The Search (13 page)

As soon as it was secured, she leaned against the wall, feeling a cold sweat transform her brow. She was panting so hard, it felt like she had run three miles.

She bit her bottom lip as it trembled.

And tried to figure out why she was so afraid. Was it because Chris had brought a gun with him . . . or that he'd left without it?

Then none of that mattered as she heard a brief knock and the front door open again.

“Hello?” a deep man's voice called out. “Is anyone here?”

More than anything in the world, Beth wished she wasn't.

Chapter 15

“I never understood what Frannie saw in Perry. After all, there is only so much a smile and sense of adventure can do for a person. Ain't so?”

M
ICAH
O
VERHOLT

A
fter spending yet another rough night staring at the blank walls and listening to the soft snores of her roommate, Frannie had been overjoyed to see the sunrise. When the nurses came to take her blood pressure, she hadn't been able to refrain from chatting with them.

She'd visited with the attendant who'd delivered her breakfast, and had even shared a “good morning” with one of her doctors.

But when she saw Luke Reynolds walk through the beige curtain and toward her side of the room, she couldn't contain her happiness. She was so happy to have a visitor.

“Luke, you came back!”

He grinned. “I did.”

“Sorry about my exuberance. It's just that I'm mighty happy to have a visitor.” And, she privately acknowledged, happy to see him in particular.

“I couldn't stay away,” he teased. “Plus, I thought you might like a ride home. Mose was going to come out here, but he thought maybe you'd be more comfortable in my car instead.”

The reminder of Sheriff Kramer and her conversation with him darkened her mood.

But no matter what, Frannie knew that she would, indeed, be more comfortable with Luke. The last thing she wanted was to be trapped in a vehicle with Sheriff Kramer while being hammered with questions. “Coming here, volunteering to take me home . . . that was kind of you.”

“Kind?” His eyebrows rose. “You must really not be feeling too well. I've never known you to speak so meekly.”

“I don't spar with everyone, Luke. Only you.”

“I guess I should feel privileged, then.”

“Privileged or unfortunate!”

Taking the chair by her bed, he gestured to her arms, where only bandages decorated her hands and arms. “Looks like you got disconnected.”

“I was thankful to have the IV out, for sure. Now I only have to wait for the doctor to give me permission to leave.” Realizing he probably had a lot to do besides wait with her, she warned, “It might be a while. Nothing here seems to happen very quickly.”

“I can wait.” Lowering his voice, he said, “So, how is your neighbor? Anything new with her?”

Frannie had an idea the patient on the other side of the curtain had most likely gotten a real earful during the sheriff's visit. But though she'd been worried about being overheard last night, she'd forgotten all about her roommate this morning. “Is she still there? The television has been off for hours.”

“I think she was asleep when I walked in.”

“She's been a tiresome roommate. She doesn't sleep much and is restless. She also speaks too loudly, has lots of company, and tends to spout off her opinions about most everything.” But even as Frannie mentioned her roommate's flaws, she also realized she would miss her, too. The woman had been a burst of color in an otherwise dreary room.

“I imagine she has been a trial.” He rubbed his leg. “Being in the hospital gets old quick, that's for sure. When I was in the hospital with my leg, I thought they'd never let me leave.”

“I'm sorry, Luke. Here I am, acting like I'm the only person to ever have a hospital stay. How long were you in the hospital?”

His eyes darkened. “Five days.”

“That is all? I would have thought longer.”

He sighed, as if even talking about his injury made it ache. “Like you, I wasn't a very good patient. Because I'd been shot, my buddies took turns standing guard over my room. I felt guilty for making them do that.”

She knew nothing about standing guard, but she did understand loyalty. “I'm sure helping you made them feel
gut
.”

Surprise flared in his eyes, then dimmed to a wry acknowledgment. “Perhaps it did.” He sighed. “Anyway, I was anxious to get out of the hospital as quickly as possible. But even though I got out relatively quickly, I still had to go to rehab for weeks after that.”

“What did they do there?”

“They helped me walk. I'm afraid that's when I became a difficult patient.” He'd been frustrated with both his stamina and the pain that had rarely seemed to ebb. “Since then, I've had a long recovery at home.” He frowned as he straightened his leg. “It's still not completely back to normal. That's why I was able to come out here. Mose needed help, and I wasn't given permission to get back to work in the field.”

“Will your leg ever be completely healed?” She blurted the question, realizing almost immediately that she was prying too much. “Sorry. It's none of my business . . .”

Luke reached out and pressed his palm on the back of her hand. His touch, so warm and sure, stilled her worries.

Just for a moment.

“Don't ever apologize for being concerned, Frannie,” he said softly. Then, as if their contact had never happened, he removed his hand and spoke. “Actually, your question is one hardly anyone ever wants to ask.” He rubbed his head, the short hair sticking up as he did. “They're afraid of the answer, I guess.”

“Is there an answer?”

He nodded. “The short answer is that it will probably never be completely back to how it was.”

“And the long answer?”

“The long one? It's that I'll be able to go back to work. Eventually, I'll learn to adjust. I won't be the same, but maybe I don't need it to be, you know?”

He was right. Life was all about learning to adjust, to make do with less or more.

He continued. “Being injured like this taught me to be more accepting of my faults. Going through rehab, when I could only do five or seven reps of an exercise at a time, it was easy to pretend that I used to be strong.”

“I'm sure you were.”

He grinned. “I might have been able to do twenty repetitions of a weight. Not fifty. Sometimes, I would kid myself.” Looking sheepish again, he said, “For a while there, you would have thought that I could run a three-minute mile. The fact was, I never was a great runner, but I did take my leg for granted. Being in a wheelchair and on crutches for weeks and weeks made me realize that my leg is a great tool to get me from one place to the next. And if it's scarred and sore and not quite what it was, it's okay.”

“Sounds like life,” she murmured.

“Like life?” His brow quirked.

“You know,” she explained. “How we're all born perfect but then things happen. You get cut in the kitchen . . .”

“Or shot in the leg,” he finished. “I never thought about it like that, but yeah, maybe you're right. Things do happen.”

“Even when we don't want them to.”

“It's tempting to paint the past as perfect. But I don't think it ever was.”

Frannie was struck by his words, more than he probably could ever imagine. Because what he'd said was how she'd felt about Perry and his death.

Somehow, she'd started pretending that things before he'd gone missing were wonderful.

They hadn't been.

She'd been scared. In fact, once he was gone, she'd thought he'd made good on his promise to move away. She'd been relieved he was out of her life.

“Is every investigation like this, Luke?”

“Is every investigation like what?”

“Painful and scary? Raw? Sometimes, it feels as if you've taken my skin and peeled it back.”

“To an extent, I think pain occurs every time peoples' lives are studied with a fine-tooth comb. However, in my experience, no two investigations are ever the same. There are motives behind every crime—and usually all motivations are personal.”

“I know revealing secrets is painful.”

His eyes flashed, and right then and there, she saw everything he was thinking—well, what he'd let her see.

“I don't know,” he finally said. “Some murders didn't take much detective work. Pretty much everyone had seen it coming. Or we had an eyewitness.”

“Ah.”

“But what I'm trying to say is that most times, I've found the killer, cuffed him, and sent him to jail. I did the paperwork, and let the prosecutors take over. The only time they needed me was on the witness stand. And then I'd give my testimony, feeling like I was doing something good—putting someone dangerous off the streets. But I never really thought about what the murder had done to the community.”

“Why not?”

“I had too much to do. There's a lot of violence in Cincinnati. If I spent as long on every case as I have on this one, nothing would get done.”

“Ah.”

“But there's more to it than that.” He leaned forward, looking at Frannie intently, like he was practically begging for her to understand. “I also didn't want to feel. Feeling everyone's pain hurts.”

She saw the guilt in his eyes. And though she knew little about the things he was speaking of, she ached to reassure him. “Perhaps that's what police officers need to do,
jah
? If you dwell too much on the hurt, you can't do your job.”

“But is that doing my job?” His expression was doubtful.

“Someone has to. And it seems like you are the right man to do it. Otherwise you wouldn't be a detective, right?”

“I guess you have a point. Hey, how did you get so smart?”

“I'm not smart.”

“I'd beg to differ.”

Beg to differ
. It was an unusual phrase, but it had a certain ring to it, she thought. “Luke,” she asked. “Do you know who killed Perry yet?”

“You know I can't answer that.”

“Ah,” she murmured, just as the curtain moved and a nurse walked through.

“Frannie Eicher, I've heard you want to leave us,” the woman who was her father's age said with a mock look of hurt. “Is that true?”

“I am afraid it is.” She, too, pretended to feel something different than she was, but unlike the nurse, Frannie knew she wasn't fooling anyone, not even for a second. She was more than ready to say goodbye to her beige room.

The nurse smiled broadly. “If you're ready, then it is time for us to take care of things. We've got a couple of paperwork issues to deal with.” She turned to Luke. “And you're going to take her home, sir?” When Luke nodded, the nurse showed them both forms and discussed pain relievers and follow-up appointments.

And Frannie felt her mind drift. She thought of all the information she'd shared. And about what she hadn't shared.

Did Luke know who killed Perry? Would the questioning ever end so the town could finally get back to normal?

Chapter 16

“The folks who visit my inn are sure nothing exciting ever happens in Crittenden County. I do my best to let them think that. It's better for business, you know.”

F
RANNIE
E
ICHER

M
iss? Is anyone here?”

“I'm here! Hold on!” Beth fairly flew down the stairs.

But instead of a lone man, a couple in their mid-forties stood waiting for her.

Beth practically hugged them, they looked so nice and unintimidating. “I'm sorry, I was just cleaning a room.” She definitely didn't want to share that she was snooping!

“It's okay, dear,” the lady said. “We wondered if you had any vacancies tonight.”

“Oh, certainly,” she said. “For just one evening?”

“That's all we have time for.” She pulled out a new map that the visitors' bureau of Marion had started passing out. “But I'm hoping we'll still have time to visit some of the Amish stores and nurseries in the area.”

Still feeling like her heart was beating so fast it was going to jump out of her chest, Beth breathed deep and smiled. “Oh, for sure. Tomorrow, go out in the morning and you'll see lots of farms and businesses.”

“But not at night?”

“Most of the businesses close at sundown.”

“I suppose that's just as well. We drove a few of the winding roads but turned around before
we
got turned around. I mean, it gets really dark out here. Who knows what could happen?”

“Only God knows, for sure,” Beth said. After she got them settled into their rooms, another visitor appeared at the door—Lydia Plank.

“Lydia, hi. You don't need a room, do you?” she joked.

Lydia grinned. “I do not. Instead, I thought I'd stop by and see if you needed any help with the inn.”

Almost afraid to accept, Beth tentatively said, “Help?”

With a wink, Lydia explained. “With the cooking and baking. And the dishes . . .”

“You, too, know I'm terrible at those things?”

“I know they're not your strongpoint,” she clarified.

There was a time to have pride, and there was a time to know when pride was overrated. “I'd love the help.”

“I'm so glad,” Lydia said as she walked straight back to Frannie's kitchen. When she saw Beth's pile of dishes in the sink and stack of recipes on the counter, she raised her brows.

“I need a lot of help.”

Rolling up her sleeves, Lydia said, “I'll make raspberry filled muffins. How's that?”

“Good. Ah, what would you like me to do?”

Turning serious, Lydia said, “Lend an ear? I need a friend to listen to me do some thinking about Walker.”

“You two are in a hard place, ain't so?”

“Neither of us wants to completely give up our lives. But so far, the compromises don't seem to be working too well, either.”

Beth smiled. It was nice to have some companionship. She headed to the overflowing sink. “Lydia, you bake and talk, I'll wash dishes and listen. Sound like a plan?”

“It sounds
wunderbaar
.”

When Lydia walked over to turn on the oven and started talking a mile a minute, Beth found herself relaxing. Perhaps the inn would continue to run just fine for a little bit longer.

S
ince the last time she and Abby Anderson had spoken Deborah had thought about having hope and God answering prayers almost constantly. Looking back, she wondered if He had been answering her prayers but she just hadn't seen things that way.

After all, almost every night she had prayed for Perry's drug abuse to end. She'd asked for relief for her family, for there to be an ending to the stress his problems had brought both to herself and her parents.

And then he had died.

Had she brought that on? Or was she supposed to be giving thanks that she had gotten an end to the drug abuse and the stress?

It was starting to seem to her that the Lord had put Abby back into her life just to ponder that very subject. When their paths had crossed, Abby had asked if she could walk with her for a bit.

“Why are you looking for a job?” Abby asked when they entered Mary King Yoder's restaurant for another much-needed afternoon snack.

Deborah paused. “Pardon me?”

Abby had the grace to blush. “I'm sorry. I guess that didn't come out right. What I meant was that I thought Amish women didn't work outside of their home. I thought they stayed home and took care of their house.”

As they stopped in front of the hostess's station, Abby bit her lip. “Don't you want to stay home and take care of things? It sounds like a great way to spend your days.”

Deborah couldn't help it, she laughed. From the moment she'd met Abby on the sidewalk, the younger woman had been peppering her with one question after another.

They were as varied as could be, too. Sometimes Abby asked about prayers and church services. Other times, the questions seemed almost peculiar. But no matter what, Deborah was learning that Abby was certainly not shy about asking for information!

To buy herself some time, she murmured, “Abby, you are an Amish student, that's for sure.”

“And?”

Deborah waited until the hostess greeted them, grabbed two menus, and started walking them to their table. “And I'm not so sure that you need to know everything there is to know about me. Not all at once, at least.”

“I'm not trying to pry.”

This time she couldn't hide her amusement. “Sure you are.”

“I'm sorry.” Abby's cheeks flushed as they were walked to their table. “I didn't realize you had so many secrets.”

“I don't. Not really.” Had things always been like this? she wondered. Had she always been afraid of someone getting too close or asking something too personal?

Or had it only been since Perry started doing things she was ashamed of?

“We all have secrets of one sort or another, Abby. Don't you think?”

“I suppose.” But there was something in Abby's eyes that betrayed pure pain.

Making Deborah remember that there was a whole lot more to Abby than just what most people saw. She wasn't just a pretty English teenager about to finish high school. No, instead she was a girl struggling to find her place in the world after going through a very troubling circumstance.

“I don't know if I have all that many secrets,” she said slowly, “but I do know that every person is different whether they are Amish or English. We all have our own likes and dislikes.”

“Deborah, all I asked was why you didn't want to stay home and take care of things. If you didn't want to tell me, you could have just said that.”

Deborah chided herself as she picked up the menu and studied it. Abby was exactly right. The question hadn't been all that prying. It had only been her reaction to it that had made it feel that way.

But that said, there was a limit to how much she wanted to talk about herself. “What looks good to you, Abby?”

She sighed. “I don't know. I don't see much low-calorie food here.”

Deborah smiled. Most Amish women she knew kept busy lives, with a lot of labor around the house. There was no need for low-calorie foods. “Of course not! If we had wanted low-calorie, we wouldn't have come here to eat. Instead we need to work on feeding our souls.”

A light entered her brown eyes. “Well, if we're not watching our waistlines, then my soul says it wants coconut cream pie.”

“Mine does, too! And a cup of coffee.” When the waitress came over, they both ordered the same thing.

Deborah was glad their paths had crossed. Looking for a job but only getting refusals was taking a toll on her confidence. Abby's smiles and unending questions were doing a great job of taking her mind off her problems.

She also knew that Abby was waiting for her to answer her question. And though she wasn't sure how to answer it, she gave it a try.

“Abby, the reason I'm not planning to sit at home and take care of things is because there's not much left. Now's not the right time, either. It's just my parents and me now. And to be truthful, we're a sad sort of trio.”

“I'm sorry. I can't seem to stop bringing up bad subjects.”

“We'd be that way whether you brought up memories or not, Abby.” She hesitated, then deciding that talking about her family and Perry with someone who didn't really know him helped clear her head. “See, we're mourning his loss, but my parents and I are dealing with the things we're finding out about his life, too.”

Abby averted her eyes. “Walker said Perry was . . . difficult.”

Deborah was surprised Walker had been that diplomatic. Her brother hadn't been shy about complaining about Walker breaking off their friendship. “Perry made a lot of things difficult,” she said, feeling like she was being honest about her brother for the first time in her life. “He was a mess and he was loud. He could be lazy and mean, too.” Though it hurt, she pushed herself to say the rest. “Then, he was angry.”

“But someone told me he'd been nice to her.”

Deborah wondered if she was talking about Frannie Eicher or Lydia Plank. “Perry did have some good qualities,” she allowed. “For most of his life, he was perfectly nice. But then he became someone no one recognized.”

He'd also become someone she'd begun to fear. Afraid that Abby would sense her betrayal, she swallowed back a whole host of regrets and disappointments. “Perry had begun to take drugs, and then sell them, too. But I guess you knew that.”

Abby looked at her for a long moment. It was obvious now that she had something on her mind that she was hesitant to ask.

Deborah braced herself. “Do you have another question about my brother?”

“Yes. No.” She bit her lip.

“Go ahead and ask. If I don't want to answer, I won't.”

“All right. Remember when we were talking about God's plan?”

“I do.”

“Out of all the people in Crittenden County, why do you think He decided that I should be the one to discover Perry?”

Deborah had wondered why it had been her brother who'd become a drug dealer. Why her brother had been the one to go missing.

Why it had to have been her brother in the well.

Then, suddenly, she had the answer. Just as if God had decided to whisper into her ear in the booth of Mary King Yoder's restaurant. “Because you can handle it,” she replied.

Their pie came then, and Deborah dug into her piece with gusto. Her mind was racing too much to talk to Abby.

The memories had come back, when she'd been sure Perry had run off to the city. She would sit by the window and stare blankly out. Wishing for a sign that he was on his way home.

Wishing that he would return and miraculously be the boy they'd always loved instead of the man he'd turned into.

But of course he never came home.

When Mose had appeared on their doorstep, hat in hand, and had told her parents the news, it had truly been one of the darkest moments in her life.

But now she realized that there had been some sense of relief, too. She and her parents had imagined Perry being homeless and hungry.

Or doing unlawful things. Or being hurt and unable to ask for help.

Deborah had learned that her mind could be a terrible foe in the middle of the night. At three in the morning, her worst fears about Perry surfaced . . . and those fears had been too frightening to ever share in the morning's light.

“I don't know how well I'm handling things, but I'm glad you think I am.” When Deborah smiled, Abby continued. “My grandmother told me it's not a good idea to try to guess why God does the things He does. His plans are far bigger than ours could ever be.”

“Well said, Abby,” she said softly. “What your grandmother said is
gut
advice, for sure. It's human to doubt, though. Our mind plays tricks on us. Makes us doubt what our parents taught us. Or what the Bible says. Sometimes that's the hardest thing not to do.”

Abby's gaze was piercing. “When I was following my girlfriends on that field, everything inside of me was saying that it was the wrong thing to do. That I should stop and turn around. I really wish I had listened.”

“I'm sure you did.”

“Deborah, do . . . do you think that voice was God?”

“I do not know.” And that was the truth.

“If I would have listened to that voice, I wouldn't have been in the field. And someone else would have discovered . . . your brother. Maybe Jessica and Emily. Maybe somebody else . . .” Her voice trailed off with a shrug.

Deborah understood her confusion. What would have happened if Abby hadn't discovered Perry's body when she did? Would things be better for her parents if they still held a grain of hope?

Or would they all have delved into a darker place by now, not only sitting in silence in the evenings, but letting the doubts and worries and blame take hold of them. Turning what was already a terrible situation into something far worse?

She weighed her words carefully, then realized that there were no “right” words. What was in her heart counted. “That might be true. But perhaps other people might have been so disturbed by what they saw that they wouldn't have told anyone. Or perhaps they would have been too afraid to know what to do. But what's done is done. And please know that I don't blame you, Abby. I never have.”

“Who have you blamed, then?”

Ah, so Abby was smart enough to know that Deborah wasn't strong enough to not blame anyone.

That no matter how easy it was to hope and pray for forgiveness, it was a far different thing to realize that instant forgiveness was almost impossible to do.

“I blame everyone and no one.”

As Abby's eyes widened, she continued. “The truth is that I blame Perry and the detective and myself and my parents.” She paused as the waitress refilled their mugs of coffee. “I blame Walker and Lydia and the drugs— And . . .”