“You know they’ll likely change the drop location, Sarah Booth, and I will call. But whatever happens, do not tell Coleman.”
“I haven’t, but I still think we should.”
“I only want Eve back safely.”
“Cece, I think this has something to do with Eve’s brother. If Tinkie and I are right in our supposition that the brother has kidnapped Eve, it might not be about money but about revenge. He wasn’t wanted. She was. He could be very angry, and not completely rational.” I didn’t want to scare her but we had to face the truth. “We need to be prepared for that, Cece. We need someone who will take action if necessary. What if this young man is not right mentally? We need Coleman on the scene.”
“Are you asking if I can shoot my kin?” she asked.
“I guess I am.”
“To save Eve, yes. I can do whatever I need to.”
“This is Eve’s brother, which makes him your cousin, too. Eve may never forgive you. You may not be able to forgive yourself.”
“Yet Eve will be alive. Isn’t that what’s important?” Cece had gone from sad to defiant.
“Yes, that’s the bottom line. But I’d like to achieve that with a minimum of collateral damage if we can.”
“I’ll text you when I know more.”
There was one more possibility I had to bring up. “Cece, what if Eve is working with these people? Are you willing to confront that if it’s necessary?”
“I’ll do whatever I have to. If Eve is trying to squeeze money out of me, she’ll be sorry. I’d give her the shirt off my back, but I won’t be played. Not even by someone I love.”
Cece meant it, too. She’d fought too long and too hard to be who she was to take crap off a blackmailer.
“Okay. Text me as soon as you hear. I’ll be in Fortis Landing trying to get the Bromleys to tell me their role in this.”
“Good luck with that,” Cece said.
“Okay.”
“And thank you, Sarah Booth. Thank you for everything.”
* * *
I drove along the narrow highway watching the last light fade from the sky. It was an early dusk because the night was overcast. The huge, heavy clouds collided on the horizon, making me think of the weatherman’s hopeful forecast of snow. It wasn’t impossible, but snow in December surely wasn’t an ordinary event. The winter was a time for cold, clear nights. Normally, no place I’d ever been had a winter night’s view like the Mississippi Delta, with the stars unobscured by any lights. This night, though, had a sense of foreboding. The weather played a role in my mood, but there was more to it. I’d partially figured out what was going on, but I didn’t have the most important answers. Where was Eve? Had she had her baby? Was she okay?
I pulled into the back of the parking lot at Bullwinkle’s. A thicket of sweet olive offered a perfect hiding place. Leaving the car there would mean a trek through the wooded area, but it would also give me the advantage of approaching the cabin from an unexpected direction. I’d have time to surveil the area thoroughly. While I expected to find the Bromleys or Mariam and force them to talk, in my heart of hearts I hoped for even more. My gut told me that Eve played a big role in everything that was happening. Possibly a willing role. If I was lucky, I’d find Eve inside.
The rowdy lyrics of “You Don’t Have to Call Me Darlin’” came through the night, along with the stomping of cowboy boots and cat whistles. It was Christmas Eve at Bullwinkle’s and folks were partying down.
Christmas Eve had always been a family time in my home. My years in New York, I’d gone to parties and theater gatherings, but it had never really felt like Christmas Eve. Now, all I wanted was to watch the Christmas pageant at the church and then go home with Coleman. Or barring that, I hoped by midnight I would be at the Sunflower County Hospital with Eve and that she would be giving birth to a happy baby.
Using my phone as an occasional light, I stepped into the darkness of the woods. I had to get back to the Bromley cabin. My best bet would be if I found Mariam alone so I could talk to her. She knew more than she’d let on, and I believed I could persuade her to talk. I believed she held the key to Eve’s location. The ugly baby doll was proof. I felt sorry for her, but I also needed to resolve the matter of Eve’s safety. I was on a mission.
A stick cracked to my right and I stopped, holding myself completely still. The woods were silent except for the scurrying of small animals looking for a warm nest. As aggravating as Jitty could be, I’d welcome her company at this moment. Another limb cracked as some creature moved a little closer to me.
The music in the bar, now a faraway echo, shifted to a Christmas carol. “Oh, holy night, the stars are brightly shining. It is the night of our dear Savior’s birth.” I listened to the lyrics that the choir at the church would soon be singing for the Christmas pageant—that I was going to miss. There was no help for it, though. Coleman and I would, hopefully, have many Christmases in the future to share.
Moving with great care, I left the music behind and edged in the direction of the Bromley’s cabin. I wanted to come up on it from behind. As I crept forward, I tried to think of all the possibilities I might confront. I had to be mentally prepared. What if I saw Eve? What if she was truly being held captive? If she was in danger, could I shoot someone? More troubling were other questions. What if she wasn’t in danger and was playing my friend? What would I do?
The blow came out of nowhere and landed on the side of my head. I dropped to one knee, struggling to remain upright. For some reason it was very important that I didn’t fall over. I had to see who’d hit me.
“Girl, you should have minded your own business.”
I recognized the voice. It was Curtis Bromley. I staggered to my feet and caught my balance against a tree.
“This would have all been over by morning, but you just couldn’t stay out of it. Now you’ve forced me to do something I sure didn’t want to do.”
“Where is Eve?” I demanded.
“You’re going to get that girl killed,” Curtis said as he grabbed my arm when I started to teeter over. He frisked me and took my gun. “Now come with me and don’t make any noise. If they know you’re poking around here, I don’t know what they’ll do.”
I couldn’t follow exactly what he was saying. It didn’t make sense. He was the one who’d struck me, but he was acting like he was protecting Eve. “Where is she?”
“She’s in labor. That’s a kink in our plan,” Curtis said, and he was clearly worried. “Now you have to be quiet. I’m serious. You’ll get her killed along with the rest of us. Matilda told me I should have tied you up this afternoon when you were at the house and poking around my shed, but I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to do any of this.”
“Take me to Eve.” My dizziness was clearing.
“Not happening. You’re going to stay right here, trussed up like Tom Turkey, until this is done and the money has changed hands. Once that’s finished, I’ll come let you go. You just keep in mind that if they have a clue you’re on to them, they’ll kill you and maybe Eve, too.”
“They, who is they? Her brother?”
He snorted. “Mitch wouldn’t harm a fly.”
“But he kidnapped Eve.” Curtis helped me to sit at the base of a tree, which was a relief because my head was still spinning a little and my legs were tired.
“Mitch did no such thing. He would never harm Eve. That boy was so excited when he found out he had a sister. The chance that Eve might help him—that was more than he’d ever expected. You should know he’s worried sick about her baby. If Eve’s baby has the same medical problem that his son has, it’s going to be bad if she delivers out here without medical attention. He tried to talk her out of this crazy scheme, but she wouldn’t listen to reason. She and Dara. They said it was the only way.”
I was completely lost. “What medical problem?”
“Something about how the blood doesn’t clot properly and the liver isn’t cleaning it. It’s a genetic thing. That
’s why Mitch was so desperate to get to Eve. He meant to help her, and then it turned into another whole thing.”
“You said it’s genetic?” My brain fog was clearing up quickly, and I remembered the blood all over the kitchen of the little cottage. “We have to get Eve to a hospital if she’s in labor.”
“You think I don’t know that? And you’ve just killed any chance of doing that. Now you stay here.” He grabbed my hands and tied them behind the tree. “I’ll let you go as soon as we have the money and Eve is free. I won’t be gone long but I can’t have you meddling. I’ll be back as soon as I can. It’s cold, I know, but not cold enough to harm you.”
“What is Eve to you?” I asked him.
“Doesn’t matter. All that matters is that we get through this night and get her to the hospital.”
He sighed as he pulled duct tape from his pants pocket. “Good thing I always travel prepared.” In another few seconds, he had me properly gagged.
18
I was in a fine pickle, stuck out in the woods, unable to move or even call out for help. Curtis Bromley hadn’t bothered to take my phone, but tucked in my pocket, it was useless to me. What a miscalculation that I’d left the critters at home with Jitty. Help wasn’t coming from that quarter. I hadn’t told Tinkie where I was going because I knew she’d be mad and try to blow off her work with the costumes. I’d hidden my car so well, no one would notice it until the morning. I’d managed to put myself in a bad situation without any hope of rescue.
When I thought it couldn’t get any worse, it started to snow. Big, fat, wet white flakes of Christmas magic that began to melt on my legs and face. Soon I would be nothing but a mound of slushy snow.
How many Christmas Eves had I wished and wished for snow? I’d seen a few winter wonderlands in New York City—and felt like I’d been brushed by a miracle. A white Christmas was the picture postcard of all holidays. I was about to get one, too. Only I was sitting on the damp ground, tied to a tree. My hands were already freezing. I’d read horror stories of people left out in the snow who had to have their fingers, toes, and noses removed due to frostbite. Crapola! That would not be a good look to sport on Christmas day.
As I started to shake violently from the cold, I tried to entertain myself with pleasant memories or foolishness. I began to make a list of foods I would never eat again if I got free of my situation. No more Cheetos or cheesecake no matter how bad the craving. No more sucking chocolate syrup out of the squeeze container in the refrigerator. I would toss out the frozen pumpkin custard muffins I’d been hoarding for an emergency. There were so many little things I’d always meant to get around to doing. Like maybe my taxes before the very last minute. At least I wouldn’t have to deal with those if I froze to death.
From out of nowhere came the beautiful music of “The Waltz of the Snowflakes.” It seemed to well up from the very ground I sat on. Of course I knew I was freezing to death. Auditory hallucination. Any minute, Jitty would appear and I’d know my end was imminent.
Just as I feared, a troupe of snowflakes from The Nutcracker danced onto the scene. I’d seen productions of the ballet, but I’d never imagined I’d see the waltz of the snowflakes while it was actually snowing. The magnificent dancers in their white tulle skirts frosted with silver glitter twirled and danced through the increasing snowfall. It was a beautiful vision to die with.
“Sarah Booth Delaney! Don’t you dare quit!”
My eyelids weighed a hundred pounds, but I forced them up to confront a lovely mocha snowflake. While all the others looked to have been poured from milk with uniform blond hair, this snowflake, my Jitty, reminded me of hot coffee with a dollop of cream and glossy black hair. The other snowflakes were serene and ethereal. My Jitty was red hot with anger.
“Wake up, Sarah Booth. Don’t make me do something you’ll regret.” She glared at me as the other dancers moved around us, leaping and whirling like an actual snowstorm.
“I’m tired, Jitty.”
“And cold, no doubt.”
“Not so cold.” I smiled. “No, I’m not cold any longer.”
“That is not a good sign,” Jitty said, more agitated than ever. “If you go to sleep, you won’t wake up in this world ever again.”
The siren song of paradise called to me. “Will I be with my parents?”
“What about Coleman?” Jitty asked. She was the very devil.
“Coleman?” If I died, Coleman would never forgive himself. Nor would my friends.
“What about Dahlia House?” Jitty asked. “You’re so busy regretting dietary choices, you never thought to regret that you didn’t make a will. You got no heirs, ’cept for me, and no one is going to believe I should inherit Dahlia House. I’ll be homeless and that will be your fault, too.”
Damn. Jitty was going to blame me for everything. Any minute now I’d be responsible for world hunger and Twitter.
“Cut me some slack. I’m tied to a tree. I can’t be responsible if I freeze to death. It’s not like I sat down and quit.” Amazingly I could talk clearly around the duct tape that clamped my mouth shut.
“What are you doing to free yourself?”
“What can I do? I’m not magic. I don’t have a fairy godmother to call on. I don’t have a grandmother or a mother. Or even Aunt Loulane.”
“Sarah Booth!” My mother’s voice came to me and she walked through the dancers to come to my side. She wore a favorite golden brown sweater exactly the shade of her hair, and her red lips were in a straight, thin line. “Get up right this instant.”
“I’m tied to a tree.” Did the dead have some serious issue with seeing the obvious?
“And what are you doing to remedy that?” My mother knelt down so that I could more easily see her face. Snowflakes clung to her long curls. Her gray-green eyes stared into mine, infusing my body with a kind of heat that started from my solar plexus.
“Where’s Daddy?” I tried to look behind her, but the world was luminous. I couldn’t see what was in the glow.
“I’m here, Sarah Booth.” And he was. Right at my mother’s shoulder. He put a hand on her and I realized they were both dressed for a party. She was wearing a beautiful green cocktail dress with the bodice trimmed in glittering lights. Battery operated—never. Mama had tapped into some angelic power source. My dad looked handsome in a tux with a dusting of snowflakes on his shoulders and in his hair. All around me the ground had turned white. For the first time in—ever—the weatherman had been right about snow. It was really coming down now. More than two inches had accumulated. Too bad I hadn’t pranced into the woods after the snowfall. At least then I would have left tracks. Now the ground stretched white, pure, and untouched.
“Sarah Booth!” My father cupped my face in his hand. “Wake up! Now!”
I shook myself awake and drank in the sight of them in their party finery. I had a party to go to tomorrow. After celebrating with Coleman tonight. “I love that dress, Mom. Where are you guys going?”
“There’s a gathering in the Great Beyond we need to attend. And you have a Christmas pageant, which is already going strong. Mrs. Hedgepeth is not exactly who I would have cast as Mary, but she does quite a bit of tithing.”
“You mean those parts were for sale?” I was outrageously outraged. “How is that right?”
“Much in life isn’t fair. Like the fact you’re tied to a tree for the first Mississippi Delta snowfall of your adult life. But it’s almost over. Sarah Booth, hang on. Just for a little while longer. You can do it.”
I sighed softly. “No, I don’t think I can.” Maybe I didn’t want to. If I could be with them …
“It doesn’t work that way,” Daddy said. “You can’t quit and expect to reap the rewards of hard effort. I taught you better.”
He was always the one who dictated the more difficult path. The easy path was not for a Delaney. “I just want to sleep.”
“You can sleep in the grave.” Jitty was back. “Now perk up and tell your Mama and Daddy how much yo
u love them. They can’t stay much longer. There are rules in the Great Beyond, as you well know.”
The glow behind my parents had become fiercer, and all of the dancing snowflakes settled into a tableau. “Sarah Booth, you have to fight.”
It was my mother’s voice, but it was also Jitty.
“Free yourself.”
I wanted to complain and point out that if it was so easy, I would have been freed a long time ago. But I tugged at my bonds again and rubbed against the bark of the tree. The wet snow had given the rope a little bit of stretch, and I frantically began to tug.
“That’s it.” My parents approved of my actions. “You can do it.”
“Mama, Daddy, did you think I was stupid to go to New York and try to be an actress?” It was a question I needed an answer to.
“Stupid, never.” My mom touched the top of my head and it felt like the brush of an angel’s wing.
“We think it was very brave, Sarah Booth. You went looking for happiness, and you were willing to take risks. You didn’t find what you sought in New York, but at least you looked.”
“Is Coleman what I seek?” If only I had their reassurance, it would allow me to leap past all of my doubts and insecurities.
“You know the answer in your heart. Never turn your back on a miracle. That’s all we can tell you.”
They started to fade, and the illumination went with them, along with the snowflake dancers and Jitty. I was alone in the woods, and I’d been there for a long time. But I was awake and fighting now. Fighting for my life and my dream. I felt the rope that tied my hands slip a little. I dug down into the snow and wet my hands and the rope again, using the wet slickness to my advantage. Real concern compelled me to act quickly. Curtis Bromley wasn’t a killer. He hadn’t intended to leave me tied to a tree in the snow. Heck, he’d never anticipated the snow. No one could have, not really. He said he’d come back, and I believed that was his intention. Something unexpected had happened, and that didn’t bode well for Eve Falcon or her baby.
A Gift of Bones--A Sarah Booth Delaney Mystery Page 18