Missing with Bonus Material: The Secrets of Crittenden County, Book One (5 page)

Lydia knew that to be true. But even if it was, it didn’t mean she had to get involved. “I bet the detective will go away soon. He’s from Ohio, right?”

“Yeah, but I don’t think he’s going back there until he solves this,” Walker said slowly. “Actually . . . I think he might come back here and talk to you some more.”

“He shouldn’t. I told him I didn’t know anything.”

With a grunt, Walker stood up. “Listen, I don’t know how much you knew about Perry’s secrets. But if you knew even half as much as I do, you need to listen to me. If we don’t keep our stories straight, we’re going to get burned.”

Even though she knew what he meant, she played dumb, if only to gain a few precious seconds to process everything. “Burned?”

His voice turned kind. Almost patient. “You know . . . caught. We’re going to become real suspects.”

Perhaps they should keep their stories straight, especially about that evening in December. But if they did, it might mean that Walker had something to hide. And what if what he was hiding was dangerous? What if he had something to do with Perry’s death and he was lying?

She really didn’t know all that much about him.

Shaking her head, she got to her feet. “Well, thank you for the warning.”

His jaw looked set as he reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a ballpoint pen. “Give me your hand.”

She did as he asked. Cradling her hand in his right, he wrote a series of numbers on her palm with his left hand. When he was finished, he curved her fingers over, making a fist.

Hiding the numbers from view.

“That’s my cell phone number. When you’re ready to talk to me about what you really know . . . or about what we saw in December . . . don’t come to the store or call my house. Call this number.”

She didn’t need to ask why he wanted any conversation between them to be kept secret. She felt the same way. Their town was too small to be able to count on privacy. It didn’t matter if he was English and she was Amish.

Someone in their circles would notice them talking together and comment on it. “And then?”

“And then, we’ll figure out a way to talk. Without the detective finding out.”

She couldn’t help but touch his arm with her unmarked hand. “I think if we do talk it should be out in the open,” she said, changing her mind about meeting. “Otherwise, we’ll raise suspicions.”

“Fine, we’ll meet in the open.”

His voice was so clipped, yet another wave of unease filtered through her. “Walker, do you think, really think, we need to be so worried?”

Instead of moving away from her hand, he stepped closer, making her full palm curve around his bicep. “Lydia, I think if the detective realizes that all of us knew Perry better than we’re saying, things are going to get really complicated. More complicated than either of us can imagine. And that makes me really worried.”

Walker turned and walked away before Lydia could think of any retort that made sense.

Instead, she sat back down on the bench and tried to calm her shaking nerves. She had known things were going to get discovered sooner than later. She’d known it as certainly as she had known Perry wasn’t the right man for her.

She’d just hoped the truth would come out at a far later date.

“Lydia, is everything all right?” her mother called out from behind the screen door.

“It’s fine.” Thinking quickly, she said, “That was just my friend Walker. He stopped by to say hello, that’s all.”

Her mother leaned closer to the screen door—so close that her nose was pressed up against it. “I didn’t know you were friends with any
Englischer
boys.”

“I’m not. I mean I’m not friends with very many. But Walker is nice.”

“Is he now? And how old might he be?”

“I don’t know, Mamm.” And because it was yet another thing that she didn’t know about in her life, her voice turned sharper. “Truly,
muddah
. He only came by to see how I was doing. See, he knew Perry, too. And the detective has spoken to him also.”

“Well, unlike that
Englischer,
you had nothing to do with Perry’s disappearance.”

So that was how they were going to refer to Perry’s death. “Walker did not, either.”

“But you can’t be sure, can you?”

“I can be sure that I trust him as much as anyone else. He’s a nice man, Mamm.” And she could also be sure that he was hiding information. Just like she was.

“Perhaps,” her mother said before turning away in an uncharacteristically quiet fashion.

Ten minutes later, after she heard her mother leave the kitchen, Lydia hurried to her room. She carefully wrote down the phone number on the back of an old Christmas card, then locked herself in the bathroom and scrubbed her hand until it was raw.

At least the numbers were gone.

If only the memories could be erased as easily.

When they’d first started courting, Perry had been sweet and had brought her daisies and had blushed when he talked to her. He’d had a faint Kentucky drawl that had mixed with his Amish accent, creating a soothing, lilting cadence. She’d liked to just listen to him talk.

Back then, she’d been sure that Perry was the man for her. She’d gone to sleep dreaming about weddings and days spent walking by his side.

And then, practically overnight, Perry wasn’t so sweet at all.

He’d yell at her. And show up late. And his accented voice developed a hard edge to it that hurt her feelings.

She began to avoid him.

And then they had fought about his new dreams and her old-fashioned values. Just remembering how he’d teased her about not wanting to do more than kiss him good night caused her to tremble. The way he’d grabbed her upper arms and trapped her next to his body. The way his kisses had turned painful and his heated gaze had turned cool when she’d pushed him away. Closing her eyes, she breathed deep, preferring to inhale the residual tang of Pine-Sol and bleach on her hands than to recall the sharp scent of rain-soaked leaves that surrounded their feet in the woods.

When she had prayed that she’d never see Perry again.

But that prayer hadn’t come true.

Chapter 5

“Perry could ride a unicycle, juggle three oranges at a time, and run faster than you could ever imagine. He always thought it a shame that none of that mattered in the real world.”

A
BRAHAM
B
ORNTRAGER

W
alker had no idea if his visit with Lydia had been a mistake or not. Saying she was reserved was putting it mildly. The girl had seemed to keep every single emotion she was feeling to herself. As he drove his old Chevy truck off of the Planks’ property and hit the state highway, he played their conversation over and over in his head.

“I don’t see why we need to share stories. The detective will leave soon.”

The words had fallen from Lydia’s lips like they’d been recorded messages—tinny and canned sounding. Could she have sounded any more guarded or wary?

Had she been afraid of him? Or was this her normal way of conversing? And if it was, what had Perry even seen in her?

Probably that she was, well . . . beautiful.

The opinion caught him off guard. Back when Perry had dated her and their paths had crossed, Walker didn’t remember her being that way. But now that he thought about it—maybe he’d never taken a good look at her. The first time he’d met Lydia had been when Perry had been standing by her side. As soon as Walker had heard the word “courting” he’d taken an emotional step backward.

After all, there was an unspoken rule between him and most of his friends—guys didn’t even think about other guys’ girlfriends. But he wouldn’t have looked at an Amish girl closely, anyway.

Back when he’d been in high school, he’d been all about being part of the in-crowd. He’d been a four-year letterman for baseball, and he’d worn his letter jacket around like it was a big deal. Just about any cute girl he’d wanted to date had acted flattered and excited just to be noticed by him.

Walker knew his head had gotten so full, it had been a wonder it still remained on his head! After a while, he’d started to only worry about his appearance and his reputation.

Then he’d gone off to community college and had found out real quick that he hadn’t been as special as he thought he was. A late-night conversation with his dad let him know the truth—that his parents had been patiently waiting for him to get over himself, knowing that he’d been simply going through a phase.

Being out of his small bubble made him realize that the world wasn’t just about him. And, that it wasn’t a nice place, either. That feeling hit home more than ever when the detective showed up, rattling his cage.

As he pulled into his driveway, he spied Abby sitting on the front steps of their house, waiting for him. Unfortunately, his sister was sitting as she usually did. Looking a little bit lost and a lot in need of a friend. He wasn’t sure why she’d never fit in at school like he had. Maybe it was her awkwardness in social situations? Or maybe it was her way of always analyzing things to the nth degree.

But whatever the reason, he always felt a rush of protectiveness toward her. She needed him like few other people in the world did.

He parked his truck off to the side of the driveway, and waved his hand as she watched him approach.

“What’s up?” he asked, keeping his voice steady and easy as he threw an arm around her shoulders. “How was school?”

“Fine.”

“Hey, ‘fine’ is better than usual.” Walker tried to tease a smile from his sister.

Now that everyone knew she’d found Perry’s body, her reputation at school had gone from being just another awkward girl to the weird one. It was painful to know that she was the new constant source of gossip and ridicule.

“ ‘Fine’ means no one went out of their way to talk about Perry with me today.” She bit her lip. “And ‘fine’ means that Jessica didn’t make fun of me in chemistry.”

“Hey, that’s a start, huh?”

“I don’t know. I think she was just too busy with her new boyfriend to pay me much attention.”

“Maybe she’s finally realizing that there’s more to you than she thought.” Jeez, he sounded like some kind of Dr. Phil wannabe, but he couldn’t stand her being so depressed. “I mean, you’ve been standing up to her and the other girls in her clique more and more, right?”

She shrugged. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

“You should. Hiding won’t help.”

Brushing a hand through her blond hair, so curly in the humidity, she looked him in the eye. “I’ve actually been waiting for you for another reason.”

“Which is?”

“Are you, um, busy right now?”

“It’s five. We’re going to eat dinner in an hour.”

“But after? Are you busy after dinner?”

He was worn out from talking with the detective and Lydia. More than a little ready to just sit and watch TV. Plus he had a couple of chapters to read for Biology. But there was such sadness mixed with hope in Abby’s voice that he couldn’t bear to put her off without giving her a chance. “I’m just going to watch TV and study. Why?”

“I wondered if maybe we could go visit Grandma Francis and Grandpa James.”

He hadn’t seen that one coming. “Tonight?”

“Well, yeah.”

“Why do you want to go see them tonight?”

“I don’t know.” She looked down. Fussed with a hole in her faded jeans. “You don’t have to stay there if you don’t want. You could just drop me off,” she added quickly.

Walker didn’t want to go, but at the moment he was more interested in why she was going than the logistics of it all. “If I left, how would you get home?”

“I could probably stay with them overnight, and then Mom or Dad could pick me up sometime tomorrow.”

“But you have school . . .” Dismay filled Walker as he began to realize that this was probably yet another one of Abby’s schemes to get out of being at school. “You can’t miss again.”

“I won’t be missing anything. Tomorrow’s a school holiday—teacher workday or something.”

Walker nodded, hoping to give himself some time to try to figure out what to say. Though they all loved his father’s parents, it wasn’t a usual thing for him or Abby to want to visit them on the spur of the moment. Usually, visits to their Amish grandparents were accompanied by complaints about the heat, or the chores, or the quiet stillness that surrounded their home.

“So, what brought this on?”

“Oh, nothing.”

Yeah, right. Abby’s voice was airy and she wasn’t looking him in the eye. “Come on. I know you pretty well, right? Suddenly, you’ve just decided that you want to go spend the night with our grandparents? Do they even know you’re coming over?”

“No.”

“So you just want us to show up? Without an invitation?”

“They’ve always said we could stop by anytime. That means we don’t need to wait for them to ask, right?”

He supposed she was right, but it still felt like it would be rude to just drop by unannounced. “I don’t know, Ab.”

“Come on. It’s not like they’re strangers.” She kicked her feet out in front of her, then crossed them. Then shifted again. Just being restless. Just being Abby. “They’re our grandparents, you know.”

“They’re also very polite and kind. Probably too polite to turn you away.”

“I already talked to Mom about it. She said I could go if you didn’t mind taking me.”

She might not have minded, but Walker had a feeling she probably wasn’t too happy about it. “But what about Dad? They’re
his
parents.”

“She said Dad would never stop me from seeing them.”

“Would never stop is a long way from being happy about this visit.”

“Walker, if you won’t take me, just say so. Okay? I don’t need all your opinions right now.”

Her words, and that sad look of acceptance, took the wind out of his sails. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. I mean, I know this isn’t what you want to be doing . . .”

His sister looked so heartbroken, he didn’t have the heart to tell her no. Seeing his grandparents was complicated for him, too. Though it was never spoken of, he’d often felt the tension that rose between their father and his parents. Sometimes it seemed as if their dad was embarrassed by what he now thought of as important—his job, his car, the life he’d built for himself. It also seemed that there were a lot of unspoken conflicts that were never solved.

However, none of it was his business. He had enough problems without worrying about Abby’s. “How soon do you want to go?”

“You’ll take me? Really?”

“I’ll take you right after dinner. But you get to tell Dad yourself.”

“I will.”

Now that the burden wasn’t on his shoulders, he added, “Be sure to pack an overnight bag, too. But keep it in the truck. If you get the feeling that they’ll let you spend the night, then you can get it out. Okay?”

Her smile told him everything he needed to know, and pushed away the rest of his doubts.