“Well, I know you still have feelings for your mama and that’s okay, too. We can be mad at the people we love. But if you don’t talk with her about your feelings, they’ll just fester up inside of you and make you sick. It’s like having an invisible infection inside your heart and it never gets better unless you treat it.”
Alexis gave a stiff nod but remained quiet.
“I need to ask you something about Chloe.” At the mention of her baby sister, her demeanor became protective. Her little fists curled and he doubted she even realized it.
“What about Chloe?”
“Was your daddy mean to her?”
“Daddy was mean to all of us.”
“Yeah, I get that. He sure as hell ain’t up for Father of the Year but I mean did he pick on Chloe more than the rest of you?” At first Alexis seemed reluctant to answer, her small mouth compressed as if trying to hold back what wanted to fall out, so he waited. His patience was rewarded when Alexis started talking in a barely audible whisper.
“Yes,” she said, tears glittering in her eyes. “It got really bad when our mom left.”
“Do you know why?” he asked gently and Alexis shook her head. Drawing a deep breath, he asked the question that had been bothering him the most. “Do you think your daddy was trying to make Chloe sick?”
Alexis bit the side of her cheek and her face paled as she struggled to hold back the tears that welled in her eyes.
“It’s okay, you can tell me. I know you did your best to keep your sisters safe. Tell me what your daddy was doing to Chloe.”
Alexis gulped and when she spoke again her voice shook. “Special eggs. He made her eat eggs that he made special and they always made her sick. The last time, right before we left Arizona, I watched him as he made Chloe’s breakfast. He put something in it from under the kitchen sink and I know that’s not where we keep the salt and pepper. We only keep cleaning supplies down there. So I didn’t let her eat them.”
“How’d you do that?”
“When he wasn’t looking I switched our plates. I knew he hadn’t put anything in me and Taylor’s eggs and then I told him I didn’t feel good. I threw my eggs away. He didn’t care about me, but he made sure Chloe ate every bit on her plate before he’d let her get down from the table. I think my daddy—” She stopped on a painful sob and John felt her struggle as if it were his own. Alexis had confirmed his worst fear. The girls’ father had been trying to poison his youngest daughter.
He caught Alexis’s red-rimmed stare and made her a solemn promise. “You’re never going back to that man. And if your mom isn’t up to snuff…you aren’t going back to her, either. That okay with you?”
Her answer was slow in coming but he suspected it came straight from her heart as she nodded and said, “Fine by me.”
Good. First things first…“I’m friends with Sheriff Casey. You need to tell her everything you just told me.”
“Are you sure we’re not going to go back to Daddy?” she asked, her eyes scared.
“Not if I have anything to say about it.”
“Daddy was real mean to Chloe,” she said. “I’m afraid of what he’ll do if we go back. He told Chloe if she didn’t stop peeing her panties he’d put her outside like a dog because she smelled like one. He left her out there for hours in the rain. I went out and got her after he went to bed. It took all night to warm her up but the cough she has now…it’s from that night. Sometimes she coughs so hard, she can’t breathe.”
“I know, honey, that’s why I took her to the doc. She’s got some medicine and we’re taking care of that nasty cough so you don’t need to worry anymore,” he said, careful to keep his voice neutral and calm when inside he was to the boiling point. He couldn’t imagine little Chloe locked outside, shivering in the rain, crying for her sisters and huddled against the door while her father sat in relative comfort inside the house. God help him if John got his hands on that man. But for now, he needed to lift the weight from this little girl’s shoulders. “All right. Here’s the deal. Sheriff Casey is a good person. There’s no way you’re going back to your daddy after you tell her what you told me. But you have to be honest with her so she can help. Okay?”
Alexis nodded and wiped at the remaining tears glistening on her downy cheek. “Why did she leave us with him?” she asked quietly, more to herself than to John. Suddenly, she looked at him as if expecting an answer though he didn’t have one. “Maybe if she’d taken us with her…Chloe wouldn’t have been hurt.” She rose and glanced away, seeming much older than she really was. When she spoke again, her voice was cold. “I hate her. No one can make me love her again. Not you. Not anybody. I’ll hate her forever and it doesn’t matter if she’s changed.”
As John watched her stalk from the room to join her sisters, he didn’t doubt a single emotion flowing from that little girl’s strong heart. In a way he felt bad for the storm that was heading in the direction of Renee Dolling. That woman would have to dig deep to find the loving daughter she’d left behind. And, given what the girls had been through, Renee might find her way to China much easier than the way to her daughter’s closed-off heart.
He didn’t envy her. Not one bit.
Chapter Four
“COURT RULING STANDS. Temporary guardianship will remain with Gladys Stemming until family court has had a chance to review the case further.” The rap of the gavel brought Renee out of her stunned stupor. What had just happened?
She shot from her seat. “Excuse me? What the hell just happened?”
The Honorable Judge Lawrence Prescott II gave her a sharp look just as the bailiff started to move forward to deter her from approaching the bench. “You’ll watch your language in my courtroom, miss,” he said with a soft drawl that betrayed southern roots somewhere in his lineage. He gestured for her to take her seat and once she reluctantly returned to her chair, he said to his court reporter, who in Renee’s opinion looked a lot like the receptionist at the sheriff’s department, “Please repeat the judgment for Mrs. Dolling, Nancy.”
Renee stared, unable to believe what she was witnessing, as indeed dour-faced sheriff’s receptionist Nancy pulled the tape from the machine and repeated in a clipped voice the judgment that had just been rendered.
Schooling her voice into something less screeching and more reasonable, she tried a different tactic. “I heard the judgment. What I don’t understand is how the court can appoint a virtual stranger as guardian for my children when I am their mother. They should be with me. Surely, you can understand that?”
Judge Prescott gave her a wintry glare and Renee felt her hopes of putting this nightmare behind her anytime soon freezing to the point of death. “What I understand is that you’re a fickle woman prone to bad decisions when it comes to your children. That’s what I know about you. What I know about Gladys Stemming is that she’s solid and dependable.” The judge glanced at John Murphy sitting opposite to Renee. “And since Mr. Murphy has offered the use of the ranch while she recuperates from her surgery, it is the court’s determination that the children have a safe and stable environment while this whole situation is sorted out. In addition to that, the children themselves have expressed a desire
