Love Finds You in Sugarcreek, Ohio

by Serena B. Miller

  In spite of her own hurt and her aunts’ ruined work frolic, the main thing on her mind was how alone Joe must feel right now. And how afraid Bobby must be. His little-boy sobs still echoed in her heart.

  She cast around in her mind for a clue as to who might have tipped off the press. The only person she could think of was Kim Whitfield. She’d been a fool to give Kim all that information…a fool for having confided in the girl about her suspicions concerning Joe. Obviously, Kim had done the research and figured it out. Unfortunately, she had also chosen to share her discovery with the world.

  It was a five-minute drive to her house, her gun, her uniform, and her squad car.

  She made it in three.

  Stephanie was sitting at the kitchen table buttering a stack of toast when Rachel burst in.

  “We need more bread,” Stephanie said. Then she looked up. “You’re home awful early. Did you forget something?”

  Rachel took in the scene at a glance. In addition to the toast sitting on the table, there was a stack of magazines beside the plate.

  She strode over to the table and scanned the top one. It was the most recent issue of the People magazines she had carried out of the library. And along with the others, it had been tucked away on the top shelf of her closet.

  “Where did you get these?” she demanded.

  “Your bedroom,” Stephanie answered. “I was looking for some clothes—I thought maybe you’d have something that would fit.” She took a bite of toast. “You don’t have much for me to work with, you know. You should shop more, Rachel.”

  Rachel ignored Stephanie’s rudeness and focused on the problem at hand. “How long have you had these?”

  “What? These? They’re just magazines.”

  In spite of Stephanie’s attempt to look innocent, Rachel saw that she was hiding something.

  “There are about thirty reporters camped out on Joe’s front yard. Do you know anything about that?”

  Stephanie turned the pages of the top magazine, her eyes cast down. “I might.”

  Rachel grasped Stephanie’s jaw in her hand and forced her to look at her.

  “What did you do?”

  Stephanie wrenched her face away, scattering toast crumbs across the table. “I made a phone call. I got a baby girl inside of me, Rachel! You keep telling me I need to be thinking about how to take care of her.”

  “What does that have to do with Joe and Bobby?”

  Stephanie opened the pages to a picture of Joe where he hadn’t shaved for a couple of days. Although there was only a shadow of beard, it was enough to tip someone off if they looked hard enough.

  “I was bored. Then I saw this stack of magazines in your bedroom. I love People magazine, but the only ones you had was of that baseball player everyone was talking about and trying to find. I knew right away it was Joe. I figured there might be some money in a good tip like that, so I called the National Enquirer. I was right. They were very interested.”

  “How did you even know how to get in touch with them?” She was appalled. The National Enquirer?

  “Did you ever hear of the Internet, Rachel?” Stephanie rolled her eyes. “I surfed around on your computer. The Enquirer said they’d pay for ‘good stories and juicy tips about celebrities.’ I figured this was as good a story and as juicy a tip as I was ever going to get.”

  Unconcerned about the lives she’d just destroyed, Stephanie calmly slathered strawberry jam on her toast and took a bite.

  There were a half dozen things Rachel wanted to say—but now was not the time. Instead, she abruptly left Stephanie to her toast and magazines and went into her bedroom to suit up. After a couple phone calls, she donned her uniform, loaded her gun and her utility belt, clipped it around her waist, grabbed her hat, and slammed out of the house.

  Joe might never trust her again, but she could at least keep the press from beating down his door.

  Bobby sat in the middle of his bed, sniffling, while Joe packed the duffel bag. In the bottom of the bag was some money he had gleaned from the books in Abraham’s library.

  Rifling through the old man’s books had made him feel like a thief, but he knew that no matter what, he’d pay it back. With interest.

  His plan was to wait out the rest of the day and then leave in the middle of the night while the reporters, hopefully, were half asleep.

  Getting to his truck and then out on the road was going to be difficult. It was blocked by one of the news vans. He would have to drive through the yard. He had little hope of getting away undetected, but the least he could do was lead the newshounds away from the gentle women who had taken him in. The three aunts did not need to have this happen to them.

  He ached to think of how their little work frolic had been destroyed—all because of him. They were undoubtedly disappointed. He was disappointed too.

  Now he would never get to smooth fresh paint over the boards he had so painstakingly prepared. He had looked forward to working alongside Eli’s sons and the others. He had looked forward to sharing food and camaraderie at the long table he had helped set up in the backyard. Laughing. Talking. Working beside friends while his son tumbled about, playing with the other children.

  Rachel and the newspeople had stolen this from him.

  The only thing left to do now was to go back to LA, dragging a tail of reporters behind him. He would hole up at his house again. Give the interviews Henrietta would schedule. Find a good shrink for his son.

  “It’ll be all right, buddy.” He tried to reassure his little boy in spite of his own heartbreak. “Daddy will take care of you. We’ll have an adventure.”

  “Don’t want ’venture.” Bobby sniffed. “Want Anna and Lydia and Bertha and Rachel and Gracie.”

  “I know. We’ll come back someday, after this is all over—when the people out in the yard go away.”

  “Those people are bad.” Bobby curled into a ball, and his thumb went into his mouth.

  “They aren’t bad. They’re just doing their job.” Joe lifted his son onto his lap and wiped away the tears that streaked down his little cheeks.

  He hated Rachel for what she’d done to them.

  Outside Bobby’s bedroom, he noticed a flashing colored light falling faintly on the hallway wall. He went to investigate. In the living room, blue-and-white flashing lights filtered through the new blinds he had installed.

  He lifted one of the slats a fraction of an inch and quickly inhaled. Rachel had pulled her squad car directly onto his front lawn, parallel to the porch, blocking access to his house. She had changed into her uniform and was standing in front of the driver’s door—her feet planted wide and a shotgun held loosely at her side. He couldn’t hear what she was saying, but even from where he was watching, it was obvious that she had drawn an imaginary line in front of his house and was daring anyone to cross over it.

  His heart turned over at the sight of her. She’d said she had his back. Now she was guarding his house. Could he have been wrong in accusing her of alerting them?

  The reporters were slowly backing off the lawn, but they stopped at the aunts’ property line. They still lined the road.

  He didn’t know who had called the media, but it hit him with full force that Rachel couldn’t possibly have done so. It simply was not in her. The woman was no liar. If she said she had told no one—he knew she told the truth.

  And he had shoved her out the door.

  And she had come back to try to protect him anyway.

  His heart ached with the sight of her, so valiant, so ready to do battle.

  Except there was little she could do. He had dealt with publicity most of his adult life. The newspeople would never give up—not as long as there was a story. The fact that he had been able to slip away from them once had been nothing less than a miracle.

  At that moment, he heard a knock at the back door. Probably another reporter—one who had been willing to make his way through the tangle of the aunts’ rose garden. He opened the door a crack and was
shocked to see Eli standing there with clothes draped over his arm.

  “You are having druvvel—trouble—again?”

  Joe pulled the old man inside. “Just a little.”

  “It is best you leave now, Rachel says.” Eli shoved the clothing into his hands. “Today you become an Amishman—for a while.”

  Joe was dumbfounded. “I do?”

  “Put these on. Both you and the boy. The hats too. We have much to do. Our Rachel has a plan.”

  Rachel’s plan, whatever it was, had to be better than trying to shove his way out to the truck.

  Eli watched out the blinds at the front window as Joe stripped and jerked on the Amish clothes. His fingers fumbled with the buttoned flap in front. Bobby, after being dressed in some of Eli’s grandson’s clothing, became fascinated with the image of himself in the mirror.

  Eli looked Joe up and down and grinned. “My son’s clothes are too short for you, but we have to fool those Englischers out there only for a little bit.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  Eli peeked out at his horse and buggy. “We go to my house now.”

  “They’ll see us.”

  “They will see two Amishmen who came for the work frolic and are disappointed that it was cancelled by the presence of rude Englisch reporters. Bobby, you will get behind the seat and hide like a good boy. Joe, put whatever bags you have in the back of the buggy with him. I will keep the flaps down so they will see little.”

  Joe positioned Bobby in the back and climbed in. With Rachel arguing with reporters and providing a distraction, Eli drove the buggy out from behind the house.

  “Keep your head down, Bobby,” Eli commanded. “Joe, hold the hat over your face.”

  Reporters tried to block the buggy.

  “Out of my way! Go home! Go home!” Eli shouted. “Ich huf seliau camera fleght zu schtickau!”

  It was the most Pennsylvania Dutch Joe had ever heard Eli speak. He had no idea what the old man had said, but the string of guttural German didn’t sound at all like the gentle Amishman Joe thought he knew.

  Even though they backed away, the reporters did try to snap pictures. Following Eli’s cue, Joe covered his face with his hat—a frequent Amish response to the despised photographs—as they trotted down the road and toward the sanctuary of Eli’s farm.

  When they had gone a safe distance, Joe turned around. To his relief, he saw that they had not been followed. The reporters were still mistakenly back at the daadi haus, exchanging heated words with Rachel.

  “What in the world did you say to them back there?” Joe asked.

  “You don’t want to know,” Eli said. “I am ashamed. I lost control of my tongue.”

  “Was that cursing?”

  “I did not curse, but I did tell them that I hoped their cameras would fly to pieces.” Eli hung his head. “I considered mentioning the similarity between their faces and my billy goat’s, but I restrained myself. It was a great temptation.”

  Joe roared with laughter and threw an arm around the old man’s shoulders.

  Eli looked stunned. He scooted to the far edge of his seat, putting as much space between himself and Joe as possible—apparently fearful that Joe might be overcome with an overwhelming Englisch need to hug.

  As Eli brought the buggy to a stop in his own backyard, a silver blue Mustang pulled up. Rachel’s car.

  For a moment, Joe’s heart leaped. He would get a chance to apologize. Then he realized that Rachel was still back at the daadi haus. A tall young woman with auburn hair, dressed in the uniform of a Sugarcreek cop, unfolded herself from the low-slung vehicle.

  “My name is Kim Whitfield.” She held out her hand. “I work with Rachel. You must be Joe.”

  “I am.”

  “Sorry about all that’s happened today. Rachel asked me to pack her car for you. There’s an untraceable cell phone and a car seat for Bobby. There’s also enough money in the glove compartment to rent a room for a few nights. She advises you to go now, while she has the reporters distracted. Here are the keys. If you don’t mind me saying so, there’s a limit on how long they’ll be content to take pictures of her. You’d better take off.”

  Wordlessly, Joe grabbed their duffel bag out of the buggy and threw it onto the Mustang’s floor. As he buckled Bobby into the child’s booster seat Rachel had never removed, Kim made one more comment.

  “Rachel said to tell you it was Stephanie who called the press. The girl figured it out from some old magazines Rachel had in her closet that had you on the front cover. She said she’d appreciate it if you’d try to forgive her for being so stupid as to leave them there with a nosy teenager around.”

  “Tell her thanks, and I’ll call her later.”

  “I’m sure she’d like that,” Kim said.

  Joe handed the two hats back to Eli. “I’ll get your son’s clothes back to you as soon as I can,” he said.

  “There is no hurry. We Amish do not lack for handmade clothing and hats.” Eli smiled. “May Gott go with you, my friend.”

  “And with you, Eli.”

  With everything in him, he hoped this would not be the last time he ever saw the old man.

  “Drive the speed limit and be careful,” Kim reminded him. “Remember, you still don’t have a driver’s license. We don’t want you to get picked up.”

  “I’ll be careful,” Joe said.

  As he drove away, he found himself newly amazed at Rachel. Instead of dissolving into tears because of his angry words, as Grace would have done, she had quickly and efficiently gone into action to extricate him and his son from a bad situation.

  His first impression of Rachel had been an accurate one. Rachel was indeed a fighter. The question he had to ask himself was—with a woman like that by his side, why in the world was he running?

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “Thanks, Aaron.” Joe set his duffel bag on the floor and looked around at the hunting cabin. “This is…great.”

  “Are you sure?” Aaron shoved his glasses up the bridge of his nose, an action Joe remembered from college as a barometer of Aaron’s nervousness.

  Who wouldn’t be nervous, with him and Bobby showing up out of the blue and asking for sanctuary?

  His old college roommate had not inquired about, and Joe had been too tired to explain, the unusual clothing he and Bobby were wearing. That was typical of Aaron. He accepted everyone without question exactly as they were. Whether that was from compassion or disinterest, Joe had never decided. He supposed Aaron figured that if Joe felt the need to dress like an Amishman, there must be a reasonable explanation.

  They had been close friends at one time, and college roommates for two years. Aaron had taken his Bible classes seriously.

  Joe had not.

  Aaron had tried to keep in touch, even after Joe’s star on the pro baseball circuit had begun to rise.

  Joe had not.

  At the time, he’d had more exciting friends to hang out with than earnest old Aaron, who was stuck in West Virginia trying to eke out a living from a little gospel bookstore.

  Aaron had contacted him directly after Grace’s death, when the storm of public intrusion had been at its peak, and had once again offered Joe the use of the empty hunting cabin he had inherited from his grandfather, along with a solemn promise of privacy.

  It was all that Aaron had to give, and he offered it freely.

  Deep down, Joe realized he had been slowly working his way to Aaron ever since they’d left LA. His old nerdy friend and Aaron’s wife, Deborah, were Christians down to the marrow of their bones. Because of this, Joe felt he could trust them.

  Aaron’s nervousness now took the form of taking his glasses off and polishing them furiously. “If I’d had any idea you were coming, I would have gotten it in better shape.” He shoved the glasses back onto his nose.

  “It’s fine—just the way it is.”

  With cobwebs on the ceiling, mice droppings on the floor, and an abandoned bird’s nest in the corner
.

  With nostalgia, Joe thought back to the clean, orderly daadi haus in which he had awakened with such hope only this morning.

  “I’ll come back tomorrow and help you get it in better shape,” Aaron promised.

  “Really, Aaron, it’s fine.” Joe tried to keep the exhaustion from his voice, but he was dead on his feet. “The only other thing I need from you is a promise that you won’t tell anyone we’re here.”

  “We won’t.” Aaron blinked a couple of times. “But wouldn’t Bobby rather sleep at our house tonight? There’s an extra cot in our little boy’s room.”

  Bobby had cried half of the way here.

  “I doubt he would be willing to do that,” Joe said. “But thanks for asking.”

  “It can get pretty cold up here in October.” Aaron rubbed his arms. “If you need it, there’s wood stacked outside, some kindling in the box beside the fireplace, and dry matches in that jar on the mantelpiece.”

  As much as Joe appreciated what his friend was doing for him, feeling like a refugee was even more infuriating after experiencing the respite of the daadi haus and his small circle of Sugarcreek friends. He didn’t want to be here.

  He was running. Again.

  He hated it.

  He despised what fame had stolen from him and his family. It had come upon him one ball game at a time, one fan at a time. He hadn’t awakened one morning suddenly being unable to shop for his own groceries without being accosted for autographs. Fame had grown slowly, the inconveniences offset by the riches he thought he had wanted.

  Regaining his anonymity for these past few months had convinced him that the price fame had exacted wasn’t worth it. Life as a regular guy was sweet in Sugarcreek. Having tasted that sweetness, all he really wanted now was the freedom to live in that small town, where a handful of people truly cared about him. Him—not the legend.

  He had fantasized about coaching Bobby’s little league team someday and having pizza with the other dads. He wanted to be able to go to a parent-teacher conference and have a teacher feel free to scold him, if necessary, over his child’s behavior. He wanted to go to church and help pass communion without people whispering about him and pointing as he did so.