The Slow Burn of Silence (A Snowy Creek Novel) (30 page)

Jeb brings the pasta and sets the pot heavily on the table. He’s steaming as he takes a seat. I can see his brain is racing.

I dish up, put a plate in front of Quinn.

“Why did my real parents give me away?” Quinn says.

I stiffen. My gaze jerks to Quinn, then Jeb.

Jeb’s fork clatters.

Now
she wants to talk about the adoption?

“Was there something wrong with me? Who were they?”

Thunder claps above the house. I wince as the lights flicker on and off. The power could go any minute. Clearing my throat, I say, “Maybe right now is not such a good time to talk about it—”

“You said it was good to talk. Now you don’t want to tell me, do you?”

Jeb and I exchange a hot glance. I clear my throat. “They’re not called ‘real’ parents, Quinn. They’re called birth parents. Sophia and Peter were just as much real parents as your birth parents were. Just in a different way.”

“Why did they give me away?” Her voice is going thin.

“There can be many reasons for an adoption. Sometimes, a mother and father can be in a bad position, or even too young to raise a child of their own.”

“What about my birth parents? Were they too young?”

It was finally all coming out now. The information has simmered and reached some kind of boiling point in Quinn, and now she is not going to let it drop.

I exchange another nervous glance with Jeb. We’re not ready to tell he
r . . .
not yet. Not now. Not this way. It goes against everything he promised Sophia.

“Why didn’t my mom and dad tell me I was adopted? Why did they
pretend
?”

“I told you,” I say softly, leaning forward. “Sophia and Peter—your mom and dad—wanted to wait just a little while longer before they told you. Until you were a bit older.”

“Why?”

“Because they believed that you would understand things differently. “

“How did Missy know that I was adopted, then?”

I clear my throat, brain racing. “I think Missy might have overheard Trey and Stacey talking about it. Remember, Trey and I were going to be married, so he knew you were adopted. And there’s a good chance he might have mentioned this fact to Stacey because he’s going out with her now.”

“So other people know, too?”

We’re entering dangerous territory. My thoughts flash to the women.
Spawn of the devi
l . . .

Anger rushes hot and instant to my face again. “Maybe a few know, Quinn. It’s not a negative thing.”

“Will I ever know who my birth parents are? Do you know?”

Jeb’s muscles are coiled like a spring. He’s not touching his food. I can literally feel his energy across the table and I avoid his eyes, because if I look at him again, Quinn will read me. She will know we are both keeping something from her.

“Is it a secret?” She picks at the frayed edge of her napkin.

Again, I clear my throat. “In certain adoptions, these things can be secret, and it’s a bit complicated in your case, but I want to promise you something. Right now. Look at me, Quinn.”

She lifts her eyes.

“I’m working on finding out all the details for you, the whole truth about what happened to bring you into Sophia and Peter’s arm
s . . .
my arms. And when I know it all, I will tell you. Only the truth. Always the truth. You can trust me—I will not lie about this.”

Quinn lurches up from her chair, and she lunges into my arms. I hug her fiercely, stroking her hair.

Jeb surges to his feet. He paces in front of the storm-streaked windows. It’s getting dark out.

When I feel Quinn’s muscles ease slightly, I hold her shoulders, look into her eyes. “You okay?”

She bites her lip hard. Her eyes are dry and hot looking. Red spots sit high on her cheeks.

“I think we should go upstairs and run a quick bath, how about that? We’ll put some bubbles in, okay?” I’m not sure it’s wise to bathe in a storm, but it’s all I can think of. It’s something concrete and comforting.

I sit with Quinn while she soaks, then I rub her dry with a big fluffy towel. She remains mute and oddly distant the whole while, and it makes me edgy. I leave her to change, giving her some space, and I go downstairs.

Jeb comes up to me, takes my shoulders. “Is she okay?”

“I hope so. It’s going to take time.” I hesitate. “We should find a therapist, a professional to help us all through this, because I sure as hell don’t know what I’m doing.” As I speak I realize we really are forming some kind of dysfunctional family unit. And we’re not ready. This is all happening outside of our control, in spite of our best attempts to delay things. In spite of Jeb’s goal, Sophia’s wish, to clear his name first.

“What else happened at the bike park?” Jeb says quietly. “There’s more, isn’t there? I saw you going at those women, Rachel. What did you say to them?”

A brilliant white flash of lightning illuminates the lake and thunder booms. I flinch as the power flickers again. The thunder grumbles away into the peaks.

“I told them,” I say. “I told them everything we think happened. About Merilee maybe being in the mine, about the Jeep, the ska music.”

“You
told
them?”

I say nothing.

“What for?”

“I lost it. I’m sorry, Jeb. I went postal when they called her ‘spawn of the devil.’ It all came out before I could even think it through.”

“What, exactly, did you say?”

I push my hair back off my face. “Everything. I told them we knew Luke borrowed Adam’s Jeep, that the girls ran to the guys in the Jeep. I suggested the guys might have driven the girls up to the mine and that maybe Merilee died there. I said they might have tried to take Amy north to deflect attention from the mine. And they might have formed a pact to blame you.” I swallow. “I told them Amy remembered a dragon tattoo.”

He spins away from me, glares out the black, rain-streaked window. “Fuck,” he says quietly.

“You wanted to rattle their cages, Jeb. I rattled.”

“Yeah, but—” He turns back to me. “Jesus, if Beppie tells Clin
t . . .
”

“You think he’ll come directly after us?”

“I think he went directly after Amy and Sophia and Peter. And fast. I believe it was him.” He grabs my shoulders suddenly. “Listen, pack your bags. When Quinn is done changing, I’m taking you both out of here.”

“What about the proof, Jeb?”

“The proof is buried deep in a mine, Rachel. It hasn’t gone anywhere in nine years, and it’s not going anywhere now, fire or not. My priority is now to keep you and Quinn safe, to get you away from these people, this town. We’ve learned what we can here. We have a lot of information, a lot of possibilities to work with. We can deal with what we have from afar now. We can involve outside agencies. This town is too crooked, too steeped in this to handle it from the inside. It’s now become dangerous for you. For my daughter. I’m getting you both out.”

“Jeb—”

“I don’t like these fires and this weather as it is. We’re going. Go upstairs and get your things.”

When Lily arrived home with the boys, she saw that Adam had been home but was no longer there. His uniform was on the bed and his hiking boots were gone. So was his jacket. With trembling hands, she tried to call his cell, but he was not answering.

She put frozen pizzas in the oven and told the boys to go bathe quickly and change. She turned on the radio, listening to news of the fires. The Mount Barren fire was burning rapidly down the south flank in the alpine. The downdrafts were strong enough that it could jump the Khyber Creek drainage and move on to Bear Mountain. If it did that, the village itself would be in danger. She’d already packed emergency bags, just in case, before fetching the boys from bike camp.

She paced up and down, tried to call Adam again. Still no answer. She thought of the Jeep he had owned all those years ago when they were dating. The ska music he loved. The bumper sticker, what had that sticker looked like? There was a photo somewhere.

Lily went into Adam’s office and rummaged on the shelves for the old photo album she knew was there. She found it, flipped through the pages. She froze when she came to the one she was looking for. Adam with his arm around her. He’d been a cop for three years when that was taken. They were standing behind his Jeep, and there was a Hawaiian sticker on the bumper. Just as Rachel had described. She set the album on his desk and quickly flipped through his stack of CDs. Lots of old Jamaican ska, including Damani Jakeel.

She thought of that argument with his mother. The bloody hoodie.

What had Sheila known, or been hiding? Had both she and Adam tried to protect Luke? This would ruin Adam if it came out now. Ruin all of them. Her name would be mud. Her sons would be scorned.

As Lily moved to replace the CDs, she bumped Adam’s mouse and the computer screen on the desktop crackled to life. A Word document filled the screen. It was a letter. Addressed to Chief Constable Rob Mackin.

Lily leaned forward, her stomach rising into her throat as she read what her husband had written.

It is with deep regret that I present to you these facts pertaining to the Jebbediah Cullen case nine years ag
o . . .

A ringing began in Lily’s ears.

It was a confession. A full confession that incriminated both him and his mother. And by default accused the group of four guys—Luke, Clint, Harvey, and Levi—of having gang-raped the girls and killing Merilee.

Her hand went to her mouth as she read about the GPS system in his Jeep that had tracked the Jeep’s route up to the mine and back down to the Green River rail crossing, then north from the gravel pit that night. About how Adam had found the GPS route erased the next day. How he’d found a gold Saint Christopher medallion in his Jeep after Luke had brought it home, and how his mother had later taken the medallion from his drawer. How Luke had arrived home in a bloodied hoodie. How his mother had added the hoodie to the list of evidence found in Jeb’s car.

He wrote in his confession that he was including in the envelope Merilee Zukanov’s Saint Christopher medallion, and the GPS route from his Jeep that night, which he’d saved on a flash drive before it had been erased. He said his mother hadn’t known he’d saved it.

What did he mean, “including in the envelope”?

Lily scrabbled around in Adam’s desk drawers, finding nothing but an open pack of manila envelopes. And it struck her. Her gaze shot to the printer.

He’d printed the confession out already; the printer light was still on. He’d put this confession along with the medallion and a flash drive into an envelope. He must have it with him.

Or worse.

Hands shaking, she tried again to call her husband. The call went to voice mail.

She stared out the rain-streaked window. It was getting dark.

Quickly she called Chief Mackin. They put her through right away.

“Lily, we’re busy. Getting ready to upgrade to mandatory evac. You and Adam and the boys, you’ll need to get out—”

“Have you seen Adam?”

He hesitated. “This morning, yes.”

“You haven’t seen him since? He hasn’t brought you an envelope?”

“A what?”

“Where is he?”

“Lily, did he tell you?”

“Tell me what?” Her voice came out shrill.

“I placed Adam on mandatory leave, until this Cullen affair is sorted out.”

“When?”

“Early this morning.”

She hung up.

“Mom! Pizza’s burning!”

She rushed through to the kitchen, tap, tap, tap, tapping her wrist with her fingers as she went, like Dr. Bennett said. To relax herself. She yanked the pizzas out the oven and dumped them smoking onto the stovetop. Tears flooded down her face.

“What is it, Mom?” Tyler asked.

This was Rachel’s fault. That spawn’s fault. Jeb’s fault. Evil, they were evil.

“
I . . .
I need to drive you both over to Vickie’s place. She will take you and Mikey down to Vancouver with your bags if there’s an evacuation order. I’ll follow. Later. Real soon.”

“Why? Where are you going, what’s the matter?”

She wiped her face quickly with the dishcloth. “Nothing. I need to find your father, I need to fix something. Go upstairs, get Mikey, your bags. Go to the car.”