Authors: Leigh Bale
Shouldn’t she?
Toni shook her head. She didn’t
know if she was that strong.
“You and Mac both deserve to be
happy,” Grams said.
Yes, but happiness seemed to be a
luxury they couldn’t afford. At least not until Cara was home safe and they
were assured that no intruders would break into their house again.
Toni pressed her shaking fingers
against her trembling lips. She felt so disloyal. How could she foster a
relationship with the man who may have killed her brother?
She didn’t know what to think
anymore. She needed more time to sort this out.
But time was running out. Fast.
“I wonder if Cara called.” Grams
startled her when she stepped over to the phone machine.
Toni gazed at her grandmother with
doubt. Lately, the elderly woman had been having some lapses in memory. Didn’t
she recall that Cara had been kidnapped?
“I’ll check it.” Toni leapt toward
the small white box sitting on the desk by the telephone. “You go on into the
kitchen and I’ll be there in just a moment.”
Shaking her head, Bernice headed
toward the door. “Okay, but if Cara calls, I want to speak with her
immediately. She should check in more often. Some things are going to change
around here.”
Toni agreed. It was time. Cara had
been running wild for too long. In case the kidnappers had called, Toni turned
the volume on the phone machine down low so Grams wouldn’t hear. She didn’t
want to upset the woman any more than she already was.
Nothing. Not a single phone
message.
When would the kidnappers contact
her again? And where did that leave Cara?
A fresh wave of panic threatened to
engulf Toni.
Please, God. Please help me find my
sister.
She must remember to have faith.
Fear led to despair and certainly wouldn’t help Cara. If she couldn’t find
Eric’s file, what then? She only prayed it wasn’t too late for her sister.
Half-an-hour later, Uncle Glade
left and Bernice locked the door behind him. Working side-by-side, Grams and
Toni prepared a pan of lasagna and green salad. They didn’t talk much, both of
them lost in their own thoughts.
“Is Mac coming for dinner?” Grams
asked.
“No, he can’t make it tonight.”
Toni didn’t tell her grandmother she hadn’t invited Mac over. After his
confession today, she needed time alone to think.
They ate and washed the dishes,
then Toni went to her room. In the dark, she closed the door and lay across her
bed. The gentle summer breeze ruffled the lacy curtains at the open window. She
stared at them as they danced about in the darkness.
A zillion “what if’s” clogged her
mind. What if Mac hadn’t fired over Eric’s head? Even in the heat of battle,
what if Mac had been more cautious? Would Eric have come home safely? Even if
it was an accident, how could she ever forgive Mac for what he’d done?
How can you not forgive him?
The thought permeated her mind. She
looked up, at a picture on the wall of the Savior kneeling in the Garden of
Gethsemane. He’d died to atone for the sins of the world.
Her sins. And Mac’s. He was
entitled to the blessings of the Atonement, too. Accidentally killing your best
friend during war wasn’t a sin. And yet, she knew the Atonement also healed
acts of carelessness and neglect. She had no right to judge and deprive Mac of
that. Unless she wanted to fall under condemnation of the Lord.
If she truly believed in the
atonement, how could she withhold her forgiveness from Mac? She had to dig deep
within herself and find the faith to forgive him. If she couldn’t do that, she
would then be guilty of a greater sin.
She loved Mac. After everything
that had happened, she still loved him. But was that enough? It couldn’t
restore Mac’s faith in the Lord. Only he could do that himself. And it couldn’t
make her forget what Mac may have done to Eric.
She found no answers and her weary
eyes couldn’t seem to drop closed. Sleep refused to come.
Toni awoke in the early morning,
still fully clothed, disoriented and chilled. The shadowed glow of dawn
glimmered outside her window. What time was it?
She glanced at the bedside table.
Almost five o’clock. Something had woken her, but what?
As she reached to turn on the lamp,
a dim light down below in the back yard caught her eye. Grandma sat in the
dark, reclining in a patio chair next to the flower garden. Wearing her heavy
bathrobe, she had her arms wrapped around her, staring at her bare toes. No
doubt she couldn’t sleep again and Toni thought she was probably worried about
Cara.
From her vantage point above, Toni
saw the faint light from a lamp in the family room filtering out the sliding
glass doors onto the patio. Darkness blanketed the surrounding flower beds,
trees and shrubbery. Several bushes rustled at the back of the yard.
Apprehension prickled the back of
Toni’s neck. She felt someone watching her. Something terrible was about to
happen. She could feel it in her bones.
She stared into the shadows of the
back yard.
There!
Her breath caught in her throat. A
man dressed in black stepped away from the bushes edging the fence along the
side of the house. He moved furtively, hunched within the shadows.
Grams!
Toni tore out of the room, taking
the stairs down to the family room two at a time. Her heart pounded. Her side
hitched.
She reached the landing with a
thump and knocked over the lamp in her haste to jerk open the sliding glass
doors. As she raced out onto the patio, she tripped over the bottom step and
fell against the glass-topped patio table. The lawn chair Grams had been
sitting in was empty.
“Grams!” she called. “Where are
you?”
No answer. Terror scorched her as
she scanned the darkness, searching for her grandmother.
A sound came from near the tool
shed. Toni grabbed a broom and ran in that direction. In the moonlight, she
could make out the pink of her grandmother’s bathrobe lying on the damp lawn.
Bernice lay in a heap beside the fence, her face ashen with shock, hands
covering her mouth, her eyes wide with fear.
Thump!
Two dark figures grappled in the shadows.
Two men! The man dressed in dark clothes tried to flee and the other, larger
man jerked him back.
Mac! But who was he fighting with?
The men fell to the ground,
grunting, rolling across the dew-kissed grass. Toni knelt beside her
grandmother, pulling her close.
“What on earth is going on?”
Bernice’s voice trembled as she clung to Toni. “That man attacked me, and then
Mac showed up.”
As the assailant tried to flee, Mac
pulled the hood of the man’s sweatshirt back. Vague drafts of sunrise
illuminated a face filled with hate and desperation.
The ponytail man!
Toni gasped with recognition.
In the scuffle, Ponytail’s long
hair came undone from its binding. Tangles of black hair fell loose around his
shoulders. Mac stumbled, dropping to one knee, pushing himself back up.
Ponytail slammed a fist against
Mac’s jaw. Mac grunted with the impact, but didn’t retreat. His hands moved in
rapid succession, delivering several punishing blows to Ponytail’s neck, torso
and face. Blood spurted from Ponytail’s nose.
In an effort to protect Mac, Toni
picked up the discarded broom and laid the stick across Ponytail’s back. He
whirled on her, lashing out with his arm, knocking her to the ground.
Ponytail turned and kicked Mac’s
injured leg. Mac fell, grimacing with pain. Ponytail ran, vaulting over the
trash cans beside the fence. He raced through the open gate and down the
street, disappearing from view.
Mac tried to follow, but his leg
wouldn’t hold him and he dropped to the ground. Doubling up his fist, he
smacked the damp earth.
“Mac!” Toni ran to him and knelt by
his side.
She helped him sit up.
“I let him get away,” he growled.
Frustration edged his words.
“Mac, what are you doing here? And
who was that man?” Bernice’s pale face gleamed in the moonlight as she wrapped
her arms around her body.
“Let’s get Mac into the house,”
Toni said. “He can explain once we’re inside.”
Together, the two women helped Mac
rise. He leaned on them as he hopped over to the patio and braced his hands on
the doorjamb. Followed by the women, he went inside, then slumped onto the sofa
in the family room, breathing hard as he rubbed his injured leg.
“What were you doing outside,
Grams?” Toni asked.
“I couldn’t sleep, so I went
outside to get some fresh air. I heard a noise over by the shed and thought it
must be the cat. When I went over to check, that man jumped out and grabbed me.
Mac showed up just in time.”
Mac gritted his teeth, rubbing his
calf as if to ease the pain. Toni didn’t know what he was doing here so early
in the morning, but she was grateful he’d come.
“Oh, Mac, what have you done?”
Bernice leaned over to inspect his calf.
Toni knelt beside him, surveying
the damage with her grandmother. A smear of blood on his pant leg showed that
he’d opened the healing wound. She glanced up at his face. He had stubble on
his chin, his eyes crinkled with fatigue. He still wore his same clothes from
yesterday and looked as though he hadn’t slept all night long.
“Get the first aid kit,” Bernice
told Toni.
She obeyed, stepping into the
kitchen before opening the top cupboard. She soon returned.
“Where’s your cane, Mac?” Toni
asked.
“I left it in my truck.” He
clenched his jaw.
“Your truck?” Toni stepped around a
recliner, handing a bottle of antiseptic, cotton swabs and clean bandages to
Grandma.
“I’ll take care of this myself.” He
took the antiseptic. He wasn’t about to let these two women tend the wound in
his upper thigh.
He limped down the hallway and
disappeared into the guest room for some privacy. When he returned, Bernice
lifted her eyebrows. “Why are you here so early in the morning, son?”
Mac hesitated to answer. “I was in
my truck.”
Toni sat beside him on the couch.
“What do you mean? Where is your truck?”
He heaved a sigh of resignation.
“Parked out front.”
Bernice sat across from Mac in an easy
chair. “Let me get this straight, son. You’ve been sitting outside in your
truck all night long, watching over our house?”
He met Grams’ eyes without
flinching, but Toni caught a flicker of doubt. “Yes, ma’am.”
Toni prayed Grandma didn’t scold
him.
“Why?”
He shrugged. “In case the burglar
returned. I wanted to make sure you two were safe.”
“But how did you know we were
here?” Toni asked.
“I called your Aunt Holly last
night to talk to you and she said now you had a security system, you’d gone
home.”
“Do you know who you were fighting
with? Was he the burglar?” Bernice asked.
Mac looked at Toni. She knew part
of the answer. But why would Ponytail come here if he had kidnapped Cara? Had
he also killed Lieutenant Andrus? The kidnapper had given them twenty-four
hours to find Eric’s file. Surely Ponytail wouldn’t come here before their time
was up.
Or would he?
Her emotions must have shown on her
face, because Mac nodded. “I know. I’m sorry, Toni. I tried to stop him, to see
if he could answer some questions for us.”
“Oh,” Toni groaned and covered her
face with her hands. “This is getting too complicated. I don’t understand
anything.”
She glanced at the grandfather
clock. Just past six in the morning. Sunlight filtered through the sliding
glass door, offering the promise of a new day. They had only a few hours to
find Eric’s missing file.
“What questions? What is going on
here?” Bernice spoke in a demanding tone, expecting some answers.
Mac hesitated, looking at Toni. On
top of everything else, she feared her grandmother was losing her hold on
reality. The elderly lady didn’t seem to remember that Cara had been kidnapped.
Either that, or this was the woman’s way of coping with the loss.
She faced her grandmother, speaking
in a gentle tone. “Grams, remember Cara’s been taken? I need you to be strong,
or we won’t be able to help Cara.”
Bernice’s eyes hardened. “What’s
happened to my granddaughter?”
Mac’s cell phone started to ring
and he glanced at the caller ID. “It’s the Colonel.”
“So early? He must have some news
to be calling you at this time of the morning.” A thrill of expectancy churned
in Toni’s stomach. Maybe they could find Eric’s missing file before it was too
late.
While Mac stepped away to take the
call, Toni explained again to Grams about the ponytail man trying to run them
off the road, Cara’s kidnapping and then finding Lieutenant Andrus dead. She
omitted the news that Mac may have killed Eric. Even if it were true, it
wouldn’t be Christlike to speak of it until the final test results came in.
Above all else, Toni wanted to protect her family from any more hurt.
“I’m sorry, Grams, but that’s all I
know. I have no idea who took Cara or what exactly we’re dealing with.”
“We must call the police,” Grams
said.
“We have. And Colonel Wilkinson has
promised to help.”
“Oh, dear.” By the time Mac
returned, Bernice sat slumped against the couch, her face ashen, her cheeks
damp with tears. She didn’t say a word. Instead, she stared at Mac with hope
filling her eyes.
“What did the Colonel say?” Toni
asked.
Mac shrugged. “As expected, he came
up empty on Eric’s personnel file. No one at the Pentagon seems to know
anything about a secret file. If they do, they’re not talking.”
“But where does that leave Cara?”
Grandma groaned and clasped a hand to her mouth, looking grief-stricken.