Bloodline(10)

Whose bed?

Yes, the room. I recognize it. I’ve been here before, inside these bright walls. Slept here? Visited? Remembering this bedroom is vital.

The knowledge is almost there, but when I try to squeeze, it escapes like a slippery silver fish between my fingers. I can’t concentrate enough to hold it, not over the driving primal drumbeat of . . .

I am Joan Harken. I am a reporter. My baby is gone.

It doesn’t make a difference where I am.

I have to save my baby.

I’m overcome by a desperate thirst, and my breasts are so swollen with milk that the flesh threatens to split, and it doesn’t matter because I finally understand what I must do.

I begin to sit up, slowly, but even that small effort is too much. I fall back into the pillow, my world narrowing to a pinhole, one thought echoing down.

Don’t scream this time. You don’t want them to come.





CHAPTER 6

I’m whistling as I look around the sparkling interior of the Schmidt house.

Our house.

In the almost week since we moved to Lilydale, I’ve scoured the interior from top to bottom, with the exception of the dirt basement I still can’t bring myself to enter. The lovely avocado-colored Amana fridge required only a soapy scrub down and a crisp orange box of Arm & Hammer to freshen it up. Once I stripped the horrible flowered contact paper from the oak cupboards and scoured their fronts, they suddenly appeared modern, gleaming against the white countertops. I couldn’t do much with the mustard-yellow linoleum, cracked at the edges and worn in high-traffic areas, but a coat of tangerine paint on the walls and the white lace curtains I discovered in a box in the corner of the attic have brightened the room immeasurably. Plus, the paint killed the musty odor I first noticed upon entering the house.

I also bought a can of paint remover at the downtown Ace Hardware and discovered, to my boundless delight, glorious maple crown molding in the dining room beneath the rust-colored paint that has covered it since the ’40s, according to Deck. He encourages my puttering. I love that he doesn’t mind me overhauling his childhood home, though he drew the line at me removing the hideous red-and-gold wallpaper in our bedroom.

He’ll come around.

In the meantime, I have plenty enough work to do chiseling through the paint sealing the windows shut and airing out the upstairs. I wouldn’t mind a full bathroom on the second floor—ours has only a sink and toilet—and once I’m working full-time at the newspaper, we should be able to afford it.

When I mention this to Deck, he frowns. “But you’re working constantly,” he says, indicating the dining room, which does look beautiful with the newly revealed crown molding.

His expression throws me off. I take his hand across the table, fumbling to explain something I assumed was a given. “When we decided to move here, you said I’d be able to work at the paper. I was full-time when we lived in Minneapolis.”

We’re eating dinner, one of a dozen casseroles that’s been dropped off since we moved in. Our freezer is at capacity, yet the women keep showing up with their hot dishes, like Lilydale is a regular old Mayfield and I’m June Cleaver. I’ve named this one Soothing Stomach Stew: rice, hamburger, onion, and cream of mushroom soup, all stirred together beneath a crushed potato chip topping. A few nights ago, we ate a nearly identical hot dish topped with cheese.

Deck cradles my hand. “Sure, but you didn’t have a baby then. Keeping a home is its own job. I’ve never seen you work so hard. Now let’s stop talking about the newspaper for tonight. I’m tired.”

He said the same thing last night and the night before. But I swallow the spike of resentment right along with the salty hot dish, both of them thudding in my belly. I smile to mask my discomfort and try a different tack. I must relax him so I can convince him to let me work. I didn’t need his approval in Minneapolis, but here . . . he’s made clear the paper won’t hire me without his and Ronald’s endorsement. Said that’s just how small towns work.

“I had a lovely conversation with Dorothy next door,” I lie, smiling even wider, so wide that my lips creak. “Such a gracious lady.”

Deck’s shoulders relax. Good. I can come at this sideways. “I so much love living here,” I continue. “It’s everything you promised, so calm.”

Here it comes, the question that will allow me to lead him back to talking about the newspaper. “Why, I bet there hasn’t been a single crime ever committed here, not a dangerous one, just like you promised, not one that would put a reporter in danger. Has there been?”

His face puckers for a moment and then relaxes. “I suppose the Paulie Aandeg kidnapping is the closest thing to news we’ve had.”

The room shrinks and my breath expands. I didn’t expect such a powerful answer. A real story. “Paulie Aandeg?”

“He disappeared on his first day of kindergarten.”

“When was that?”

He glances at his wristwatch as if it might tell the story. “Decades ago.”

Disappointment settles like a gray scarf over my shoulders. Any story there has already been told. “They never found him?”

“Never,” Deck says, patting my hand. “But don’t you worry. There’s always news to cover, and Dad and I’ll get you a spot at the Gazette real soon.”