Every town has its secrets…

Returning to Cold Creek, Ohio, is an act of courage for Tess Lockwood. Abducted and held captive as a young girl, she is unable to remember anything about the crime that destroyed her childhood and tore her family apart. Now a grown woman with a bright future, she is certain she has put the past behind her. But when she inherits the family home, Tess must confront the demons that still haunt her and the town of Cold Creek.

Gabe McCord has always blamed himself for what happened to Tess. He had been a teenager when she was snatched from the group of children he was responsible for watching. Now Gabe has taken on the role of sheriff and hopes to shed new light on the cold case, especially given his growing feelings for Tess.

Tess isn’t ready to recall what happened to her, and she has no intention of digging up any details that might remind her of the truth. But when another child in the town goes missing, she’s certain it’s related to her return to Cold Creek. Together,Tess and Gabe will have to work to unlock their painful memories in order to save another child and heal their damaged souls, for good.…

Praise for the novels of New York Times bestselling author Karen Harper

“Harper, a master of suspense, keeps readers guessing about crime and love until the very end, while detailed descriptions of the Amish community and the Ohio countryside add to the enjoyment of this thrilling tale.”

—Booklist on Fall from Pride (starred review)

“Danger and romance find their way into Ohio Amish country in a lively and endearing first installment of the Amish Home Valley series.”

—Publishers Weekly on Fall from Pride

“The author’s likable, engaging characters and a strong plot lend additional strength to her ever-amazing descriptions of Amish life.”

—RT Book Reviews on Return to Grace

“Harper’s description of Lisa and Mitch fighting the river and braving the elements are so realistic the reader can almost feel the icy winds. A tale guaranteed to bring shivers to the spine, Down River will delight Harper’s current fans and earn her many more.”

—Booklist (starred review)

“Haunting suspense, tender romance and an evocative look at the complexities of Amish life—Dark Angel is simply riveting!”

—Tess Gerritsen, New York Times bestselling author

“A compelling story…intricate and fascinating details of Amish life.”

—Tami Hoag, New York Times bestselling author, on Dark Road Home

“Well-researched and rich in detail… With its tantalizing buildup and well-developed characters, this offering is certain to earn Harper high marks.”

—Publishers Weekly on Dark Angel, winner of the 2005 Mary Higgins Clark Award

Shattered Secrets

Karen Harper

www.mirabooks.co.uk

To the staff and board of the Ohioana Library Association, which does so much to promote and preserve the work of Ohio authors. Especially to my friends, former director of Ohioana Linda Hengst and current Executive Director David Weaver. Don and I appreciate all you do.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Praise

Title Page

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Author’s Note

Copyright

1

Tess Lockwood drew in a sharp breath. She’d buried her memories deep, but the sign for Cold Creek, Ohio, brought the terror back. To face everything again—to relive it—no, she refused to do that. But they kept cropping up, tall as the cornstalks crowding the roads in this area.

She told herself that Cold Creek was a charming, quaint town but started to shake when she saw a sign stuck in the ground. Reelect Gabe McCord for Sheriff. It was with a few other local political ones, including a fancy poster to reelect Reese Owens, still mayor here after all these years. She’d tried to prepare herself for the fact that she was going to see people who reminded her of the past. But Gabe was the worst and she’d do everything possible to avoid him if she could.

Selling the family house she’d recently inherited was her immediate goal or she wouldn’t have come back at all, especially at this time of year. But the day care center she wanted to buy would go to someone else if she didn’t get some money fast. Her life’s desire was to purchase the Sunshine and Smiles Center for preschool kids in Jackson, Michigan, where she’d worked for years. She planned to live upstairs and redo a lot of the space downstairs where she would teach and protect her young charges. The timing was doubly right since her renters in Cold Creek, her cousin Lee and his family, were moving out. Her mother had wanted to sell their house years ago, but it had no fields attached, and people hesitated to buy a place where a tragedy had happened. They had managed to rent it though, and were relieved that their cousins could live there for a while.

“Wow, four traffic lights uptown instead of one,” she said aloud, thumping a fist on the steering wheel while she was stopped at the first light near the gas station. She needed a fill-up, but it looked pretty busy right now and she wasn’t ready to run into familiar faces. “Like Gracie said, this place is so much bigger!” It felt comforting to talk to herself, as if she had someone with her, someone who really cared what happened.

Of course, she still had two sisters who cared about her, though Char and Kate were understandably upset that their mother had left the house only to her. On her deathbed Mom had said she owed Tess something for what had happened.

The Cold Creek Community Church they used to attend was at this end of the commercial district. She saw they had put on an addition. Piles of pumpkins adorned its lawn with a donation bucket out front for people to leave some money. Even in Jackson, you’d never seen something like that. Please Make Your Own Change, the hand-printed sign read. How she’d like to make a lot of changes in her life, banish the nightmares and the fear.

When the light turned green, Tess drove slowly to read the store signs. The doctor’s office was still there but with a new name stenciled on the window, not Dr. Marvin, who had tended to her immediately after her kidnapping. The tiny storefront library they used to visit between times the bookmobile stopped by was still crammed between the hardware store and the bank. On the other side of Main Street she saw the Kwik Shop, where they used to buy groceries. She’d brought milk and juice—and two bottles of wine—in her big cooler. She also had cereal, bread, peanut butter and jam, so she wouldn’t have to stop anywhere, at least right now.

Cold Creek had seemed huge when she left at age six, but she knew that was just because everything seemed big to little kids. Still, from the keep-your-chin-up phone calls from Lee’s wife, Gracie, over the past few years, Tess had heard all about the recent growth of the town and its influx of wealthy retirees and weekenders.

She wasn’t sure how people would react to her return. Although eighteen years had passed since she’d set foot here, would people still stare and whisper? They might not recognize her at first, but how quickly would word get around? They might give her those looks so full of curiosity and pity it made her feel ashamed, despite the fact that her mother, Dr. Marvin, that investigator Agent Reingold and the sheriff had said over and over that what happened wasn’t her fault.

But was it her fault? After all, she’d run into the back cornfield and tried to hide when Gabe, their teenage next-door neighbor and the sheriff’s son, had told her to cut it out and called her a crazy tomboy. That was where and when it all began. And maybe Gabe was right, because she’d felt a little crazy ever since.

In the space where the sheriff’s office had been, she saw a gift shop, Creekside Gifts, its windows decorated with Halloween costumes, wooden black cats and corn shocks. Farther on beyond the tiny town square, a brick sheriff’s office had been built next to a new volunteer fire department. The American flag and the Ohio state flag flew from a big pole between the two buildings. A police vehicle with Sheriff emblazoned on the side was parked in the small lot, but she saw no one around. Rod McCord had been sheriff when she lived in Cold Creek and his son, Gabe, held that position now.

He would be thirty-one now, because he was thirteen when her family left town. Gracie said Gabe had bought his parents’ house, directly across the roadside cornfield from the Lockwood homestead she now owned, so they’d be neighbors, just like when they were children.

The third traffic light turned red and she came to a stop again. Gracie had told her about “the great divide,” but now she saw it for herself. The west side of town belonged to the outsiders, the new folks who had invaded and kept pretty much separate from the townies, except on market day. Well, what did she care? Tess told herself as she frowned at a new restaurant, a tearoom, some shops—and an English pub, no less, in rural Falls County.

Her stomach clenched as she turned onto hilly Valley View Road. “You can do this, Tess,” she said.

But as she drove down the two-lane road lined with tall, thick cornfields, she wasn’t so sure. Especially when she passed the McCord place as the sun began to set atop the darkening Appalachian foothills and her family’s old farmhouse crept into view. It seemed to leap at her. Even with the car windows up and the doors locked, she was certain she could feel the cornstalks clutching at her, rustling, whispering. She suddenly recalled being told to be quiet or the ears of corn would hear her. Who had said that? Mom or Dad?

“You’re fine,” she told herself. “You’ll be just fine.”

But she sat stock-still in the car at the bottom of the gravel driveway with the motor running until Gracie burst from the front door of the house and windmilled her arm to wave her in.

* * *

Falls County sheriff Gabe McCord left his cruiser about twenty yards outside the tall wooden gate of the Hear Ye Commune and walked closer. The place gave him the creeps, but the thirteen families of what he’d call a far-out religious sect had broken no laws and kept pretty much to themselves except on Saturdays when they had a big table of their produce at the farmers’ market.

He’d received a complaint from Marian Bell that someone had seen a child at the Hear Ye market stall who resembled her lost daughter, Amanda, so he had to check it out. Gabe’s theory was that the girl had been snatched by her father and taken abroad when the Bell marriage broke up, but Peter Bell had been impossible to trace. Amanda’s disappearance didn’t fit the pattern of the child kidnappings that had haunted his father and now him, but he was following all leads, desperate for any break in the long-standing case.

Although no one had disappeared on his watch, he still got heartburn over it in more ways than one. Worse, he was convinced his father had suffered two heart attacks running himself into the ground over the abductions. The so-called cold case of Cold Creek was always on the front burner for Gabe.

“Lee, how you doing?” Gabe greeted his former neighbor as he was walking across the grassy ground outside the fenced compound of meeting house, family buildings, school, gardens and workshops. Lee Lockwood was holding a forked willow branch straight out while pacing the grassy knoll. “Looking for water—or buried treasure?” Gabe asked. Most folks in the area knew Lee was a water dowser, which some in the area called a water witcher, as if it was evil or demonic.

“Oh, hi, Sheriff. Didn’t see you coming. Usually we got guards out. You know, greeters who watch for strangers or gawkers. Got a lot of kids here to protect, including my two, now. And I really get into dowsing when I do it. Yeah, looking for water. Don’t you go believing that buried treasure stuff you hear, nor the old wives’ tales about locating ancient graves with a dowsing branch neither. It’s just we could use another well since the water pipes don’t come out this far from town yet. Been looking most of the afternoon though, and no go so far. I figure when cousin Tess gets back, I’ll have her help me. She’s got the gift too, you know.”

He pointed the tip of the willow wand toward Gabe. Lee looked really nervous about his presence, but then some people were. The usually reticent man was trying to cover his unease up with talk.

Lee rushed on, frowning so hard his forehead furrowed. “Least Tess used to be good at it when she was a little kid. But I ’spose she don’t want to be reminded of any of the old times.”

“No. Me neither, but it’s still an open case. Grace told me Teresa—that is, Tess—is coming back for a while to sell the old place. But aren’t you going to miss living at the Lockwood house? Grace said your kids were doing fine in the public school, so why shift them here after only two months this year?”

“There’s lots of benefits here. Protection from the world. Closeness to God through Bright Star, other things.”

It was getting dark as the sun sank behind the tops of the hills where rain clouds were gathering. Gabe wanted to get this over with, but he stared into the face of the earnest young man and hesitated to get him involved. He was a first cousin to Teresa, now called Tess, Lockwood, the first child taken in the two—or maybe three—kidnappings of young girls.

“Brice Monson has everyone here calling him Bright Star?” Gabe asked.

“Those who trust his guidance. ‘You do well to heed a light that shines in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.’ That’s the way we look at Brice. The bright morning star in a dark world.”

Gabe decided not to get into it with his former neighbor, who had just moved out last week. He’d seen Grace was still there, sweeping the front porch, waiting for Tess at the very house where the first kidnapping had happened when his dad was sheriff. That afternoon Gabe was supposed to be watching several neighbor kids. Thank God Tess had come back alive, because the other two—if Amanda was one—had not come back at all.

“See you later,” Gabe said. He headed for the gate to the compound.

“Oh, hey, forgot to tell you,” Lee called after him. “Everyone’s down by the creek picking up walnuts to sell at the farmers’ market, even Bright Star. He let me stay here because we need a new water well, like I said.”

The compound did look deserted. Gabe walked back toward Lee. Was the man shaking or was that willow limb quivering in his hands of its own accord?

“You tell him I’ll be back tomorrow morning a little after ten,” Gabe said, hoping Lee was listening. He looked transfixed, staring at the ground where the stick seemed to point like a skinny, crooked finger. Was Lee putting on a show for him? Gabe didn’t really believe in dowsing any more than he believed Brice Monson was some sort of modern-day messiah. But Lee looked so amazed that Gabe could only hope he’d remember to pass on his message.

As he strode back to the cruiser, Gabe couldn’t help thinking Monson had picked a weird time to order everyone down by Cold Creek to pick up walnuts. Darkness setting in, a rainstorm coming. Gabe had helped his dad collect walnuts down there once. His hands were stained brown from it, and he’d run around the house pretending it was spattered, dried blood until he caught heck from his mother. “Blood on someone’s hands is not fun and games!” she’d scolded him.

Did Lee actually have to get Monson’s permission to stay behind? he wondered. This place was starting to sound worse than boot camp. Gabe was glad he hadn’t mentioned what he wanted here. Monson might not agree to bring all the girls about Amanda’s age for a lineup to see if the girl in the photo Marian had given him resembled her lost child. But Gabe was hungry for anything to make progress on these kidnappings—any lead, any hint, any clue.

As he got into his vehicle, he heard a rumble of thunder echo from the hills. It reminded him of things that made him uneasy when he needed to be in control, because it sounded like distant 155-millimeter howitzers, boom, thump, thump. Thunder often took him back to the day in Iraq when his Explosive Ordnance Disposal Unit disarmed a huge bomb in a Kirkuk market before it could detonate. Even as they succeeded, other IEDs went off in the distance, echoing, killing some of the men he’d sent to another site.

After he fastened his seat belt, his hand darted to his chest. Sometimes he almost thought he could feel his army-issued pistol in its cross-draw holster from his duty days. Today he wore his weapon on his equipment belt. From his inside jacket pocket he pulled out the pictures of Marian Bell’s daughter and the Hear Ye girl. One was a close-up first-grade school photo, the other a grainy, more distant one of the child in question, standing by the commune’s market booth. He stared at the photos side by side in the graying light. Again, he vowed he’d somehow finish what his dad had left undone: find the phantom Cold Creek kidnapper, who took little girls and, but for Tess Lockwood, made them disappear.

* * *

“Ooh, I think it’s raining, and I hate to drive in the rain,” Gracie told Tess as she looked out the window toward the road. “It’s turning dark early. I had to get special permission to wait for you and I don’t want to get back late.”

After an affectionate welcome from her cousin’s wife, Tess had toured the house at Gracie’s insistence. Tess had tried to buck herself up to face the place alone, but it was good to have her here. Tess and Gracie were almost the same height, though the similarities stopped there. Gracie had long red hair, amber eyes, a round face and plump body compared to Tess’s blond, chin-length hair, blue eyes and lithe frame. She’d never questioned why Gracie had taken such a liking to her, as if she were the Lockwood cousin instead of Lee. But then they had all played together as children. Gracie was one of the distantly spaced neighborhood kids, and their mothers had been friends. Back then, everyone in Cold Creek had known each other, or at least had seemed to.

“I’m sorry we sold most of our furniture, but I hope we’ve left you enough to get by for the couple of weeks you’re here,” Gracie said. “The houses in the commune are pretty well set up already.”

“But your family will still be together, right?” Tess asked as they stood inside the back door while the rain rattled against the windows and Gracie scrambled into her slicker and pulled up its hood.

“Together when it matters, though Kelsey and Ethan will now have lots of family, lots of mothers and cousins in the faith.”

Gracie didn’t notice, but Tess shook her head, surprised that her friend had accepted Lee’s new religious ideas so easily. But Gracie had a kind, sweet personality. How many girls who married into a family would keep in touch with someone who had moved away when Lee himself didn’t seem interested? How many young women—Gracie was twenty-eight, four years older than Tess—would care so deeply about her? Why, at times Gracie seemed more of a sister to her than Char or Kate. She’d seen more of Gracie over the past five years, before Lee turned into such a religious man and they stopped visiting her and Mom in Michigan. The last time she’d seen them was at her mother’s funeral just last year.

“I can’t wait to see how big Kelsey and Ethan are now,” Tess told her. “I love kids that age, same as the ones I work with. And just the ages I want to care for when I can sell this place and buy my child care center back home.”

“Back home,” Gracie said, giving Tess a quick goodbye hug. “Isn’t back home really here? Well, I know about the bad things, but you have the strength to put it all behind you, and we wish you’d stay around longer.”

“One week, maybe two max, but we’ll make each day count. And when I get my place back in Jackson, you can come visit.”

“Well,” Gracie drawled, “don’t know about that with our new commitments and all.”

Tess frowned and looked out the kitchen window at the rain falling. The security light flooded the backyard with brightness. Her mother had put that in after Tess was taken, even before she found her way home.

As Gracie opened the back door she said, “I’ll bring the kids to see you tomorrow, if it’s allowed.”

“Why wouldn’t it be allowed?”

“Their school and work schedule. I’m not sure.”

“Work? They’re four and two years old.”

“They learn to work during play!”

“Okay, okay. I’d love to meet with their teachers. We can exchange ideas.”

Gracie hesitated between the inside wooden door and the glass storm door. Tess sensed she wanted to change the subject. “You still might want to rent out this place,” Gracie said, her hand on the knob. “Real estate’s not moving well around here.”

“Two things I’ve decided for sure. One, I’m going to advertise and sell it myself so I don’t have to pay a Realtor commission. And two, I don’t want to rent it. I want it gone with the bad memories because I’m making only good ones now. And you’ve helped a lot. Thanks for cleaning the place. And for the cider, cheese and apple crisp in the fridge. See you tomorrow!”

They hugged again, and Gracie darted out into the rain. Tess watched the overhead light in her old black car pop on, then her headlights as they disappeared down the driveway. Slanting rain and gray gloom swallowed the two red taillights like a wild animal’s eyes closing.

Tess glanced out the back window again at the place where the nightmare had started—and at this time of year. She had to fight the memories. The cornfield lay so close, so vast at the edge of the backyard, then curled around the house to join the field between the Lockwood and McCord houses. The day she’d been taken was a sunny one but with rain clouds threatening from the distant fringe of blue-green hills.

She’d run into the field, hiding from Gabe, who’d agreed to watch her and two other kids when her mom had to pick up Kate and Char at school and take them to the dentist. They were all just playing in the backyard. Gabe had watched them before for short periods. There was no problem....

Tess stood frozen, lost in thought. Unlike her sisters, she’d always had perfect teeth and she was so young, they had not taken her that day. After her father left the family, there was never any money for things like an orthodontist. Both of her older sisters ended up paying for their own teeth straightening as adults.

“Lots of folks around here have natural teeth, Claire!” she remembered her dad shouting at her mom. “We come from good Appalachian stock,” he’d said more than once, “not those fancy folks starting to buy land over by Lake Azure who get their teeth fixed and face-lifts!”

Strange that the little Tess recalled of her father he was always shouting. She figured that bottled-up anger—his blaming Mom for not taking his “terrific, terrible Teresa” with her the day she was kidnapped—was the reason he’d left them. Several months after Tess came back home, he’d moved to Oregon, had remarried and hadn’t seen his three Midwest daughters since. Char and Kate said he wasn’t worth so much as a free weekend cell phone call or a Tweet, but Tess wasn’t so sure.

Before she could keep a lid on the past from starting to spill out like worms from a can, she remembered another voice shouting. “You darn little, crazy tomboy, get out of that corn, or you’ll get lost!” That’s what Gabe McCord had bellowed at her that awful day. And then, even standing there, staring out at the field, her memories stopped, just like someone slamming the lid back on. Thank God, she thought. Because if her thoughts got loose, they turned to nightmares filled with monsters, turned to terror....

Tess strode from the back door to the front one, checking the locks again, then tested all the windows to be sure they were bolted. Her mom had had the locks installed to protect Char and Kate after Tess was taken, though nothing bad ever happened to them. Tess nearly stumbled over her suitcase, then remembered her food sacks and the cooler she and Gracie had carried in. She’d better unpack for her short stay.

She jumped as headlights slashed across the dining room windows from the driveway. Was Gracie back already?

Her heart thudding to match the thunder outside, Tess peered out the dining room window. It was very dark for not being that late yet. A black car, not Gracie’s, killed its lights. She certainly wasn’t going to answer the door, but the man who got out had seen all the lights on, so she could hardly hide.

She gasped as she saw light catch the silver and gold printing on the car door as it opened. A man, broad-shouldered and tall with a brimmed black hat, got out. She heard the car door slam. She realized it must be the last man on earth she wanted to see.

2

The badge on the man’s jacket glinted silver in the outside floodlight as he approached the back door and knocked. The sound rattled Tess. But she stepped forward to unlock it, then opened only the inside door so the glass storm door was still fastened between them.

“Sheriff Gabe McCord, Tess. Just wanted to welcome you back,” he said in a loud, deep voice that carried well over the rain and through the glass barrier between them. His big-brimmed hat shadowed his face, and his jacket was slick with rain.

She knew she should ask him in. But she had the feeling that if she opened the door, she’d be opening up so much more. No, she had to be sensible, stay sane. This was the here and now, not two decades ago. She unlatched and opened the storm door.

“I appreciate that,” she told him, relieved her voice sounded steady. “Do you want to step in?”

“Thanks. Just for a sec. Grace mentioned you’d be here today. Sorry to lose them as neighbors,” he said, sweeping his hat off his head as he entered the kitchen, making it seem so much smaller. “I see you’ve got a sign up in the front yard already.”

“Yes, I brought it with me. I put it up when Gracie and I were unloading my car.”

She took two steps back. Gabriel McCord was so much taller and sturdier than the skinny kid she remembered. Unlike most people of Appalachian descent, Gabe was black-haired, although he was blue-eyed. She could see the young boy in his features but barely. He seemed all hard lines and tense angles—the slash of his dark eyebrows; the sharp slant of his shadowed, clean-shaven cheekbones, his square chin with a scar, his broad nose, even his solidly built body. His hands, which held his hat, were big with blunt fingers. He had a deep, commanding voice that, even when he spoke quietly, reverberated through her.

She tried not to stare, to say something light and polite. As he quickly assessed her, she felt frozen, yet she turned hot under his steady, probing gaze. He probably saw her as exhibit number one, the girl who came back alive and yet could remember nothing of her ordeal.

“I heard you’d be fixing to sell this place,” he said.

“Yes, I really need to. I need the money to open a day care center for preschoolers back in Michigan. That’s home now.”

“A day care center sounds great. That’s something folks around here could use, both those whose kids need a head start, besides what the government provides, and the Lake Azure folks.”

“They’re not all retirees in that community?”

“There are some well-to-do younger people who want to escape city stress, get back to nature, raise their kids away from crime and all that, though we have our share. Well, besides what happened to you, I mean. Meth labs, marijuana plots up in the hills, domestic disputes, drunks busting things up or shooting off guns. Especially this time of year, we get outsiders trespassing on the grounds of the old mental health asylum, vandalizing and worse. But I didn’t mean to unload on you. I just wanted to say if you need anything while you’re here, I’m just across the cornfield, at least at night. Don’t hesitate to call the station or my phone next door. Grace said she’d leave the numbers for you on the fridge.”

“Yes. Yes, she did,” Tess said, glancing at the piece of paper under the magnet that advertised Gabe McCoy for Sheriff. “Thank you,” she added. “So, how is your mother? Gracie said your father died.”

“Yeah, at age seventy-two. A heart attack, though they had some good years living in Florida after they left here. She’s still there. Sorry to hear your mother passed away so young.”

“She had a hard life, working to take care of her three girls—me especially, after everything. That’s why she left this house to me. Kate and Char have more...high-powered careers than I do. Kate’s a university professor in anthropology, and Char’s a social worker. They both travel a lot, so I’m here on my own for this besides the fact that it’s my house now.” She hesitated. “Listen, Gabe,” she continued, unclasping her hands, which she didn’t realize she was gripping so hard. “I’m sure you know a lot of people here and I don’t. Will you let me know if you can think of anyone who might want to buy an old house to fix up?”

“Sure. If you don’t mind people knowing you’re back, I can ask around, have them contact you. If you put up any signs around town, better give your phone number, but maybe not your name, not say you’ll be here for a while.”

She could tell he’d tried to word that carefully, but it scared her. Actually she’d planned her for-sale posters that way. But was he thinking that since her abductor had never been found and she was an eyewitness—maybe people didn’t believe she couldn’t recall a thing about her eight months away. Was she still in danger?

“Thanks,” she repeated. “I’ll remember that.”

He said goodbye, put his hat back on and went out into the rain. As she locked both doors behind him, she recalled that her mother had said some people blamed Gabe for not watching her better that day. There were whispers that her being taken was his fault, that he’d disobeyed orders to keep an eye on them. Tess had never told anyone but the truth was she was the one who had disobeyed him that dreadful day.

“Get back here, you crazy tomboy!” he’d shouted at her when she stuck out her tongue and darted back into the cornfield where she was hiding from him. She’d always liked Gabe, liked to get attention from him.

And with that mere thought, images came flying back at her. Someone was in the next row of corn, pushing stalks away, bumping the heavy ears. It must be Gabe. A terrible face jumped at her—hit her. Had she smacked into a scarecrow? She turned to run, but a hard hand covered her mouth. Was the scarecrow alive?

The thing dragged her away from her friends’ voices. She fought, went to her knees with the thing on top of her, pressing her down between two rows of stalks.

She tasted soil from the field, spit out straw. Something sharp stuck her in the side of her neck. It hurt more than a bee sting. Hard hands on her, pulling her up. She couldn’t see. Something was shoved into her mouth, something pulled over her head. She wanted Mom. She wanted Dad! Dad loved her, his terrific, terrible Teresa. But there was no Mom, no Dad, no Gabe.

Reality struck her. No Gabe...of course there was no Gabe. He’d just left and she stood in the kitchen of her family’s old house.

Shaking, heaving a huge sigh, she checked and relocked both doors and leaned against the kitchen counter until her heart stopped thudding. She shoved the waking nightmare away...had to get back to the here and now. She was going to put her things away but have a glass of wine before she washed up for bed. She’d take a shower in the morning when it was light. And pray she could go to sleep in this house at all.

* * *

The rain on the roof—and the fear of another nightmare—kept Tess awake most of the night. She felt revved up from seeing Gabe after all these years. She couldn’t help wondering if he became sheriff just to follow in his father’s footsteps or because of guilt that she was abducted when he was watching her.

Gracie told her that another child, Jill Stillwell, had been taken about ten years ago from a tent where she was sleeping next to her brother in her backyard, no less. Could it be the same kidnapper who snatched me? Tess thought about what had happened. Gracie said there was a cornfield behind the house where the escape must have been made. Not until the next morning, when the boy woke up and found his sister hadn’t gone inside to sleep, was she discovered missing. Another innocent young boy like Gabe, left to feel guilty, maybe even more so, since Jill Stillwell had never been found.

Tess also tossed and turned and agonized over the fact that Gabe joined the army and went to war straight out of high school. She could sympathize with him wanting to get out of Cold Creek. But maybe he went to escape the war going on inside him.

A glass of wine before bed usually helped her to sleep, but her thoughts kept racing. She could tell Gabe had wanted to make her feel comfortable, yet she felt unsafe with him. She admitted to herself the reason was that he kind of got to her. He was really sexy and she hadn’t been expecting that. With her thoughts on Gabe she finally fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

* * *

Tess had just finished a late breakfast of cereal, banana, juice and coffee when another surprise visitor showed up, this time at her front door. She didn’t recognize the overweight woman at first because she’d changed so much, but the bright blue lettering on the side of her white van tipped Tess off. Thompson Veterinary and Pet Cemetery, Crown Crest Lane. Keep Your Beloved Pet For Life.

About half a mile beyond the back cornfield was a big house, veterinary office and pet cemetery owned by longtime bachelor Dane Thompson. Grace had told Tess that Dane’s widowed sister, Marva, who had lived in the area for years, had moved in with him not long ago. When Tess and her family left town, Marva Thompson Green had been trim and spry, very attractive. She’d been married to a small-field farmer. Tess remembered that Marva had cared for her and her sisters while her mother looked for a job after her father deserted them.

“Remember me, Teresa?” Marva called through the storm door when Tess opened the wooden one.

With a smile, she extended a coffee cake with pecans and brown-sugar glaze. It touched Tess to realize Cold Creek hospitality still ruled here. Yet she hesitated a moment before opening the storm door. Dane Thompson had been under suspicion off and on for her kidnapping. Obviously, nothing had come of the gossip about him.

“Hello, Mrs. Green,” Tess said as she opened the storm door. “How kind of you. Can you step in?”

“Why, surely will, for a spell. You’re looking pretty, though you could put a little weight on. All three of you Lockwood girls were pretty, you especially. Now that you’re all grown up, you call me Marva. I heard you’d be back soon from your cousin Lee. He did some work for us—built a new fence around the cemetery since kids are always messing with things there, and Halloween’s not far off. It’s usually not us they bother but the old mental health asylum over on West Hill Road. Sitting derelict, you know, so the kids from far and wide break in there and scare each other, leave graffiti, you know what I mean, Teresa.”

“I go by Tess now. But how is Dr. Thompson?” Tess inquired as she put the coffee cake on the only table Grace had left in the living room. She gestured Marva toward the two rocking chairs, but the white-haired, very tan-looking woman just shook her head and plunged on.

“Busy like never before with the Lake Azure area getting so built up. Dane’s been able to afford real upgrades in the cemetery. Why, you should see it. Using digital technology, Dane can offer having QR codes implanted on the tombstones. You know, those little black-and-white grids that can speak to smart phones. Presto! A person can see that pet buried there romping, playing like when alive, and can link to family Facebook websites too. Oh, I’m sure you know more about all that modern stuff than I do.”

“Actually my preschool students knew more than I did about all that,” Tess told her, forcing a smile. “It’s amazing all the things technology can do.”

“Well, it’s a lot better than Dane’s taxidermist friend just stuffing dead dogs, if you ask me,” Marva said with a little sniff. She brushed at the sleeves of her denim jacket as if there was dog hair there. “But,” she went on, “I have to get the van back to Dane. He makes house calls at Lake Azure now, you see. I run the tanning parlor—two shops beyond the English pub uptown. You’ll love their fish-and-chips,” Marva added as she headed for the door. “The town has probably changed from what you recall—if you do remember, I mean, because you left so young. And good luck selling your house and land, because my old place and the barn are still for sale. I don’t know what I’d do if Dane didn’t pay the taxes on it for me.”

The state of property sales in the area depressed Tess, but she smiled and thanked Marva again for the coffee cake. It surprised her there was a tanning parlor in Cold Creek. She knew they were dangerous. And it was being run by Marva, the former farmer’s wife. No way was this the Cold Creek Tess remembered. If the Lake Azure area folks had money to invest in having their dead pets stare at them from tombstones, maybe someone there would like to buy an old house, closer to town than Marva’s, to fix up and flip or for an investment. Instead of avoiding the new area of town, Tess decided she’d better put some of the posters she’d had made over by Lake Azure too.

She waved as Marva drove off in the new-looking van. If only she could have kept her mother for life and not have to come back here to sell this place and face her fears alone.

* * *

Standing outside a run-down, old barn someone had made into a makeshift meth lab before clearing out, Gabe put through a call on his police radio to Jace Miller, his only deputy. There were a few places in the hills that even satellite communications didn’t work, like odd no-man spots around here. The best sites were near the Lake Azure phone towers the residents had insisted be put in. Even some smart phones were too dumb to trust in these hills, but his call went through.

He’d figured that at least two people had been sleeping here, by the piles of smashed leaves on the floor of the barn. He’d found a scrap of old blanket once at another site and had sent it to a lab for fiber and DNA testing, but they’d found nothing except dog hairs, and he’d got nothing out of it but a four-month wait and a big bill.

“Jace, the place was another in-the-weeds meth lab,” he said into his mouthpiece mounted on his shoulder. “Looks like a mom-and-pop setup, but they’ve been cooking the stuff up here for sure. Same old story. They managed to keep ahead of us and cleared out, like they knew their time was up. Or someone warned them, but who? Over.”

“Copy that. If it’s that fly-by-night bunch we’ve been after, they’re probably already using another deserted barn or old hunting cabin somewhere. You want me to call our cleanup contact to get rid of the toxic stuff? Over.”

“For sure. Tell them it’s the usual. Drain cleaner, rock salt spilled, jugs and bottles. At least there’s no sign that anyone’s been held here against their—her—will.”

“Gabe, you can’t be on the old kidnap cases day and night forever.”

“The hell I can’t. Something’s going to turn up when we’re looking at something else, I know it is. Speaking of which, I’m going back to the commune to insist on getting a look at those girls to see if anyone matches the photo Marian Bell gave me. Over.”

“She’ll have you lifting fingerprints off those girls in the Hear Ye sect next. She’s obsessed when we both know her ex took that kid.”

“We theorize he did. Any and every lead.”

“And you’ll probably drive by your place again today to see if vic number one’s okay too, won’t you? Teresa, the one you were almost an eyewitness to her being taken.”

“She goes by Tess now, and you roll out the welcome mat for her if she drops by or calls in. Who knows what she’ll be able to remember now that she’s back here? Worse, who knows who she’ll stir up from fear she will remember something?”

* * *

Tess took the stack of eight-by-eleven-inch posters she’d made at home from the office supply store and went uptown. She knew a few spots to post them in what she was now thinking of as “Old Town,” but she’d like to venture into some of the newer places too. The Lake Azure people no doubt had more money.

Even before Gabe suggested it, she’d decided to keep her name out of this, though some folks would recognize the place being sold as the Lockwood house. The poster only gave information about the house and her cell phone number. She’d included the color reproduction of an old picture of the place she’d found in Mom’s photo album. Tess liked the picture because it was taken in the early summer before the corn grew thick and tall. It looked more spacious—almost safe.

She stopped for gas and they let her put a poster on the wall behind the cash register. The guy in charge tried to flirt with her, but she stayed all business. Without asking, she posted one on the crowded bulletin board at the Kwik Shop. She remembered standing there with her mother—or was it with Kate or Char?—reading signs about used bikes and a mini trampoline for sale. How they’d wanted any kind of trampoline.

Relieved no one had recognized her as people went in and out pushing grocery carts, she walked a few doors down into the small, storefront library both Mom and Char had loved, though they all got books there. To her surprise, Etta Falls, one of the community pillars, was still behind the small checkout desk. Miss Etta came from the pioneer family in the area, once successful farmers who had money, compared to most around here. Miss Etta was obviously surprised to see her too, because she jumped right up, whipped off her reading glasses so they dangled by a cord and clapped her hands over her mouth for a second.

“Well, I’ll be! Is it Teresa Lockwood? I heard your mother died and wondered if you girls might come back to sell the house.”

“I’m sure you remember Kate and Charlene more than you do me, Miss Etta. They were older and more avid readers.”

“Yes, my dear,” she said, hurrying around the counter, “but you were the one we were all pulling for, praying for.” Still as thin and energetic as ever, she put her strong hands on Tess’s shoulders and, stiff-armed, seemed to examine her. “You look just fine, Teresa. You all live in Michigan, so I hear.”

“After Mother’s death, it’s just me. Kate and Char have careers that call for travel.” Then she blurted out a big lie: “I don’t think about the past, only the future.”

“So good to hear. But, you know, it’s hard to forget some things.... Now, I’ll bet I could pull a few books for you to give you strength, cheer you up. I tried to give your kin Grace and Lee Lockwood self-help books on brainwashing and the like, but they are convinced that man who leads their group has all the answers—and I’m not even sure anyone in the compound even knows the questions,” she added with the hint of a smile as she released Tess’s shoulders.

Tess had forgotten how low-pitched the woman’s voice was, so perfect for a lifelong librarian. She remembered how Miss Etta always tried to help everyone by suggesting books that would fit their interests or problems. In a way, it was nice that, just like Old Town, the woman—she was probably at least sixty-five now—hadn’t changed much. Yet this close up, Tess could see her brown hair was streaked with gray, and tiny wrinkles like spiderwebs perched at the corners of her eyes and mouth.

“Do you still take the bookmobile out?” Tess asked. “We all loved to see it coming when the weather was bad or we didn’t have money for extra gas after Dad left.”

“I take it out for several hours when things are slow here. It’s still a one-woman show, because the Lake Azure party house has book clubs galore run by their social director, and so many of them prefer to order their books out of the air—you know, online for digital readers,” she said with a sniff and a roll of her eyes.

“And your mother?”

Miss Etta’s head jerked in surprise. “You remember my mother? But she’s been a recluse for years, still is.”

“I only remember about her, that you take good care of her and that you’re from the Falls family that was the first to settle in this area.”

“Yes, that’s right. Most folks think this county is named for the waterfalls over by the quarry, but it was for my ancestors. My great-great-great-grandfather Elias Falls was the Daniel Boone of this area. As for my mother, she’s doing as well as could be expected. You never met her, did you?”

“I don’t think so. Unless I was really young then. Oh, I came in to ask if I could post a for-sale sign about my house. And I go by Tess now, not Teresa. My mother didn’t like it, but when I hit high school, she let me change it just to shut me up.”

“And, no doubt,” Miss Etta said, “because she loved you dearly, especially once she got you back.”

With a firm nod, Miss Etta took the poster and used four thumbtacks to align it perfectly with other announcements on the neatly kept bulletin board with signs recommending books of all kinds.

Sometimes Tess wished she was as book smart as her mother and sisters, especially Kate. Mostly, Tess liked to read out loud to little kids, not spend her time on adult books about crime and suspense, thrillers, not even family sagas or passionate love stories—trouble, trouble, trouble. Children’s books were so comforting, unless they were by Maurice Sendak, with all those grotesque, fanged night monsters, but she refused to read those to her kids.

Suddenly there was a strange roaring in her ears. She was being dragged through the corn, then carried away from her house but closer to the noise. Dizzy, crazy, couldn’t think, trying to stay awake because the scarecrow was going to feed her to the other, bigger monster. She knew it was in the field, big and green with a voice like the waterfall. It would chop her to pieces and eat her up like corn, but she was too scared to cry....

“Welcome home,” Miss Etta said as Tess fought to thrust away the waking nightmare. The librarian brushed her hands together after hanging the poster and hurried to her desk to pump hand sanitizer on her hands from a big plastic bottle. Tess walked toward the front door and managed to wave to Miss Etta, who called out after her, “Remember, my dear, I’d be happy to give you a temporary library card if you aren’t staying long.”

On the sidewalk, Tess stopped to steady herself and breathe in the crisp autumn air. She’d been afraid Cold Creek would magnify her day or night bad dreams. If only she could get the broken, terrifying memories out, maybe they’d all go away! Meanwhile, she knew she had to stay busy, had to stay on task.

She decided to hit the barbershop and Hair Port beauty salon to leave posters. Then she’d visit the new part of town, even try the firehouse and police station, maybe drive out to Lake Azure just to look around. She liked the idea of some things being changed or new here, not like the parts of town that looked the same way as the year, the month, the very day she was taken. Tomorrow—the anniversary of her kidnapping—would be a tough day.

3

“Of course we want to cooperate with the outside authorities, but please run that by me again before I say yay or nay about parading our young maidens before you, Sheriff McCord,” Brice Monson insisted. He had agreed to meet with Gabe that morning in the deserted common room of the largest building in the Hear Ye compound. Monson raised one eyebrow as he examined the photo Gabe showed him.

Gabe had to admit that “Bright Star” Monson’s looks alone could make someone think he was from another world. The man was pale with hair either bleached or prematurely white, and eyes the hue of water. His face was gaunt and his torso thin as though he lived on alien food in this area of homegrown goods. He always wore loose-fitting, draped outfits that reminded Gabe of something a swami would wear—or was that a guru? It was hard to tell the man’s age. His long hair was pulled straight back in a ponytail, which accentuated the shape of his skull. He wore a strip of leather tied around his forehead as if a dark halo had slipped.

“You’re aware, Mr. Monson, of the abductions of two—possibly three—young girls from the area. The most recent loss was of a six-year-old, and that photo of a child in your group greatly resembles her. I’m accusing no one of anything and I realize blonde girls that age can look somewhat alike, but the mother of the missing child is adamant that I look into this, which I’m sure you understand.”

“But all our young maidens are with families,” Monson said, handing the photo back. “I assure you, if someone in our flock had taken such a girl, we would be smitten with confusion and rebuke because we had forsaken the light. But yes, to comfort that mother’s heart, we will allow you to step into the room where that child is, maiden Lorna Rogers. There are two other daughters, if you would like to meet with the parents or their other girls.”

It suddenly seemed like such a wild-goose chase that Gabe almost backed off. But since he thought some sort of mind-control game was going on with the clever, charismatic Monson, he followed him into what looked like an old-fashioned schoolroom at the back of the building. About a dozen girls of the approximate age he’d requested were weaving baskets into which their adult mentors—craft teachers?—were placing bouquets of bloodred bittersweet boughs.

“For our market booth uptown on Saturday,” Monson whispered. Darned if the guy’s voice didn’t make Gabe think of the serpent whispering to Eve in the garden. Did he command control of this place by talking in that low voice instead of yelling?

Once the teachers caught sight of them, they and their young charges stood and bowed slightly to Monson, because Gabe knew it sure wasn’t to him. The girls were all dressed in similar navy blue or brown dresses and reminded him of reruns of Little House on the Prairie. All had long hair pulled straight back from their faces with black cords similar to the one around Monson’s forehead.

“Please, return to your games,” Monson intoned with a single sweep of his right arm. The girls, without a grin or giggle, settled back to their tasks.

Games? Gabe thought. Right away he spotted the girl Marian Bell had been so riled up about. She did resemble Amanda Bell, but, this close, he noticed differences right away. Lorna Rogers was shorter and had not one freckle, while the Bell girl’s nose and cheeks were dusted with them. Still, driven by his need to turn over every rock, he approached the child and the others with her.

“Is that weaving hard to do, Lorna?” he asked.

Her eyes widened as she looked up. She stared at his uniform, especially his badge.

“No, sir,” she replied quietly, still not looking him in the eyes. “It’s lots of fun, and I want to make more baskets for the walnuts too.”

Aside from her distinct freckles, Amanda Bell had green eyes and an obvious lisp. This girl had neither. Gabe nodded and stepped back, realizing Monson had sidled over to hear what was being said. Did everyone whisper around here?

“Thank you for your time and patience,” he told Monson as he started out of the room. “Sorry to have bothered you and the maidens.”

“I’ll see you clear out,” Monson said, and Gabe noted the double meaning of that.

At least he’d learned some things today. Lee and Grace Lockwood were crazier than he thought for coming here to live, letting their boy and girl be part of this. And though Lorna was not Amanda, he definitely didn’t trust Brice Monson.

* * *

Tess drove around Lake Azure, where the Lockwoods used to picnic and play as kids, when they were a family. The wildness of it seemed tamed now with manicured lawns and earth-hued condos set back in landscaped plantings of trees and late-flowering foliage. None of the residences looked the same, some two-story, some ranch, some A-frame. Part of the lake was cordoned off for swimming and paddleboats. Canoes were pulled up on two man-made sand beaches edging the green water. A large, two-story lodge stood at the center of it all. This was a Cold Creek community?

Feeling she didn’t belong there, she drove back into town. She’d already wandered along the new part of Main Street, reading the handwritten menu on the Little Italy Restaurant sign, peeking in Miss Marple’s Tearoom and the Lion’s Head Pub. She’d gone inside the pub because she could see a bulletin board, where she put up one of her posters. That board was a twin to the dartboard that was just inside the door.

“Want a pint or a shandy, luv?” came a very British male voice from inside. “Fish-and-chips be ready straightaway!”

That all sounded good, but she made an excuse and went back outside. No one recognized her at the fire department. The dispatcher was alone since it was all volunteer, but he said the only postings allowed were for duty shifts and schedules. She knew she’d be allowed to put a poster up at the sheriff’s office, so she headed next door. Despite the fact that it wasn’t in the same place and, no doubt, had different people from those who had staffed it years before, her feet began to drag.

She found herself both hoping and dreading that Gabe would be there. Her stomach did a weird little flip-flop at the thought of him.

Inside, a young, pretty brunette sat behind the front desk. “Can I help you?” she asked with a smile.

“I was just wondering if I could put up a poster for a house for sale if you have a public bulletin board. I told the sheriff I’d be putting some up around town.”

“Oh,” she said, rising. “I’m his day dispatcher, Ann Simons. Are you Teresa Lockwood?”

“Yes. I go by Tess now.”

“Oh, right. So I heard. Sure, I got the idea Sheriff McCord wouldn’t mind. You passed the board we use in the entryway there if you can find a place for your sign,” she said, pointing. “I don’t keep it very up to date, and please ignore the Most Wanted posters on it. We’re glad to have you back for a little while, Tess.”

“Thanks. People have been very kind.” She headed for the corkboard, then turned around. “Ann, if you hear of anyone who needs a solidly built house just outside town, then—”

The front door banged open, barely missing Tess. A woman flipped her long blond hair back over her shoulder with a metallic clatter of bracelets. She wore knee-high boots with fringed cuffs, tight black leather pants and an orange brocade jacket. Her face looked too old for the hair or the clothes—or was her rough complexion just the result of too much sun? Tess wondered if maybe she was a regular at Marva’s tanning salon.

“Is he back yet?” the woman demanded of Ann.

“No, but I’m sure you’ll be the first to hear if there is anything to know,” Ann replied calmly.

The woman huffed out a sigh as her shoulders drooped. “I’ll wait. That’s all I do now, wait. And study the other cases and find similarities despite the differences the sheriff’s been preaching to me.”

She collapsed on the pine bench in the waiting area, hunched over and swung her suitcase-sized orange leather purse between her legs. Tess watched her out of the corner of her eye. The woman looked Tess’s way and exploded again.

“You’re Teresa Lockwood, aren’t you?” she cried, jumping to her feet. “I mean, of course you’ve changed, but I’ve studied the old newspaper pictures and articles in the library so long and— You are, aren’t you? I don’t mean to startle you,” she said as she hurried toward Tess, “but my daughter’s disappeared too. If you could just help me, I’m desperate for word of her. Here, let me show you her picture—I mean, you were younger when you were taken, but you are both blonde, and the sheriff—”

“Marian,” Ann said, stepping between the two of them, “why don’t you just sit down and wait for Sheriff McCord?”

“Because I said I’m desperate and I am! Surely this woman can help me find my girl if she can just recall what happened to her years ago.”

“Come on now,” Ann cajoled, tugging on Marian’s arm. “Let’s have some coffee and calm down. Deputy Miller or the sheriff will be back soon, and—”

“Calm down? I need to talk to her—to you, Ms. Lockwood,” she cried, peering over Ann’s shoulder.

Tess was shaking. Had her own mother been this berserk when she was lost? Her heart went out to this woman—Marian—even though she wanted to flee. She finally found her voice.

“I’m sorry,” she told the woman, “but the sheriff, like his father before him, knows all I could tell. I came back, so I hope and pray your daughter will too, and then—”

“Amanda Bell. Her name is Amanda, and I’m Marian Bell. I live up in Lake Azure on Pinecrest if you recall anything at all—where you were kept, anything!”

“I don’t,” Tess whispered, more to herself than to the others. She didn’t, did she? No, of course not. If she did, it would help find the other—now two?—missing girls. It could lead to Gabe’s solving the case. It would end the horror that still haunted her like a monster just out of reach, trying to devour her. But, God help her, she could not recall a thing that would lead to anyone or any place.

Tess saw she still held the poster in her hand and quickly stuck it to the board between an announcement about a charity auction and a bank robbery in Chillicothe, the largest nearby city. She opened the door and went out into the brisk, sunny day, feeling assaulted, as though her soul had been shredded by that woman. Yet she forgave and understood her. Being recognized and interrogated like that—it was one of her worst fears about coming back.

Tess had started for her car when she heard a voice behind her.

“Hey, Tess, I thought that was your car. How’s it going, putting up posters?”

She turned to face Gabe as he caught up with her.

“What’s wrong?” he demanded, his piercing eyes scanning her face. He put a gentle hand on her arm. He wasn’t wearing his hat, and the wind ruffled his mussed hair. “Were you in my office? Did Ann say something to upset you? I told her you might be in.”

“Marian Bell recognized me. She’s distraught, demanded I remember things I just can’t.”

“I’m sorry. She gets out of control, but I—”

“Understand why,” she finished with him. “I guess I was thinking about how it must have been for my mother as well as me. One thing I’m sure of. I must have felt forsaken when I was abducted and gone so long, like I was abandoned. I never really thought how devastated my family must have been—only that they didn’t come for me. I guess that was selfish.”

“Don’t think that way. You were a little girl. You were so young you might not even have formed memories into words at that point, and so you can’t recall things in words now.”

“Sounds like you’ve been reading up on it.”

“Over the years. Especially lately. I’m sorry you ran into Marian or vice versa. I’m going to have to break her heart again, set her off on another tirade. I followed a lead she gave me today that didn’t pan out. Her daughter, an only child she had late in life, was taken about four months ago and ever since, she’s been seeing her behind every tree, so to speak. But I’ll be sure she leaves you alone. I should have prepped her for you being back. If worse comes to worst, I’ll get a restraining order on her. Let me walk you to your car. Were you leaving?”

“I am now. Thanks for everything, Gabe.”

She unlocked her car door, and he opened it for her. “Don’t thank me for anything,” he said, “unless I get the bastard who’s been doing this.” Despite his words, his voice was deep and quiet, even soothing. She felt as if she almost stood in his protective embrace since he had one hand on the car roof and one on the open door while she stood there. She sank quickly into the driver’s seat, and he leaned down toward her.

Not looking at him but staring at her hands gripping the steering wheel, she spoke. “I want you to know I don’t blame you for my being...being lost that day. You told me not to run into the cornfield, but I didn’t listen, didn’t obey, even though my mother told me you were in charge. I just needed to say it, because I’m not sure I ever told you or your dad.”

“You remember that? I do too, but I still shouldn’t have been so angry that I paid no attention to the little scream you gave. Even when I decided to just ignore your antics and you didn’t speak again, I thought that was just the little tomboy next door carrying on, bugging me more. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever told anyone about our little argument either, including my dad.”

“But— I did? I screamed? I don’t recall a thing after you yelled at me and I ran through the corn rows.”

“I’m not pressing you to remember more. Sorry, if Marian Bell’s doing the yelling now. I’d better go in and break the bad news to her. Listen, call me if you need anything.”

“And if I remember anything else?”

“Yeah, of course, but no pressure from me. Keep in touch, okay? And good luck with selling the house. I’ll mention it to the mayor, since he sees lots of folks every day. He’s been in office for years now. He knows everyone.”

He extended his hand. She took it, and they shook. Despite the stiff, brisk breeze, his skin was warm, his touch strong. She needed that and gravitated to it when she didn’t want to. She had steered clear of romantic complications in her life because she just didn’t want to get close to anyone that way. And, of all people, for many reasons, Gabe McCord was way out of bounds.

He stood back and closed her car door. She started the engine and rolled down her window to say goodbye, even though they’d probably said all there was to say. She heard the crackle of his radio as words came over it.

He gasped and stepped back. “Gotta go. Marian Bell will have to wait,” he said. She thought he’d head for his car, but he ran down the street toward the old part of town.

Tess sat stock-still, watching him in the rearview mirror. Tomorrow was the twentieth anniversary of the day she’d disappeared. And what she’d overheard made her want to cover her head, curl up and scream. “Jace here, Gabe. Four-year-old Sandy Kenton’s gone missing from her mother’s gift shop!”

4

Gabe felt as if a bomb blast had gone off close to his head. His ears were ringing, his head felt as though it would split, his lungs ached. In Iraq, he’d been thrown ten yards and suffered torn nerve connections from an explosion. Now his own blast of fury and panic propelled him down the street to the Creekside Gifts shop. He almost hurtled through the door. Woo-ooo, a haunted house automatic recording went off, followed by witchlike cackling.

He didn’t see Jace, but the store manager, Lindell Kenton, Sandy’s mother, was slumped over the checkout desk halfway back in the store. Gabe brushed aside fake cobwebs and two suspended mannequins dressed as witches. Lindell sat on a tall stool behind the counter. Her tear-streaked face tilted toward Gabe.

“It can’t be,” she said, and started to sob. Her face was red, her eyes swollen. “She was just playing in the back room, like always. She...she just disappeared when I answered the phone here. Win’s on his way. This can’t...can’t be happening. Not now. Never!”

Gabe knew she was referring to the time of year. The two previous kidnappings had also occurred in October, though ten years apart. Tomorrow was the date Tess had been taken. He’d been planning to keep an eye on her and things in town. He’d always treated October 13 as a day to be careful—in short, be wary of copycats, protect people and places. But now this.

Jace appeared from the back room, shoving his way through two dangling ghosts made of sheets. “I’ve been up and down the back alley,” he called to Gabe. “Next, I’ll check all the stores and buildings on this side of the street.”

“Go start that. I want Lindell to walk me through everything.”

But he followed Jace to the back door, relieved to see he’d used rubber bands to fasten small paper sacks over both door handles to preserve possible prints. “And, Jace,” he called after him, “check the alley Dumpsters and the creek out back. It’s shallow enough there to see into. But we’ll have to drag it to the east where it gets deep.”

“Her mother says she wouldn’t leave the building.”

“But she did—one way or the other.”

As Gabe hurried back into the front room, Lindell started speaking. “It was just a normal day.” Her voice was nasally and thick with crying. Gabe put his hand over hers, gripped on the counter. “Normal—I mean that we do this two days a week when she’s not at my sister’s house with her kids. She plays here, helps me,” she said, and dissolved into sucking sobs.

“Okay, Lindell, you’ve got to help me. We’ll find her. Don’t jump to conclusions,” he insisted, though he was jumping to them too, despite the fact that the other girls had been taken more or less from their backyards. “There’s a lot of stuff in here for Halloween and probably more things in the back. Could she be hiding? Could she have hit her head and knocked herself out? Come on, take me to the last place you saw her and talk me through it. Don’t leave anything out.”

Still shaking her head at his questions, she got up from the stool. Her cell phone on the counter rang. She jumped to answer it. Gabe moved closer to hear.

“Just a customer,” she whispered.

“Tell them there’s an emergency, and you’re closed. Hang up but keep the phone on and with you.”

She did what he said. Her voice quavered on the word emergency as she talked to the customer. “Maybe we’ll get a ransom call,” she said when she hung up. “I pray to God it’s someone who wants to give her back for money.”

Looking dazed, Lindell led him into the back storage room. It was a maze of stacked boxes, costumes and masks laid out on a worktable. He knew a lot of local folks would buy their costumes and candy at the big Walmart on the highway, but this was a popular place too, even with the Lake Azure residents. They always had a huge costume party here for Halloween, so, no doubt, a lot of people could have been in here and seen Sandy, cute, blonde, friendly, probably trusting.

In another area he saw shelves with small Christmas trees, cloth Santas and carved manger scenes. Halloween isn’t even here yet, Gabe thought as he concentrated on what she was saying and showing him.

He’d known Lindell and her husband, Winston, for as long as he could remember. Elementary school and beyond; they were three years ahead of him in school. The Kentons had been high school sweethearts, prom king and queen. Win worked for the state park system; Lindell ran this shop. They had two boys in middle school, then Sandy, their baby. Damn, if this was another of the abductions that had haunted this place for twenty years. The sign on the road into town that touted the scenic nature and friendly folks ought to also read Home of the Cold Creek Kidnapper.

* * *

Tess knew she couldn’t go home right away. Her thoughts were racing. It was almost the day she was taken. But if it was another of the abductions, this time it was from a gift shop in town. Perhaps this terrible event wasn’t related to her abduction at all.

She forced herself to stop at the Kwik Shop, where she bought a sack of freshly baked donuts for Gracie and Lee, a box of chocolate chip cookies for Kelsey and animal crackers for Ethan. She had gifts for them at the house, but she’d have to deliver them later, because she could not face her house in the clutches of the cornfield right now. She didn’t take the time to buy anything she needed for herself, but paid, got back in her car and drove straight past her house to the Hear Ye Commune about two miles down Valley View. She had to see little Kelsey and Ethan, put her arms around them, know that they were safe. That way, wouldn’t she feel safer too?

When she turned in at the compound, she saw a hand-carved wooden sign that read Hear Ye, While There Is Yet Time!

A dirt lane led to a small parking lot outside the main fence. She turned in with the words echoing in her head. While there is yet time. If the young girl in town had been taken, how much time was left to find her before she was driven out of the area, spirited away to be gone for months, maybe forever? Gabe and his deputy must be looking for her in town, but wouldn’t the girl’s abductor flee for the hills or some rural place to hide her?

Without stopping, Tess turned the car around and drove right back out onto the road. There was surely safety in numbers inside the compound, where Kelsey and Ethan would be warm, watched, loved. But somewhere out on some road, there could be a child, taken away, hidden, a little girl, shivering and too scared to cry.

Tess knew she had to drive these roads looking for something—anything! And she was going past Dane Thompson’s house and pet cemetery first.

* * *

As the minutes passed, Gabe could almost hear a clock in his head, one with an alarm clanging. Sandy’s father, Win Kenton, had arrived and was pacing and shouting. Lindell was still crying. She’d gone berserk in the storage room when they found the Barbie doll Sandy always kept with her. Gabe had to physically remove her in case there were clues in the clutter.

In the past half hour, Gabe had called in the BCI, the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation, from near London, Ohio, up by Columbus. They’d been helpful on the other cases, though they’d never found the abducted girls. But they could provide forensic help, which a small, rural district could not afford. He’d notified the State Highway Patrol, even though he had no clue what sort of vehicle might be involved.

Jace had said there was no sign of the girl in the creek, at least nearby. They had the volunteer fire department dragging the eastern part where it got deep. Jace was still talking to store owners and shoppers to find out if anyone had seen something suspicious. That helped to spread the word, including that the sheriff was forming a civilian search team of the area in one hour’s time. The meeting place was the parking lot by the sheriff’s office and fire department. It had not escaped Gabe that this abduction had taken place in the building that used to be the sheriff’s office. Surely that had not been a perverted challenge or insult. But what if the kidnapper had chosen this site on purpose?

He walked away from the Kentons and called Ann on his radio. Before he could say a word, she blurted, “Marian Bell wants to offer a huge reward for any information leading to the recovery of her daughter and or Sandy Kenton. She’s still here, refuses to leave.”

“Better there than here, but it’s too early for a reward. Listen, call Peggy in too, wake her up. You two are going to have to help each other on the phones over the next twenty-four hours in case any info comes in. And a BCI unit is on their way. I’ll talk to the FBI later, but I don’t want them taking over, and there’s never been a shred of proof anyone’s been taken across state lines. Actually Tess Lockwood coming back alive only about seven miles from where she was taken weighs in against that.”

“I’ll call my brothers to help with the search as soon as I get to Peggy,” Ann said.

Peggy Barfield was Gabe’s night dispatcher, an older woman than Ann. Poor Peggy had probably only gotten about four hours of sleep. But this was—at least it could be—war. He hated ordering Ann around so brusquely, and was reminded he’d done a dumb thing with her. They’d been dating, when he knew better than to mix business with pleasure. Worse, he wasn’t that serious about Ann, but she—and her three local, redneck brothers—had it in their heads that Gabe should be proposing about now.

“Okay, Gabe, got it,” Ann said. “I’ll start making lots of coffee. I’ve got the urns here for the charity auction. You take care of yourself, for the possible victim, the community—and me.”

“Talk to you later. Let people wait inside if they show up early for the volunteer search.”

For the possible victim, the community—and me, she’d said. Now there was a motto for a reelection poster, but that was the least of his worries right now. How about adding For the first victim too—Tess Lockwood? When she heard about this would she be stoic or distraught? Would it trigger any memories? If only he could be there to comfort her when she eventually heard.

Damn. He spotted Mayor Owens hustling across the street toward the store, looking really steamed. Having him around was the last thing Gabe needed.

* * *

Tess slowed as she passed Dane Thompson’s house and vet clinic. She could see the fenced-in pet cemetery beyond the back lawn with its separate drive. Of course, the size of the cemetery had grown a lot from what she recalled. Once, before she was abducted, Char and Kate had taken her the entire length through the cornfield to read the tombstones—the names and quotes about the buried pets. There had been a few photos too, embedded into the marble monuments, but nothing like the electronic resurrection of pets Marva had mentioned.

Though she was trembling already, Tess shuddered at the memory of pictures of dead pets—some even after death, made to look natural, as if they were asleep. Or were they ones that had been stuffed and mounted by Dane’s taxidermist friend? Pushing thoughts of dead pets aside, Tess wondered if the kidnapper was getting so desperate that he took a child from a store in town? And if Marian Bell’s daughter was kidnapped only four months ago—she didn’t know any details of that abduction—the crimes were a lot closer together than hers and the second girl, Jill Stillwell’s, had been.

And why pick on one little town, one small, rural area? It had to be because the kidnapper knew it well, probably lived here. So, did he keep his victims nearby? Why didn’t he go to Chillicothe or Columbus, where there were more victims available and no one would recognize him? Her mother had said once that Gabe’s dad had tried to check for similar kidnappings, but no other statewide or nationwide crimes had the same circumstances. Now, this missing girl’s situation didn’t match the first two either.

Tess saw that the same huge cornfield that backed up to her house still ended behind the Thompson property. Like many of the large fields nearby, it was owned and farmed by a wealthy local man using huge, mechanical planters and reapers. That deep, dark cornfield abutting the Lockwood property was one reason Dane had been on the list of persons of interest when Tess was taken. That and the fact that people just plain considered him a bit weird. He’d never married, had stayed out of public life and, with his close friend, a taxidermist named John Hillman, had always been fascinated by dead animals. And for some reason she could not explain, Tess admitted she had an instinctive dislike and fear of this place.

She didn’t see the white van parked anywhere around, but she did see Marva raking leaves at the side of the house. Tess turned around at the next intersection and drove back. She wouldn’t go into the house, the clinic, of course, especially not the cemetery, but she could drive in and chat with Marva. Indirectly, she could learn if Dane was home or where he was. It would be something to help Gabe, because she could never help him in the way everyone thought and hoped she could—by remembering any details about what had happened to her.

Her heart hammered in her chest as she drove slowly up the paved driveway. She reached for the sack of donuts she had bought for Gracie and Lee and got out.

“Oh, Teresa—I mean Tess,” Marva called, obviously surprised to see her. She stopped raking. “Is this a return visit already, or do you have a pet who needs help? Dane’s not here right now—house calls at Lake Azure and someplace else.”

So Dane was out in his van somewhere while a new girl was missing. Gripping the sack in front of her, Tess walked closer. Dried leaves rustled under her feet. Did she remember this place? The farmhouse, the garage and clinic building? No, but she did recall being pulled through the pet gravestones here, didn’t she? Or was that the memory of when Dane yelled at her and her sisters and they fled? What a shock it would be if she’d spent the eight months of her captivity so close to home.

“You were just so kind to bring me that delicious coffee cake, and I saw these fresh-baked donuts in town, Marva. After all, we are neighbors of the same cornfield.”

“Why, yes, we are. I didn’t expect one thing back in kind, but I thank you.” She peeked in the bag. “Dane loves this kind, and coming from you, he’ll be extra pleased.”

“Why is that?” Tess asked, annoyed her voice quavered.

“Didn’t anyone tell you that some busybodies blamed him at first when you disappeared? This will mean to him that you certainly don’t believe that false drivel and slander. Why, he’s dedicated himself to protecting life, not harming anyone. Won’t you step inside?”

Tess shook her head and stepped back a bit. She considered telling Marva that another child was missing, just to see her reaction. She should probably agree to step into the house, even to wait to talk to Dane, but she was suddenly filled with the need to get out of here.

She’d have to tell Gabe what she’d done and learned. Marva was outside as if nothing had happened, but Dane was out somewhere—and with his van. Perhaps someone had spotted him uptown today. Maybe he’d have an alibi. Guilt and fear aside, Tess knew deep down she’d be best staying out of all this, for her own safety and sanity. So what was she doing here on the property of the man many suspected was the Cold Creek kidnapper?

“See you later, Marva!” Tess called as she got back in her car.

She turned down one country road and then another, just driving, thinking. Finally, she found herself stopping at the spot where a man in a pickup truck had seen her walking dazed along the road eight months after she’d disappeared. Eight months! And she couldn’t really recall one thing about her time away.

No cars were coming from either direction. Tess stopped and, sitting in her car with tears in her eyes, thanked the Lord for letting her be found in this very place—well, somewhere along here, Mom had said. And she prayed Sandy Kenton and the two other missing girls would be found safe and sound and soon.

5

“Is it true? Another girl gone?” Mayor Reese Owens shouted at Gabe as he ducked under the yellow police tape across the front door of the gift shop and exploded into the room. That’s the way Gabe always thought of the man’s entrances—explosions. Reese would have made a great national politician with his dramatic actions and shoot-from-the-hip comments.

“Sandy Kenton is missing—true,” Gabe told him, gesturing for Reese to keep his voice down. “But by the same kidnapper as the others, not sure yet because of the different M.O.” He put his hands on Reese’s shoulders and backed him up to keep him away from the Kentons, who were huddled together at the checkout desk. He didn’t want Reese lecturing Lindell that this was her fault. Reese loved to play the blame game.

“Yeah, well,” Reese said, not taking the hint to keep his voice down, “besides being desperate to get his hands on another one, maybe he wants to make a point about Teresa Lockwood coming back—like a warning to her to shut up or get out of here.”

“It’s been well publicized Tess—she goes by Tess now—has amnesia about her time away.”

“So? People get over amnesia. She’ll just draw media interviews—especially when this gets out, which it has. I already got a call from my wife and a Columbus TV station. I want publicity for the town, but not this again.”

Reese was out of breath, but he was also out of shape. At least eighty pounds too heavy, he was all swagger and stuffing. Years ago, Reese had married one of the richest women around, Lillian Montgomery, whose grandfather had once been governor of the state, and that gave him instant clout. He owned the hardware store and a lot of property in town, not to mention he was one of the first Lake Azure investors.

In his mid-fifties, Reese had thinning auburn hair and a rising forehead—and usually a rising temper. Dealing with the man was one of the challenges of Gabe’s job, enough to sometimes make him wish he still headed up a bomb squad in Kirkuk.

“Listen, Reese, I’ve called in outside help, and we’ll have a civilian search party fanning out in about half an hour.” He sat the man down on a bale of hay under an array of big yarn spiders and cobwebs, then perched beside him. “If you can handle the media while I head up the search, that will be a big help.”

“Nothing’s going to help if this is that same SOB again. I mean, what are we, rural rubes, can’t track someone who’s struck more than once at the same time of year, then disappears until he wants another kid? I know you’re young and partly riding on your pa’s reputation, only in your first term, but—”

Gabe interrupted him before he heard the rest. The last thing he needed from this man was to be blamed for any of this. That cut too close to his own guilt feelings for losing Teresa all those years ago.

“That reminds me,” Gabe said. “I’ve got to call in Sam Jeffers and his hunting dog. I swear his hounds can follow any trail.” He dug his phone out of his utility belt and started skimming through his phone book on it. “Years ago, when Teresa was taken, the dog Sam had then got us partway across the field before the trail turned cold. And Sandy left a doll behind we can use to have him get the scent.”

“I’ll bet you and Jace have obscured that by now.”

“Mr. Mayor—how about you leave this to me and you handle the outsiders?” Gabe said, trying to keep his own temper in check. He hit the phone number for Jeffers. No answer, no voice mail option. The guy was always out hunting this time of year. He’d probably turned his ringtone off so as not to scare his prey; so maybe he couldn’t help. Gabe’s gut fear was that maybe nothing could.

* * *

Tess almost drove into the Hear Ye compound again on her way home but decided she was too upset to see her family right now, especially the little ones. To her surprise, her cousin Lee was sitting on the front steps of her house with a bicycle leaned against the porch pillar.

“Lee!” she called as she got out and hurried toward him. He hugged her but didn’t look her in the eye. He seemed distracted and upset.

“Is everyone all right?” she asked. “Did you hear what happened in town?”

“That’s partly why I came to see you were okay. Reverend Monson announced it at the end of the church service.”

“A church service on a Tuesday?”

“Whenever it’s needed.”

“I guess it would be good to have everyone together for an announcement like that, to pray for the child, comfort each other and all.”

“Listen, you’re invited to come visit us.”

“Oh, that’s great. I can’t wait to see the kids. I almost stopped there today, you know, just to be with my family,” she confessed as he pulled the bike away from the porch and held it between them. It was an old one with fat tires and scraped paint. He rode that here a couple of miles on these hills? She wondered why he didn’t use their car, but she didn’t want to seem to criticize.

“And if you do come, can you help me with some dowsing?” he asked, his voice beseeching but his face worried. “I think I have a find, but I want to be sure if we’re going to drill for another well, and your power was always better than mine, even when you were so young. Both of us, a gift from our grandmother—and the Lord, of course.”

“But I haven’t pursued water witching,” Tess insisted. Tears sprang to her eyes. How could anyone talk about things other than the missing girl right now? How could life go on when she must be in mortal danger?

“Don’t ever call it water witching,” Lee said, giving his bike a shake when he probably wished he could shake her. “Water dowsing or, better yet, water divining. Like I said, a divine gift and not to be taken lightly. Tess, both your father and mine had the gift.”

“My father quit doing it before he left.”

“Yeah, well, it still meant something to him. His dried willow wands—branches—are still in a corner of the basement inside. That’s like an omen, a sign from God, so quit stalling.”

“They’re downstairs? He kept them? But if I don’t feel comfortable helping, does that mean I’m not to see your family?” she challenged, finally realizing she felt hostile vibes. She always thought that Lee had wanted Gracie to steer clear of her as phone calls and visits had waned over the past few years. And as Lee had been more and more sucked into the religious group that Gracie had evidently, finally embraced too.

“Sure, you can visit anyway,” he insisted, frowning. “I just would appreciate your help with the willow wand, that’s all. I’ll still hold it if you just want to watch. A new well would benefit everyone, you know, Kelsey and Ethan too.”

He knew her soft spot for kids. Even as she agreed to help him tomorrow afternoon, she thought again of the little Kenton girl she’d never met, but—if she’d been taken—Tess’s heart and soul were right there with her.

* * *

When Tess heard on the radio that a citizen search team had fanned out from the gift shop until dark, she cursed herself that she’d fled the town so fast. She would have helped with that, even if people stared or whispered or—like Marian Bell—asked her what she remembered. Then again, the radio and television people, no doubt, newspaper reporters too, would be around by now. Only a few times over the years had a reporter or a true-crime author located her in Michigan and wanted an interview, which she and Mom had never agreed to, even though they could have used the money.

As dusk descended, Tess stayed inside her house using only a flashlight to get around even when strangers knocked on her door, rang the front bell or called her name.

Unfortunately, her posters in town worked against her when word got out that her phone number was on them. Hoping it would be Gabe on the phone, she answered her cell only to hear it was a reporter from Live at Five News from as far away as Cincinnati. She hung up without a word.

She ate a cold dinner and drank cider—nothing tasted good—and sat with the curtains closed, huddled on the floor in a corner of the living room with her knees pulled up to her chin, ignoring the knocks on her front and back doors, her name being shouted by reporters. Then finally—finally—a voice she wanted to hear came from outside.

“Tess, it’s Gabe! You in there? I’ve got everyone off your property. They went back into town! You’re not answering your phone. Tess?”

She ran to the back door but peered out before opening it.

She undid the bolt, the locks, and swung the door wide, only to have to unlock the storm door too.

“Did you find her?” she asked as he came up the steps and entered. He closed and locked the door behind him. She leaned against the kitchen counter. She had almost done the unthinkable, throwing herself into his arms and holding on tight like a kid.

“Wish I could say yes. The search and dragging part of the creek turned up nothing. Same story. Girl vanishes into thin air.”

“Like me and Jill Stillwell—Amanda Bell too.”

“Yeah. In broad daylight, without a cornfield, with her mother in the next room and while you and I were talking on Main Street.”

“You...you don’t think it was some sort of challenge or message to you or me. That someone else was taken so close to when I was?” she asked.

“No, I didn’t mean that. I’ve been comforting her family and getting the personnel we need here to find her fast. And it must have been someone she knew because she didn’t make a peep, even if she was—is—a friendly kid. Tess,” he said, stepping closer and taking her hands in his big, warm ones, “I gotta level with you. The fact that you came back home after being away for almost eight months, even if it was years ago, gives me a bit of hope for Sandy Kenton—Jill Stillwell too. There’s a thing called a golden window, a very short period of time—usually three hours, I’m afraid—when young children are kidnapped that they are likely to be kept alive, but you came back after a long time away.”

“Which is why people don’t want to believe me that I can’t recall anything to help. I wish I could, really, Gabe!”

“I believe you. Maybe we should finally let it out that you had needle marks in your arms, that you were probably drugged, maybe with some sort of amnesiac drug.”

Her nostrils flared, and she sniffed hard. She was shocked. Why had she not been told that? In a way, it helped. She snatched her hands from his grasp and moved out into the living room, where she had all the curtains drawn. With Gabe here she felt safe enough to snap on a light, and then she collapsed, weak-kneed, into one of the rocking chairs.

“I should have been told about the drugs!” she said when he followed her and sank wearily into the other rocker. Their feet almost touched, but neither of them moved their chairs except to tilt them closer together.

“The decision was made, with your mother’s approval,” he explained, “to keep the drug thing quiet.”

“And he was never caught, was he?” she shouted when she hadn’t meant to raise her voice. If you raised your voice, people got upset and you could be punished; she’d learned that from her father—or was it from someone else?

“No, he was never caught,” he said, tipping even farther forward in his chair with his elbows on his knees. “It’s the great regret of my father’s life. He started having heart trouble about then. But the failure to find you and then Jill—and the kidnapper—now may be my fault as well as my father’s.”

“I said before I don’t blame you.”

He nodded. “I want you to know, I told Marian Bell to steer clear of you. If she so much as glares your way, let me know. And I admit it would help if you could recall anything, anything at all.”

“About back then, nothing but being dragged off through the cornfield—and yes, maybe that something stuck me in the neck. Maybe drugged, right away.” She rubbed her arms through her sweater as if she could feel other needle marks there. She did remember tiny train tracks on her arms, that’s what she used to call them, but Mom never explained, even when she could have taken the truth.

In a sudden surge of need to help this man and the lost girl, Tess said, “I can tell you at least that Marva Thompson Green was home shortly after the abduction today, and Dane wasn’t. He was out in his van making Lake Azure house calls, according to her.”

Gabe sat up straight. His rocking chair jerked.

“How do you know that? Did you phone or see her? Did you see him or his van in town?”

“No, I stopped to talk to Marva at their place before I drove the back roads. I told her I was just returning her earlier visit and gave her some donuts since she’d brought me some baked goods.”

“Right when you came back Marva came to visit? To kind of feel out what you remembered?”

“Maybe. At least my mother did tell me where I was found wandering around the day I was recovered—and I’ve never really recovered,” she said. She stood so fast her chair rocked and bumped the back of her legs. “But I went there today.”

“Look,” Gabe said, rising too and stopping her with a strong grip on her elbow, “I don’t want you on deserted roads or around Dane’s place or letting him or Marva in here. You do know he was the prime suspect for a long time, don’t you?”

“Yes, at least someone saw fit to tell me that.”

“Tess, about the fact that you were drugged. It’s common police procedure to hold back some vital evidence, some piece of insider information that will be valuable when questioning a person of interest or preparing a trial after an indictment.”

“Don’t you—didn’t my mother—realize it would have helped me to know? If I was drugged, maybe that’s why I can’t remember, can’t help Marian Bell, the Stillwells and Sandy’s mother!”

“I didn’t—and don’t—want you to use that as an excuse. There can still be things you can recall, anything at all.”

“So you’re saying your offer to help and protect me was just a cover so you could hang close and see what you could shake out of me? Even before this poor girl was taken today?”

“I didn’t say that. No, that’s not true.”

“Well, see, Sheriff McCord, here’s my problem, one at least. I don’t know what’s true and what isn’t about my nightmares. I have them, sometimes at night, but flashes of things when I’m awake too.”

“What’s in the nightmares and flashes?”

“Feeling lost. A horrible feeling of dread. Like I have to flee something, but I don’t know what. Some kind of big machine, sometimes maybe a dinosaur, I think, and what sense does that make? Nothing I can clearly recall, and that’s worse than if there was some bogeyman I could face and try to fight or conquer!”

To her amazement, though she wanted to strike out at him, hit him, instead she threw herself into his arms. Breathing hard, he held her close for a moment. Her belly pressed against his gun belt, her thighs against his. He felt strong and steady, but he must be using her. She pushed back so hard against his rock-solid chest that she almost fell.

“Tess, honestly,” he said, grabbing for her arm again, though she shook him off. “Besides getting rid of the media mavens outside, I just stopped by to tell you that, even though I’m going to be working this new case day and night, you are not forgotten. Anyone bothers you, you let me know. Or if you recall anything in a bad dream or broad daylight. If you can’t get right through to me, call Ann or Peggy on the desk. If you call 911, you’ll get them too, and they’ll get me. Got that? Promise?”

Tess nodded jerkily, kept nodding. She blinked back burning, unshed tears. The weight of having experienced things that could save others, things just out of reach, pressed hard on her heart. For one moment, she thought she heard a roaring noise, felt something awful flapping in her face, but then it was gone.

After a quick squeeze of her shoulder, Gabe hurried toward the back door.

“Lock up behind me!” he called back to her.

Without another word, she followed and did as he said. But could she really lock him out of her life anymore? The man meant a lot to her, much more than the boy ever had. She wanted to help him, but he stirred strange feelings in her that she feared almost as much as her buried memories. Need. Even desire. Instead of locking him out in any way, she longed to let him inside her defenses.

6

The first thing Tess thought when she woke from a fitful sleep was that it was the twentieth anniversary of the day she was taken. Most anniversaries were happy, but this one—now that another girl was missing—felt doubly cursed.

As soon as it was daylight and she’d eaten breakfast, she turned on the basement light, took a flashlight too and went downstairs. The basement stairs creaked as she went down. It smelled a bit dank down here. She thought she should buy an air freshener in case anyone came to look at the house. Should she accompany potential buyers down here, or could that be dangerous? Since her kidnapper might still be in the area, he could try to test her to learn if seeing his face again would trigger a memory. Or would he think she should be silenced?

She knew she had to be wary today, stay strong. But even if horrible memories came flooding back, it would be worth it if she recalled something to help the poor child who’d gone missing and the girls who had been taken before.

Lee hadn’t exactly said where he’d seen her father’s dowsing wands. She could picture his collection of green, slender willow tree boughs. She wondered why Lee had kept them, if they were dry. Since Dad had been so skilled at dowsing, maybe Lee thought they had some special power, or that it would be bad luck to trash them. And why hadn’t Mom done that, especially after Dad deserted her?

Over the years Mom, Kate and Char had tried to explain to Tess that Dad’s leaving wasn’t her fault, though Dad had blamed Mom for letting a boy keep an eye on her, even if he was the sheriff’s son. She remembered their terrible arguments. But Kate and Char assured her that Dad was just looking for an excuse to leave, and it was cruel and wrong of him to blame their mother for something no one could predict or prevent. Could Gabe have prevented it?

Tess found a pile of six willow wands behind the furnace. She shone the flashlight on them. Of course, they were not supple and green anymore but dried and dusty. Lee’s father and hers, twin brothers, had possessed the gift to locate underground water by walking with a Y-shaped willow branch held out in front of them until it quivered in their hands. And most of the time, freshwater lay beneath.

She recalled her mother telling her about a sunny day, the Fourth of July the year she was taken, when her family was picnicking at a friend’s house. At age four, she had picked up the willow wand Dad had brought to show people. She had imitated him, walked with it toward their friend’s barn and felt the pull, a magnetism, making it quiver and tremble in her hands. Other times in the weeks of that late summer, Dad had tested whether her finds with the wand matched his, and they always had.

So, was that very willow wand among these? She touched them, stroked the top one. Some people thought dowsing was mere superstition or fakery, just chance finds or playing the odds. But others, especially older folks, believed it could find not only water but buried treasure, even lodes of precious ores. Some said it could point to graves, especially if the corpse had been buried with metal jewelry. If only, like a dowsing wand, she could find the thing that would point toward her buried memories!

She heard the ringtone of her cell phone, which she’d left in the kitchen. Taking the top willow wand with her, she dashed upstairs and grabbed the phone from the table.

“Hello?”

“Tess, it’s Kate. I can’t talk long. I’ve been making great progress on researching the Celts. I’m hopeful I can link their culture to the ancient Adenas of the American Midwest. Next time I’m home, I’m going to take a closer look at the burial mounds in our area because that could be another link to prove the Celts came to the eastern U.S. But I wanted to call you to see how you are. You know, especially today. I’ve been thinking about you. Are you back in Cold Creek to sell the house? How are you doing?”

“I’m here, and it was okay at first. But another girl was taken yesterday, like my coming back was a curse!”

“What? Taken from her backyard? Taken into the corn?”

“Taken from the back room of a gift shop uptown while her mother worked in the next room. It’s a shop on the site of the old police station.”

“That’s terrible. Listen now, you call Char and let her talk you through this. She’s better at that than me. And don’t you go blaming yourself, or fixin’ to hang around there to help.”

Tess bit her lip. Don’t you go blaming yourself...fixin’ to... Her big sister was calling from England. Kate Lockwood, high school valedictorian, full college scholarship recipient, Phi Beta Kappa, magna cum laude, professor and published author, could travel the world to study and teach ancient anthropology, but when she got upset, she still sounded like a southern Ohioan from Cold Creek. And she wouldn’t like to be reminded of that one bit.

“Tess, are you there? How’d you find the old place after Lee and Grace cleared out?”

“It’s pretty empty, but the ghosts are still here, if you know what I mean. I’ve got posters up all over town to advertise selling it. And I just found Dad’s old willow wands in the basement.”

“Witching wands, you mean?” she said, her voice turning sharp. “He should have taken them when he cleared out of our lives. You know, I looked up a lot about water divining once, even wrote an undergrad paper on it.”

“So what did you find out?” Tess asked, stroking the cracked wood of the old wand. At least that would get Kate off the subject of the house.

“You’re interested in dowsing? Okay, here’s what I recall...”

Here’s what I recall... The words echoed in Tess’s head. Again, she wished desperately she could recall who had taken her and where twenty years ago.

“So, besides dowsing appearing in artwork from ancient China and Egypt,” Kate was saying, obviously in her lecture mode, “some claim that when Moses and Aaron used a rod to locate water in the Bible, that was dowsing. Martin Luther called dowsing ‘the work of the devil.’ In more modern times, Albert Einstein believed in it, and during World War Two General George Patton—well, he believed in the paranormal anyway—had a willow tree flown to Morocco to find water to replace the wells the German army had blown up. And that reminds me, the Brits used dowsing in the Falklands, and in Vietnam the Americans used it to locate weapons and tunnels.”

“Your memory always amazes me, Kate. I’ll have to tell Lee about all that.”

“If he’s still so gung ho for that whacked-out religious cult, he probably couldn’t care less. But one more thing. I read that from time to time, some have used dowsing to track criminals or find missing persons. But don’t go telling the new Sheriff McCord about that, or he’ll think you’ve gone off the deep end. What’s he like all grown up?”

“Very dedicated. Really intense.”

“Intense? Tess, what does he look like?”

“Tall, broad shoulders. Icy blue eyes but dark hair. Black uniform. Strong but gentle...”

“Okay, okay. Intense about solving these crimes, you mean?”

“Yes, that’s what I mean,” Tess said, realizing she was sounding a bit shrill, as if she had to defend Gabe.

“So, is the town as diverse economically and socially as Grace has been telling you?” Kate blessedly changed the subject.

Tess explained the great divide in town and how that had changed things. But she told her how seeing Etta Falls at the old library made her feel as if she was in a time warp.

“She was so encouraging to me about reading and learning,” Kate said. “Especially the months you were—were gone—she tried hard to distract us with books Char and I would love, books for Mom on how to cope with loss, things like that. I remember our first-grade class went on a field trip to her house, because it still had one of the first pioneer cabins way out in the woods on their land. She showed us an old pistol and a family graveyard out back, but the tombstones were so old you couldn’t read a thing on them. And that mother of hers is like a historic relic herself.”

They talked too long, but Kate could probably afford it. Despite the great divide between her and her sisters—in education and ambition—she loved hearing their voices. Whatever her differences with them, she wished so much they were here to help and to hug.

* * *

Gabe recognized the older of the two BCI agents the minute he got out of the plain black car that had pulled in next to the blue-and-white mobile crime lab truck in the police parking lot. Despite it being two decades later, Gabe saw it was Victor Reingold, the agent who had worked with his father on Teresa Lockwood’s abduction, though he hadn’t been back to help with the second abduction nor had Gabe brought him in on Amanda’s case.

Gabe hurried over to meet the agents. Reingold’s shock of unruly hair had gone white, but his brown, hooded eyes looked as sharp as ever. He walked with a slight limp, and almost always dressed in black, like Batman without a cape, Gabe used to think. The man in the lab truck was a lanky blond wearing rimless glasses and a dark blue jacket with BCI emblazoned on the back. He looked as uptight as Reingold looked at ease and in control. Gabe thought the younger guy might as well have Forensics Techie tattooed on his forehead.

“Glad the posse’s here,” Gabe told them, shaking first Reingold’s hand and then the other man’s. “Sheriff Gabe McCord,” he told them, though he guessed that was pretty obvious.

“Mike Morgan,” the younger man said. “I usually do lab forensics, so I’m glad to be out in the field, especially on this one. I have three young daughters, so I’m all in.”

“Remember me, Gabe?” Reingold said as Gabe led them toward the building.

“I sure do, Agent Reingold.”

“You were pretty young on that first case and pretty upset about being so close to it. Tough on you and on your dad as sheriff. He was a very good man, Gabe. My sympathies on his death. Glad to be back on the job with you to get this longtime pervert, but sorry it happened again. I was on special assignment in Washington, D.C., on the second abduction, but I kept up on things. So let’s do this. And call me Vic, okay?”

“Thanks, Vic. Mike, you too,” he said as he opened the door to the station for them. He knew the BCI agents liked to assess local facilities and staff before possibly calling for more help. He introduced them to Ann and Peggy, then, pointing things out, gave them a brief tour of the station.

As he walked them back to his office, he gave them the rundown. “The crime scene’s a cluttered storage room of a gift shop, where we bagged the doorknobs.”

“Good work,” Mike said. “We can even track palm prints now. Ohio was the test case for that. And our databases for fingerprints use the automated APHIS system and are FBI connected.”

“Outside of that storage room,” Gabe told them, “it’s a long shot, but I’ve got a local guy coming in, a tracker with a good nose dog to sniff the child’s doll and see what that gets us. But I figured you’d want to fine-tooth comb the crime scene first. We did an exterior search with local volunteers beyond the alley that runs behind the stores near the creek, and dragged the water where it’s deep. We found nothing—just like the other two or three takes.”

“Or three?” Vic demanded, scrutinizing the huge map taped on the wall of Gabe’s office. It was a site map he’d inherited from his father and had been updating. “I thought I’d read up on everything—but three previous to this Sandy Kenton?” Vic asked, turning to stare at Gabe.

“I think the possible number three, Amanda Bell, was a child snatched by her father, who left the country. He’s hard to find but we think he’s in South America. I’ve worked on the case, and the family has hired a private detective. The mother will probably be after you as soon as she hears you’re around.”

“Hard to believe it’s been twenty years since that first abduction—my case,” Vic said, turning back to the map and thumping his index finger on the site of the Lockwood house. “But Teresa Lockwood’s surviving was pure chance, so I intend, just like you, to solve this fast.”

“Teresa goes by Tess now and she’s back in town briefly to sell her family homestead, the crime scene.”

“Recall the place well, and her, when we finally got her back,” Vic said, turning to look at him with narrowed eyes again. “Traumatized, drugged, been beaten, a real pretty little girl. Were the others blonde and good-looking too?”

“Not a common factor. I’ve got dossiers and all kinds of stuff on each victim you can look over.”

“Great. You bet I will.”

Gabe saw the man still had an unusual habit he remembered. He chewed wooden toothpicks to a wet pulp, then spit them out. If only these abducted kids had had some sort of habit where they left a trail, other than maybe a scent.

“Yeah, the dog on the scent trail’s worth a try,” Vic said as though he’d read Gabe’s mind. “We could call in a K-9 unit, but time’s of the essence. We’ll just have to make sure you’re with the guy, step for step. But remember, he ain’t nothing but a hound dog, and we’ve got two leads right under our own noses. Number one, the abduction scene. Let’s see the gift shop storeroom, where Mike can start working, but then let’s you and me, Gabe, go pay a call on our ace in the hole, Teresa Lockwood.”

Gabe’s head snapped around. “She still has retrograde amnesia on the whole thing. Still delicate. I’ve been trying to establish a good relationship with her, but so far—”

“Then let’s see if we can take it farther than so far,” Vic said and spit a chewed-up toothpick into Gabe’s wastebasket.

Gabe stared the man down. “I think she’ll bolt if we press her.”

“You been trying another approach besides a frontal assault?” Vic challenged, coming closer. “You want one more try with her, using your method?” he said, raising one eyebrow. “If so, okay, but make it quick, before I go busting in. Ticktock, and you know it.”

“Tess came back from her abduction after almost eight months away, so I’m hoping the others have been kept alive—are still alive for all we know. Maybe someone just wants a little girl to raise.”

“Odds are against that, but maybe. Still, if the kidnapper’s local, where are the girls? And since you once told me you wished you’d have rescued Teresa when she was snatched, I don’t know if you’re still feeling guilty about her, handling her—so to speak—with kid gloves. Take a little time today to try again with her, okay? Just a suggestion, of course, ’cause we’re here to work with you, and you know the situation best.”

Gabe just nodded, though he got the undercurrent of what Vic had said. Maybe the man did read minds, did sense how protective he felt about Tess. “I’ll take you to the site, let you do your thing,” Gabe told them. “This is the twentieth anniversary of the day Tess was taken, and I wanted to see if she’s all right anyway.”

“You all right, Gabe?” Vic asked. “You got a lot at stake here for the community, your father’s memory, yourself—for Tess too, right?”

“Yes, I’m fine, just obsessed with solving these cases.”

“Good, ’cause once we get this prelim work done, I got some other info for you, but first go talk to vic number one, okay?”

* * *

Tess sat on the top of the old picnic table in the backyard and glared at the waving shocks of heavily laden corn. Trying to dispel the bogeyman of memories—or lack of them—was something she’d wanted to do for a while. Besides, the cornfield had always haunted her. Those dark green, deep and long, straight alleys between the blowing stalks... The way you could get lost in there, especially if you were small as she’d been back then. Any cornfield could be a maze to a child.

She nearly jumped off the table when a man’s voice spoke nearby.

“Tess?”

“Gabe! I didn’t hear you. Did you find her? Any news?”

“We’ve got help from the Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation here—a forensics expert and an agent. The bureau’s a lot more sophisticated now than it was then. As a matter of fact,” he said as he came closer, “Victor Reingold, the same man who worked your case, is here.”

“Really? But he seemed old then!”

“Only to a young girl. Listen, I need to drive up to the falls to check on some graffiti there. It will only take an hour. I hear there’s something written there that may relate to this case. I wondered if you’d like to go along—to the falls. You could leave a for-sale poster for your house at the lodge there. I’ve got missing-child ones in the car that I’ll leave.”

“Oh, sure,” she said, scooting off the tabletop. “I always thought it was so pretty there. So, Agent Reingold’s here. I do remember him and things that came after—well, a while after I came back home. I should thank him for his help back then, even though it turned out I just came back on my own. If, that is, he understands I can’t recall things to help with this case, but wish I could.”

“Sure. I already told him that.”

“I’ll get my purse. Just a sec.”

She darted inside. The old, dried-out willow wand lay on the kitchen counter, almost as if it was a gift from Dad to her on this day. He’d often done that—left their birthday gifts somewhere and made them search for them, not just handed them over. But if she could recall things like that, why were other things so far out of reach? If only she could do what Kate had mentioned, which she figured was pretty impossible—use that old dowsing stick to find the missing girl.

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.