The Carson Springs Trilogy: Stranger in Paradise, Taste of Honey, and Wish Come True (22 page)

She remembered Andie, the girl at Rusk’s—her first almost-friend. They were to have gone riding tomorrow. Now that, too, was blown.

If she thought about it too much she wouldn’t be able to go on. Laura’s kindness. Maude’s unspoken understanding. They’d known exactly how far to extend themselves without making her feel uncomfortable. For the first time in her life she’d had the feeling she belonged.

The grassy slope blurred. The girl blinked hard, and it swam back into focus. She found herself thinking of Mrs. Keyes, her foster mom when she was twelve. Once she’d come home from school with a bloody nose after having been attacked by three sixth-grade boys, and Mrs. Keyes, a big brassy-haired woman with a smile that never quite reached her eyes, had merely handed her a tissue and ordered her to stop bawling. No use crying over spilled milk, she’d said, her favorite expression along with Feeling sorry for yourself isn’t going to help.

The girl was pierced with a sorrow so keen it was almost palpable. She lifted her face to the distant mountains—Sleeping Indian Chief, Moon’s Nest, Toyon Ridge—shouldering their way into the orangeade sky. She’d wished for it for so long it was as much a part of her as the color of her hair, or the crooked little toe on her right foot: a home of her own. And now, just when she could almost feel it in her grasp, it was gone.

She pushed the thought away, wiping the tears from her cheeks. Feeling sorry for myself isn’t going to help. She had to look ahead now; watch where she was going so she didn’t get caught.

She reached the top of the hill, sweating and out of breath. But all she saw were more hills, rolling off into the distance. The only sign of habitation was the walled convent on the other side of a thickly wooded grove. Our Lady of the Wayside. Its nuns were famous for their honey Laura had said. They also kept pretty much to themselves; they wouldn’t bother with her.

She heard the faint rushing of a stream, and her gaze was drawn to the grove below. She could lie low there until after dark, when there’d be less chance of getting caught. Cautiously, she started down the slope. The sun was nearly touching the horizon, leaving the hillside tiger striped with shadow—an hour when she’d have been setting the table for dinner while Maude stirred something on the stove. Her throat clenched, and she had to stop more than once to catch her breath.

When she reached the grove, the girl sank down beneath a live oak with branches nearly as thick as its trunk. She was surprised at how tired she was; she hadn’t come that far. On hikes with Laura she could walk for miles without feeling winded.

She closed her eyes. She would rest only until dark. Then head west, toward the highway. Once she got there she could thumb a ride.

As she drifted to sleep she imagined herself in the deep, claw-foot tub at Laura’s. Tears floated up behind her closed lids, and in her half-conscious state the past weeks seemed nothing more than a dream—a beautiful one from which she never wanted to awake.

She slept for hours curled on her side on the ground, her head resting in the crook of her arm and her thumb lightly grazing her mouth. She didn’t see the sun slip below the mountaintops, or hear the peep of nightjars in the branches overhead. The raccoon that stopped to drink from the stream lifted its head to sniff the air before slipping off undisturbed.

Somewhere around midnight she was startled awake by the sharp snap of a twig. She bolted upright, groggy and disoriented, her heart thudding. She couldn’t see anything at first, only darkness. Then shapes around her began to materialize. A fallen branch, the glistening boulders of the stream. In the bushes along the opposite bank a flicker of movement caught her eye.

She froze, her breath catching in her throat.

A bear? Laura had warned her to be on the lookout, but the girl hadn’t taken her all that seriously. She’d seen possums and raccoons, once even a rattlesnake. But the likelihood of coming across a bear in these hills had seemed as remote as a flying saucer.

Then she remembered the homeless guy who’d been found stabbed to death. Suppose his killer was out there? Goose bumps swarmed up her arms and legs, each thud of her heart like the whack of a baseball bat.

Another loud snap. She dropped to her belly, holding herself flat against the ground. If she kept very, very still he—or it—wouldn’t notice her.

Probably a deer. A harmless little Bambi.

But the crackling in the underbrush was too loud. She squeezed her eyes shut, holding as still as humanly possible. She almost hoped it was a bear. If you left them alone, Laura had said, they usually went away. Her chances would be better than with—

Memories of Lyle came rushing back. She moaned low in her throat, struggling to block them out. Several more minutes crawled past, and now there was only the sound of the stream and the dry rattle of leaves overhead. She remained perfectly still until her arms and legs began to grow numb, then lifted her head and looked around. No sign of anyone… or anything.

The pounding in her chest slowed. She held her head cocked, but when several more minutes passed without a sound, she lowered her head to the ground. She wouldn’t sleep, she told herself. Just lie here until it was safe to get up and move around.

Hours later she woke from a familiar dream. She was running through a house in which blind corridors appeared everywhere she turned. Parts of the house were familiar—the living room was Lyle’s and Shirlee’s, the stairs those of a half-remembered elementary school, the hallway with its dour faces in frames along the wall that of the Keyes’s Ditmus Avenue apartment. She felt a keen sense of urgency; she had to get out before something terrible happened—she didn’t know what, only that her life depended on it. She was reaching for a doorknob when—

Wake up child wake up

She drifted up to consciousness, her eyes opening to a ghostly face that seemed to float as if disembodied in the darkness overhead. She let out a startled yelp, and lurched upright.

A hand patted her arm gently. “Easy, child,” spoke a lilting female voice. Not a ghost after all. “You look as though you’ve had a bit of a shock. Did you see her then?”

“Who?” she croaked.

“Why, Sister Benedicta, of course.” The disembodied face materialized into a nun in a dark serge habit and veil. “Our resident ghost,” she said. “I’ve never seen her myself, though there are those who swear they have.” A merry note crept into her voice. They might have been chatting over tea and cookies. “I’m Sister Agnes, by the way. And who, dear child, might you be?”

The girl heard herself stammer, “I…I’m Finch.”

“Well now, isn’t this a fine way to start the day?” The little nun rocked back on her haunches, breaking into a smile of such warmth and goodwill the girl couldn’t help smiling back.

Then she remembered why she was here, and her heart began to pound. “What…what time is it?” Had she somehow slept the whole night away?

“O’dark in the morning, as me mam used to say.” Sister Agnes chuckled at her own joke. “I like to get my morning walk in before chapel. I do my best thinking then, with the world a blank slate just waitin’ to be written on. Plus, you never know what you’ll find.” She beamed at the girl as if at a rare flower or bird she’d stumbled across.

“I should be going.” The girl had pulled herself onto one knee when a wave of lightheadedness caused her to sink back.

Sister Agnes scarcely seemed to notice. “Take you, for instance,” she went on in the same tea-party voice. “When I came across you, lying there still as death, I confess I thought the worst. All that talk of a murderer.” Her expression clouded over briefly. “And now here we are chattin’ like old friends.”

“I must have gotten lost.” Could she trust this nun? She talked like the Irish cops back home, but there was definitely something odd about her.

A small pale hand floated up, mothlike, to alight on her cheek. “Lost? Well, I suppose that’s one way of puttin’ it.” She rose, still smiling, and held out her hand. “Come. Let’s get you home.”

The girl just sat there, hugging her knees.

“I thought so.” Sister Agnes sank back down beside her. “Are you running away then? Is that it?”

“I guess you could call it that.”

“May I ask where you’re headin’?”

The girl hesitated before replying miserably, “I don’t know.”

Sister Agnes nodded thoughtfully. “I see. Well, that’s a horse of a different color, isn’t it?” Blue eyes peered from a face made up of a series of circles—moon face, round chin, apple cheeks. “Anything I can do to help?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Maybe there is, and you just don’t know it.”

The girl tensed. “I don’t believe in God, if that’s what you mean.”

Sister Agnes didn’t appear shocked. “Never mind, child,” she said. “He believes in you.” She fingered the silver cross on a chain about her neck. “Oh, I know it doesn’t always seem that way. There’s times we think God couldn’t possibly love us. Take me, for instance. I seem to have a habit of stealing things. One minute I’ll be lookin’ at something…and the next thing I know I’ll be walking out the door with that very same thing in me pocket.” She heaved a sigh. “So you see, none of us is perfect, but that’s no cause for losing hope.”

An owl hooted in mournful echo. “I…I’ve done things I’m not proud of,” the girl said.

Sister Agnes patted her knee. “What kind of project would we be for God if we went around behavin’ like saints all the time? He’d have to find another hobby, for sure.”

The girl managed a tiny smile. “Like bird-watching?”

“More like beekeeping, I should think. Something with bite to it, if you’ll pardon the pun.” She chuckled softly. “That’s what our dear, departed Sister Benedicta is famous for, by the way. If it hadn’t been for her we’d never have found our second calling.”

“Honey?”

“Yes. Which reminds me—” Sister Agnes rose to her feet, brushing leaves from her skirt. A stout little woman with a body as round as her face. “You must be hungry. Come, let’s get you fed.”

The girl glanced up at her doubtfully. “Are you sure it’s okay?”

“And why wouldn’t it be when there’s more than enough to go around?” If Finch had been referring to something other than breakfast, Sister Agnes wasn’t letting on. This time when she extended her hand the girl grasped hold. “From the looks of it you’ll be wanting last night’s supper as well.”

Realizing suddenly that she was starving, the girl wordlessly fell into step behind her.

Laura was crawling out of bed, half asleep, when she heard a car in the driveway. She dashed to the living room window and peered out. Last night, when Finch still hadn’t returned, she’d phoned an old friend in the police department. Ernie would be discreet, she knew. He’d keep an eye out without making a federal case of it. After the incident with Elroy (which she saw no reason to mention), she wasn’t taking any chances.

But it wasn’t a squad car pulling in. Laura stepped out onto the porch, shading her eyes against the morning glare. A nun was behind the wheel of the VW van belonging to Our Lady of the Wayside. Laura was puzzled—hadn’t the items stolen by Sister Agnes been returned?—until she saw who was getting out of the passenger’s side: Finch.

A hand flew to her mouth, and she bit down on her palm to keep from crying out. Finch started toward the house, trudging like a weary soldier home from battle: a lanky girl in wrinkled blue shorts and a maroon T-shirt who’d filled out some in the past weeks, and whose once-pale skin was as brown as Hector’s. She looked as though she’d spent the night outdoors; her clothes were dirty and her long hair tangled—like when Laura had first seen her. Except that then her expression had been wary; now it was as if she was hoping to be let back in.

Laura’s heart went out to her. Last night, as she’d lain awake fearing the worst, Finch must have been doing the same. It was all she could do to keep from dashing to meet her. She waited instead, a hand on the doorknob, hardly daring to breathe.

Finch paused halfway up the steps. “I didn’t think you’d be up this early.” Her voice was flat, her gaze fixed on a point just past Laura’s ear.

“Are you kidding? I was up half the night!” Laura raked a hand through her hair, struggling to remain calm. “You scared the hell out of us, you know. Running off like that.”

Pearl chose that moment to trundle onto the porch, yawning. Finch crouched down, wrapping her arms about the dog’s neck. The old yellow Lab wagged her tail, welcoming Finch with a lick. When the girl brought her head up, her eyes were wet.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Well, you should be. We were worried sick.” Laura realized she was practically yelling, and lowered her voice. “You could have phoned at least—to let us know you were okay.”

“I didn’t think you’d want to hear from me after—” She bit her lip.

“What happened with Elroy was his own fault.”

“What if I’d killed him?” A pair of wide, brown eyes searched hers over Pearl’s silky yellow ear.

“You didn’t.”

Finch shook her head. “I don’t know what happened. I heard him yelling at Maude…and the next thing I knew the knife was in my hand.” The blood drained from her face. Slowly, she straightened and stood up.

“You were only defending Maude,” Laura said softly. She stepped forward to slip an arm about Finch’s shoulders. “Look, why don’t we go inside? Frankly, I’m so happy you’re back I can’t think of anything else right now.”

The girl hesitated. “You mean you’re not going to turn me in?”

“Why would I do a thing like that?”

“You don’t know me. You don’t know what I’ve done.”

Laura drew back to eye her sternly. “Look, let’s get one thing straight. No matter what, you’ll always have a home here. But I can’t help you unless you’re willing to take a chance on us, too.”

“You don’t know what I’ve done,” Finch repeated in a hoarse whisper.

“I know you’re scared.” Laura spoke gently. “I also know you well enough by now to feel reasonably certain that whatever it is you think you’ve done, it couldn’t be all that terrible.”

The girl dropped her head; Laura could feel her trembling, and felt suddenly afraid. A chill settled over her as well. She’d been thinking along the lines of abuse, possibly sexual. But what if that wasn’t all?