The Stillwater Girls(34)

The older girl freezes, still as a statue but eyes live and alert, and the younger one stares down at her lap.

I have a feeling their story won’t be for the faint of heart.

“Hi, girls,” Deputy May says in a voice as sweet as honey cakes. “Ms. Gideon here gave us a call because she wanted us to make sure you’re okay.”

The girls deposit their slow, watchful gazes in her direction, but their lips are sealed tight, as if they have no intention of speaking.

“Can you tell me what happened? How you got here?” the deputy asks with a friendly smile.

They say nothing.

“Are either of you hurt?” she asks.

I resist the urge to prompt them to say something. I’m not their mother. I’m simply the woman who answered the door and gave them food and water. They have no reason to do anything I tell them to do.

The dark-haired one reaches for a grape, examining it between her fingers.

“It’s okay,” the older one says. “You can eat it. We grew those one year, remember? Ours were purple.”

The deputy and I exchange looks.

The little one pops it into her mouth, chewing with intention, rolling it around on her tongue and reaching for a second one when she’s done.

“I understand you might be scared right now,” May says, her hands resting on her duty belt, “but we really want to help you, and we can’t do that unless you tell us what happened.”

“What are your names?” I ask, hoping desperately to break the ice. Flattening my palm against my chest, I say, “I’m Nicolette.”

My eyes lock with the older one. I have every reason to believe she’s not going to answer me, so I don’t push her.

“You can call me Nic if you’d like,” I add with a sweet smile.

The pause between us all lingers, and the sound of Deputy May drawing in a slow breath fills my ears.

“Wren,” the blonde girl says. “My name is Wren. And my sister’s name is Sage.”

So they are sisters . . .

Deputy May takes the chair across from them. “And how did you get here, girls?”

“We walked,” Wren says. “Can I take off my coat?”

“Of course,” I say.

She shrugs out of her threadbare jacket, revealing a pale nightdress drenched in sweat and clinging to her thin frame. I take the jacket from her, draping it over the back of a chair. The overwhelming scent of stale must fills the air.

“Where are you from?” the deputy asks. “Do you know your address?”

Wren squints and then blinks, as if she doesn’t understand the question.

“What about your parents?” Deputy May tilts her head. “Are they looking for you?”

Sage glances up at Wren, but Wren doesn’t flinch. “No.”

“Do you . . . do you have parents?” May asks, thin brows raised.

“We did,” Wren says, gaze flicking toward her plate.

For a moment, I’m convinced I’m dreaming because none of this seems real and none of it makes sense, but I take a seat beside the deputy and trust she knows what she’s doing, that she knows how to ask the questions in a way to get them to answer.

“Wren, I need to use the outhouse,” the little one whispers.

Outhouse?

May forces a hard breath through her nose as we exchange looks.

“I don’t have an outhouse,” I say with a pillow-soft apology, “but I have a bathroom. It’s like an outhouse but with running water and lights.” Rising, I add, “I’ll walk you there. It’s just down the hall.”

Sage looks to Wren, and Wren tells her it’s all right. A second later, I’m heading to the powder bath in the hall with the little coffee-eyed darling in tow.

Flicking on the light, I step out of the way, only Sage doesn’t enter. She stands, staring, her hands pressed against the doorframe.

“Have you ever used a bathroom like this before?” I ask.

She bites her bottom lip and shakes her head once, her eyes moving from the toilet to the faucet to the mirror and then to me.

Moving into the powder room, I lift the lid and say, “This is where you . . . relieve yourself.” Pointing to the chrome lever on the back of the tank, I say, “You push this when you’re done.”

I don’t want it to scare her, so I demonstrate, flushing a clean bowl of water and standing back as she watches it swirl around the white porcelain and disappear.

“When you’re finished, you wash your hands here.” I reach for the faucet handles, turning each one on and then off, and then I point to a white dispenser and the gray hand towel hanging on the bar to the left. “There’s your soap. You can dry your hands here when you’re done.”

“Th . . . thank you,” she says, hands folded across her tiny waist.

I step away and return to the kitchen, where Deputy May is walking away from the table, her hand pressed on her radio as she speaks into the mic.

Wren stares ahead, a blank look on her face, and May points me toward a vacant hallway.

“We’re going to take them to Mercy General,” she says when we’re out of Wren’s sight. “They’ll get a full medical workup, and we’ll have psych evaluate them. Child Protective Services is on their way as well.”