Autumn's Shadow

by Lyn Cote

  But Burke's terseness piqued her curiosity. What was going on underneath Burke's deputy sheriff's hat? Thoughts about Nick? And what else? The impulse to remove the lid, to get to know this man was suddenly irresistible. She eased back in her seat, revved her engine once, and took off, gravel flying.

  Opening the windows and turning up the country western station, she headed down the back roads she knew so well. Today had turned out the perfect Labor Day—sunny and warm. Everyone's picnics would be held without wearing raincoats and without anchoring everything down so it wouldn't blow away.

  The wind through the windows tossed her hair around as they bounced over dirt roads. She felt herself grinning. Tomorrow she'd return to school and again face all its challenges. Today she'd planned to spend the day spiffing up the Family Closet, but plans ...had changed for the better.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she observed the handsome deputy, whom every single woman in LaFollette was buzzing about. He was studying her as though she'd suddenly gone crazy. She grinned wider. Confounding him made her feel even freer, more audacious. She tapped the steering wheel in time to the music. It felt so good to run away even if it was only for the afternoon.

  Finally, she turned down a rutted lane and skirted a familiar thick stand of pines. The sight before her instantly heightened her joy. She drove up to the building site and parked. After a moment of drinking in the view, she glanced at him. "This is ...will be my home soon." She opened her door and jumped out. "Come on in." Keely left Burke behind in her car.

  Burke gazed out the windshield. Why had she brought him here to a long ranch home covered in sandy brick and shades of gray fieldstone? Though it was obviously still in process, it fit the setting— which looked like it had been waiting for just such a dwelling.

  Keely bounded to the door and unlocked it.

  Uncertain over this sudden change of events, he got out, still studying the house. He'd recognized the symptoms of catharsis in her. He'd seen it before when he'd been working with someone and they just had to stop and blow off steam before they broke under the pressure. But why had she included him in her escape? What did it mean? How should he react?

  He made his way over the deep ruts in the ungraded drive and stopped on the newly poured concrete walk to the front door. Mallard ducks flew overhead, quacking. They were heading for the lake he'd seen beyond one corner behind the house. He pictured the modest cabin he'd thought of renting. The financial gap separating him and this woman loomed before him again, and it caught him up short. Never before had he been in this situation, an unpleasant one.

  "Come on in!" Keely's voice floated to him.

  His hands in his pockets, he went inside. So she had more money than he did. More education. But they weren't going to get involved, so what did it matter?

  Inside, he found that the walls were being painted and the trim had been cut. A miter saw, various lengths of oak trim, and painting supplies littered the rooms and hall. First quality oak trim.

  "Come here and see my view."

  Keely's voice drew him toward the lake side of the house. She sounded so happy. He didn't have the heart to let his own low spirits spoil her fun. The change of events, change of scenery, change in Keely—as she had sung along with the radio and driven with abandon over deserted, pine-lined roads—had begun to loosen his own stress.

  Maybe he needed a short "vacation" too. He couldn't let on that he was less than thrilled she was willing to share this place, this holiday afternoon with him. At the least that would be rude. At the most, it would ruin her attempt at "breaking out" of her gloom.

  Trying out a grin, he entered what must be the family room and stood getting the feel of the room with its oak beams and fieldstone fireplace. And the house was beginning to work on him. The expansive room with its view, worthy of a wildlife documentary, opened something deep inside him. It was like a cracking of ice.

  Standing in front of a wall of windows and sliding glass doors, Keely smiled at him. Then she slid one of the doors open. The warm wind that blew in the door flowed through him, deep inside him. He felt his face ease into a grin, a real one.

  "What do you think?" She motioned toward a porch overlooking the lake. "Doesn't it take your breath away?"

  You take my breath away. He froze, not daring to venture farther or speak. Witnessing her expressions of joy—her smile and even the way she moved with a spring to her step—was thawing him, layer by layer. He had to stay rooted where he stood...or he would take her into his arms.

  What's happening to me? I don't get it. Holding Keely Turner should be the last thing on my mind.

  "Is there something wrong?" She searched his face, her head cocked to one side.

  "No," he covered up. He'd let himself come here with her, and now he couldn't stop staring at her. She'd been on his mind every day—whether he'd admitted it or not. Ever since he'd gone to her rescue at Walachek's, everywhere he turned this woman appeared right in front of him. He'd tried to ignore her—impossible.

  What was so distinctive about her? What did she have that made him forget that he was single and meant to remain single? The answer was easy. She was like no woman he'd known...in a very long time. And he hadn't been worthy of Sharon either. Events had proved that. But now, he couldn't leave Keely here alone.

  "Then let me show you around," she offered.

  "Okay," he finally managed to croak from a dry throat. He wanted to be here with her, couldn't resist being near her, this wasn't easy to swallow.

  "I'm sorry. Do you want to leave? I kind of dragged you here . . ." She paused in front of him.

  "No." And it was deeply true. "No, this is great."

  "Are you sure? It's just that there is so much going on inside you, and you let so little of it out."

  Her words surprised him. She was curious about him too? He wasn't interesting. And soon she'd realize that they had too little in common, stood too far apart to come together.

  She pursed her lips. "Come outside." She led him onto the unfinished porch and down the steps yet without a railing to the lake. Farther down the shore, a man stood on an old pier fishing. Across the lake, someone was canoeing alone. She turned to face him.

  He couldn't help but wonder what she'd say next.

  "Since you got here, it's been one thing after another ,right? That's what's tying you into knots," she said as though analyzing him.

  He grimaced with feeling. "You've got that right."

  "So let's lighten up. I've been feeling glum too. Let's face facts—either Grady or Nick might have shot out the windows at school." She shrugged. "But it might be neither of them."She leaned toward him.

  Burke wished she'd keep her distance. His resistance to her was disintegrating. Her appeal had broken through. He felt himself wanting to relax, to shed his shoes and socks and wade in the warm shallows beside her. Let the sun warm their faces. He nodded in encouragement.

  "Now the case of the Weavers' foster baby may have opened up. But maybe not. We can't do anything more than we've done. And this is the last day of summer—are you going to waste it?" She slipped her arm through his.

  Some of her sparkle flowed through her touch into him. He had to hold out against the way she was dissolving his defenses. The ice in the wall he'd kept firmly around himself today disintegrated in a heated flash. "When—" he cleared his throat—"are you planning on moving in?"

  She laughed out loud but in a way that didn't insult him. "Let's take a walk along the shore and I'll tell you. I can tell you because—" she paused to beam at him—"you're not exactly a chatterbox." Not letting him comment, she went on. "Now if it weren't for my father, I would have been in this house over two months ago."

  "Why the delay?"

  She looked away from him, out across the lake. The canoeist paddled closer to them. "My father wanted to make sure everything was done ...right," she replied with an edge to her voice.

  Burke had only known this woman briefly, but he instantly got the underlying
message. Her father had probably made trouble for the contractor and subcontractors. He drew her closer to him and began walking, suddenly wanting to cheer her. "Did you draw up the plans yourself?"

  Turning toward him, she gave him another of her radiant grins, so spontaneous, so generous. It flashed through him, taking him back years. No one had looked at him like that for . . .

  "Yes, I did," she replied. "I wanted something simple, something that would harmonize with this setting...."

  He lost himself in the eagerness of her low voice. No need to do more than listen, to do more than stay close. No need to think, remember. He let her lead him on, listening to her plans for her home, her future.What kind of man would she choose to share this house with her? He focused on her voice, not his disturbing thought.

  "Sheriff!" A short, round, gray-haired woman burst through the sheriff's department door on Wednesday morning around eight. "Rodd Durand! It's me, Patsy Kainz!"

  Hearing the urgency in the woman's voice, Burke stood up at his desk. Behind the counter, the dispatcher took off her earphones and gawked at the excited woman.

  Rodd stepped out of his office. "Patsy, what—?"

  "That pendant . . ." The red-faced woman paused to catch her breath.

  She worried Burke. She looked like his grandmother had just before her triple bypass. Burke stood up and rolled an office chair toward her. "Please sit down. You look . . .here sit down."

  She plopped on the chair. "That pendant...in the paper. I think...I think it's...my grandmother's. Can I see it?"

  Rodd nodded to Burke, and he in turn strode back to the evidence room, snatched the clear-bagged necklace from the safe, and returned. His heartbeat sped up. Had they gotten lucky? The local paper with the blurb about the necklace had just been delivered this morning.

  Receiving the sealed plastic bag from him, Rodd held it in front of the woman. "Don't take it out," he warned. Then he let her hold it and examine it through the plastic. She gazed at it, turned it in the light. Tears moistened her eyes."Seeing the picture like that in the paper ...shocked me. How did you find it? It's my grandmother's. It's Jayleen's."

  "But the engraving says Maria," Rodd pointed out.

  Burke watched the woman, gauging her replies. He couldn't think of an ulterior motive for her claiming the pendant. It wasn't valuable unless it truly belonged in her family. Rodd was acting like he saw this woman a credible source. And he should know.

  Patsy swallowed her tears and drew herself up, sitting straighter. "My grandmother wore this as a girl in Germany. Her name was Maria. She gave it to me and I gave it to Jayleen, my granddaughter before that woman...took my grandkids to Milwaukee." Patsy paused as if getting her emotions under control. "I didn't have any daughters. Just sons. Just like my grandmother. That's why I gave it to my granddaughter. How did you get it, Sheriff? Jayleen's not here in the county, is she?"

  Burke and Rodd exchanged looks. Burke saw that Rodd was buying the woman's explanation, and he had to agree—the woman did sound believable.

  "Come into my office, Patsy. You, too, Burke." Rodd turned to the dispatcher. "Unless there's murder or bank robbery, don't interrupt us."

  Burke understood Rodd's desire to wrap this up. No one wanted a baby left unidentified, a fatal case unsolved. And this case was special to his friend. He'd be the one to save the baby from the car.

  Rodd urged Patsy into his office. Burke followed and closed the door behind them. Rodd settled Patsy into the chair in front of his desk while Burke sat to one side. "Patsy, you say your granddaughter's in Milwaukee?"

  "Yes." Patsy primmed her lips. "That woman, her mother, divorced my son when he shoulda been the one to get rid of her. While he was working hard at the mill all day, she started hanging around Flanagan's. The drink got her. My boy'd come home and—" Patsy frowned with deep disapproval—"find the kids had been all alone after school, and no housework done, no supper cooked for a hard-working man—"

  "When did this happen?" Rodd stemmed the flow of recrimination.

  "Over three years ago," Patsy said. "Then one of her ...men talked her into going to Milwaukee with him. She divorced my son, who was too good for her anyway. But she took the kids, Jayleen and her two younger brothers, with them." Patsy scowled. "In my day, a woman like that wouldn't have gotten custody. The kids should have stayed with their father. But she knew it would hurt him so she took the kids away. Besides, she wanted Jayleen along to do the work, and she wanted the child support—couldn't get that without the kids."

  "How old is Jayleen?" Burke asked. The story was adding up, but who was the baby's mother? Rodd and he traded glances. Would the granddaughter be old enough to be a mother? Or did the baby belong to the girl's mother?

  "Jayleen's fifteen, will be sixteen come Christmas."Patsy's lined face crinkled into concern. "I can't believe Jayleen would let that necklace go. She promised me she'd take care of it. Where did you find the necklace? How did you get it?"

  Rodd leaned forward, his elbows on the desk. "You remember the car that blew up, the one—"

  "The one with the baby in it?" Patsy sat forward in her chair. "The baby that the Weavers took in?"

  Rodd nodded. "Yes, this necklace was found inside the padding of the car seat that the baby was in."

  "What? How?" Patsy looked stunned. "When I rushed in here, I thought maybe Jayleen had come back on her own. Or maybe she'd lost the necklace before she went and had been afraid to tell me, and now someone had found it. I just didn't want to lose it. I know Jayleen wouldn't let go of it on purpose. I don't understand. What are you saying?"

  Burke waited to hear how much Rodd would reveal.

  Rodd frowned. "Does your son go down to see his kids often?"

  "Once a month like clockwork. Gets a motel and spends the weekend in Milwaukee with them. I know he wants the kids back. Jayleen's old enough to make up her own mind, but she stays to take care of her two younger brothers. Least, that's what I think. I don't believe that woman has changed much since she left Steadfast."

  "So he'd know if she had a baby?" Rodd asked.

  "A baby?" Patsy looked aghast. "You mean you think the Weavers' foster baby belongs to that woman?"

  "Could it belong to your granddaughter?" Burke asked in a quiet tone, nearly a whisper. Remembering how awful last winter was, he inquired further, "Did your son manage to get down to Milwaukee much last year? It was one bad winter. State highways were closed more than once."

  Patsy turned to look at him—wide-eyed. "You're right. He made it there in October, but he didn't get back till late March. Every time he'd be ready to go, another storm would blow in. He got halfway twice and was turned back by the state troopers, shutting down the highways. He was really upset." She paused, her mouth working as though saying words to herself. "But he called every week to see how the kids were."

  "And how were they?" Rodd asked.

  Patsy frowned more deeply than she had before. "Jayleen was always out when he called. He thought she was mad at him because he kept promising to come and then couldn't make it. At least, that's what her mother hinted."

  Burke considered this added information. The time frame fit. Jayleen could have had a baby last fall. Girls hid pregnancies all the time. Sometimes they didn't even realize they were pregnant. But who had driven the baby north last January? And why?

  Then Patsy put the question they all had into words. "If the baby belongs to the mother or to Jayleen, how did the necklace and baby get here?"

  "Maybe we should call the mother—," Rodd started, reaching for the phone.

  "No," Patsy growled. "If you give her any warning, she'll have lies ready. I haven't seen my granddaughter for three years. That woman wouldn't let them come for a visit, and my son couldn't afford to go to court and complain about it. And I didn't go see them because I can't stand that . . ." She closed her mouth and tightened it up with maximum disapproval, leaving no doubt of her meaning.

  Rodd looked at the clock. "Then I think we need to go to Mi
lwaukee. Can your son get off work if it's an emergency?"

  "Sure. And I'm going too." Patsy took on a fighting expression. "If my sweet Jayleen needs me, I'm going. I've waited too long to make my son do right. If I'm a great-grandmother, I want to know it."

  Rodd stood up. Frowning suddenly, he made a sound of disgust. "Burke, I've got that meeting with the DA today on pending cases; you'll have to handle this. Patsy, my deputy will do just what I would. I'm positive of that. You can trust him." Rodd turned to him. "Touch base with MPD if you have to, but find out as much as you can about whose baby we have and how it got here."

  Looking Burke over, Patsy nodded. "I need to call my husband."

  "Go ahead." Burke turned to Patsy. "then I'll drive you to where your son works. Let's get going right now."

  Chapter Six

  About a week and a half since the unidentified baby case had been solved, Burke sat in the small crowded church. He usually avoided weddings. But here in Steadfast, he hadn't been able to duck out. His friend Rodd was the best man and his wife was the matron of honor for the older couple at the front. And Burke had almost rented the cabin from the groom, so he couldn't beg off.

  At the front of the church, the buxom bride in a pale lavender dress and the silver-haired groom in a navy suit held hands. Pastor Weaver, his sandy hair a halo in the bright sunshine, was reading from Ephesians chapter 5. " 'You husbands must love your wives with the same love Christ showed the church.' "

  To Burke's left, farther forward, sat Keely Turner. Her blonde-streaked hair, pulled up high, drew him like a torch glowing in a darkened room. Images of her from the Labor Day they'd spent together bobbed to the surface of his mind often. Now he tried to keep his eyes on the bride and groom, but his gaze slipped back to Keely sitting so straight with her head held high. The carefree woman that he'd waded in Loon Lake with had disappeared. Ms. Turner had reappeared.

  Pastor Weaver paused in his reading and gazed at the congregation. "I feel almost foolish to be speaking to these two fine seniors about making the commitment of marriage. Their first marriages both lasted longer than I have lived."He beamed at them. "But it has been a real treat to talk to them about their love for each other. Bruno and Lou have known each other for ...forever."