Bloodline(66)

Of course. Once they kill the boy, they murder the mother and burn any evidence. I must save Mariela. And her children.

The ones who are left.

Except the trucks don’t stop south of town. They veer east and keep driving straight past the dark trees, pop through the skin of Lilydale and into the real world. Soon, I can smell rich black ash burning and see soot rising in the air miles ahead. I drive toward the fire, all the way to Cold Spring. A barn is blazing on the edge of town. Fire trucks from the nearest municipalities are there fighting the roaring flames.

It has nothing to do with Lilydale.

I keep driving.

I could drive forever, I think. I could motor all the way to Siesta Key and never look back. I can raise this baby on my own. I’ll change my name. They’ll never be able to find me.

Except women like me don’t do that. We don’t start new lives. And I can’t leave, not if there’s a chance Angel is still alive.

Saint Cloud is ten miles ahead, Lilydale twenty miles behind. I keep driving all the way to Grover Tucker’s house, telling myself I’m buying time until I can figure out a plan. I find him in his lush backyard sitting in the shade, sipping lemonade.

“You got my message,” he says without getting up. “I wasn’t sure if your friend would pass it on.”

I step closer. I want to see his face. The shade is too dark, though. “What message?”

“I called Saturday morning. Said I had news for you.”

I glanced down at the sapphire on my ring finger. Saturday was the morning Deck proposed, just after the phone rang. That bastard is their puppet. “You heard about Angel Gomez disappearing?”

“I did, but that wasn’t what I called about.” He stands slowly. “Let’s step into the house.”

I follow him into his spotless kitchen, the light blue of the cabinets picking up the checkered pattern of the linoleum. He has lace curtains. I wonder if he was ever married.

There’s a pile of papers on the counter. I recognize the picture of Kris I left with him on top. Below that is a manila folder. He hands the stack of papers to me, his face lined and sorrowful, his eyes cloudy.

“He was telling you the truth about his name. It really is Kris Jefferson. Maybe where he’d been, too. The rest is a lie. His military papers and rap sheet are in the envelope. He’s two years too old to be Paulie.”

My throat is sticky. “Rap sheet?”

“Nothing too dark. Lifted some cars. Wrote a few bad checks. He’s a grifter and a drifter, but I don’t think dangerous.”

I know the answer to the question, more or less, but I ask anyway. “How’d he end up in Lilydale?”

Grover turns his hands palms up. “Who knows? He might of told you the truth of that, at least part of it. He heard about the missing boy. Had nothing better to do, so came north to see what he could make of it.”

That’s one possibility. There’s another one, though. If the Mill Street families hired a man to mug me so I’d be scared enough to move here, is it too much of a stretch to imagine they’d also hired a drifter to distract me until I gave birth, to flirt and give me a chance to play a reporter? I lean against the counter. I hate to think of myself as so vain, so easily diverted. “Don’t suppose you know who Paulie Aandeg’s father was?”

Grover shakes his head. “I’m trying to track down his birth certificate, but that’s turning out to be a lot more work than it should be. I have one last favor to call in, but the outcome doesn’t look good.”

My shoulders slump. “I’m scared.”

Grover’s face has been drooping, but it tightens up. I see the sheriff he must have been: commanding, smart. “It’s that damn town,” he says. “Is there anyone there you can trust?”

I think of Regina, and how she may have told Ronald that I’d spotted my mugger. I don’t tell him about her because I can’t even trust him. Lilydale has separated me from the herd and is coming in for the kill.

He reads my face. His own grows grim.

“Get out of that town,” he says. “Get out of there now.”





CHAPTER 51

I am going mad.

Really and truly, I am leaping out of my mind. I sense it as I drive home, grow certain of it as I return the Coronet keys to a furious Dennis, sink into it as I walk up my driveway and enter my house.

There is nowhere else to go.

Slow Henry bounces off the sofa, twines around my leg, purring.

His touch pulls me back to myself, just like it did after I was mugged.

I cradle the phone in my neck and dial Ursula’s number. Her Ansafone picks up. I glance at my watch. She must be at work. When the machine prompts me to leave a message, I let it all out. To hell with her thinking I’m insane. I have to tell her.

“Ursula, it’s Joan. I know you think I’m mad, but you need to listen. This is real. I must get out of Lilydale. Deck’s one of them. That’s not even the worst. I think they killed Paulie Aandeg. I think the men who run the town take advantage of the women and expect them to keep quiet, even when the women get pregnant. And now, they’ve stolen another child. Do you hear that Ursula? They steal kids!”

I am yelling so loud I almost don’t hear the click.

But I do. My flesh melts into my bones, and I groan.