“That’s not what Grandma says.”
“What do you mean honey? What does Grandma say?”
“I don’t think Grandma likes me very much. She’s always saying I’m not good. Only she says I’m a no-good.”
Jamie felt as though a hammer had slammed her chest. “Well, Grandma can’t say that. You’re a very good girl. Maybe Grandma just wasn’t feeling well. Didn’t you say she had to go to the doctor?”
“Why can’t I live with you, Mommy?”
The pain in Jamie’s throat was making it hard for her to talk. “Sweetie, Grandma and Grandpa love you and they’d be so unhappy if you didn’t live with them.”
“That’s what you always tell me, Mommy, but I told Grandma I want to live with you and she said she was going to wash my mouth out with soap if I said that again. She said the devil was going to take me away and I’d never see anyone again. Why can’t I stay with you, Mommy? I’d be so good. You’d see, I’d tie my own shoelaces and I wouldn’t be any trouble. I know how to wash dishes. I’d wash all the dishes and you wouldn’t have to. Please Mommy. I’d try so hard. I’d be such a good girl. You’d see, Mommy. Please!”
She had locked her hands around the back of Jamie’s neck and her eyes were fastened on Jamie’s.
I could just take her out of this place, just get into the car, and drive with her, far, far away, away from this damned nightmare. It isn’t fair. Things like this shouldn’t happen to innocent little kids. I should just put her in the car and go!
And we’d wind up fugitives. I can just see it, Mandy’s picture in an Amber Alert. And then, after they drag us back, I’d never see her again!
She put her hands around the little face—God, was there anything sweeter than the velvet feel of your own little girl’s face in your hands? She hoped the child could see the seriousness of what she was about to say to her. “Someday, you are going to live with me, honey. You’ll see. I promise you, sweetie. I promise!”
Somehow, somehow I will make it happen!
“And I want you to make a promise to me. I want you to promise me you’ll remember that you are a good girl, darling. You are a wonderful girl. Don’t ever let anyone tell you any different!”
She held her tightly, almost terrified by the fragileness of the little body in her arms, and she pressed her cheek against the feathery fine hair.
“Now, you promise me,” she said, “if anyone says you’re not good, you’ll say to them, ‘Yes, I am. I am a good girl.’ Promise me, sweetie?”
Mandy whispered firmly right into Jamie’s ear.
“I promise, Mommy.”
What am I going to do? I don’t want to scare her, but she’s not safe. I’ve got to see to it that Ray stays away from her!
And if I don’t do it right, I’ll make it worse for both of us!
She forced herself to put on a light-hearted face and hugged her little girl. “Now, sweetie, you and I are supposed to be having a good time today. So don’t you worry about Grandma. It’s going to be all right. And don’t worry about Daddy’s parties or going over there. That’s not going to happen again.”
Jamie hadn’t a clue how she could stop them, but it was all she could think of to tell Mandy. “And right now, you and I are going shopping and we’re going to find you the snazziest new shirt. Okay?”
Mandy sniffled a little bit, but her face brightened. She felt safe with Mommy and Mommy said everything was going to be okay. She put her plump little hand into Jamie’s, and together they went back to Jamie’s car.
* * *
Saturday was family shopping day, the day when everyone from fifty miles around drove into Butcher’s Fork to stock up. All the moms and dads and trailing-along kids, babies being toted or riding in shopping carts. The air at the Big Buy was filled with the sounds of piped-in music, the soft whirr of the air-conditioning, and the muted buzz of the shoppers.
Jamie and Mandy made their first stop, as they always did, to buy a bag of popcorn. Jamie carried the bag and Mandy had her fist crammed with popcorn.
“I want a shirt with Hello Kitty on it, Mommy. Okay, Mommy? Can I have a shirt with Hello Kitty on it?”
“For sure you can, if they have them.” Jamie steered her toward the racks of children’s T-shirts. “Let’s see what’s here.”
Jamie was glad to have something silly to think about. One little corner of her mind could deal with Hello Kitty on a T-shirt. The rest of her mind was being wracked with tough, tough problems. And she didn’t have forever to solve them. Every day that Mandy was exposed to the Nixons, all of them, was another day for them to harm her daughter.
As she searched through the hanging shirts on the circular racks, with Mandy bouncing excitedly around her, she was trying to think of a plan. First of all, she would have to just sit down and think this through carefully. And the best way to do that would be to go to her favorite retreat. After she took Mandy back to Edna’s tonight she could grab a sandwich and a coffee and head up to the canyon. A few hours up there would clear her head and help her figure things out. And don’t even talk to her anymore about finding the strength to just bear her troubles. Those days had just come to an end.
But now the canyon wasn’t hers only. She had allowed Cal Cameron to share it with her. A mistake? With everything else on her mind, there in the midst of the T-shirts, there was now also the sudden memory of him from last night, a good-looking cowboy, with the canyon wind blowing the trees and the grasses around him.
And the memory of how she’d run away from the touch of his fingers on her hair and the warmth of his hand holding hers.
“Here’s one, Mommy! I found one!”
Mandy was reaching into the display of shirts above her head, excitedly trying to pull out her prize from amidst the mass of hanging T-shirts. “Is this my size? Is it, Mommy? Is it?”
“Hey, good for you honey. You found one all by yourself.” Jamie came around the rack to where Mandy was bouncing up and down. “Let’s just check the label and see if—”
She was brought up short, forgetting what she was saying. Far down the aisle, near the other end of the store, there he was!
Cal Cameron was walking slowly, apparently trying to find something on the shelf in front of him. He was running his right hand along the labels on the shelf edge.
And his left hand was holding a tiny baby against his chest.
A baby? Jamie’s mouth opened in astonishment. The infant was sound asleep, her little round head nestled on Cal’s shoulder, her little round bottom in its puffy diaper not even filling Cal’s big hand. Even at this distance, Jamie could tell the baby wasn’t more than a few weeks old. It was dressed only in the diaper, a lightweight knit top and tiny pink booties. A frilly satin headband decorated her fuzzy scalp.
Jamie saw him pull a big pack of diapers from the shelf, and then he turned away, apparently calling to someone to join him. In a moment she saw a shopping cart propelled by a little boy arrive at his side, and Cal dropped the pack into the cart.
“Is it my size, Mommy? Does it fit me?”
Mandy was pulling at the shirt that Jamie had abstractedly removed from its hanger.
“What?” She looked down at Mandy, bringing her thoughts back to the T-shirt. “Oh. Oh, yes. Just a minute.”
She looked at the label, and then held the shirt against Mandy’s chest, spreading it across the child’s shoulders. Involuntarily her eyes rose again to watch Cal, following his jeans-and-boots-and-Stetson-topped figure as he and the boy left the aisle, the infant unmoving on his big shoulder. She watched him walk to the checkout counter where, at the end of the line, a young woman was waiting, along with a little girl of about two or three. Cal came up to the woman and leaned his head close to her as she turned toward him. His arm went around her shoulder, drawing her close in a quick embrace and Jamie felt as though she’d been smacked across the face. His Stetson obscured her view for a moment, but not before she’d had a chance to see that the dark-haired woman was very pretty, a lit
tle taller than average height, and that her shape was attractive in her jeans and western shirt. A bright bandana had been rolled into a headband and was knotted around her short, curly hair. As Jamie watched, with a bad feeling of seeing something she wasn’t supposed to have seen, Cal reached into his pocket with his free hand and pulled out a wallet that he handed to the woman. She took some bills from it and handed the wallet back to him.
For a moment, Jamie came to a wrong conclusion.
My God, the man has a wife and three kids. Wow! Was I ever close to a big mistake there!
Then she remembered.
Of course. I completely forgot. That must be his sister and her kids.
“Mommy, are we going to buy it? Can I have it, Mommy? Mommy?” Mandy was yanking on Jamie’s hand, trying to get her attention. “Mommy! Mommy! You said!”
“You bet, honey.” She bent low and scooped Mandy up into her arms. “We’re going to go pay for it right now. You can tote the shirt, and I’m going to tote you.”
She came up behind Cal on the line.
“Well, hello there.”
Cal turned and his face lit up.
“Hey, how about that,” he said, surprised to see her. His smile was big and broad. “And this,” he said, looking down at Mandy, “must be the little Mandy-girl I been hearing about?”
“Yes, this is Mandy. And who is this?” She smiled at the baby, who was still snoozing innocently on Cal’s shoulder.
Cal didn’t answer right away. He turned to the curly-haired woman who by now was looking Jamie over.
“Ellie, look who’s here. This is Jamie Sundstrom I was telling you about.” Both women’s eyes opened wide, surprised. “This is my sister, Ellie. Ellie Jackman. And that little tyke over there,” he said, pointing to the little girl, “stuffing Oreos into her mouth, that’s Samantha Susie. We call her Sissy. This big fellow”—he put his hand on the boy’s head—“this is A.J. That’s short for Andrew John. And this here”—he ducked his chin down toward the baby—“this here’s Christina Estre-lita. Don’t know why they hung such a big name on such a little thing, but they wanted to name her for both her grandmothers. I call her Pissy.”
Ellie punched his shoulder.
“Don’t listen to him. We call her Chrissy.”
“Chrissy looks very comfortable,” Jamie said.
“She’ll be yelling soon enough,” Ellie said, moving ahead in the line. “Twenty minutes from now, like clockwork, I’ll be feeding her again. So I really got to drag this crowd on home right away.” She was loading things onto the checkout conveyor belt. “But I told Cal here to bring you down to visit. And Mandy, too. She’s just about right between A.J. and Sissy, isn’t she?”
“Just about.”
“How about it, Jamie?” Cal said.
“Well, sure. Maybe some Saturday.”
“Oh, I forgot. You and Mandy don’t get much time together. So we shouldn’t keep you now.”
“Well, yes, we were just going for a drive together”—she paused—“into the canyon, maybe . . .”
Ellie had taken the baby from Cal and was herding her kids to the door. She called back, “We’ve got to run now,” and she was out into the parking lot.
Cal started after his sister, pushing the bag-filled cart.
“I’ll call you,” he said.
Sure. We’ll see.
* * *
“Where are we driving, Mommy?”
Mandy was holding one hand out the window, letting the wind press against her fingers. A sad, sad song was coming to them on the Kanab station and she and Jamie had been singing solemnly along.
“I’m going to show you the best place in the whole world,”
Jamie turned the car onto the ranch road that would take them to her canyon.
Mandy pointed to the field just south of where they were driving. A young calf was standing near the road, its skinny legs splayed out and its neck stretched way up as it lifted its head to the sky. It was bellowing loudly, calling over and over again.
“What the matter with him, Mommy? He sounds like he’s crying.”
Jamie stopped the car and searched the field as far as she could see. There was no cow in sight.
“It looks like the little fellow got separated from his Mommy.”
Mandy’s little brow puckered. “Does that mean he’s lost, Mommy? Won’t she be able to find him?”
“She’ll be able to find him.” Jamie looked into the rear view mirror so she could look into Mandy’s eyes. “When the Mommy cow and the baby calf get lost, they have a way to find each other again.”
“What do they do?”
“They go back to the last place where they were together. It may take them a day or two, and they don’t always get to the exactly right spot, but they get pretty close, and then the Mommy moos as loud as she can, and the baby bellows, like that little one is doing, and pretty soon, there they are, together again.”
Jamie started up the car and continued toward the canyon. In the rear view mirror, she saw that Mandy had her thumb in her mouth.
When did that start? She hasn’t sucked her thumb since she was an infant.
“I’ll bet, sweetie, by the time we come back this way that calf’s Mommy will be there already, giving him his dinner.”
Mentally, Jamie crossed her fingers, hoping she wasn’t setting Mandy up for a disappointment. In the mirror, she saw a beaming smile break out as Mandy let go of her thumb.
“Yes!” Mandy was all good cheer again. “His Mommy knows how to find him, and she’ll come along soon with a big hamburger and a bunch of fries.”
“You silly!” Jamie laughed. “You know they only drink chocolate shakes!”
Mandy squealed happily as Jamie gave her a big smile in the mirror, and by the time Jamie had driven to her spot in the canyon, they were both singing again, at the top of their voices, this time to a lively bit of foolishness. Soon she was at her favorite place and Jamie was feeling quite giddy with the pleasure of being in the canyon with her favorite person.
“This is where I come whenever I want to be in a really pretty place. Or when I need to think real hard about something. We can just sit here for a while and listen to the birds. We still have a couple of hours before we have to get you back to Grandma’s.”
She lifted Mandy onto the flat rock and sat down next to her, cuddling the child up to her side.
Together, they enjoyed the peace and the beauty that surrounded them, the lovely isolation of this mountain roost, far above the valley, far from all people. The cool air rustled the fragile, round leaves of the quaking aspens.
“They look like a whole tree of shaking pennies,” Mandy said, pointing to the aspen leaves.
Jamie’s arm around Mandy tightened.
I’m going to figure out a way. Somehow, there has to be a way to get her back.
They talked of this and that for a while, and Mandy even put her head in Jamie’s lap and snoozed for a bit until it was time to return to Sharperville. On the way out of the canyon, Mandy pointed to the field, where the little calf had his head tucked up under his mother’s belly, nursing contentedly.
“His Mommy found him,” Mandy said, “just like you said she would.”
“Of course she did. Didn’t I tell you she’d find him? All he had to do was to go back to the last place where they were together.”
Jamie was mighty happy that cow had showed up in time. Things didn’t always work out all that smoothly, but at least this was one time she got it right.
Chapter Seven
Her phone was ringing just as she was pulling up in front of her dad’s house.
Cal was calling and he wanted to see her.
She sat there, behind the wheel. Thinking.
“I don’t know, Cal.” She chewed on a fingernail nervously. “My Saturdays after I see Mandy are always kind of hard. I’d be real bad company.”
“That’s just what I figured. Figured you could use a little cheering up.”
; “I don’t know. I’m feeling more poisonous than usual tonight. After seeing my ex-mother-in-law. Anyway, I’ve got a lot on my mind. There’s some stuff has come up and I’ve got to spend some quiet time by myself so I can think it through real careful.”
“Well now, Jamie, you know two heads are better than one.”
Why did she hesitate? Why didn’t she just tell him to make it some other time?
“Listen,” he said, filling in the space of her hesitation, “Ellie here’ll make us some sandwiches and we can take them up to your place in the canyon and see if we can’t work out some answers for you.”
Still she hesitated.
“I’ll swing by in about a half hour,” he said. “We’ll still have a couple of hours of daylight.”
“I’ll put some coffee in a thermos,” she heard herself saying.
“All right!”
He hung up and she sat there, staring out over the steering wheel.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” she said to the empty air. “How did he manage to do that?”
* * *
The day had been a hot one and the valley behind them was sending up shimmering images, water-like, reflective. Overhead, just skimming the thin treetops, a turkey buzzard moved slowly, its wings steady, easy, tipped up slightly at the edges, its sharp eyes watching.
It would be good to get up into the canyon; it would be cooler there, easier to think things out. This time Jamie had a jacket with her.
Cal’s hands rested lightly at the bottom of the wheel, steering with only the tips of his fingers as the truck climbed the canyon road. He took his eyes from the road for a moment, glancing over at Jamie, whose face was turned away from him, looking out her open window. She was resting one elbow on the frame and was absent-mindedly chewing on her thumbnail.
“You’re biting your nails,” he said.
He smiled at her, like he got a kick out of her having such a childish habit, and she pulled her hand abruptly away from her mouth, embarrassed to have been caught in the act.
“I was preoccupied,”
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