by Camille Eide
How far was Juniper Valley from Portland? He could deal with that after he wrapped up his work with Janet. All he needed to do now was add a few days to his trip and then ring Grace’s house to let them know when he would arrive. He would meet with the old woman face to face.
Ian stopped pacing, took a cleansing breath, and blasted it out.
Something wasn’t right. There was another reason for the refusal. Emily’s wording was too polite, as if she were hiding something. The letters he’d exchanged with these women for the past two years proved Grace wanted to come home—that was a dead cert. He could see the white-haired pair reading his latest missive over their tea, a homesick Grace blethering about the virtues of her homeland to her kind ,old friend.
Could he have been wrong about his great-aunt? Perhaps her polite companion had been “editing” Grace the same way Ian had “edited” Maggie. Maybe in truth, Grace was as stubborn as her sister. Or more stubborn, if such a frightful thing was possible. What would a meeting with such a woman accomplish?
The thing to do was catch Aunt Grace by surprise. That way neither she nor her companion would have time to come up with any more polite excuses or refuse to see him.
He scanned the letter again, but the sound of a sputtering motor and grinding gears followed by rubber skidding across dirt snapped his attention to the bedroom window.
What in the—He pushed back the curtain, held his breath, and listened.
No. She could not have found the key.
But as he watched the circular drive below, the green, weathered farm truck lurched past.
With Maggie at the wheel.
Ian flew down the stairs, burst out the front door, and raced down the walkway. By the time he spotted Maggie again, she was more than twenty metres away.
The brake lights didn’t even flicker as the truck swerved down the drive.
“Maggie, stop!” Bolting into a dead sprint, Ian picked up speed on the downhill slope.
The truck continued but moved slowly enough that he was able to narrow the gap. At the rate she was going, he could still catch the little fugitive at the bottom of the drive where it met Craig’s Hill Road.
But when the truck reached the intersection, it pitched sharply to the right without slowing and continued on.
“Stop!” He had no idea how Maggie kept the truck on the road, but she did.
Apparently, she was headed for town.
He rounded the corner, feet pounding the packed dirt.
The bridge spanning Dumhnally Burn loomed ahead, but Maggie was far more likely to miss the narrow bridge than she was to cross it. Which meant she was going to tumble off the bank and toss herself and the old truck into the burn.
Chest pounding, he kicked out longer strides. Yelling was pointless.
The truck lumbered along.
Ian focused all his energy on the driver’s door on the right. He caught up and worked to keep a steady pace alongside. With one hand, he latched onto the door handle, and with the other, he grasped the window frame. Mid-run, he sprang and pulled himself up onto the running board.
Maggie grunted. The truck bounced over a bump and she jerked the wheel to the left.
“Maggie, don’t—” Ian’s grasp on the handle slipped. Grabbing the window frame with both hands, he steadied himself, then reached through and took hold of the steering wheel.
The truck bounced over grassy mounds at the left edge of the road, knocking his hand away.
He reached again and yanked the wheel right, back toward the road. “Stop the truck, Maggie. Now!”
“No!”
The bridge loomed closer. The truck drifted off the left edge of the road again and bounced into the grass.
Maggie corrected hard to the right, throwing Ian off balance.
His foot slipped. He clung to the window frame with one hand, grasped the edge of the truck bed with the other, and held on.
Her correction shot them too far. The truck bounded off the right side of the road, bouncing over clumps and grassy mounds, and headed straight for the bank.
God, I’m not letting go, so You’d better stop this thing. For her sake. Bracing both feet on the running board, Ian gripped the edge of the window.
They neared the bank.
He reached for the key and yanked it out.
The engine sputtered and so did the old woman, but the silent truck coasted on.
“Brake!” Ian grabbed the wheel with both hands and pulled it toward him, hard.
The truck curved right and, though it slowed, kept rolling.
Please ...
He cranked the wheel as far as it would go, bringing the truck parallel with the edge of the bank. The left front wheel dipped, lifting a rear wheel slightly off the ground.
Ian leaned back and held his breath. He could open the door and try to pull Maggie out before it went down, but shifting his weight even a little could send it over.
The truck hovered there, teetering slightly as water gurgled over rocks below. Then the truck tilted back with a jumble of squeaks and settled down, still.
Heart hammering and chest heaving, Ian stepped off and leaned back against the cab. He slid down to the running board and sat, his weight an added measure of balance. Sweat trickled from his head and soaked through his shirt.
The tick of the cooling engine and the cadence of his rapid breathing were amplified by the sudden hush that settled over the glen.
“Give it back,” Maggie muttered.
A burst of fury made his temples throb. Ian shot up, spun round, and yanked the door open. “Get out.”
“No.” Her gnarled hands clamped the wheel.
His pulse thumped in his head. “Where did you think you were going?”
“To the village.”
“I said I’d take you when I finished booking my flights, then, didn’t I?”
Her hazy eyes narrowed in his direction. “I dinna need ye. I’ve been going to town on my own since long before ye were born.”
“Maggie.” His jawed clamped tight, forcing a growl out through his nose. “I don’t have time for this.”
“Dinna fash yerself, laddie. I was doing perfectly fine before ye came along.”
“Fine?” His jaw dropped. “You were headed straight over the bank!”
“I meant before ye came here to live.” The scowl on her face deepened. “I dinna ken why ye’re here.”
That makes two of us. “Because you’re blind, you’re a menace, and you can’t take care of yourself.”
A wounded look passed through the scowl, just briefly. Then her cheeks burst into blotchy little tomatoes, her lips forming a tight, straight line.
She was a menace. But he still felt a slight twinge for saying it. “Come out.”
“No.” Knobby fingers gripped the wheel harder, turning white.
“If you don’t stop this—” he bit back a far more choice word “—childishness, I won’t bring your sister home.”
“Humph!”
If he had to drag her out, he would, and it wouldn’t be pretty.
Suddenly, she loosened her grip and scooted toward the bank.
Truck metal squeaked.
“Don’t move!” Ian stepped on the running board to balance the weight. “Get out this side.”
Grumbling about it being her truck, Maggie clambered down. Ian climbed in before she could change her mind, backed the truck away from the bank, and headed toward Craig’s Hill Road.
One glimpse of the old woman’s scowl and it hit him: Like the old truck moments before, his plans to leave the country had just come to a dead stop.
Something had to be done about Maggie.
In the privacy of the old cottage, Ian tugged out his mobile, held his breath, and rang the only person whom Maggie would ever allow to stay, the only person whose nerve equaled hers.
His sister answered on the second ring, a good sign. Now to sound patient as he waded through Claire’s usual chatter before making his request. After a polite am
ount of time, he brought it up.
“Sorry,” Claire said. “We’ve got plans for that week. Davy and I are taking the kids on a holiday to Loch Lomond. I always knew there was an upside to unemployment.”
“Can’t you take her with you then?”
“Ha! Nice try. We’re going waterskiing. Can’t you just see her tearing off across the loch like an angry goose?”
Aye. All too well.
“Besides, we’re staying with friends. I can’t just show up with my old grannie, now can I?”
Ian ran his fingers through his hair and expelled a long, hissing breath.
“Why don’t you take her with you to the States?” Claire snickered. “Now that would be loads of fun. I’m sure she’d fancy that.”
“Maggie won’t go near a plane.”
“Well ...” Her hesitation stretched longer and thinner with each passing second. “Oh, come on, Ian. She’ll have a lovely, wee time without your sour face. She’ll be fine.”
“She found the key to the truck, Claire. While I was home. Do you know what she could do with ten days by herself?” He refused to think about it, but the images still appeared. Screaming neighbors, burning farmsteads, maimed livestock. An old truck and an old woman sinking into the loch.
He massaged his pulsating temples.
“You wouldn’t be having this problem if you had a wife.”
He clamped his lips together as Claire went on about how her single friends had taken a raging fancy to him and how her friend Marion was madly in love with him and was fully prepared to bear him half a dozen children.
We’ve been over this. A decent woman deserves better.
“I know, I know, that topic is off limits. Though you’re altogether daft if you actually believe there is such a thing.”
“Such a thing as ...?”
“Off limits.”
Ian exhaled.
“Why don’t you ask a neighbor or someone from her church to come check on Maggie?”
“What poor, unsuspecting soul do you suggest I send? Nobody could set foot in the door, not if they were coming to check on her. She’d probably run them off with a butcher knife.”
A muffled laugh meant Claire had no trouble picturing that.
Ian made a mental note to send all the kitchen knives to Claire’s house with Maggie.
“So, what’re you going to do?”
Ian heaved a sigh. “Either I leave for ten days and pray to God that she doesn’t burn anything down, or I cancel my trip.”
“Sorry, love. I wish I could help, but this holiday with Davy and the kids ... I can’t reschedule, and it would break their wee hearts to cancel. We’re long overdue for some family time. You know how it is. I mean—sorry.”
“Forget it.” He punched the call off and winced. Bad form. It wasn’t Claire’s fault.
By the end of the week, he had telephoned everyone he knew. As he paced the drive between the house and the woodshed, he stared at his silent mobile. He’d even resorted to ringing a few of Maggie’s whist club members. But they were all just as old, likely just as stubborn, and perhaps even more dangerous.
With his trip only days away, he hammered his brain for an answer, but all he could think of was the new minister running down the drive as fast as his bony legs would carry him and Maggie on his heels, glinting blade in hand.
God, what am I doing here?
He stared at the phone as though the Almighty would ring with an answer. He wouldn’t, of course. With the way Ian had avoided Him the last few years, God wouldn’t have much to say to him.
Maybe pounding his head against the woodshed would help. If nothing else, it might silence the nagging doubts he had about his sanity and why he chose to help a mule-headed old woman who battled him every step of the way.
Maybe she was his punishment.
Aye, maybe this was what ten years of nursing mortal hatred had earned him.
Ian took a deep breath, ran both hands through his hair, and exhaled hard. “Right, then, God. I’ve done all I can. If You have any sort of plan, it’s up to You to do something.”
The mobile buzzed in his hand. He nearly dropped it before checking the screen.
Claire Kendal.
“Ian? You’re not going to believe this! I can hardly believe it myself, but then I suppose I should.”
As she blethered, Ian tried to piece together strings of half-finished sentences on the chance there was something of significance to him. “What are you saying?”
“He got it! Davy got the job we’ve been praying for. Ha! Isn’t that amazing?”
“That’s excellent news—”
“He starts next week. Now the girls and I can come out and make jam for the fair with Maggie. She’s been after me to teach them.”
“What?”
An exasperated sigh. “We had to cancel our holiday, which means I’m free to keep watch on Maggie for you.” She snorted. “And you’re the one who went to college.”
Ian’s jaw fell and for a moment, he couldn’t speak. Something deep, something long buried, broke loose and he burst out laughing, ignoring the affronted silence on the other end.
Claire and her girls would come and stay with Maggie. The old woman would be pleased to have her great-granddaughters come for a visit, and perhaps she wouldn’t be too suspicious about Claire taking a sudden interest in helping with the jam for the Kirkhaven Summer Fair.
His sister would have her hands full, without a doubt. He laughed again as he pictured feisty little Claire trying to wrestle the axe away from their eighty-three-year-old grannie. It would be a nearly even match.
As he went inside the house to pack, he dared anyone else to stand in his way.
CHAPTER FOUR
“Emily!” A voice came from the trail behind her.
Halfway to her Jeep, Emily stopped and turned around. “Hey, Hector.” She tucked straying tendrils of hair behind her ear and smiled at the brown-skinned boy as he jogged to catch up with her on the path.
He stopped and bent with hands on knees, huffing. “You coming back tomorrow?”
“No, I’m off this weekend. What’s up?”
Hector checked out his shoes, shook his head, and looked up. “Nothin’. Just wondered.”
Emily studied him for a moment. “Family visit weekend?”
He nodded.
“Okay.” She tilted her head for a better look at his face and his nonverbal cues. “Are you worried about it?”
“Naw, nothin’ like that. I just wondered if you wanna meet my grandpa, that’s all.”
Ah. Poor Hector. Even with a mentally unstable mom who’d repeatedly left him with total strangers, no clue if he had a dad, and an uncle who spent more of his time in jail than out, Hector never gave up trying to piece together some kind of a family.
Some would expect him to be hard and angry, yet Hector was one of the sweetest kids she’d ever met. Generous and tenderhearted, he was a boy she wished she could adopt herself, to shield him from further heartache and show him his life mattered.
But she probably shouldn’t make those kinds of promises—to a kid or anyone else.
Hope glistened in Hector’s eyes.
A deep twinge tugged at her chest. “I would like to meet him, Hector, but I’m going to be gone this weekend. There’s something I need to do. I’m really sorry.”
The boy shook his head. “Naw, man, it’s cool. Yeah. You probably got a hot date.”
With a wink, Emily nodded. “Yeah, a really hot date. With a bunch of old people.”
He made a face that looked like he’d just found a slug in his Big Mac.
Emily chuckled. “Actually, my great-aunt is away on a beach retreat with her seniors’ group from church and I need to go hang with them and ... make sure she’s having a good time.” And being safe. And remembering her meds. And not causing herself embarrassment.
“Aw man, you mean you have to keep teenagers and old peoples out of trouble? That’s whack. No wonder you got no boy
friend. A’ight. But if you change your mind, you know where I’ll be.” He started back toward the house, walking backward. “Hey, just so you know, my grandpa’s name is Hector too. I mean too like too, not number two.” He almost tripped on a clump of sagebrush. “I’m Hec Two. Hector Emilio Cuevas the Second. Works two ways. Get it?”
“That’s cool, Hec.” She flashed a double thumbs-up.
“It’s like Hec to the second power.” He emphasized power with both hands splayed down like a rapper. Pretty good for an eleven-year-old.
“Yeah, I totally get it.” Emily laughed. “See you Monday, Hec Two.” She trekked down to the staff parking lot. So many of the kids at Juniper Ranch felt painfully lost and abandoned. Though they were in good care now with Sue Quinn and the other counselors, the loss they’d suffered still pressed in on Emily, making her heart ache.
Lord, being dumped hurts so much. Help these kids get past it. Help me do everything I can to make them feel wanted. Help them know that they matter, in spite of what others have told them. Or not told them.
She dug her phone out of her pocket and checked the recent calls. The last call to her dad was more than a week ago, and he wasn’t any happier to hear from her that time than usual. But she’d promised her dying mother, and a promise was a promise, no matter how long ago she’d made it. Or how difficult it was to carry out.
When she reached the Jeep, she hovered a finger over the redial button. First, though, she needed a moment to bolster her heart and mind. Emily leaned her back against the Jeep’s warm metal, heated by a full day’s sun, and closed her eyes. A gentle breeze blew strands of hair across her cheek, straying from her loosely clipped up-do. She drew in a breath of clean, dry air and let it out slowly, let it carry away the sorrow, the pity. The dread.
He didn’t need to hear any of that in her voice.
Emily opened her eyes and caught her reflection in the side-view mirror. She pulled out the clip and shook down her hair. After searching her bag for lip balm, she smoothed it over her dry lips, then shot a practice smile into the mirror. She stared at her dad’s number again.
So, what to talk about this time? Sorry, Dad. I know you can’t stand the sight of me, and I have no clue why, but I promised Mom I wouldn’t let you pull away after she was gone, so here I am. Again.
