More Than Memories (20 page)

In answer, he pulled her closer against him and
stroked her hair as they fell asleep.

“Dead?” Karen repeated the next morning, “And
that’s all she said? So she must have regained her memory.”

Trent and Karen stood in the kitchen by the
brewing coffee pot, both needing some caffeine after a troubled night of
wondering about Molly. Karen had taken the day off from work and came over
bright and early.

The pot finished and they each poured a cup. Trent
sighed, rubbed his face, and went to sit on the couch in the living room. “Such
a bare house. No wonder she didn’t remember anything here. Now I’m sure her
parents didn’t want her to.”

Karen sat in the recliner. “And it must have
something to do with Kenneth Webb, who’s dead. It doesn’t sound good, but I’m
sure she’s just upset and wanting to figure it out. She’s probably got a lot of
memories to sort through.”

A lifetime, Trent thought. Her childhood, their
romance, her friendship with Alicia, and whatever she knew about her birth
father. He wondered what it felt like to discover your parents had lied to you
on so many different accounts. He remembered them as warm, caring people who
indulged their only daughter’s many crazy whims. The description Karen had
given didn’t sound anything like them.

They both looked to the doorway as they heard soft
steps on the stairs. “Hey Karen, Trent.” Molly saw their coffee and headed for
the kitchen. Trent jumped up and told her to sit, he’d make it.

“Just—”

“Sugar, I know.” He knew all those little things
about her, and she knew them about him. Those memories had been locked away
inside her head but she’d still known. He came back with a hot cup and sat down
next to her on the couch, putting an arm behind her shoulders. The dark color
under her eyes said she hadn’t slept much, either.

Karen sat quietly and patiently. Trent had a
harder time waiting as he tapped on his mug. Molly sipped her coffee and said,
“There’s suddenly so much in my head I don’t know where to begin. I spent all
night sifting through memories, remembering new things, putting things in
order, and then I finally fell asleep and dreamed about it all.”

She paused, turning and looking up into Trent’s
face. He saw a look he hadn’t seen since before she had disappeared: she knew
him, knew all about him, and knew him inside and out just like he knew himself.
They used to look into each other’s eyes and communicate without a word and he
felt that again.

She continued, “I thought about you the most, and
I can’t believe how much time we spent together growing up. You were like
another best friend to me.”

“One that always had a crush on you.” He felt more
like himself now that she remembered all the times they shared, but he saw her
face darken and knew she must be thinking about the end of that summer four
years ago.

She leaned into Trent, glancing at Karen and him.
“It’s worse than I feared.”

“About your real father?” he quietly asked. Karen,
though leaning forward, remained silent.

“I didn’t know about him until he showed up in
Ridge City. I don’t know if I can tell you about it.” She shuddered and had to
set her coffee cup on the table because she kept shaking.

Hesitantly, he asked, “Can you tell me how he
died?”

Pushing her eyes shut, Molly let out a breath that
sounded panicked. Trent felt awful for making her think about it, but he needed
to know. For a minute, the three of them sat still, like moving would disturb a
pond full of her memories and send them rippling away. She pulled her knees
up to her chest.

In a whisper so quiet they could barely hear her,
Molly said, “Arnold killed him.”

Arnold killed him?

“What?
” Karen
asked from across the room. Molly’s eyes opened to look at her.

At last, Molly tried, but couldn’t look at either
of them while she spoke. “I went home to get some things and see how my parents
were doing. I wanted to test the waters before Trent and I shared the big
news.”

“Kenneth was there?”

“Not at first. A man came to the door while I was
in my room. I came partway down the stairs because he sounded upset, yelling to
see his daughter. I thought he was crazy and had the wrong house. I didn’t
think he meant me. Mom was at the front door, trying to keep him out and
yelling for dad. Kenneth forced his way inside the door and pulled a gun from
behind his back. I screamed, and he yelled at me to come down. Dad ran in from
the backyard right then.”

“Did he fire the gun?”

She shook her head, but didn’t speak for another
minute. “Kenneth asked if I knew him, but of course I didn’t. He went
ballistic, kept yelling that Arnold wasn’t my father. He said he wanted his
family back and that Arnold had stolen us away from him.” Molly’s voice broke
and she turned her face into Trent’s shoulder.

“It’s okay. It’s over now, all in the past.” Trent
wasn’t sure how to comfort her, but now he realized whatever happened must have
been in self-defense, and that was a relief. “Arnold maneuvered the gun away
from Kenneth?”

She shook her head, “No, Kenneth kept it, but dad
had a knife. Kenneth tried to make me and my mom leave with him. When he
grabbed me to pull me outside, Dad jumped up and stabbed him. Dad wrestled the
gun out of his hand. Blood
dripped all o
ver
the floor.” She stopped there and he understood. Looking up, he saw Karen
looked awfully upset.

“This sounds like self-defens
e. Arnold was just trying to save his wife and daughter,”
he said to both women.

“How did you get away
from him? What happened?”

“Kenneth didn’t let go
of me; they jerked back and forth. I got my arm free but I tried to help Dad.
Kenneth and Dad knocked into me while they were struggling. I
remember
hitting my head.” Her hand went up and touched the spot. “The banister, I
think. Or the stairs. It happened so fast. I don’t even know where Mom was at
that point. The ceiling turned black. Next a loud noise jarred me
as if I’d been sle
eping. That man, Kenneth, fell
down and died right there.”

Karen had moved onto the couch with them and put a
hand on Molly’s back to let her know she was there for her.

Trent wanted to ask what they did with the body,
why Molly was willing to run like that, but decided to let her share at her own
pace. He had a lot of questions as her husband and friend, and the detective in
him wanted to get all the pieces and understand what happened too. At least
their business in California was done. They could return to Ridge City and have
the police there handle the case.

Maybe Molly saw the wheels turning, because she
asked him, “Am I in legal trouble? I’m not sure if I did anything wrong.”

“No, no you didn’t. You were a witness, and Arnold
acted to save his family and self.”

“But they didn’t go to the police.”

Yes, that was a problem. “Do you know why?”

After a moment’s thought, she said, “I remember
packing, feeling scared, but I don’t actually remember anything we said. I had
this feeling we were packing to get out of there, a trip, because we had to leave
for a while. I don’t remember thinking we wouldn’t come back. I don’t remember
the trip to Redding, either. I don’t know why we ran.”

“They must have thought they did something wrong,”
Karen offered. “I can understand if they panicked. Kenneth was dead, after
all.”

Trent knew the restraining order was on record,
giving even more credibility to their story, so he couldn’t imagine what they
were thinking. Whatever the Andersons had thought, they weren’t around to
explain. He asked, “Now do you think your parents’ accident was just that, an
accident?”

Molly’s head rose quickly, then her shoulders
slumped. “Kenneth couldn’t have killed my parents. At least not from this side
of the grave. So i
t must have been a m
ean
twist of fate.”

“Not having someone to blame doesn’t mean you
can’t be mad,” he said. “But now you know, and you wanted that, didn’t you?”

“I guess I did.” She picked her coffee back up.
“So what about the rest of it? What do I do?”

“We do need to report this,” Trent said. “Back in
Ridge City. The only loose end is locating the body.”

“I don’t remember seeing…”
Where or when they
hid or buried the body.
She shivered
.

“But there’s some good leads from your story.” He
gently pulled her against him, wanting to lend her his strength. “It’ll be up
to the authorities now.”

Molly placed her mug down on the coffee table
without taking a drink. Her hand lingered there as she became lost in her
thoughts. “About going back to Ridge City. I want to close this part of my life
first.”

Trent tilted his head but waited for her to
explain.

“I have to finish things here before I move on. I
have to get rid of all this stuff, pack what I want, put the house up for sale.
That is, if Cindy doesn’t want it back.”

“I can stay a while and help you with all this.” Trent
stood and paced. “I still have concerns about your neighbor.  I’m having his
prints ran.” He explained about the sunglasses he found on her porch.

“But so far, they haven’t found anything on him?”

“No, so it’s probably just a guy with a crush, but
I’m making sure he’s harmless.” Ironically, as he spoke, a distinct noise
started up softly in the distance. The police sirens grew louder until he
couldn’t ignore them. Trent’s cell rang. “Hello?”

“Williams. Quinn. We’re heading to your neighbor’s
house. Your feeling was right. The prints got a hit because there’s a warrant
out for his arrest. Looks like he was hiding here, just like your Andersons.”

Quinn didn’t say more, but hung up the phone as
the sirens reached Justin’s house. They stood together at the window, watching
the scene next door. He didn’t want to get in the middle of someone else’s
jurisdiction and planned to find out the details when things quieted down. As
they watched the officers go inside, he told her, “Your neighbor’s been running
from a warrant.”

Two officers dragged Atwood from the house, cuffed
and yelling. They put him inside a squad car and left. “I want to go talk to
them. See what they’ll tell me.”

“I’m coming with you,” Molly said. He gave her a
look that meant he didn’t like that idea, so she added, “It is safe now,
right?”

They approached the house together, and Quinn
apparently had given the okay already because an officer
allowed
Trent inside the house.

“Come see this.” The officer led them upstairs to
a bedroom to show them a wall of pictures, some of Molly coming and going from
her house, around town, and a few taken in Ridge City over the last few weeks.

Molly crossed her arms and looked at Trent in horror.

“He won’t bother you after this, I promise.” Trent
clenched his fists, but told himself the law would take care of it. He asked
the officer, “That’s what the warrant was for, isn’t it? He’s done this before
to someone else?”

The officer nodded. “Several times. He’s not
dodging this one.”

Chills ran up his back. “Mol, let’s get out of
here.” 

She nodded and turned on her heels. He followed
her back to her own house at a quick pace, where he asked, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m okay. I just want to get all this taken
care of soon so I can go home.”

Home. Their home.

“Thanks again,” Molly told Cindy over the phone
before they hung up. Glancing around the bare house, she sighed in relief. It
was one of those long, end of the journey type sighs. She had wanted her aunt to
take the house back, but Cindy wouldn’t have it. They finally compromised by agreeing
to split the profits from the sell. Cindy would take care of the furniture.
She’d originally left it in the house and then the Andersons had moved in and
used it. Molly didn’t want anything to do with it or any other reminder of how
her parents had hid things and lied to her. She wanted to remember her life
with them before Kenneth Webb found them.

It’d taken three days to wrap up the loose ends. Her
possessions were packed, at least the ones she wanted to keep: mostly just
clothes and the photo albums she found in the basement. Everything she wanted
to take with her would fit in a car.

“Ready?”

She turned and smiled at her husband. His eyes
were glowing with love for her, and she knew it was a rare and special love, the
kind you find once in a lifetime.

“Yup.” She stretched up to kiss him and fall into
his embrace. She wanted to linger there and hold him close, and could tell he
wanted that too, but at the same time she felt they both wanted to get out of
there and on with life.  

When she looked up at his face again, he wiped the
tear that was tickling its way down her cheek. She locked the door on the way
out and they were on their way.

Starting back up the freeway, this time knowing
what awaited her, Molly didn’t look back at Redding. It’d been a bit
bittersweet to hug Karen that last time, but she knew they would call often and
visit each other. In fact, why hadn’t she thought of inviting Karen up sooner?
She’d love to get them together with her friends in Ridge City.

Alicia called and Trent put her on the hands free speaker.

“Want some happy news?” she asked.

“That’d be nice.”

“Mark’s getting serious with one of the local
school teachers. Sounds like he finally had enough of Bev.”

Trent glanced over with a smile. Molly laughed.
“But who’ll Bev complain to now? Hopefully she’ll leave David alone about me.”

Alicia sighed. “We talked quite a bit about all
that, and we told Bev,
firmly
, to leave you alone and not to spread
gossip like that anymore.”