‘Dr. Reynolds,’ said a deep distant male voice, ‘This is Ron from Honda City to remind you that your car is due for its regular maintence. Please call our service department at …’ Beep! ‘Hey, Sugar,’ the mellow female voice called out, ‘what you doing out so late? Don’t tell me your still at that damn hospital. You do know you’re only getting paid for an 8 hour day, don’t you? Call me when you can. I just put Candy to sleep and I’m not far behind her. My G-d that child sure does fight sleep! If I don’t catch you tonight, I’ll see you in the morning, OK?’ Beep!
Gina smiled as she heard her friend’s voice. Tanya Beecher was the head nurse on the NICU where Gina worked. They had worked together for 2 years and had become great friends. Tanya, mother of two small children, was undergoing a rough divorce. Gina spent a lot of time talking things through with her and babysitting for her 6 year old daughter, Candace and 8 year old son Bryan. Both of the children were having a hard time adjusting to their new family situation so Gina was spending more time with the children, taking them to the movies or out for a pizza, letting Tanya get a little time to herself. They were planning to spend Christmas together this year at Star Mountain Ski Resort, a few hours north of the city. There were lots of activities for the children and the vacation would do them all good. As she readied herself for bed she reviewed the list of gifts she planned to buy for the children. She wanted to make sure this would be a wonderful holiday and help them cope with their father’s absence. As her cat settled on the comforter beside her, she thought about Tanya’s kids missing their father; then moved to thoughts of her own father and how she had coped with his absence, loss really. She wondered if she had ever really felt that loss, any of her losses really. That time of her life had been such a crisis she wondered if she had really processed what happened to her. She wondered what happened to those feelings of love and attachment she had felt for her family or if she had ever truly had those feelings. As she drifted off to sleep she wondered if she would ever see them again, the family who had raised her, turned their backs on her and who were now so very, very far away. She wondered if they ever thought of her or cared…
CHAPTER 5
THE FAMILY FARM
Nestled between Dudley Gap and Hurricane West Virginia was a narrow patch of farmland that the Raines family had owned for generations since great, great, great-grandfather Alcott Earl Raines had immigrated to this country from England in the late 1800’s. Immigrants who made the journey to America had the same reasons as their predecessors. Escaping religious, racial, and political persecution, seeking economic opportunity and still others came to escape prison. Alcott Earl was in this latter category. He had been involved with England’s underground criminal element and after his last ‘big score’ got word that his arrest was imminent. Pamphlets advertising cheap farmland in America were posted all over London and that decided it for him. He packed up his bride Mary Althea and they were off to become farmers in the new country. Two brothers and a sister soon followed with their families. Pooling their ill-gotten gains they purchased a narrow track of land. The land was rocky and mostly barren, lined with a thick forest of pine scrubs, it wove high up into the mountains. It was hard to farm, but it was all they could afford and it was nearly hidden. It was perfect. The Raines family farm had been established.
The dry forest soil had been coaxed to produce some corn and vegetable crops, enough to eat and some to sell in the local market. A small herd of cattle and some chickens allowed the family to eke out a meager existence. The men farmed and hunted, the women canned vegetables, baked enough bread to sell a few loaves in the town every Friday and made everything they had from scraps of cloth found here and there. Every night the women sat together and made their quilts, which they sold annually at the county fair. That brought in enough money to buy their winter supplies. They built several simple log cabins, a large barn, a chicken coop. The property grew cluttered with farm equipment, broken wagon wheels and home-made children’s toys. Clothes lines, loaded down with sheets and clothes, looped between the trees, blowing in the mountain wind. Lean mixed-breed dog packs roamed the property and a colony of cats took up residence in the barn.
Because of the family’s criminal past, it became their tradition to stick together and avoid contact with outsiders. As long as Alcott Earl Raines lived he feared the long arm of the British Police and demanded complete isolation from the outside world. The tradition was so deeply ingrained that even after his death and the death of his children’s children, the tradition was strictly maintained although no one alive knew the real reason for it. The Raines family feared and distrusted outsiders. When the time came to marry, sons and daughters reached out, found mates in nearby towns and brought them back to the Raines Family farm to live. New cabins were built, families grew and the newly married outsiders became insiders. Eventually ties with their own families were broken. Living in isolation the way they did, the family group developed its own culture, its own set of beliefs. They became a world unto themselves.
Soon the large sprawling collective poked into the forest weaving snakelike through the trees into the mountains. The huge extended family worked the fields, sharing clothes, food and associating only with one another. The family maintained its isolationist practices in spite of their minimal trade arrangements with outsiders. By 1918 West Virginia along with all the other states passed laws requiring children to attend school through elementary school so wanting to avoid problems with the outside world, the Raines family enrolled their children in public school and made sure they attended at least until the children could legally drop out. Though none of them liked it; they valued farm work, not book reading and numbers. That was for city folk. Over time, however, events of the outside world had an impact on them. The Industrial Revolution, World Wars I and II, The Great Depression, The Civil Rights and Women's movements affected the Raines family; but their basic beliefs remained intact. They were anti-stranger and anti-government. They rejected the modern ways. Had no radios or televisions and refused to read newspapers. They refused to learn about the community around them. They obeyed only those laws they felt compelled to obey.
Family members rarely left their West Virginia farm except for occasional visits to town to buy necessities or sell their produce. The women never traveled unless a man was with her and never had contact with outsiders except to buy supplies or sell their wares. Women delivered one another’s babies, men treated their animals and children alike for the odd broken bone or illness.
Professional medical care was prohibited.
By 1965, their isolationism began to break down. One by one, the Raines children learned about life outside the farm; one by one, they took jobs in nearby towns, went off to war, and developed other skills and interests; the elders passed away and the locus of control shifted from an isolationist patriarchal culture to a more egalitarian one. But Alcott Earl Raines III imbued with the culture of his father and grandfather, ruled his family with an iron hand, struggling against all odds to keep the old ways alive. As extended family members assimilated into the general culture, he became increasingly strident and controlling, determined not to assimilate. His wife and children tried their best not to cross him knowing what he could do when he was mad. The children learned to support each other in their lies and never let the ‘old man’ know the truth about certain things.
By 1985 only Alcott Earl Raines, III and his wife Hattie, their children and two widowed aunts were left on the farm. Alcott Earl and Hattie moved into the ‘great house,’ and the aunts moved next door. Tearing down the structures seemed like a huge task so they took what they needed, sold some things and left the cabins to their fate. After a few years of neglect, the sprawling complex looked like an assortment of tumble down shacks. Kudzu covered the roofs and crept around window frames; scrub grass and weeds reached through floor boards and doors swung on their hinges. Raccoons took up residence, squirrels dashed in and out the broken windows and bats hung in the eaves.
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br /> Five of the eight children born to Alcott Earl and Hattie Raines had survived the birthing process. There were three young girls arranged like stepping stones 3, 5 and 7. Reggie Lee was the middle girl. Her younger sister Patty Sue and her older sister Betty Jo became known as the ‘good girls’. Reggie was called the ‘wild one’. No one had ever stopped to think about why. The three girls shared a room on the second floor, next to their parent’s room. It was decorated in old farmhouse décor with faded rose wallpaper, three mismatched beds and a broken down dresser. A few old dolls and toys lay scattered around the room - which was usually in disarray.
Two older brothers, Clint, 11, Dale, 10 lived on the top floor of the house, along with their cousin Jake 9. The room was set up like a bunk-house from the old west. Meager cots and a small wooden chest of drawers completed the space. The floor was rough wood and barren. There was one small ceiling light with two bulbs, one burnt out. But, it was all that they needed. They were only up there to sleep and dress. Both brothers, who tested low average, dropped out of school in the 7th grade to help their father on the farm. As they got older, joyriding jumped to the top of their list. The boys had limited interest in anything beyond drinking and having fun. They leaned a ladder against the back of the house and several times a week they would climb out the 3rd floor window, steal ‘the old man’s’ truck and drive into town. The brothers always hung out together, usually at bars. More often than not, they dragged their cousin Jake along with them.
Jake Gennett was born to Hattie’s youngest sister who died giving birth to her 9th and last child, a little girl. The motherless Gennett children were divvied up between various relatives and their father turned to whiskey. Jake was 4 when his mother died and never got over her loss. Overt violent behavior was noted when at the age of 6 he pushed his baby sister down a flight of stairs. At the age of 7, he got kicked out of his father’s sister’s home for drowning and nearly killing a younger cousin. Hattie and Earl Raines agreed to take him when he was 9 because he had been kicked out of his third family placement and the next step would be state foster care. Hattie felt that her girls were old enough to take care of themselves. Patty Sue was 3 when Jake moved in.
Jake was a sneaky, manipulative child - always had been. Scrawny with narrow eyes and a continual sneer, he invited aggression from his peers. He acted out in school, avoided his farm chores and drank behind the outhouse with his friends. With each passing year, his anger grew and his ability to control it decreased. He felt hatred and contempt for almost everyone except his Aunt Hattie. He liked her. She reminded him of his mother and she was the source of all good things. She was a good cook and an excellent baker. Whenever he needed anything he’d sidle up to her and act real sweet and she’d get him what he wanted. He knew she felt sorry for him and gave him more attention than she did her own kids and played that to his advantage. He never let her see his nasty side for fear of losing her. His anger, however, was directed toward everything and everyone who was younger, smaller and weaker than he was. He was especially hateful toward girls and as he got older, his vengefulness took on a sexual dimension.
Reggie Lee, age 5, was the first to attract his attention. He didn’t dare mess with the brothers. They were bigger than him and knew how to fight. Patty Sue, the baby was usually with her older sister or mother, so he couldn’t get to them very well. The most he could do with them was spill things on them or trip them as they walked past, or he would scare them with the occasional corn snake hidden in his pocket. He couldn’t do much to those girls, but Reggie, well Reggie was perfect. She was a pretty little girl with a halo of blonde ringlets and sparkling blue eyes. She often went out alone wandering around looking for crayfish or tadpoles, collecting rocks. Independent for a 5 year old, she had a spirit about her. She was sassy and tough. He enjoyed teasing and baiting her. He’d chase her through the woods, knock her collection of rocks out of her hands, grab her turtle and toss it in the water. He’d climb up trees and jump down on her, wrestle her to the ground. She detested him. She sensed immediately that there was something evil about him, some extra bad quality that her brothers, in spite of their roughness, didn’t have. Jake began to stalk her. He loved to trap her and hold her down, touching her and making her mad. Even though she was young, Reggie was good at detecting his moods and his moves. She often outsmarted him, managing to get away without being touched. But as he got older and stronger he learned to overpower her. As the years passed, his intention changed from chase and grab to pain and power. Then he wanted to hurt her. Really hurt her. He would hit her, push her down, climb on top and rub against her. Over time his actions grew more extreme. Hattie Raines, noticing her daughter’s dirty clothes and mussed up hair, started to scold and punish her for getting dirty. “I don’t have all day to wash your clothes,” she’d say. For years her child tried to tell her what Jake was doing to her and why she had blood and dirt on her clothes, Hattie would hear none of it. “Jake, he’s a good boy,” she’d say “Now don’t you go blaming everything on him.” He seemed like a perfect gentleman to her. He even helped clear the table after dinner.
Her own boys never did that, she thought. No, it was Reggie, the wild one. Thought she was smarter than the rest of them she did, getting A’s in school and wanting to read and study all the time, never wanting to help in the kitchen or sew on a button. ‘There is something wrong with that girl,’ Hattie thought. So she ignored her daughter ‘stories’ and punished her for getting dirty, while Jake hid around the corner grinning and feeling himself swell with pride at the thought of the child’s predicament. ‘You’re a pretty clever guy, Jake,’ he would say to himself. ‘Pretty clever….. You’ve got that old aunt eating out of your hand and poor little Reggie is out there swinging in the wind. Got her just where you want her,’ he sneered to himself…
CHAPTER 6
COLLISIONS
There was a soft ping as the elevator door opened on the 8th floor. Gina Reynolds walked down the silent carpeted hallway, passing dimly lit recessed doorways and breathed a sigh of relief as she unlocked the door to her condo. The door opened to a cozy room with a large picture window that revealed a view of Lake Michigan, glittering waterfront lights and a sprinkling of stars. Pausing to take in the panorama, she felt glad to be home, her private space. Now she could relax. Twinkie rushed toward her meowing, tail held high, expectant expression on her face. Gina leaned down stroked her and said, “Give me a minute, Sweetie, and I’ll feed you. Okay? I know you’re hungry. Let me change my clothes real quick....” She dropped the stack of mail she’d carried up from the mailbox onto the sideboard and the round metal box of cookies the doorman had just given her.
“Doc,” he said “Mom baked these for you. Wanted to thank you for sending her to that heart doctor; he’s really helping her.”
“No problem Andy, anytime,” Gina smiled saying, “You thank her for these cookies, ok?”
She smiled as she changed into sweats and slippers. The cat rolled on her back and stretched across Gina’s work shoes, rubbing her whisker pads, inviting a belly rub. Gina leaned over and massaged her long soft fur, listening to her purr.
In the kitchen, she filled small food bowls and smiled as the cat dug in making little gobbling sounds. She poured some salad fixings into a bowl, tossed in cold chicken and feta cheese, squirted Caesar dressing on top and grabbing a bottle of water from the refrigerator, she carried her dinner into the living room and settled on the sofa. Even at this hour a steady stream of cars sped along Lake Shore Drive; the night sky reflected in the swaying water. The view was mesmerizing. This is perfect, she thought, the perfect job, the perfect home, the perfect life. If only my past would stay in the past.
For many years her past had stayed locked out of her mind. Then there had been the triggers. News reports about girls being hurt; TV shows she had seen; an overheard conversation. There had been many triggers and floodgates opened, engulfing her. A gentle competent woman, she often felt alone and afraid. As she ate, she t
ried to collect her thoughts about the day. That day had started with another nightmare and it had thrown her for a loop. She looked out at the lake, the images from her dream floated to the surface along with the feelings they evoked. Danger, vulnerability and something else… raw fear… It was just a dream, she told herself, just a dream. But she couldn’t convince herself. Something about it seemed very real and very present. There are images that dart through my mind, she had told her therapist, like tiny rays of light flashing through pinholes in a window shade. They fly by in an instant and then evaporate with a ring of familiarity. A feeling of dread remains, clinging to me like sweat on a hot summer night. My rational mind says I’m being irrational. My rational mind says there’s nothing to fear. No reason to think he found me. But those nightmares, those images that streak through my mind, they say something altogether different. They say “RUN!” They say “DANGER!” They say “HE’S COMING FOR YOU!” It’s easy to rationalize and say “this is a flashback. You were a traumatized child. There’s nothing to worry about.” But then I see his snarling face and smell his rancid breath and hear his raspy voice and feel his rough grasp and I cannot be calmed by words or reasoning. There is a part of me that knows his obsession, knows he will find me and kill me. That part of me knows my fear is not only real but realistic.
Relentless (Elisabeth Reinhardt Book 1) Page 2
