“See you later,” Gabe said. He headed for the gate to the compound.
“Oh, hey, forgot to tell you,” Lee called after him. “Everyone’s down by the creek picking up walnuts to sell at the farmers’ market, even Bright Star. He let me stay here because we need a new water well, like I said.”
The compound did look deserted. Gabe walked back toward Lee. Was the man shaking or was that willow limb quivering in his hands of its own accord?
“You tell him I’ll be back tomorrow morning a little after ten,” Gabe said, hoping Lee was listening. He looked transfixed, staring at the ground where the stick seemed to point like a skinny, crooked finger. Was Lee putting on a show for him? Gabe didn’t really believe in dowsing any more than he believed Brice Monson was some sort of modern-day messiah. But Lee looked so amazed that Gabe could only hope he’d remember to pass on his message.
As he strode back to the cruiser, Gabe couldn’t help thinking Monson had picked a weird time to order everyone down by Cold Creek to pick up walnuts. Darkness setting in, a rainstorm coming. Gabe had helped his dad collect walnuts down there once. His hands were stained brown from it, and he’d run around the house pretending it was spattered, dried blood until he caught heck from his mother. “Blood on someone’s hands is not fun and games!” she’d scolded him.
Did Lee actually have to get Monson’s permission to stay behind? he wondered. This place was starting to sound worse than boot camp. Gabe was glad he hadn’t mentioned what he wanted here. Monson might not agree to bring all the girls about Amanda’s age for a lineup to see if the girl in the photo Marian had given him resembled her lost child. But Gabe was hungry for anything to make progress on these kidnappings—any lead, any hint, any clue.
As he got into his vehicle, he heard a rumble of thunder echo from the hills. It reminded him of things that made him uneasy when he needed to be in control, because it sounded like distant 155-millimeter howitzers, boom, thump, thump. Thunder often took him back to the day in Iraq when his Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit disarmed a huge bomb in a Kirkuk market before it could detonate. Even as they succeeded, other IEDs went off in the distance, echoing, killing some of the men he’d sent to another site.
After he fastened his seat belt, his hand darted to his chest. Sometimes he almost thought he could feel his army-issued pistol in its cross-draw holster from his duty days. Today he wore his weapon on his equipment belt. From his inside jacket pocket he pulled out the pictures of Marian Bell’s daughter and the Hear Ye girl. One was a close-up first-grade school photo, the other a grainy, more distant one of the child in question, standing by the commune’s market booth. He stared at the photos side by side in the graying light. Again, he vowed he’d somehow finish what his dad had left undone: find the phantom Cold Creek kidnapper, who took little girls and, but for Tess Lockwood, made them disappear.
* * *
“Ooh, I think it’s raining, and I hate to drive in the rain,” Gracie told Tess as she looked out the window toward the road. “It’s turning dark early. I had to get special permission to wait for you and I don’t want to get back late.”
After an affectionate welcome from her cousin’s wife, Tess had toured the house at Gracie’s insistence. Tess had tried to buck herself up to face the place alone, but it was good to have her here. Tess and Gracie were almost the same height, though the similarities stopped there. Gracie had long red hair, amber eyes, a round face and plump body compared to Tess’s blond, chin-length hair, blue eyes and lithe frame. She’d never questioned why Gracie had taken such a liking to her, as if she were the Lockwood cousin instead of Lee. But then they had all played together as children. Gracie was one of the distantly spaced neighborhood kids, and their mothers had been friends. Back then, everyone in Cold Creek had known each other, or at least had seemed to.
“I’m sorry we sold most of our furniture, but I hope we’ve left you enough to get by for the couple of weeks you’re here,” Gracie said. “The houses in the commune are pretty well set up already.”
“But your family will still be together, right?” Tess asked as they stood inside the back door while the rain rattled against the windows and Gracie scrambled into her slicker and pulled up its hood.
“Together when it matters, though Kelsey and Ethan will now have lots of family, lots of mothers and cousins in the faith.”
Gracie didn’t notice, but Tess shook her head, surprised that her friend had accepted Lee’s new religious ideas so easily. But Gracie had a kind, sweet personality. How many girls who married into a family would keep in touch with someone who had moved away when Lee himself didn’t seem interested? How many young women—Gracie was twenty-eight, four years older than Tess—would care so deeply about her? Why, at times Gracie seemed more of a sister to her than Char or Kate. She’d seen more of Gracie over the past five years, before Lee turned into such a religious man and they stopped visiting her and Mom in Michigan. The last time she’d seen them was at her mother’s funeral just last year.
“I can’t wait to see how big Kelsey and Ethan are now,” Tess told her. “I love kids that age, same as the ones I work with. And just the ages I want to care for when I can sell this place and buy my child care center back home.”
“Back home,” Gracie said, giving Tess a quick goodbye hug. “Isn’t back home really here? Well, I know about the bad things, but you have the strength to put it all behind you, and we wish you’d stay around longer.”
“One week, maybe two max, but we’ll make each day count. And when I get my place back in Jackson, you can come visit.”
“Well,” Gracie drawled, “don’t know about that with our new commitments and all.”
Tess frowned and looked out the kitchen window at the rain falling. The security light flooded the backyard with brightness. Her mother had put that in after Tess was taken, even before she found her way home.
As Gracie opened the back door she said, “I’ll bring the kids to see you tomorrow, if it’s allowed.”
“Why wouldn’t it be allowed?”
“Their school and work schedule. I’m not sure.”
“Work? They’re four and two years old.”
“They learn to work during play!”
“Okay, okay. I’d love to meet with their teachers. We can exchange ideas.”
Gracie hesitated between the inside wooden door and the glass storm door. Tess sensed she wanted to change the subject. “You still might want to rent out this place,” Gracie said, her hand on the knob. “Real estate’s not moving well around here.”
“Two things I’ve decided for sure. One, I’m going to advertise and sell it myself so I don’t have to pay a Realtor commission. And two, I don’t want to rent it. I want it gone with the bad memories because I’m making only good ones now. And you’ve helped a lot. Thanks for cleaning the place. And for the cider, cheese and apple crisp in the fridge. See you tomorrow!”
They hugged again, and Gracie darted out into the rain. Tess watched the overhead light in her old black car pop on, then her headlights as they disappeared down the driveway. Slanting rain and gray gloom swallowed the two red taillights like a wild animal’s eyes closing.
Tess glanced out the back window again at the place where the nightmare had started—and at this time of year. She had to fight the memories. The cornfield lay so close, so vast at the edge of the backyard, then curled around the house to join the field between the Lockwood and McCord houses. The day she’d been taken was a sunny one but with rain clouds threatening from the distant fringe of blue-green hills.
She’d run into the field, hiding from Gabe, who’d agreed to watch her and two other kids when her mom had to pick