Season of Wonder

by RaeAnne Thayne

  Dani knew Jenny and her parents. They lived just one street over and her family had two beautiful Irish setters who appeared well mannered and well loved.

  “Will her parents be there?”

  “Her dad is on a work trip but her mom will be home, she said.”

  She wanted to say no. Dani had been looking forward to spending a little time together with her daughters. The girls didn’t have school the next day because of a teacher training thing and Silver could hang out all day with friends if she wanted while the babysitter was there with Mia.

  But Silver had struggled to fit in socially and find good friends since they moved to Haven Point and Dani didn’t want to discourage any progress in that area.

  “That’s fine, then. Do you want me to give you a ride?”

  “No. I’ll walk. It’s just through the block. Can I stay until eleven?”

  “Yes, since you don’t have school tomorrow. Text me when you’re done and I’ll pick you up. It doesn’t matter how close she lives, I don’t want you walking around town so late.”

  “It’s like a block away, Mom. And, again, we’re in the middle of freaking nowhere, Idaho. Walking is good for me.”

  She sighed, choosing to pick her battles. “Watch for cars.”

  On impulse, Dani hugged her daughter, fighting the urge to wrap her arms around her and not let go. After a moment, Silver hugged her back but quickly pulled away and hurried out the door.

  Dani watched after her, trying to ignore the niggle of worry.

  How did parents survive these teenage years? She constantly felt like a raw bundle of nerves, always afraid she was going to say the wrong thing and set off an emotional meltdown.

  She watched until Silver walked around the corner, then turned back to Mia.

  “Guess it’s just you and me, pumpkin. I’ll make the popcorn. You pick the movie.”

  “Elf,” Mia said without hesitation, which was just fine with Dani.

  She was pouring kernels in the air popper when Mia came into the kitchen holding the Blu-ray.

  “I found it.”

  “Good job. Why don’t you grab some ice water so you don’t have to leave in the middle of the show if you need a drink? Your glass with the elephants on it is still at the table from dinner.”

  Mia took her water glass and filled it from the refrigerator ice maker.

  “Mama,” she said, features pensive, after the rattling ice stopped, “why doesn’t Silver like us anymore?”

  Dani’s heart cracked apart a little at the sadness in her six-year-old’s voice, mostly because deep inside, she felt as bewildered and abandoned.

  “She does, honey. She’s just a teenager living in a strange town and trying to make friends. It hasn’t been very easy for her.”

  “I think I liked the old Silver better.”

  Dani didn’t want to tell her daughter that she did, too.

  After she finished adding toppings to the bowl of popcorn, she and Mia settled onto the couch. With Mia snuggled against her, Dani felt some of the tension leave her, but she couldn’t shake her worry about Silver. She wanted so desperately for her daughter to find good friends who were also decent human beings.

  The movie was familiar enough that her mind began to wander. Not for the first time, she wondered if she had made a huge mistake by bringing her daughters to Haven Point.

  It had seemed the perfect opportunity. She and Frank Morales had struck up an instant friendship her second year of veterinary school when she’d stayed after a seminar he presented at a conference to ask him some questions.

  That initial meeting had developed into a semiregular correspondence. She had a feeling Frank had looked on her as a mentee of sorts. He had been unfailingly patient and kind with her questions about various aspects of veterinary medicine and what went into running a successful practice.

  A month before her graduation, Frank had called her with a proposition. He was looking for another doctor to take some of the load at his veterinary clinic. If she liked it here in Haven Point after her year’s internship was up, he wanted her to take over the practice.

  It was an offer she couldn’t refuse, beneficial to her professionally while being perfect for her little family on a personal level.

  This was everything she used to dream about, the chance to raise her girls in a safe place surrounded by nice people who cared about each other. Here, people didn’t know about Tommy, about his disastrous choices.

  Of course, when she’d accepted the internship and moved here, she couldn’t have known about the tragic sequence of events to come later, the horror story that unfolded across the country mere weeks after she came to town.

  She felt the beginnings of panic again, just thinking about what would happen if news of Tommy’s final moments were to filter through to everyone.

  Frank knew, of course. She had to tell him. While he had been kind and understanding, she couldn’t imagine the other people in town would accept the truth so easily.

  Coming to Haven Point had sounded great in theory but the reality of making a life here was harder than she had imagined. The truth was, she didn’t know how to socialize casually, which was a ridiculous thing for a thirty-year-old woman with a doctorate degree to admit.

  She had married Tommy when she was seventeen. The years since, she’d been so focused on her girls, on school, on work and on simply surviving that she had gotten out of practice when it came to making and keeping friendships.

  She didn’t know how to relate to these people who were so darn nice all the time, and her awkwardness in the beginning had made her leery about accepting new invitations. Then Tommy had become a household name in the worst possible way. Dani knew she couldn’t socialize now. She kept finding new excuses not to attend book club meetings or the Haven Point Helping Hands’ regular luncheons and after a few months, the invitations had tapered off.

  Her girls were struggling, too. Silver had all this attitude all the time, some of that from grief and shame over her father, Dani was certain. Even Mia, who hadn’t even known Tommy, had become painfully shy in public, though she was her usual warm, sweet self at home.

  Dani had to fix this or they could never make their home here, but she didn’t know the first place to start.

  “Mama, you’re not watching the movie,” Mia chided her.

  “I’m sorry.” She forced a smile and reached for some popcorn. “I’ll watch now.”

  She couldn’t do anything at this moment but worry, so she vowed to put it aside for now and focus on something light and silly and fun.

  And then maybe take that hour-long soak in the tub after Silver was home and her girls were both safely tucked in bed.

  * * *

  For about the twentieth time in the last fifteen minutes, Yukon went to the back door and peered through the glass toward the backyard and the lake at the edge of it.

  Retired police dogs were a lot like retired police officers, in Ruben’s experience. They sometimes had a difficult time remembering they weren’t on the job anymore.

  “Easy, buddy. What’s going on?” Ruben scratched the dog’s neck in an attempt to calm him but the dog still seemed to want to alert him to something out in the back.

  Yukon pulled away and went to the door whining, his attention focused on something near the boathouse, something Ruben couldn’t see. He could only hope it wasn’t a skunk. He hadn’t seen one around here in some time, but one never knew up here. It could also be a black bear or a mountain lion.

  Yukon whined again and nudged at the door and Ruben finally rose from the sofa and slipped his feet into the boots he kept by the back door. If the dog needed to go out, Ruben had to let him but he couldn’t send him out alone if there might be a potential threat out there.

  He pulled on his jacket and grabbed the dog’s leash. Ollie trotted over, always ready for so
me fun, and Ruben had to shake his head at the little dog. “Not you. You’ve got to stay inside and watch the house while we do a little recon.”

  Ollie gave what sounded like a resigned sigh and plopped down on the rug to watch as Ruben clipped the leash on Yukon.

  “All right, bud. Let’s go see what’s happening.”

  The night was cold, mostly clear, with only a few random clouds passing in front of the big moon that hovered just above the mountains. It was the kind of December night meant to be spent by the fire with a special someone.

  Too bad he didn’t have a special someone.

  It had been almost a year since he had dated anyone remotely seriously, and that had been with a teacher in Shelter Springs.

  He had met Lindsey while giving a self-defense class organized by Wynona Emmett, sister to his boss and close friend, Marshall Bailey. She had been sweet and warm and kind, but she also had been still in love with her ex-husband, something it had taken both of them six months of dating to fully acknowledge.

  Ruben sighed. He missed Lindsey but he really missed hanging out with her kids, two cute little boys just a little older than Dani Capelli’s youngest girl.

  He supposed that spoke volumes about their relationship. His heart hadn’t been committed yet, but he had definitely seen things moving in that direction eventually.

  At least they hadn’t gotten far enough for the situation to turn ugly, like it did for his brother Mateo, who was in the middle of a nasty court battle for visitation with the stepson he had raised from a baby.

  Next time he decided to let his heart get involved, Ruben had vowed it would be with a woman who didn’t have children. The only trouble with that philosophy was that he was getting older and so were the women who interested him. He had outgrown his attraction to dewy, fresh-eyed coeds when he was in his twenties. He liked a woman who had been around the block a time or two and had the wisdom and experience to prove it.

  Someone like Daniela Capelli, for instance.

  He glanced next door, toward her house. The lights were on and he thought he saw someone moving around inside.

  He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the woman since he’d left the veterinary clinic earlier in the week. He was no closer to solving the mystery of her, though.

  Too bad she had kids—a younger one who seemed afraid of him and an older one who treated him like he had a bad case of head lice every time she saw him.

  Yukon whined and pulled in the direction of the boathouse again, which was really just a covered concrete slab where he kept his shiny new cabin cruiser, aptly named The Wonder.

  Ruben could swear he heard whispers drifting to him on the wind. Was someone there?

  Suddenly Yukon’s whine turned to a bark and the whispers turned to shouts. Someone yelled, “Run,” at the same moment the dog lunged away from Ruben and the leash slipped out of his hand.

  He reached for it, but Yukon moved with single-minded speed toward the boathouse, barking away.

  Surprised at the unusual behavior from his normally obedient dog, Ruben raced after him. He ordered the dog in Dutch—the language he was trained in—to stay. After only a moment’s hesitation, Yukon reluctantly obeyed, too well trained to do otherwise.

  “Good boy.”

  Ruben could hear rustling in the bushes around the boathouse as he drew closer.

  “Whoever you are,” he called out, “you’re going to want to not move. My dog is trained to attack on command. I just have to say the word.”

  He heard a small sound of distress and aimed his flashlight in the direction of the dog, who had alerted onto a shape crouched close to the ground. The dog wasn’t growling. In fact, his tail might even have been wagging, though it was too dark to be sure.

  “I should also tell you, I’m a deputy sheriff and I’m armed.”

  He didn’t add that he was armed with only a flashlight and can of bear spray. The intruder didn’t need that much information.

  “Don’t shoot me. Please don’t shoot me.” The voice was high-pitched and sounded terrified. Either it was only a kid or Ruben and Yukon had scared the cojones off somebody.

  “Come on out from there. I won’t hurt you. Neither will Yukon, as long as you don’t make any sudden movements.”

  “Can you take his leash? Just in case?”

  The voice struck a chord. He’d heard it before, and not that long ago. He tried to place it as he stepped forward to grab Yukon’s leash, speaking in Dutch again to order the dog to stay.

  “I have the leash but that probably won’t help you. I was holding it earlier but he got away from me when he caught your scent.”

  He sensed the dog wasn’t being predatory, he only wanted to play, but the intruder couldn’t know that.

  “Come on out.”

  After a long moment, the trespasser slowly rose from the ground, appearing ready to bolt at any moment. Ruben moved into position to block any escape route, and aimed his flashlight at the figure, clothed in a dark coat with the hood up.

  Shock rippled through him. “Silver? Silver Capelli? What are you doing here?”

  Of all the miscreants in town who might have it out for him—and it was impossible to avoid making a few enemies here and there in his line of work—he never would have pinpointed Dani’s older daughter as someone who might trespass on his property.

  “Um. Just taking a walk. That’s all. I just wanted to, uh, see the water, then your dog scared me and I freaked. I’ll, uh, just be going now.”

  Did she really think he was that stupid? Her house was next to his. If she wanted to see the water, she only had to walk into her own backyard, not scale the fence to come into his.

  “Hold on a second.”

  His flashlight gleamed on something metallic in the grass. He nudged it with his foot and saw it was a spray can. With a sinking suspicion, he turned the flashlight onto his new boat. Across the hull in glaring red letters he saw “Fascist Pi” written in two-foot-tall letters.

  Either she had a thing against math equations or she hadn’t had time to finish writing an inflammatory slur against police officers.

  “Wow. Nice artwork.”

  “It was like that when I got here. I didn’t see who did it.”

  He shined the flashlight on her. Again, did he look that stupid? “I can see the spray paint residue on your finger. I believe that’s the very definition of red-handed.”

  She hid her hand behind her back, as if she were five years old and had been caught playing in her mom’s makeup.

  As he took a step closer, she stepped back, though she lifted her chin. Whether that was instinct or courage, he didn’t know. One part of him had to admire her grit, even as he acknowledged that, ridiculously, his feelings were hurt.

  What had he done to earn this kind of vitriol? He had tried to be nice to Silver since she and her family moved to Haven Point. He had talked to her a few times when he was making visits to the school and had even cracked a joke or two with her and her friends.

  “I have two questions,” he said as he flipped on the lights of the boathouse so he could get a better look at her handiwork. “The obvious one is why.”

  “What’s the other question?”

  “Answer the first one, then I’ll ask the second.”

  She didn’t meet his gaze. She still looked scared but he thought some of her abject terror seemed to be fading. She even reached down to pet Yukon, then faced him with an expression of defiance mingled with a shadow of guilt.

  “I don’t know,” she finally said. “I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  It wasn’t an uncommon excuse from kids who didn’t always think through the consequences of their actions, who considered themselves invincible and were only interested in the thrill of the moment.

  He had never personally been able to figure out the thr
ill of defiling someone else’s property. Vandalism as a way to pass the time always annoyed the hell out of him.

  “It wasn’t. Obviously. It was a very, very bad idea. You see that now, right?”

  She shrugged and looked down again without answering. When it became clear she wasn’t going to respond, Ruben frowned.

  “Second question. Who else did this with you?”

  “Nobody,” she said quickly. Too quickly.

  He had heard other voices, had definitely heard that “run” command ring out across the backyard.

  “You’re in enough trouble, Silver. Don’t compound it by lying to me. We both know that’s not true. Who was here with you?”

  She lifted her chin again and in the pale light, he saw defiance in her eyes. “Nobody. Only me.”

  “Why are you standing up for them? They were only too quick to leave you here to face the consequences—and Yukon—by yourself.”

  “You don’t know anything,” she snapped.

  “I know that was a pretty rotten thing to do, letting you take the rap when you weren’t the only one involved. Was this whole vandalism thing even your idea?”

  She didn’t respond, which he had a feeling was answer enough.

  “What’s going to happen to me?” she finally asked. “Are you going to arrest me?”

  “That depends. Is my boat the only thing you’ve tagged tonight?”

  She looked down at Yukon, as if hoping the dog could help her figure out how to answer.

  “Silver?” he pressed.

  “No,” she finally said, her voice low. “You’re going to find out anyway. I might as well tell you. We... I did two other things. A shed down the street where the mean old guy who always yells at kids lives, and Mrs. Grimes’s garage door.”

  Gertrude Grimes taught English at the middle school and had been a cranky old crone back in the day when he went there. The intervening years hadn’t improved her demeanor much.

  “Are you going to arrest me?” she asked again. Her voice sounded scared and upset and, again, he caught that trace of guilt on her features.

  He had the feeling Silver was having a hard time adjusting to life in Haven Point. Was this simply an outward sign of that, or was there more to it?