by Sylvia Nobel
“Don’t worry about it. Having the story is repayment enough, but as far as Dayln goes, I’m not as willing as you are to just forgive and forget.”
“Wait!” she cut in. “I’ve agonized over this all day and well...I keep thinking of something my Mom used to say. Sometimes we have to do what we think is best even if others might consider it wrong.”
Her words punched me in the gut. “Jesus, Audrey. Are you asking me to stand aside and give her a pass? Even though she tried to kill both of us!”
Her eyes pooled. “I can’t tell you what to do, but for me...for me...well, I just can’t do anything else that will add to her misery. Think of what’s she’s been through. I don’t believe she deliberately killed our father and she swore that she would never have done any of those awful things to me, to us, if she’d known who I was. She deserves some happiness in her life. If we send her to prison...if she doesn’t have this surgery...she’ll die. She’ll find a way to...” She paused for a breath and swiped at the tears on her cheeks. “I know this is going to sound totally off the wall, but I’ve felt so alone all my life and now, for the first time...I have family, real flesh and blood family, don’t you see?”
I guess I must have been shaking my head in wonder, because she pleaded, “Kendall, please. You’ve earned the right to print every word of this, but when you do, everyone on earth is going to know this dirty, sickening, terrible disgusting story and...” A strangled sob aborted the remainder of her sentence as she turned and bolted through the kitchen door.
I just stood there in the fading twilight feeling helpless. Crap. Double crap! And she didn’t know yet what Dr. Orcutt had confided to me. The heavy feeling that had inhabited my stomach all day invaded my heart as I trudged back up the stairs to my room. What should I do? Spike the story? After all the effort? After everything I’d been through? I knew what my father would do. He would say it was my duty as a journalist to report the story as it happened. But, how was I to balance the public’s so-called right to know against my own troubled conscience?
Chapter 30
Audrey didn’t join me for Marta’s baked enchilada dinner and afterwards when I went upstairs, I found her bedroom door closed and locked. When I knocked, she yelled, “I don’t want to talk to you anymore.” I knew her well enough to know that she was in one of her uncommunicative moods, so I decided to drive downtown to the Muleskinner and say goodbye to Whitey Flanigan. Inside, the usual collection of somber-faced patrons huddled around the bar and I nurtured the profound wish that Audrey’s plans would come to fruition. Work was what these idle men needed to cure their hopeless hearts. As I shook hands with Whitey, it was hard to believe that so much had transpired in only one short week. I was half-amused and half-annoyed to hear the ‘big’ story circulating around town. Did I know that if it hadn’t been for D.J.’s quick action Audrey Morgan would have drowned in the leach pond?
“We’re sure gonna miss your purty face,” Whitey said, flashing me a generous expanse of teeth and gums as I turned to wave a final farewell at the door. “You take care, Irish, and be sure to send along a couple of copies of your story. It might bring in a little business and put us on the map again,” he added with a wink.
He had no idea. I gave him a thumbs up and drove slowly back to the house, unable to shake my glum mood. I’d no sooner stepped into the cinnamon roll-scented kitchen than the phone rang. “Sí, she is here,” Marta said, motioning for me to come.
I pressed the receiver to my ear and when I heard Tally’s mellifluous, “Hey, there, boss lady,” I suddenly felt a whole lot better.
“Hey, yourself,” I replied warmly. “Are you home?”
“Yep.”
“And here I thought I’d get back before you. How’d everything go in Mexico? You get your stallion?”
“Uh huh. A few interesting things happened, but according to Tugg, my trip can’t even begin to hold a candle to yours.”
I bit my lip. Thank goodness I’d extracted Tugg’s promise not to mention my close call or Tally would be having a major cow. At the moment, I wasn’t up to enduring what was sure to be a lengthy I-told-you-so lecture on my mulish propensity to inject myself into life-threatening situations. Eventually, I’d tell him. Just not right this minute. Keeping a light tone, I said, “Well, it did turn out to be just a little more complicated than I originally thought.”
“No kidding. I thought your last case was weird, but this one...well, where do you find these people, anyway?”
“They find me.”
“Amazing. So, when are you coming back?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Good.” Tally wasn’t one to waste words. “Mom and Ronda will be away. How about dinner at my place?”
The image of time alone with him sent a warm glow radiating though me. “Mmmm. Sounds wonderful.”
“I’ll have a fire burning for you,” he drawled seductively. Smiling, I played along. “A fire? Don’t you think it’s a bit hot for that?”
“I wasn’t talking about the weather.”
I giggled and murmured, “Oh, you wicked man. I can hardly wait to see you.”
“Ditto.”
After hanging up, I eagerly accepted the fresh-from-the-oven cinnamon roll Marta offered me and then headed for bed. As tired as I was, sleep eluded me. After an aggravating hour spent replaying in my mind the events of the last week, I switched on the lamp and grabbed my notepad. Two hours later, I set it aside and fell into a deep dreamless sleep that lasted until I was awakened by loud purring and the feel of claws kneading my shoulder. I cracked open one eye, surprised to see it was after seven o’clock. I’d planned to be on the road by now. “Hey, girl, you should have wakened me sooner,” I said with a yawn, scratching my furry alarm clock behind the ears. I’d never had one of my own before, but the idea of owning a friendly feline companion was suddenly very appealing to me.
I enjoyed every bite of Marta’s sumptuous farewell breakfast and afterwards, watery-eyed and murmuring endearments in Spanish I didn’t quite catch, she gave me a bear hug that squeezed the air from my lungs. Ignoring my protests, she then bestowed upon me a ‘traveling lunch’ big enough to feed a family of twelve. I was loading my luggage into the trunk when Audrey came running out the kitchen door wrapped in her fuzzy pink bathrobe.
“Were you going to leave without saying goodbye to me?” she demanded, looking tousled and cross.
“You said you didn’t want to talk to me.”
Her luminous eyes softened. “I didn’t mean it, Kendall. I was...sort of upset.”
“That’s okay. You have every right.”
“I did a lot of thinking last night and instead of being mad at you I owe you my thanks. You’ve been a true friend to me. If you hadn’t urged me to stay I wouldn’t have ever known what my mom was trying to tell me in the letter. I would never have realized how much she really loved me and I want you to know that, well...I guess it will be okay for you to print the story.”
I stared at her in surprise. “Why the change of heart?”
She straightened her shoulders. “I don’t know. As totally weird as this whole situation is, I realized something else really important.”
“What’s that?”
“I can’t just run away from it. Somehow, I have to come to terms with what’s happened and you know what else?”
“I’m listening.”
“It might sound strange, but I don’t feel like I’m drifting anymore.” She paused, her gaze sweeping the valley and sharp blue sky. “ For better or worse, I know who I am now. This is my home. I finally have some roots and I have someone here who needs all the help and care I can give.”
Although I’d seen the barest hint of it last evening, her transformation amazed me. Three days seemed an awfully short amount of time for her to have adjusted to all that had transpired and all the problems still to come. The girl was definitely developing some guts after all. I smiled at her. “I think maybe you have someone here who needs your heart too.
”
She blushed a becoming pink. “You think so?”
My smile broadened. “Yeah, I think so.”
We stood in silence for a moment and then I tapped my watch. “Well, I’ve got to hit the road.”
“Are you sure you can’t stay a few more days?”
“You don’t need me now and besides, I’ve got someone waiting for me too.”
She swallowed hard. “Can I hug you goodbye?”
I nodded and as her thin arms came around my waist, tears stung my eyes. So much for my objectivity, I thought ruefully, returning her hug.
After wishing her loads of good luck, I climbed into my car and headed for Boneyard Pass thinking how much easier it was to maneuver on the newly repaired road rather than the river of mud it had been on the way in.
When I reached the crest of the hill, I pulled over to the side and got out to shoot the pictures I hadn’t been able to get last week in the driving rainstorm. With the wide- angle shots, I tried to capture the essence of this secluded town that time had forgotten, an enchanted hideaway that had captivated my heart and imagination forever. I zoomed in on the Morgan house snugly cradled beneath the craggy horns of Devil’s Hill, using up the remainder of the film in my camera. Then, I pulled the two sheaves of paper from my purse.
The large bundle in my right hand contained the entire story replete with each salacious detail, the version that would expose the nightmare of Dayln Morgan for all the world to read, and in my left, I held the shorter, sanitized version I’d written last night. I stood there uncertain for a minute, savoring the lonesome whisper of the warm wind rustling through the mesquite. There were a hundred good reasons not to do this. I had Audrey’s permission to run the piece and I felt in my gut, it was the best thing I’d ever written. My journalistic sensibilities screamed for me to be logical, but in the time of reckoning the decision wasn’t really that difficult.
I shoved the short version into my purse and with great fanfare, tore the long one into a thousand pieces. The wind caught the scraps of yellow paper and scattered them into the air. They hung there for a few seconds as if to taunt me, then gently fluttered to the bottom of the ravine where they would repose in stately silence alongside the sun-bleached bones of the burros whose fate had bequeathed the name Boneyard Pass.
Feeling curiously at peace, I hopped in my car and headed home, leaving the secrets of Morgan’s Folly safely tucked away among the amber hills now slumbering in the bright golden rays of the morning sun.
SYLVIA NOBEL CURRENTLY RESIDES IN
PHOENIX, ARIZONA WITH HER HUSBAND
AND SIX CATS. SHE IS A MEMBER OF
MYSTERY WRITERS OF AMERICA.
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