A Family To Cherish (14 page)

“And that's exactly what she's going to get,” said Doug, his tone barely civil.

Pam flashed a cunning little smile. “Well, at least we agree on that.”

Benny set down his coffee cup and stood up.
“Listen, babykins, we'd better get going or we'll miss our return flight.”

Pam stood and smoothed out her gray gabardine skirt. “You're right, Benny. It's getting dark, and I think we've said all we need to say.” She gazed over at Doug and made an exaggeratedly sad face. “Well, brother dear, I guess the next time we see you will be in court. I'm sorry it has to be this way.”

“Me, too,” said Doug, his lips tight against his teeth.

Pam blew him a kiss, which he ignored.

“Be sure and bring the kid with you when you come to San Francisco,” said Benny. “We don't want to make another trip up these wretched mountains to get her.”

Pam paused at the doorway. “Wait a minute, Benny. I just want to go and give the little tyke a good-night kiss.” Pam tossed Barbara a calculating glance. “After all, we want Janee to know how much we love her. You don't mind, do you, Barb?”

Barbara crossed her arms tightly on her chest. She forced herself to say, “Sure. Go say good-night to Janee. I promised her I'd be in, too.”

Pam's stacked heels made a clacking sound on the wood floor as she strutted down the hall. Barbara debated whether to follow Pam to Janee's room, then thought better of the idea. Pam would only accuse her of spying or intruding.

Less than a minute later, Pam burst into the living
room, her face white. “Benny, she's gone. Janee's gone!”

“Gone? What are you talking about?” barked Benny.

“She's not there. Her bed is empty.”

“You must have gone to our room by mistake,” said Barbara.

“I know a child's room from a master bedroom,” said Pam thickly. “I'm telling you, Janee's not in her bed.”

“Then she's probably in the bathroom,” said Doug. “Or maybe she went and crawled into our bed.”

“No, I checked everywhere. She's not here. Maybe someone's kidnapped her. Do something. Call the police.”

Icy alarm prickled Barbara's skin. Pam's concern sounded genuine. “I'll go look.” Barbara was already striding down the hall. Her heart hammered as she opened Janee's door and scoured the room with her gaze. There was no sign of Janee. She looked in the bathroom, then crossed the hall to the master bedroom. No Janee.

Doug was close on her heels. “I'll check the closets.”

Within minutes they had checked every nook and cranny of the cabin. Barbara's heart thundered in her chest. “Where could she be, Doug? She was just here.”

He slipped his arm around her and led her over
to the rocker by the fireplace. “She's got to be close by, Barb. We would have heard if someone had entered the house. The windows are locked. She must have wandered off somehow.”

“But where? And why?”

“I smell a rat,” said Benny, his eyes narrowing. “Maybe you two had this planned all along. Hide Janee somewhere so we can't get custody.”

“Oh, Benny, shut up,” said Pam. “My brother wouldn't do some lowlife thing like that. Look at them. They're scared silly.”

Benny held up his hands placatingly. “Okay, it was just an idea.”

“Benny, if this weren't a crisis situation,” said Doug hotly, “I'd show you what I think of your ideas.” He strode off down the hall and was back moments later. “I checked the back door again. It's slightly ajar. Janee must have gone outside.”

“Or someone came in,” said Barbara with a shudder.

“I'm going to check around the yard. She might just be outside looking for pinecones or something.”

“Well, I'm calling the police,” said Pam, picking up the phone.

“Do that,” said Barbara. “Doug and I will be outside.” Then she paused as a horrifying thought struck. “What if she ran away?”

Doug frowned. “Why would she do that?”

Barbara clasped her hand over her mouth, com
prehension striking like a lightning bolt. “Oh, Doug, maybe she overheard our conversation.”

“What conversation?”

“Remember, she peeked around the corner, and we told her to get back to bed? What if she heard Pam saying we didn't want her and would never love her? I can't bear to think of it.”

“But she wouldn't run away.”

“Wouldn't she?”

Pam hung up the phone. “The police are on their way.”

“I'm not waiting for the police,” said Doug, grabbing his jacket and a flashlight.

Barbara slipped on her windbreaker and followed him outside. It was dark now, the air brisk, the October wind biting. “She doesn't even have her coat, Doug. Just her flannel shirt and dungarees.”

“She can't have gone far, Barb. We'll find her.”

Barbara's hopes swelled as she thought of a possibility. “Maybe she ran over to Trent's cabin. She's crazy about him. Maybe she went to say hello.”

“Let's check.”

To Barbara's disappointment, Janee hadn't ventured over to the next cabin, but Trent quickly offered to join the search. “First, I'll make a few calls,” he said, seizing his cell phone. “There are lots of folks on the mountain who would want to help look for her.”

“We'll search the woods behind our cabin,” said Doug. “Trent, you cover your property.”

“Will do.”

They had just begun exploring the backyard when Barbara heard a siren. “The police are here, Doug.”

“We'd better go back to the house and talk to them. No telling what Pam and Benny will say.”

They spent several precious minutes—time they could have spent searching for Janee—answering the officers' endless questions. Had Janee wandered off before? Was she upset about something? Had they noticed any strangers prowling around? On and on. Finally, in exasperation, Barbara said, “Sergeant, we've told you everything we know. Can't you just go look for her?”

“Ma'am, we already have officers out combing the area. If she's out there, we'll find her.”

“We're going to look, too,” said Doug, “so if there are no more questions—”

“Let the professionals handle this, Dr. Logan,” said the officer. “We'd rather have you folks stay close to home—in case the child returns.”

“We'll stay close by,” said Doug, “but we're still going to take a look around.”

Doug got another flashlight for Barbara, and they went outside. Hand in hand they walked around the yard, first the front, then the side and the back, calling Janee's name, then listening for a little girl's voice amid the sounds of the night.

“Doug, where could she have gone?”

“Almost anywhere.”

“She could catch her death of cold. Or a coyote could attack her. She could fall…”

“Don't anticipate the worst, Barb. We've got to believe she's okay.”

After searching the yard, they ventured into the woods, following a narrow path through brambles and twigs. “We promised the police we wouldn't go far away,” Barbara reminded Doug, as he held back a branch for her.

“I know, but I can't sit and twiddle my thumbs. We have to keep looking.”

They followed one path through the spiky pines, then another, calling Janee's name over and over. After a while, Barbara stopped and sat down on a boulder jutting out from a small thicket. Doug sat down beside her and held her close. “You're cold.”

“A little. And weary. I need a minute to catch my breath.” She gazed up at the patches of sky glimmering through the dense pine fronds. The moon was full, its light smudged by wisps of clouds. A breeze stirred, rustling dry leaves and whispering through the fanning branches. “Do you see the face in the moon, Doug?” she murmured. “When I was a little girl, I thought it was the face of God smiling down on me. I loved a full moon because it made God seem so close.”

Doug coughed uneasily. “I'm afraid I haven't thought much about God for a long time. Except when we're in church.”

Barbara gazed up at her husband. There in the
moonlight he had never looked more stalwart and handsome. “I was angry at God after Caitlin died,” she confessed. “I closed my heart to Him.”

Doug nodded. “I know.”

“I closed my heart to you, too, Doug,” she said in a small, penitent voice.

“I know, Barbie.”

“I didn't mean to, Doug. I just felt numb. It was as if everything inside me closed up and shut down. My emotions wouldn't work anymore. I couldn't feel anything.”

Doug's voice was solemn. “I know. You couldn't help it.”

“Is that why you threw yourself into your work? Because I wasn't there for you?”

He shrugged. “I don't know, Barb. I guess I figured you didn't love me the same way anymore. I knew you blamed me for Caitlin's death. But you had a right. I blamed myself.”

She stared up at him. “Blamed you? What are you talking about? Why would I blame you?”

His voice grew heavy with emotion. “I'm a doctor. I'm supposed to be able to help people, make them well. But I couldn't save my own daughter.”

“It wasn't your fault, Doug.”

“Wasn't it? I let her ride her bike without her helmet. And when the doctors said she was well enough to go home, I didn't argue. I went along. But in the pit of my stomach I knew she shouldn't go home yet. I took her anyway because they said
she was ready. Maybe I didn't want to look like an overprotective dad to my colleagues—I don't know.”

“You couldn't have known about the blood clot. No one could have known. It would have happened even if she'd been in the hospital.”

“I know the facts, Barb. I know them in my head, and everything you say is true. But I can't feel them in my heart. All I feel is the guilt. I hear the recriminations in my head over and over, every day.”

“Oh, Doug, is that why you gave up your surgical practice? Is that why you became a hospital administrator, instead?”

“I suppose that was a large part of it.”

Barbara clasped Doug's hand and pressed his sturdy fingers against her lips. “I had no idea you felt that way. You never should have given up your medical career. You're wrong to blame yourself.”

“Why? It's how you feel, too. I know it is. I've read it in your eyes every day for four years.”

She leaned her head against his warm cheek. “I don't blame you, Doug. At least, I don't think I do. Lately my feelings are so jumbled, I don't know what I feel.”

Doug was silent for a long time. Finally he said in a voice that was barely audible, “Barbie, I killed your love as surely as I killed Caitlin. If I'd been a better doctor, a better husband, a better father—”

She silenced him with a finger to his lips. “Don't say that, Doug. It's not true. If I made you feel that
way, I'm sorry. You must know I never stopped loving you.”

“But you never wanted to make love after Caitlin died.”

“Not because I didn't love you, Doug. Because somehow it seemed wrong to take pleasure in the very act that had created Caitlin. I couldn't let myself feel pleasure because then I'd feel the pain, too.”

“I only wanted to be close to you, to comfort you.”

“I needed another kind of comfort, Doug. I needed you to tell me how you felt. I needed you to weep with me over Caitlin, but after that first day, you never cried again. I couldn't understand how you could just pick up your life and go on without ever shedding another tear.”

“I didn't want to upset you.”

“I longed for us to weep together. I felt as if our relationship had become a barren desert that only our tears could water. But you never offered them.”

“I never knew, Barb. I'm sorry.”

“I'm sorry, too. Sorry I closed you out and made you think I blamed you. I never did.”

“Are you sure?”

“Right now, I'm not sure of anything, except that I love you.”

He held her tightly against him. “I love you, too.”

They slipped into a pensive silence again. Finally
Barbara said, “Maybe a part of me did blame you, Doug. I blamed God. I closed my heart to Him just as I closed myself to you. But these last few weeks I've begun to find Him again, and He's healing me. Really healing me from the inside out. I feel love blossoming in my heart again—love for you, love for God, love for Janee—replacing the numbness and the anger. I know—and this is hard to say—but I know His love will sustain us, no matter what happens with Janee.”

“You make me hungry for that kind of faith, Barb.”

“It's not me, Doug. It's what God has done in my heart. It's all Him.”

“I wish I had that kind of closeness with Him. It's been a long, dry spell trying to make it on my own.”

“We could pray now, Doug. Please. Pray for Janee. Pray for us.”

“I'm rusty. I don't know the words.”

“Say what's in your heart.”

Doug squeezed Barbara's hand tightly, lowered his head and said falteringly, “God, I'm not good at this…finding the right words…saying what I feel. You and I—we've been out of touch too long. Help me make things right with You—and right with Barb. Help us to find Janee. And if You're willing, we'd sure like a chance to raise her as our own. Thanks, Lord, for listening.”

“Yes, Lord, thank you,” Barbara whispered. She
relaxed her forehead against Doug's cheek and marveled to find it wet with tears. “Doug, you're crying.”

Embarrassed, he drew back and with an awkward hand wiped away the wetness. “No, I'm just a little choked up,” he conceded.

She seized his hand and touched the velvety smooth cheek where the tears had been. “Don't brush them away, darling. I've waited too long for them. Those tears are watering the garden of our love.” She nuzzled her cheek against his and whispered, “And our prayers are the sunshine making our love grow again, because we have the Son shining in our hearts.”