to escape city stress, get back to nature, raise their kids away from crime and all that, though we have our share. Well, besides what happened to you, I mean. Meth labs, marijuana plots up in the hills, domestic disputes, drunks busting things up or shooting off guns. Especially this time of year, we get outsiders trespassing on the grounds of the old mental health asylum, vandalizing and worse. But I didn’t mean to unload on you. I just wanted to say if you need anything while you’re here, I’m just across the cornfield, at least at night. Don’t hesitate to call the station or my phone next door. Grace said she’d leave the numbers for you on the fridge.”
“Yes. Yes, she did,” Tess said, glancing at the piece of paper under the magnet that advertised Gabe McCoy for Sheriff. “Thank you,” she added. “So, how is your mother? Gracie said your father died.”
“Yeah, at age seventy-two. A heart attack, though they had some good years living in Florida after they left here. She’s still there. Sorry to hear your mother passed away so young.”
“She had a hard life, working to take care of her three girls—me especially, after everything. That’s why she left this house to me. Kate and Char have more...high-powered careers than I do. Kate’s a university professor in anthropology, and Char’s a social worker. They both travel a lot, so I’m here on my own for this besides the fact that it’s my house now.” She hesitated. “Listen, Gabe,” she continued, unclasping her hands, which she didn’t realize she was gripping so hard. “I’m sure you know a lot of people here and I don’t. Will you let me know if you can think of anyone who might want to buy an old house to fix up?”
“Sure. If you don’t mind people knowing you’re back, I can ask around, have them contact you. If you put up any signs around town, better give your phone number, but maybe not your name, not say you’ll be here for a while.”
She could tell he’d tried to word that carefully, but it scared her. Actually she’d planned her for-sale posters that way. But was he thinking that since her abductor had never been found and she was an eyewitness—maybe people didn’t believe she couldn’t recall a thing about her eight months away. Was she still in danger?
“Thanks,” she repeated. “I’ll remember that.”
He said goodbye, put his hat back on and went out into the rain. As she locked both doors behind him, she recalled that her mother had said some people blamed Gabe for not watching her better that day. There were whispers that her being taken was his fault, that he’d disobeyed orders to keep an eye on them. Tess had never told anyone but the truth was she was the one who had disobeyed him that dreadful day.
“Get back here, you crazy tomboy!” he’d shouted at her when she stuck out her tongue and darted back into the cornfield where she was hiding from him. She’d always liked Gabe, liked to get attention from him.
And with that mere thought, images came flying back at her. Someone was in the next row of corn, pushing stalks away, bumping the heavy ears. It must be Gabe. A terrible face jumped at her—hit her. Had she smacked into a scarecrow? She turned to run, but a hard hand covered her mouth. Was the scarecrow alive?
The thing dragged her away from her friends’ voices. She fought, went to her knees with the thing on top of her, pressing her down between two rows of stalks.
She tasted soil from the field, spit out straw. Something sharp stuck her in the side of her neck. It hurt more than a bee sting. Hard hands on her, pulling her up. She couldn’t see. Something was shoved into her mouth, something pulled over her head. She wanted Mom. She wanted Dad! Dad loved her, his terrific, terrible Teresa. But there was no Mom, no Dad, no Gabe.
Reality struck her. No Gabe...of course there was no Gabe. He’d just left and she stood in the kitchen of her family’s old house.
Shaking, heaving a huge sigh, she checked and relocked both doors and leaned against the kitchen counter until her heart stopped thudding. She shoved the waking nightmare away...had to get back to the here and now. She was going to put her things away but have a glass of wine before she washed up for bed. She’d take a shower in the morning when it was light. And pray she could go to sleep in this house at all.
* * *
The rain on the roof—and the fear of another nightmare—kept Tess awake most of the night. She felt revved up from seeing Gabe after all these years. She couldn’t help wondering if he became sheriff just to follow in his father’s footsteps or because of guilt that she was abducted when he was watching her.
Gracie told her that another child, Jill Stillwell, had been taken about ten years ago from a tent where she was sleeping next to her brother in her backyard, no less. Could it be the same kidnapper who snatched me? Tess thought about what had happened. Gracie said there was a cornfield behind the house where the escape must have been made. Not until the next morning, when the boy woke up and found his sister hadn’t gone inside to sleep, was she discovered missing. Another innocent young boy like Gabe, left to feel guilty, maybe even more so, since Jill Stillwell had never been found.
Tess also tossed and turned and agonized over the fact that Gabe joined the army and went to war straight out of high school. She could sympathize with him wanting to get out of Cold Creek. But maybe he went to escape the war going on inside him.
A glass of wine before bed usually helped her to sleep, but her thoughts kept racing. She could tell Gabe had wanted to make her feel comfortable, yet she felt unsafe with him. She admitted to herself the reason was that he kind of got to her. He was really sexy and she hadn’t been expecting that. With her thoughts on Gabe she finally fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.
* * *
Tess had just finished a late breakfast of cereal, banana, juice and coffee when another surprise visitor showed up, this time at her front door. She didn’t recognize the overweight woman at first because she’d changed so much, but the bright blue lettering on the side of her white van tipped Tess off. Thompson Veterinary and Pet Cemetery, Crown Crest Lane. Keep Your Beloved Pet For Life.
About half a mile beyond the back cornfield was a big house, veterinary office and pet cemetery owned by longtime bachelor Dane Thompson. Grace had told Tess that Dane’s widowed sister, Marva, who had lived in the area for years, had moved in with him not long ago. When Tess and her family left town, Marva Thompson Green had been trim and spry, very attractive. She’d been married to a small-field farmer. Tess remembered that Marva had cared for her and her sisters while her mother looked for a job after her father deserted them.
“Remember me, Teresa?” Marva called through the storm door when Tess opened the wooden one.
With a smile, she extended a coffee cake with pecans and brown-sugar glaze. It touched Tess to realize Cold Creek hospitality still ruled here. Yet she hesitated a moment before opening the storm door. Dane Thompson had been under suspicion off and on for her kidnapping. Obviously, nothing had come of the gossip about him.
“Hello, Mrs. Green,” Tess said as she opened the storm door. “How kind of you. Can you step in?”
“Why, surely will, for a spell. You’re looking pretty, though you could put a little weight on. All three of you Lockwood girls were pretty, you especially. Now that you’re all grown up, you call me Marva. I heard you’d be back soon from your cousin Lee. He did some work for us—built a new fence around the cemetery since kids are always messing with things there, and Halloween’s not far off. It’s usually not us they bother but the old mental health asylum over on West Hill Road. Sitting derelict, you know, so the kids from far and wide break in there and scare each other, leave graffiti, you know what I mean, Teresa.”
“I
