by Dana R. Lynn
Not even Aiden knew everything. He knew that Steve had attacked her when she was eleven, but she’d never told him that their stepfather had raped her when she was fifteen. Or that Luke had stopped him from killing her.
“You okay?”
She dropped her phone on the counter, the noise echoing in the quiet kitchen. She hadn’t heard Luke approach.
“Sorry.” She plugged her phone into the charger, hands shaking. “Just thinking. My friend Randi called. I tried to call her back, but she didn’t answer.”
She was babbling and she knew it. Anything to hide her nervous reaction.
He wasn’t fooled. He gently took her hand where it was fumbling with the cord. “It’s all right. I will sleep here tonight on the couch. If anyone tries to break in, I’ll stop them.”
“But the Amish don’t believe in violence. Not even to protect their families.”
A dark shadow passed over his face. Was he regretting joining the church? The shadow lifted. “I won’t shoot a gun. I won’t start a fight. But I will place myself between you and LJ and anyone that tries to hurt you.”
It sounded like a promise. Warmth drizzled down her spine at his words.
Then her guard went up.
She knew he meant well, but regardless of whether or not he remembered her, he had made his choice and joined the Amish church. That wasn’t something he could undo. No matter how much he might want to stay and protect them, sooner or later he would have to leave them.
And no Englisch woman, not even the mother of his son, could go with him.
* * *
He didn’t like the paleness in her cheeks. Nor the frantic edge in her voice. She wouldn’t meet his gaze. What was going through her mind?
He put his finger to her chin to raise her eyes to his. In the back of his mind, he was shocked at his boldness. To touch a strange woman!
But this was no stranger. Even if his memory had never returned, this woman had married him and given him a son. He had a responsibility to them. Though he couldn’t see any way for them to ever be a family again.
“Jennie.”
Her eyes finally shot to his. He ignored the sizzle he felt at the connection; he searched her face for some clue to how she was really coping with all that had happened. His gut told him that she was one who tended to close herself off when bad things occurred. With her past, it would make sense that she would have trouble trusting.
Even him. Maybe especially him.
His heart ached at the thought. He shoved it aside. It was something he couldn’t change.
“I’m fine, really,” she responded to his unspoken question. “It’s been a really hard day, and I don’t like not having a plan. I like to know what to expect.”
“You’ve always hated surprises,” he replied, then stopped. How did he know that?
“Do you remember?”
He shook his head, sorry to see the hope draining from her lovely face. She really was a beautiful woman.
Stop it, he cautioned himself. You don’t have the right to notice that.
“It’s not that I remembered it. It’s an impression that I had. I didn’t realize I knew that about you until I said it.”
When she turned and walked away, he wanted to call her back but had no idea what he planned on saying to her. It was a hopeless situation.
No, not hopeless. Gott was still in control, though it was difficult to see through the chaos swirling around them what His plan for them was. If only Luke could see the map that Gott intended them to follow.
Sighing, Luke prowled the perimeter of the living room, reading the spines of the books in the bookshelf and the labels on the DVDs, many of which seemed familiar to him. Had they watched any of these movies together? In his mind, he imagined snuggling with Jennie on the couch, laughing over a movie, possibly eating popcorn. It felt right, like they had done exactly that.
Had. It was in the past, and he had no reason to long for it now. His path had veered from the one he might have trod together with the beautiful brunette giggling softly with LJ. He tilted his head for a moment, rubbing his chest as the sound caught at him with the force of a fist striking him.
Lord, guide me. Give me the strength to protect them and to do Your will. Whether I want to do it or not.
Moving to the window, he shoved the curtains out of the way and peered down at the street below. The view was peaceful: trees covered with snow, the lawn a white blanket stretching out to the street. In the waning light, the snow almost seemed to glow. A snowplow drove past, its large plow scraping the road, creating a foot-tall barrier of snow along the side of the road.
Was someone out there now, watching them, planning another ambush? It was highly unlikely that whoever was behind the attacks was done. After all, there had been two attempts on Jennie’s life today.
They should have called the police after the second attempt. It was a foreign thought to him. But Jennie wasn’t Amish. She should have thought of it. Unless she didn’t see the point. They couldn’t identify the driver or the car. Would going to the police have changed things?
He let the curtains fall closed again.
The rest of the afternoon passed in tense silence. He tried to start up several conversations with Jennie, but sooner or later, one of them would lose the thread of the conversation. Dinner was a simple affair of grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup. LJ scrunched up his face when his mother poured a small amount of soup in his bowl, then grinned in delight when she placed a dill pickle spear on the plate next to his sandwich.
Luke shuddered, then glanced up, surprised when a chuckle gurgled out of Jennie.
“What?”
“You never did like pickles.”
“They’re unnatural.”
A full belly laugh erupted from her. “Oh, my. You used to cringe when I would eat them straight out of the jar. Sometimes I’d do it just to see your reaction.”
“You are a cruel woman.” He fought the urge to grin, attempting to school his face into a stern expression. It probably looked ridiculous.
She winked, then dropped her eyes. No doubt, she recalled the seriousness of their situation.
After dinner, Jennie rose to give LJ his bath and put him to bed.
“I’ll take care of the dishes,” Luke offered.
She raised an eyebrow. “You used to avoid doing dishes like the plague.”
He grimaced. “I don’t like doing dishes, true, but it’s a job that has to be done, ain’t so?”
Her nose wrinkled up. “You even sound Amish now. When we met, you went out of your way to sound American.”
“Englisch,” he corrected. Still, he frowned. “I remember feeling rebellious as a teenager. I don’t anymore.”
“Obviously.”
He couldn’t tell if she was being critical or stating a fact.
“Come on, LJ. Bath time.”
“Yippee!” The four-year-old hopped down from his seat. “With bubbles?”
“With bubbles.”
Luke found himself smiling at his son’s exuberance. The smile faded as he contemplated the situation while doing the dishes. How would he protect them? He knew what Steve Curtis looked like, but by now it was clear that Steve had other people coming after Jennie. It could be anyone they passed on the street. It could even be people she knew and trusted.
Although, she didn’t seem like a person who trusted that many people. Her mother may have been partly to blame for that. It was hard to imagine a mother abandoning her children the way Jennie’s parent had. The horrible things she’d endured while in the foster care system couldn’t have helped. And then Steve had attacked her. His lips tightened at the thought of the young girl she had once been suffering, with no one to listen.
An image of Jennie flashed in his mind, hair in a disheveled ponytail, tears tracking down a dirty,
bruised face. He blinked and the image was gone. Was it a memory? His heart hurt for that girl.
And he marveled at the strong woman she’d grown into. Jennie might have suffered, but she was certainly not a victim. She’d raised a smart, happy son. A son who had no idea that the world could be a dangerous place.
His son.
Danke, Gott, for keeping them safe. Help me protect them.
Thirty minutes later, a clean LJ rushed down the hall to hug him good-night. “Night, Daddy! I’m going to sleep in Mama’s room tonight.”
“I don’t want to let him out of my sight,” Jennie explained. “Is that silly?”
“I think it’s smart,” Luke said, “after the day you had.”
She tossed him a quick, weary smile, before leading LJ off to bed. She was back fifteen minutes later, her arms stacked with bedding for him.
“I have extra blankets in the hall closet if you get cold.”
“Danke.” He took the linens from her, almost flinching when their fingers met. The tingle he felt at the touch was not good, definitely not something he should enjoy. He couldn’t help it, though. She is my wife, even if I don’t remember her.
The thought brought no comfort.
He set about putting the sheet on the couch. Leaving his boots and his hat near the door, he stretched out, determined to sleep.
An hour later, he was still wide-awake, listening to the cars drive up and down the road. Was Steve in one of those cars?
At about one in the morning, he woke with a shout, the dream about being caught in a fire, trying to get to Jennie and LJ fading. Tossing the blanket aside, he jumped up from the couch and went to look out the window to check for any perils again. He couldn’t see anything through the thick haze of fresh falling snow. The windows shook with the force of the wind. He laid one hand flat against the pane. It was ice-cold. His breath misted the glass.
Uneasy, he walked down the hall. He could hear LJ’s light snore coming from Jennie’s room. A second later, he smiled when he heard a soft noise inside. She’d sneezed in her sleep.
She had asthma, he recalled.
Frustrated, he willed himself to recall more. Nothing came.
Finally, he returned to the couch.
It was going to be a long night.
FIVE
“Mama, I don’t want to sleep in your room anymore. Your walls are scary.”
Jennie sighed. LJ had woken her up out of a sound sleep. Her walls were scary? She looked around her room, trying to imagine how it looked to a four-year-old. Ahh. There were shadows on her walls. She sometimes left the blinds open a few inches.
Getting out of bed, she closed the plastic slats, eradicating the looming shadows on her wall.
“Is that better, sweetie?”
“Yeah,” LJ said, dragging the word out.
“But?”
“I want my light.”
Of course.
“I’ll be right back.” Jennie turned on her bedside light, so that he wouldn’t get scared, then quickly went to his room to collect his Scooby-Doo night-light. A minute later, she was plugging it in.
“Okay?”
“Okay.”
Finally. She tucked the covers around him before getting in on the other side of the bed. It took her a while to fall asleep. Her mind refused to accept that it was time to slow down and instead kept running over the events of the day.
Almost as shocking as Steve’s escape was Luke’s return. Her brain couldn’t get over the change in him. When she had met him, he’d kept his curly hair short and typically wore faded blue jeans and T-shirts. If it was cold, then flannel shirts were his main defense against the weather. To see him looking so much more mature than the man she’d married, and staring at her with nearly no recognition, it was like hearing he’d died all over again. And the way he dressed! She hadn’t exaggerated when she told him that he used to go out of his way to appear Englisch. Anything he could do to blend in with her world he’d do. She knew he had often rebelled against what was expected when they were younger. Part of that might have had to do with the fact that he and his father clashed so frequently. That was why he’d left the Amish world. Today, she could see that he was completely comfortable in his choice to join the Amish world.
Of course, he hadn’t known about her. That would have made a difference. She knew it would have. Maybe if she’d insisted he wear a wedding ring, he would have at least known he was married and come searching for her. At the time, though, she hadn’t argued when he’d said wearing a ring, or jewelry of any kind, made him uncomfortable.
Jennie huffed and flopped over on her other side. This was doing no good. It didn’t matter how many times she thought about what might have happened. Nothing would change. She’d still have been alone for the past five years.
He was here now, her mind whispered. Yeah, but for how long?
Finally, she drifted into an uneasy sleep.
* * *
Jennie sat up in bed, her senses on full alert. The room was dark still. What had awakened her?
Reaching out a trembling hand, she patted LJ’s warm body. She could feel the steady rise and fall of his little chest as he breathed deeply, still sound asleep. Relief seeped down into her soul.
He was safe.
A quick glance at the digital clock glowing on her nightstand told her it was just past four in the morning. Not quite time to rise. She normally didn’t get up until six.
But something had awakened her. Silently, she pushed her covers away and slid off her side of the bed, taking care not to make too much movement. She didn’t want to disturb LJ. Once he woke up, there’d be no getting him back to sleep. She really had no desire to rise for the day before dawn. It had taken her so long to get to sleep in the first place.
She pushed her feet into the slippers she kept tucked under the edge of the bed before padding out to the hall. Once there, she paused, listening. She could hear the wind wailing outside and shivered in response. Moving to the thermostat, she turned the heat up a notch. Normally, she wouldn’t, but she felt bad about Luke sleeping on the couch. The living room always tended to be a little drafty, and that couch couldn’t be comfortable.
She went into the kitchen to get a drink of water, careful to keep the glass from clinking. On her way back to the bedroom, she paused.
What was that noise she heard? It came from outside. She went into her room and tried to look out her window. Her window faced away from the street. There were no streetlamps to illuminate the ground below. In fact, it was impossible to see anything moving about in the inky blackness outside.
There was a large tree right outside. Its branches stretched up to her second floor window and beyond. Sometimes they scraped against the windows. She’d probably heard that and, in her paranoia, was overreacting.
Kicking off her slippers, she crawled back into her bed, pulling the covers up over her shoulders. Lying on her side, she placed her arm around LJ.
Everything was fine, she told herself. She was well, LJ was here at her side and Luke was just in the next room. Closing her eyes, she tried to will herself back to sleep. It was hard with her heart running like a freight train.
Thump. Scratch.
Her eyes shot open. That was no tree branch. Something was outside her apartment.
She hurried out of bed. Should she wake Luke? There was no way she was going to be like one of those women in a horror movie and go investigate the noise by herself. Not when she already knew someone was out to kill her.
Another scratch made up her mind. This one sounded like it was right outside LJ’s room. Flipping on the hallway light, she ran to the bed and grabbed her son. Picking him up, she carried him as quickly as she could to the living room and deposited him on the love seat. Luke was sleeping on his back, one arm flung over his head.
“Luke!” She ran to hi
m and shook his shoulder. “Luke! Wake up.”
Faster than she would have believed possible, he bolted upright, knocking her over. He yelled out in Pennsylvania Dutch. She didn’t understand the words, but by then, he seemed to be aware of his surroundings. He bounded to his feet, helping her to stand even as his eyes scanned the living room. His posture relaxed when his eyes fell on LJ still asleep on the love seat.
“Are you all right? What’s going on?”
She wrapped her arms around her middle, chilled despite the fact that the living room was now a toasty seventy degrees.
“I heard something. I thought it might have been a tree scraping along the side of the apartment. But then I heard another sound, coming from outside LJ’s room. There’s no way it could have been a tree branch.”
She didn’t say anything else. Luke was already headed down the hall. She wanted to call him back. What if someone was in there, and he got ambushed?
“Luke,” she called out, her voice a raspy whisper.
When he didn’t respond, she grabbed her cell phone and lowered herself to the floor in front of the love seat where her son was sitting. She wanted to be ready to call 911 at a moment’s notice.
* * *
Luke stepped into LJ’s bedroom. The light filtering in from the hall illuminated much of the room, casting eerie shadows on the wall. He stood for a moment, allowing his eyes to scan the room. Nothing stood out as being out of place.
Jennie had heard noises from outside. Striding over to the window, he opened the blinds. There was nothing moving outside. Casting his eyes down, he froze.
Up against the side of the building, propped right against the windowsill leading into his son’s room, was a ladder.
“Jennie,” he called out softly.
Within seconds, she was in the doorway. She seemed to glow, silhouetted against the soft white light from the hall. For a brief moment, he was trapped, an image of her in a long white gown flashing through his mind.
