Home to Whiskey Creek
“Except for Gail, who moved to Los Angeles, that whole clique still hangs out together.”
“You mean your clique?” she said dryly.
Minus the baseball players. He wasn’t quite as close to the guys who used to be on the team with him, but they had a drink every now and then. “Yeah. I see Eve and Cheyenne and the others at the coffee shop on Fridays. But...those people were all in my graduating class. Did you hang out with seniors?” He couldn’t recall seeing her at any of the parties, dances or other get-togethers. That one moment on the ball field was his only memory of the girl she used to be.
“By the end of the year, I had quite a few senior friends because those were the people in my classes.”
“What classes did you have?”
“AP Econ. AP World History. Honors Chem. The usual. I had calculus with Cheyenne and Eve.”
He whistled. “That isn’t usual. You were in calculus as a sophomore? And advanced placement classes? You must’ve been a brainiac. A shy brainiac,” he added, combining the two images he now held of her.
“I was naive,” she stated flatly.
They’d reached Jackson, so he pulled into the first fast-food restaurant he could find. She’d downed two energy bars and finished his water, but she needed a full meal. “What would you like?”
Her eyes widened as if his actions surprised her. “Nothing. I thought maybe you wanted dinner. I can wait.”
“There’s no reason to. We’re already here, and it’s only getting later. Nothing will be open in Whiskey Creek.”
Her eyes were riveted to the clock, which read eleven-thirty. “Gran will have food. I really don’t want to be seen like this.”
“You’re in a dark truck. No one will notice you. Let me buy you a bite to eat.”
She hesitated.
“Come on. It’ll help your headache.”
“How do you know I have a headache?”
He waited for her to finally look at him, and made a face that suggested anyone would have a headache.
“Okay,” she relented. “I’ll have a burger. Thank you.”
“Anything else?”
“No, that’s enough. I’ll mail you a check since I don’t have any money with me.”
Assuming she must be joking, he laughed. “It’ll be all of a couple bucks. And even if I wanted it back, why would you mail it? We live in the same town, remember?”
“True, but our paths won’t cross.”
She didn’t know that. She’d only been back a few days, and one of those had been spent in the mine. Their paths could cross. For whatever reason, she didn’t want them to. “I think I can afford to buy you a burger.”
After ordering two double cheeseburgers, two fries and two shakes, he idled forward to wait for the food. “Have you been in touch with anyone from Whiskey Creek since you left?”
“Besides Gran and Darlene? No.”
That didn’t sound as though she’d been particularly close to the people she’d mentioned. “Do your friends know you’re back?”
“Not yet. I’m not here to socialize. I’m here to help.”
So she’d said, but wouldn’t most people automatically do both?
He slung his arm over the steering wheel. “I could go to my father for you. He’s the mayor these days. Once he retired, he decided, out of the blue, to go into politics. Shocked us all. But the point is, he now has some pull with the police. If I tell him what happened, I know he’d have Chief Stacy look into the situation...discreetly. Would that make a difference?”
She shook her head, a resolute no.
“He’ll see to it,” he pressed. “And no one will be the wiser. Trust me.”
“No! Please. I don’t want your father to know anything about this.”
“Why not?”
“I’d rather go on about my business. Why does it matter to you whether I report what happened?”
“Okay, I get it.” And yet he hated feeling so...out of control when there was something he wanted to control. “It’s just...beyond me to let this go,” he explained. “Whoever did it deserves to be punished.”
“That’s not up to you.”
She had a point there.
The girl working the drive-through pushed open the window to collect his money—and gave him a thousand-watt smile the moment she recognized him. “Hey, Noah!”
He was tempted to roll his eyes at her enthusiasm. She was maybe seventeen. “Hi, Cindy.”
“What are you up to tonight?” A calculated dimple appeared in her cheek. She didn’t live in Whiskey Creek, but he saw her when she came to visit her married sister, who happened to be his closest neighbor.
“Just got back from a ride. How’s school going?” He hoped that would remind her of her age.
“Fine. Can I get you anything else?”
As he’d promised, she hadn’t realized he had company. The way Adelaide hugged her door kept her completely in shadow. He wasn’t sure he’d ever had a woman sit so far away from him in his truck. He could only assume that, after what she’d been through, she was afraid of men. “No, thanks.”
Cindy counted out his change and passed him his receipt with the sack. “Well, if you’d like something later, you know where to find me.”
Embarrassed by the innuendo in her voice, he pretended not to notice. “Thanks.”
He handed the food to Adelaide as he drove off. Had she picked up on the offer he’d just received? He hoped not. He knew it wouldn’t reflect well on him.
Why he cared, he couldn’t say.
Addy stretched her legs as she sat up, and he cranked the heat again so she’d be comfortable.
“If you won’t go to the police, what will you tell Milly?” he asked.
“I haven’t figured that out yet.”
“I really think you should come forward.”
“That changes everything.”
The sarcasm in her response took him by surprise. “Pardon me?”
She lifted her chin, revealing her unwillingness to bend on this issue. “I can’t, okay? If I come forward, whoever did this will hurt Gran. He told me so.”
“Why would anyone want to hurt either of you?”
She didn’t answer.
“Are you not going to respond?”
“It’s just a freak thing that happened. If I put it behind me and forget, it won’t happen again.”
“You hope.”
She didn’t answer.
“What if Milly already filed a missing-person report?”
Obviously not enchanted by that idea, she caught her bottom lip between her teeth. “Would Chief Stacy allow her to? It’s only been one day. Doesn’t it take, like...three days for the police to consider a missing adult as a criminal case?”
“Depends on the circumstances.”
“Right.” She slumped over, as if her chances of having the ordeal go unnoticed weren’t as good as she’d hoped. “I was taken from my bed.”
“How’d that happen?”
“There’s a door to the outside in my bedroom, where the porch wraps around the house. I left it open to get some air, and he cut through the screen door.”
“Then it’s not like you drove off with him. I’m guessing the police are already involved.”
She stuck a French fry in her mouth. “So...I’ll just tell everyone the same thing I told you.”
“That you must’ve been sleepwalking.”
She had to roll back the sleeves of his sweatshirt; they were too big to stay pushed up on her long, thin arms. “Why not?”
The marks on her wrists suggested she’d been bound, which upset him more than any of it.
“Because no one will believe you.” Especially once they saw what he did.
“That part doesn’t matter.”
“It only matters that they not learn the truth. Is that it?”
She’d been shoveling the food down pretty fast, but at this she slowed. “Basically.”
He stopped at the light where he needed to turn to go to Whiskey Creek. “You’re not making sense,” he said in frustration. But then something occurred to him that he should’ve thought of before. “Wait a second. He didn’t...rape you, did he?”
She’d had her panties on, and they’d been intact. Her shirt hadn’t been torn off, either. But those marks on her wrists...
“No, he didn’t,” she said, but she’d spoken too quickly and the tears that welled up called her a liar.
Shit! He was an idiot for not catching on sooner. She’d been beaten but his sweatshirt had covered her wrists until she started eating. And the way she’d responded when he questioned her led him to believe she knew the person who’d hurt her and was even trying to protect him. That screamed domestic violence, not rape—at least, not stranger rape.
If she’d been sexually assaulted, maybe she was refusing to go to the hospital because she didn’t want anyone to find out, didn’t want to go through the humiliation.
Or she had no confidence it would make any difference.
“Adelaide, please,” he said, “let me take you to the hospital. I know it’ll be degrading and...terrible but...I don’t think you should make this decision in your current, uh, condition.”
A tear crested her lashes and ran down her cheek as she shoved the rest of the food away. “You don’t know anything.”
A car honked behind them. The light had turned green, and he hadn’t noticed.
“I know this is...a hard situation,” he said as he accelerated. “But...they have what’s called a rape kit. You need to try and get a sample of his DNA while you can.” He grappled for other reasons that might convince her. “You don’t want anyone else to be hurt, do you?”
She covered her ears. “Stop it! He won’t hurt anyone else. That’s not an issue.”
Could he believe her? Or was it wishful thinking?
Either way, her expression broke his heart. She’d reached her limit. One more push and she might shatter. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll back off.”
After that they drove in silence. When they reached the house, he thought she’d get out and go in without saying goodbye. Although they couldn’t see Milly through the windows, every light seemed to be on. He could sense Adelaide’s eagerness to get behind that closed door. But she turned back with her hand on the latch. “So...is this our little secret?”
He studied her. “Is what our little secret?”
She hesitated, obviously trying to define what she was asking. “Just...don’t make a big deal out of what happened. That’s all. Let me do the talking.”
“I’m not going to make a big deal of it. But if your grandmother’s called the cops, others will know about it. Even if it doesn’t reach the major news outlets, it’ll be reported in the weekly paper. You won’t be able to avoid the Gold Country Gazette.”
Her shoulders drooped as she recognized the truth in what he said. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” She started taking off his sweatshirt.
He stopped her. “Keep it. I get free T-shirts and sweatshirts all the time, and it’s cold out.”
She seemed tempted to return it, anyway, but probably realized that would reveal more of her than she wanted him to see. “Thanks for the help.”
“No problem,” he murmured, but she’d already climbed out and was limping across the lawn.
4
The house was quiet. But the lights in the kitchen and living room would’ve told anyone who really knew Milly that all was not as it should be. She never stayed up past ten o’clock and, other than on the porch, she never left a light burning when she went to bed.
Adelaide had hoped to slip into her room and put on some clothes before she disturbed Gran. She didn’t want Milly to see her looking so battered. But she heard her grandmother call out the second she returned the hide-a-key container to its place under the porch. Gran had probably been lying in bed with her hearing aids in and turned up high, praying for her safe return and listening for the door.
“Addy? That you?”
The worry in her voice upset Adelaide, made her even angrier with the man who’d thrown her down the mine shaft. She’d always live in the shadow of the past, but Gran had nothing to do with graduation night fifteen years ago. Stephen, Derek, Tom or Kevin—whichever one of them had abducted her—had no right to put Milly through the panic of finding her missing.
“Yeah, Gran, it’s me. Sorry to wake you.” Intent on getting into a pair of sweatpants, she started toward her bedroom, but her grandmother wasn’t in bed. Gran intercepted her at the hallway entrance, fully clothed, walker and all.
“Wake me?” She definitely had her hearing aids in. Addy could tell without having to look because Milly was speaking at a normal volume. “I’ve been absolutely frantic. Where’ve you been?”
She was carrying her eyeglasses, hadn’t put them on yet. Adelaide was grateful for that small reprieve, even though she knew it wouldn’t last long.
“I didn’t mean to give you a scare. I had a little...” God, Noah was right. No way could she keep this quiet. Not in Whiskey Creek. Her injuries, not to mention the timeline, refuted every excuse she could devise. “Mishap,” she finished weakly.
“What kind of mishap? What happened?” Her grandmother’s hands shook worse than Adelaide had ever noticed but, steadying herself with the walker, she managed to slip her glasses on her nose. Then she covered her mouth. “Good Lord!” she breathed through her fingers. “Who did this to you?”
Thanks to shock and righteous anger, Gran’s voice rang truer and stronger than it had in months. For a moment, Adelaide felt like the little girl who’d been so well cared for by this woman. Part of her wished she was still young enough to crawl into Gran’s lap for the love and solace she used to find there.
But Gran was almost eighty. It was Adelaide’s turn to take care of her. And she wanted to do that. Her mother certainly never would help out. She always had an excuse to be off doing whatever she pleased. “I don’t know,” she said. “Someone cut the screen on the outside door to my room and dragged me from my bed.”
Gran’s fingers, gnarled with arthritis, gripped Adelaide’s arm. “I saw that. Scared me so much I called Chief Stacy right away.”
There went Adelaide’s hopes for not involving the authorities. But, deep down, she’d known she wouldn’t be able to avoid it. “You’ve called the police?”
“Of course! Chief Stacy’s been as worried about you as I have. He started searching the minute he left here, him and the other officers.”
“All three of them?” It wasn’t a large force; it never had been.
“All three of them,” she confirmed, oblivious to Adelaide’s sarcasm. “But...how’d someone get past the door? Wasn’t it locked?”
Adelaide was embarrassed to admit she’d not only unlocked it, she’d left it open. Gran kept the house so hot she couldn’t sleep. “I needed some air,” she explained.
The skin below Gran’s throat wagged as she shook her head. “In this day and age, you can’t go to bed with your doors unlocked. Even in Whiskey Creek. I haven’t done it in twenty-three years, ever since your Grandpa passed.”
The house had no air-conditioning. During the summer, they had to open their windows—essentially the same thing, but Adelaide didn’t argue.
Gran’s gaze lowered to Adelaide’s bare legs. “The man who took you...he didn’t—”
“No.” She understood where her grandmother’s thoughts were going. Noah’s had just traveled down the same path. Anyone would think of sexual assault, especially since she wasn’t fully clothed.
“Then why’d he do it?” Gran persisted.
She needed to downplay what had occurred. Tell only as much as she had to so it would go away as soon as possible. And whatever she said had to be believable, first and foremost. “I think he intended to rape me but...I fought him off.”
“What took you so long to get home? You haven’t been with him this whole time, have you?”
Adelaide wished she didn’t have to mention the mine. She didn’t want it connected to her, didn’t want anyone to be reminded of Cody and his graduation party. But even if she lied about that part, Noah would give away the truth when he said where he’d found her. She hadn’t been able to offer him a single compelling reason not to share that information. She couldn’t, not without raising his suspicion as to why she wanted it kept quiet. And, other than Chief Stacy and maybe his father, he was the last person whose curiosity she wanted to arouse.
Left with no choice, she told Gran what’d happened, and who’d saved her.
“Noah’s such a nice boy,” she said.
Not if he was anything like his brother. Adelaide owed him for what he’d done tonight, but she didn’t have a positive impression of him from high school. He’d been one of those senior “gods” she’d worshipped, one who’d acted as if he owned the school. Never had she known him to be aware of the plight of those around them or to care. She told herself it was a miracle he’d bothered to come to her rescue.
“Thank goodness he was in the right place at the right time,” Gran was saying. “That’s one of the Lord’s tender mercies. But why didn’t he take you to the hospital?”
“I wouldn’t let him.”
“Then we need to go now.” She moved her walker forward as if intent on getting her purse, but Addy caught her arm.
“There’s no need.”
“Of course there is. You’re bleeding!”
“I’m fine, Gran. This looks much worse than it is. Trust me, it’d be a waste of time and money. Nothing’s broken.”
“We should still—”
“I wasn’t raped,” she insisted. “What can they do other than clean my wounds? We can do that here.”
Gran’s concern warred with the practicality of Adelaide’s argument. She’d always been frugal. “You’re certain?”
Adelaide mustered a reassuring smile. “Positive.”
“Okay, but I should at least let Chief Stacy know you’re home. He’ll be anxious to talk to you—”
“Not tonight,” she interrupted. “There’s no need to wake him. I’m too exhausted to answer any questions at the moment.”
“But you’ll want to give him a statement as soon as possible, while you can remember the details.”
“I don’t know anything that will help figure out who did this, Gran. I can’t even provide a description. The man was wearing a ski mask.” She actually had four men to choose from, but she couldn’t make a determination by body type alone, not when they’d all probably filled out and changed so much. Chances were she’d recognize their faces if she happened across them, but the person who’d dragged her from her bed last night had been careful to hide his identity.
“There’s his height, his weight—”
“Both a blur to me. Can’t it wait until tomorrow? Please? I’m not up to being grilled.” She managed a pleading expression. “Even by you.”
Empathy etched deeper grooves in Gran’s wrinkled face. “Okay, we’ll wait, if that’s what you want. Maybe you’ll remember something important once you’ve had a chance to recover.”
Or not. “Thanks.”
“I’m so glad you’re back, honey. I don’t know what I would’ve done if...if this had ended differently. You’ve always been my Addy, my pride and joy.”
Hearing the tears in her voice, Adelaide gave her another hug. “Don’t worry. Everything’s going to be fine.”
Milly was a proud woman, not one to cry easily. With a sniff, she straightened her spine and motioned for Adelaide to follow her to the kitchen. “Come in here so we can get you cleaned up.”
“Shouldn’t we do that in the bathroom?”
“There’s more room in the kitchen. More light, too.”
That was true. Gran’s house was one of a handful of local homes listed on the National Register of Historic Places. As was the style a hundred years ago, it had tall ceilings, thick molding, elaborate cut-glass windows and—the one downside besides the old plumbing and wiring they’d had to replace—small bathrooms. “I’ve got to shower first.”
Reluctantly, Gran let her disappear into the bathroom, and Adelaide took her time stripping off Noah’s sweatshirt and her filthy clothes before standing beneath the hot spray.
Blood and dirt ran off her body, circling the drain and taking the last of her energy with it. When she’d finished scrubbing, she could only stand there and stare as the last of the soap bubbles disappeared.
“Addy, you coming?”
Gran’s voice brought her out of her stupor.
“Be right there,” she called, and turned off the water. She’d hoped her grandmother would give up and go to bed, allow her to recover on her own. But she should’ve known better. Gran would never leave her like this.
“Can you grab the bandages from under the bathroom sink before you come?”
“Sure.” Her body complained at the movement but—even injured—it was easier for her to crouch than Gran. Tossing her towel aside, she sorted through the laxatives, extra soap, Listerine and bath salts.
She found a small box of Band-Aids, but she wasn’t sure what good they were going to be. Abrasions covered most of her arms and legs.
“We need gauze,” she muttered, but she wasn’t about to go to the store—or let Gran attempt to drive there. The only drugstore open this late would be halfway to Sacramento.
Gran had a cup of tea waiting for her when she entered the kitchen. Adelaide could smell the mint. She normally liked tea, but tonight she didn’t have enough strength to hold the cup. And she had another problem. While pulling on a pair of cutoffs and a tank top she’d figured out why her legs hurt worse in back. Thanks to the fact that she’d slid down the wooden supports of that mine shaft when whoever it was had shoved her in, she had as many slivers in her butt and thighs as she did on her hands.
They had to come out and she couldn’t do it on her own, so she’d brought the magnifying glass Gran used for reading and a pair of tweezers, along with the Band-Aids. She hoped her grandmother would be able to help because Adelaide couldn’t wait to crawl into bed and block the past twenty or so hours from her mind. Everything from that first terrifying image of a man looming over her bed to the shocking realization that it was Cody’s brother who’d pulled her out of the deep, dark hole. The hole that might otherwise have become her grave.
* * *
The lights were still on at Milly’s house, only now the blind in the kitchen was down.
Conscious of the late hour and that he’d be intruding, Noah hesitated on the stoop with the bag of supplies he’d brought from his place. He knew that Adelaide, who’d tried to avoid even incidental contact with him in his truck, wouldn’t be happy to see him. She’d disliked him instantly. But most people didn’t have the kind of first-aid supplies he kept on hand for mountain bike spills. And Adelaide had refused to go to the hospital, so...he figured she might need them.
Telling himself he was going the extra mile largely for Milly’s sake, because he knew how much her granddaughter’s injuries would upset her, he took a deep breath and knocked.
The curtain moved; someone was peering out at him. After what’d happened, he was relieved to see they were taking precautions.
He raised the bag to show he’d brought something. Then he heard the bolt slide back.
“Noah!” Milly exclaimed as soon as she got her walker out of the way so she could open the door. “How nice of you to come back.”
Surprised by the intensity of her relief, he looked over her gray head to find the living room empty. Was Adelaide in bed? “She okay?”
Milly lowered her voice. “Who knows? She refuses to see a doctor. Do you think I should make her?”
He’d already tried and was sure it wouldn’t work. In his estimation, they were better off going with the “do-it-yourself” method he held in his hand, unless her injuries were worse than she’d let on. “Have you found anything serious?”
“Not really. She says nothing’s broken. And I’m doing all I can to get her cleaned up, but...it’s not easy when your hand shakes like mine.” She motioned to the sack. “What do you have in there?”
“Iodine, painkiller, large bandages.” He didn’t mention that the painkiller was prescription-strength, a couple of pills he had left over from when he’d broken his jaw in a free-ride bike race six months ago.
“That’ll come in handy.” She glanced over her shoulder. “But what I need right now is another pair of eyes and a steadier hand.”
“For what?”
He’d expected her to take the bag and say good-night. Instead, she drew him inside. “Come see what you can do.”