Somewhere Between Luck and Trust (28 page)

“And if you make a mistake, who cares?” Dawson said. “Go straight to the good stuff.” He pointed at a section of the menu. “The rest is sides and desserts and salads. We want meat, lots of meat.”

She squinted at the words. She remembered hearing about hieroglyphics and the archaeologists who had come upon them and tried so hard to figure out what they said. She could relate. Then she pounced on a familiar shape, two letters together. “Ch...” She looked up. “Chicken.”

“Not just any chicken,” Dawson said.

There were three words in front of
chicken.
She put her finger on the first and sounded it out, until suddenly it fell into place. She was, after all, a North Carolina girl.

“Pulled.” She looked up again. “Pulled something something chicken.”

“Try the second word,” Georgia said. “One syllable.”

“F...ree.” She looked up again. “Free. Pulled free something chicken.”

“The unidentified word might throw you,” Georgia warned, “because it uses rules we haven’t tackled. It—”

“Range!” Cristy clapped the menu against her breasts. “Pulled free range chicken!”

“Hey, is it fair to guess like that?” Dawson asked.

Georgia answered. “Darn right. Cristy used her phrase memory plus logic and what rules she’s learned so far to put the words together the right way. That’s how we all learn to read.”

Cristy held the menu tighter and tried not to cry. “It’s not just a game. I’m actually...getting this.”

“Faster than a speeding bullet,” Lucas said. “You’re doing great. At this rate you’ll be graduating from college in no time.”

She sobered, and for a moment she thought he was making fun of her.

Lucas saw what she was thinking. “No, honey, I’m serious. Dead serious. There are colleges, good colleges, with special programs for dyslexic students. They set things up so you can be tested differently and have study aids. You’ll be ready faster than you can imagine. Then you can finally soak in all that information the wrong kind of education denied you.”

Cristy glanced at Georgia for confirmation. “Really?”

“One step at a time, of course, but yes, that’s a perfectly reasonable goal for you. In fact I really hope that’s where you’ll head.” Then Georgia focused on Dawson when she spoke again.

“There are all kinds of barriers that keep us from getting where we want to go, but there are usually ways around them, if we just try to find them.” She switched her gaze back to Cristy. “Whether you make it to college or not, I’m proud of you.”

Cristy hoped that Dawson had heard Georgia’s message, too, but for the moment, she just basked in the glory of being able to order from an actual printed menu for the first time in her life.

Chapter Thirty-One

CRISTY KNEW THAT
if Georgia suspected Jackson had been threatening her, she would have talked her out of returning home tonight. To be safe she left the restaurant immediately after the meal. The sky was still light enough that the road up Doggett Mountain was no more treacherous than usual. Sunset was turning distant mountains a rose-tinged lavender when she pulled up to the house.

She had promised she would phone Georgia when she got inside, and the moment she unlocked the door and let herself in, she did. Only after she’d left a message and hung up did she realize that Beau hadn’t been waiting on the porch to greet her.

So far the big dog had stayed around when she was gone, without needing to be locked inside. He seemed to know Cristy was his personal human, at least temporarily, and while he enjoyed romping, he rarely strayed far. He liked being fed and petted, as well as having a stick tossed when she had the time. He liked curling up at her feet like a furry ottoman when she worked on her reading. She could picture herself on the glider with Beau at her feet as she worked on the alphabet quilt for Michael. The dog kept her from feeling too lonely, and she felt safer, because Beau announced any visitor well before he or she arrived.

But Beau was nowhere in sight.

She changed her shoes and grabbed the light jacket Samantha had bought her. Then as she started back to the door something caught her eye, something white lying on the table where she usually set her purse or keys.

A sheet of paper that didn’t belong there.

She hadn’t noticed it when she’d come inside, because in her hurry to make the phone call, she had carried her things into the kitchen and dropped them on the counter closest to the telephone.

She stopped, rooted to the heart-pine floor by a feeling of foreboding. She didn’t like clutter. As a child her room had always been orderly, because if it wasn’t, her parents had a reason to invade. Later, when she’d had her own place, she had still created and maintained a special place for every item. This might be her way of establishing order in her disorderly universe, but whatever the reason, she hadn’t changed it here.

The paper on the table wasn’t something she had carelessly forgotten. The paper hadn’t been there when she left.

She considered calling Georgia again and leaving another message. But what would she say?
There’s a strange piece of paper on the table, and I’m frightened?
She would have to explain why she was worried, and Georgia would probably be upset she hadn’t told her about Jackson earlier. The goddesses certainly wouldn’t want her to stay on here, not with the possibility that she could bring trouble or worse right to their doorstep.

The front door had been locked when she arrived home. Of course she hadn’t actually
tried
it first. Just assuming it was locked, she had inserted her key, and she was almost certain that when she turned it she’d heard the click when the lock released. Whenever she left the house, the old front door had to be locked from the outside with a key, a precaution she appreciated, since she couldn’t lock herself out.

But was she mistaken about that click? Had someone—Jackson, of course—broken into the house and left a note, then left an unlocked door behind him?

All this went through her head in a matter of seconds. She couldn’t tell herself she was being silly, because she knew better. Beau’s absence took on new and frightening possibilities.

She made herself walk to the table and pick up the paper. She held it to the fading light from a window and saw that it was a note, and she didn’t have to be literate to know who had written it. Jackson’s scrawling signature was unmistakable. He had often left notes before leaving her house, notes usually scrawled on whatever scrap of paper he could find.

And now he had left another.

Her hands were shaking so hard she could barely hold the paper. Jackson could be upstairs even now. That would explain why the door had been locked when she entered. He had turned the lock on the inside and was even now waiting somewhere. Maybe his car was parked beside the barn, or farther down the road by the Johnstons’ house.

She opened the front door and took the note outside. She stared at it, trying to make sense of the letters, the words. Willing her brain to cooperate, she sounded them out.

“M—is-sed.” The sounds emerged as “ma-is-said,” which made no sense. She tried combining the first two sounds by saying them faster. “Mis...sed.” She said it three times before she realized what it was. “Missed!”

The next word was one she knew on sight. “You. Missed you.”

She wanted to cry.

The next two words fell into place with surprising ease. Not because she could read them, but because she knew Jackson’s pet name for her, and knowing it, she made a reasonable guess that the letters spelled Baby Duck.

“Missed you, Baby Duck.”

Bile rose in her throat, and her hands shook harder. There were only two more words before his signature. “Ne...xt.” It took a moment, but she figured out that it probably said
next.
And a one-syllable word after it, which began with
t
and had an
e
at the end, which meant the
e
was probably silent.

Hadn’t Georgia told her a silly story about silent
e
’s? The
e
silently bossed the vowel before it and forced it to say its name. That meant the word would be...

“Time.” Which made sense.

This time she had no sense of accomplishment that she had read the short sentences. Now she felt as if she was reading for her life.

“Missed you, Baby Duck. Next time?” There was a question mark at the end.

She remembered Sully’s stun gun. Recently she had changed the hiding place to an empty canister behind the canned goods in the kitchen. Could she find the courage to go back into the house, take down the canister and arm herself? Could she find the courage to use the stun gun if she had to?

She thought of Beau. Where was the dog? If Jackson was still inside, he already knew she’d come home. If she shouted for Beau, she wouldn’t be alerting him of anything new.

But the note had said “next time.” Which meant he
hadn’t
waited at the house for her return.

Of course, nothing Jackson said or wrote could be believed.

She crept back into the house and into the kitchen, reaching up into the cabinet as quietly as she could to take down the canister. The stun gun was inside, right where she’d left it. She held it in her hand; then she disassembled it, took the battery and hooked it up to the connectors, just the way Sully had showed her.

Her hands were shaking so hard she had to struggle to make the simple connection. The battery slid against her damp palms, and at first the connectors refused to snap into place, but at last she succeeded, slid the cover back over it and inserted the pin. Finally she slipped the loop over her wrist, holding the gun in the palm of her hand with her thumb near the switch in case she needed to turn it on.

She didn’t feel safer. She wasn’t sure if she was courageous enough to use the gun, even if Jackson sprang from behind a chair as she walked back through the living room. But she did feel less like a victim, and that gave her courage to go back outside and shout for Beau.

The sky was rapidly turning dark. The moment he’d heard her car, the dog should have come bounding out to meet her. By now he would be hungry. Beau was always hungry, but this time of night, he was ravenous. He was one of those dogs who was never full. If she carelessly left a fifty-pound sack of food within reach, he would eat every nugget and die happy. She had to secure his food in a plastic garbage can with a lid that wouldn’t pop off even if he knocked the can over.

“Beau!” She walked down the steps, and for the first time she realized she should have phoned Sully. Sully would want to know Jackson had been here, and Beau was Sully’s dog.

She debated the wisdom of going back inside, and in the end she retraced her steps. Sully, too, wasn’t answering, but she left a message.

“I’m going to look for Beau,” she finished. “If you can come...” She debated, then continued. “Sully, if you can come tonight, whatever time you can get here, please come. I...I don’t know for sure Jackson’s not still here somewhere, but I have to go look for Beau. Something’s wrong. I know it is. If you come and I’m not here at the house...” Tears clouded her voice now. “Please find me.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

SINCE CRISTY HAD
headed straight for home after dinner, Georgia went with Lucas to drop Dawson back at his house. The boy was silent for most of the ride. Dawson’s family situation wasn’t perfect, but when he held his life up to Cristy’s, could he see how many advantages he had that he’d always taken for granted? He was doing his best to help Cristy learn to read, but she wondered if Dawson himself would be the more important recipient in that relationship.

Before dinner she had parked her car in front of the A-frame and driven with Lucas, and after they dropped off Dawson he parked beside it.

“Want to come inside for an espresso?”

It was still early, and they hadn’t been alone together since before their trip to Athens. She glanced at her watch, but that was just for show. She had missed him when he was gone, and she was hungry to be alone with him.

“You aren’t too tired?” she asked.

“I find you energizing.” He leaned over and kissed her lightly on the lips. “We can do some sleuthing, too.”

She wondered exactly what he wanted to discover. Desire uncurled inside her, warm and delicious. She touched his cheek with her fingertips, then she opened her door.

On his deck something was curled up in a lawn chair, and the blur of white rose and stretched when they approached. She remembered Lucas had mentioned a stray cat, and here was the evidence.

“Meet Lancelot,” he said.

The cat, long-haired and surprisingly tidy, looked lazy and well fed, and if he was a stray, he was a stray with connections.

“You’re sure this isn’t somebody’s pet?”

“Let’s just say I don’t worry about him when I’m away. I think he just likes to top off whatever he’s fed at home, so he stops by to see what’s for dessert.”

“You think you might need a real pet? You know, one you’re not sharing?”

He unlocked the door and ushered her in. Lancelot stayed outside, as if he knew his final course would be forthcoming so he didn’t have to beg.

“Cats are great, but I like dogs better, though a dog sounds like something you do when you’re settled.”

“You’re not settled?”

“Not in this house.” He dragged out the last word.

“I’m trying to picture you with a dog. A setter maybe. Something at home in front of the fire while you write.”

“I’m thinking bloodhound.”

“Mystery writer stuff.” She smiled seductively. “And speaking of that? I decided I know you well enough to read one of your books. So I did.”

“And?”

“I’m in love.” She paused. “With Zenzo.”

He shrugged out of his leather jacket and draped it over a stool. “In my best Zenzo fashion I can do espresso with biscotti. I can also do some of Nonna’s
limoncello
icy cold. And you liked the writing?”

“Espresso and biscotti, if that’s not too much trouble, and the writing is fabulous. I loved every page.”

He leaned over and kissed her. “And I love that you read it. Now I have a job for you.”

“I’ll roll up my sleeves.”

“Just flip on my computer.” He nodded to the end of the counter where his laptop was in residence. “Why don’t you see how many high schools in Georgia have horses as mascots?”

“Do you really think I’ll find something that specific?”

“I bet you do.”

She hadn’t had time to worry about how to incorporate Cristy’s theory into the search, but obviously Lucas had been mulling it over. As he revved up his daunting espresso maker, she waited for the computer to boot. In a minute she was waiting for the results of her search for Georgia high school mascots.

The page came up. “Georgia High School Football Historians Association,” she read out loud. She clicked on the link. A chart organized by school, city, mascot and colors popped onto the screen.

“Is there anything we can’t find out on the internet these days?”

“Got it?”

“Easy. But there are a lot of schools. Maybe seventy on the first page, and that’s just for the letter
a.
”

“Sounds like we have our work cut out for us.”

She liked the way he’d said ‘us,’ as if it was a given he would be helping.

She scanned the column under mascots on the first page and found nothing related to a rearing horse. She did the same with the second
b
page, and halfway down she found a winner. “Broncos. Brookwood Broncos.”

“Certainly possible, although wouldn’t you symbolize that with a bucking horse, not a rearing one?”

“It’s a horse.”

“That it is. Keep looking.”

The air was beginning to smell deliciously coffee-scented. “Page three for
c.
Coahulla Creek Colts.”

“That works. Train a colt, the colt rears in protest.”

“You’re taking this too literally.”

“Zenzo will tell you that accurate investigation is key. What else?”

By the time the espresso was ready she’d found more Colts and a number of Mustangs. She was just sorry there were no illustrations to go with the names.

“We’ll make a list and some phone calls,” Lucas said, taking the espresso to the table. “It’s worth a shot.”

“This was so long ago. High schools disappear. They merge. They change names or mascots. But I guess it’s something.”

“The biscotti’s in that white canister by the sink. Would you put some on a plate for us while I feed Lancelot?”

He disappeared into a spacious pantry and reemerged with a bowl of cat food. She was on her way to the sink when her cell phone rang. She stopped for her handbag and drew out the phone, checking caller ID. She recognized Bunny Galveston’s number and knew she had to take the call.

“Hello, Bunny,” she said when she answered.

“I hope I’m not calling too late.”

“Not at all. A friend and I were just talking about the search for Trish. Did you find out more? You’ve already been so helpful.”

“I tracked down the name of Trish’s big sister—at least we think she was the one. Unfortunately Julie can’t be reached for a week, maybe two. She’s off in the jungle photographing raptors. She’s quite the adventurer.”

Georgia was sorry this Julie wasn’t her mother. At least she sounded interesting, which Trish did not.

She made the polite response. “That’s too bad, but this will keep.”

“Nobody can remember her last name, although two women in our pledge class are absolutely sure Trish was short for Patricia. Some of the pledges called her Tricia, not Trish.”

Georgia wasn’t sure that was a stellar breakthrough, but it was something. “So you’ve been talking to everyone?”

“I have, and there’s something else. Something silly, but now that my memory’s been jogged, I remember it, too.”

Georgia leaned against the counter. “The smallest things can be useful.”

“The rules for pledges were very strict. Really, we stopped just short of hazing. It was a way to be certain the pledges took it seriously enough. Do or die for Zeta Chi. All that.”

“Uh-huh.” Georgia waited.

“One thing we never did? Miss a meeting—and we had lots of them—unless we had a darned good reason. We were fined, but worse we were basically given the cold shoulder by everybody until the next meeting, when, if we attended, we paid the fine and received forgiveness. If we missed a second one, we were in danger of being cut. It was pretty silly, but that’s the way it worked. So we all made sure we were there, no matter what.”

Lucas came back into the kitchen, and Georgia knew she needed to end the conversation. “Did Trish miss a meeting?” she asked, hoping to prod Bunny along.

“This was going to be a major one, for the whole sorority, to discuss our homecoming party and who would do what. Trish said she had an emergency and had to go home.”

Bunny paused, to build drama. “It turned out her cat was sick.
That
was the emergency. I guess she’d had the cat since she was a little girl, and she was absolutely distraught, sobbing and wailing. Said she didn’t care if she was fined or anything else. She was going home to be with her cat. And she left school. Just like that, even though everybody pointed out she could leave the next morning after the meeting.”

“Her cat was sick.” Georgia was trying to process this, while at the same time she was picturing the cat charm on the bracelet.

“The cat died before she got there, I guess. Some of the sisters started calling her Catwoman, but not to her face.”

Georgia’s mind was whirling. She didn’t answer.

“The interesting thing?” Bunny continued. “She was gone more than a day, and somebody remembered that her trip home took a while because home wasn’t just around the corner. She probably took a good portion of a day to get there, another good portion to get back. By the time she buried the cat and returned to Athens, she’d missed another meeting.”

Georgia was trying to think of something she could say, but nothing came to mind.

Bunny didn’t seem to notice. “I think that’s it,” she said. “But I’ll let you know the minute I hear something else.”

Georgia pulled herself together enough to say thanks and goodbye. She ended the call and slipped the phone back in her handbag. The smell of the coffee, which had been so tantalizing, was now overwhelming.

Lucas was at her side now, and he looked worried. “Are you all right?”

She searched for the words that would prove she was fine, but she couldn’t think of a single one.

He put his arm around her. “I think you ought to sit down.”

Georgia looked up at him. “Her cat died.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Trish, Tricia, whatever her name is. She had a cat, and when the cat got sick, she fell apart. She left school, left the sorority, didn’t care what happened or whether they kicked her out. She drove home, apparently a good ways, to see the cat.” She searched his eyes. “The woman who left her own baby to die in a sink was so broken up when her cat got sick that she didn’t care about anything else except getting home to be with it.”

He put his arms around her and pulled her close. “Don’t do this to yourself. We don’t know Trish is your mother.”

But she
did
know. The pieces fit, and while as an academic researcher she knew that sometimes pieces fit and the lead was still false, she also realized that every piece of evidence they’d found so far pointed to a woman named Trish, whose love of her childhood cat was still remembered by her Zeta Chi sisters.

She never cried, but now tears were running down her cheeks. She wanted to laugh at the absurdity of what she’d learned. She wanted to find the woman who had nearly condemned her to death, and shake her until she went limp in Georgia’s arms.

“That...cat probably weighed more...than I did when I was born.”

“Georgia...” His arms tightened around her. “People are complex, and they aren’t always moral. You know that. There can’t possibly be a good enough reason for what she did to you. But she was young and probably terrified. Maybe when she left you in the sink she thought you weren’t alive. You were so small, maybe you weren’t moving, or she couldn’t tell you were breathing. And later, when she saw the newspaper stories, she realized she’d made a mistake, but she knew you were being taken care of, and she didn’t see a reason to confess.”

“What part of that woman...do I have inside me?” She shook her head.

“Not the part that abandoned an infant.” He held her so their eyes could meet. “You’re a wonderful mother and grandmother. You could never do what she did. You don’t have that inside you.”

She thought about the couple who had adopted her, then rejected her. The foster families who had given up on her. The young husband who had left her so he could go overseas and be killed by terrorists.

“She’s not the only person who left me. She was just the first.” She tried to pull away, but he tightened his hold.

“And now you think maybe
you
ought to be the one to leave?”

She couldn’t deny it. “It’s easier.”

“I’m not going to make it easy.” He pulled her close and his lips found hers. When she tried to turn away, he kissed her harder.

“I’m damaged goods,” she whispered. “I don’t know how to do this, Lucas.”

“Then we’ll figure it out together.” This close his desire for her was clear. “I want you. For now, for always. I’m not going to leave you unless you want me to. Not ever.”

“I don’t know—”

“That’s okay, too. Tie up the past before we talk about a future. I can be a little bit patient. But just for the record? I see my future with you. And I’m going to be pretty damned insistent.”

She tried to laugh, but it sounded more like a sob. “Past, future. What about now?”

“Now it’s just you and me, and nobody else in this room.” And he kissed her again.

This time, she leaned into him, and in the building and culmination of desire, everything else simply melted away.