An Offering of Hope

by Greenwood Muir, Diane

  Polly’s phone rang while she waited at the stop sign to turn south toward Boone.

  "Hey, Andrea, what's up?"

  "How are you?"

  "I'm good. How are things on your side of the street?"

  "Thinking about dinner with the Mikkels'. I know you have a lot going on this weekend with the Renaldis coming into town, but what about next weekend?"

  "I can't say for sure," Polly said. "I'm bringing Lexi home tomorrow." At least she hoped to be bringing Lexi home with her tomorrow. Sal hadn't called yet and Polly had no idea what she was walking into at the hospital. Rebecca was coming. Tab was coming. If Polly had one more issue to deal with, her head was going to explode.

  "You are? That seems fast."

  "I thought so, too. I'll be honest, I'd hoped to have the weekend to get ready for her, but we'll make do."

  "The only reason I brought it up was that Joss called me to schedule something. I kinda thought that we might have the dinner at our house since you have so much going on. That way you wouldn't have to add cooking for a crowd to your life."

  "I always cook for a crowd."

  "There is that."

  "Did you talk to Kirk?"

  "I mentioned that Nate was interested in doing something with Bruce McKenzie. Polly, it was the first time I've seen his eyes light up. Well, other than when he first went out to mess around in Nate's garage. He likes Bruce and he trusts Nate. I guess I wanted Henry to be there because Kirk feels so comfortable with him. If Henry says it's a good idea, Kirk would feel more confident."

  "You're sure about this?"

  "I don't know. He could be terrified tomorrow and reject the whole idea. What do you know of Bruce and Hannah? Would Bruce understand a man who carries that much baggage?"

  "Bruce carries baggage," Polly said. "He's a classmate of mine and we were friends in high school. His father is a hard man and Bruce left Iowa so he didn't have to work with him. Life fell apart and he had to come crawling back. The old man accepted him back, but it's never going to be easy between the two of them."

  "That's good to know. I can assure Kirk that Bruce has had to get through trauma, too."

  "Nothing like what Kirk faced."

  "One of the things we learn is that each person's trauma is their own. We don't compare. There are men and women in Kirk's support groups who have experienced so much more than him. Each person handles their stuff differently and all we can do is take care of each other."

  "That's a little profound."

  Andrea chuckled. "You'd be amazed what comes out when people have to be honest in a group. Let me talk to Joss and see what she has next week."

  "Let me know. We'll try to be there. I'll feed the kids at home so you don't have to put up with that added chaos."

  "I thought I'd feed my crew early, too," Andrea said. "Thanks."

  Polly pulled into the parking lot of the hospital. She looked at the tote bags of clothes in the seat beside her and shrugged. She might as well take them. If something appealed to Lexi, at least she'd have clothing to wear home tomorrow.

  Her stomach fluttered at the thought of having this conversation. The last time she'd invited someone to move in, they'd been much younger and hadn't known independence for years. Shelly Nelson desperately needed support while she learned to live in the real world, away from her captor and the life she'd been caught up in. Lexi had been taking care of herself for the last four years, working and making housing decisions on her own while finishing her degree. With big plans for her future, she wasn't a shrinking violet, no matter what her behavior had been earlier this week.

  As Lexi grew stronger these last two days, she relied less and less on Polly for emotional support. She'd accepted Sal and then Rebecca as people she could confide in. If she wanted to move back to Iowa City and look for a new apartment and enroll in a graduate program, she could do that easily without any help from Polly.

  She huffed, hoping that she wasn't helping Lexi because there was something in it for herself. She didn't want to be the person who took care of others in need because it gave her life meaning. Sure, it was rewarding to see people she loved come into themselves and live their best lives, but if there were some strange underlying ulterior motive, she was going to have to give herself a stern talking-to.

  Polly gathered up the tote bags, pushed ugly thoughts aside, and went into the hospital. She got to Lexi's room and knocked quietly.

  "Come in," Lexi said.

  The girl looked completely different. Her hair was clean and pulled back into a ponytail, and she wore a gorgeous red robe over her hospital night gown. Sal was giving Lexi a manicure at the table.

  "Wow," Polly said. "A manicure. In all the years I've known you, Sal, you've never given me one of those."

  "You never asked," Sal said, looking up with a grin. "I'm almost finished. Show her, Lexi."

  Lexi held up her other hand, bright red polish on her fingers.

  "That came from the Sal Ogden collection, I can tell," Polly said. "How are you?"

  "I feel much better," Lexi said. "They washed my hair and then Sal gave me this beautiful robe. I feel like a human being again."

  Polly set the tote bags down just inside the door. "I hear they're releasing you tomorrow."

  Lexi looked down. "I don't know what I’m going to do."

  Sal nodded. "We talked about this. Polly's house is huge. It's a little loud sometimes, but it can't be any worse than a dormitory. The boys are just younger."

  "Why would you take me in?" she asked, almost too soft for Polly to hear.

  "Because you need a safe place to live. I have that."

  "Done." Sal held Lexi's hand in hers. "Don't touch anything until it dries, and you’ll be good to go." She placed Lexi's hand back on the table, grabbed up her polish, and pushed an emery board to Lexi. "Keep that. I have plenty."

  "Thank you."

  Sal stood and crossed to Polly, gave her a quick hug and said, "I need to be off. More shopping to do, and I want to be home in time to kiss my gorgeous husband. You two talk about what comes next. Remember, Lexi, Polly won't do anything she doesn't want to do. And you aren't a charity case. Remember that." She put her coat on, nodded at the two of them, and before Polly could take her next breath, was out the door.

  "She's something," Lexi said.

  "Always has been."

  "She told me that you wanted me to live with you. You don't have to do that."

  "I know, but I want to. You need a place to stay, don't you?"

  Lexi shrugged. "I could call my friends in Iowa City. They might let me live with them until I figure things out."

  "Is that what you want to do?"

  "I don't know. Everything is happening so fast." She looked at Polly and tears filled her eyes. "When I was stuck in that room all summer, I didn't think I'd get out of there alive. I assumed that once I gave birth, they'd probably kill me, and no one would ever know. I worked on accepting that. We talked about it. I asked Austin once if that's what happened to the other two girls and he never answered me. That's when I knew it had to be true." She sat behind the bedside table and sobbed. When she tried to take a tissue from the box, she stopped herself and shook the fingers with wet fingernail polish. "I can't even cry right."

  Polly took the tissue out and pressed it into Lexi's dry hand, then pushed the table away so she could move in closer. "You're alive and when you're ready to start living again, I'll be here to help you. You can stay with my family as long as you like. If it's a week, fine. If it's five years, fine. We'll figure it out."

  "Sal said that nobody in your family is related to you."

  "Nope. But we're a family, no matter what. We take care of each other and we love each other. There's a whole lot of love and respect in that household."

  "Why would you want me?"

  "Why wouldn't I?"

  "I'm nobody. You don't know me. You don't know my family. You don't know anything about me. I could be a serial killer."

  Polly to
ok in a long, slow breath and tried to hide her smile. "I've known serial killers. You aren't one."

  "You do?"

  "Before I moved to Iowa, I dated a man named Joey. He was a little nuts. Okay, he was a lot nuts. Somehow, years later, he got caught up with a serial killer and came to Iowa to chase me down. They killed women who looked like me. Joey insisted that it was because of this other man, but he planned to kidnap me and make me his wife. I'm pretty sure they’d have killed me in the end."

  "What happened?"

  "Oh, I made their lives miserable once they broke into my house. The sheriff was there in time to haul them away and they are in prison for the rest of their lives."

  "Do you think Austin should go to prison? He tried to help me. I don't know if he hurt those other girls like he did me. I just don't know anything." Lexi frowned at Polly. "Why didn't I fight harder to get out of that house? Sometimes it was like I was outside of my body wondering why I never fought back. Maybe I could have beat Austin up and escaped. We used to whisper about how we could overpower him, but he must have heard us, and he wouldn’t come into the room. There wasn't anything in there except three beds, so we didn’t really have any weapons. We were fat, pregnant girls who had nothing."

  "You may always wonder what you could have done differently," Polly said. "You had no good answer at the time and that's all there was to it."

  "He didn't even let us have extra clothes. Every week he'd bring clean clothes to us and shove them in the slot. That's when we could take a shower. There was always a washcloth and a towel with the clean clothes. We had to shove everything back out when we were done. Every month he'd push through sheets and pillowcases, so we could change our beds. We tried to keep a pillowcase once, just in case he didn't notice. He noticed and told us that if we didn't give it to him, we'd miss breakfast the next morning."

  "Someone like that should go to prison." Polly glanced up at the clock on the wall. "I need to tell you something because Deputy Hudson is coming to ask more questions. Austin was found dead this morning."

  Lexi's eyes grew wide. "He's dead? What about the other two girls?"

  "We don't know anything about them. He was found alone in a hotel room."

  The girl leaned back in the bed. "I hate to admit it, but I feel safer with him gone. I know he tried to help me at the end, but he's the one who …" She shook her head and closed her eyes. "I'm so tired."

  "Did he do something else to you?"

  "No. Nothing bad like rape or molestation. I don't think he was turned on by pregnant girls. At least that's what he said. If we could have gotten him into the room by offering sex, we would have done it. We even talked about it."

  "You haven't told me the last names of the other two girls."

  Lexi blinked. "I didn't? That's weird. I wonder why not. We promised that if we ever escaped, we'd try to get help for anyone who was left." She sighed. "That's why I worry that he killed them."

  "What were their names?"

  "Misty Lonergan was the first girl that left. She was from Red Oak, Iowa, but she was working at a hotel in Iowa City. A lady came up to her in church and they got to talking and Misty said that she didn't know if she wanted to keep her baby, but what else was she going to do."

  "Had that lady been at church before?"

  "A couple of weeks. Misty said she shouldn't have been so stupid, but the lady was really friendly and before she knew it, she was pouring out her heart and soul. When we compared stories, it was Mrs. Morten, but Misty knew her as Mrs. Tickner.

  "The second girl?" Polly asked.

  "She was from somewhere in Minnesota. Near Rochester. She'd been at the house longer than Misty, even though she gave birth after. She got pregnant and panicked the night she found out, so she went looking online for a place to adopt her baby out and maybe make some money. She called the number and they sent her two hundred dollars on Venmo so she could take a bus to Des Moines. Then that same couple met her there and she ended up in hell."

  "What was her name?"

  "Oh, yeah. Brady Visser. She was so sweet, but she cried all the time. She blamed herself because she didn't want to keep the baby."

  Polly wished she had pencil and paper to get this all down for Tab, but it wouldn't hurt for Lexi to repeat herself. Tab would ask more questions and dig for more information about the girls.

  "I don't know very much about the two girls that came in at the end. They were totally freaked out and it was awful to listen to them crying. They wouldn't talk to me, and besides, I didn't feel very good. I should have cared more about them, but I was just trying to deal with the idea that I was about to die. All I could hope was that my baby would have a good life with nice people. I hope Austin didn't hurt the baby when he ripped it out of me." She looked at Polly with sad eyes. "I wish I knew whether it was a girl or a boy."

  "I'm sorry, honey."

  "Will you really let me stay with you for a while? I like Rebecca."

  "Yes, Lexi. You are invited to stay at our house. If you like Rebecca, you'll get a kick out of the rest of the family. The four little boys are full of energy. Elijah is my musician. He's amazing. Noah is his older brother and he loves to read and to play with the horses. Then there are Caleb and JaRon. Caleb is working so hard to grow up. He helps his little sister, Cassidy, and he adores Heath, who is in college. JaRon is a little ball of love. He's so stinking sweet. Cassidy came to us last year and refused to speak out loud for months. It's been a long road for her, but she's in kindergarten now and doing really well."

  Polly chuckled. "Oh, and part of that is because of this wonderful older woman who comes over to spend time with her. Agnes Hill. One day, Cassidy and I were in the car and Cassidy shouted until I turned around. We found Agnes toppled over in a cluster of bushes that wouldn't let her go. From that moment on, she and Cassidy were best friends. The woman is a hoot. She says exactly what she's thinking to every adult, but with the kids, she is love personified. She's at the house quite often, mostly to help me with Cassidy."

  "She sounds interesting."

  "That's the polite thing to call it. I never know what's going to come out of her mouth. We have friends coming to Bellingwood tomorrow and they'll be with us a lot this weekend. In fact, this weekend is crazy busy. Cat is having a baby shower on Saturday." Polly stole a peek at Lexi to see if that would affect her. The girl didn't flinch. "And Sunday afternoon we're having an open house at a bed and breakfast we built this last year."

  "You built a bed and breakfast?"

  "Kinda. It's a community thing. My husband, Henry, is a contractor."

  "I don't want to be in the way."

  "You won't be. You can choose to participate in anything or nothing. If you want to hide in your room, that's fine. If you want to hide in the family room, I can't guarantee privacy from the boys, but you'll be safe."

  "My room?"

  Polly smiled. "It's going to be a wild and crazy room until you decide exactly what you want to do with it. I have a friend who's an artist and she brought me wild red rugs and blankets and an adorable bedside table. Rebecca will set it up and then we'll change whatever you like to make it comfortable."

  "I love red."

  "Then we're all set. Tell me about things that you owned before you ended up in Ankeny. Do you have them in storage somewhere?"

  "Oh shit." Lexi clapped her hand over her mouth. "Sorry. I forgot all about that stuff. I have boxes of books and mementos. Just knick-knacks. And I have a desk and an office chair. There are pictures. You know, stuff."

  "Are your things somewhere that we can get to them?"

  "I'd have to call Meg. I don't have her number. It was in my phone and that's long gone."

  "Does Meg have your things?"

  "I stored it in her boyfriend's garage. Since I didn't go back this fall, I don't know what they did. She has to be wondering where I am."

  "I'm glad to hear that your things are with friends."

  Lexi shrugged. "It's not much. There are winter
clothes in the boxes. Am I going to have to leave here with this robe on?"

  "That's up to you." Polly walked over and picked up the totes. "I have a friend who is almost exactly the same size as you. These are her maternity and post-maternity clothes. We thought maybe you could find a few things to wear until you can either get to your own clothes or buy new things."

  "I was saving money, but that was supposed to go toward rent when I started grad school. I don't have my debit card either."

  "All of that can be worked out," Polly said. She was glad that Lexi had a little money of her own.

  "Knock, knock," Rebecca said at the door. "Deputy Hudson is coming down the hall. Do you know about that?"

  Polly smiled and nodded. "Yes. How was your day?"

  "You know. School stuff. Oh, Lexi, I love your robe and your fingernails! You look great. Is that from Sal?"

  Lexi grinned, caught up in Rebecca's enthusiasm. "This is so nice, isn't it?"

  "And clothes?" Rebecca turned to Polly. "Where did these come from?"

  "Jessie."

  Rebecca nodded. "She's totally your size, Lexi. That's a great idea. So, did Polly talk to you about living with us?"

  "Yes. I’m having a hard time believing it."

  "Believe it. It's a Polly thing. She's always got extra room in the house. Sometimes we don't know where it comes from, but when she needs it, it's there. I'm excited that you want to live with us. You have no idea how great Polly and Henry are."

  The door pushed open again and Tab walked in.

  "She looks like a new person, doesn't she, Deputy?" Rebecca asked.

  "You really do, Lexi. Are you feeling better?"

  "Yes, ma'am."

  Tab chuckled. "You don't have to ma'am me. I can't be that much older than you. Did Polly tell you what happened this morning?"

  "I did," Polly said as Lexi nodded.

  "What happened?" Rebecca asked.

  "Why don't you and I step outside and I'll explain while Deputy Hudson talks to Lexi."

  Rebecca looked back and forth between Tab and Polly, then nodded. "We're right outside, Lexi. I'll be back and we can look through those clothes. Something in there will be perfect for you."