Buried Sins (9 page)

Zach consulted the address in his notebook, checked the GPS monitor and nodded. “This is it, all right. Not what you expected?”

“No. I can’t imagine Tony growing up here.” She thought of the safe-deposit box stuffed with money, and her stomach tightened. “But I seem to have been wrong about plenty of things where Tony was concerned.”

Tony, who were you? Was there anything real about our marriage?

The look Zach sent her seemed to assess her stability. “Are you sure you want to do this now?”

She took a deep breath. In a situation like this, her grandmother would rely on her faith. For a moment she felt a twinge of something that might be envy. To feel that Someone was always there—

But she couldn’t. She grabbed the door handle. “Let’s go.”

“Wait a second.” He reached across her to clasp her hand before she could open the door. For a moment she couldn’t seem to breathe. He was too close, much too close. She could smell the clean scent of his soap, feel the hard muscles in the arm that pressed against her.

“Why?” She forced out the word, her voice breathless.

He drew back, as if he’d just realized how close he was. “Maybe it would be better if I took the lead in talking to them. If they don’t already know that Tony was married—”

“Yes, of course you’re right.” That was yet another nightmare to think about. Tony’s family would have no reason to welcome, or believe in, a previously unknown wife. “Just—”

“What?”

She hesitated a moment and then shook her head. “I was going to say be tactful, but maybe there’s nothing left to be tactful about.”

He squeezed her hand, so lightly that she might have imagined it. “I’ll do my best.”

She slid out of the car and waited until he joined her on the sidewalk. The gate shrieked in protest when he pushed it open, and she followed him up the walk, stepping over the cracks where weeds flourished unchecked.

Three steps up to a concrete stoop, and then Zach rapped sharply on the door, ignoring the doorbell. Moments passed. The lace curtain on the window beside the door twitched. Someone was checking them out.

They must have looked presentable, because the woman swung the door open. “Something I can do for you?”

She was probably not more than thirty, Caro guessed. Blond hair, dark roots showing, was pulled back into a ponytail. She wore a faded navy cardigan over a waitress uniform, and the bag slung over her shoulder seemed to say that she had either just come in or was just going out.

“We’re looking for Anthony Gibson. Does he live here?”

She jerked a nod and turned to look over her shoulder. “Somebody for you, Tony. Listen, I have to go. I’ll see you later.”

She held the door so that they could enter and then slid past them as if eager to make her departure.

“What do you folks want?” The tone held a trace of suspicion. The man thumped his way toward them with a walker. Tall, like Tony, with dark eyes.

But the world was full of tall men with dark eyes. Surely this couldn’t be Tony’s father. The setting was wrong, and he must be too old—he looked nearly as old as Grams, rather than being a contemporary of her mother.

“You’re Tony Gibson?” Zach nudged her forward as he spoke.

“That’s right.” The man came to a stop at a mustard-colored recliner and sat, shoving the walker to one side.

“I’m Zachary Burkhalter, Chief of Police over in Churchville in Lancaster County. This is Caroline Hampton. We wanted to talk to you about your son.”

She opened her mouth to say that this couldn’t be her Tony’s father, and then she closed it again, because Tony’s picture sat on top of the upright piano in the corner. A much younger Tony, but that smile was unmistakable.

The lines in the man’s face seemed to grow deeper. “My son died a month ago. If he owed you money, you’re wasting your time coming here for it.”

“No, nothing like that,” Zach said easily. “We’re just trying to clear up some questions that came up after Tony’s death. We weren’t sure we had the right family.”

The old man—Tony’s father, she reminded herself—leaned back in the recliner, grabbing the handle so that the footrest flipped up. “My son, all right.” He pointed to the picture on the piano. “If that’s the Tony Gibson you’re looking for.”

“Yes.” She forced herself to speak. “Yes, it is.”

“Died out west. New Mexico, it was.” He didn’t look grieved, just resigned. “I always figured it would happen that way. Somebody’d call and tell us he was gone.”

“What made you think that?” Zach’s voice had gentled, as if he recognized pain behind the resignation.

He shrugged. “Always skating too near the edge of the law, Tony was. You can’t keep doing that and not get into trouble at some point.”

“Had you heard from him lately?”
Did he tell you about me?
That was what she wanted to ask, but something held her back.

“Not for months. He sent Mary Alice a hundred bucks back in January, I think it was. Said she should get Christmas presents with it.”

Mary Alice was apparently the woman who’d opened the door to them. Tony’s sister, she supposed, left here to look after their ailing father.

“Were you expecting a visit from him this spring?” She put the question abruptly, hearing Tony’s voice in her mind.
We’ll go back east in the spring, sweetheart. We’ll surprise both our families.
He’d spun her around in a hug.
My folks will be crazy about you.

“No. And I wouldn’t have believed him if he had said so.” He planted his hands on the arms of the recliner and leaned toward her. “What is all this, anyway? Why do you want to know about my son? What are you to him?”

“We just—” Zach began, but she shook her head.

“Don’t, Zach.” She took a breath. For good or ill, the man had a right to know she was his son’s widow. “I’m sorry to blurt it out this way, Mr. Gibson. I’m actually Caroline Hampton Gibson. I was married to Tony.”

He didn’t speak, but a wave of red flushed alarmingly into his face. He jerked the recliner back into the upright position with a thump.

She took a step backward. “I don’t want anything from you. I just thought you ought to know—”

“You’re crazy, that’s what you are.” He grabbed the walker and took a step toward her. “Or you’re trying to pull something. Some of his friends, most likely, just as crooked as he was.”

“Nothing like that.” Zach’s tone was soothing.

The old man ignored him, glaring at Caroline. “I don’t know who you are. But I know who you’re not. You’re not my son’s wife. Mary Alice is Tony’s wife, and she’s the mother of his little girl.”

C
aroline spread the old quilt over the table in the barn, handling it as carefully as if it were a living creature. Maybe working on the quilt would distract her from the memory of yesterday’s shocking revelations.

Maybe, but she doubted it.

She forced herself to concentrate on the pattern. The research she’d done had told her that the particular way the flying geese and star were combined on this quilt was unusual. She wanted to see it more clearly, but the colors were muted by an inevitable coating of dust. Going over it with the brush attachment of the vacuum cleaner on low power was the recommended process.

The soft hum of the vacuum blocked out other sounds. Unfortunately, it couldn’t block out her thoughts. They kept leaping rebelliously back to that disastrous trip to Philadelphia.

Maybe
disastrous
wasn’t the right word. The revelations, one after the other, had been painful, but would she be better off if she didn’t know? The truth would be the truth, whether she wanted to hear it or not.

She still wasn’t sure how she’d gotten out of that house after Tony’s father had dropped his bombshell. Zach had taken over, of course. That would always be his automatic response. He’d soothed the man as best he could and piloted her back to the car.

She hadn’t been able to talk about it during the drive back. Maybe it would have been better to get it out, but she couldn’t. She’d been numb, maybe in shock.

Zach hadn’t pressed her, other than to urge her to tell her grandmother or her sisters what happened. He’d left her with the promise that he’d check the records and find out the facts.

She hadn’t taken Zach’s advice, good as it probably was. She’d been in limbo, unable to decide anything. She’d spent the evening with Grams and Rachel, taking comfort in their chatter, listening to Grams’s stories, reviving a sense of belonging she hadn’t had in a very long time.

She switched off the vacuum and stood back to look at the results. The experts appeared to be right—the area she’d gone over was discernibly brighter, the deep, saturated colors coming to life.

The sound of a step had her turning, seeing the shadow he cast in the patch of sunlight on the barn boards before she saw him. Zach stood in the doorway, his figure a dark shape against the brightness outside.

His uniform didn’t induce that instinctive revulsion any longer, but her stomach still tightened at the sight of him. He might have found out. He might know the truth about her marriage.

“Hi. Your sister told me I’d find you here.” He came toward her, heels sounding on the wide planks. A shaft of sunlight turned his sandy hair to gold for a moment, and then it darkened when he moved out of the light. He studied the quilt. “Are you taking up quilting now?”

“This is the quilt your sister and I were talking about. It apparently dates from the 1850s. I’m trying, very cautiously, to clean it up.” She was a coward, but she’d rather talk about the quilt than what had brought him here.

“I’m surprised Agatha Morris wasn’t interested. I’d expect her to be here leaning over your shoulder, telling you you’re doing it all wrong.”

“I may be, but eight out of ten experts on the Internet agreed that vacuuming with a soft brush was a good first step.”

“What would we do without the Internet?”

He said the words casually, but she heard something beneath them that alerted her.

“You’ve found out, haven’t you?” She let go of the vacuum hose, and it clattered to the floor.

He nodded toward a bench against the low wall that separated the hay mow from the rest of the barn floor. “Let’s have a seat. I see Cal left behind some of the improvements he made when this was his workshop.”

She followed him, not interested in whether her brother-in-law had made the bench or not, just intent on sitting down before her knees did something stupid.

“The Internet does make searching records easier. Tony married Mary Alice seven years ago in Philadelphia.”

She ought to be shaken, shocked and appalled. Maybe she was, but at the moment she mostly seemed numb. “You’re sure—” She shook her head. “Of course you’re sure, or you wouldn’t be telling me. What about the child?”

“Their daughter, Allison Mary, was born seven months later. A shotgun wedding, maybe.”

It would be tempting to try and rationalize what Tony had done in that light, but she found she couldn’t. He’d had a wife. A child. He had a duty to them, not to her.

“Did he get a divorce?” A voice she barely recognized as hers asked the question.

He hesitated for a moment, as if knowing how much this would hurt her. His very silence told her the answer before he said the word.

“No.” His stretched his arm along the back of the bench and touched her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Caroline.”

She nodded, trying to think this through. “So the marriage he went through with me wasn’t legal. Am I—did I do anything against the law in marrying him?”

“No. He was the bigamist, not you.”

She took a deep breath. “I guess mostly I don’t understand. He must have known I’d find out the truth eventually. Why would he do such a thing?”

“That’s a good question. Can you think of any reason—anything that might explain what was going through his mind?”

“If I could, don’t you think I’d have mentioned that by now? There’s nothing.” She planted her hands on her knees. “Maybe if I threw something I’d feel better—preferably something at Tony’s head.”

“I don’t think that would help.” His voice was mild, as it always was. That didn’t tell her whether he believed her or not. “It’s natural enough to be angry at him.”

“He’s well beyond the reach of my anger now.” That in itself was cause for wrath. Tony had escaped, and left her to deal with everything. “I’m relieved about one thing, though. Since I wasn’t really his wife, I don’t have to do anything about that money.”

He didn’t answer. Didn’t move. How, then, did she know that he wanted something—something in relation to the money?

“What?” Impatience threaded her voice.

“You should talk to the Santa Fe police about it. They’re the ones investigating his death, and it could have an impact upon that case.”

“I don’t want to.” Her fingers twisted together in her lap. He put his hand over hers, stilling the restless movement.

“That’s pretty obvious. Would you mind telling me why?”

Zach studied the expression on Caroline’s face. What was going on with her? For that matter, what was going on with him? He ought to be looking at this situation, at her, with his usual professional detachment.

He wasn’t managing to do that, not where Caroline was concerned. She got under his skin in a way he’d never experienced before.

She wasn’t his type. Take that as a starting point. Sure, he was attracted to her. Any man would be. But this was about more than creamy skin and eyes so deep a green that a man could drown in them.

He was drawn by what he sensed beneath that—the creativity that sparked and sizzled in her, the gentle smile that didn’t come often enough, the hint of vulnerability mixed with strength and independence.

His arguments seemed to be heading him in the wrong direction. Against that, he stacked who he was. A cop. A family man. A father who wouldn’t bring a woman into his daughter’s life unless he was sure she was the right woman. A Christian woman.

He must have been silent too long, because Caroline turned her head to look at him.

“Aren’t you going to argue with me?”

“I guess I should.” He didn’t want to. He sympathized with her, maybe too much. She’d been through a tragedy that would be tough for anyone to handle, especially someone who didn’t have a relationship with Christ to see her through.

He looked up at the lofty barn roof, where dust motes danced in the stripes of sunlight. Something about the quiet, open space made him feel as if he was in church.

Lord, show me how to deal with this. Caroline is hurting. I want to help her, but I have to do my duty.

“I don’t see why I should do the police’s work for them.” Caroline’s tone was defensive, and she sent him a sidelong glance that was reminiscent of Ruthie when she was in a stubborn mood. “I haven’t done anything wrong, and even if Tony did, surely his liability died with him.”

He studied her averted face. “Is Tony dead?”

Her gaze flashed to him. “Yes. The police said he was. I buried him.”

“So the things that have happened since you came here—the letter, the coffee, the safe-deposit box—were they coincidences? Someone trying to make you think Tony is still alive?”

Her lips trembled for a moment, and she pressed them firmly together. She shook her head. “I don’t know. Nothing else has happened. Maybe nothing will. Maybe—”

“Do you really think that?” He was sorry for her, but he couldn’t let her convince herself that she could just walk away from this.

She shoved her hair back from her face in that characteristic gesture. “I’d like to, but I guess I can’t. Still, according to you I’m not Tony’s wife. So why should I be involved?”

He couldn’t tell her that Tony had been under investigation by the Santa Fe police—that was their business, and he couldn’t interfere unless they asked for his help. But she already suspected gambling, didn’t she?

“If Tony was involved in something that skirted the law, as his father said, that money could be important. The police should know.”

“Why should I be the one to tell them? It properly belongs to Mary Alice, doesn’t it? Let her tell them.”

“She doesn’t know about it. Come on, Caroline, stop evading the issue. Why won’t you go to the police?”

She swung to face him, anger flaring in her eyes. “You know the answer to that, don’t you? I don’t know what happens to other people who’ve been where I was, but I know what effect it had on me. I’ve spent the past eight years being so law abiding it’s painful—obeying every last little rule and regulation, never jay-walking, never so much as getting a parking ticket.”

“Because you learned respect for the law.” He was feeling his way, not sure what lay behind that vehemence.

“No! Because I can never put myself in that helpless position again. Because I learned I couldn’t trust anyone—not my family and not the police.”

She swung away from him, breathing hard, as if sorry she’d revealed that much of herself to him. He couldn’t let her stop, not when she was so close to letting him see what was going on inside her.

“What happened? Tell me. You got into trouble, but there’s more to it than that.”

She shook her head, mouth set, eyes shimmering with tears that she no doubt didn’t want him to see.

“You were riding around with two guys,” he said deliberately. “You stayed outside in the car as a lookout while they went into a convenience store and beat up the elderly proprietor.”

“No.” The word seemed torn from her. “I didn’t. I didn’t know what they were doing. I had no idea they were robbing that man.” Her voice trembled, the pain in it almost convincing him.

“Did your lawyer bring that up at the trial?”

“My lawyer didn’t believe anything I told him.” A touch of bitterness. “Or maybe he didn’t care.”

“Your family could have gotten different representation for you.” They hadn’t; he knew that. Why not?

For a moment she stared, eyes wide and clouded, as if she looked into the past. “The authorities couldn’t find my mother. Turned out she’d run off to Palm Springs with her latest boyfriend. You couldn’t expect her to pass up a trip like that just because her kid was in trouble, could you?”

The insight into what her life had been like with her mother shook him. He’d heard bits and pieces from time to time about Lily Hampton, none of it good.

“Your grandparents, your sisters—”

She shook her head. “I guess they tried to help, when they finally heard, but by then I was in the system. There wasn’t much they could do. Besides, my mother was my legal guardian.” Her voice shook a little. She might deny it, but that youthful betrayal had affected the rest of her life.

He understood, only too well. Once a juvenile was in the system, everything affecting them had to grind through the legal process. “Your grandmother must have been frantic.”

“I suppose.” Doubt touched her eyes. “At the time, all I could see was that they’d let me down.”

“You got through it.” He couldn’t imagine how much strength it must have taken for her to deal with that situation alone at her age.

“Not without scars.”

Lord, help me to understand.
“That’s not all, is it?” He knew, without questioning how, that there had been more. That something worse had happened to her when she was alone and vulnerable. “Locked up in a place like that—the other kids must have—”

“Not the other kids.” Her body tensed, as if she drew into herself. “I dealt with them.”

“Who?” He had to force the word out, because he thought he knew the answer, and he didn’t want to hear it.

She hugged herself, as if cold in spite of the warmth of the day. “I don’t want—”

“Who was it?” His voice was sharp to his ears. “A cop?”

She pressed her lips together. Nodded. “When I was arrested.” It came out in a whisper. “He took me into a room by myself at the police station. Left me there. I thought my mother would come, but she didn’t. He came back. He—” Her breath caught, as if she choked on the word.

“He attacked you.” He managed, somehow, through the red haze of fury that nearly choked him, to keep the words gentle.

The muscles in her neck worked. She nodded. “Someone came in, finally. He said I was faking, trying to get him in trouble. I didn’t care what he said, as long as I didn’t have to see him again.”

She should have filed a complaint, but he could understand why she hadn’t. She’d been alone, and she’d just had a harsh lesson in how helpless she was. Small wonder she didn’t trust the system or anyone involved in it.

If he’d been the one to walk into that room, he’d have been tempted to dispense some harsh justice of his own to the man who’d abused his position and shamed his badge. Even now he wanted to put his fist through the barn wall.