by Jeannie Watt
“Thank you,” Tess muttered flatly, ready to hang up. She hated feeling like she was bugging the hell out of him, but she had no one else. He was it.
“Hey,” he said just as she was about to say goodbye. “Is everything okay?”
Was that a grudging hint of empathy in his voice?
“No.” She blurted the word, and it felt great to say it out loud, even to this guy who obviously had better things to do than talk to her. No. Everything was not all right.
“What’s wrong?”
“I can’t shake the nerves,” Tess said, her voice low and intense. “I’m scared. All of the time.” She was in the middle of nowhere, as hidden away from Eddie as she could be and she still felt like a target.
The detective pulled in a breath. “Are you in contact with anyone you know? Anyone Eddie might know?”
“Just you.” She’d wanted to contact William, just to have someone to talk to, but hadn’t.
“I don’t count,” he said. “Would Eddie have any reason to suspect you’ve gone to where you are now? Any connection between the place you’re living and your past that he would know about?”
“Not much.” Did one visit when she was twelve count? Her grandmother had taken her to see a friend in Barlow Ridge, who’d long since passed away. Her younger stepbrother, Mikey, had been with them, but the stop had been part of a longer trip to Salt Lake City. It’d been a short overnight visit, but the isolation of Barlow Ridge had struck Tess, stuck with her. She’d felt so far away from her problems there. So protected from the reality of her life—not her life with her grandmother, but the reality of her mother’s life. It had been no accident that when she started to look for places to hide, she’d checked Barlow Ridge. Finding the Anderson Ranch for lease had seemed like a sign. A godsend.
“We passed through here once sixteen years ago on our way to another city,” Tess said, walking over to the window and staring out without actually seeing anything. She was too focused on Detective Hiller and his questions. His ultimate conclusion.
“No connections there?”
“No.” And still none.
“What specifically is making you nervous?”
“I’m afraid of someone recognizing me and word getting out that the slashed model lives here.” It sounded lame when she said it out loud, as if she was overestimating her importance and how much people thought about her, but the story of the slashing had made the news. Being recognized was not out of the realm of possibility—which was why she was here in the first place.
“How would they recognize you?” the detective asked. “Not to be blunt...” When wasn’t he blunt? “But I’ve seen you before and after the attack. You look nothing like your old self.”
Tess hadn’t expected the remark to sting, but it did. Her career, her looks, had given her an identity, made her more than a runaway and a survivor. She was back to being a survivor.
Tess took a moment, trying to find the words to explain why her fear of Eddie was so pervasive. Finally she settled on, “I know what a sadistic bastard Eddie is. I can’t help worrying about him finding me, because if he does...” She swallowed to keep her throat from closing, remembering how the guy who cut her face had said that Eddie would keep taking pieces off her until he got what he wanted. She reached out with her free hand to stroke Blossom. The dog leaned into her leg.
“I understand your concern,” the detective said as if he was reading a script. Not exactly reassuring.
“He’s done some awful things to people,” Tess said. She hated how defensive she sounded.
“Let’s look at this logically. Would he be able to hang out in your community without being noticed?”
“Not easily.”
“Is there a drug culture?”
Tess almost laughed. Yes. A huge cowboy drug culture. “If there is, it’s really small and private.” But she saw where he was going with this. Was there anyone who might know someone who knew someone who knew Eddie? But thinking of the people she’d met so far in Barlow Ridge...unlikely. “I don’t think there’s a bunch of trafficking through this particular community, but I don’t know about the closest town. It’s...larger.”
There was a brief silence then the detective said, “You’ve been assaulted. Your fear is normal, but my gut says the chances of your stepfather running you down are remote if everything you’ve said is true. But you have to follow your gut.”
“All right,” Tess said quietly. The detective was basically telling her that she had nothing to worry about, then adding a disclaimer in case he was wrong. Again, less than reassuring, but somehow Tess did feel reassured. A little anyway. Her fear was normal. She knew that, but it felt good having someone say it out loud.
“I’ll call if we get any new information on the case, but for right now all I can tell you is that your stepfather has made every parole meeting and as far as I know, hasn’t missed a day of work. I’ll call you if that changes or we get any new information.”
There didn’t seem much to say after the detective’s summation, so Tess simply said, “Thank you.”
“If there’s nothing else...?”
“No.”
“Then have a good day.” The line went dead before she could say goodbye.
Tess hung up the phone and then walked over to the window to stare out across the sunny fields behind her house. What the detective said made sense. Eddie really had no way to track her here. If someone recognized her, what would they do? Contact the media? It wasn’t like she was missing and the authorities were looking for her. If people thought they recognized her, they might talk among themselves. Wonder.
And maybe someone Eddie knew would get wind of it...
What were the chances? She was eight hundred miles away from Eddie.
Tess leaned forward until her forehead touched the glass. What she needed was perspective—to look at things without filtering them through the residual feelings of trauma left by the attack.
Just because she’d been a victim didn’t mean she had to remain one. All she had to do was figure out how to get a grip...and separate reality from paranoia.
She let out a breath that briefly fogged the window.
That was going to take a whole lot of practice.
* * *
ZACH WAS IN the kitchen when Beth Ann and Emma came into the house. The bills sat in a stack next to the phone, stamped and ready to go. The bank account was drained and he’d had to call Jeff, his cousin and ranching partner, to set up a time to discuss selling cows earlier than planned. He was so damned tired of hanging on by a thread.
“Lizzie and Darcy thought they saw a late calf and went to check,” Beth Ann said as she dumped two backpacks onto a kitchen chair. “And Emma has news.”
“We’re going to 4-H horse camp. Both Darcy and me this year.” Emma grinned widely before opening the fridge and pulling out the milk. She poured half a glass and then put the top back on the plastic bottle and shoved it back inside the fridge.
“We haven’t filled out the forms yet. Or paid,” Zach said, not quite certain how to take this happy news.
“We got scholarships,” Emma said. “Irv stopped by the school and told the class who’d won scholarships. It was me and Darcy and Luke.”
“Scholarships?” Zach met Beth Ann’s eyes over the top of his daughter’s head. Every year the volunteer firemen gave scholarships to various camps and the graduating seniors for college.
“Yes. This year Emma and Darcy g
ot the scholarships. You didn’t know?”
No, he didn’t know, and he was a fireman. When had the guys decided that his family would receive the charity this year?
“Isn’t it great, Dad?” Emma said, doing a happy twirl that came close to slopping the milk out of her glass.
“Well,” Zach started before he caught Beth Ann’s eye again where he read “leave it for now.” Fine. He’d leave it, but he was going to pay for this camp. “I don’t know what Lizzie and I are going to do without you guys around for a week.”
“You’ll manage,” Emma said. “I can’t believe I get to go this year!” She skipped out of the kitchen, happy as can be, leaving Zach and Beth Ann and a whole lot of tension in the air.
“I didn’t know the girls put in for scholarships.”
“Everyone in the 4-H club puts in for a scholarship,” Beth Ann said.
“There are kids who need the money more than Emma and Darcy.”
“Can you really afford to have both of them go this year?”
He could barely afford having Darcy go alone last year. The camp, which was near Boise and associated with the university there, ended up costing almost nine hundred dollars per kid for travel, a week’s worth of food and the instructors, who were always top-notch.
“I can figure something out.”
“Damn it, Zach. What’s more important here? Your pride or both girls getting to go to camp?”
“There’s got to be a way other than charity.”
“Scholarships are not charity. They’re awarded to deserving kids, regardless of need.”
“Bull. I’ve been in on enough selection meetings that I know exactly how they’re awarded.” Because pretty much every kid in the local 4-H club was deserving. Need was the number one factor used when the firemen selected their scholarship recipients.
Darcy came in through the back door just then, smiling widely. “You have a new bull calf, but the mama isn’t going to let anyone near it. Did Emma tell you about horse camp?”
“Yes, she did.”
“Isn’t it great?” Darcy asked as she pulled her backpack out from under Lizzie’s pink one. “Now I can use the hundred dollars I saved for something else!”
“Yeah,” Zach said, forcing a smile that he hoped looked halfway genuine. “It’s good to have a windfall like that. Where’s your little sister?”
“Lizzie thought she heard something in the barn.”
“Like...what?”
“Like her imagination,” Darcy said. “I couldn’t hear anything, but you know how she loves to find baby barn cats. She’ll be in pretty soon.” She hefted her backpack and headed out of the kitchen toward the living room.
“I know you hate this, Zach, but you’re thinking about this the wrong way,” Beth Ann said once Darcy was hopefully out of hearing range.
Zach chose not to answer, because no matter how he thought about it, it stung. Maybe it wouldn’t have stung so much if he could have afforded to send both girls and this was a happy surprise, but that wasn’t what it was. His fellow firemen were giving him charity in the one way he wouldn’t be able to say no.
“Now you can use that eighteen hundred dollars for something else,” Beth Ann pointed out, echoing Darcy.
“I guess,” Zach said. Hard to argue since that money would take a bite out of the medical bills. “Staying for dinner? We’re having another slow-cooker delight.”
“No. I think I’ll head home and hit the books.” She touched his upper arm, patting lightly. Zach met her eyes. Smiled a little.
“See you later,” he said.
* * *
TESS STAYED AWAKE until daybreak. She’d read and drawn and even conducted a late-night job search. She went over and over her conversation with Detective Hiller, told herself that he was right, but as soon as it was dark outside she found herself with all the lights on, listening for anything out of the ordinary. There was no storm that night, which may have been why she could hear so much more than she had the previous few nights. Rattling windows, creaking boards. The noises of an old house, but enough to keep her on edge.
This is normal. You’ve been assaulted. Of course you’re on edge.
Why was it so damned hard to put this all into perspective? It’d been three months since she’d been slashed and she’d expected once she got out of California and deep into the wilds of Nevada that the fear would fade faster than it was.
Maybe that was part of her problem. The fear wasn’t going to simply fade away after a trauma. She had to work at overcoming it and thus far all she’d been doing was reacting to it.
Finally, after the sun came up, she let the dogs out, then crawled back into bed, meaning only to close her eyes for ten or fifteen minutes before she let the dogs back in. She woke up with a start, realizing the dogs were still outside and that somehow she’d fallen asleep.
She grabbed the clock which was facing the wall and turned it around. One-thirty?
She’d slept for eight hours straight. A record. She didn’t know whether to be happy or disturbed. She’d been unconscious, oblivious to danger for eight long hours.
But nothing had happened.
Pushing the rumpled hair back from her face, she walked into the bathroom, grimaced when she saw the crease marks on her face from sleeping so hard.
Tess pushed aside the bathroom window curtains to see the dogs sleeping in the shade under the big elm tree in the backyard, the sunlight that filtered through the branches dappling their coats as they snoozed. They looked so peaceful. Everything seemed so...dare she say it, think it? Everything seemed so normal.
And then the phone rang, scaring the bejeezus out of her.
She scooped it up on the second ring, answered it after taking a deep breath so that her voice sounded normal.
“Ms. O’Neil? We have a cancellation this afternoon at four. Could you bring your dog in then?”
Could she? Tess pushed her hair back, leaving her hand on top of her head as she calculated. Almost two. She could be ready by two-thirty. An hour’s drive to Wesley...
“Ms. O’Neil?”
“Uh, yes. I can make it.”
“Great. We’ll see you and Mac at four.”
Half an hour later, she loaded the dogs into the backseat of her car. It was the first time she’d left Barlow Ridge since arriving. The first time she’d ventured out into the world at large to risk being recognized.
But somehow getting sleep, real sleep, not her usual pattern of sleeping for half an hour and then waking, made her feel better. Stronger. Able to tackle this mission.
Or maybe the logic of Detective Hiller’s assessment had finally sunk in to the point that she could work on believing it. She didn’t care which it was as long as she could start easing herself back into a more normal existence—or as normal as it could be living in the middle of nowhere under a false name.
The vet office was easy to find and little more than an hour after she’d left the ranch she was there, sitting in the car, summoning the courage to go inside.
Tess touched her cheek, which she’d left uncovered, having decided that a white bandage caught the eye more than unsightly scars. Instead she’d worn a light blue knit cloche hat that flattened her hair down onto her cheeks, partially covering the injury, and sunglasses to hide the drooping corner of her left eye.
“Hello,” the vet tech, a young woman with a reddish-brown braid down her back, called brightly as Tess and Mac entered the wai
ting room.
“Hi.” Tess smiled briefly and then pushed her glasses up to the bridge of her nose as they started to slide down. There were no other people in the office, but a lot of barking in the back.
“I need you to fill this out,” the girl said, coming around the counter and handing Tess a clipboard. “New in town?” she asked before kneeling in front of Mac who obligingly held his bad leg out.
The question made Tess’s stomach knot. “I’ve been here for a while,” she said as she took the pen and started filling out the information. When she was done, the only truthful information was her phone number and Mac’s vitals. Everything else was a fabrication. Her entire life was a fabrication.
Tess brought the clipboard back to the counter just as a tall broad man with blond hair opened the door leading to the clinic. “Hey,” he said with an easy smile. “I’m Dr. Hyatt—Sam.” His eyes traveled over her injured cheek, making her stomach tighten even more, and then he focused on Mac. “What happened?”
Tess gave him a quick rundown and then the vet said, “I’ll have to x-ray.” He cocked one eyebrow as if waiting for Tess to ask a question. It took her a moment to realize he was waiting for her to ask how much an X-ray would cost.
“Whatever it takes.”
“I’ll keep the cost down as low as I can.”
“You’d never survive in Beverly Hills,” Tess said with a half smile, trying her best to act nonchalant. Normal.
“Are you from Southern Cal?” Sam asked shooting her a quick glance as he ran a hand over Mac’s head.
“No.” The word came out too quickly and sounded very much like the lie it was. Tess faked a smile. “Um, how long will this take? I have a couple errands I need to run.”
Dr. Hyatt frowned slightly before he said, “An hour. Tops.”
“Okay. Thanks. I’ll see you in an hour.”
Tess made her escape, pulling in a deep breath of crisp air as the door closed behind her. It did nothing to clear her head. She had no errands. She simply needed to get away from the vet and his cute chatty receptionist before she made more mistakes—or her stomach turned inside out from stress.
