All God's Promises (A Prairie Heritage Book 7)

by Vikki Kestell

  Kari took in the old-fashioned organdy dress Rose wore. Although she could not tell the color of the flowing fabric, the pattern was lovely, the lace on the collar beautiful in its simplicity.

  It was the expression on Rose’s face that captivated Kari. She thought that some other woman caught in the same unguarded pose might have projected sadness or vulnerability, but Rose’s photograph did not. Although Rose’s head was turned a fraction from the camera, Kari could see and study Rose’s countenance.

  A strong chin.

  Firm but sweet mouth.

  Steady, calm eyes.

  Soft gray, Matthew had told her.

  It was a portrait of confident, patient hope.

  Kari touched Rose’s face with her fingertips. Rose. My great-grandmother! What a legacy you and Jan left to us.

  I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

  —

  MATTHEW, LINDA, AND KARI LINGERED OVER BREAKFAST the next morning.

  Kari had not yet told Matthew and Linda that she had recalled the memories of the night her parents died. As they sat down to eat in the morning, she had to first explain about her lifetime of panic attacks. About The Black.

  “All my life,” Kari began, “from as early as I could remember, I have had panic attacks. If I tried to think about Mommy and Daddy, I would grow anxious. If I tried to push the anxiety down and still think about them, the anxiety would turn into a panic attack. So, of course, I avoided thinking about them.

  “The worst part, though, was this dream I had, this awful, recurring nightmare. In it I felt like I had forgotten something, something important. But the more I tried to remember what it was, the worse the nightmare grew. A horrid, dark mist, what I named The Black, would smother and swallow me. Sometimes a voice would say, We don’t want her. We don’t want her! As a kid, I woke up screaming more times than I can count.”

  Linda took Kari’s hand. “I’m so sorry, Kari! Anxiety attacks are no laughing matter. I had a few after our son Richard had a serious accident. But I couldn’t understand how they took over like that, why they overwhelmed me.”

  “I didn’t understand them at first, either,” Matthew confessed. “Linda is not a worrier. She is one of the calmest, most levelheaded individuals I know. And her faith is unshakable.”

  Linda nodded. “I was able, after a few episodes, to grasp the fact that the attacks were a physical response rather than a mental one. And after I figured out that I was not dying, that the symptoms would pass, I learned to wait them out. After a few months, the incidents eased and finally stopped.”

  She studied Kari with compassion. “I guess I got off easy. A six-year-old would have much more difficulty coping with an anxiety attack, especially a newly orphaned six-year-old. And to be oppressed like that your whole life? O my dear. I am so sorry.”

  Linda’s loving empathy caused Kari to swallow. Hard. “Yes, well, I coped as best I could, mainly by avoiding the trigger, which was thinking about my parents. Then, after my divorce I started seeing a counselor, a therapist who deals with domestic violence. Anthony, the private investigator I hired for my divorce, recommended her. Her name is Ruth.”

  Kari chuckled a little as she remembered meeting Ruth. “I knew that Anthony was a Christian—he makes no bones about it—but Ruth was the first Christian I’d encountered to actually share Jesus and the Gospel with me—to challenge me, to confront me with my need for a savior, I guess.”

  Her chortle ended as a sardonic grin. “Let me say that her straightforward approach didn’t go over well with me!”

  She laughed and Matthew and Linda joined her. “Ruth brought Jesus into every single conversation, and I thought, Good heavens, woman! Give it a rest already!

  “Then Ruth started digging around in my life, digging into places I didn’t want to go. Ruth wanted to know about my childhood and, of course, because we were talking about Mommy and Daddy, I had a panic attack. Right there in her office.”

  Kari looked at her aunt and uncle. “As it was taking me over, Ruth did the most amazing thing. She wrapped her arms around me and said she would stay with me, that it would pass and she would stay right there with me until it did.

  “Ruth is a very loving person. Her willingness to be with me—to share in my discomfort—affected me more deeply than I cared to admit.

  “Well, after that, I told her everything about the panic attacks, about the nightmares, about The Black. Ruth suggested that I might be suppressing an early childhood memory. Of course, I had no idea what that memory might be. And, as much as I resented her preaching at me, because I had opened up to her I also started to trust her.

  “Anyway, after I moved to New Orleans, found Rose’s journal, and started reading it, the anxiety and nightmares eased. For the most part.”

  Caught up in Kari’s tale, Matthew and Linda sat, with mouths slack, forks on their plates next to the unfinished remains of their breakfast.

  Matthew’s kind eyes sought Kari’s. “I think we saw you have a panic attack in Søren and Ilsa’s living room—after we told you that Joy and Grant’s baby son Edmund had been kidnapped and that you were Edmund’s daughter.”

  Kari nodded. “Yes. I guess you did.”

  “What has changed, Kari? You have a point to make here, yes?”

  Kari loved her uncle more at that moment. “Well, something else happened after everyone had left the family reunion.”

  Matthew and Linda leaned toward her. “Will you tell us?” Linda asked.

  Kari nodded. “It’s what I’ve been working up to,” she whispered.

  Taking a deep breath, Kari plunged ahead. “That night the old, ugly nightmare came again, but it started differently. I was standing on the dirt road that runs by Søren’s farm, the one that runs out onto the prairie. I saw people walking toward me. Happy people. Mommy and Daddy were with them, and they reached for me.

  “It was so real, they were so real, that I could smell Daddy’s cologne. But then the same old nightmare intruded. Before Daddy reached me, that dreadful curtain—The Black—came down to separate us. As always, I was struggling to hang on to something important, but I couldn’t grasp it, couldn’t find it.

  “In this dream, for the first time ever, Daddy reached me. I put my head on his shoulder and he held me.”

  Kari wept for the exquisite joy of that moment, and Matthew placed his hand upon hers and stroked it.

  “I felt safe. Loved! And, oh! I wanted to stay with him, but The Black was lurking close by. Then, without warning, I was standing—not on the road by Søren’s farm, but by a highway in the dark. I was back from the road, standing in the weeds. I could see a very little by moonlight. Everything else, all around me, was dark. Shadowed.”

  “I could see the outline of our car closer to the highway. Daddy and Mommy had put me a distance from the road. The car had broken down and they were trying to fix it, I think.”

  Kari stared into Matthew and Linda’s curious and concerned faces. “Daddy said, Wait here where it’s safe. Watch over them for us. He hugged me and then he and Mommy went back to the car to try to fix it.”

  Matthew and Linda exchanged confused glances.

  Kari rushed on. “I remembered then, seeing the lights rush toward our car, toward Mommy and Daddy. A truck. A big one. I remember the horrible, crashing, tearing sounds. Then silence.”

  Kari stared at the table. “I didn’t want to look anymore, but Daddy’s voice urged me to be brave. To look. To remember. So I kept dreaming, but in the dream, I remembered the accident. And more. You see, Uncle Matthew, I remembered everything The Black had been hiding from me all these years.”

  She shivered. “Mommy and Daddy had moved us away from the side of the highway because it didn’t have much of a shoulder. I was supposed to watch Elaine and Sammie and keep them safe.”

  Matthew choked a little. “Who . . . who are Elaine and Sammie, Kari?”

  “That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I remembered them—my little sister. My baby b
rother.”

  “You are saying that you remember having a younger brother and sister?” Matthew was floored. Stunned. Linda’s face expressed the same disbelief and alarm.

  “Yes. Elaine and Samuel. Sammie.” Kari sighed. “Elaine was three, I think. Sammie was an infant. Maybe six months? He was lying in a little car seat thing. Elaine was sitting on a blanket next to him.”

  She glanced up and saw their doubts. “I know. Believe, me, I know. I cannot believe that I forgot them for so many years. And there’s more. Apparently we were taken somewhere, perhaps nearby or into Albuquerque. I don’t know exactly where, but the room was very bright. A woman—a social worker?—was there. And a man and a woman. A couple. The man picked up Elaine. The woman had Sammie.

  “The man said they would take Elaine and Sammie but they didn’t want me. The social worker said it was all right—that I wouldn’t remember or talk about them.

  “The woman grabbed me and slapped me and said, If you ever mention your sister or brother to anyone—if you ever say their names—well, very bad things will happen to them. Do you hear me? In fact, if you ever even think about your sister or brother again, I will know it, and I will have that man and woman throw your sister and brother in a river to drown.”

  Linda recoiled in horror; Matthew’s face turned dark red and he growled deep in his throat.

  Kari didn’t notice their reactions. “The Black surrounded me. That’s when it started. The nightmares and panic attacks. Anyway, when I remembered the man and woman taking Elaine and Sammie, I must have started screaming in my sleep. The next thing I knew, Søren, Ilsa, and Max were in my room. I told them about the dream. I told them everything I remembered. Told them about Elaine and Sammie.”

  Kari dropped her face into her hands and sobbed. “But, still! I forgot my own sister and brother? How could I? I’m so ashamed!”

  “Stuff and nonsense, Kari Thoresen Michaels. You stop that right now.”

  Shocked at the steel undergirding Matthew’s words, Kari sat up and wiped her face.

  He waved a finger over his plate of cold eggs. “The Accuser of the Brethren—Satan, if you are unfamiliar with this passage of Scripture—wants to condemn a six-year-old child for being unable to cope with an event that would have sent many an adult to the loony bin? You must begin to exercise discipline over your thoughts, Kari. Reject any blame for not remembering your siblings. Fix your faith and courage on what is ahead. Focus your mental and emotional energy on what you need to do. You’re going to find them, aren’t you?”

  “Yes. At least I’m going to try.”

  “Try? Don’t think for a minute that God brought these memories back to you so you could stew in defeat the rest of your days, Kari.” The uncle Kari had considered merely kind and gentle was showing a very different side—a spine and a will of iron.

  “This is a lot to take in,” Linda murmured.

  “Yes, but it is a call to action, not an invitation to a pity party,” Matthew replied.

  Kari ducked her head. “I’m sorry.”

  Matthew frowned. “Please reserve those two words for instances where they are appropriate. You have no cause to be sorry or to apologize, especially to us. Now—” He gathered Linda’s hand in one hand and reached for Kari’s hand with the other; Linda clasped Kari’s free hand, completing the circle. “Let’s fight this battle where the war is being waged: In the spiritual realm.”

  He bowed his head. “Father God, you are the maker of heaven and earth. Your eyes roam to and fro across the earth and see everything. In you the lost are found. You found Kari, Lord God, and brought her back to her family. More importantly than that, you brought her to Jesus.

  “Your plans span eternity, Lord God, and yet you are attentive to the very hairs on our heads. Now, Lord, you are revealing the next part of your plan for Kari. I am confident, Father, that you opened her memories ‘in due season,’ which means at the right time to accommodate your plans!

  “Therefore we ask you, in the mighty name of Jesus, to lead her and guide her. Help her find Elaine and Sammie. According to your will let it be done, Lord, and may you receive the glory. Amen.”

  “Amen!” Kari repeated. Matthew’s few simple words of prayer had galvanized her.

  “What will you do first?” Linda asked, squeezing Kari’s hand before letting it go.

  “I will head to Albuquerque from here. I want to hire Anthony Esquibel, the investigator I used for my divorce. He has a lot of contacts in Albuquerque and Bernalillo County. He will know how to get started. And when I return to New Orleans, I will ask my attorney’s investigator to join him.”

  “What does your friend Ruth say about all this, Kari?” Linda asked.

  “I-I haven’t told Ruth about Elaine and Samuel yet, but I will when I get to Albuquerque.”

  “Not to be indelicate, Kari, but these things take money. We—” Matthew looked to Linda for confirmation. “You are family. We can help a little. We will give what we can, and I am certain others will, too, when they hear about Elaine and Samuel.”

  Kari’s mouth curved into a sweet smile and grew larger. “Those are about the most precious words I have ever heard, Uncle Matthew, but money won’t be an issue.”

  The couple looked dubious. “Um, are you sure? Things have a way of costing more than we think.”

  Kari looked at both of them. “Please don’t shout this from the rooftops, but Peter Granger left me a wealthy woman. That is to say, he left me and my siblings wealthy. Trust me when I say I have plenty of money. I am grateful to God that I can well afford whatever we need in the months ahead.”

  Linda blinked. Matthew muttered, “Well, then!”

  Kari grinned more. “It is justice of sorts, don’t you agree, that everything Peter Granger—or Dean Morgan, if you prefer—spent his lifetime acquiring should come to those he injured the most?”

  Kari’s head tipped to the side a bit. “In fact, shouldn’t you and Jacob and Luke—who had to watch your mom grieve for her lost son—shouldn’t you and your families share in my bounty?”

  Matthew was already shaking his head. “No, no. There’s no need, Kari. Don’t give that another thought.”

  “If you say so, Uncle Matthew.” But Kari tucked the idea away to think on more later.

  Linda stood up. “Look at us! Look at the time! It’s closer now to lunch than breakfast.”

  She started clearing the table and Kari jumped up to help. “Yes; I should probably get on the road again.”

  After Linda and Kari had cleared away the dishes, Matthew appeared with three volumes in his hand. The books were identical in size but their leather covers were differing colors.

  “I don’t want to forget to give these to you a second time.”

  Kari held the books in her hands with awe. “I cannot thank you enough for trusting me with Rose’s other journals, Uncle Matthew.”

  “We pray they will be a blessing to you, Kari. In the same way the first one brought you to Jesus, we pray these will encourage you as you go forward.”

  Kari said nothing, but she caressed the cover of the top book.

  —

  AS KARI POINTED THE CADDY BACK ONTO THE HIGHWAY, she took courage from Matthew’s prayer, and she prayed aloud for herself.

  “Lord, my uncle and my cousins urge me to trust you. They say that you will help me through this difficult transition. And they say that you know where Elaine and Samuel are, that I can trust you—that in you the lost are found!

  “I am so new to this faith thing, though. It is hard to believe you will find them after so many years.

  “Nevertheless, I set my heart and mind on you. As Uncle Matthew said, I must fix my faith and courage upon the task ahead. I confess my trust in you, Lord—not in my own ideas, not in the abilities of my investigators, not in the money I can throw at this effort, but in you. Where you lead me, I will follow.”

  Kari took a deep breath and added, “I believe you work all things together for my good, so I will tr
ust and rest in you. Amen.”

  ~~**~~

  Chapter 3

  KARI REACHED ALBUQUERQUE THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON and checked into the downtown Marriott. As soon as she reached her room, she dialed Ruth’s number from memory.

  “Ruth?”

  “Kari? It’s so good to hear your voice. Are you back in town?”

  “Yes, I just got here. Can’t wait to see you. I, er, a lot has happened in the last few weeks.”

  “You sound different, Kari.”

  No kidding! You thought my inheriting Peter Granger’s estate was life-altering? Not even! Now my whole world has been turned upside down.

  And Jesus! O my Jesus!

  “Some interesting things have happened, Ruth. I can’t wait to tell you.”

  They chatted for a few minutes before Kari asked, “May I treat you to dinner tonight? How about El Pinto? I could use a ‘green chile fix.’”

  “I’d love that,” Ruth answered.

  “Would you mind . . . I’d like to ask Anthony and Gloria to join us.”

  “Of course not. I would enjoy their company.”

  Ruth changed tack. “You were gone almost three weeks. Did you uncover any more about the woman who wrote the journal?”

  “Um, yes, actually. That is part of what I want to tell you, but it will take a while to explain everything.”

  “Well, you have aroused my curiosity.”

  Kari laughed. “Shall we say six o’clock? And I warn you again that my tale will take time to tell. I will probably monopolize the conversation.”

  They hung up, and Kari looked for and dialed Anthony’s office number. A receptionist answered on the first ring.

  “Esquibel Investigations.”

  “Good afternoon. This is Kari, um, Hillyer. Kari Hillyer. Is Mr. Esquibel in the office?”

  “One moment, please.”

  Good grief. I need to decide what my name is and have Clover get it fixed as soon as possible.