Southern Storm

by Terri Blackstock

  Sadie stirred, and Caleb began to pat on her bottom, trying to wake her up. She turned over and squinted her eyes open, saw Caleb and smiled. “Hey, Bud,” she said. “What are you doing here?”

  He laughed aloud and crawled up to her face, planted a kiss on her cheek. Sadie seemed to remember the night before, and she sat up in bed and squinted up at Morgan. “I thought you were at the hospital.”

  “Karen had her baby,” Morgan said. “It was a boy.”

  “Great. Everything okay?”

  “Yeah,” Morgan said. “She’s resting, so I decided to come home for a little while.”

  Sadie rubbed her eyes, shoved her hair back from her face. “Morgan, I’m so sorry about last night.”

  Caleb slid off the bed and toddled to Sadie’s dresser.

  Sighing, Morgan pulled a chair out from under her desk and sat down facing her. “What happened, Sadie? Talk to me.”

  Sadie got up and directed Caleb to the blocks she kept on her closet floor. “Trevor just asked me to meet him on the beach, and we went for a walk. It wasn’t going to be any big deal. But his friends were having a party, and we went to it, and when we got there Crystal Lewis told me he was only with me for one reason, and I got so tense and upset . . . then he brought me this drink. I was embarrassed to throw it out in front of these people who already hated me, so I drank it. I didn’t intend to drink anymore after that, Morgan. I was just going to have that one, and then I was going to find some excuse to leave and go home.” She started to cry. “I don’t know what happened. That first drink relaxed me so much that I didn’t remember what I’d planned to do. When he brought me a second one, I drank it, too. And then there was a third . . .” She wiped the tears from her face. “I lost count after that.”

  “Sadie, do you understand now why we didn’t want you going out with that boy?”

  “Not really,” Sadie said. “He’s nice. He likes me, and he’s the only one who does. He’s kind of like the gatekeeper, you know? I can make friends through him, and finally become a part of the people on this island.”

  “You are a part of the people on this island. You’re a part of our family.”

  Sadie sat down next to Caleb on the floor. “I know, Morgan.

  But that’s not enough. I need friends my own age.”

  Morgan shook her head. “But Sadie, when a guy inspires you to lie to your parents and sneak out and get drunk, he’s not good for you. And I’m not so sure that Crystal wasn’t right about what he wanted.”

  “He’s not like that.” But Sadie’s denial was weak. “Man, my head hurts. I’m just like my mom. Nursing a hangover and apologizing about the night before . . .”

  “You’re not like that,” Morgan said. “This was a one-time thing. I’ll fix you some breakfast and give you some aspirin or something. But you are going to church. We’re not going to tolerate having you party on Saturday night and then be in no shape to worship the next day. That’s not how it works around here.”

  “I know.”

  Morgan took Caleb downstairs and, fighting her aching fatigue, began cooking the eggs and bacon she normally cooked on Sunday mornings. After a few minutes, Sadie came down and took her seat at the table.

  Jonathan came in and gave her a look. “So how do you feel?”

  She shrugged. “Head’s killing me.”

  He sat down beside her. “Sadie, who was at that party last night?”

  “Nobody you know.”

  “How can you say that?” he asked. “I’ve lived on this island for most of my life. I know everybody here. Were they kids from your school?”

  “A few.”

  “College kids?” Jonathan asked.

  “I don’t know how old they were.”

  Morgan shot Jonathan a look. “But they were drinking and they served alcohol to a minor?” he asked.

  “They didn’t serve it to me,” she said. “It was just punch. I didn’t know—”

  “You didn’t know it was alcoholic?” Jonathan asked.

  “Well, okay, I did know, but—”

  Morgan moved the frying pan from the stove. “Sadie, I don’t know what to do. I’m new at having a teenager in the house. I don’t know whether I’m supposed to ground you or what.”

  Sadie just looked up at her miserably. “Ground me from what? I never go anywhere.”

  Morgan knew she had a point.

  “I want to do something effective, honey. I want to make sure that you don’t make mistakes that will ruin your life. Sadie, you’re stronger than that. You have more character. This is not what I’d expect of the girl who got away from Jack Dent and took care of herself on the beach for days with a broken arm.”

  Sadie sat back in her chair. Morgan saw the pain in her face, and her heart ached for her. She couldn’t seem to work up any anger toward her.

  Morgan came to the table and leaned over her. “Sadie, I have high hopes for you. I want you to go to college, do something with your life. I pray every night that someday you’ll meet a wonderful godly man who will be your husband, that you’ll have a family of your own, and that all the things in your past will be redeemed. I pray that for you. But if you start down this path, Sadie, none of that is going to happen.”

  Sadie started to cry again. “It’s not a path. I’m not on a path, Morgan. I just made some mistakes last night. I won’t do it again.”

  Morgan hugged her. When she let her go, she sat down next to her.

  Sadie had trouble looking at her. “I’m so ashamed. I never thought I’d do something so stupid. It’s like throwing all the good things you’ve done for me back in your faces, and I didn’t mean to do that. I really didn’t.”

  “You don’t owe us anything,” Jonathan said. “Nothing at all. We took you in because we love you. And we expect you to obey us because you love us.”

  “It was just one night,” Sadie said. “I really won’t do it again.”

  Morgan wiped the tears off of the girl’s wet cheek. Then she did what her mother would have done. She got up from the table and, with her spatula, dipped out some scrambled eggs and a couple of pieces of bacon and put them on a plate for Sadie. “Here. Eat this. It’ll make you feel better.”

  “I don’t know if I can eat.” Sadie looked up at Jonathan. “Are you going to ground me?”

  “Honey, I don’t know what we’re going to do,” Jonathan said. “I need some time to pray about this, whether to ground you or take away privileges or what. But just know that whatever comes is because we love you.”

  “I know.” She stared down at her plate and finally pushed it away. “I’ll eat something later.” She got up and started back up the stairs. “I have to get dressed for church. I’ll be down in a minute.”

  Morgan watched her retreat up the stairs. Finally, she turned back to her husband. “Jonathan, what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s just a phase. Maybe it won’t happen again.” He got up and pulled her close. “You look so tired. Why don’t you stay home from church?”

  She sighed. “I thought about it. But I just feel like I need to worship this morning. With Cade missing, and Sadie . . . I’ll sleep later before I go back to the hospital.”

  As Morgan went to get Caleb and herself ready for church, she prayed that this thing with Sadie was an end, and not a beginning.

  CHAPTER 35

  Cade emerged from a shallow sleep. His throat felt on fire again, so he reached for the empty bottle beside him and looked over at the toilet tank. If he could just get there again, relieve himself, take clean water from the tank . . .

  He moved his legs over the side of the bed, gritting his teeth against the pain. Without putting his weight on his wounded leg, he stood up. He managed to make his way over, groaning with the pain incited by each movement. He relieved himself, flushed, then dunked the bottle into the tank of clean water and drank some of it.

  He leaned against the wall and looked around the room. There must be something he could use t
o overpower Ann Clark the next time she came in. But it wasn’t just her he was dealing with. There was someone else, someone he hadn’t seen, the one who had shot him from the top of the stairs. Even if he bested Ann, he’d have to contend with that other person if he tried to get away.

  This time they’d kill him for sure.

  He couldn’t imagine why they hadn’t finished the job by now. She had already stated her intention to kill him. But he still had a use to her, she’d said. He was their scapegoat, but for what?

  He made his way back to the bed and dropped down on it, exhausted from the short journey across the room. Carefully, he set his leg back on the bed. She hadn’t changed his sheets. They were still bloody and smelled of decay.

  “Help me, Lord,” he whispered. “Please help me.”

  He had to find something he could use as a weapon. He couldn’t just lie here and do nothing. He looked around the room and saw the bare beams against the tar paper in the wall. Maybe he would be able to break one of the beams free. He began to hit on the one closest to his bed with the heel of his hand, trying to loosen it, but it didn’t budge, and each effort shot pain through his side, cutting each nerve ending like a scalpel, making him want to scream out in agony. But he had to think . . . he had to stay focused.

  He began to quote Psalm 6 again, praying God’s Word back to him and trusting from the depth of his heart that the Lord had heard.

  CHAPTER 36

  Blair yawned as she crossed the Islands Expressway back onto Tybee Island. She had spent the night staked out in her car down from Ann Clark’s house but hadn’t seen anything that gave her clues about Cade’s whereabouts.

  Instead of going home when she reached Cape Refuge, she went to Cricket’s and pulled into the space next to Cade’s truck. It had been parked here for six days now. Six days! Where in the world was he?

  She got out of the car, opened the passenger door, and slipped into the driver’s seat. On the passenger seat she saw a box of breath mints, a small New Testament, and a couple of ATM slips. A windbreaker hung on the hook behind her head. She unhooked it and brought it to her nose, breathing in his scent. It smelled like wind and sea air and the soap he used.

  She sat in his driver’s seat, clutching the jacket to her chest and staring out the window to the activity on the dock.

  Behind her, she heard the singing from the warehouse church her parents had led for years and where Jonathan and Morgan were now presiding, since they hadn’t been able to find a permanent preacher. The parking lot was full.

  The chorus of “Be Thou My Vision” floated over the wind. It had been one of her mother’s favorites. She’d sung it herself dozens of times as a child, sitting on the front pew in that very building with her father preaching and her mother playing piano. Around her, she had always been aware of the misfits and outcasts, those who’d come in from the sea and those who were just passing through. . . .

  But it wasn’t just those who had no place to go who came to church in that little warehouse. Islanders who could have gone to church anywhere came to worship there and considered it their church home.

  Cade was among them. If he were here today, he’d be in that building, sitting on his favorite pew, raising his hands to the Lord he believed in, and worshiping with his whole heart and soul.

  She hung his jacket back up and got out of the truck. The breeze blew through her hair as the song continued, and she thought about the prayer she’d breathed the other night in her yard. The prayer for Cade. If there was a God to hear it, she didn’t know why he’d pay any heed to her, not when she’d been so blatantly defiant about her parents’ religion. She had grown to hate the church and, somewhere during her college years, had decided to stop going.

  Now she would give anything to be within those walls, singing that song led by her mother and soaking up the wisdom her father imparted.

  That was never to be again.

  But the longing was still there, to go into that building where she’d spent so many Sundays of her childhood. She felt that yearning to sit among those people who believed in a God who answered prayers. Maybe if she did, she could get them to understand the urgency of praying for Cade. Maybe then something would break and he would be found.

  But she couldn’t go in there. It would be hypocrisy, sitting in a church pretending to worship when you didn’t believe a word of what you were hearing or singing. Instead, she turned to Cricket’s. How many times had she gravitated here on Sunday morning only to sit inside the dirty little restaurant and listen to the music pouring from the windows of the building next door?

  She could do it again today, but she didn’t want to. She wanted to go to the church.

  Maybe she did believe . . . just a little.

  Quietly, she crossed the boardwalk and made her way around to the front of the building. Her parents’ murder came back to her, their blood on the floor, their bodies lying there while the police investigated the scene.

  She stood at the front door before going in, put her hand over her chest, and tried to breathe deeply. There were good memories here too. Mostly good ones, if the truth were known. And if Morgan and Jonathan had been able to clean up the stains of their parents’ murder and come back to this building to worship each week, then she should be able to do the same.

  The song ended and she waited a moment. She heard Jonathan’s voice and knew he must be praying. Then the piano started up again, and they started to sing “The Old Rugged Cross.” Finally, she opened the door and stepped inside.

  The building was full, nothing like she remembered. From somewhere Jonathan had gotten extra pews and had put them in four rows of five pews each. He’d moved the pulpit that her father used to stand behind, and now it was more in the center of the room. Morgan sat at the piano playing the songs that they had known since they were children. Sadie sat on the second row, holding Caleb.

  Jonathan had had the room air-conditioned, and Blair suspected that was why so many of the sailors coming in from the sea filed in here. It probably had nothing to do with worship, she thought. They were just trying to get cool. To her, it seemed like manipulation.

  She slipped into a back pew, hoping to be unnoticed, but the moment the song ended and they sat down, Jonathan met her eyes. She saw him look over at Morgan, and Morgan’s face erupted into a smile.

  Don’t get your hopes up, Blair told them with her eyes. I’m not here to convert.

  But she wasn’t sure why she had come. She couldn’t have explained it if she had tried, but as Jonathan began to preach she felt an overpowering sense of nostalgia. She would have never figured him for a preacher, yet he had learned well from her father.

  She closed her eyes, and tears pinched through her eyelashes at the memory of her parents filling up this room, their spirits and souls so big that everyone who came in felt as if they’d been hugged—whether they really had or not. Oh, she missed those hugs.

  She swallowed and looked around at the faces of those who had meant so much to her family. Cade should be here, she thought, sitting on that second row in the middle. He might have gotten up to lead a prayer or pass the plate for the offering.

  Jonathan read from the parable about the shepherd leaving his ninety-nine sheep to look for the one. She wondered if God would do that for Cade—or if Jonathan considered her the one lost sheep in this group. As her mind worked on the implications of that story, Jonathan closed out the sermon. He led the group in a prayer for Cade’s safety, for his health, for him to be found, or for him to return from wherever he’d been. She found hope in that. There was supposed to be power in the prayers of groups. Her parents had quoted the two-or-more Scripture so many times.

  Maybe she didn’t have to rely on her own meager prayers to reach the ears of God if he really did exist. Maybe he would hear the prayers of these righteous people and deliver Cade from wherever he was.

  When the sermon ended, Morgan led them in “Love Lifted Me.” Blair didn’t sing along. Instead, she slipped ou
t of her pew and out the front door. She could still hear the voices singing the song as she went to her car.

  CHAPTER 37

  While everyone napped after church, Jonathan paced in the office, a million frustrations whirling through his mind. Another day—and Cade was still missing.

  Why wasn’t there an all-out hunt for him?

  He decided to go to the police station and see what was being done. Then he could decide how he could be involved.

  He found Joe sitting at Cade’s desk, poring over lab reports, looking even more exhausted than Morgan. “Hey,” Jonathan said. “Got a minute?”

  Joe nodded and rubbed his eyes. “Come on in.”

  Jonathan dropped down into the chair across from the desk and set his elbows on his knees. “It’s been six days, Joe. What are you doing about Cade?”

  “Everything I know to do.” Joe leaned back in the chair. “I decided to turn his house into a crime scene. We searched it last night, but I don’t think it turned up any leads. Today I’m going to have his truck moved from Cricket’s so we can search it more thoroughly.”

  “Can’t you do a full search of Ann Clark’s house?”

  “I wish. But I’ve still got to have more evidence to establish probable cause. I’ve finally got the Savannah Police Department looking for Cade too, but it’s taken a few days to convince everybody he’s really disappeared. And the letter didn’t help. People who don’t know him are inclined to think it’s real.” He rocked forward and set his jaw on his fist.

  Jonathan let out a long sigh and shook his head. “What can I do, Joe? I feel like I’m letting him down, just sitting here doing nothing.”

  “Let the police do it, Jonathan. We have the resources and the training.”

  “Come on,” Jonathan said. “You may be trained, but half the force is under twenty-five. They don’t have the experience to solve something like this.”

  “It’s not just us. Cops in other jurisdictions are looking, Jonathan. He’s one of our own. We’re not going to let it rest.”