The souls of lost lake, p.23
The Souls of Lost Lake, page 23
Ava clapped a hand to her bruised face, and this time her breaths came in short sobs. She swallowed them back. Cryin’ wasn’t goin’ to solve nothin’. Crawling to her feet, she raised her shoulder and tilted her head so her dress would soak up some of the blood welling up in the corner of her lip. He had split it when he’d struck her cheek. As she brought her arm away from her mouth, Ava felt the warmth of the blood smear against her cheek.
“Good Lord in heaven!” A feminine voice trilled from the forest edge.
Ava met the shocked and horrified blue-eyed gaze of Mrs. Sanderson.
“Ava Coons, you little devil.”
32
“This might sting.”
Ava eyed Mrs. Sanderson as she squeezed water from a washcloth and lifted it to Ava’s lip. She sat at the Sandersons’ kitchen table, which was already finer than any table Ava had ever sat her bottom at before. Lace covered it, a vase of wildflowers perched in the middle, and a long slab of polished wood was on the far end, on which rested what appeared to be a freshly made blackberry pie.
Mrs. Sanderson dabbed at the blood. Ava winced, the warm water seeping into the split on her lip.
“Who did this?”
Ava didn’t answer. If she was bein’ honest, Mrs. Sanderson scared her now. If Ned was right—if she really killed Jipsy—Ava needed to be on her guard.
“You’re not going to speak?” Another dab with the wet cloth.
Ava tightened her lips.
Mrs. Sanderson submerged the cloth into the bowl of water she’d brought to the table. Ava noticed a few wet spots dotting her dress front. “You are aware all of Tempter’s Creek is looking for you?”
Ava nodded.
Mrs. Sanderson opened a drawer below the kitchen counter and pulled out a metal box. Returning to the table, she raised the lid. Inside were bandage supplies and various ointments. She set to work on Ava’s lip, the silence growing between them. Ava could hear Mrs. Sanderson’s quiet breathing. Her perfume was flowery—rose maybe, or gardenia?—Ava couldn’t tell between the two.
When Mrs. Sanderson finished, she packed away the medicine kit and returned it to its drawer. She opened the icebox and wrapped a chunk of ice in a cotton dish towel.
“For your cheek.” Mrs. Sanderson handed the ice to Ava. “Hold it against it. It will help ease the bruising and swelling.” She took a chair opposite Ava and sat down, folding her hands primly in front of her. It was an act of kindness. Ava wavered between concern over Mrs. Sanderson’s trustworthiness, and gratefulness for the tender care the woman had given her.
“So, Ava Coons, you’ve become quite the hassle for Tempter’s Creek.”
Ava didn’t reply but instead lifted the ice and held it against her cheek. Even with the cloth wrapped around it, it chilled her skin almost instantly and seeped through to cause her hand to sting with cold.
Mrs. Sanderson smiled thinly. “Did you know we aren’t that far apart in age? In another life and another world, we might have been friends.”
Now that was a lark. Ava smiled at the irony. Mrs. Sanderson did as well. Their smiles weren’t friendly so much as wary.
“It appears there’s more to you than meets the eye. Or else you have involved yourself with someone who finds bruising a woman not to be off-limits. You’re blessed that whoever did this to you missed your eye. Regardless, since I’ve now played your nursemaid, you may call me Sarah.” When Ava didn’t respond, Sarah continued, “I suppose that makes me more relatable, yes? Being on a first-name basis?”
Ava didn’t think it meant a hill of beans difference really. Relating to Sarah Sanderson would never be on her list of things to do, and if Sarah believed that somehow they shared a hobby of killin’ people, well, she wouldn’t find a kindred spirit in this room.
“You were always quite mouthy, Ava. Why stay silent now? Especially now? Silence will do nothing to plead your case.” Sarah’s lips pursed for a moment, rosy and full. She raised a thin eyebrow. “And you are well aware of my opinion regarding you.”
Ava adjusted the ice, pressing her lips together. Best to keep her mouth shut than say something Sarah could turn against her.
“Tea perhaps? Might that loosen your tongue?” Sarah eased herself out of her chair with the grace of a princess. She filled a kettle with water at the sink and then set it with a clatter on the stovetop. “I believe I should call the police.”
“No!” Ava yelped.
Sarah’s eyes narrowed in a smirk of satisfaction. “Well, that got you to talk. But truly, we need to report this attack. In no way should any heinous man be attacking women in the daytime. Not at nighttime, either, but the daylight speaks to his audacity. Tell me who did this to you, and I’ll be sure he receives his due punishment.”
“No police.” Ava shook her head. She wanted to go into the station on her own terms, if she was going to go at all. Having the cops called on her would set her off on a worse foot than she was already standing on. Quite at Mrs. Sanderson’s—no, Sarah’s—mercy. It was an awful place to be in. How was she supposed to get any truth out of the woman now?
“Hmm . . .” Sarah crossed her arms over her chest in thought and tapped her fingers on her elbow. “You won’t reveal the man who attacked you? Or is it a ruse to divert our attention to your absence after poor Jipsy’s death? Paint yourself as a victim as well?”
“No.” Ava lowered her hand that held the ice pack.
“Really?” Sarah nodded. “What a pity if poor Ava Coons herself was injured by a vagrant roaming Tempter’s Creek with an affinity for violence.”
“I’m not doing no such thing.” Ava bit her tongue. Her resistance wasn’t helping.
Sarah sniffed. “You murdered Matthew Hubbard in cold blood.”
Ava narrowed her eyes.
“Then Jipsy.”
Ava tilted her chin up. She wouldn’t answer.
“And your poor, poor family . . .”
Sarah Sanderson prodded Ava’s weakness.
Ava bristled, stiffening in her chair. “Go get me one of your man’s axes. I’ll show ya I can hardly hoist it over my head now, let alone as a thirteen-year-old girl!” Ava protested, bringing her hand down on the table with a slap. “Chuck Weber an’ people like you got folks around here to forget to put their thinkin’ caps on!”
Sarah clicked her tongue. “My, my.”
“Perhaps you killed Jipsy.” It wasn’t the smartest way of going about it. Ava knew that the moment she whipped the question out.
“Me?” The surprise in Sarah’s posture seemed genuine enough. “Whyever—where on earth would you come up with that addlebrained idea?”
“Doesn’t matter where,” Ava argued. Her lip was beginning to throb, almost worse than her cheek. “Everyone knows you and Hubbard had a little thing going on the side.” Might as well bait the highfalutin prissy and see if she got mad enough to blurt out something true.
“The gall!” Sarah stiffened as her kettle whistled. She jerked it off the burner with a hot pad. “How dare you imply I am anything but faithful to my husband!”
“Jipsy knew, didn’t she? She was goin’ to out you, so you had to shut her up.” Ava was all but copying Ned word for word. It was self-preservation if nothing else.
Sarah paced the kitchen, looked out the back window, then spun to face Ava. Her eyes were shooting darts of anger. “Gossip such as that can ruin a woman. Where did you hear of it?”
Ava tilted her chin up. “Gossip such as someone killin’ her family can ruin a woman too. Where did you come up with that?”
“Everyone knows it,” Sarah spat.
“Then everyone knows you were sneakin’ off with Matthew.”
“Matthew, is it?” Sarah’s eyes narrowed.
Ava colored. Drat. She lifted her hands to her cheeks. She’d not told a soul, had no intentions of tellin’, even if Jipsy was dead and gone.
The two women eyed each other. The room became thick with their unspoken accusations and defenses. Both breathed a mite heavier than when Ava had first come in. Finally, she dropped her gaze from Sarah’s penetrating one. Water droplets were soaking into her dress from the ice melting through the dish towel she still clutched in her hand.
“Since we both know so much about the other’s sins”—Sarah’s words were laced with sarcasm—“perhaps we should just leave the other alone and be done with it.”
Leave each other alone? It was like a small gift in the turmoil for Sarah Sanderson to imply she’d stop stirring the pot alongside of Chuck Weber. But to offer that sure seemed like maybe she’d hit a sore spot and Sarah was hiding something she didn’t want found out. Maybe Ned was right. It was possible, Ava supposed, and if Sarah didn’t want Tempter’s Creek to know her secrets, then . . .
Pushing up from her chair, Ava determined it was a good time to take her leave before Sarah Sanderson used that kitchen knife on the counter—or maybe that meat cleaver over by the stove—to resolve this conversation in an entirely different fashion.
“You’re leaving?” Sarah’s hand was on the kitchen counter. A few inches away lay a paring knife.
Ava mustered her blandest face. “I think you’re right.” She offered an olive branch. “We’ll just call it even ’tween us.”
Sarah’s fingers twitched.
Ava eyed the paring knife.
“Hardly even, Ava Coons. You’ve accused me of adultery.”
“You’ve accused me of murder,” Ava retorted.
Sarah tilted her head to the side, staring down her nose at Ava. “Humankind does have an affinity for breaking the Ten Commandments, don’t they? However, I am not one of them.”
Silence.
A bird warbled outside the window.
The paring knife remained where it was.
“Off with you then,” Sarah commanded. “And stay away from me, you hear?”
Ava darted out the back door. No need to test Sarah Sanderson and her paring knife any further than she already had.
33
Wren
“Now’s not the time,” Wren muttered to herself, swiping to ignore Pippin’s call. Her brother could leave a message. He was never great at empathy, and trying to talk through tears was hard enough as it was.
Today drained every ounce of energy from Wren—from the Markham home. She curled at the end of the sofa, a fuzzy blanket over her lap, a wad of tissues in her hand.
“He may need something,” Tristan Blythe said from across the room. Having her own father here helped—a little—but she wondered if he was more capable of being a moral support for Gary than for her. The two widowers would relate in their own way. Patty’s passing had reopened the wounds of Wren’s mother’s passing. Both left voids behind that were unfathomable.
“Pippin can wait,” Wren responded belatedly to her father. And she was right. He could. Still, she swiped to her voicemail screen and read the voice-to-text composition.
Searched for your birth records. Didn’t find anything. You’ll probably want to . . . Dad knows . . . or at the safe deposit box. Talk later. Bye.
It was a half-translated message but enough to give her pause. So Pippin had pulled through for her, but his powers with technology had come up short. The knowledge gnawed at her already raw stomach. Wren set her phone on the arm of the sofa, eyed her dad who was chatting quietly with Gary, and pushed the knowledge to the back of her mind.
Her gaze connected with Eddie’s form as he worked in the kitchen. It was his comfort place. He knew what to do in the kitchen. His aide, Esther, was manning the camp’s kitchen for the rest of the week due to Patty’s passing, yet Eddie needed to stay busy.
Wren eased off the couch, tugged her socks on straight, and headed for the kitchen. Dishes clanked together as Eddie pulled them from the dishwasher, clean and ready to put away.
“Need help?” Wren’s question sliced through the emotionally ladened air.
Eddie shook his head. “Nah. I’m just goin’ to make some cookies.”
“Chocolate chip?”
“Butterscotch,” he responded. He threw a pile of forks into the silverware drawer.
“Oh.” That was odd. Eddie didn’t even like butterscotch. Her heart plummeted further. They were Patty’s favorite. “Eddie?”
He began stacking glasses into the cupboard, his back to her. “Yeah?”
“Do you want to go for a walk?” It was a paltry offer considering butterscotch cookies, but the truth of the matter was, Wren knew no one was hungry.
Eddie shook his head as he kneed the dishwasher door shut. “No thanks.” He tugged off the quilted mixer cover that Patty had sewn, pulling the appliance toward him on the counter.
Wren hesitated, searching desperately for words. Maybe there were none. Maybe this was the right thing for Eddie to do. The people from the funeral home had left an hour ago with Patty. Wren was certain she’d never forget the sound of the stretcher and its wheels traveling across the floor. She’d closed her eyes quickly as it had exited Patty’s room, but she’d caught sight of the black bag that embraced Patty’s body. It was the gruesome side of death. The vacancy of everything. Her body, her room, their lives. Eddie’s life. Gary’s. All of it was empty. And yet there were little reminders of Patty everywhere they looked. A vase she’d bought at a garage sale sitting in the windowsill. A watercolor she’d painted before Eddie was born, hanging by the calendar on the wall. Her shoes were by the door, along with her favorite baseball cap she wore when she was out in the sun.
The hospice staff had been helpful, but Patty had been gone no more than forty minutes and they were collecting the morphine pills, checking off boxes on an end-of-life task sheet, and calling for someone to come retrieve the larger items like the walker and bedside toilet. Life was already moving ahead at a pace far faster than should be allowed. A hospice aide had just broken down the hospital bed and hauled it out in pieces. The back door had closed. The van driven away. The house left in a stone-cold silence that caused them all to question what had just happened.
Tristan Blythe came.
They’d gathered.
Eddie had gone to the kitchen.
Now here they were. Baking butterscotch cookies. The most mundane homelife activity.
But Patty was gone. And yet . . . Wren fingered a devotional book Patty always kept on the kitchen bar . . . she wasn’t.
Wren glanced at the clock. It was ticking. It needed to stop. Time needed to freeze.
“Do you want help?” Lame. She wanted to race after the undertaker’s car and make them unzip the bag and give Patty resuscitation. It was a cruel prank. Patty was still alive. In fact, Wren was almost sure if she returned to Patty’s bedroom, she would be there, tucked in and with a ready smile.
“I got it.” Eddie pulled two sticks of butter from the fridge. He unwrapped them and dropped them in a glass bowl, popping it into the microwave.
“Want me to get the eggs?” Wren offered. Anything to pretend life was as it should be. That she didn’t hear Gary’s voice cracking with tears in the other room, and the low grumble of her father’s voice attempting to comfort him.
“Wren, I’ve got it!” Eddie snapped.
Tears sprang to her eyes. Which was dumb. She was dumb. It wasn’t personal. Eddie was hurting. Broken. Like the eggs.
Eddie tossed the eggshell in the garbage and broke another egg into the mixer’s bowl. He froze, then leaned against the counter, his head bent. “Sorry,” he mumbled.
“It’s okay.” Wren stood there. She’d never felt so helpless before.
Eddie cracked another egg. The shell exploded in his hand, shards of it dropping into the bowl. He swore under his breath, startling Wren. Eddie never swore.
Digging into the goop, Eddie attempted to swipe out the eggshell. The microwave beeped, indicating the butter was ready. He abandoned the shell and popped open the microwave. The butter had completely melted and boiled over onto the glass plate. Eddie swore again. This time louder.
“Eddie?” Wren took a step toward him.
He slammed the microwave door shut. He swore again.
“Eddie.” She opted for stern this time.
“Knock it off, Wren.” Eddie’s bite was harsh.
Wren backed up the step she had taken. Eddie reached into the mixer bowl and tried to fish out more shell but succeeded only in completely slopping egg all over his hand. With a roar, he flung the egg white into the sink. His curse filled the kitchen, silenced their fathers in the living room, and made Wren sink onto a barstool.
Eddie stopped. Met her stunned expression, then growled again and made for the back door.
“Eddie!” Gary hurried into the kitchen, Tristan Blythe behind him.
Wren held up a hand. “I’ll go.”
“He needs to grieve,” Tristan observed.
“He will, Dad.” Wren glowered at him. Sometimes he was obtuse for an educated professor. “Patty just died. Give him time.”
Gary met Wren’s gaze with a look of lost helplessness. She eased off the barstool and made her way in the direction Eddie had fled. As she reached for the back door, the thought hit her. They were both motherless now. All they had left were their fathers, extended family . . . Wren’s breath caught as she closed the door behind her. That was assuming she even had a family. Pippin’s voicemail reverberated in her mind. No birth records. None. How was that even possible in this digital age of impeccable records?
Eddie was trudging down the gravel road, flanked on both sides by woods. Woods that, if traversed deeply enough, would wind their way to Lost Lake. The site of another tragedy, past and possibly present. Wren hurried after her childhood friend. Now wasn’t the time to be thinking about Jasmine.
“Eddie!” Wren shouted.
He slowed his pace but didn’t look back at her. His hands were stuffed into the pockets of his army-green shorts. His blue-and-green plaid shirt hung loosely, only emphasizing his bowed shoulders. Wren broke into a jog, regretting that she’d slipped on a pair of moccasins instead of tennis shoes. But in a few moments she caught up with him. Her shoulder brushed his as Wren slowed her pace.
