Read Stay (Dunham series #2) Online

Authors: Moriah Jovan

Tags: #romance, #love, #religion, #politics, #womens fiction, #libertarian, #sacrifice, #chef, #mothers and daughters, #laura ingalls wilder, #culinary, #the proviso

Stay (Dunham series #2) (2 page)

BOOK: Stay (Dunham series #2)
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* * * * *

 

 

2: Lazy, Lousy, Liza Jane

 

 

April 1995

 

Vanessa squeezed tight into herself, watching from
across the street, waiting for him. She sat on the sidewalk, her
back against the stone wall of the café and furniture store, a
small book hidden between her upraised knees and her chest.

There he was, striding purposefully into the
courthouse like he owned it: tall, blond, hard, and very cruel. She
could see it in his face. She knew what he’d done—the whole county
knew. And trembled. She didn’t know which was scarier: approaching
the man who’d gotten away with the murder of her mother’s boyfriend
or going home to her mother after having done so.

She
could
just forget the whole thing and go
back to school, but Laura would be disappointed in her if she left
now, so Vanessa tried to screw up her courage and go see the man
every person in the county feared.

“He could snap again,” went the whispers. “Who knows
what’ll set that crazy bastard off now.”

He had more than one reputation in town, for sure.
Whenever Vanessa and the rest of the sixth graders ate lunch in the
narrow quad between the elementary school and high school, she
would overhear the older girls talking about him as if he were a
rock star. Even a couple of teachers would whisper his name and
giggle. She supposed he was kinda sorta good looking, but he was
way old—like, twenty-five or something—and terrifying.

Her heart in her throat, she still couldn’t make
herself move.

What would Laura do?

Laura would march herself on in there and do the
right thing no matter what. “Vanessa, that boy didn’t rape Simone,”
she’d say, or so Vanessa imagined she might say. “You’re the only
person who knows that besides your mother and sister, so it’s
your
responsibility.”

Vanessa knew what would happen to her when LaVon and
Simone found out she’d blown up their scheme—and they
would
find out.

Dirk, the only protector she had ever had, was gone
all the way around the world to New Zealand, to talk to people
about his church. She’d had no one to protect her for a year and
this would seal her fate. Perhaps it was time she packed her bags
and set out on her own.

The crowd of people going to work had thinned out
quite a while ago and then only the intermittent flow of deputies
coming and going kept her from entering. She supposed it was now or
never if she was going to do this, because eventually someone would
approach her to find out why she wasn’t at school.

Reluctantly she stood and shoved the book up her
shirt, then hugged it to her tight. With leaden feet she crossed
the street and headed up the long walk to the courthouse doors.
Once inside, she didn’t know what to do. Everybody looked at her
strangely but no one asked her her business.

She looked up at the building directory and looked
for his name. There. Second floor. She stared up the very high,
wide staircase and took a deep breath. One step at a time, one step
at a time, one step at a time, and then she was in front of the
door she sought:

 

PROSECUTOR’S

OFFICE

 

Her hand reached out for the doorknob as if it were
on a string and she was a puppet—wait, no, a . . . She searched for
the right word. Marionette. That’s right. A marionette. And while
she’d been thinking of the right word, her feet had gone ahead and
taken her through the door and into the office.

Ancient wood and metal desks were crammed into an
open area any which way. Men stormed around the obstacles, cursing,
yelling, and generally filling the air with much anger and lots of
bad words. She swallowed. In front of her was another door:

 

CLAUDE NOCEK

PROSECUTOR

 

A young black man stopped short and looked down at
her. She stepped back, her eyes wide, because now she would
actually have to talk to one of those men who were cursing and
yelling and being angry.

She bit her lip.

Tightened her arms over her body, over the book, its
vinyl cover stuck to her skin.

“Well, uh, hi,” he said after a long few seconds.
“My name’s Richard. What can I do for you?”

She gulped. “I came to see Mr. Hilliard,” she
whispered. “I have something for him.”

A bemused smile swept across his face and she knew
then that he was nice and he’d help her. “Really? What would that
be?”

“A book,” she breathed. “I really need to talk to
him, please.”

He turned a bit and gestured that she should step
ahead of him. She shrank from the curious glances of the other men
as their conversation first lowered and then stilled in her
presence. She felt Richard’s hand lightly on her back but didn’t
pull away; she didn’t like strangers to touch her, but she had come
here by herself for a reason. She tucked her head down and let her
brown hair fall to cover her face. Finally, she took one step and
then another, Richard’s hand guiding her across the floor to a dark
corner in the back. Mr. Hilliard sat hunched over his desk,
engrossed in his work. She blinked when he jotted a note. He was
left-handed, like her. Somehow that made her think that maybe she
didn’t have to be so afraid.

“Knox, this young lady says she has something for
you.”

Mr. Hilliard raised his head and looked first at the
man, then at her. She tried to hide how afraid she was but knew she
couldn’t. Then the most amazing thing happened.

He smiled. And it was a nice smile.

“Hi. What’s your name?”

“Vanessa,” she whispered. She didn’t want to tell
him her last name because his smile might go away and then he might
not be nice to her anymore. Her mother badgered him enough as it
was and she was sure he was sorry he’d ever heard the Whittaker
name.

“How old are you?”

“Twelve.”

“Why aren’t you in school?”

“I have to give you something. It’s very
important.”

He looked up at Richard and nodded, which she
figured meant he was to go away. Mr. Hilliard reached behind
himself and pulled a wooden chair toward Vanessa, setting it next
to his desk. He patted it. “Have a seat, Vanessa. What do you have
for me?”

She approached warily because of what he’d done. It
was wrong and bad and horrible. Yet . . . Vanessa felt safer at
home because of what he had done (honestly, she was secretly
glad
, which Laura would say made her as evil as Mr.
Hilliard) so she bit her lip again as she sat down on the chair.
She slowly drew the book from under her shirt, making sure not to
show any skin, and without a word, she handed it to him.

He took it from her gently, turning it over and over
again. She knew that book by heart: pink plastic with a small lock
that didn’t seem to work very well. The key had been lost—she
didn’t know when. The book was decorated in pink, red, and white
hearts, glitter, and silver flowers. She also knew every word in
it, which was why she had come.

He opened it and looked at the beginning of it,
where its owner’s name was written, the “i”s dotted with hearts.
Then his mouth tightened and he looked at her from the corners of
his eyes. She didn’t think that was a nice look.

Thankfully, he began to read. It wouldn’t take him
long to get to the important part, so she decided to make herself
as small as she could. She curled into herself then, hooking her
heels on the edge of the seat. She drew her knees to her chest and
wrapped her arms around them.

Her stomach rumbled loudly, earning her another,
longer, glance.

She knew that look.

More than a few people had been mean enough to say
it.

When was the last time you ate?

Then he tipped back his chair and, putting one foot
on the edge of his desk, he read page after page with what seemed
to Vanessa to be lightning speed.

Then he was done and he looked at her for a long
time. He was chewing on the inside of his mouth. She didn’t know
what that meant, either.

He threw the book on his desk and linked his fingers
behind his head. “Why did you bring me that?” he asked. She still
couldn’t tell if he was mad or not.

“Because it’s the truth,” she whispered. “People
were burned at the stake because no one told the truth.”

Mr. Hilliard got a funny look on his face. “What
people?”

“The witches. In Salem. A long time ago. People died
because mean girls told a lie. I read about it.”

“I see,” he said slowly and looked down at the book.
He pointed to it. “How do I know this is the truth?”

She hadn’t thought about that. To her, it was so
clear. Her forehead crinkled. “I guess— Well, I don’t know.”

“Now, you know I’m going to have to ask about this
and that I’ll have to say how I got it, right?”

Vanessa nodded. “Yes,” she said, and gulped again.
She began to tremble because now that Mr. Hilliard hadn’t shot her
in the head like he did Tom Parley, she knew her mother and her
sister would make her wish he had.

He wiped a hand down his face and didn’t talk for a
long time. Finally, he handed her a pen and paper. “Write down your
grade and teacher’s name, Vanessa.” She did, and then he took a
business card, turned it over, and wrote on it. When he handed it
to her, he said, “If anything happens to you, if you’re afraid at
home for any reason, you call me and I’ll come get you, even if
it’s three o’clock in the morning.”

“Where would you take me?”

“To my cousin Giselle’s house until social services
could come get you.”

Foster people. That sounded worse than home, if that
was possible. She bit her lip yet again in indecision.

“Well, okay. I can see that might not seem fun.
Right now, I’m going to take you to school. Have you had anything
to eat this morning?”

She shook her head again, understanding what he
intended and that it would mean a ride in a car with a strange
adult man, yet she was too hungry to let the possibility of a free
meal pass her by.

So she went with him and she stood by his pretty
dark green car while he unlocked and opened the door for her, then
closed it once she had climbed in. She didn’t think much of it
until he parked at McDonald’s and murmured, “Stay there.” Now
simply curious, she watched him get out of the car, walk around to
her side, and open her door for her. He offered her his hand as if
she were an adult! A real lady! And then he opened the door of
McDonald’s for her!

He let her pick whatever she wanted and eat at the
picnic table (he didn’t say much because he seemed to be busy
thinking), bought her more (enough for dinner tonight, breakfast
tomorrow, and possibly lunch too, if she hid it well enough), then
took her to school. The high school girls were outside because it
was their lunchtime and they could go off campus if they wanted.
She was very conscious of them because they thought Mr. Hilliard
was handsome and dangerous, and they had stopped to stare when they
heard, then saw, his car.

What would Laura do?

Laura would hold her head high and ignore the people
who stared.

They parked and she reached for the door handle.
“Stay there,” he reminded her, and again she waited, feeling very
grown up and sophisticated. The senior girls watched Mr. Hilliard
open her door for her and help her out the same way he had at
McDonald’s. A strange, nice feeling went through her, like how the
word “dignity” might feel. They watched him walk her across the
lawn away from the lunch quad to the entrance of the elementary
school. They watched him hold the front door open for her, again,
as if she were an adult and a lady.

The school secretaries gasped when they saw him walk
in behind Vanessa and they shrank away from him. He seemed not to
notice.

“Vanessa Whittaker’s been at the courthouse for an
interview,” he said to the principal, who came out of his office to
see what the commotion was all about. “I’m sure you won’t put her
down as tardy for today.”

“Oh, of course not, Mr. Hilliard. Of course
not.”

Wow. She had never thought Mr. Roberg could be
afraid of anything.

Mr. Hilliard stepped away from her then. He looked
down at her and smiled again that really nice smile. “Thank you,
Vanessa. You’re probably the bravest person I’ve ever met.”

Vanessa grinned back at him then, big enough she
felt her eyes crinkle at the corners. Now she knew that everything
would be okay. Her mother wouldn’t dare do anything to her as long
as everyone knew that Knox Hilliard was Vanessa’s friend. He patted
her shoulder before he left.

She was walking down the street toward her mobile
home after school when the cop car whizzed by and stopped at her
trailer. By the time she got there, her sister was being hauled out
in handcuffs.

“You little bitch!” she screamed when she saw
Vanessa. “You lying little bitch!” She lurched toward Vanessa and
Vanessa instinctively stepped back, but the deputy hauled her back
toward him, then shoved her in the back seat of the squad car, a
hand on her head.

Her mother came out on the deck and looked straight
at Vanessa, taking a puff of her cigarette. “So what’d that bastard
do to you to get you to lie for that sonofabitch who raped your
sister?”

“I didn’t lie,” she murmured as she climbed the
steps, the deputy’s car pulling away from the curb and disappearing
down the street. She pulled out Mr. Hilliard’s business card and
showed her the back, where he had written the word “home” and his
phone number. “Mr. Hilliard is my friend. He thinks I’m brave.”

Laura was brave.

Her mother stiffened, and after a long pause, she
went back in the house without a word.

 

 

* * * * *

 

 

3: Blackstone’s Formulation

BOOK: Stay (Dunham series #2)
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