Bookends (18 page)

When she said the amount, Jonas let out a whoop. “Miss Snyder, you are a miracle worker. I don’t even wanna know how you did it.”

“Using perfectly legal methods, I assure you. We have a few more details to work out, but before I proceed, I wanted to be certain this would still … please you.”

He almost didn’t notice the purr in her voice. “Trust me, I’m pleased, Dee Dee. As soon as the weather breaks, I’ll have the crew back in here, bulldozers roaring. Keep in close contact with me, will you?”

“That was the idea.”

“Good. And … thanks.” He punched off the phone, adrenaline pumping through his system. The borough would be thrilled. After he got the full story from Dee Dee, he’d stop by the council meeting Tuesday night, give them the good news.

When the cell phone in his hand rang again, he nearly dropped it in surprise before finding the right button. “H-hello? Emilie?”

“Emilie, huh? So you finally snagged a woman.”

He stared at the receiver for a half second, the male voice on the line not registering.

“You there, Jonas? It’s Nate.”

He gripped the phone harder. “Nathan? Is it really you?”

“Sure it’s me. Who’s Emilie?”

“A … a woman, here in Lititz.”
Who’d better get her mousy-haired self over here pronto before I send Trix out to find her.
“More later on that score. Where are you, man? What’s going on? You doin’ okay?”

Nate’s laugh sounded forced. “I’m in Florida. Jacksonville area. Hitting a few golf balls. Making a few friends.”

He knew the sort of friends Nate usually attracted. Guys out for a fast buck, trying to find the right hustle that would put them over the top financially. And women willing to go along for the ride who had nothing better to do than hang on.

Jonas didn’t stoop to calling them losers, but they were definitely lost.
Like Nathan.

“You didn’t answer my last question, Nate. Are you okay?”

“Sure.” His brother’s response was a long time coming. “I’m a little low on cash right now, that’s all. Nothing new. I’ll manage.”

Jonas felt a knot forming in his gut. He knew what Nate would say next, knew what was expected of him, the older brother with all the answers—and all the resources. It no longer made him feel useful—just used.

“Manage how?” Jonas prompted him, dreading his response.

“You know. Find a good club looking for a pro. Florida’s lousy with golf courses. Something will open up.”

Good.
At least he was trying to find honest work. “What about cash in the meantime?” Jonas couldn’t hang up without knowing his brother had a roof over his head and three square meals a day.

Nate’s chuckle sounded like a spring uncoiling. “Well, if you have any loose bills sitting around …”

Jonas plucked his checkbook out of the clutter that served as his desk, and checked the balance. “How much are we talkin’ about, bro?”

The phone line seemed to go dead. One beat, then two. “As much …” Nathan’s voice faltered. “As much as you can spare, Jonas. Just for a few … months. I’m talking about a loan, not a handout.”

“Right.” He’d heard this before. “Is five thousand enough?”

Silence again. “Yeah. Great. Should last me quite a while, let me get on my feet down here, find a nice place …”

Nathan was babbling now, his words a gushing stream of relief. Jonas grabbed a pen and scribbled down the necessary information while he listened to his brother’s endless thanks, shaking his head at his own gullibility. No matter what Nathan promised, Jonas knew he’d never see this money again.

The practical, bottom-line, business side of him said it was the worst thing, the stupidest thing he could do.

The generous, protective, big brother side of him said it was the best thing, the most sacrificial thing he could do.

Which was the
godly
thing to do? That’s all Jonas cared about. Right now, he wasn’t getting a clear word from that sector.

“Where do I send it, Nate?” Jonas printed the address on an envelope and stuffed the check inside. “Done. This’ll have to hold you for a while, buddy. I’ve got a lot of my funds tied up in Carter’s Run. Yeah, we’re right on schedule.” Jonas filled him in, describing the course in detail, elated at his brother’s sudden interest in his work.

It was nearly noon when Jonas finally punched off the phone after a final admonition to keep in touch. A pointless exercise. Nate wouldn’t call back until he needed something.

The cell phone rang again almost immediately. “Good grief,” Jonas muttered, punching it back on. “This better be you, Emilie.”

“Jonas, finally!” a woman gasped. “It’s Beth Landis.”

“Beth?” The muffled sound of traffic hummed in the background. “Where are you?”

“Cedar Street. Some guy loaned me his car phone and—” Her voice was drowned out by a grinding motor in the background. “—been trying to reach you for half an hour. After you called me about Emilie, I started worrying and decided to walk over to her house. On the way—” Beth’s words dissolved into a high, thin wail. “Jonas, she’s … she’s been in a terrible accident.”

“An
accident?
” Jonas was on his feet. “Is she hurt?” He jammed the phone against his shoulder and scrambled to find the keys to his Explorer, warm gloves, a flashlight, a blanket, anything that looked like emergency gear. “I’ll be there in five minutes. Less.” He felt his own vocal cords tightening. “And tell me she’s okay.”

“We … we don’t know yet, Jonas.” Beth was fighting for breath. “She’s … trapped in the car. The police are here. And EMS. And the fire department.”

“The
fire
—
?
” He yanked on a wool cap, sprinting toward the back door. “Okay. Okay, don’t move, don’t panic, Beth. I’m out the door. Hear that engine starting? I’ll be there in two minutes.” He backed down the slick driveway, barely noticing the poor traction as he turned the knob to engage the four-wheel drive. “Make that one minute. Don’t cry, honey. Emilie is in good hands. She’ll be okay. Just sit tight and pray, Beth. Pray hard.”

He tossed the phone aside and pointed the Explorer toward Cedar, his heart pounding, his mind racing. Beth had tried to call him for thirty minutes.
Thirty minutes!
But no, he was too busy buying and spending, too worried about his business and his brother …

The guilt trapped in his throat nearly choked him.
Keep her safe, Lord. Please keep her safe!
He shouldn’t have let her drive in the first place. Should have picked her up, for crying out loud. So what if that made their sledding thing look like a date. It
was
a date, wasn’t it? Sort of?

In the rearview mirror, he caught a glimpse of Emilie’s new Flexible Flyer in the cargo section, propped up with a big, blue bow tied on top.
Too late, Fielding. You’re too late.
The knot in his throat sank to his stomach.

The minute he turned north on Cedar, he could see the red lights of emergency vehicles two blocks ahead. Releasing his foot off the accelerator only slightly, he closed in on the entrance to the cemetery, taking in the scattered semicircle of police vehicles and pedestrians congregating around a badly crumpled BMW with North Carolina tags.

He didn’t remember parking the car or stuffing his pockets with everything in sight that might serve some purpose. All he remembered were Beth’s eyes, wide and weeping, and Sara’s small arms reaching toward him as he hurried across the snowpacked pavement.

“Sara!” Without thinking, he grabbed the sobbing little girl and crushed her against his chest, tears stinging his eyes. “I’m here, Sara. I’m here. Everything will be okay, I promise.”

Sara shook her head and swung one soggy pink mitten in the direction of the mangled car. “But Em-ee-lee’s in there.” Her tiny voice barely penetrated through her scarf. “They can’t get her out, Whale Man. Can you get her out?”

“I’ll sure try, honey.” He lowered Sara to the ground in time for Beth to give him a brief hug and a wary look.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t …” He shook his head, overcome, knowing how lame
his excuse sounded. “I’m … I’m sorry.” Jonas abruptly turned toward the accident scene, avoiding the disappointment written all over Beth’s face.

I didn’t know. Didn’t know, Lord!

“Can I help?” He eased his way through the crowd, concerned faces parting to make way for him. Maybe it was his own grim expression that cleared a path for him to reach the inner circle within seconds. Spotting the chief of police, Jonas raised his voice to get the man’s attention. “Ted, what can I do here?”

“Unless you got the Jaws of Life in your back pocket, nothing.” The older man eased over, his eyes trained on the battered car. “Do you know this woman?”

“Yeah, I do. She … she goes to my church.”
Attaboy, stick your neck out.
Jonas pulled off his cap and wiped the cold sweat off his brow. “Has she moved yet? Is she breathing?” Side by side, the two stared at the BMW, crushed like an accordion against a square stone and mortar pillar. Emilie was slumped against the driver’s side, her shoulder pinned forward in an awkward and painful-looking position. She was utterly still, her face paler than he’d ever seen it.

Oh, Emilie
 … Jonas swallowed several times, jamming his hands in his pockets, fighting for control.

Emilie isn’t moving. Why isn’t she moving, Lord?

Around the accident site were half a dozen rescue workers doing their best to dismantle what was left of the car. A volunteer fireman attempted to pry the door loose with a crowbar while a young woman in an EMS uniform managed to get one arm through the twisted metal, then shouted, “We’ve got a pulse!”

A murmur of hope circled around him as Jonas inched closer, every cell in his body straining to see her, touch her, hear her voice. Know she was alive. Tell her he was sorry, that he’d messed up, that he—

“It’s all about you, then. Not about me.”

Her words, spoken in a heated moment in Pastor Yeager’s office, echoed in his memory.
No! It’s about you, Emilie. All about you, this time.

Would he ever stop feeling guilty around this woman?

Farther up Cedar Street a horn blared. As the crowd turned to watch another volunteer in a rescue vehicle inch his way down the slippery hill, Ted clamped a meaty hand on his shoulder. “Good news, Jonas. There’s the
guy with the tools we’ve been waiting for. We’ve had wrecks all over the township this morning, you know. Worse than last weekend.” Ted raised his voice above the din. “Give the man some room!”

Sliding his vehicle to a dramatic stop, the bearded young man scrambled out of the front seat, then unlocked the trunk and pulled out a hefty power unit and a contraption that resembled a huge set of pliers. “Jaws of Life, coming through!” he bellowed, carting fifty pounds of equipment in each hand across the treacherous ice. Cheers broke out as the team hustled to get the device ready to go, their movements a blur of speed and precision.

Jonas held his breath as the hydraulics kicked in and the metal door on the driver’s side began giving way with a piercing shriek. Two inches. Four. “How much space do we need to get her out?” Jonas hollered above the deafening noise of the engine.

“The most it’ll give us is twenty-seven inches,” Ted shouted back. “I can’t tell by looking. How big a woman is she?”

“Not very.” Jonas slowly shook his head, his gaze glued to the action mere feet away. “Tall, but kinda skinny. Should be enough room.”
Gotta be enough, Lord. Gotta be.

He’d never felt so powerless. Standing there, unable to help, unable to reach past the jagged wreckage and pull her clear, waiting instead for an experienced crew to do the one thing he couldn’t do: save Emilie Getz.

“Emilie! Emilie, do you hear me? We’re going to lift you out of the car now. The paramedics are here and your vitals are good, so just relax and let us do the work, okay? That’s it. That’s the way.”

Two firm hands grasped her shoulders while another pair carefully snapped a thick white cuff around her neck. “Ohhh.” The moan took an enormous amount of energy. The pain claimed whatever was left. She couldn’t focus her eyes, couldn’t feel her extremities. Her mouth was dry as parchment, her lips cracked, and the dense, metallic taste in her mouth begged for something wet and cold to rinse it away.

“Water,” she croaked, not sure if she spoke the word or only thought it. She tried again. “Water.”

A plastic bottle appeared near her lips and she drank greedily. The effort nearly consumed her. “Thank you …”

“That’s why we’re here, Emilie.” A young woman’s voice. Soothing, comforting. “Rod is going to maneuver your legs through this opening, while Skip supports your shoulders through the other window. We have a gurney waiting, so don’t worry, we gotcha. Okay? Ready, Emilie?”

“Ready.”

Voices around her counted to three, then all at once she was moving, being turned and steered like a vehicle careening out of control. “Help,” she whimpered, confused. She was sliding. Sliding! Backwards. Sideways. Stop! Stop the car. “Stop. Stop,” she moaned.

Finally she did stop, landing flat on her back—a cold white sky above, a cold white sheet below. The voices had faces—faces that smiled down at her, red-cheeked and grinning. “What a trouper you are!” the man they called Rod said, the one who’d guided her legs through the narrow opening.

“Right.” Her smile was faint but genuine.

The young woman with the calm voice pushed aside a torn coat sleeve to slip a blood pressure cuff around Emilie’s arm. “Good thing you wore so many clothes, ma’am. All that padding probably saved your life.”

“Good thing,” she agreed, her eyes drifting shut from utter exhaustion. Why
did
she have so many layers on? Was she cold? Was she sick?
No.
She was avoiding … avoiding some …

“Somebody’s pretty anxious to see you, Emilie.”

A shadow fell across her, blocking the pale wintry sun. She moistened her lips and tried to speak. “Who …?”

“It’s me, Emilie.”

The voice was low, rough, masculine. Halting, as if caught on a branch. She could feel the warmth of his breath hovering over her. Her eyes opened slowly, weighted down with invisible bricks. “Ohh. Jonas.” She closed them again, but not before noticing the tears welling up in his enormous brown eyes as he knelt by her side. “Good,” she said, feeling some need to ease his obvious discomfort.