by Nora Roberts
“They saw you come,” she told Zane as tears dripped again. “But he didn’t get too mad because I made you go pretty quick. He only slapped me a couple times for that.”
“I’m so sorry, Traci. I’m sorry for that. We’re going to help you. We’re going to make sure he doesn’t hurt you again, but there are a couple of things that have to be done. You need to file charges.”
Her head dropped, her shoulders bowed. “He said he’d kill me if I tried, and nobody believes a lying whore. If they did, he’d kill my mama, hurt my sister.”
“We’re not going to let that happen. You need a doctor to examine you, Traci.”
“I can’t. I can’t! He’ll go crazy like he did when I fell down the stairs and lost the baby. He hit me and I fell down the stairs and lost the baby. He went crazy ’cause I had to have a doctor.”
Darby and Zane exchanged a quick glance.
“How about if we have a doctor come here?” Darby kept that soothing arm around her. “A woman doctor. She’s a friend. And you know Chief Keller, Traci. He’s a good man. He wants to help you. He’ll help you if you tell him what happened last night, what happened when you lost the baby.”
“I lied to him before. I had to!”
“That doesn’t matter now,” Zane told her.
“I just need to get away. If I could get far enough away, he won’t find me.”
And go where? Darby thought. Do what?
“I was married to a man who hurt me like you’re hurt.” Darby paused as Traci turned her head to meet her eyes. “If I hadn’t gotten help, if people hadn’t helped me when I needed it, he’d have hurt me even more than he did. I was awfully scared. But people did help me. And the police locked him up so he couldn’t hurt me again.”
“What did you do that made him hurt you?”
“Nothing, and neither did you. People like that hurt you because it’s who they are, not because of anything you did.”
“Why did you come to me, Traci?”
At Zane’s question, she dropped her head again, and her nervous hands tugged and twisted in the long skirt of her cotton dress.
“Clint said it was all a lie how your daddy beat you so bad when you were a boy, but my mama said it was true. My mama doesn’t lie. Clint lies. You can help me get divorced maybe, but I’ve gotta get far away.”
“There are places that are safe that aren’t so far away. My sister works with people who need safe places. We can get you into a shelter. I can help you get a restraining order, and help you get into that safe place. I can help you get a divorce.”
“I don’t have the money to pay you. Maybe Mama—”
“You don’t need to pay. You need to talk to the chief, tell him what happened. Tell him what’s happened before. What happened when you were pregnant.”
“He said he’d kill me and my whole family if I did that.”
“That’s what you tell Chief Keller. You tell him everything, and I’ll be right with you, as your lawyer, okay? You let the doctor examine you, so she can tell the chief how he hurt you.”
“If I do, can you keep my family safe?”
“We’re going to make sure of it.”
“I can call the doctor, Traci, and your mother. They can both come here.”
She froze, her hands going limp on her skirt. “My mama can come here? Can she go with me to the safe place?”
“We’re going to work that out.” Zane rose. “I want you to tell me if it’s okay to call Chief Keller. You tell Darby if it’s all right to call the doctor, and your mama. We don’t do anything unless you say it’s all right.”
“I’m so scared. I’m so tired.” Putting her head back, she closed her eyes. “I half hoped he’d just kill me last night, so it’d be over with. I can’t live this way anymore. I don’t want to live if it’s this way. If you call them, it’ll change. I need it to change, so you can call them. But please call my mama. I just want my mama.”
Putting her face in her hands, she sobbed.
* * *
It shook Darby down to the bone, brought back with crystal clarity the fear, shock, utter helplessness of being beaten by a man who’d vowed to cherish her.
More than the attack by Graham Bigelow, she realized, witnessing Traci’s exhaustion, despair, and terror shot her back to her own.
And that need, that desperate, visceral need for a mother’s comfort.
Lee came first, so Darby busied herself making coffee while he spoke quietly with Traci and Zane in the great room. Gentle voices, she thought, a gentle way as she served the coffee, then went outside to wait for the others. To give Traci privacy.
And remembered her own interview with the police, how calm they’d been and, yes, gentle. Patient, she realized, guiding her back through the nightmare so she could document it for them.
All she’d wanted? Her mother.
She watched the car coming fast up the steep road, walked down to meet Traci’s mother, and, she noted, her sister as she got out of the car.
She saw that Traci’s mother still wore her house slippers. Tears burned at the back of Darby’s eyes—her own memories, her relief.
She fought them back, reached out a hand for Lucy Abbott’s.
“She’s inside, with Chief Keller and Zane. She doesn’t want to go to the clinic, but Dr. Ledbecker’s coming here.”
“How bad is—I need to—”
“He hurt her, Mrs. Abbott. It’s not the first time, but we can make sure it’s the last.”
“You go on in to her, Mama. I need a second here. Can she go right in?” Allie asked.
“Sure. Straight back. Mrs. Abbott…” Darby hesitated, then went with her gut. “She’s going to need you to just hold on to her for a while. That’s what she’ll need.”
With a nod, Lucy rushed to the house and inside.
“Okay.” Allie’s jaw set like iron. “Where is the son of a bitch?”
“Traci said he left early to go hunting. That’s when she got out.”
“About fucking time. Sorry—Mama hates that word, but it just keeps pushing out of me. How’d she get here?”
“I had a job I wanted to finish up out on Highpoint Road, and I saw her when I was driving out, saw she was hurt, talked her into getting in the truck. She wanted to come here. She had Zane’s card with her.”
“Good sense at last.” When tears swirled in Allie eyes, she blinked them away hard, then put her arms around Darby. “Bless you.”
“No, I didn’t—”
“Bless you,” Allie repeated. “Let me thank you. I’ve been sick with worry and mad as all hellfire with Traci for a long time, so let me thank you and pull myself together before I go in.”
“He threatened you and your mother.”
Allie jerked back.
“If she left or said anything about the beatings, he’d hurt you. She believed him, so maybe don’t be so mad at her.”
With her lips pressed tight together, Allie stared out toward the lake, the hills. “I tell you this, I tell you this right now, my Tim and I can take care of ourselves, our babies, Mama, and Traci, and damn Clint Draper and all the rest of them. She’s coming home if I have to drag her there this time.”
“She shouldn’t go home yet.”
Fire flashed the tears dry as Allie whirled back to Darby. “If you’re saying she’s going back to that bastard, I’m going to pop you right in the mouth.”
“I’m not saying that. Zane called Britt, and Britt’s making arrangements for Traci to go in a shelter in Asheville. Your mother can go with her if that’s what she wants. She’d do better at a shelter for now, until Lee makes sure Clint’s locked up, until she feels safe. And she’d get counseling there, be able to talk to other women who’ve been through what she has.”
“All right, as much as I want her home, maybe that’s good sense, too. She was always so bright and sweet, my baby sister. I want my sister back.”
“They spied on her, Allie—the Drapers—watched to make sure she toed the li
ne. He threatened her family if she crossed that line. It took courage for her to leave.”
“You’re right.” Heaving out a cleansing breath, Allie shoved her dark blond hair back from her face. “Okay, you’re right, and I have to get rid of some of this mad. I’m going to go on in.”
“I’m going to wait out here for the doctor.”
“I’m not going to forget what you did today. Nobody in Lakeview will forget what you did.” Allie squeezed Darby’s hand. “Neither will the Drapers, so you have a care, Darby.”
When Charlene arrived, Darby took her inside. While Zane showed Traci—with her mother glued to her side—and Charlene to a guest room, Darby grabbed a Coke and took Zod outside for a walk.
“You stayed right with her, didn’t you?” she murmured to the dog. “You have a good heart.”
She wandered into the trees while Zod sniffed, pranced on his stubby legs, and eventually squatted.
“That’s the way, and here’s the place. No pooping on my nice lawn or in my most excellent gardens.”
When she walked out again, she saw Zane sitting at one of the tables, making notes on a legal pad.
“There you are.” He got to his feet, walked straight to her as Zod danced, and wrapped his arms around her. “Don’t be sad. It’s a good day. Don’t be sad.”
“It threw me back. Not like when I faced off with Bigelow—that was the flight-or-fight instinct, and remembering how I didn’t know how to fight with Trent. This took me all through the afterward. It was one horrible night in my life. How many horrible nights has Traci lived through?”
“It ends now. We’ll help make sure of it. Lee’s already got a warrant. He’s called up a couple of officers, and they’re heading out to the Drapers’.”
“He won’t be there if they went hunting.”
“That’s the next thing.” Giving her arms a rub, Zane stepped back. “It’s not hunting season, for anything, so Lee can slap all of them on that one. Clint’s going to come home eventually.
“Meanwhile, Britt’s heading over. Emily put some cabin amenities together, so she’ll pick those up, then take Traci to the shelter, help her settle in. That’s saying Charlene clears her for it. If not, Britt’ll take her to the hospital in Asheville first.”
“You were so calm with her,” Darby acknowledged. “So calm and kind. You knew just what to say, how to say it.”
“Just part of the job.”
“No. No, no.” Agitated, she paced away as she spoke. “It’s not. It’s who you are. And whatever you said to her before, when you gave her your card, that had to be the right thing in the right way or she wouldn’t have kept it, she wouldn’t have wanted to come to you.”
“I was in her place once.”
“Worse. Worse, and look who you are.” She turned back. “You could’ve turned bitter, you could’ve turned mean, or had the spine beaten out of you. But you didn’t. You’re kind and caring, and you’ve built a purposeful life. Damn it, you’ve screwed things up for me.”
He let out a half laugh as his eyebrows shot up. “How’s that?”
“I came here because it suited my list of requirements. It could’ve been any of dozens of other places, but I ended up here. My mother always said there’s a reason for everything. And I guess there is. Lakeview was away—that was number one. The growing season, the size of the community, the topography, and so on. Suited.”
“It’s hard for me to screw up a growing season. Any of that Coke left?”
She pushed it at him. “Not that. I also had very specific goals. If, after living here for a few weeks, it felt right, I’d start building my business. Again, number one. A very close second? Finding my own place, buying a house, some land, making it a home. Building good connections in the community, working my way into it, making friends.”
“Seems to me you’ve done a good job all around there. Can’t see where I screwed it up for you.”
“No? Well, I’m not finished. I like sex.”
“And for that I’m grateful.”
Agitated, she stuck her hands in her pockets, pulled them out again. “Not a damn thing wrong with finding somebody—unattached, trustworthy, interesting who I’m attracted to—to have sex with. Add on he’s great-looking, fun, smart, and all that? Bonus round.”
Zane rested a hip on the table, rubbing the happy dog with his foot. “Just not seeing the screwing-it-up part here.”
She pulled her cap off, began to slap it against her thigh.
“Did you hear ‘relationship’ in there? ‘Serious relationship’ on my list of requirements? No, you didn’t. The sort where I end up all but living with him and not really turning my own place into my home.”
“We got the scary wallpaper down, got the walls painted.”
“That makes it habitable, not home. Just now? I’m taking Zod back in the woods, and congratulating him for not pooping on my lawn or in my garden. Not Zane’s, not his, my. Personal pronoun, because you’ve screwed things up and this is home.”
“Look at it.” Zane spread his arms. “You made it one, darlin’. That’s not me screwing things up.”
“You let me,” she pointed out, though that was weak, and she knew it. “Then I see you with Micah, a friend you’ve kept close since you were kids. I see you with your family, and they’re just goddamn terrific, I see you with every-damn-body, and you’re this person.”
“I am a person. I can’t deny it.”
“Oh, don’t be so damn funny. I’m irritated. I’m agitated. I see you, and you’re kind and caring because at the core, you have honor.”
“Well, that might be stretching it some.”
“I say you have honor,” she snapped back. “I see it, I feel it, I hear it. And why the hell couldn’t I have met you a couple years from now after I finished crossing off everything on my completely sensible list?”
Now he smiled. “Kismet? I wasn’t looking for this either. I wasn’t looking for you, but I love you, Darby.”
“I know it,” she said on an annoyed huff. “And as if that doesn’t screw things up enough, I love you.”
“I know it. But it’s sure nice to hear you say it. Come home, Darby. Come all the way home.”
She already had, she thought with a sigh. “I’m keeping my place.”
“Why wouldn’t you? You’ll make the grounds spectacular, put in the greenhouse you talk about, store equipment and Christ knows what other big-ass machine you’ll want. Your place is essential for High Country Landscaping.”
She jabbed a finger in the air as he strolled toward her. “See, you get me. That’s another way you—”
“Screwed everything up?” he finished.
“Yeah.” Surrendering, she framed his face with her hands. “I guess I’ll just have to live with it, and you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Zane waited with his sister while Charlene finished treating Traci’s injuries.
“I can go with you,” he began. “Help you get her and her mother moved into the shelter.”
“No, you’ve got a ton to do here, plus, it’ll give me some time to talk to Traci. It’s a big, scary step she’s taking.”
“Text me when you get her there.” He glanced at his watch. “I was hoping to hear from Lee by now.”
“Let Lee do his cop thing. I’ll do my counselor thing, and you do your lawyer thing. Add on host thing for a really big party.” She pulled his wrist over to check the time herself. “I’ll be back to pitch in there in a couple hours—and Silas, too, when he’s wrapped up the cop business. Emily’ll be over, too—with Audra. We’ll get it all done.”
“I’m thinking of it as Traci’s Independence Day.”
“It’s a good thought.”
But Zane knew his sister. “You’re worried she won’t stick.”
“She’s got plenty of support, but she’s also got a hard road ahead. We’ll be hopeful.”
He led with that hope as he helped Traci into Britt’s car, reminded her to call him, any
time, if she needed him. After thanking Charlene, assuring Allie he’d stay on top of things, he stood a moment on his hill. Quiet now, peaceful now, the lake below shining in the sunlight.
A perfect summer day, he thought, echoing Darby’s earlier assessment. The kind of day for taking a sail, eating potato salad, drinking a beer in the shade.
The kind of day where it seemed nothing hard or mean existed.
But it did, always would. Life meant you navigated the hard and mean, rose over it, pushed it back.
So he would.
* * *
After using the warrant to enter Traci’s house, having a conversation with Clint’s hard-eyed mother at her place, his brother’s slovenly—the word popped into his head—wife at hers, Lee deduced they’d already figured out something was up.
In Jed Draper’s place, three kids—two in diapers that needed changing—and a third with a nasty look in his eye and scabby knees—fought, wailed, whined until Lee’s head throbbed.
But Sally Draper never deviated from her story, one that matched her mother-in-law’s almost word for word.
She didn’t know where the men had gone—certainly not hunting! Fishing more like, camping out for a day or two. And if that ungrateful Traci said her brother laid a single hand on her, she was a liar on top of being a lazy slut.
Bea Draper, the matriarch, had run the same line, and added a few flourishes. How Traci had a terrible temper, threw things at her hardworking boy. Was clumsy as a two-legged mule, always tripping over things—mostly as she didn’t put shit-all away.
Lee took note of the field glasses in both houses, set on the sill of the window facing Traci’s backyard.
He considered it all as he made his way back to the house where Traci had lived, and what he’d found—or hadn’t found—inside.
She’d run off at dawn with only the clothes on her back and Zane’s card in her pocket. Yet inside he’d found only two handmade dresses, both cotton and as shapeless as what she’d had on. No jewelry, no makeup—not even a tube of lipstick—two cotton nightgowns his grandmother wouldn’t have worn, and not a single pair of shoes.