Unspoken Fear

by Hunter Morgan

  Chapter 13

  Rachel sat upright in bed, her forehead beaded in sweat. She couldn't even remember what the nightmare was about, only that it was awful. That it was terrifying and left her feeling as if she were someone other than herself.

  She glanced at the clock beside her bed. It was 4:55 a.m. She looked at the windows. The room-darkening shades were pulled down, but she could see the barest hint of light seeping around the edges. The sun would be up soon.

  She threw her legs over the side of the bed with a groan, thinking she might as well get up and start her day. It wasn't like she was going to be able to sleep again. She turned on the lamp beside her bed, allowing it to cast a circle of soothing light over the bed and the floor at her feet. She crossed the room to an upholstered chair and grabbed a bra and a pair of jeans she'd left there the night before. Both could be worn again, but she'd tossed yesterday's T-shirt in the dirty clothes after Mallory had rubbed chocolate milk from her mouth all over Rachel. That was what mothers were for, right? A napkin.

  Clothes in hand, she went to her dresser, a turn-of-the-century antique she and Noah had rescued from a yard sale a million years ago. She'd refinished it and the double bed they'd bought the same day. The bed now resided in the storage room along with Noah's boxes. She hadn't been able to bear to sleep in it after he went to jail, so she'd replaced it in the room they had once shared with the twin-size antique iron bed she slept in now. Once her grandmother's, it was one of the few possessions she owned belonging to her own family.

  She'd been raised by her grandmother after her father was killed in the Vietnam War and her mother had taken off to be a hippie, abandoning her infant daughter.

  Although Rachel saw her mother on and off over the years as she married, divorced, moved, married and divorced again, they had never been close. She hadn't even come to her and Noah's wedding, though what her excuse had been, Rachel couldn't even remember now. Not that she had cared that much. Her grandma, in her eyes, had been her mother, and she still missed her a great deal, even though she'd been dead eight years.

  Rachel pulled a gray athletic T-shirt, a pair of panties, and a pair of socks from the dresser and stood as she dressed. Barefoot, socks in hand, she shut out the bedside light on her way out the door. At Mallory's door, she peeked in, saw her angelic daughter on her back, nightgown gathered around her waist to show a pair of pink butterfly panties, her limbs thrown out in abandon. With a smile, she closed the door and quietly retreated down the hall.

  In the kitchen, Rachel turned on the light and started collecting the necessary items to start a pot of coffee. She used to let Chester out first thing when she came down every morning, but he had started sleeping in Noah's room and she certainly wasn't going in to get him.

  As she measured out the coffee, she thought about Noah asleep in the other room. He was trying so hard. Doing so well. He was attending his AA meetings and hadn't had a single drink, to her knowledge, since his release. He worked from dawn to dusk on the property and seemed to be genuinely interested in the vineyard's day-to-day operations. And as much as she hated to admit it, even to herself, she was glad to have him around.

  It was interesting that he was so much like the Noah she had once known, but different, too. Not necessarily a bad different. Just different. But wasn't she a different person than she'd been before the babies died, before his parents had gone to Central America, before he started seriously drinking?

  She carried the stainless steel carafe to the kitchen faucet and turned on the cold water, letting it run for a minute. Noah had surprised her the other day when he'd spoken to Mallory so sternly in front of Snowden and the female officer. Rachel had been equally surprised by her own reaction, or lack thereof. She thought she would have been upset with him for reprimanding Mallory. She wasn't his child; she was Rachel's, just Rachel's. But she hadn't felt that way when he'd done it. She'd actually had been relieved to have him step in, if only for a minute.

  She thought about him asking her about Snowden. She knew every time he looked at Mallory, he must be wondering who her father was. But she'd decided even before her daughter was born that she wouldn't tell Noah. That she would never tell him. He'd given up that right the night he had left the house drunk and shattered so many lives.

  The carafe filled with water, Rachel carried it to the coffee-maker, poured the water in the reservoir, set the carafe in its place, and hit the black button. The red light popped on.

  Barefoot, she walked to the door, unlocked it, and pushed open the screen door, stepping out onto the porch. The narrow floorboards, painted gray, were cool beneath her feet. She breathed deeply, pressing her hands to her lower back, contemplating what task on her list of a hundred she'd tackle first today. Trouble was, there was so much that needed doing that she never felt like she was getting ahead.

  Preschool was out for the summer, though, and that would help. She wouldn't have to spend so much time driving back and forth to town. And Mattie would certainly be happy to have Mallory home all summer. He really missed her when she was in school.

  Rachel walked to the end of the porch and let her hands fall to her sides as she surveyed the yard and surrounding outbuildings in the muted morning light. She loved this yard. It seemed like it had been her life for so long that she couldn't imagine leaving it. Not even with the job applications sitting on her desk in the office.

  Her gaze shifted from one outbuilding to the next in the semicircle of the backyard. When she reached the garage, she took a step forward, down the front step. The garage bay door was open, and her car was half out of the garage.

  Baffled, she walked down the steps, down the sidewalk, and cut across the grass. She'd parked the car yesterday afternoon after returning from Josh's house where she'd bought eggs, a weekly ritual. Rachel didn't really notice a difference in taste, but Mrs. Santori insisted on cooking with fresh eggs.

  Rachel distinctly recalled that she had pulled her car into the garage, all the way into the garage, and hadn't moved it again. She walked around the back of her station wagon, dragging her fingers across the hatchback window. It was dirty and needed a wash. She walked around to the driver's side and peered inside. Sure enough, her keys were there. She always left them in the ignition. It wasn't like they lived in a high-crime area.

  She walked away from the car, striding toward the house. What did Noah think he was doing? He wasn't allowed to drive a car. He wasn't allowed to go anywhere in the middle of the night. No one went anywhere in the middle of the night unless they were up to no good.

  She walked into the kitchen and made a beeline for the spare bedroom. "Noah," she demanded, pushing open his door without knocking. "Just what the hell do you think you're doing?"

  Rachel's voice startled Noah, and his eyes flew open.

  "Well," she demanded, taking a step closer to his bed.

  Chester, who'd obviously been asleep near the door, rose slowly and yawned, stretching.

  Noah ran his hand over his face as he sat up, sliding his legs over the side of the bed. He felt funny sitting there in nothing but a pair of boxers, even though she'd obviously seen him in less. "What... what's the matter, Rachel?"

  "What's the matter with you is what I want to know!" She wasn't usually a shouter, but she was definitely shouting now.

  "Wait..." He held up one hand, still a little groggy. He'd been having such a hard time sleeping at night that he'd taken some allergy medicine around midnight, hoping it might help him get some rest. Surely he couldn't have suffered a blackout and gone somewhere, done something while asleep and drugged on antihistamines. "I don't know what we're talking about here."

  She crossed her arms over her chest. "My car. You moved my car."

  He grimaced. "I did not move your car."

  "You went somewhere in it last night and then you didn't even get it all the way back into the garage. What? You thought I wouldn't notice that you'd left the ass end hanging out of the garage?"

  "Rachel, I don't know
what's going on with your car, but I didn't move it and I certainly didn't go anywhere."

  She waited, that accusing look still on her face.

  "Last night I played that matching card game with Mallory and Mattie after dinner, I watched the end of the Orioles game on TV, and then I went to bed. Remember? I was just shutting out the lights when you came downstairs to lock the door and get a glass of water?"

  She glanced away, then back at him, one hand perched on her hip. She looked like she'd just gotten up; her hair hadn't been brushed yet, and she had the innocence about her face that seemed apparent only in the first minutes after a person woke.

  "Don't lie to me," she said. "I don't understand why you would lie to me."

  He looked up at her, hoping he wasn't lying. "Rachel, I'm telling you, I didn't move your car. There's got to be another explanation. Maybe it rolled."

  "The garage door is up. I closed it after I parked it yesterday afternoon."

  "Anyone could have opened it. Maybe Mallory opened it to get her bike or her wagon out, or maybe Mattie did it."

  She looked back at him, her jaw still set determinedly. "It was closed when we went into the house for supper. Mallory never went outside again, and I walked Mattie to the barn when he was ready for bed."

  "I don't know what to tell you." He got up and walked past her, out the door toward the bathroom, trying not to be annoyed with her for accusing him. If the car had been moved, it was logical she would think he had done it. Shoot, he wondered if he had done it, but he wasn't going to tell her that. "There's got to be a logical explanation." He went into the bathroom and closed the door on her. When he came out two minutes later, she was still there.

  She followed him back to his room. "Please tell me you're not drinking again, Noah. Please tell me you're not going to get liquor at night. That you're not drinking and driving."

  He grabbed his jeans off the ironing board set up in the spare room and stepped into them. Then he chose a clean red T-shirt from a pile he stored on a cardboard box for lack of any better place to keep them. "I'm not drinking, Rachel. I haven't had a drink in over five years. Not since the vodka that night."

  To his surprise... to his shame, her green eyes filled with tears. "Noah, I can't go through this again. You can't." She clasped both sides of her face with her hands. "We won't survive it. Not a second time."

  He grabbed her hands and lowered them to her sides, forcing her to look at him. His own eyes teared up. "Not a drink since that night. You have to believe me, Rachel. I'll take a blood test, a lie detector test, anything to make you believe." He pressed his lips together when they began to tremble. "Because I need you to believe me."

  Her eyes held his gaze, seeming to search for the truth. Slowly, she relaxed in his grasp, exhaling. "You really haven't been drinking, have you?"

  He shook his head, releasing her, trying to give himself a moment to collect himself. "I haven't. I swear I haven't, Rachel."

  "Then who moved my car last night?"

  "I don't know." He sat down on the edge of the unmade bed to put on his socks. "Mallory, maybe? She's always asking if she can drive the tractor."

  "That's ridiculous. She was with us last night."

  "I don't know, then. Mattie?"

  "He doesn't know how to drive a car, Noah. He can barely cut his own meat. Mallory would be more likely to move the car than he would," she scoffed.

  Chester, standing in the doorway between the spare room and the hall, whined.

  "Consuelo or Mateo?" Noah offered.

  "Equally ridiculous." She looked down at the old dog. "Want to go out? OK, boy."

  She walked out of the room, Chester rushing in front of her. Noah followed in his stocking feet, his sneakers in his hand. "Well, what other explanation could there be?"

  Rachel let Chester out and stood by the door. "You think someone tried to steal my car last night and something spooked them? The keys were in it. I guess someone could have tried to steal it."

  "It makes more sense than Mallory moving it."

  "Think I should call the police?" She walked to the cupboard to the right of the sink and opened the old-fashioned glass-front door, removing two extra-large mugs.

  "Might not be a bad idea."

  "What am I supposed to say?" She went to the coffee-maker and poured them both cups of steaming coffee. "Someone trespassed on my property and moved my car?"

  "And maybe your lawn mower," he pointed out, accepting the mug she offered.

  She looked at him.

  "I meant it when I said I hadn't left it out that night. I don't know how it got out in the yard after I put it away."

  "I lock the doors in the house at night. I know we're safe and all, but that's a little creepy." She leaned against the counter and took a sip of coffee. Then she looked up at him. "Especially when the police don't know who killed Johnny Leager or Pam Rehak."

  He took a seat at the kitchen table, turning the chair so he could face her. "I'm sure this has nothing to do with that."

  "It's almost as if someone is doing it to scare me," she murmured.

  "That doesn't make sense."

  She lifted her gaze. "No less sense than someone beating Johnny to death with a brick, leaving a note accusing him of adultery, or hitting Pam in the head and then setting her on fire."

  "And leaving a note accusing her of the same sin," Noah said, his thoughts now moving in the same direction as hers.

  "My God, you're kidding." She walked over to the table, pulling out the chair at the end, sitting down to face him. "Is that what Snowden was here about yesterday?"

  "He didn't actually come out and say there was a note, but they've definitely made a connection between the two murders, even though they were killed in different ways. Talking to them yesterday, I just had this feeling it was about the accusation of adultery. They were very interested in information I might know that others weren't privy to."

  "So they suspect Johnny and Pam were having an affair and that you knew about it," she said softly.

  "I never told you who he had been with, Rachel."

  "Guess I kind of know now," she answered, still holding his gaze.

  He didn't know what to say so he took another drink, as did she.

  Then she looked up at him again. "This is going to sound crazy, Noah, but... do you believe in evil?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "I... I don't exactly know." She fiddled with the handle of her cup, thinking about her nightmares, about the weird feelings she kept getting when she was in town, and then sometimes she felt it here, too, though only late at night. "I guess I'm talking inherent evil. The kind that makes people do things they don't really want to do. Lures people."

  She had a strange look on her face that concerned him. "You mean like Satan?"

  She stared into her cup of coffee. "Yeah, I guess so. My grandmother always used to say that he was present everywhere. Lurking. That we had to listen carefully to be certain it was God's voice and not Satan's, that Satan's voice could be very alluring."

  "I used to believe Satan existed," he said evenly.

  "But now you don't?"

  He didn't want to get into this discussion with her right now. A man who professed not to believe in God certainly didn't believe in Satan, did he, but he knew how much it would upset her to hear him say so. Instead he skirted the issue. "Rachel, after the last few years, I don't know what I believe anymore." He hesitated, getting the feeling there was something more here than he was seeing. "Why do you ask?"

  "I don't know." She shrugged, rising from the chair. "So you think I should call the police?"

  "I doubt they need to launch a full investigation, but I don't think it would hurt to put in a report."

  "I could stop by the station after I drop Mallory off for her playdate. I want to run a gift basket by for Sister Julie, anyway."

  "For that fund-raiser they're having at Maria's Place?"

  She nodded and turned around to put away the coffee caniste
r.

  "You're not going to go? Sister Julie was telling me about it; it sounded like fun. Mallory and Mattie would probably enjoy the picnic."

  "I don't know. We don't usually participate in public things like that."

  "Because of me? Because people look at you and point and say you're the one who used to be married to the priest who killed people."

  Her face colored.

  He smiled grimly. "It's OK Rachel. How about if we all go?"

  "You'd go?"

  Noah had no idea why he'd made such a suggestion, but the look on her face made him give up any chance of backpeddling now. "I guess. Sure. Why not? By now, the newness of being the town's latest released prisoner has probably died down."

  "Mallory would love to go to the picnic." Rachel was grinning now.

  "Just write a check to Sister Julie from the vineyard account for the tickets. I'm sure it's considered a tax-deductible donation." He got up, walking to the back door, his coffee cup in hand. He suddenly felt hemmed in, as if he couldn't breathe right. He needed to get outside and get a fresh breath of air.

  "OK. I'll do that. Great."

  Noah walked out of the kitchen and onto the porch, and his gaze immediately fastened on the Volvo, half in and half out of the garage. Carrying his mug of coffee, he walked off the porch and to the garage. He went around the driver's side, almost afraid to look inside for fear he'd see an empty vodka bottle or something else incriminating.

  To his relief, there was nothing there, at least nothing obvious through the window. He opened the door and reached in, removing Rachel's car keys, leaving the car right where it was.

  As he walked back to the house, he contemplated how the heck Rachel's Volvo had gotten there and hoped he'd had nothing to do with it.

  * * *

  Rachel waited until the police officer who had escorted her to Snowden's office retreated back down the hall and then she moved to take a seat in one of the chairs in front of his desk.

  "Officer Lopez took your information?" Snowden asked from the other side of his desk. He had a stack of manila folders a mile high in front of him and a yellow legal pad he'd apparently been taking notes on when she came in. She could tell by the fine lines around his eyes that he was stressed and not getting enough sleep at night.