Home by Dark
Marta Perry
The past can catch up to you….Rachel Weaver Mason is finally going home to Deer Run, the Amish community she left behind so many years ago. Recently widowed, she wants desperately to create a haven for herself and her young daughter. But the community, including Rachel’s family, is anything but welcoming.The only person happy to see her is her teenaged brother, Benjamin, and he’s protecting a dark secret that endangers them all. Determined to keep Benjamin safe from a suspected killer, Rachel has no choice but to turn to the one man she wanted to get as far away from as possible. Colin McDonald was her late husband’s friend, and the man who came between them.He’s never forgotten her and would do anything to keep her and her family safe. Rachel doesn’t know if she can trust Colin, or her growing feelings for him. But as they hunt for the killer, the tension between them builds and soon both their lives, and their hearts, are on the line.“While love is a powerful entity in this story, danger is never too far behind. Top Pick!" —RT Book Reviews on Season of Secrets
THE PAST CAN CATCH UP TO YOU…
Rachel Weaver Mason is finally going home to Deer Run, the Amish community she left behind so many years ago. Recently widowed, she wants desperately to create a haven for herself and her young daughter.
But the community, including Rachel’s family, is anything but welcoming. The only person happy to see her is her teenage brother, Benjamin, and he’s protecting a dark secret that endangers them all.
Determined to keep Benjamin safe from a suspected killer, Rachel has no choice but to turn to the one man she wanted to get as far away from as possible. Colin McDonald was her late husband’s friend, and the man who came between them. He’s never forgotten her and would do anything to keep her and her family safe.
Rachel doesn’t know if she can trust Colin, or her growing feelings for him. But as they hunt for the killer, the tension between them builds and soon both their lives, and their hearts, are on the line.
Praise for Marta Perry
“Perry skillfully continues her chilling, deceptively charming romantic suspense series with a dark, puzzling mystery that features a sweet romance and a nice sprinkling of Amish culture.”
—Library Journal on Vanish in Plain Sight
“Marta Perry illuminates the differences between the Amish community and the larger society with an obvious care and respect for ways and beliefs…. She weaves these differences into the story with a deft hand, drawing the reader into a suspenseful, continually moving plot.”
—Fresh Fiction on Murder in Plain Sight
“Leah’s Choice, by Marta Perry, is a knowing and careful look into Amish culture and faith. A truly enjoyable reading experience.”
—Angela Hunt, New York Times bestselling author of Let Darkness Come
“Leah’s Choice is a story of grace and servitude as well as a story of difficult choices and heartbreaking realities. It touched my heart. I think the world of Amish fiction has found a new champion.”
—Lenora Worth, author of Code of Honor
“Marta Perry delivers a strong story of tension, fear and trepidation. Season of Secrets (4.5 stars) is an excellent mystery that’s certain to keep you in constant suspense. While love is a powerful entity in this story, danger is never too far behind.”
—RT Book Reviews, Top Pick
Home by Dark
Marta Perry
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Dear Reader,
Thank you for choosing to read the first book in my new Amish suspense series, which is set in a fictional community in my own part of Pennsylvania. I’m finding it a delicate balancing act but also great fun to combine the real places I know with my fictional community.
The Amish attitude toward nonviolence plays a large role in Home by Dark. It’s sometimes difficult for people in the larger community to reconcile the very law-abiding nature of Amish life with the reluctance of the Amish to become involved with the law and its representatives. This attitude dates back to the earliest years of the Amish faith, when Amish were persecuted and killed by the law and government of the time. For the most part, an Amish person is more likely to forgive and/or ignore a crime against them by an outsider than to seek help from the police, and that attitude permeates the events of my story.
I hope you’ll let me know how you felt about this story, and I’d love to send you a signed bookmark or my brochure of Pennsylvania Dutch recipes. You can write to me at Harlequin HQN, 233 Broadway, Suite 1001, New York, NY 10279, email me at marta@martaperry.com or visit me on the web at www.martaperry.com (http://www.martaperry.com).
Blessings,
Marta Perry
This story is dedicated to my grandson, Bjoern Jacob. And, as always, to Brian, with much love.
The gem cannot be polished without friction,
nor the person perfected without trials.
—Amish proverb
Contents
Prologue (#u68fe7559-9695-587b-8c9f-a28ebee52624)
Chapter One (#u517152d1-839f-5291-9912-7a97dd03a238)
Chapter Two (#ua74e5241-f2db-54ae-b129-b42176cf1f96)
Chapter Three (#u12bc1d08-f9cd-5c62-a08d-f6d8dc82cdc3)
Chapter Four (#ufd0e27cb-a594-51cd-9e0b-0ae91887a9b2)
Chapter Five (#u32da4113-a4fe-52bf-ac6d-dbfbba1e6fe0)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE
THE DESERTED BARN loomed ahead of them, broken beams jutting up toward the darkening sky like menacing fingers. Benjamin Weaver shivered, and the gas cans Will had made him carry clanked together.
Will’s head jerked around at the sound. “Keep it quiet.” His voice was a low mutter of Pennsylvania Dutch. “You want to get us arrested?”
“Told you we shouldn’t’ve brought him.” Joseph Stoltz frowned at him. Both the older boys wore Englisch clothes, and they’d snickered at Benj for showing up dressed Amish.
All very well for them to put on jeans and T-shirts. They were both old enough to have started their rumspringa, and parents turned a blind eye to such clothes then. But he was only fourteen, and Daad would skin him if he found Benj in a getup like that. Daad had been upset enough lately with Benj’s oldest sister, Rachel, coming back to town and not being Amish anymore.
He shivered again, half with cold, half with fear of where this adventure was taking him. It grew chilly at night this early in June, especially out here on the wooded hillside. He hadn’t thought to bring a jacket when he’d crawled out his window and slid down the roof of the woodshed. He’d been too excited that Will and Joseph were letting him come along to think about that.
Now his mind was churning, and he didn’t like what it was telling him. That it was a mistake for him to get involved, that he’d be shaming Daad and Mammi, that—
A loud creak sounded through the trees, and Benj didn’t need Will Esch’s gesture to drop to his knees behind the closest fallen log. Another sound from up ahead, one that he couldn’t identify. Why would anyone be up here in the woods overlooking Deer Run at night? Nobody’d be interested in that falling-down old barn.
Nobody but Will, who figured it would make a fine blaze up there on top of the hill for the whole village to see. Benj eased his hands away from the gas cans and rubbed clammy palms on his pants. He’d thought they were just going to splash paint on the barn, not start a fire. He should have had better sense than to get involved in one of Will’s schemes.
Will leaned over. “I’ll go check it out,” he whispered. “Wait for my signal, ja?”
With Will’s eyes on him, Benj could only nod. Too late now for second thoughts.
Will slipped over the log and slithered through the trees toward the barn. Benj leaned against the rough bark, wishing he was home in his bed. Will was moving quickly—Benj could see him, a dark shadow weaving through the trees. He’d be at the barn in a minute.
Benj turned away, sliding down to sit on the ground. In no time they’d hear Will whistle. Benj would have no choice but to pick up the gas cans and go along. Will was right about one thing. That dry old wood would make a fine blaze. But if they got caught...
He’d never seen an Englisch jail, but it seemed a pretty fair guess he wouldn’t like it.
“What’s taking so long?” Joseph muttered, peering over the log. “I can’t see him—”
He broke off at the sound of a motor. Lights swept through the trees, and Benj’s heart stopped. A vehicle was coming up the old logging road toward the barn. If Will was seen—
A man’s voice, shouting. Then, incredibly, a shotgun cracked through the woods, sending crows lifting in a noisy cloud from the trees. Benj was frozen, wits dazed by the sound.
And then Will vaulted over the log, shoving him with a hard hand. “Run,” he ordered.
Benj scrambled to his feet, following Will, with Joseph a step behind him, bolting through the brush. Another report, a branch crashing to the ground, and he was running as hard and fast as he could, running as if the devil himself were at his heels, crashing through the undergrowth heading down the hill and toward the road, if they got to the road they’d be safe, no one would shoot there.
An eternity later they stumbled out onto the macadam of the two-lane road that wound through Deer Run. Across the way was Mason House, where his sister Rachel lived now. He could go to Rachel, he could tell her—
Will grabbed his arm, shook him. “Where’s the cans?”
Benj blinked, then jerked his head toward the hillside. “Back there.”
“Dummy.” Will shoved him. “Ach, they can’t tell who we were from that. All we’ve gotta do is keep quiet.”
Joseph, always more cautious than Will, moved nervously. “But they were shooting. We should—”
“You should be quiet, like I tell you,” Will snarled. “You didn’t see anything, you don’t say anything, not to anyone. Got that?”
He spun, grabbing Benj by the shirt. “Answer me. You got that?”
Benj nodded. He hadn’t seen anything—that was for sure. Just a dark shape, wielding what had to be a shotgun. And right now he didn’t know whether he was more afraid of Will or the man with the gun.
CHAPTER ONE
SOMETHING WAS WRONG with her little brother. Rachel Weaver Mason swept the paint roller along the wall of what would be the registration area for her bed-and-breakfast, darting a sideways glance at her brother Benjamin.
Benjamin knelt on the drop cloth, straw-colored hair hiding his eyes, as he carefully cut in the edge of cream paint next to the woodwork. Benj might be only fourteen, but like most Amish youth, he possessed a number of practical skills, along with a strong work ethic. He’d said he’d help her with the painting, and he’d turned up bright and early this morning for what he called a work frolic.
Rachel suppressed a faint twinge at the expression. With any ordinary Amish family, a dozen or more relatives would have shown up at the word she needed help with the house her mother-in-law had so surprisingly left her.
But she was not Amish any longer. Running away to marry Ronnie Mason at eighteen, leaving behind her home, her family and her faith, had put a period to that part of her life. Even though she’d come back to Deer Run in the end, a widow with a nine-year-old daughter to support, she couldn’t expect to be treated as anything other than an outsider.
Only Benj, the little brother she’d hardly expected to remember her, looked at her as if she were family. The one time she’d seen her father since she’d returned, Daad had been as stiff and polite as if he’d never seen her before, and her heart still ached at the pain of that reception.
Was Daad hurting at the distance between them as well? Maybe so, but he’d never show it, and Mose, the brother who’d always been as close as a twin to her, copied Daad’s attitude.
Maybe that was better than seeing the pain and longing in her mother’s eyes. Mamm wanted her daughter back, wanted to be close to the granddaughter she barely knew, but Rachel’s return couldn’t wipe out the grief of her leaving. As for the two younger sisters who were little more than children when she’d left—well, Naomi and Lovina watched her as warily as a robin might eye a prowling cat.
“New paint makes it look better, for sure.” Benj sat back on his heels, glancing up at her with eyes as blue as her own.
Innocent eyes, but holding an edge of worry that didn’t belong there. Benj shouldn’t be jumping at sudden sounds and glancing warily around corners. That wasn’t normal.
“Was ist letz?” The question came out of her without conscious thought in Pennsylvania Dutch, maybe because that was the language of her heart. “What’s wrong, Benj? Are you worried about something?”
His hand jerked, depositing a drop of cream paint on the woodwork, and he bent to wipe it off with concentrated care. Benj was outgrowing the blue shirt he wore, his wrists sticking out of the sleeves, and the back of his neck was as vulnerable as her daughter Mandy’s.
“Worried?” he said finally, not looking at her. “I got nothing to worry about, ain’t so?” He tried to make it sound light, but his voice shook a little.
Rachel wanted to touch his shoulder, to draw him into her arms for comforting the way she would have when he was four. But she’d left then, abandoning him as she had the rest of the family. The fact that he seemed willing to start fresh with her didn’t mean she could go back to the way things once were.
“I don’t mean to pry,” she said, choosing the words carefully. “But if you ever want to tell me anything at all, I can keep it to myself.”
Benj seemed frozen, brush poised an inch from the wall. She held her breath, willing him to speak.
Then Mandy came clattering down the stairs, jumping the last few as if in too much of a hurry to take them one at a time, and the opportunity was gone.
“My room is all cleaned up,” she announced. “Can I help paint now?”
Mandy had obviously fixed her own hair this morning. The honey-colored braids were loose enough that strands already worked their way free of the bands, and the part was slightly erratic.
“No pictures of puppies on the wall?” Benjamin grinned at Mandy, his troubles apparently forgotten for the moment.
“I’m way past that,” she said loftily.
Rachel caught back a chuckle before Mandy could think she was being laughed at. Only nine, and Mandy sometimes sounded more like a teenager than Benjamin.
As for Benj, he treated Mandy like a little sister rather than the niece she actually was, to the obvious pleasure of both of them. He even had Mandy saying a few phrases in Pennsylvania Dutch.
“You can paint if you’re careful.” Rachel reminded herself that she’d wielded a pretty mean paintbrush at Mandy’s age. Amish children learned to work alongside their parents almost from the time they could walk. “You can use this roller, and I’ll go up the stepladder and do the top part.”
“It’s going to look so neat.” Mandy grabbed the roller, and Rachel steadied her arm for the first few strokes. “It was nice of my grandmother to leave us her house, wasn’t it? I wish we could have visited her.”
Rachel used climbing the stepladder as a pretext for not answering the implied question. She certainly wasn’t going to tell Mandy that the grandmother she’d been named after hadn’t ever invited them to come, not even when Ronnie died.
Amanda Mason had known how to hold a grudge, and Ronnie had been just as bad. Well, he’d been hurt, and he’d tried to mask it by insisting he didn’t care. His mother had always taken such pride in him that he hadn’t expected her iron opposition to his marriage. He’d been so sure she’d come around, but she never did. Rachel’s throat tightened, and she swallowed, trying to relax it.
Mandy swept the roller along the wall. “When it’s all finished, then we’ll start having guests, won’t we, Mommy?”
“I hope so.”
If they didn’t... Well, she wouldn’t go there. Ronnie had left nothing for his widow and child but a few debts, and his mother’s gift of the house hadn’t included an income to run it on. But Mrs. Mason had left a trust fund to cover Mandy’s education, to Rachel’s everlasting gratitude.
Mandy wouldn’t be tossed out into an unforgiving world with an eighth-grade education, the way Rachel had been, per Amish custom. That was a little fact neither she nor Ronnie, wrapped in the glow of first love, had taken into consideration.
“That’s not so bad.” Benjamin was studying Mandy’s efforts. “Chust don’t go too close to the woodwork, ja? I’ll do that with the brush.”
“Ja,” Mandy echoed, her face serious and intent. Usually Rachel thought Mandy looked like her father, with that honey-colored hair and those changeable green eyes, but sometimes, as now, her expression was like looking into a mirror.
Benjamin moved over to paint next to Mandy, grinning at her, his face relaxed as he said something teasing to her about finishing first. His expression reassured Rachel. Surely there couldn’t be anything seriously wrong, or he wouldn’t be laughing with Mandy, would he?
She’d been jumping to conclusions, maybe putting her own worries and fears onto him. He was probably—
The front door rattled with a knock and opened. Rachel turned, brush in hand, and whatever she’d been about to think was forgotten when she looked at Benjamin. Eyes wide with fear or shock, body rigid, a muscle visibly twitching by his mouth.
She’d been right to begin with. Something was very wrong with her little brother.
Rachel forced herself to glance aside. Benj was at a sensitive age—he wouldn’t like knowing he’d given himself away to her.
And she found her stomach jolting as she looked instead at Colin McDonald. He stood in her hallway, seeming as cool and relaxed as if he were in his own house. But then, nothing ever did ruffle Colin. Whether he’d been driving his truck far too fast up a mountain road or winning a bet by climbing to the top of steep slate roof on the Presbyterian church, he’d never betrayed a tremor. A challenge might bring a little added spark to his cool gray eyes, but that was all.
“Colin.” Belatedly realizing she was on the stepladder, paintbrush in hand, she climbed down, telling her nerves to unclench. “I didn’t expect to see you today.”
Or any other day, for that matter, but that was wishful thinking. Now that she was back in Deer Run, seeing Colin would be inevitable.
He arched an eyebrow, giving her the smile that had charmed most of the females in the township at one time or another. Even her, for a few brief moments, until she’d realized what he was really like.
“How could an old friend like me not come to welcome you back?” He glanced at the paint she’d managed to accumulate on her hands. “Don’t think I’ll offer to shake hands, though. Or give you a hug.”
Same Colin, always just a bit superior. But she wasn’t a shy little Amish girl any longer.
“Afraid of getting your hands dirty?” She let her gaze sweep over the spotless khaki pants and blue polo shirt he wore. Perfect as always. That strand of blue-black hair tumbling onto his forehead and the laughter in his eyes just added to the image of someone who had it all together.
It was that exterior, so Ronnie said, that had fooled adults into believing that whoever had caused a particular bit of mischief, it couldn’t have been Colin.
His expression seemed to grant her a point. “Just not dressed for painting, that’s all.” He let his gaze move on past her. “Hi, Benj. And here’s Mandy, all grown up.”
“Mandy, this is Mr. McDonald, an old friend of your daddy’s. Benj...” But her brother was gone, sliding through the door to the kitchen with an unintelligible murmur.
Colin looked after him. “What’s wrong with Benjamin? He and I are old friends, and he’s looking at me as if I were a zombie.”
“A zombie?” Mandy inquired. “What’s that?”
“Like an ogre,” Rachel said quickly, before Colin could attempt to explain. “From a fairy tale.” She hadn’t been able to give Mandy the safe, protected childhood she’d had, but she’d tried to guard her from the worst of current culture.
Mandy nodded, small face serious, and Rachel could practically see her storing that information away. Then Mandy pinned Colin with an assessing gaze.
“You don’t look like an ogre,” she observed.
“I’m not,” he said quickly. “That was a joke, because Benj ran off when I came in.”
“He didn’t run off,” Rachel said, exasperated at the turn the conversation had taken. “He’s gone to the kitchen for some lemonade, that’s all. Mandy, you can go and have a snack, too, while I talk to Mr. McDonald. Then we’ll get back to work.”
With a lingering glance at Colin, Mandy walked toward the kitchen and disappeared from view. And, Rachel trusted, from earshot.
She turned back to Colin, hoping he’d take the hint and make this visit brief. She found him surveying her quizzically, making her uncomfortably aware of her frayed jeans and the oversize old shirt of Ronnie’s she’d found in the closet. Why couldn’t he have come when she was looking her best, not her worst? Not that she cared, she reminded herself.
“Trying to protect your daughter from my bad influence?” he asked.
Rachel felt her cheeks grow warm. “What makes you think that?”
He ignored the question, taking a casual step closer to her. She’d thought the past ten years hadn’t changed him much, but she was suddenly aware that he was taller and broader than he used to be. The athletic boy had matured into a man.
Physically, maybe. Somehow she guessed that the teenage hell-raiser wasn’t far under the civilized surface.
“You always did think I was a bad influence on Ronnie, didn’t you?” Those cool gray eyes pinned her in place, and Rachel found her pulse fluttering erratically.
She’d had good reason to know it, but before she could attempt an answer, he stepped back with a rueful smile.
“Never mind. There’s seldom any point in revisiting the past, is there?”
“I guess not.” Too bad she did so much of it, especially now.
“Anyway, to business. You know I’ve taken over my dad’s real estate firm, don’t you?”
“No, I didn’t.” She hadn’t been back long enough to get caught up on all the local news, and this particular item was a surprise. “What happened to the guy who said he’d never come back to this one-horse town?”
“He grew up.” Colin clipped off the words, as if that might be a sore subject. “So Amanda Mason left this mausoleum to you, did she?” He sent a disparaging glance around the high-ceilinged hall, a few shreds of floral wallpaper still visible that Rachel had missed in her scraping. “Was that her way of punishing you for marrying her precious boy—to saddle you with this white elephant?”
“I don’t know what was in her mind,” Rachel said carefully. Colin didn’t need to know how astonished she’d been to be contacted by her mother-in-law’s attorney after all those years of pointed silence. “But it was very kind of her.”
“Kind?” He looked at her as if she were crazy. “How would you like to list it with me?”
“List...?” Her mind went blank.
“Put it on the market.” He said the words slowly, as if she were deficient in understanding. “You probably know it’s a terrible time to be selling, but I think I can still get a decent price for you, as long as you’re not expecting the moon and the stars.” He paced toward the stairwell, as if mentally measuring the hallway.
Real estate market, of course. “That’s kind of you, Colin, but I don’t plan to sell.”
Colin stopped in midstride, turning to give her an incredulous look. “You can’t intend to live here.”
That was a comment she’d made to herself a number of times in the past month, but hearing him say it made her bristle. “Why not? It’s my house now.”
“It’s a wreck,” he said bluntly. “I don’t know what Amanda was thinking, but she let the place go in her final years. You’d have to sink a fortune in it to get it back the way it was, and I don’t suppose she left you that.”
“No.” Just the house, a small yearly amount to pay the taxes and enough in a trust fund for Mandy’s education.
“Well then, the only thing to do is sell the place.” He made it sound as if she had no choice, but she did.
“I’m not going to sell. I’m going to run it as a bed-and-breakfast.”
Colin stared at her, expressionless. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he said finally. “Unless you’ve got an independent income, you can’t expect to get by that way.”
Rachel lifted her chin. Too bad she hadn’t stayed on the ladder, so she could look down at him. “Mandy and I will be fine, thank you. Mason House should go to my daughter, and I intend to keep it running until then.”
“You’ll be lucky if you don’t starve, the pair of you. Jeannette Walker does okay at The Willows, but she’s been at the B and B business a long time.” He shook his head, turned away in frustration and then spun back.
“Look, did Ronnie leave you anything at all to fall back on?”
She stiffened. “I can’t imagine why you think you have the right to inquire into my finances.”
Colin’s eyes narrowed. “I have the right to be concerned about my best friend’s child.”
“You saw Ronnie...what—once in ten years? I hardly think that qualifies you as a best friend.” She stopped, took a breath, forced down the angry words that, once spoken, could never be taken back.
“That should put me in my place, right?” He gave her a crooked smile. “But I’ve never been very good at taking hints.”
“Colin—” Should she apologize? But she hadn’t said anything but the truth.
“Not very good at minding my own business, either.” He walked to the door and then glanced back at her, hand on the knob. “I’ll be around, Rachel. I promise.”
The door closed behind him, leaving her wondering why that promise should sound remarkably like a threat.
* * *
COLIN HADN’T EVEN reached the steps of the wraparound porch when the truth reared its head. He’d messed up badly, antagonizing Rachel instead of gaining her cooperation. The mixture of guilt and something he hesitated to call attraction had played havoc with his self-control.
Not that Rachel had controlled her temper very well, either. She’d come a long way, it seemed, from the shy, innocent little Amish girl she’d been. Her heart-shaped face and sky-blue eyes still had a slight hint of vulnerability, though, and even with her blond hair pulled back, no makeup and wearing a baggy shirt, he’d felt...well, something.
But this Rachel had given back as good as she’d gotten, with a quick flare of antagonism at what she undoubtedly saw as his interference. Small wonder. Marriage to Ronnie Mason would try the patience of a saint.
Colin went slowly down the steps to the walk, the carved wooden railing wobbling under his touch. If Rachel really intended to open this place as a bed-and-breakfast, she’d have to get that fixed before she had a lawsuit on her hands.
He stood back, glancing up at the house. A three-story Victorian, it towered over everything else in the village. Literally towered, since the whimsical Queen Anne design boasted an actual round tower at one corner, forming circular bays in the parlor and the room above it.
Deer Run hadn’t changed all that much in the hundred and some years since Mason House had gone up. Probably the best thing that could have happened to the village was the decision not to run a state route through the collection of homes and stores.
Deer Run had subsided into undisturbed rural slumber, eventually becoming a bedroom community for nearby Williamsport. The Mason place and, across the road, the Sitler place, a not-quite-so-imposing Victorian, formed the west end of the straggle of homes mixed with businesses that was Deer Run.
Colin had to admit that Mason House was considerably more appealing, even in its current state, than The Willows, the only other bed-and-breakfast in town. Even the weeping willow in the side yard was bigger than the one that gave Jeannette Walker’s place its name.
Still, this was a crazy idea on Rachel’s part. He didn’t suppose Ronnie would have left her anything. Or have had life insurance. Ronnie had thought himself immortal—an excusable folly in an eighteen-year-old, but not in a grown man with a wife and child to support.
And now Rachel was about to compound the folly by sinking whatever little money she did have into this white elephant. She and the child would end up worse off than they’d started.
He reached the end of the walk and turned right. The sensible thing for Rachel to do was sell up. The antique furnishings would be worth a tidy sum, he’d think, even if he had trouble getting rid of the house for her. And she wouldn’t need to know that he’d forego his commission on the sale.
She could start over someplace away from the memories this place had to evoke, away from the family that didn’t seem ready to accept her.
With the exception of her little brother, apparently. Benj was a good kid, and he’d have been too small when Rachel left to know what a turmoil her decision had caused. At least she had him to give her a hand.
Colin’s eyes narrowed. Rachel had been wrong about one other thing. Benj wasn’t in the kitchen having lemonade. From where he stood now, Colin could see the boy slipping toward one of the dilapidated outbuildings behind the main house. Sneaking was actually the word that came to mind. Benj glanced around, the movement furtive, before disappearing into what had once been a stable.
What was the kid up to? He knew Benj pretty well, or as well as an Englischer was likely to know an Amish kid. The boy had been doing yard work for him for over a year. He’d have said Benj Weaver was the last person to have something to hide. It appeared he’d have been wrong.
Making a quick decision, Colin started across the lawn, skirting the willow tree. Benj hadn’t come out yet. What could he find to interest him in the old stable? Maybe Rachel had asked the boy to check it out for some reason, in which case Colin was going to look like an interfering busybody.
He neared the stable and glanced toward the house, half-expecting to see Rachel’s face at one of the windows, looking at him disapprovingly. But there was no sign of her. The stable door hung open, sagging on its hinges. Not touching it, he leaned over to look inside.
The interior had become the repository for everything that wasn’t wanted in the main house—lumber piles, a couple of old bicycles, a massive chest of drawers, a miscellaneous collection of discarded furniture. A narrow passageway, almost roofed over with boxes, made its way through the chaos. Benj was on his knees, head poked into the opening.
“Looks like a good place to hide,” Colin said, keeping his voice casual.
Benj jerked, banging his head on a crate. He edged out, rubbing his head, and sat back on his heels, eyeing Colin warily.
“I guess you could keep Mandy busy playing hide-and-seek out here,” he suggested.
Benj’s face cleared. “Ja. It would be a gut hideout.”
“Better be careful, though. Probably plenty of rusty nails mixed in with this junk. You don’t want her to have to get a tetanus shot.”
“I...I’ll be careful.” Benj swallowed, the muscles of his neck working, and shot another furtive glance around.
Colin leaned an elbow on the nearest crate and immediately regretted it. He’d have to change his shirt before he headed back to the office.
“I haven’t seen you for a while, Benj. What have you been up to lately?”
There was no mistaking the flash of fear in the boy’s face before he ducked his head. “Not much.” He shrugged. “Helping Rachel is all.”
Colin studied him thoughtfully. Something was clearly wrong, but like most adolescent males, Benj wasn’t about to turn to a grown-up for help. Colin remembered that stage only too well. Still, how much trouble could an Amish kid get into in a place like Deer Run?
“Well, if you’re helping your sister, maybe you’d better get back at it,” he said.
Benj gave a quick nod, hopped to his feet and darted out the door without another word.
Colin watched him run across the lawn, then turned and glanced at the small opening in the piles of junk. He might, if he had to, be able to worm his way through there, but not today.
He stepped back out into the June sunshine, frowning thoughtfully at the back of the house. Whatever it was Benj thought he needed a hideout for, Colin doubted that it was an innocent game of hide-and-seek. But what on earth could a kid like Benjamin have to hide? And what was causing that spark of fear in his eyes?
CHAPTER TWO
BY MIDAFTERNOON, the early enthusiasm Mandy had shown for painting had predictably waned. Benj was quite willing to keep on working, but Rachel decided they’d all had enough for one day. The entrance hall painting was finished, and the prospect of starting another room seemed too daunting.
“Why don’t you show Mandy the outbuildings?” she suggested. “She’s wanted to explore, and I haven’t had time to go with her.”
“Sure thing.” Benj wiped his hands on the edge of the old sheet she’d used to cover the marble-topped stand in the hall. He grinned at Mandy. “Komm, schnell. You remember what that means?”
“Come quick,” Mandy said promptly. “Bet I can beat you to the back door.” She darted toward the kitchen, with Benj letting her get a head start.
It was a relief to see her little brother acting normally again. “Denke, Benj. I know I can count on you to keep Mandy from trying anything too daring.”
A shadow crossed his face at what had surely been an innocent remark. Then he nodded, smiled and chased after Mandy.
Rachel frowned after him for a moment before going into the powder room that had taken the place of a large closet once Amanda Mason had decided she didn’t care to go up and down the stairs too often. A quick washing got rid of most of the paint stains, but the face that stared back at Rachel from the mirror still wore the worried frown that had become almost a permanent fixture in recent months.
She forced a smile, trying to counteract the effect. With her hair pulled back from a center part and the lack of makeup, she looked...well, not like the Amish girl who had run away with Ronnie Mason. That girl had had rosy cheeks and stars in her eyes. With her hair pulled back and sans makeup, this was closer to the Amish woman she would have turned into had young love, in the shape of Ronnie, not intervened.
Splashing some cold water on her face, Rachel turned away from the mirror. Dwelling on the past was seldom a good idea, as Colin had said, and she’d been doing too much of that lately. She couldn’t build a future on what-ifs.
Besides, she had Mandy. Fierce maternal love surged through her. Mandy was worth any sacrifice. The doubts Colin had voiced were the ones that kept her up at night, but she couldn’t listen to them. She would make a success of her plans because Mandy’s security and happiness depended upon them.
The house seemed empty with Benj and Mandy gone. She crossed the hallway and headed out the front door. She might as well check and see if any mail had found her at her new address yet.
The long porch across the front was one of the house’s beauties. In her mind’s eye, Rachel could see it the way she intended it to be, its gingerbread trim freshly painted, geraniums blooming in pots and hanging baskets, with comfortable rockers where her guests could relax.
She grasped the railing as she started down the steps, and it wobbled under her hand. Yet another thing she’d have to fix. She’d make up in hard work what she lacked in money.
The mailbox stood on a post next to the road, since Deer Run wasn’t big enough to warrant a mail carrier who walked from house to house. She pulled it open, finding an electric bill that had apparently chased her from the rental apartment in Philadelphia and what appeared to be a complimentary copy of the County Gazette, a weekly newspaper that was primarily composed of advertisements.
Holding it conjured up an image of Daadi reading through it, word by word, after he’d finished reading The Budget, the Amish newspaper that kept far-flung Amish communities in touch. She could see him so vividly, sitting in the wooden rocker next to the gas stove, his drugstore reading glasses sliding down his nose.
“Rachel? It is Rachel Weaver, isn’t it? I mean, Rachel Mason, of course.” The woman who’d hailed her hurried across the road after a cautious look in both directions.
Rachel waited, heart sinking. She’d been reasonably certain she could count on a call from Helen Blackwood, an elderly crony of her late mother-in-law, but she’d hoped to be a little better prepared for it. All the people in Deer Run she least wanted to see seemed determined to find her when she looked like a bag lady.
Not, she supposed, that Helen Blackwood would use those words. Having spent her entire life in Deer Run, Helen’s knowledge of the wider world was probably limited to whatever she watched on television.
The woman had nearly reached her, and Rachel arranged what she hoped was a welcoming smile on her face. “Miss Blackwood, how nice to see you. I hope you’re well.”
“Right as rain.” The woman’s returning smile was somewhat guarded, as if she questioned her welcome. “But do call me Helen. After all, I was your mother-in-law’s greatest friend.”
“Helen,” Rachel repeated, trying to infuse some warmth into the word. His mother’s shadow—that was how Ronnie had referred to Helen in the light, contemptuous way he sometimes had of dismissing people.
Unlike Amanda Mason, who had never succumbed to the idea of women wearing pants, Helen had stuffed herself into a pair of navy stretch pants, worn with a three-quarter-sleeve blouse in a jaunty sailing print. Her sense of the fitness of things had apparently not extended to bare feet, because she wore what must be knee-length nylons with her sensible sandals. With her round pink cheeks and curly white hair, she looked like a china doll in improbable dress.
“I’ve been intending to come over and welcome you back to Deer Run, but I didn’t want to intrude.” Helen sent an inquiring glance toward the house, and Rachel realized she was expected to invite her visitor in.
“You caught me just finishing some painting,” she said, indicating her paint-stained clothes. “Won’t you come inside? I’m sure I can rustle up some lemonade, if my daughter and my brother haven’t finished it.”
“No lemonade for me, thanks, but I will come in for just a moment.” Helen opened the wrought-iron gate, which squeaked in protest, and joined her on the flagstone walk. “I’m afraid you found the house in need of a great deal of work. I told Amanda and told her she should keep it up better, but she got rather...” Helen paused, as if selecting the word carefully. “Well...rather bitter toward the end, saying what difference did it make, since she had no one—”
Helen stopped, her already pink cheeks turning a deeper hue. “Well, anyway, I’m sure that was just her illness talking.”
“Most likely.” Rachel was noncommittal. Maybe Colin had been right in his offhand comment about Amanda leaving her the house to punish her. No, she wouldn’t let herself descend into that sort of cynicism.
This visit could be a blessing in disguise. If anyone knew why Amanda Mason had left her property the way she had, it would surely be Helen.
Rachel took a step to the left as they went up the stairs to the porch, making sure that Helen had the side where the railing was solid. Fixing the railing had better be promoted to the top of her to-do list.
Helen moved into the house and stopped, staring. “Oh. You’ve painted the hall. Amanda always insisted it be papered. I’m sure I don’t know what she would say.”
“I’m afraid wallpapering isn’t among my skills.” Rachel couldn’t help the stiffness in her voice. She should have expected negative comments. Mason House was a landmark in the village, and people didn’t like to see landmarks changed.
“I’m sorry, my dear.” The sudden sympathy in Helen’s voice caught her off guard. “Every time I open my mouth I put my foot in it, that’s what Amanda used to say.”
Maybe it hadn’t been an easy task, being Amanda Mason’s closest friend. Ronnie had come by his penchant for making cutting remarks from his mother, most likely.
“It’s all right.” Rachel led her guest into the front parlor, thankful that it was virtually untouched save for a vacuuming that had been desperately needed. Sunlight streamed through the windows in the circular bay, making patterns on the Oriental carpet. “It’s natural that you hate to see the house changed after all these years.”
“Well, change is inevitable, isn’t it?” Helen sat down on the curving tapestry love seat, putting her feet together and glancing with apparent satisfaction at her slacks. “I tried to tell Amanda that once, but got my nose bitten off for my trouble.”
“I suppose she preferred things the way they’d always been.” Rachel darted a glance at the portrait of her mother-in-law that hung over the mantel. Amanda, with her coronet of white hair, regal bearing and elegant bone structure, had been suited to the style of a century ago. It was impossible to imagine her wearing Helen’s current outfit.
“True enough.” Helen patted her soft white curls. “Why, she insisted on wearing a hat to church every single Sunday, even when she was the only woman in the entire congregation with a hat. So it just goes to show you, doesn’t it?” she added, a bit obscurely.
Rachel wasn’t sure what it was meant to show, other than that Amanda had the courage of her convictions. And Rachel already knew that, didn’t she? Amanda had cut off her only son without apparent regret when he married Rachel. Not even the birth of the granddaughter Ronnie had optimistically insisted on naming after her had made a difference. And that made the legacy of the house all the more inexplicable.
“I’m going to risk putting my foot in my mouth again,” Helen said, leaning toward her. “But I believe Amanda realized, once it was too late, that she’d been wrong in the way she’d treated her son.”
Rachel studied her face, but Helen seemed genuine. “Perhaps. But she never tried to get in touch with him.”
“She wouldn’t have known how to say she was sorry. Amanda wasn’t always so rigid, you know. She changed after her husband died. Dear Ronald.” Helen sighed. “He was devoted to her, and his death was such a shock.”
“He had a heart attack, didn’t he?” Ronnie had rarely spoken of his father’s death.
Helen nodded. “Right down there at the creek.” She gestured toward the rear of the house. “And then a few years later that Amish boy drowned in practically the same spot. You probably don’t remember that, do you? Anyway, I think Amanda blamed herself that she hadn’t put up a fence. Not that that would necessarily have stopped anyone from reaching the creek if they were determined to get there....”
Helen’s voice seemed to fade as she prattled on about the dangers of the small dam on the stream behind the house, while Rachel’s memory slipped backward twenty summers. She might have forgotten the death of Ronnie’s father, but the memory of Aaron Mast was clear as crystal even though she hadn’t thought of him in years. He’d been eighteen when she was ten, and she’d had the sort of crush on him that girls now seemed to have on the latest teen pop star. His death had been devastating.
She realized Helen was eyeing her curiously and knew she’d been lost in memories too long. “I do remember Aaron, yes. I didn’t realize his accident bothered Ronnie’s mother so much though.”
“She became so strict with Ronnie after that summer.” Helen’s tone was mournful. “She was overprotective, and no boy appreciates that sort of thing. And she seemed to pin all her hopes for the future on him.”
She knew this part of the story too well. “Those hopes were ruined when he ran away with me,” she said bluntly.
“Yes, well...” Again Helen seemed to search for words. “I always thought if she’d handled it better, and frankly, dear, if your parents had, as well, things might have ended differently.”
They might not have married at all—that was what Helen meant, and Rachel was mature enough now to know that was true. If it hadn’t been for so much outspoken opposition...again, that was the past. She had to concentrate on now and on the future, for her daughter.
“I knew how Amanda felt, of course. That’s why it surprised me so much when she left Mason House to me.” Rachel let the comment lie, hoping Helen would pick it up.
“I was sure she’d do the right thing in the end,” Helen said. “She might talk of leaving everything to charity, but at bottom, she’d never consider letting Mason House go out of the family. I remember the day Jacob Evans came to have her sign her will. That’s Jacob Senior, not the son who’s in the firm now. She said she’d provided for little Amanda’s education. And she was content knowing that she’d grow up in this house. ‘There’s been enough sorrow and anger in Mason House,’ she said. ‘Maybe Ronnie’s child will bring the joy back.’”
Ronnie’s child. Of course that was how Amanda would have seen it, leaving out the woman of whom she’d disapproved so completely. There would have been no thought of Rachel in her final dispositions, except as the necessary guardian of Ronnie’s child.
Well, she’d wanted to know why Amanda had left the place to her, and now she did. She could hardly complain if the answer wasn’t to her liking.
* * *
“I’M HOME.” Colin figured the announcement was hardly needed, since Duke, Dad’s elderly black lab, had given his customary woof of welcome and padded over to receive a thump on the back.
But there was no answering call from the kitchen or the study. “Where is he, Duke?” Colin walked back the hall toward the kitchen, poking his head into the study and laundry room en route, his pulse accelerating as each place he looked turned up empty. Duke padded after him, head down, as if accepting blame for his master’s absence.
Colin opened the back door for a quick look at the yard, but his father wasn’t dusting the rose bushes or checking out the young tomato plants in the garden. Colin stood for a moment, hand gripping the knob.
Okay, think. Don’t panic. If his father had fallen somewhere in the house, Duke wouldn’t be trailing along at Colin’s heels. That meant Dad had gone out.
“Did he go for a walk without you?”
Colin must be losing track of his mental facilities himself, standing here questioning the dog as if expecting an answer. Dad was an inveterate walker, but he ordinarily took the dog with him, and that fact provided Colin with a minimal measure of assurance. If Dad forgot why he’d gone out or how to get back home, something that happened at times, Duke could be relied on to pilot him safely home.
“Stay, Duke.” Leaving the dog sitting forlornly in the living room, Colin headed out the front door. He’d take the car and do a quick spin around town. No doubt he’d find his father walking casually back from the coffee shop. There was no need for the apprehension that prickled along his skin.
Rachel would hardly credit it if she could see him now, he thought wryly. In her eyes, he was obviously still the hell-raiser who’d turned his parents’ hair gray. She’d never believe he could be as panicked over his seventy-year-old father as she must sometimes be over her nine-year-old child.
He’d nearly reached the car he’d left in the driveway when another vehicle pulled in behind his. Jake Evans, driving the battered pickup he’d had since college, came to a stop. Dad sat next to him, frowning a little with that faintly lost look he’d worn so often since Mom’s death.
“Hey, Colin.” Jake slid out, going around and opening the passenger-side door before Colin could get there. “I ran into your dad down by the antique shop and gave him a lift home.” The look he sent Colin suggested there had been more to it than that, but whatever it was would keep until his father was out of earshot.
Colin nodded, caught between gratitude and grief—gratitude that most people in Deer Run seemed to accept his father’s mental lapses with kindness, and grief that his father, always so sharp and in control, had to rely on others just to find his way home.
“Why didn’t you take Duke with you, Dad?” He attempted to take his father’s arm, but Dad pulled free with a sudden spurt of independence.
“Didn’t feel like it,” he said shortly, his lean face showing irritation. “I don’t need Duke to babysit me, you know.”
Don’t you? Colin suppressed the thought. “Maybe not, but you know how hurt he is to be left behind.” Colin turned to Jake. “You should have seen that dog when I came in, head hanging like he’d done something wrong and couldn’t figure out what it was. Come on in. There’s probably some cold beer in the fridge.”
“Sounds good.” Jake fell into step with him, his faded jeans and frayed Lafayette T-shirt an ironic comment on having been recently named one of the area’s most eligible bachelors by a regional magazine.
“So, you have to beat the ladies off with a stick since that article came out?” Colin couldn’t resist needling Jake just a little.
“I should have known better than to speak to that reporter.” Jake pulled the brim of his ball cap down as if hiding his identity. “I wouldn’t have, but the senior partner insisted it was good publicity for the law firm.”
Colin grinned, appreciating the comment for the joke it was, since the senior partner in question was Jake’s father. “You sure he’s not just trying to get you married off?”
Jake shuddered elaborately. “Please, don’t say that. He reminds me every other week that I’m not getting any younger, and my mother sighs and says that all her friends are becoming grandmothers, and why can’t she?”
Why indeed? Colin’s heart cramped at the thought of his own mother. If she’d cherished dreams of grandchildren, he’d never known it.
In a few minutes they were settled in chairs on the back porch, cold cans in hand. His father, having apologized to Duke for leaving him, walked down to inspect the garden with the dog at his heels.
“He can’t hear us. What happened?” Colin focused on the beads of moisture that formed on the can, not wanting to see the sympathy in Jake’s brown eyes.
“Nothing too bad,” Jake said easily. “I happened to be passing the antique shop when I spotted him. I figured you didn’t know where he was, so I offered to drive him home.”
He gave Jake a level glance. “There’s more, right?”
Jake shrugged. “Your dad thought he recognized a bureau as belonging to his mother. Wanted it sent home right away. If Phil Nastrom had been there, he’d have known just how to handle it, but he wasn’t. The clerk was a spotty teenager who wouldn’t know a bow-front dresser from the kitchen sink, and he was getting a bit riled. I had a word with him. That’s all.”
It took an effort to unclench his teeth. “Right. Thanks, Jake. I’ll speak to Phil.”
“No problem. And you don’t need to worry about Phil. Or any of the other old-timers in town, for that matter. They know and respect your dad.”
“Yeah.” He wasn’t sure whether that made it better or worse. “Look at him.” He gestured to his father, who was tying up a tomato plant that had sagged away from its stake. “Much of the time he’s fine. It’s bad enough that he had to give up the business. I can’t take away his freedom, and he won’t hear of having anyone else in the house to look after him.” It kept Colin awake at nights, wondering what he was going to do when his father got worse, as he inevitably would.
“It’s rough.” Jake’s voice was rough, too, with the slight embarrassment guys felt when sympathy was required. “Guess it’s part of life, reaching the point that we have to take care of the parents. It just hit you earlier than most of us.”
Colin nodded. There wasn’t much else to say, and he’d do what he had to do. Right now he’d better change the conversation. It was getting downright maudlin.
“I stopped by to visit Rachel Mason today. Have you seen her since she got back?” he asked.
“No, we did most of our business in winding up the estate via emails and phone calls.” Jake set the can down on the porch floor. “I guess either Dad or I should stop to see her, since we represented old Mrs. Mason. How is Rachel doing?”
“Okay, I guess.” Actually, he doubted it, but it seemed disloyal to say too much negative. “She’s trying to fix the house up to run it as a bed-and-breakfast. Seems to me she’d be better off selling for whatever she could get. What possessed Amanda Mason to leave her that white elephant?”
“If Amanda heard you she’d be turning over in her grave.” Jake grimaced. “There’s a gruesome thought. The woman scared me to death, I don’t mind telling you. Dad did most of the dealing with her, thank goodness. The one time he took me along to introduce me, she looked at me as if I’d crawled out from under a rock.”
“She probably remembered you as one of Ronnie’s cronies, leading her lily-white boy into trouble.”
“She saved that for you, Colin, my boy. She just generally disapproved of the younger generation, which to her was anybody born after about 1950, I figure. Rachel was probably lucky Mrs. Mason cut her and Ronnie out of her life.”
“I’m not sure Rachel sees it that way.” He studied the beer can again before taking a final gulp. “So what exactly did old Amanda leave her?”
Jake squirmed in his lawn chair. “Come on, man. You’re asking me to betray a client’s confidence.”
“The client is dead, and the will is on file in the county offices. Anybody who goes in there and pays the fee can get a look at it. You’re just saving me a trip.”
“True.” It was Jake’s turn to pick up his beer and gaze at it. “The will wasn’t very complicated. Amanda wanted to put in some harsh language about her son marrying against her wishes, yada, yada, as if anybody cared, but Dad talked her out of that as undignified. In the end, she left the house and a small sum for upkeep to Rachel, not wanting Mason House to go out of the family and be cut up for offices or torn down and turned into a mini-mart.”
“Hardly likely,” Colin commented.
“No, but that was the argument Dad used to try to get her to be fair to Rachel. Even so, the amount of money she’s to receive each year will just about cover the taxes on the place. At least the old woman listened to him about the little girl and left a tidy sum in trust for her college education. The rest went to various charities, I understand.”
“Big deal. So Mandy gets to go to college, but in the meantime she and her mother can barely scrape by. Not what I call fair.”
“Hey, don’t blame me. It’s the best Dad could do, and believe me, he had to fight for that much.” Jake looked defensive. “Why do you care so much, anyway? I know you and Ronnie were good buds in high school, but a lot of water has gone over the dam since then.”
He shrugged, having no desire to look too closely into his feelings. “No big deal. Like you said, Ronnie was a friend. I figure I owe Rachel a little support.”
He’d failed to do the right thing when he was eighteen. If he hadn’t been so intent on following that mysterious code by which teenagers lived, he might have prevented Ronnie and Rachel from a decision that had messed up several lives, as far as he could tell.
That wasn’t his only failure, of course. He was doing his best to make amends for not being here when his parents needed him. Now he had a chance to make amends to Rachel, as well, if he could figure out how. And if she would let him.
CHAPTER THREE
THE WOMAN COMING out of the market stared at Rachel with such curiosity that Rachel almost felt compelled to explain her presence. She’d forgotten that open curiosity about one’s neighbors wasn’t just tolerated in a small community like Deer Run, it was also expected. Ushering Mandy ahead of her, she slipped into the store and let the door close behind her with a jingle of its bell.
“Wow. What a cool store. Did you used to come here when you were a little girl, Mommy?” Mandy stared with fascination at a case labeled Live Bait, and Rachel suspected a question about that was coming up next.
“I did, yes. But it’s bigger now than it used to be.”
It looked as if Anna and Jacob Miller had expanded their modest grocery into the next storefront, with a whole section devoted to crafts and trinkets of the sort beloved of tourists. In a few steps Mandy, forgetting live bait, had become absorbed by a display of small wooden Amish dolls.
“Rachel Mason!” The voice boomed from the counter at the rear of the shop. “It wondered me when you’d get in here to say hello to old friends.”
“Anna.” A trickle of thankfulness ran through her at the warmth in Anna Miller’s voice. “It is wonderful gut to see you.”
She lapsed automatically into Pennsylvania Dutch and then caught herself. She’d told herself she would speak English in front of Mandy when they came back here, but she hadn’t realized how difficult it would be.
Catching Mandy’s hand, she led her daughter to the counter. “This is my little girl, Mandy. Mandy, this is Mrs. Miller.”
“Ach, I would know her for yours in a minute.” Anna beamed with satisfaction. “Mandy, do you know you look just like your mammi did at your age?”
Mandy blinked, looking at her mother as if assessing the truth of the claim. “Do I? I haven’t ever seen any pictures of Mommy when she was nine, so I didn’t know.”
“Ach, no, you wouldn’t.” Anna had the trick of talking to a child as if they were contemporaries, which had always made her a favorite with the young ones. “Your mammi was brought up Amish, like me. We don’t hold with taking photographs of people.”
A gesture indicated Anna’s blue dress and matching apron. There were more strands of gray in the brown hair smoothed back under Anna’s kapp, and she’d added another chin or two to her round face, but otherwise she was much as Rachel remembered her.
“Why?” Mandy was being curious, that was all, but had such a blunt question of an adult come from an Amish child, it would have earned a quick reprimand from a parent.
“I’ll tell you all about it later,” Rachel said quickly. “You can go and look at the dolls while Mrs. Miller and I talk.”
The flash in Mandy’s intelligent eyes said she knew when she was being gotten rid of, but she returned to the display counter.
“You’ve expanded the shop, I see,” Rachel said quickly. “Business must be good.”
“So-so.” Anna waggled her hand. “We get more tourists through Deer Run than we used to, so I told Jacob we had to take advantage of the trade. And there’s talk that the gas drilling they’re doing north of here will come to this area, too. That will bring in new people, I should think.”
“Do folks want to see that happen here?” From the little she’d read, it sounded as if the new methods of gas drilling caused considerable controversy.
“Some do, some don’t.” Anna’s face clouded. “The bishop fears the effect of easy money on the Leit.”
The Leit. The Amish. She hadn’t heard that expression in years. And the bishop had a typically Amish attitude, which ran exactly counter to contemporary culture, in a case like this. Making money too easily, or becoming what the world would call a success, could have a bad effect on humility, that typically Amish virtue.
“I’d think it safer to count on the tourists,” she said.
“Ja, we do. As you will, too. I hear you are going to open Mason House as a bed-and-breakfast, ain’t so?”
She nodded. News spread fast in a place like Deer Run. She’d only mentioned her plans to Colin yesterday. Of course, Anna would probably have heard through Rachel’s family, not Colin.
“I hope so. I don’t know what else to do with a house that size. It’s way too big for the two of us.” Something Amanda Mason had certainly known when she’d left her property as she had.
Anna nodded. “It’s a gut plan, I think. And it will keep you here, where you belong.”
“I’m afraid not everyone thinks I belong here.” The words slipped out before she could caution herself that they were unwise.
“Don’t you think such a thing. Your daadi will come around, you wait and see.” Anna didn’t bother pretending she didn’t know what Rachel meant. “He is being as stubborn as old Mrs. Mason, and she accepted you in the end, ja?”
Rachel wasn’t sure accepted was the right word, but she nodded. “I hope. So far Benj is the only one acting normal around me. And now you.”
“Not chust me,” Anna responded quickly. “You have plenty of friends here who will be glad to see you. And when you’re ready to open, I will be mentioning your B and B to every tourist who comes in here. Folks will want to stay at a place run by somebody raised Amish. You’ll see.”
That comment stirred up more concerns. “I wouldn’t want anyone to think I’m trying to make money out of having been Amish.”
Anna spread plump hands, palms up. “Why not? Everyone else does, it seems. Folks say the tourists are going to komm anyway. We might as well make some money off them.”
Anna had a point. It seemed she would have to get rid of any squeamish scruples if she intended to make a go of the business.
The bell jingled, and Anna glanced automatically toward the door. “Remember what I was saying about your friends? Here is one, I see. You remember Meredith King, ja?” She raised her voice. “Meredith, look who is here. You and Rachel were great friends when you were little girls, I remember.”
Rachel turned, surveying the woman who stood giving her the once-over in return. Meredith King. Meredith lived just two houses down from Mason House, so she was practically a neighbor now.
The friendship Anna mentioned hadn’t actually lasted very long, but Rachel’s memories of her Englisch friend were oddly distinct. Meredith might no longer wear torn-at-the-knees jeans and faded T-shirts, but her glossy dark brown hair was the same, worn sleekly straight to curve around a fine-boned face.
Meredith’s chocolate-colored eyes seemed to warm when they rested on her. “Rachel, is it really you? I could hardly believe it when I heard you were coming back to Deer Run.”
Rachel felt herself stiffen. “Brave of me, do you think?”
A delicate pink bloomed in Meredith’s cheeks. “I didn’t mean it that way. But if I managed to escape Deer Run, I wouldn’t be coming back in a hurry.”
Before Rachel could think of a proper response, Meredith had turned to Anna. “A quart of the goat’s milk for my mother, please. And if Rachel has time, a couple of coffees and sweet rolls.”
She glanced at Rachel. “Please? I can’t let you get away without a talk after all this time. And Anna has the best coffee and sweet rolls in town.” She gestured toward an area beyond the counter, which Rachel now realized was fitted with a few round tables and chairs, another addition since her time.
“Sounds great. But I have my daughter with me. Let me see if she’s ready for something to drink.” She went quickly to Mandy with the question, but her daughter was busy fitting the pieces of a miniature wooden train together.
“Not now, Mommy.” Mandy didn’t bother to do more than glance up.
“I’ll be over at the table if you change your mind.” It seldom worked well to try to distract Mandy from her single-minded absorption in the fascination of the moment.
The coffee and rolls were already on the table by the time Rachel joined Meredith, the rolls the traditional spirals oozing with so much brown sugar and cinnamon that her hands would need a thorough scrubbing afterward.
“She reminds me of you at that age.” Meredith watched Mandy, smiling slightly. “Sweet and serious.”
“Mandy has a mischievous side, as well.” Rachel put a spoonful of sugar in her coffee and stirred. “But then I guess I did, too.”
“As I recall, you were the one who talked us into catching minnows in the creek when I had a good dress on,” Meredith said. “Not that I wasn’t just as happy to get rid of that ruffled number my mother had picked out.”
“I think you fell in the mud on purpose.” Amazing, how easy it was to slip back to that relationship they’d had twenty summers ago. “I see you’re picking your own clothes now.” She nodded at Meredith’s softly tailored shirt, worn with a single gold chain and a neat pair of tan slacks.
“Eventually even my mother had to admit that I wasn’t the frilly sort.” Meredith raised an eyebrow. “But your change in dress is more serious. How is your family adjusting to having you back again?”
Rachel shrugged. True, her denim skirt and plain cotton shirt were modest, but they were a far cry from Amish clothing. “Mixed reception, I guess. Mammi is glad to see Mandy, I’m sure, but Daad and my brother Mose gave me a distant nod the one time I saw them.”
She made an effort not to let the hurt show in her voice, but she had a feeling Meredith saw through it. Her face warmed with sympathy.
“What about your sisters? And the little brother...Benjamin, is it?”
Rachel nodded. “Benj, yes. He’s the only one who acts normally around me.” Except for those odd moments of fear and tension that still worried her. “The girls are like Mamm. Cautious.”
“I’m sorry,” Meredith said softly. “I know what it’s like to turn to a parent who’s not there.”
“I heard about your father’s death. I’m so sorry for your loss. You were still in college then, weren’t you?” Meredith had always been her father’s girl. She must have taken his passing hard.
Meredith nodded, staring absently down at her cup. “I still miss him. And my mother...well, she relies on me. So I’m still here.”
Something about her tone explained Meredith’s odd phrasing when she’d spoken of escaping Deer Run. She’d been talking about herself, not Rachel.
“Do you have a job here?” Jobs in Deer Run were few and far between, she’d think, it not being exactly a thriving metropolis.
“I’m an accountant. I have an office at the house, although sometimes I work on site at some of the small businesses I deal with.” Meredith’s voice was carefully expressionless, but Rachel suspected she knew whose idea it was that Meredith’s office should be at home, and she wasn’t sure how to respond. Mrs. King had always been the clinging sort.
Fortunately, Meredith didn’t seem to expect a response. She was watching Mandy again, amusement in her gaze. “Is she as imaginative as we were at that age?”
“I guess so. Although I don’t think she could possibly be as imaginative as we were that summer we were ten.” Rachel smiled, too, remembering.
“That was mainly Lainey Colton’s fault,” Meredith said. “She was the only kid I ever met who could create a fantasy world as real as that one was. We basically lived in Lainey’s world that whole summer.”
“Knights and fairies and dragons...trust me, that’s not the usual imaginative fare for Amish children. Maybe that was why it enthralled me so much.”
And it was equally unusual for an Amish child to spend so much time with two Englisch friends, but Mamm had been preoccupied in helping to care for Aunt Hannah, who’d been ordered bed rest during a difficult pregnancy, and she’d just been happy to have her children out from underfoot. Besides, Mamm had considered she had a duty to Lainey’s Amish great-aunt to provide a suitable companion for her visitor.
“It seems strange now, not seeing Lainey at all since that summer,” Meredith said. “We wrote for a while after she moved back with her mother, but then we lost touch.”
Rachel nodded. “The same with me. That whole summer was just...different.”
“Different,” Meredith echoed. “Remember how Lainey insisted Aaron Mast was an enchanted prince? And we followed him around for weeks, looking for a way to break the spell?”
“I remember.” Aaron Mast, with his golden hair, even features, kind blue eyes—he’d been the perfect Prince Charming for three imaginative young girls. He’d probably never known, from the lofty heights of his eighteen years, how they’d felt about him.
Rachel drew in a long breath and blew it out in something that was almost a sigh. She hadn’t thought of Aaron in years, and now he’d come up twice in two days.
“And then he drowned.” Meredith shook her head. “When I look back at it, it seems to me the summer ended then. Our prince was dead, the parents clamped down on where we were as if we might fall into the dam as well and Lainey was sent back to her mother. The magic was over.”
Over and forgotten, Rachel thought. And there was no reason at all for the odd foreboding at the back of her mind.
* * *
COLIN GLANCED INTO the window of Millers’ store and stopped dead. Duke, strolling at his side, gave him a reproachful look and then sat down, leaning heavily against his leg.
Rachel Mason and Meredith King sat at one of the small round tables, heads together, talking. Something teased at his memory—an image of them as little girls, busily building a tree house in the massive oak tree in the side yard of the King house. It looked as if Rachel had found an old friend.
They were getting up now, obviously saying goodbye. With a sudden decision, he moved to the door and stood waiting for Rachel to come out.
She and Mandy emerged a few minutes later. Rachel’s eyes narrowed a bit at the sight of him, but all of Mandy’s attention was for Duke.
“What a nice dog. Is he yours? What’s his name? Can I pet him?” Mandy pelted him with questions, not bothering with pleasantries.
“Yes. Duke. And yes, he’d like to be petted,” he said, smiling at the child’s enthusiasm.
“Nice dog,” Mandy crooned, dropping to her knees beside the dog and stroking his glossy black fur. “You’re such a good boy, Duke.”
Duke, a sucker for compliments, obliged with a gentle nuzzling of Mandy’s neck.
“Look, Mommy, he likes me.” Mandy shot a glance at her mother. “See, I’m really good with dogs. If I had a puppy—”
“We’ll talk about it later.” Rachel sounded as if that conversation was one they’d already had several times. “Say goodbye to Duke now. We need to get home.” She shifted a bag of groceries to her other arm to reach for her daughter’s hand.
He forestalled her by giving Mandy the leash. “We’ll walk along with you, and you can lead Duke. He needs a walk.”
“Can I really? Wow, thank you.” The warmth in Mandy’s little face made her response more than just the polite words of a well-brought-up child.
“Sure. And I’ll carry your mom’s package.” He reached for Rachel’s bag. She pulled away from him, but he didn’t drop his hand. “Come on, now,” he said softly. “You know perfectly well I can’t walk you home with you carrying the groceries and my hands free. What would people think of me?”
“You don’t need to be walking me...us...home at all.” Rachel’s pointed chin set stubbornly.
“Sure I do.” He nodded to Mandy, already ten yards ahead of them on the sidewalk. “Mandy has my dog.”
“You know perfectly well—” She stopped, maybe realizing how silly it sounded. “Oh, all right.” She surrendered the bag. “If you must.”
Satisfied, he fell into step with her. “You know, I’ll start thinking you don’t like me if you keep going on this way.”
“I—” She stopped, seeming to change her mind about what she was going to say. “I wouldn’t want people to start talking. That’s all.”
“Because I walked beside you and carried your groceries?” He raised an eyebrow. “We’re not ten, and I’m not carrying your books home from school.”
The warm peach of her skin seemed to deepen. “No. But you know how people talk in Deer Run. You just said it yourself, remember?”
“True.” He could hardly deny it. “But you can’t stop meeting old friends because of what people might say. I saw you and Meredith getting reacquainted,” he added quickly, before she could remind him that they’d never exactly been friends.
“It was nice to see Meredith again.” She took the diversion with a slight frown. “I was a little surprised she’s still living at home.”
“Are you kidding? With that mother of hers? Margo King has been a professional hypochondriac all her life. She used that to keep poor old John dancing attendance on her, and now that he’s gone, she’s guilted Meredith into taking his place.”
Rachel darted a glance his way. “Cynical, aren’t you?”
He shrugged. “I call ’em as I see ’em. If you’re around them very long, you’ll see for yourself. Everyone in town knows what Meredith’s mother is like except Meredith.”
“I doubt that everyone in town is as cynical as you are.”
There was that word again. Was he cynical? He didn’t think so. At least, not about Rachel and her daughter.
“Just wait and see,” he said. “By the way, what’s going on with that little brother of yours?”
“Benj?” Rachel’s deep blue eyes widened. “Why? What have you heard?” The questions had a sharp edge of emotion. Was it fear? Surely not.
“Take it easy.” He lifted his free hand in a gesture of surrender. “I just meant that I expected him to stop around and mow the grass today, but he didn’t show up. Why are you worried about him?” He turned the question back on her.
“I’m not.” She made an unsuccessful attempt to mask the anxiety in her face.
“You know, you’re really not very good at telling fibs. You ought to practice a bit more.”
“I’m not interested in telling fibs.” The color came up in her cheeks again. “I don’t know why Benj didn’t show up. I’ll speak to him about it. He shouldn’t slack off on his work.”
“Spoken like a true big sister,” he said. “You don’t need to bug the boy about it. But you are worried about him, aren’t you?”
He waited, wondering if she’d try to lie again.
Rachel was silent for a moment, her gaze seeming fixed on her daughter. Mandy had stopped on the walk in front of Jeannette Walker’s B and B, and she seemed to be telling Duke something to which he listened intently, his head cocked to one side.
Finally Rachel shook her head, sighing a little. “Maybe I’m imagining things. After all, I don’t know Benj very well.” The words contained a wealth of regret. “But he seems to be frightened of something. And he’s keeping it secret, whatever it is.”
He nodded, unable to dismiss her concern. “I’ve noticed it, as well. He’s not in trouble with your dad, is he?”
“Not that I know of. I just wish he’d talk to me about it. Or somebody else, if not me.”
“Don’t start blaming yourself. Teenage boys don’t confide readily in anyone older. Probably teenage girls are the same, but I can only speak for the boys.” He tried a smile, hoping to lighten the moment.
“You were never an Amish teenager.”
“Boys are boys, Amish or Englisch,” he retorted. Maybe he didn’t want to start talking about being a teenager with Rachel. There were too many minefields in that topic, like what had happened between them one summer afternoon. “Looks like Duke’s making himself right at home.”
He nodded toward Mason House, looming ahead of them like a monster ready to consume anyone foolish enough to count on it. Duke had flopped to his side on the porch floor, with Mandy sitting next to him. His head rested on her leg, and he wore a blissful expression as she petted him.
“Mandy loves dogs. She’ll be pretending he’s hers in no time at all.”
“She ought to have a puppy,” he said, hardly thinking of what he was saying because he was so lost in Rachel’s expression when she looked at her child. “You had plenty of animals to take care of at that age.”
“I lived on a farm,” she reminded him. “If we got a dog I’d have to be certain it wouldn’t disturb the guests. Or frighten them.”
“You could keep a dog away from the guests, I’d think. And it would be a little added security for you and Mandy, if you’re determined to stay here alone.”
“There’s nothing to be frightened of in Deer Run. I don’t need a dog for security.”
He held the gate open for her. “Times have changed. Even Deer Run is affected by the modern world, whether it looks like it or not.”
Rachel seemed to shrug that off. She stopped at the porch steps and held out her hands for the grocery bag. “Thank you. I’ll take that now.”
“I’ll carry it in for you.” He went up the steps. “Maybe you’d be kind enough to give Duke a drink before we finish our walk,” he suggested, aiming the words more at Mandy than her mother.
“I’ll do it.” Mandy leaped to her feet. “Hurry and open the door, Mommy. I have to get Duke a pan of water.”
Rachel sent him a glance that mingled reproach with giving in. “All right. Let me get my keys.”
He had his hand on the knob while she was fumbling in her bag for the keys. It turned under the pressure of his fingers, and the stained-glass paneled door swung open.
“Looks as if you forgot to lock it,” he commented, pushing the door the rest of the way.
Rachel stood where she was, blue eyes darkening. “I’m sure I locked the door before we left. How can it be open?”
CHAPTER FOUR
COLIN GRASPED THE doorknob, holding the door ajar while he studied Rachel’s face. She obviously believed what she was saying, but was that realistic? Wasn’t it far more likely that she’d just forgotten to lock the door?
“Maybe the lock didn’t catch when you went out,” he said, trying for diplomacy.
Rachel’s expression said she knew exactly what he was thinking. “I did not forget to lock the door, and I double-checked it when I left. You learn that much, living in the city.”
Before he could answer, Mandy wedged herself between them, reaching for the door. “Let me go in, please, Mommy. I want to get a drink for Duke.”
Rachel grasped her daughter’s shoulders in a quick, protective movement. Obviously his idea was backfiring.
“I’ll bet there’s an outside faucet somewhere near the flower beds,” he suggested. “Why don’t you use that one? You don’t want Duke’s muddy paws in your house.”
Duke’s paws weren’t really muddy, but maybe that would distract the child from getting in before he’d had a chance to check the house.
“That’s a good idea,” Rachel said, seconding him before Mandy could object. “Remember the faucet and bucket where Benj washed the brushes? You can use that one.”
“I remember.” Mandy darted off the porch with Duke lumbering after her. Poor old boy was getting more exercise than he’d expected, but at least it got Mandy out of the way.
“I suppose Benj might have come over.” Rachel reached for the door, obviously intending to see for herself.
Colin grasped her hand to forestall her and felt an almost visceral jolt at the brief contact. Rachel’s gaze met his, her blue eyes seeming to widen before she dropped her gaze.
“Let me,” he said. Before she could argue the point, he pushed open the door and stepped inside the entrance hall. He stood for a moment, listening, effectively blocking the door so that Rachel couldn’t rush in behind him.
Nothing. The staircase, with its mahogany railing, wound upward in silence; the rooms to either side of the hallway stood empty and still. The house seemed to be holding its breath, waiting.
He shook off the fancy. “Doesn’t look like anything’s disturbed.” He moved to the console table, letting Rachel come in behind him. “Except this.” He gestured to the table, where a paper-wrapped sheaf of pink roses lay next to a basket of fruit, their fragrance perfuming the air.
Rachel stared at the roses as if they hid a snake. “Someone’s been in here.”
She still seemed upset out of proportion to the cause, and he reminded himself to proceed cautiously. The little he knew of her life in recent years didn’t encourage him to think it had been free of trouble. Experience had probably convinced her that surprises were usually unpleasant.
“Maybe one of the other doors was unlocked,” he suggested. “Anyway, people bearing fruit and flowers rarely have malicious intent, ain’t so?”
His use of the familiar Pennsylvania Dutch tag was intended to break the tension, and it seemed to. Rachel’s lips softened a bit, even if she didn’t manage a smile.
“I guess you’re right. Denke, Colin. I’m being silly. I—”
The sound of a footstep in the kitchen cut off whatever she’d been going to say. With a quick, instinctive movement he closed the space between them.
And then felt foolish when the swinging door to the back of the house opened to reveal Jeannette Walker, holding a milk-glass vase in one hand.
“Rachel, there you are. Hello, Colin.” Jeannette came toward them quickly, apparently oblivious of having caused any alarm. “I stopped by to say welcome.” She gestured with the vase. “Just looking for something to put the roses in. A bed-and-breakfast doesn’t look welcoming without flowers, I find.”
“They’re beautiful, Ms. Walker.” Rachel recovered her powers of speech. “It’s so kind of you to bring them.”
“Not at all. I know Amanda let the flower beds go terribly in recent years.” Jeannette was at her most gracious—the successful innkeeper welcoming a newcomer who would be no competition at all.
While the women fussed over the arrangement of roses in the vase Colin scrutinized Jeannette, wondering what her agenda was. Prior experience of Jeannette Walker told him she always had an agenda. Whether it was a question of the right Christmas decorations for the village stores or the advisability of allowing a billboard at the edge of town, Jeannette rammed her wishes through with such subtlety that few people even realized they’d been manipulated.
The iron fist in the velvet glove—that was Jeannette. She wore her usual uniform of tailored slacks and sweater set with pearls—apparently what she considered proper attire for her position, winter or summer. She was only in her mid-forties, probably, but her tightly permed curls and carefully outlined lips made her look older.
Jeannette turned toward him as if she’d read his thoughts. “Colin, I’m surprised you’re not working today. But then, I suppose the real estate business is rather slow at the moment.”
He just smiled, inured to Jeannette’s petty barbs. “Or I might be so busy that I needed a day off. Hard to tell, isn’t it?”
Jeannette gave a slight sniff, dismissing him, and turned to Rachel. “Now, I want you to feel free to call on me anytime for advice. It’s so complicated to set up a B and B—all those tax rules and safety regulations, the advertising, the record-keeping. And there’s the difficulty of maintaining a web presence, because of course that’s how everyone shops these days, even for vacations. And setting up online reservations can be such a nightmare. Believe me, I know how overwhelming it can be for someone with little experience.”
If Rachel hadn’t been overwhelmed before, she looked it now after Jeannette’s recital of the tasks ahead of her.
“Just ask me for advice anytime,” Jeannette reiterated on her way to the door. “I’m here to help.”
Rachel stammered out a goodbye, and the door closed behind Jeannette.
“Help herself, more likely,” he commented, his tone caustic.
“She was being nice,” Rachel said. “Do you always have to be so cynical?”
That wasn’t the first time she’d accused of that particular fault. “Didn’t you see what Jeannette was doing? You...”
He stopped, seeming to hear an echo of Ronnie’s voice in his words. Ronnie, berating Rachel for something left undone on that one occasion he’d visited them after they’d married. Ronnie, turning his caustic wit against the woman who was working a menial job to help support their little family.
“Sorry.” He really did have to watch what he said. “I guess you got enough cynicism from Ronnie to last you a lifetime.”
Rachel’s chin lifted. “You can keep your sympathy to yourself. You don’t know anything at all about our marriage.”
“Don’t I?” His temper flared at that. “I know what I saw. You working like a slave to keep food on the table and Ronnie using that sharp tongue of his to cut you to ribbons, blaming you...”
He stopped, knowing he’d gone too far.
Pain and embarrassment chased each other across Rachel’s face, but then her shoulders squared. “If that’s what you thought of us, I’m not surprised you never came back for another visit.”
He reached out and grasped her wrist, feeling her pulse beating hard against his palm. “I didn’t come back because if I had, I wouldn’t have been able to resist the urge to knock Ronnie’s block off. And maybe a little healthy cynicism would be good for you.”
For a moment they stared at each other, and it seemed to him that the very air echoed with the beat of her pulse. Then she wrenched her hand free, the color coming up in her cheeks.
“You—”
The front door swung open to admit child and dog. “Duke had his drink. And I wiped his paws off, honest I did, Mommy.”
With a fulminating look at him, Rachel turned to her daughter. “That’s fine, dear. I don’t mind Duke coming in, but give the leash to Mr. McDonald now. He has to go.”
Mandy handed it over with a slight pout. “Come again soon, okay?”
“Sure thing, Mandy.” He glanced at Rachel. Her lips were pressed tightly together. “Hard not to say what you think, isn’t it?” he asked.
She unclenched her jaw. “Goodbye, Colin.”
* * *
MANDY CHATTERED ABOUT Colin’s dog all through supper, making it impossible for Rachel to stop thinking about him. Colin, that is. Not the dog. Of course Duke was the only thing on her daughter’s mind. Mandy had been asking for a puppy since she learned to talk, it sometimes seemed.
When they lived in the city, Rachel had found that a reasonable excuse not to burden herself with a dog. Now that they were ensconced in Deer Run, that reason no longer applied. She’d either have to come up with another one or give in.
Colin’s suggestion that a dog would provide protection for her and Mandy might have some validity, although she hated to admit that since it came from him. She’d been frightened, almost irrationally so, to find the door unlocked and someone in the house, even so benign a visitor as Jeannette. Maybe Benj’s fears were rubbing off on her.
Rachel carried dishes to the sink and turned on the hot water. They were eating in the kitchen, since it seemed silly for the two of them to sit in that formal dining room. Besides, it was the most cheerful room in the house, with its white walls and blue-and-white checked curtains at the many-paned south-facing windows. Some geraniums would probably do well on the two sills, distracting the eye from the faded linoleum on the floor and a gas range so elderly that it made her nervous every time she turned it on. Benj had lit it for her the first time, laughing at her fears.
Benj hadn’t come over today, unless he’d been here while she and Mandy were out. That was unusual. He’d stopped by every day since she’d moved in.
Mandy carried her plate carefully to the sink and handed it to Rachel. “I’ll clear the table, Mommy. Okay?”
“Okay. Thanks, sweetheart.” She loved it when Mandy helped without waiting to be asked, although a slight suspicion lurked at the back of her mind that Mandy might be intent on showing that she was mature enough for a puppy.
“Is Duke an old dog?” Mandy set her milk glass on the counter with a slight clink.
“I don’t know. What makes you ask that?”
“He has some gray hair on his face. I thought maybe that meant he was old.”
“You’re very observant.” She tugged at one of the ponytails Mandy wore today. “You can ask—”
A knock at the back door interrupted her. Maybe Benj, although he usually just opened the door and shouted. She hurried to the door, wiping her hands on a dish towel, and pulled it open. A cheerful greeting died on her lips. It wasn’t Benj. It was her father.
“Daadi.” The word came out as something of a croak. “I didn’t expect...come in, please.” She stepped back, gesturing toward the kitchen, trying to talk naturally around the lump in her throat. If her father was ready to accept her...
But he was already shaking his head at the invitation, his dark blue eyes distant. Ten years hadn’t really changed him much, save for a few gray hairs in the brown beard that reached his chest and a few more wrinkles around his eyes. His summer straw hat sat squarely on his head, looking exactly like the straw hats he’d worn since she could remember, and his suspenders crossed shoulders that were still strong.
“I am looking for Benjamin.” He clipped off the words. “He is here, ja?”
Rachel blinked a little, shaking her head. “We haven’t seen him today. Is something wrong?” She felt a small hand slip into hers. Mandy had come to stand next to her. She didn’t speak, but she studied her grandfather curiously.
“Nothing.” His expression belied the word, but it was clear that he wasn’t going to confide in her. Still, the very fact that he’d come to her door made it clear that he was worried about Benj. “He missed his supper, and his mamm is fretting about it.”
“Is Benj in trouble for missing supper?” Mandy asked.
Her father stared at Mandy for a moment, and Rachel had a sense that his expression was softening. “Not in trouble. But he should tell his mammi if he is going to be late, ja?”
“Ja,” she echoed.
Daad raised his hand in a slight gesture, as if about to touch Mandy’s face. Then he let it drop to his side and turned away.
Rachel’s heart cramped. Daadi, I know I broke your heart when I ran away. But I’m back now. Can’t we be friends, at least, for Mandy’s sake?
She wouldn’t say it, because she was afraid to hear his response.
“If I see Benj...” she began.
“If you see him, send him home. He has missed his supper.”
“I’ll tell him.” But she was talking to her father’s back as he walked away.
Rachel closed the door. She had known it wouldn’t be easy, coming back. She just hadn’t thought it would cause so much pain.
“Mommy, why doesn’t he like us?” Mandy didn’t sound hurt so much as curious.
“He doesn’t dislike us, sweetheart.” She picked her way through the thicket of explaining incomprehensible adult behavior to a child. “You see, he and my mother were really hurt when I ran away from them to marry your daddy. I think it’s hard for him to forget that.”
“Well, but you’re back now.” Mandy’s tone was practical. “I wish we could make up and be friends. Then I’d have a grandpa and grandma like everybody else.”
“I wish that, too.” She couldn’t let Mandy see her pain, because it was important that Mandy know she could count on her mother to be strong. “Maybe it will happen. We just have to be patient.”
Mandy stared at her for a long moment in much the same way she’d studied Daadi. “I’ll try,” she said finally, as if being patient was the hardest thing in the world. Well, maybe it was to a nine-year-old.
Rachel managed a smile. “Now, why don’t you find something to do while I finish up the dishes? Maybe we’ll have time for a game afterward.”
Mandy nodded. “I know just what to do. I’m going to make a picture of Duke. I’ll show you when I’m done.” She darted off, the kitchen door swinging behind her.
Rachel stared at the sink. She ought to get moving on the dishes. She ought to do a lot of things, but right now all she could think about was Benj. Her parents had to be very worried indeed for her father to come to her door.
The back window looked out over the outbuildings and beyond them to the creek and the covered bridge that crossed it, delineating Amish farms from the village proper. Daad had already appeared on the other side of the covered bridge. He paused for a moment, looking downstream, and fear curled inside her. Twenty yards or so beyond the bridge the stream tumbled over the small dam that had been there as long as anyone could remember. Pearson’s Dam, it was called, but she had no idea who Pearson had been. The dam wasn’t more than three feet high, but the force of water was such that a person could be swept under by it as if caught in a riptide. That was what had happened to Aaron Mast.
But Daad was walking on, heading for the stretch of woods along the south pasture. Obviously there had been no one at the dam.
Still, the fear was admitted, wasn’t easily dismissed. She ought to do something, but what?
A memory slid into her mind as if it had been waiting for the chance. Colin had said he’d expected Benj to show up to work on the lawn. Maybe that was the answer.
Without giving herself time to think about it, she went quickly to the telephone in the hallway. It was the work of a moment to look up Colin’s number and punch the buttons. If Colin thought she was making an excuse to call him—
She nearly hung up at that thought, but she already heard his voice in her ear.
“Colin, it’s Rachel Mason. I’m sorry to bother you, but is Benj at your place, by any chance? My father is looking for him.”
“He’s not here now. Let me ask my father if he came over earlier.”
She heard the sound of muffled voices and could tell that the answer was negative even before Colin came back on the line.
“Dad hasn’t seen him today. Is something wrong?” His voice deepened on the question, and she knew he was revisiting their earlier conversation about Benj.
“No...no, nothing.” That wasn’t quite true, but it also wasn’t Colin’s business.
“Come on, Rachel. You wouldn’t be calling me if nothing was wrong, now would you?” Something that might have been amusement threaded the concern in his tone. “What is it?”
“My daad stopped by to see if Benj was here, that’s all. He didn’t come home for supper. It’s not exactly earthshaking.” She tried to sound as if she were taking Benj’s absence lightly and was afraid she didn’t succeed.
“I’ll come over,” Colin said instantly, proving that she hadn’t deceived him.
“No, don’t do that. He’s probably turned up by now.” She rushed the words, regretting that she had called. “Thanks.” She hung up quickly, before Colin could say anything else.
Walking to the rear window, Rachel peered out. She couldn’t see her father now. Had he gone back to the house? Or had he walked into the woods beyond the pasture?
Standing here worrying wasn’t helping. She went quickly to the bottom of the stairs. “Mandy, I’m going outside for a minute. I’ll be right back.” Her voice seemed to bounce around the turn in the stairs.
“Okay, Mommy.”
Judging by the sound, Mandy was in her room, probably hard at work on the promised picture. Since that room overlooked the willow on the side of the house, Mandy would be unlikely to see her in the backyard, looking...well, she wasn’t sure where she was going to look. She just knew that doing nothing wasn’t an option.
Pulling on the navy windbreaker that hung in the back hall, Rachel slipped out the back door. The sun was just beginning to disappear behind the ridge, and she knew how quickly darkness could claim the valley after sunset. The air was already cooling, and she was glad of the jacket.
The garage, the old stable, other outbuildings she hadn’t yet identified—there were plenty of places for a skinny teenager to hide, even without going into the woods. But why was she thinking about hiding? Logically speaking, Benj had no reason to hide, but fear wasn’t logical, and she had seen fear in her little brother’s eyes lately, no matter how he tried to hide it.
She walked past the outbuildings toward the covered bridge. Daad had already looked there, of course. She’d seen him. But that didn’t stop her from wanting to have a quick glance herself.
The inside of the one-lane bridge was already dark, with the arched opening at the other showing an empty stretch of lane. The covered bridge had only one window cut into the side that looked downstream. It was a simple, utilitarian structure, built over a century ago to provide both access to the village from the farms and to give farmers a place to shelter a loaded wagon in case of a storm.
Rachel put one hand against a rough-hewn timber and shivered. When she was young, she’d seen the bridge as her gateway to the world. Now it seemed a barrier, cutting her off from what had once been so familiar.
Shaking away the thought, she turned back the way she’d come. She stepped out of the bridge and found herself face-to-face with Colin. Her breath caught.
“What are you doing here?” That came out more sharply than it should have, probably.
“Has Benj turned up yet?” He answered with a question of his own.
She shook her head. Surely Daad would let her know if Benj had been found. He’d know she was worried.
“I’m sure he’s fine. Goodness, he’s fourteen, not four.” But she couldn’t prevent a sideways glance down toward the dam, spilling over into its pool.
“You’re imagining him falling over the dam. Not very likely.”
Colin was quick as a cat, and it annoyed her that he read her so easily.
“No, of course not. Someone mentioned the deaths that have happened there, and I guess it was in my mind, that’s all.”
“Deaths?” Colin frowned for a moment. “Aaron Mast, I remember his drowning. And there was a story before that of an Amish girl who’d drowned—I think the grown-ups just used that to scare us away.”
“I didn’t hear about that one. Maybe my parents didn’t think I needed scaring. But what about Ronnie’s dad?”
Colin just stared at her for a moment, and then he frowned. “He didn’t drown. He was fishing in the pond, I think, and he had a heart attack.”
“I don’t know why we’re talking about that, anyway.” She took a step toward the house, rubbing her arms. The sun had completed its descent, taking the warmth of the day with it. “Benj isn’t there, and wherever he is...” She let that trail off. Where was he?
“I know where he might be,” Colin said.
She whirled on him. “If you know, why didn’t you say so, instead of upsetting me with talk about people drowning? Where is he?”
“I said might.” Colin nodded toward the stable. “I happened to see him in there yesterday. Let’s have a look.”
He led the way, moving so quickly that she had to hurry to keep up. “I don’t see why—” she began, but he gestured her to be quiet.
The door was partially open. Why hadn’t she noticed that before? Colin stepped inside, and she followed him.
The dusty windows let in very little light. She blinked, trying to get her eyes to adjust to the dimness. Castoff furniture and boxes containing who knows what were stacked so high that they loomed like creatures preparing to attack.
A click, and then light blossomed, turning the lurking shadows into a pathetic collection of junk. Colin had obviously brought a flashlight. He aimed the beam on a narrow passageway between the crates.
“Come on out, Benj,” he said. “I know you’re in here.”
Nothing. Silence, save for some vague creaks. She shook her head. “This isn’t doing any good.”
Colin ignored her, bending to focus the flashlight beam into the hole. “Don’t make me come in there after you. It wouldn’t be a pretty sight.”
She started to turn away and then swung back at a scuffling noise, her breath catching. Benj came crawling slowly out into the light, blinking as if he were a mole hauled into the daylight.
“Ja, all right. I am here.”
Rachel grabbed him, pulling him to his feet, not sure whether she wanted to hug him or shake him. “Benj, what on earth are you playing at? Do you know Daadi was here looking for you? What do you mean by scaring everyone that way?”
He looked up at her, his expression so strained and miserable that she wanted the scolding words back.
She touched his cheek gently. “What is it, Benj? Please, tell me what’s wrong.”
“I can’t.” It came out as a whisper, and his head dropped so that he wasn’t meeting her eyes. “I promised.”
“A promise that makes you scared to death and upsets your family? What kind of a promise is that? Benj—” She ran out of words, not sure what to say in the face of his stubborn silence.
“Wake up, Benj.” Colin’s voice was so stern that her brother’s head jerked back, his eyes going wide. “Okay, you made a promise. Trust me, I remember promises like that—stupid ones that you knew when you made them weren’t worth it.” Colin sounded as if he really was talking about himself. “It’s time to straighten up and act like a man, not a kid. Now tell your sister what this is all about before I pull your dad in to hear it.”
“No, don’t.” Benj’s face went even whiter, if that were possible. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean...” Tears welled in his eyes, and he knuckled them away, shamefaced. “I don’t know what to do. Will made us promise not to tell. But now Will is gone, and I don’t know what to do.”
“Will Esch?” Colin rapped out the question.
Benj nodded, choking back a sob.
Will Esch. Rachel repeated the name silently. She knew the family. Will must be a couple of years older than Benj.
“What do you mean, he’s gone?” Colin seemed to be having more success getting information out of Benj than she had, so Rachel forced herself to keep silent.
“He...he was gone when his mother went to call him today. They think he’s run off. But what if he didn’t? What if something happened—” He fell silent so suddenly it was like shutting off a tap. He shook his head. “After I heard, I couldn’t go home. Daadi would know the minute he looked at me that something was wrong. I had to think on it a bit.” He gestured toward the hiding place, as if to say that had been his haven for thinking through his troubles.
“Okay, so you and Will and somebody else were involved in something you shouldn’t have been, and Will made you promise not to tell anyone for fear you’d get into trouble.” Colin had put the story together more quickly than she had.
Benj gulped and nodded.
“That doesn’t explain why you’re so scared. Come on, out with the rest of it.”
The command in Colin’s tone would have convinced someone a lot more sophisticated than a fourteen-year-old Amish boy, and Rachel could only be thankful he was there. She’d never have gotten this much out of Benj on her own.
“We were...we were trespassing.” The way Benj seemed to be editing his words made Rachel fear they’d been doing something worse than trespassing. “And there was a man—he yelled at us, and we ran. But he...he had a shotgun. We got away, and Will said it would be all right as long as we didn’t tell anyone, that the man couldn’t know who we were. Will said if I told I could end up in jail.” He seemed to run out of steam, his voice trembling.
Colin exchanged glances with her. “Look, first of all, nobody is going to put you in jail for trespassing. Secondly, if Will got a good scare over this, maybe he did decide to scoot out of town for a while.”
“Maybe. Maybe he’s hiding, but then maybe the man will come after me.”
It sounded absurd, but obviously her brother took the possibility seriously. “Benj, this isn’t something you can handle on your own. You need to tell Daadi—”
“No!” Benj took a step back, his eyes widening. He looked more afraid of telling Daad than of the man with the shotgun. “Please, Rachel, I can’t. He would be so...so...”
“Disappointed.” She finished the sentence for him. Of all people, she knew what it was like to disappoint Daad.
“Ja. Please...I—I know I should tell him, but not yet.”
“Your dad’s going to want to know where you’ve been,” Colin said. “Are you going to lie to him?”
Benj shook his head. “I’ll tell him I was over at Joseph’s and forgot the time. That’s the truth. Just not all of it.”
Rachel could only hope he hadn’t picked up that rationalization from her, back when she’d been hiding her meetings with Ronnie. “But if Will is hiding, Daad ought to know, so he can talk to Will’s folks.”
“I can’t. If I told Will’s folks, he would...” Benj let that trail off, as if he couldn’t imagine what Will might do. A tear trickled down his cheek, and he didn’t even attempt to wipe it away. “Rachel, promise me. Promise me you won’t tell Daadi. Please.” He caught her hand, clinging to it, and her heart seemed to jolt.
She couldn’t speak for a moment, and the silence seemed alive with crosscurrents—Benj’s desperation, Colin’s determination, her own indecision.
If she told Daad, she would ruin the relationship she’d begun to build with her brother. If she didn’t tell him, and Daad found out, he would never forgive her. Either way, she stood to lose.
But she didn’t really have a choice, not with her brother looking at her with such despair in his eyes. “I will not tell Daad,” she said slowly.
She wouldn’t. Which meant she had to find a way of dealing with the situation Benj had gotten himself into on her own.
CHAPTER FIVE
COLIN WALKED WITH Benjamin as far as the covered bridge, half-thinking the boy might make a bolt for it rather than go home. But Benj walked, if reluctantly, up the lane, and his father came out to meet him.
Colin turned back, emerging from the darkness of the covered bridge into the gentle haze of twilight in the valley. He couldn’t help a sideways glance down toward the dam. It looked so peaceful, the water tumbling over the edge to form a quiet pool beneath the trees. But local people knew that peacefulness was deceptive, and kids had always been warned away, even before Aaron Mast’s death.
He headed for the stable where he’d left Rachel, only to see her disappearing into the back entrance of the house. The door closed with a somewhat determined thud.
So Rachel didn’t want to have a conversation with him about her brother’s story. That was a shame, because he had no intention of letting it slide.
When he reached the door he found that Rachel might have closed it, but she hadn’t locked it. He tapped on the frame while opening the door. This was not a talk he wanted to have through the door.
Rachel spun to face him, annoyance clear in her expression. But he could see past the annoyance to the very real worry that dwelled beneath.
“I don’t want to be rude, but I really wish—”
“Be as rude as you like,” he invited. “I’m sure you don’t want to discuss your brother with me. But it’s too late. I heard, and I’m not going to walk away and conveniently forget.”
“Why not?” She didn’t say it angrily. She actually looked as if she needed an answer to that question.
Because I have something to make up to you, Rachel. “Because Benj is a friend, and he’s in trouble. And because you’re a friend, I hope, and you’ve just agreed to keep quiet about that trouble.”
“I suppose you think I should have told on Benj.” Her voice snapped with irritation.
“You sound like your little brother. Isn’t that what Benj did? Making a stupid promise got him into this grief.” Resisting the impulse to touch her arm, he gestured toward the kitchen table. “Come on, Rachel. You know I’m not going away that easily, and I didn’t make any promises. So let’s sit down and talk this over.”
Her temper hung in the balance for an instant, but then she nodded, capitulating so suddenly it took him by surprise.
“You’re right, of course. I’m sorry for snapping. Sit down. I’d better check on Mandy.”
He’d like to think she’d given in because she trusted him, but he wasn’t that naive. He pulled out one of the ladder-back chairs and sat. No, she’d agreed to talk because of his implied threat. Trust had nothing to do with it.
He glanced around the kitchen. He’d never been in it, that he recalled. Mrs. Mason hadn’t encouraged Ronnie to entertain his friends there. And they certainly hadn’t wanted to sit in that formal parlor, so the result had been that they’d gathered elsewhere. It looked more welcoming than he would have imagined, but maybe that was Rachel’s touch.
Rachel was back in a moment, letting the kitchen door swing shut behind her. “She’s up in her room, so she won’t hear us. I don’t want Mandy knowing anything about Benj’s situation.” On the subject of her daughter, Rachel was uncompromising.
“She won’t hear anything from me,” Colin said. “But that story of Benj’s—you don’t imagine he was telling us the whole thing, do you?”
“No.” Rachel rubbed the back of her neck tiredly. “I’m sure he knows more than that—where they were, and what they were up to, for instance. As for the man with the shotgun...” She let that trail off and sank into the chair opposite him. “Do you think that was real?”
He frowned, picturing Benj’s face when he’d said those words. “I think he believed the man had a shotgun, but whether he really did or not is another question. That might have been Benj’s guilty conscience imagining things.”
“He does feel guilty, doesn’t he?” She grasped on that part of his words. “That’s good, I think. Maybe it will discourage him from doing anything so foolish again.”
“Maybe.” Knowing teenage boys he doubted it, but let her hold on to her illusions. “And the man could have had a gun. It would be a rare house around here that didn’t have a hunting weapon of some sort. And someone hearing prowlers on his property might well carry one to investigate.”
Rachel nodded, a shudder going through her. “Benj should have realized that sort of thing might be dangerous. Why on earth would he sneak out like that?”
“Because the older kid asked him, or maybe dared him, and he had to show what a man he was.” He could remember more than a few instances when he’d fallen for similar temptation. “Somebody once dared me to raid Franklin Sitler’s apple trees, and I was stupid enough to do it. That old man can move faster than you’d think. He took off after me with a BB gun, and I was lucky to escape a peppering. Not so lucky when my dad found out, though.”
Dad hadn’t been one to spare the rod and spoil the child in those days, but hearing his father accuse him of stealing had hurt worse than any physical punishment.
Rachel actually smiled at that, but then she sobered just as quickly. “Mr. Sitler has that reputation.” Rachel glanced toward the front of the house, as if she could see through the walls to the house across the street. “If they trespassed on his property—”
Colin snorted. “Trespassed? They were planning more than that, believe me. Some sort of vandalism, or I miss my guess.”
Rachel’s eyes widened. “I can’t believe Benj would be involved in vandalism. He knows that’s wrong.”
“Of course he does. There’d be no fun in doing it otherwise.” The expression on her face made him dial it back. Now was not the time to tell her about the things he and Ronnie used to get into. “Look, this business about Will Esch disappearing—that’s what bothers me. Benj didn’t seem to know what to really think about it, just that it scares him.”
“Running off is all part of rumspringa for some boys. They think they have to see a little of the Englisch world before they settle down. At least, with him out of the way, Benj won’t be getting into any more trouble.”
He hated to burst her bubble, but he had to. “Benj doesn’t see it that way. He’s acting even jumpier than he did before. And that’s why you ought to let your dad handle it.”
“I know. I know.” Rachel’s eyes were filled with misery. “But you heard Benj. He’s more frightened of disappointing Daad than of whatever it is he’s gotten involved in. Believe me, I know that feeling.”
He reached out, clasping her hand where it lay on the table. “I’m sorry. He still hasn’t forgiven you?”
Rachel shook her head, looking down at the maple surface of the table, probably to hide the fact that there were tears in her eyes. She took a breath so deep he could see her chest rise and fall. “I promised Benj. I know it wasn’t a smart promise to make, but I can’t let him down. If I tell Daad, Benj will never forgive me.”
“Right. And if you keep his secret and your father finds out, he’ll never forgive you.”
She nodded, not looking up. She seemed to have forgotten that he was holding her hand.
“Well, I guess there’s just one thing for it, then.” He forced some cheerfulness into his voice. “I guess we’ll have to find out for ourselves how serious this business is.”
She did look up at that, and she drew her hand away from his. “We?” The spark came back into her voice and her face. “I don’t recall asking for your help.”
“You forget, Benj told me as well as you. That means I’m in.”
She shook her head firmly. “I’ll try to get Benj to tell me more, and I’ll question my sisters and see if they have any notion of what he was up to. There’s nothing you can do.”
“Sure there is. I can find out if anyone’s been complaining about vandalism, for one thing. If a homeowner chased off a bunch of kids, he’ll be talking about it.”
Alarm filled her face. “You won’t let on that Benj is involved.”
“What do you take me for? No, never mind, don’t answer that.” He already knew what she thought of him, and he didn’t need to hear it again. “I’ll be subtle. If we could find out where Will Esch went...”
He pondered, turning over possibilities in his mind. Trouble was, the Amish tended to stay off the grid. There was no easy way to trace an Amish kid who wanted to vanish.
“One of my sisters might know what the other kids are saying. They’re more likely to know than the adults.” Rachel was looking better for having a plan for what to do about Benj’s trouble.
“Good idea.” He hesitated, wanting to touch her reassuringly but thinking he’d better not push it. “We’ll figure it out. Try not to worry.”
She nodded, managing a faint smile. “Thank you, Colin. I’m not sure why you’re taking so much trouble over this, but thank you.”
He did touch her then, just a quick, feather-light brush of his knuckles against her hand. It was a tenuous truce between them, one that could collapse at a breath. But he’d take what he could get where Rachel was concerned, it seemed.
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/marta-perry/home-by-dark/) 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.