House Without Lies (Lily’s House Book 1)

by Rachel Branton

  That was only the beginning. There were hundreds of comments.

  Tessa made a sound in her throat. “I can’t believe it!”

  “It’s all true,” Halla said in a small voice.

  “Oh, honey, I know that.” Tessa hugged her. “I just meant all those people posting for you. The police will have to look into it now.”

  “Maybe.” Halla didn’t look convinced.

  “They posted them on his blog first, but he started moderating comments,” Saffron said through the speakerphone. “I think the pastor might have started the Go Fund Me account, and maybe he’s not online yet to delete them there. But even when he does, they’ve commented on all the Facebook posts as well, and Halla’s dad can’t delete comments on other people’s pages, so it’s going viral. They’ve also emailed Go Fund Me directly, asking for the payments to be halted. I’ve made screen shots of everything. We’re all posting them.”

  I looked at Tessa. “What do you think?”

  “I think it’s a great way to catch a rat.”

  “He’s not going to be happy,” Halla said, her voice trembling. “He’ll do something.”

  “But not to you,” I said. “He doesn’t know where you are. By the time he does, we’ll get my friend at DCS to stop him.”

  “No. Not yet. Please?” Halla looked frightened.

  But I knew I had to act—and soon. Jameson had been right all along about getting legitimate. I needed the support, and these girls needed to live without fear. Besides, I felt I now had enough proof and support to free Halla from her father forever.

  Even so, I nodded. She didn’t need to know what I was going to do. I could spare her the knowledge as I had Ruth until I could work it out. Sometimes being the adult meant doing what was right, especially when it was difficult.

  Jameson and I met Bea at the nearly deserted DCS offices on Sunday after church. She was wearing jeans instead of the suit attire she normally used when popping in at Teen Remake. Elsie was holding so tightly to my hand that I’d lost all feeling in my fingers, but I didn’t let her go.

  I turned her toward me and bent over slightly to look into her eyes. “We’re never going to stop fighting. Got that? I don’t know what’s going to happen, but you hold onto those words. I’m going to fight for you, no matter how long it takes.”

  Jameson stared down at us, moisture glittering in his eyes. “That’s right. Me too. And if we have to, we’ll run away to another country.”

  My jaw dropped. This from my toe-the-line, letter-of-the-law, trust-the-system boyfriend? If I’d still had any reservations about him, they were gone now. I loved him for that comment.

  Really loved him.

  For a moment, I didn’t know what to do with the knowledge. It was wonderful and exciting and mind-shattering all at once, yet it vied with the devastation I felt over having failed Elsie. There should be fireworks and rockets and celebration. We should be in each other’s arms.

  But we were exactly where we wanted to be: helping Elsie. Together.

  He took Elsie’s other hand and tapped on the door.

  Bea was waiting for us, her desk here utterly clean except for three neat piles of paper.

  Jameson placed a folder we’d made on top of one of her piles. It contained blown-up copies of the photographs I’d taken the day I’d found Elsie. My notarized statement was accompanied by one from Payden, Zoey, Bianca, Saffron, and Ruth. Halla had been upset that we hadn’t let her make one, but if things didn’t go well when we told Bea about her situation, we planned to keep her whereabouts a secret.

  Elsie was trembling and crying now, so I pulled her onto my lap as we sat, though she was really too big for that.

  Bea’s eyes were sad as she regarded Elsie. “First off, I’m here unofficially. I can’t take Elsie today, or anything like that. Just so you know.” Elsie’s body slumped against me in relief.

  “Elsie,” Bea continued, “the reason you’re here is that I wanted to ask you about your mom. I’ve done some research, but I haven’t been able to locate her. Do you know where your mother is? Because if we knew, we could get her statement and that would really help us.”

  Elsie whispered something, and I had to lean down to catch it. “She says her mother left two years ago.”

  “She left? Are you sure?” Bea looked at us significantly. Did she suspect that something else had happened to Elsie’s mother?

  “She sent me a birthday card.” Elsie looked up to say.

  “Are you sure it was from her?”

  Elsie nodded and pulled off her backpack. Her hand disappeared inside and out came a ragged envelope I’d never seen before. From it, she removed a card with a bluebird flying near a tree. Inside it read: Happy birthday, darling. I will always love you.

  I didn’t know how that was true, if she’d left Elsie with a man who physically abused her, but the tender way Elsie held the card told me she believed.

  “May I see that?” Bea examined the envelope, but I’d already seen that there was no return address. She gave it back.

  As Elsie put it away, she said, “She left because he was going to kill her.” She looked at me, and I could see the unasked question there: Why didn’t she take me?

  I had no answer.

  Bea asked what seemed like a million questions, and to my surprise, Elsie answered them. She told us her father hadn’t started hitting her until a few months after her mother left. Before, he’d scream and yell, but it had been her mother who’d taken the brunt of the abuse. Finally, Bea got to the question I’d wanted to ask Elsie for a long time.

  “Has your father ever touched you in your private places, somewhere that makes you feel uncomfortable?”

  Elsie glanced at me, her face even more frightened. “Go ahead, answer her. It’s important.” I’d suspected since she arrived that Elsie feared her father or someone sexually, because every time anyone mentioned how pretty she looked, she curled in on herself and a darkness would pass over her face.

  “He never touched me, but . . .” She swallowed hard. “I think he watched me when I was in the bathroom. I don’t know how. He says things that he couldn’t know, and he touches my hair. Or sometimes, he’ll rub his hand over my back.” She looked at me helplessly. “I don’t know how to explain, but it’s not like when you or Jameson touch me. It’s . . . creepy.”

  I knew exactly what she meant because I’d dated guys like that. It was in their eyes, the comments they made: lust, intent, darkness.

  My gaze flew to Bea’s, and I saw my worry reflected there. She asked a few more questions without learning additional information, and then asked Jameson to take Elsie out to the hallway.

  When they were gone, she said, “I’m not going to pretend this isn’t difficult. Mr. Reynolds contacted our office as well as the local police when he tracked Elsie here, and someone in my office searched our records for any trace of her. Sometimes we get kids who won’t tell us their names, or who don’t know their names, and they were all examined carefully. Reynolds is playing the bereaved parent, and as far as I can tell, everyone believes him. In fact, the social worker I talked to was completely charmed by the man. I’m really worried.”

  “What about the abuse?”

  “Oh, my gut tells me it occurred. What’s more, I think there’s a likelihood he will sexually abuse her in the future. However”—she opened the file we’d brought and took out one of my pictures—“this is the only thing we have to substantiate Elsie’s claims. And we have no proof that he was the one who did this to her.”

  “What about Elsie’s testimony?”

  “Kids lie about their parents all the time. They lie so much they often start to believe the lies.” She held up a hand to prevent my objections. “Yes, the pictures prove she’s not lying, but at this point, he could contest that it happened after she left his home.”

  “What about his delay in trying to find her? She’s been with me seven and a half weeks now, and she ran away from home at least a week before that. Ye
t he sent out flyers only three weeks ago, and he told me personally that she’d been gone only two weeks.”

  “It just boils down to his word against yours. He’ll say he was looking, just not in Phoenix. The photos do at least give our agency enough evidence to conduct oversight, and I’ll put in an emergency request for an inquiry, but I’m not going to lie to you—I think he’ll get her back. Afterward, there’ll be a home visit or two, some interviews. Or there will be as long as he doesn’t move and drop off our radar. He might be kind to her for a while, but even if he is physically abusive, she probably won’t tell on him for fear it will make things worse because she’s already been sent back once.”

  “I can’t let her go back to him.”

  Her voice took on a weariness I had never associated with her. “I know you want to stop this, but if you run with her, you’ll be liable for kidnapping, and you’ll lose your other foster children.”

  I shut my eyes to hold back the stinging tears. “Isn’t there anything we can do?”

  Bea nodded. “We find the mother. Assuming she really did leave on her own.”

  And that he didn’t kill her.

  “Her maiden name is Michelle Luce.” Bea pushed a sheet across the desk. “You didn’t get this from me, but it contains all the information I’ve been able to gather since last night on the mother’s family, including what we have from our contact in the police department. There have been no hits on the mother for two years. Absolutely nothing.”

  “So she might very well be dead.”

  Bea inclined her head. “Or in hiding. Her family might be able to give us a clue which.”

  “What about before the two years? Is there anything else that might help us? Didn’t anyone notice Michelle was being abused by her husband?”

  “There are several doctor reports over a ten-year period about suspicious broken bones, but nothing was ever proven, and Michelle never verified anything herself. That’s all. But abusers learn how to do the most damage without calling attention.” Bea’s fingers tapped on the desk, as though releasing pent-up energy. “I’m afraid the family is our only lead. Michelle’s parents are dead, but she has a sister, an aunt, and five cousins. Like Elsie’s father, they’re from Tempe, but they’ve spread out some. Only one of the cousins is out of state. I’ll send someone out myself to chat with those who live here, of course, but without proof that Reynolds has done something wrong, he’s going to look a lot like a victim himself. You know, wife leaves him with a child and runs off with a lover or something.”

  “In other words, you think we have more vested in finding her than they would.”

  “Exactly. And maybe you can get something more out of Elsie that will help.”

  “So if we find her mother—”

  “And if she agrees to make a complaint against her husband,” Bea interjected, “then we can put in place a temporary order to keep her in a foster home or with her mother.”

  “With her mother?” That made me angry. “You mean the woman who abandoned her?”

  Bea smiled and interlaced her fingers on the desk. “Lily, when you’ve been at this as long as I have, you will learn there are many reasons mothers leave, but some of them actually end up making good parents once they straighten out whatever caused them to break down. As much as I can see you’re bonding with Elsie, the best thing for her, if her mother is healthy and ready to take on a child, is to be with her mother. But keep in mind it’s not a competition. There’s room for everyone in Elsie’s life. Don’t judge Elsie’s mother for doing this. Not until you know everything.”

  I nodded, because Bea did have more experience, and I hadn’t mistaken that look of longing in Elsie’s eyes. I felt like weeping, but I managed to choke out. “Okay.”

  Silence fell, and I took that as my cue to get to my feet, but as I did, Bea spoke again. “I did go to see Ruth’s mother this morning, with the social worker who was originally assigned to them. My colleague wasn’t exactly excited about working on the weekend, but I find that Sunday mornings tell me a lot about a family.”

  Reaching out to steady myself on the desk, I held my breath against the possibility of bad news. “And?”

  “And I can tell you that after what we heard from them both, Ruth is never going back there. Unless she wants to, of course.”

  The tears I’d held in check spilled over. I’d embrace any good news at this point. “Thank you. I don’t know what you did. Wanda seemed so determined.”

  “She’s more determined to stay out of jail. We’ll talk more next week, but you’re pushing things at your current apartment, if you want to keep Ruth with you. I could send her somewhere else—”

  “No! Please. I’ll figure it out.”

  Bea shook her head, looking up at me. “You know, if you can get through all this, you are either going to be the best single foster parent I’ve ever known, or the biggest pain in the butt. I’m hoping for the former. Don’t disappoint me.”

  I nodded, clutching the paper she’d given me like a lifeline.

  “Well,” she said when I didn’t leave. “Is there something else?”

  This was the third time she’d asked me that question, and this time I was going to tell her the truth. “There is one more thing.”

  She sighed and indicated the chair. “What’s her name?”

  I sat down again. “Halla.”

  When I’d told her everything, she tried to look at the Go Fund Me, but the page had vanished. “We have screenshots,” I told her, “but it’s also all over Facebook, and Jameson—Mario, I mean—contacted the neighbor himself. He can give you the information.”

  “Have him email it to me. If this evidence is true, there’s a good likelihood we can get the father to back off completely.” She arched a brow. “Now are we done?”

  Saffron would be eighteen in a month, and we’d already decided there was no way she wanted to be tossed into the Social Services do-good machine. “Yeah, we’re done.”

  “I’ll get to work on all this, then. Let me know if you find out anything about Elsie’s mother.”

  I slowly walked toward the door, where I stopped and turned around. “What happens to kids like Elsie when they’re sent back? In the long run, I mean?”

  Bea’s mouth became a tight line, and then she said, “Depends on how bad it is. Mostly, they endure until they’re old enough to leave. If it’s really bad, they run again, which at Elsie’s age opens her up to a lot of other dangers. Sometimes they die from abuse.”

  Not very comforting.

  In the hallway, Elsie and Jameson were playing something on his phone. Her face was somber, but she was intent on the game, and I motioned for Jameson to join me. As we walked some distance away, I told him what Bea had said about finding Elsie’s mother.

  We glanced down the hall to see her watching us, her entire body tense. Did she think we were talking about turning her over?

  “Let’s get her out to the car and see if she knows anything,” Jameson said. “We can go visit the most likely relatives today. Maybe call the others.” His hand slid up my arm, leaving a trail of warmth.

  “Thank you. But you don’t have to . . . this isn’t really your . . . I . . .” I no longer knew what I was trying to say, and each time I began it sounded like I didn’t want him with me.

  “We’re in this together. You should know that by now.” His voice chided me gently, but his eyes emitted that same warmth as his hand, sending much-needed heat into my numb heart.

  “I can’t fail her.”

  “We’ll do everything we can.”

  In the car, we told Elsie everything Bea had said. I didn’t want to hide any of the facts; she was twelve, not a baby. Old enough to have run away.

  “I don’t know where my mom went,” she said. Tears leaked from her eyes.

  “Were she and her sister close?” Jameson asked.

  Elsie shrugged. “They talked on the phone sometimes.”

  “Did anyone come over?”

&nbs
p; “Yeah, Felicia. She’s my mom’s cousin, I think. They used to laugh a lot.” A fleeting smile slid across her face. “She was over a lot when I was little. But she didn’t like my dad. They had a huge fight, and then she didn’t come anymore. Mom was weird after that. She slept a lot. Sometimes she went to a doctor.” Pain filled the last words.

  I put my arm around her. “Okay, we’ll go talk to her. But first we’ll drive you back to Tessa’s.”

  “But what if my mom’s with Felicia?”

  That was exactly what I was afraid of: finding the woman enjoying a wonderful life while her child suffered under the abusive hand of her estranged husband. “She’s probably not,” I said. “We’re just going to see if they know anything. We’ll tell you what we learn.”

  “Promise?”

  I nodded. I might soften the truth, but I wouldn’t hide it from her.

  When we arrived at Tessa’s, Elsie turned to me. “Why didn’t my mom take me with her?” A gaping chasm of hurt filled those few words.

  Bea’s admonition not to judge rang in my head. “I don’t know. Maybe she didn’t have any choice.”

  15

  Felicia Grange lived in Surprise, off Greasewood Street. We decided not to call her but to show up unannounced, hoping we’d learn more.

  “We’ll surprise her in Surprise.” Jameson’s joke was lame, but I smiled anyway to show I appreciated the effort. “I’ve been looking at some apartments here for you,” he added. “Haven’t found much of anything.”

  “Bit of a commute to Teen Remake.” Forty minutes about—forty long minutes that had me wondering if I’d done the right thing leaving Elsie with Tessa. What if the police came for her while we were gone? Nothing I could do about that now.

  Felicia Grange lived in a tan and red two-story apartment in the middle of similar dwellings. The place looked much better than where I lived now but was still compact, perhaps designed for couples with young children or empty nesters who didn’t want the burden of a yard.