Abandon the Dark

Lainey hesitated, not sure whether to hold out her hand to him or not. She settled for a friendly smile. “I’m Lainey. What’s your name?”

The boy’s blue eyes held a hint of panic, and he glanced toward his grandfather.

“Answer your cousin,” Zeb said sharply.

“Thomas,” he muttered, a flush mounting to his straw-colored hair. Even the tips of his ears turned red. “I’m Thomas.”

She shouldn’t have singled him out, obviously, so she just nodded and turned to the counter, lifting the tea towel from it to reveal the crumbly top of the shoofly pie perched on a covered casserole dish.

“It looks wonderful. Thank you.”

Ella had removed her black bonnet and sweater, revealing a pert round face and a pair of sparkling blue eyes. She, at least, didn’t seem intimidated by her grandfather.

“Ach, we know what it’s like when someone’s in the hospital. You don’t want to be eating that cafeteria food, ain’t so?” Ella seemed to be taking it for granted that she’d spend the day at the hospital. “Mamm and I stopped by to see Aunt Rebecca yesterday, but it was after you’d left.”

“Sorry I wasn’t there to speak to you.” She felt obscurely guilty. “I was so tired after the flight and then driving from Pittsburgh that I went to bed early.”

“Ach, it’s a long trip. I went to a wedding last year out in Indiana, and I thought we’d never get there.” Her cheerful face lit with the reminder. “I met lots of new cousins out there.”

Ella was probably a couple of years older than her brother, so she wouldn’t have been born yet the summer Lainey spent here. The fact made her feel old.

Aunt Rebecca had never let anyone come in her house without offering food and drink, but Lainey had finished the coffee Jake made earlier.

“Would you like to have a piece of the shoofly pie? I could make a pot of coffee.” At least she hoped she could.

Ella looked about to agree, but Zeb got in first. “No. Denke,” he added. “You will need to leave for the hospital. I chust wanted to stop.” He paused, and she imagined that there was a struggle going on behind the thin, leathery face. “I spoke too hasty yesterday. Rebecca picked you. She must have had a reason.” He sounded as if he couldn’t imagine what that reason might be.

She tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t sound antagonistic. “It might have been a good idea for Aunt Rebecca to talk it over with me first.”

“Ja.” He seized on that idea. “Then you could have explained that it would be too hard with you living in St. Louis and all.”

He was jumping to the conclusion that she’d have turned down the power of attorney if she’d known, and that wasn’t really what she’d meant. Still, at least he wasn’t glaring at her today, and she had to admit that was a step in the right direction.

“In any event, she did choose me, so I’ll have to go from there.” She kept her tone pleasant but, she hoped, firm.

Zeb stiffened. “You mean you are going ahead with this? Even knowing nothing at all about Rebecca’s way of living and her property?”

“She must have thought I knew enough.” If people would stop pushing her, she might be able to think instead of react. Unfortunately, reacting won the day, and she blurted out what she hadn’t intended to say. “I trust Rebecca’s judgment. I’m accepting the power of attorney.”

Zeb’s face reddened, and Ella touched her grandfather’s arm with an air of cautioning him. “That’s so. Aunt Rebecca would have a reason. And if you have any problems deciding things, especially about the property, Grossdaadi would be the one to help you. He knows all about it.”

Zeb seemed to be counting to ten. “Ja,” he said, his tone short. “I know more than anyone about my brother’s property and what he wanted done.”

In other words, he expected her to let him vet any decisions she had to make. Apparently Jake’s conversation with Zeb hadn’t borne much fruit.

“I’m sure my aunt’s lawyer is capable of advising me.” There, put the responsibility back on Jake. He was getting paid for it, after all.

“That Englischer.” Zeb shook off Ella’s restraining hand, his color darkening alarmingly. “No Amish woman needs to have a lawyer to take care of property for her. Her family does that—the kin who have worked long hours in the sun to be sure the land is paying. Not some fancy lawyer who sits in an office all day.”

From what she’d seen of Jake, he didn’t do much sitting, but that was neither here nor there.

“There’s also the matter of making decisions about Aunt Rebecca’s care,” she said. “Or had you forgotten about that?” She didn’t bother trying to hide the annoyance in her voice.

“I have not forgotten.” He muttered something in Pennsylvania Dutch that she couldn’t understand. “Her family can do that better than you. We see her every week. You haven’t come near her in twenty years.”

The fact that it was true didn’t make it any more palatable coming from him. “But Aunt Rebecca still picked me. I wonder why she trusts me? By the way, she owns the farm you work, doesn’t she?”

Zeb’s big hands, strong despite his age, clenched into fists. For a moment she feared she’d gone too far.

Ella clutched his arm, murmuring to him urgently in Pennsylvania Dutch. She tugged at him, trying to pull him toward the door.

Zeb glared at Lainey for a moment longer. Then, not speaking, he turned and stamped out the back door. Thomas, blue eyes wide in a white face, scurried after him.

Ella shook her head, pulling her bonnet back on with hands that shook a little. “I’m sorry. He has a temper. He forgets himself. He’ll regret he spoke so after a bit.”

“I’m sorry, too.” She should have handled the situation better. When would she learn not to let her emotions get the better of her? “I do appreciate your trying to help. And the food.”

“Ach, it’s nothing.” Ella clasped her hand. “I must go. Maybe I will see you again soon.”

Lainey nodded, but somehow she doubted it. She was suddenly tired and dispirited. How had she let herself get into this situation in the first place? She didn’t belong here.

But she didn’t belong back in St. Louis, either. There seemed no place where she did belong.

CHAPTER FOUR

IT WAS ONE thing to declare she was the person in charge, Lainey decided, and quite another to sit for hours at her great-aunt’s bedside, wishing Rebecca would wake up and tell Lainey what to do.

Fortunately her cousin Katie arrived early in the afternoon, bustling into the hospital room carrying a basket on one arm and what looked like a sewing bag on the other.

“Ach, all alone here?” Katie bent to kiss Aunt Rebecca’s cheek and then glanced at Lainey. “Any change?”

“Not that I can see,” she admitted. “I’m hoping to have a chance to talk with one of the doctors this afternoon.”

“Some things chust take time,” Katie said, her tone confident as she took the second chair and opened her basket. “Now, I knew you would be hungry, so I brought a little lunch for you.”

“That looks like more than a little.” Lainey accepted the paper plate Katie handed her. “I’m fine, really.”

Katie eyed her. “You have circles under your eyes and a worried frown on your face. Komm, now. A nice sandwich and some potato salad will keep you going. And a walnut brownie to finish off. I brought lemonade, but if you want me to get you a coffee, I will.” She looked as if she’d jump out of the chair to do so, and Lainey waved her back.

“Lemonade is lovely.” Obviously it would be easier to eat than to argue. “Didn’t you bring any for yourself?”

“I ate with the family before I left the house. The men are getting a last cutting of hay today, so they had lunch early.” Katie leaned back, watching until Lainey bit into the sandwich.

She’d have said she wasn’t hungry, but the combination of fresh chicken salad on what had to be home-baked wheat bread would tempt any appetite. “Delicious,” she said around a generous mouthful. “How did you know this was my favorite?”

Katie chuckled. “Homemade food is always comforting when you’re having trouble, ain’t so? And I remembered you liked chicken. And chocolate.” She put a huge slab of brownie on the plate.

“Guilty,” Lainey said. She glanced toward Aunt Rebecca’s still figure. “It seems wrong to sit here enjoying my food when Aunt Rebecca is so ill, though.”

“That is nonsense, and she would be the first one to tell you so.” Katie’s round face grew serious. “You must take care of yourself so you can take care of her, ain’t so?”

“You sound like Aunt Rebecca,” she said softly, remembering how her great-aunt always seemed to have a store of solid common sense to share.

“Ja.” Katie’s smile was reminiscent. “I always thought Aunt Rebecca was exactly what an Amish woman should be, so maybe that’s not surprising.”

Seeming satisfied that Lainey was going to do as she was told in regard to her lunch, Katie set the basket on the floor and took up the bag. In a moment, scraps of brightly-colored fabric were spread on her dark green skirt.

“What are you making?” Lainey forked up potato salad, enjoying the crisp contrast of pickles and celery combined with the potato and egg.

“Chust piecing the patches for a quilt.” Katie’s fingers moved dexterously, rearranging the pieces into a square. “Sometimes I use the treadle machine to do the piecing, but I always like to have a project I can work on when I’m sitting.”

“It’s a log cabin design, isn’t it?” Lainey had always been fascinated by quilts, loving the complex patterns and use of color.

“Ja. For my oldest granddaughter’s birthday. She’s going to be eight already, and such a little schnicklefritz. Always into mischief.” Katie’s smile suggested she didn’t mind that in the least.

“Aunt Rebecca tried to teach me to quilt when I was here.” The memory slipped into her mind, making her smile. “I’m afraid I wasn’t very good at sitting still, but I did love arranging the blocks.”

“A nine-patch, was it?” Katie asked. “She taught me, and that’s the first one I made.”

Lainey nodded. They’d gone in the buggy to a shop outside town where a pair of Amish sisters ran a quilting business. If you needed anything for quilting, Aunt Rebecca had said, that’s where you went.

“Lorena and Lovina,” she said abruptly as the names came back to her.

“Ach, imagine you remembering them,” Katie said. “Aunt Rebecca got all her fabric from them. She still does, though I think she must have enough for a dozen quilts in the chest in the back bedroom.”

“I was fascinated by the rows of fabric. The colors...it was like being in the middle of a rainbow.” She’d run from one to another, unable to make up her mind.

Katie nodded as if she understood. Then, without a word, she put the row of fabric pieces she’d been pinning into Lainey’s lap and handed her a needle.

Lainey blinked. “You want me to work on your granddaughter’s quilt? But I’m not good enough.”

“If Rebecca taught you, you know enough,” Katie said. “And it’s gut to keep your hands busy when you’re worried. At least then you have something to show for your worrying,” she added, her tone practical.

Lainey actually found herself laughing. “If that’s the case, I should have a half-dozen quilts done by now.” She picked up the pieces and held the needle poised. “Well, we can always rip it out if my stitches are too terrible.”

But her sewing wasn’t half bad once she started. Thanks to Aunt Rebecca’s early tutelage, she’d always been able to do the hemming and mending most of her peers seemed unable to tackle. Tiny, even stitches, she reminded herself.

The routine, repetitive movements were oddly soothing, reminding her of how much she’d always enjoyed the creativity involved in hand arts. Most of her colleagues would dismiss sewing, knitting, crocheting as crafts, insisting they had no place beside the work of a real artist.

But who was to say which was important? Katie’s creations might never hang in a gallery, but they clothed her family in garments made by her own loving hands.

They worked in silence for some time, but there was nothing either boring or uncomfortable about it. Lainey glanced at her great-aunt. It seemed to her that Aunt Rebecca had relaxed somewhat, her face turned slightly toward them instead of squarely on the pillow. The room was oddly peaceful.

“Zeb came to see me this morning,” she said abruptly. Would Katie have known about his intent?

“Ja?” Katie looked up, her expression guarded. “What did he want?”

Lainey shrugged. “The same as yesterday, I suppose. He just tried a different approach this time. Ella and Thomas came with him, and she brought me food.” She cast a rueful glance at the remains of her lunch. If she kept eating everything her Amish relatives pushed on her, she’d gain twenty pounds while she was here.

“Ella’s a sweet girl,” Katie said. “But young Thomas is so shy it wonders me that he’d come to meet you.”

“I don’t suppose his grandfather gave him much choice.”

“No.” Katie was frowning. “He brought up this business about the power of attorney, did he? I wish he’d leave well enough alone.”

“He thinks Aunt Rebecca should have appointed him.” She turned in her chair so she couldn’t miss Katie’s expression. “Is that what you think, too?”

“No.” Katie’s response was so prompt and firm that Lainey couldn’t doubt her sincerity. “Not Zeb. He’s too set on his own way.” She looked at Lainey, her expression troubled. “But there are other relatives.”

Lainey’s heart sank a little. Despite Katie’s friendliness, she must agree that Lainey wasn’t the person for the job.

“I told Zeb I’m going to do what Aunt Rebecca wanted.” If that came out sounding a little belligerent, she couldn’t seem to help it. “All I can do is my best.”

Katie studied her for a long moment. Then she nodded. “Ja. All right.” She smiled and patted Lainey’s hand, but Lainey thought the smile held a tinge of doubt. “Then I will help you as best I can.”

“Thank you.” Her throat tightened. Maybe that wasn’t a wholehearted endorsement, but at this point, she’d take any support she could find.

* * *

THE REALITY OF the situation had begun to sink in by the time Lainey was headed back to the house late that afternoon, and she was already having second thoughts despite Katie’s promise of help.

As usual, she’d acted on impulse, letting Zeb’s antagonism push her into making a decision. Was she ever going to learn?

Lainey pulled the car to the curb in front of Miller’s and got out, pausing for a moment as memories crowded in. She had been allowed to walk to the store on her own the summer she’d stayed with her great-aunt, but usually she’d come with Meredith and Rachel, intent on the purchase of candy—real, old-fashioned penny candy, scooped into a small brown paper bag from the glass case.

The store looked larger than she’d remembered, but it still had pots of flowers on either side of the front door and a hitching rail at the side where Amish buggies could be parked. She touched a deep burgundy mum with her fingers, releasing its spicy scent, and went on into the store.

Lainey paused for a moment inside the door, orienting herself. Groceries were on the right, as always, but the left side of the store had been expanded. It was filled with handcrafted items to delight the heart of a tourist. Faceless Amish dolls, quilted place mats and table runners, even a few hooked rugs crowded the counters. The upper shelves held wooden items like napkin holders and even a small train.

The deep, saturated colors of a quilted table runner drew her, but she resisted the impulse and turned into the grocery aisle. Before she could pick up a box of cereal, a voice called her name.

“Lainey? It is you. I heard you were coming back to look after your great-aunt. It’s wonderful gut to see you.”

Anna Miller looked much as she had twenty years ago, with a white apron over a dark blue Amish dress and a wide smile on her round face. The face might be a little rounder, the hair a bit more gray, the curves more generous, but Anna Miller hadn’t changed much.

“Mrs. Miller.” Lainey walked quickly to the back counter. “I’d have known you anywhere. How are you?”

“Anna, please. You’re a grown-up now, ain’t so? But you still have a look of that little girl we knew.” Her cheerful face sobered. “I’m afraid it’s a sad business that brought you back to us.”

Lainey nodded. Obviously all of Deer Run knew who she was and why she was here. They probably knew what she’d had for supper last night. “I wish I’d come sooner.”

She blinked, a little surprised at herself. With everyone else she’d felt defensive on that subject, but with Anna, one had the sense that, like Aunt Rebecca, she wouldn’t judge.

“You’re here now, that’s what counts. How is your dear aunt today?” Anna leaned on the counter, seeming ready for a long chat.

“I don’t think there was much change from yesterday.” Her throat tightened. Aunt Rebecca’s hands had always been so busy—stitching or stirring or comforting a child. It had seemed wrong to see them lying lax on the white hospital sheet.

“It’s hard to see someone we love chust lying there.” Seeming to read her mind, Anna reached across the counter to pat Lainey’s hand. “But with a stroke, sometimes it takes time for the brain and body to heal. Don’t give up hope.”

“I won’t.” That was another thing that was easy to say but perhaps not so easy to do. What if this went on day after day, week after week? What would she do then?

“We are all praying for her,” Anna said softly. “She is in God’s hands.”

Lainey’s throat was too tight for her to do anything but nod.

“Ach, I’m talking away and not helping you with your shopping. You aren’t here for penny candy this time, ain’t so?” Anna’s eyes twinkled, and she gestured toward the glass-enclosed case at the end of the counter. The top part contained a variety of obviously homemade baked goods, while below there was the familiar array of bubble gum, Swedish fish, and lollipops.

“No, I think I’ll pass on that this time. We used to be awful pests at picking out what we wanted, it seems to me.”

“You and Meredith and Rachel,” Anna said. “You’ve talked to them since you came back?”

“Just briefly. They came over for a little while last night. It was nice to see them after such a long time.”

Nice, but odd. Maybe even a bit awkward. What did you say to people you hadn’t seen in twenty years?

“You were always together that summer, ain’t so? It’s quite a reunion, with first Rachel coming back to Deer Run and now you. Meredith never did leave, what with taking care of her mother and all.” Anna shook her head, a mournful look sitting oddly on her cheerful face. “I won’t say Margo King was a pleasant woman, but it was terrible, her being killed and Meredith coming that close to losing her own life as well.”

The words jolted, and Lainey could only stare at her. “I didn’t know. What happened to Meredith’s mother? An accident?” She envisioned a car smash-up, with Meredith barely surviving. But Meredith had seemed well enough last night.

Anna shook her head. “They didn’t tell you? Well, it would be a lot to take in, and you having plenty of worries on your plate as it is. No, Margo was murdered, and Meredith nearly so, and all because of poor Aaron Mast’s death that summer you were here. If Rachel hadn’t come back, maybe we’d never—”

Her words cut off abruptly as the bell on the door jangled. Two women came into the store—one tall, angular and businesslike, the other so fair and frail that she looked as if a breath would blow her away.

Lainey’s gaze crossed that of the taller woman and met a look so malevolent that she was reminded of Zeb Stoltzfus for an instant. Apparently this was yet another person who didn’t think she should be here. Lainey gripped the edge of the counter and managed a pleasant smile. She wouldn’t let herself be unnerved by a stranger’s hostility.

Anna, after standing motionless for a moment, came from around the counter and went quickly to take the blonde woman’s hand. “Laura, it is sehr gut to see you. I didn’t know that you were home from...home already.”

Lainey watched them, surprised by what seemed embarrassment underneath Anna’s hearty welcome. Laura, she repeated the name, memories coming back from the distant recesses of her mind. Laura had been a teenager that summer Lainey had spent here. Pretty, popular...what had happened to her? Her face was still beautiful, but thin and somehow empty-looking. She stood motionless next to the other woman like a doll.

“Yes, Laura is home.” The other woman’s tone was brisk. “She’s doing very well, aren’t you, Laura?”

Laura nodded, and the resemblance to a mechanical doll increased.

“We’re glad to hear it.” Anna’s hearty tone didn’t ring quite true, Lainey thought. “And look who else has come home to Deer Run?” She waved an ample arm at Lainey. “Here’s little Lainey Colton, all grown up. Lainey, you maybe wouldn’t remember Laura Hammond. And Jeannette Walker. She runs the bed-and-breakfast across the street from your aunt’s house.”

Lainey nodded. “The Willows, of course. It’s lovely.” The front yard and flower beds were manicured to within an inch of their lives, and the large Victorian house was immaculately kept up.

Just the same, she wouldn’t say she’d look forward to staying there. It was a bit on the formal side for her.

It was time for Jeannette to say that she was glad to see Lainey, or to ask about her aunt. She did neither. Instead she handed a list to Anna.

“Those are the things Laura would like. We won’t wait. You can have them delivered to Laura’s house.”

“She’s not staying with you, then?” Anna seemed to be trying to untangle something in her mind.

“No.” Jeannette snapped off the word. She gave Lainey a cool nod. “We’ll be going. Come along, Laura.” She touched the woman’s arm.

Laura turned obediently and moved toward the door. But before she left she glanced back. She gave Lainey a long look, her forehead creasing as if with an effort to remember.

When the door closed behind them, Anna let out her breath in a whoosh. “Ach, I am so clumsy. But there seems nothing to say around the woman that won’t bring up things that are better left unsaid. At least she didn’t recognize you.”

“Who? Laura?” Jeannette had certainly known who Lainey was, regardless of her actual words.

And Laura? Well, Lainey didn’t know what to make of Laura, but one thing struck her. Her fingers itched to draw that lovely, empty face, and she had a sense that she had drawn it before.

“You don’t remember?” Anna looked at her questioningly. “I shouldn’t say—” She let that trail off.

“I think you’d better,” Lainey said briskly. “I can’t go around Deer Run walking on eggshells, not knowing who I’m going to offend next.”

Anna shook her head. “I can’t tell you all of it. Not about the part that happened when you were here. You’ll have to hear that from Meredith and Rachel. But Laura...the reason I was surprised to see her is that she’s been in a mental hospital for more than a month. And she was there because it was her husband who killed Meredith’s mother.”

Lainey’s mind spun. Laura’s husband a killer? Meredith’s mother his victim? That didn’t make sense.

And the thing that made the least sense of all was Anna’s implication that the crime had its roots in something that had happened that long-ago summer.

Well, one thing was certain. She’d have to talk to Rachel and Meredith again, and soon.

* * *

JAKE SUSPECTED LAINEY wasn’t going to appreciate an unannounced visit from him this evening. On the other hand, if he’d called her first, she could so easily have made an excuse.

He’d made up his mind to drive over after supper. He didn’t want this decision put off any longer. Having a client’s affairs in disarray pounded on his nerves like a jackhammer. He might be relaxed and informal in the rest of his life, but when it came to his profession, he dotted the i’s and crossed the t’s. The school buddies who saw him as a typical good old boy would be surprised.