One Summer’s Knight

by Kathleen Creighton

  But before she had time to bring it down on the dazed man’s head, or even cry out, someone grabbed her from behind, knocking the flashlight out of her hand. She could hear it rolling across the tile floor as a powerful arm clamped across her throat, cutting off her air supply. She struggled, kicking at her assailant’s legs and making contact at least once. She heard a satisfying grunt of pain and a vicious snarl. “Do that again and I’ll break your neck.”

  She believed that, so she stopped struggling. And in the sudden stillness a voice came quietly from the darkness near the door to Riley’s study. “It’s me you want. Let her go.”

  Hal!

  The pressure on her windpipe eased, and her body dragged in air in a shuddering, convulsive gasp. There was a roaring in her ears. Fighting to remain conscious, Summer heard garbled bits of conversation: “…is it, Robey?” “Haven’t got…” “Tell… kill her.”

  Her head cleared just as a flashlight beam slashed through the darkness, pinioning the figure of a man…the man Summer had been married to for twelve years, the man she had once loved. Her children’s father. He looked strangely unchanged, she thought. His smile was as charming as ever.

  “What’s that you got there?” the man holding Summer growled.

  Still smiling, Hal held up a package wrapped in bright paper. “This? Just some presents for my kids.”

  “Yeah? Let’s see it.” A hand moved into Summer’s line of vision-a hand holding a gun.

  What happened next happened so fast, she was never sure of the exact sequence. And yet, some things seemed in slow motion: The package and Hal’s hand moving in a short downward arc. The gun flying out of the man’s hand. Hal’s scream. “Run!”

  Then she was running, through the dark kitchen, through the mudroom and out into a chaos of howling wind and driving rain. The eye of the hurricane had passed; the storm was on them again in its full force and fury, the noise so intense she couldn’t hear her own sobs. She ran instinctively, down the driveway and into the lane, heading toward the gate. Around her trees lashed and groaned like tormented souls. She couldn’t tell what was happening behind her-shouts, running footsteps, even gunshots were swallowed up in the storm.

  Something-someone-grabbed her from out of the darkness. She struggled, half-mindless with terror, screaming, scratching and biting like a wild animal, until a voice growled in her ear, “Hey-take it easy! You’re safe now-you’re safe!”

  Safe. That word punched through the wall of her terror and she went slack, letting herself be half dragged, half carried into the comparative shelter of the trees, just as footsteps splattered through the water rushing down the brick drive, and indistinguishable shapes flashed by them in the thinning darkness.

  When they had passed, the man holding Summer gasped, “Sorry I was late-had to ram through the damn gate…leave my car down there in the lane. Trees down.”

  “Who…are…you?” Summer asked through chattering teeth.

  “Name’s Denby, ma’am. I work for Mr. Grogan. I was supposed to watch out for you and the kids…sure hope he don’t fire me, lettin’ this-”

  “My children1” And she was running again, back toward the house, running with her heart in her throat and her lungs on fire, deaf to the pleas of her rescuer to wait-wait for him to check things out! But she was driven by something more compelling than fear.

  Into the house she went, soaked to the skin, water streaming down her face and into her eyes. Up the stairs and down the hallway, needing no light to see the way. Calling her children’s names, she threw open the door of their hiding place and dropped to the floor beside the canopy bed.

  “David? Helen? Hey, you can come-Oh… God…” The cry tore through her, ripping her apart, a cry of utter devastation.

  Her children weren’t there. They were gone. Gone…

  Riley had some bad moments during that seemingly endless drive home through the height of the hurricane-such as narrowly avoiding a head-on collision with a couple of suicidal idiots, one a four-by-four of some kind, the other a big dark sedan, both heading the other way like bats out of hell. Then finding his gate broken in, and a little farther up the lane, coming upon Tom Denby’s car abandoned with its hood buried in a fallen tree. But nothing-not all the worst moments of his life put together-could have compared with the moment when he burst through the wide-open doors of his house and heard that terrible cry. He’d heard something like it once before, the day they’d found Helen in the tree, but this was worse. A thousand times worse.

  He didn’t even remember how he got up the stairs and down the hallway to that bedroom doorway. But somehow he was standing in it, frozen there, and his eyes were on Summer as she stood silhouetted against the lightening windows. She stood like a pillar, too stunned even to cry as the windows crashed open and two small figures, like storm-drenched fledglings, crept over the sill and ran to their mother’s side.

  “We were gonna climb down the tree and run for help,” he heard David explain, gasping for breath. “I know you told us to stay here and don’t move, but then we heard the noises-”

  And then Riley was across the room and he couldn’t get them gathered into his arms fast enough. He was shaking so hard he felt as though he’d break apart, as if the only things holding him together were their arms, their laughter, their joyous shouts of “Oh, God-Riley!” “Hey, it’s Mr. Riley!” “Riley’s home!”

  Yes, he was. At long last, he was home.

  It was David who pulled away first. While Riley closed and latched the window, he drew a hand across his nose, sniffed and said, “Mom, Beatle’s dead, isn’t she?” But he wasn’t crying; his voice was quiet and brave. “I heard. Those men-they killed her, didn’t they?”

  Summer lifted her eyes from her son’s face to Riley’s. Hers was pale and glistening with raindrops in the graying light; dawn was breaking, even in the midst of the hurricane. “She tried to defend us,” she said brokenly. “I don’t know… I don’t know about any of them. They gave the alarm. And Peggy Sue tripped one guy and made him fall down the stairs. But I haven’t heard anything since. I just don’t know…”

  “Let’s not jump to conclusions,” Riley said with a confidence he didn’t feel. “It’s getting light. We’ll find them… won’t we, guys?” As the two children gazed up at him with trusting eyes, he took them each by the hand and, with a long look at Summer, led the way downstairs. Please, God, he thought, no matter what happens…don’t let me let them down.

  But somehow, he didn’t think he would. Ever again.

  Downstairs they found that Tom Denby had already checked out and buttoned up the place and lit the battery-powered lanterns he’d found in the kitchen. With their help and the slowly growing daylight, they quickly located Cleo. The little gray parrot was pacing back and forth along the tops of the living room draperies, muttering and swearing, “Stupid… dog…” and staring with baleful yellow eyes at the cat Peggy Sue, who was stretched out on the back of the sofa just below her like a panther on a tree limb, placidly twitching her tail.

  “My God,” Summer breathed, laughing weakly with relief, “how did she get up there? I didn’t think she could fly.”

  “Maybe,” said Riley, laughing, too, “she just didn’t have enough incentive.”

  “Mom! Mom, come quick!” David’s shout brought them into the central hallway at a dead run. “I found her! I found Beatle! She’s not dead! Quick, Mom-she’s hurt…”

  The little dog was lying on the rug just inside Riley’s study, whimpering softly. She didn’t try to get up, but when David knelt beside her, she lifted her head and licked his face.

  “Quick-” Summer was already down on her knees beside the dog “-get me a blanket-towels, a pillow, anything-go on, David, hurry!” As David jumped up and ran for the stairs, her hands were moving gently and expertly over the little animal’s shivering body. When he’d gone, she looked up at Riley and said gravely, “She’s badly hurt. She needs a vet.”

  “You’re a vet,” he reminded
her, balancing on the balls of his feet beside her, his hand on the back of her neck.

  She shook her head. “She needs a hospital-X-rays. Her leg’s broken, for sure. She could have an injured spine, internal injuries-”

  “We’ll go,” Riley promised “As soon as the storm’s over.” He didn’t stop to ask himself how they’d get there through all the storm debris; he knew he’d find a way somehow.

  When Jake Redfield arrived a short time later, Riley and Summer were in Riley’s big bed, fully clothed with the two sleeping children curled like kittens against their sides. Beatle lay on a pillow on Summer’s lap cocooned in blankets, also sleeping, shivering and whimpering only fitfully now. Summer was much encouraged by that. With the immediate threat of severe shock seemingly over, she felt the little dog’s prospects for a full recovery were good.

  “Brave little Beatle,” she whispered, gently stroking the dog’s glossy black hide. “My hero…”

  Riley’s arms tightened around her and he started to say something, but before he could the FBI agent knocked softly and stuck his head through the open door

  “Sorry,” he said in a low voice as his eyes swept dispassionately over the bed and its occupants. “Your man Denby let me in-told me to come on up. Thought you’d like to know…” His dark, exhausted eyes came to rest on Summer. “Your husband’s vehicle has been found, Mrs. Robey. In the river just west of here-witnesses tell us he drove off a washed-out bridge. According to those same witnesses, the car that was chasing him saw it happen and stopped in time. Then turned around and took off. I don’t think they’ll be back.” He paused, then said stiffly, “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry.” His eyes were dark with frustrated fury.

  Summer nodded and mumbled through the ache in her throat, “He saved us, you know. In the end…”

  Redfield nodded, frowning. “Yeah… well… What I can’t figure out is what brought him back here in the first place. Why was it so important for him to find you?” He shrugged, though the speculation remained in his eyes. “Guess we’ll never know that now.” He turned to leave, then abruptly came back and handed her a small package wrapped in brightly colored paper. “Oh-Denby asked me to give you this. Said he found it downstairs in the hallway-looks like it might belong to one of your kids.”

  Summer took the package and held it. “This is why,” she said thickly as a tear rolled down her cheek. “Hal brought this for the kids. He said he’d come to see them. He’d brought them a present. This…”

  Redfield had come closer, moving stiffly, suddenly alert as a wolf smelling prey. “Ma’am-if you wouldn’t mind opening that?”

  “Oh-sure.” She tore off the paper with unsteady fingers and pounding heart, then relaxed with a sigh of exasperation. “Oh, Hal… I swear to God, he never changes.” She held up several shrink-wrapped packages. “He always does this. Computer games-look at this. Most of them completely inappropriate for a child. Amazon Rangers! Doctor Death! What on earth was he thinking?” She sighed and began wrapping the games back in their festive paper. “Oh, well…I guess I’ll just have to hide these, like I did the last batch.”

  Redfield turned away, his shoulders sagging with disappointment. At the door he paused and looked back. “Mrs Robey, you know it was your husband they wanted, not you or the kids. You were just leverage. Now they know he’s dead, they’d have no more reason to harm you. Looks like you’re perfectly free to go now.”

  After the FBI man left there was silence, filled only with the sounds of sleeping dog and children and the rain and slowly dying wind. Summer could feel her heart pounding against Riley’s arms where they crisscrossed her chest She closed her eyes and tears oozed between them. I must not cry, she thought. I must not let him know.

  And then she felt a shudder go through his body, and his breath gusted in her hair. “I can’t do it,” he said in a ragged voice. “I can’t let you go.”

  “Riley…” she began, brokenly. But his arms tightened around her. He lowered his face to her ear, to the side of her face, and to her astonishment she felt the coolness of tears on his cheek.

  “I mean, all of you-you, them, the animals-all of you. I want you to stay here with me. Please.”

  She said nothing for a long time, crying silently. When she could, she whispered, “Why?”

  “Why?” He repeated it in an incredulous, broken voice. “Because I love you. Surely you must know that.”

  She nodded, crying harder. “Of course. And I love you. And we both know it’s not enough. Not for me. Not for us. What’s changed? You didn’t want-”

  “I was afraid.” The word as he whispered it was so bleak it chilled her. “And then…I almost lost you. All of you. And that’s when I knew there was something I was afraid of even more…”

  “But why? Riley, what is it about us-the children-that scares you so much? I’ve watched you with them. You’re wonderful. They adore you. I don’t understand.”

  Again there was silence, and she felt his body tense against hers, as if he were gathering strength. Then, with his face pressed tightly against hers, he sighed and began in a slow, careful voice, “I told you my father died when I was twelve. What I didn’t tell you was that he died in prison. He was murdered while serving time for manslaughter.” He paused, then softly explained, “Other inmates don’t like child-killers much.”

  Summer had gasped, but he went on before she could ask. “The child he killed was my brother. He beat him to death two weeks before his sixth birthday.” She made a wounded sound. He held her more closely, rocking her, asking her to let him finish it “My father was a brutal man. I learned early on to stay out of his way when he’d been drinking, which was most of the tune. My mother…found her own means of escape. My brother wasn’t so lucky. He wasn’t big enough, strong enough…to get away, and my mother wasn’t strong enough to protect him. My father hated him, I think, because he always believed he wasn’t his child. He could have been right-I I don’t know…

  “I knew when he came home that day it was going to be bad. When he started in on Rusty I took off-ran to Brasher’s to get help. Brasher called the police, and then we both ran back to our place, but we were too late. When we got there, my father was passed out drunk on the bed. My mother was sitting on the couch, holding my little brother in her arms, rocking him. Singing to him.” He paused, then said softly, “She’d always been an alcoholic. But she was never sane after that. I left before the police came.” His voice was flat “Never went back.”

  “My God…” Summer was shaking so hard she could barely speak. “And you think-My God, Riley, you don’t-you can’t believe you’d ever be like them…that you’d even be capable-”

  “I made a vow,” he said, his voice hard as stone, “that I’d never give myself the opportunity to find out. I couldn’t take the chance. Whatever the evil that was in them, it would die with me.”

  “Riley Grogan,” she said fiercely, twisting in his arms to take his face between her hands, “you are the strongest, most self-assured man I’ve ever met. So strong I thought you didn’t need anything or anybody-certainly didn’t need me! And strong men do not hurt those who are weaker than they are! They don’t. You couldn’t possibly harm a child. Surely you know that!”

  “I do now,” he growled. “Maybe deep down I always did, but I needed-” he grabbed a breath as if it were pure oxygen “-someone to make me believe it I needed-” He broke off and caught her hands, pressed them one at a time to his mouth. It seemed a long time before he drew a shuddering breath and murmured, “You have a healer’s hands, Mrs. Robey. Did you know that? I do need you. I need you to heal me…” And the words flowed through her fingers like balm.

  “I’ll be happy to-” her voice was ragged, torn between laughter and tears of exasperation “-if you’ll just please stop calling me Mrs. Robey.”

  “I will-I promise.” Then he cleared his throat and continued in an endearingly stiff and formal tone, “I would much prefer, as soon as it can be arranged, to call you Mrs.
Grogan.”

  There was a bemused pause; then in a voice soft with dawning wonder, Summer said, “All right.”

  “David-wake up, wake up,” Helen whispered. “Hurry-you’re gonna miss it! Mommy’s kissin’ Mr. Riley!”

  Jake Redfield stood in the early morning fog and watched the uniformed sheriff’s deputy stride toward him. Behind him on the banks of the river, other men, some wearing diving gear, were gathered around the shrouded body of a man.

  “Fingerprints will have to confirm it,” the deputy said as he drew near. “But it’s Robey, all right. Everything matches.”

  “He have anything on him?” Redfield asked. Like a computer disk, maybe?

  The deputy shook his head. “Wallet, several different I.D.s, a little cash, not much. Sorry…”

  Redfield turned without a word and walked back to his car.

  KATHLEEN CREIGHTON

  has roots deep in the California soil but has relocated to South Carolina. As a child, she enjoyed listening to old-timers’ tales and her fascination with the past only deepened as she grew older. Today, she says she is interested in everything-art, music, gardening, zoology, anthropology and history, but people are at the top of her list. She also has a lifelong passion for writing, and now combines her two loves in romance novels.

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  Document creation date: 04.07.2012

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