by Ciana Stone
Jolene reached for the door handle then stopped and looked at him. "For what it's worth, I never forgot about you, JD. I don't think I ever will."
She took hold of the handle to open the door. That's when she felt his hand on her shoulder. At the pressure from his hand she turned toward him.
"Jo."
How was it that a single syllable, falling from his lips had the power to override whatever good sense she had left regarding him? He pulled her into his arms, their lips meeting in a kiss she remembered with heart-rending clarity.
Need and passion blended with desperation and pain in such complexity that distinguishing between the mix was impossible. It was an emotional brew that overwhelmed and consumed. It was a kiss that touched more than her lips, it struck at the core of her, whispering with despair. Save me.
When the kiss ended, she placed her hand on the side of his face. "Please stop punishing yourself for something you didn’t do. You're a good man, JD, and a good father. You've raised two remarkable sons who think the moon and sun rest on your shoulders. That kind of love and admiration isn't given without cause. You can't hold yourself responsible for what your wife did. That was her choice, not yours. And… and according to your father, it wasn't the first time she'd tried. There were two other times. You just were never told."
"No." He pushed her away. "That's not true."
"Yes, it is."
"I don't believe you."
"You don't have to. You should talk to your father."
He stared at her for a few moments before speaking again and when he did, the anger was back. "You need to get out. I have to go home."
"Yes, you do." She climbed out of the truck and stood watching as he drove away. When the taillights of his truck disappeared, she looked at Nellie Mae's house. She might as well go on in. She might be able to get in a couple hours of work.
Jolene pulled out her key as she walked up the sidewalk. Just as she went to insert the key in the lock she heard something behind her. Unfortunately, before she had time to turn and look, stars exploded behind her eyes.
Then everything went dark.
Chapter Ten
JD swallowed the last of his coffee, put the cup in the sink, and headed for the door. Just as he pulled his hat from the rack his phone rang.
"Yeah."
"Is this JD?" The high-pitched female voice had him moving the phone away from his ear.
"Yes."
"This is Nellie Mae Baker. I tried to call your brother, Jayce but I didn't get an answer so I'm calling you."
"Okay, what can I do for you Mrs. Baker?"
"You can find Jo."
"Pardon?"
"Jo. Jolene. Jolene Windwalker. My boarder. The television lady. She's missing."
"Missing?"
"Are you deaf or just slow JD? Missing. As in gone."
"What makes you think that?"
"Because her key is on the front porch but she's not here. She didn't make it into the house."
JD stopped cold. Fear lanced through him sharp and bitter. His mind went immediately to the man who'd accosted Jo. "Yes, she did."
"No, she didn't. I got home around ten and her key was laying on the porch and she wasn't here. And she never came in. I know because I was listening."
"Did you call the police?"
"Well, yes. I'm old, not stupid. But I know she's been out there at your place a lot and she was carrying on with Jayce last night, dancing and all. I thought maybe – well, you know, maybe she went home with him."
JD knew that wasn't true but hated that Nellie Mae thought it might be. "No. She didn't go home with Jayce. I gave her a ride to your place around nine-thirty."
"Call the Chief and tell him."
"I will, Mrs. Baker. Thanks for calling."
JD didn't hesitate to press the End button and terminate the conversation. He placed the next call while heading for his truck. "Is Chief Wallace in? Yes, this is JD Weathers. Thanks."
Police Chief Lester Wallace came on the line as JD was climbing into his truck. "JD? Everything okay out your way?"
"Yes. I called about Jolene Windwalker. I drove her to Mrs. Baker's house last night around 9:30. She was at the thing at Billy's and some guy got in her face, shouting about her ruining his family's life with her lies. I backed him down and gave her a ride."
"So you saw her at 9:30?"
"Yes."
"Did you see her go into the house?"
Guilt reared its ugly head, making JD grimace. "No."
"So you didn't know the man who accosted her?"
"No."
"Can you give a description?"
"Yeah."
"Okay, I hate to interrupt your day, JD, but could you come to the station and do that this morning?"
"I'm on my way."
"'Preciate that. See you soon."
JD started his truck and pulled out. He shouldn't have left Jo standing there on the sidewalk. Especially not after what happened with that guy. What the hell was wrong with him? What if something awful had happened to her?
That thought had his body acting without conscious awareness. One moment he was driving along and the next his foot was on the brake and his truck's tires were screaming and smoking. When he came to a stop he just sat there in the road, his hands trembling in their white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel.
If something had happened to her, he'd never be able to make up for the wrong he'd done to her. He'd put the blame for what his wife did on Jo's shoulders when the truth was, she'd had no hand in it. He knew that. He'd always known it. It was just easier to try to make himself believe it was her fault than accept the blame himself.
Thinking that his wife had tried multiple times to kill herself had gnawed him all night. His father had confirmed it. JD had sat in Jason's kitchen and waited on him to get home. He confronted Pop with what Jo had told him and Pop told him the truth. His wife, Krissie tried a couple of other times to kill herself, both times with pills. Both times Pop had gotten her to the hospital in time and had hidden what she'd done from JD.
JD understood why Pop had hidden it from him. It was the same reason he'd hidden the real nature of Krissie's death from his sons. To spare them pain.
Jo hadn't caused what happened. She'd just been a convenient target for his anger and his guilt. Now he might not get to apologize to her for the way he'd treated her. More importantly he might not have the chance to tell her that the weekend he'd spent with her was the best of his life, and he'd regretted walking away every day since then.
He could lose her and he didn't know if he could bear that.
"No." He put his foot back on the accelerator. He would not lose her. He would find her. He'd give a statement and a description of the man to the police and then he'd find her. He had to.
*****
Jolene tried to force her eyes to open. She succeeded, but only for a second, then dizziness sent her spinning back into darkness. Several times she’d feel herself waking, but she couldn’t seem to fight her way out of the fog that clouded her mind. Twice she thought it was night, and then several times she thought it was day, but she couldn’t be sure. Not of anything. Something just kept dragging her back down into the darkness.
When she finally woke, she was disoriented. She didn't even remember leaving Billy's so how did she get home? At almost the same moment the question ran through her mind, she realized that she wasn't in her bed at Mrs. Bakers.
She wasn't in any bed. She was on a dirt floor, her wrists lashed together with rough rope. Fear had adrenaline surging through her body as she remembered. JD had driven away, and she'd walked to the front door of Mrs. Baker's house.
Then pain exploded in her head and the lights went out.
So where was she? She struggled to her feet, fighting dizziness and nausea. It took a few minutes to get steady on her feet and then she began to investigate. There was little light, but she determined that she was in some kind of old shed. Rough planks formed the walls, and likewis
e the door which was apparently locked from the outside. Cracks between the boards allowed dim shafts of light from one wall.
Jolene pressed her face close to a crack, trying to see outside. Scrub brush and dry land was all she could see, along with a half-moon in the sky. Where the hell was she and who had put her here? Was someone coming back? What did they plan on doing to her?
Panic started to set in and she almost retched with fear. Suck it up. She couldn't let the fear take control or she'd be a blubbering mess on the ground. She had to escape but how?
She tried loosening the rope with her teeth but the position of the knot made it impossible. She needed something to pry or cut it.
Junk was piled along the walls. Maybe there was something she could use. She went through it and nearly screamed when she lifted an old burlap sack and uncovered a fat rat. It dashed under a pile of wooden crates and she returned to the search.
After several long minutes she spied an old potato rake popped in a corner. She got it and carried to the other side of the shed where light through the cracks slanted onto the dirt floor. Jolene sat on the rake where the metal head attached to the handle. She tried five times to catch the middle of the knot into one of the rake tines and failed each time.
She got up to search again, braving the stacked up crates and hoping not to see the rat or one of his rat buddies. Jolene almost cried with relief at the sight of the old hand saw. She snatched it up and headed back for the patch of light.
She kicked the rake out of the way and sat down, positioning the saw between her legs with the soles of her feet pressing against each side of the handle. She started raking her bound wrists back and forth over the blade, sawing at the rope. Within minutes she was sweating and breathing hard. Obviously, the things she'd seen in movies were way off the mark. This stuff wasn't easy to saw through. She'd made some progress but was nowhere close to having the rope cut.
Not that she was about to give up. She went back at it, stopping now and then to check the progress and rest. It seemed like hours before she felt the rope loosen as the first strand parted. With frenzied motion, she twisted and tugged until she worked one hand free.
Tears of relief threatened as she tore the rope from her other wrist. Just as she stood she heard a noise at the door. Jolene raced across the shed and crouched behind the stack of old crates, praying that her rat friend had vacated the area.
The door opened. She didn't move a muscle and breathed through her mouth, trying to be as silent as possible. A man stepped into the shed. “Time to wake up bitch.”
Jolene heard him moving and peeked up. It didn't take long for him to realize she wasn't where he'd left her.
"What the fuck?"
Jolene tensed as he whirled around. "Where are you, bitch?"
She looked from him to the door and back at him. There was only one thing she could do. Run. Jolene bounded to her feet and headed for the door.
Two things happened almost at the same moment. Her foot snagged on one of the crates and sent her stumbling forward, trying to get her balance. The man lunged forward. His foot landed on the long curved tines of the rake which sent it shooting upward.
Jolene regained her balance as the rake came up and smacked the man right in the nose. He fell back screaming and clutching his face. That propelled her legs into motion and she raced for the door. Jolene didn't stop as she exited the building, she just kept running.
She had no clue where she was, but it didn't matter. There was no way she would stop. As she passed an old truck parked beside an abandoned house, she noticed the rutted road leading away from the house. She almost headed down the road, but realized that's what he would expect her to do. There wasn't much cover to be had on either side of the road, but on the other side of the house were scrubby bushes and brush that was easily as high as her head.
Jolene ran as fast as she could and made it to cover. She hunched down and kept running, hoping she was heading toward a main road. When she heard the man yelling she stopped and crouched down.
He shouted and cursed for a few minutes then went silent. She was scared to move. If he was looking for her she needed to stay put. As long as she was still she could hear. If she heard him she would run. Until then she was staying where she was.
That proved to be a longer wait than she expected. It must have been two hours he shouted, searching the house and yard. When she finally heard his truck engine, she peered up. Sure enough, he was leaving.
Maybe she would just wait until he'd gone then follow the road. Or not. What if he figured she'd do that? She didn't want to be caught again.
So what the hell did she do?
It came to her as she looked around. When it got light she could see and avoid him if he was waiting. Until then she just had to wait.
She crept back to the house and made her way around it, looking for a good place to hide, a place she could see if he came back. At the back of the house she found an old wooden ladder with several rungs missing. She dragged it over to the edge of house. It took a couple of attempts but she managed to stand it up and then lean it against the roof.
The roof probably was weak, rotten in places, so she tested each step as she climbed toward the ridge. Once at the top she could see out a good distance. There was no sign of the truck, no lights from vehicles. In fact, there were no lights as far as she could see in any direction.
Jolene sat down and then lay back, staring up at the sky. She had to believe that when the sun rose she would find her way somewhere she could get help. She would make it back to Cotton Creek.
She kept telling herself that, over and over as the night stretched on.
Chapter Eleven
The sound of pounding on the front door propelled JD out of his chair. He opened the door to see Cody Sweet standing on the porch with her hands on her hips.
"You left her? You just drove off and left her?"
She was shouting loud enough to be heard clear back to town. "Cody, there's no need – “"You left her? God almighty, JD. You know that woman is bat shit crazy over you and you just left her?"
He reached out to take her arm and pull her inside. "It's not like I left her standing on a back road somewhere. I left her in front of Nellie Mae Baker's house."
"And that worked out so well."
JD knew Cody was upset, and understandably so. She and Jolene had become friends and Cody was ferociously protective of people she cared about. "Look, I would never have left her if I'd thought—"
"Save it." She crossed her arms over her chest. "Look, JD, me and you go way back. I've known you since I had the wherewithal to know anyone and until now I've always thought of you as one hell of a stand-up guy. Honest and dependable and someone who was kind. But the way you've been treating Jo is just wrong."
Understanding Cody's emotional status and allowing her to butt into his private affairs were horses of different colors. "What's between me and Jo isn't your business."
"Well, I'm making it my business and you can wipe that I'm gonna annihilate you look off your face. She's my friend and I know what happened with you two. I know she never got over you leaving her the way you did and that she's still crazy about you. And I've seen the way you look at her. You haven't any more gotten over her than she has you. So why the hell do you treat her like she's the enemy?"
"Again, none of your business, so if you don't mind…" He pulled the door open in invitation for her to leave.
Cody blew out her a breath. "Okay, look, I'm sorry. I get a little wound up when something happens to someone I care about. And it's not just her, JD. You're my friend and I hate like hell seeing the two of you with all that heartbreak and misery, knowing full well that what you both really want is – well you want each other."
"Cody, it's not that simple."
"But it is, JD." She stepped closer and put her hand on his arm. "It doesn't matter what happened back then. Krissie would have killed herself whether you were home or not. She was one messed up woman, JD. She
showed up that way, and close your mouth 'cause I'm not finished and this has been building for three years.
"I'm not speaking ill of the dead, just telling you how it is. There wasn't anyone or anything that was gonna stop that gal from destroying herself. Hell, she put the move on all your brothers, even your dad. She just wanted money and a ticket to somewhere that didn't have cows. And she didn't stop at your family. I don't know how many nights Hannah or me had to drive her back home to keep her from taking off with some roustabout. Anyone who'd buy her liquor she'd take up with.
"She didn't care about you and your boys. Hell, she said as much. She showed up here thinking you were rich and she'd live high on the hog. When it turned out you were regular folks like everyone else it grated on her something fierce. She wanted bright lights, fancy clothes, and parties that went on for days and lord knows that wasn't going to come from you, salt of the earth that you are.
"But my point is, she had no real love for you JD. Hard as it is to say, and hard as it is for you to hear, it's the god's honest truth. That girl was a goner before she ever set foot in Cotton Creek, and if there was any good in her, then you got it in Dawson and Briggs.
"So, as your friend, I'm telling you that it's time to take off that hair shirt and stop blaming yourself. You had no hand in what happened. That was all on her. What you're responsible for is everything that has happened since then, including cutting a woman you're crazy about out of your life and treating her like she's to blame for all your misery.
"I've always known you to be an honest man, so I'm gonna ask you to be honest now. Not with me, but with yourself. Ask yourself – what did Jo ever do but offer you love?"
JD found himself speechless at her diatribe. Surprisingly, he wasn't one bit angry, but he was a whole lot of ashamed. "It's late, Cody and –"
"Yep. I'm going. Just think about what I said, will you?"
"I will."
"Okay I'll leave you in peace." She walked out onto the porch, stopped and looked back at him. "You'll call if you hear anything?""