlotte.”
“And whom may that have been?” Ben asked, sarcastically.
“Your wife,” Charlie announced proudly.
“Where did you see my wife? She wasn’t with him, was she?” Ben asked quickly.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“Well, I didn’t see her until I was heading back to Beaufort. You see, I got to a traffic light, and there was this brand-new red convertible with some blonde in it sitting in front of me. She wasn’t paying attention. I had to honk to get her to move when the light changed. When I got on the highway, I decided to pass her, and that’s when I recognized her,” Charlie explained proudly as he continued to pick his teeth.
“Where did she go when she got back to Beaufort?”
“I don’t know. But there is something else.”
“What’s that?”
“When I got closer to town guess who came flying by me like I wasn’t even moving?
“Who?”
“Your wife.”
“So?”
“So, the next thing I see is your FBI man passing me too. I think they were racing each other back to town. Odd ain’t it? Your wife is in Charlotte at the same time as the FBI man? Maybe they doin’ the same thing you and Emma doin’ right now,” Charlie stated and hung up the phone without another word.
***
Ben heard the phone go dead, but he just stood there holding the receiver to his ear, looking out the front window of Emma’s house.
“What was Stormie and Agent Emerson doing in Charlotte?” He said quietly and hung up the phone.
“What did you say?” Emma asked as she came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist.
“Nothing. I better get going.”
“I was hoping you could stay the night again,” she said as she reached down the front of his boxers.
“I can’t tonight,” Ben whispered as he turned and faced Emma and kissed her full red lips while slowly opening her silk robe.
“Oh, but tomorrow we’ll go to Charlotte for some business, and then we’re off to Savannah. You and I’ll have many fun-filled days together. And, I’ve got a surprise for you,” Ben explained as he caressed and lightly kissed her large breast before pulling himself away.
“What surprise Ben? What are you planning, you devil?” Emma asked with excitement as she followed Ben over to the chair, where he had left his clothes.
“I’m taking you to a dinner.”
“What kind of dinner?” Emma asked as she pulled her robe further apart and rubbed her body against his naked back.
“A fun one,” Ben answered as he turned to face her.
“Really?” Emma asked skeptically because she knew about the dinners Ben liked to go to.
***
The night was growing shorter, but he could not pull himself away from the shadows outside of the home of Emma Rodgers. He had found himself here more and more often, watching the lovers enjoying each other, over and over, night after night.
Once again, he longed to hold a beautiful woman in his arms and have her want him as much as he wanted her. It was almost midnight when Ben Arrington pulled out of Emma’s driveway. He remained in the shadows out of sight until he could no longer see the lights of Ben’s car.
“I’ll wait a bit longer for her to go to bed and fall asleep,” he said quietly as he pulled the knife from his boot and ran his thumb along its sharp edge.
Chapter 22
Stormie laid awake in the bed, thinking about her afternoon with Nathan Emerson while the sound of the ceiling fan spun around and around overhead. More than once in the past few days, she’d imagined a life away from Beaufort with a man like Nathan. For the life of her, she could not get this man out of her mind. She dreamed of a life far away from this one, but where, she contemplated?
Maybe Hawaii, she thought.
After all, the Life magazine she had received in the mail earlier in the week depicted a life of sunny days and beach living for the locals there. She allowed herself to escape to blue waters, and the beaches with a man she believed was out of her reach. A man she could never be with. It was the sound and the lights of Ben’s car pulling up near the house that brought her back to the reality of her sad and lonely life.
She laid there in the bed, not moving, pretending to be asleep as he entered the room. She waited for him to lie next to her, but he never did. Stormie kept her eyes shut, pretending to be asleep until she felt Ben standing over her. The familiar smell of Emma’s perfume lingered in the air.
Here goes nothing! She thought to herself as she pretended to wake up by opening her eyes lazily as if she had been in a deep sleep for some time now.
“Ben!” She screamed upon opening her eyes and finding her husband standing over her with his fist clutching an electrical cord.
“Where did you go today?” Ben asked as Stormie scooted across to the other side of the bed.
“What are you going to do with that?” She asked.
“See, now that’s the reason I think you’re one STUPID BITCH!” He yelled as he grabbed at her legs and pulled her toward him.
“No Ben, don’t!” She cried and kicked as the tears ran down her face.
“Why were you in Charlotte today?” Ben yelled as he reached backwards with the cord and started forward with it, taking aim at Stormie’s bare legs.
“No, you don’t!” Sissy screamed as she rushed into the room, knocking Ben over the nightstand. At first, he was bewildered and confused but quickly got to his feet. He began swinging the cord at Sissy over and over again across her backside. Sissy retreated to the c
orner of the room, where she cowered with Ben right behind her.
Stormie rushed over to the lamp that had fallen to the floor. She picked it up and ran toward Ben, screaming madly. Ben swiftly spun around with his right hand clutched in a fist and caught Stormie on the left side of her head, knocking her to the ground. She picked herself up from the hardwood floor and tried to balance herself upright, but her vision grew dark, and she fell to the floor, unconscious.
Stormie awoke to find herself lying in her bed next to Sissy. Using her elbows, she lifted herself up and looked around the room cautiously. Once she determined that Ben was gone, she turned her attention to Sissy, who was sleeping on her stomach. The early morning light shined through the window, and Stormie felt pain on the left side of her head. She looked over and saw that Sissy’s gown was blood-stained from the lashes Ben had delivered. Stormie began to cry as she reached over and held her protector, who had taken the brunt of Ben’s anger.
“Sissy, are you awake?” Stormie asked as she lovingly caressed and lightly kissed her guardian’s head.
“I’s awake.”
“Where is he?” Stormie whispered.
“He’s gone. He left after you went unconscious,” Sissy answered as she slowly lifted herself from the bed, wincing slightly.
“Do you know where he went? Is he coming back?”
“He packed his bags and quickly ran out the house. He said that he’s going out of town and won’t be back until Tuesday and that you best have some answers for him when he gets back,” Sissy answered as she stood up and looked at Stormie’s face.
“Oh, my Lord Stormie! Your face is…” Sissy began to say as Stormie stood, steadied herself, and then slowly walked into the bathroom and placed her hands on the sink to balance herself while briefly keeping her eyes shut.
Sissy followed behind her, making sure that her head injury wasn’t worse than she thought. Stormie took a deep breath and then opened her eyes.
The Secrets of Taylor Creek Page 11