by B. J Daniels
Ruth’s face crumpled. She turned her face away as if ashamed.
“You found out,” Anna said. “That’s what caused your attack.” What Ruth had found in the investigator’s report—not just on Anna, but the connection between her and Jack Fairbanks. She’d put it together because she’d known her son Jack, she’d known something was wrong.
Ruth said nothing. What was there to say? Ruth had guards outside her hospital room door because she knew what both her sons were capable of now. She would have to live with that.
Ruth brushed the tears from her pale cheeks and finally turned to look at her again. “I’m sorry. I can’t bring back your son. Or your friend.”
Anna nodded.
Ruth squeezed her hand, pain and compassion in her eyes. “I can’t—”
“I know,” Anna said. “I know.” She’d known where this conversation was headed long before she’d entered this room. Ruth blamed herself for her sons’crimes. But in the end, she was their mother. She couldn’t give them up even though clearly she knew more than Anna about what her sons had done.
But as Anna had known, Ruth Fairbanks would take no part in seeing justice done. Not against Jack. And maybe especially not against Jonathan.
With effort, Anna rose and walked to the door. She heard Ruth crying softly as she left the room. She didn’t look back.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
ANNA STOOD ON THE screened-in porch, sipping her coffee. The lake was beautiful this morning, the surface cloaked in a low wispy fog, the sun piercing the thin veil to glow on the slick green water.
It had been over a year since she’d seen Shadow Lake. It had taken that long to see the lake’s beauty and not its darkness. She no longer had the house in Seattle. During that time away, she’d rented an apartment in Pilot’s Cove that was close to the private nursery school where she had worked. She’d been close enough that she saw a lot of Doc. And Walker.
Not long after she’d left Shadow Lake she’d read about the tragedy in the newspaper. She’d been waiting for it so at least part of it came as no surprise, although Jonathan Fairbanks’s drowning sent the rest of the country into shock. He’d won his father’s seat on the Senate. There’d been talk of him running for president in 2012.
According to Walker, Ruth was the one who found Jonathan’s body washed up on the beach. Walker swore that it wasn’t the only body Ruth had found that early morning in July, but that Fairbanks money had kept the truth from coming out.
Jonathan had been buried beside his brother Jack and father Big Jim Fairbanks in the cemetery in Shadow Lake. Anna hadn’t attended the funeral, but Walker had. He said that both Jack’s and Jonathan’s graves had fresh sod on them. “I think Jack is finally at peace.”
Shortly after the funeral, Ruth Fairbanks had ordered everything on the island razed, including an old shack at the north end as well as the mansion. She, according to one inside source, was traveling abroad.
Anna hadn’t been down to the Shadow Lake cemetery, but Doc still went every day to visit with Gladys. He said the grass on Jonathan’s grave was brown year around, while Jack’s was always green. Anna didn’t believe him. Maybe one day she’d go see for herself.
She’d heard from Doc that someone had seen former Police Chief Robert Nash down in Oregon. Lucinda was expecting again. Another girl.
Anna could hear Doc in the kitchen now making them a sack lunch to take fishing. Summer in Shadow Lake was just as wonderful as she’d been told it would be. She heard Doc go out to meet the mailman, heard their murmured voices as Doc visited for a moment and returned, the screen door banging softly behind him.
Out on the lake, Anna picked up the sound of a boat motor heading this way. Moments later, the bow cut through the thin fog, pulled up to the dock, the motor dying as waves lapped at the shore and laughter drifted up to the house.
“The boys are here,” Doc said behind her.
She nodded, smiling as she watched Billy Blake and D.C. Walker playfully pushing each other in a race for the house.
“They’re never going to grow up,” Doc said, a smile in his voice.
She hoped not.
“Something came for you,” Doc said, holding out a piece of mail.
Anna put down her coffee and took the square white envelope. There was no return address. The postmark was Fiji, a place someone might stop when traveling around the world. It was addressed to Anna Walker in care of Dr. Gene Brubaker, Shadow Lake, Washington. Whoever had sent it knew that Anna and Walker were married and living with Doc. Doc liked the company and said he felt safer with the chief of police living under his roof.
Anna knew Doc needed the company. He still missed Gladys desperately, but he seemed healthier and happier having them there. He now talked of the future as if he had plans to stick around for a while.
Frowning, Anna pried up the flap. There was a card inside with the word CONGRATULATIONS emblazed across the front and what looked like confetti being thrown to the breeze. Only it wasn’t confetti, it was tiny colorful baby rattles.
There was no printed greeting inside the card. Just a handful of carefully written words in an older woman’s unsteady hand.
As Billy and Walker bound up the steps, Anna covered her swollen round belly, felt the child move inside and read the words.
It was a blessing from the Bible: “The Lord deal kindly with you.” Ruth 1:8
ISBN: 978-1-4268-0707-7
SHADOW LAKE
Copyright © 2007 by Barbara Heinlein.
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