Bitter Rain by Baker Shannon

Author:Baker, Shannon
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Severn River Publishing
Published: 2021-02-09T00:00:00+00:00

17

We drove through Sand Gap and Dry Creek without conversation. Then I broke the silence. “We don’t have much to go on. According to her friends, and from what Douglas saw and heard, Shelly’s been acting different.”

That jaw worked. “Girls are disappearing on the rez. I think she’s been taken.”

“That’s a pretty big leap. Especially when we just saw a couple of those missing girls were off partying.”

He gripped the armrest. “We need to talk to Barnett.”

“Because the high school girls think he’s creepy? We thought our chem teacher was a zombie when we were in high school, but I’ll bet now he never ate anyone’s brains.”

Kyle looked at me with a familiar anguish. “I’ve always tried to protect her, and I feel helpless.”

He wrung my heart in his hands. I saw Carly, ten years old, baggy flannel pajama pants and her dad’s sweatshirt, curled into the corner of the old couch Ted and I inherited from his grandmother. Glenda was in day two of another round of chemo, so I’d brought Carly to Frog Creek for a few days. She’d wanted to stay home, but the adults vetoed her.

It had been snowing since before dawn, and we’d baked cookies and watched movies, and still the day stretched ahead of us.

Ted had burst through the back door, tracking slush and mud across the living room. “Let’s go!”

Carly jerked off the couch. “Where?”

He grabbed her hand and propelled her toward the attic stairs. Carly always stayed in a room we’d made for her up there. “Long johns, wool socks. We’re going sledding.”

Her eyes lit up, and she bounded for the stairs.

Ted patted my butt to push me toward our bedroom. “You, too. I’ll get the snowmobile and pull you guys up the hill.”

I hesitated, eyeing the accumulation on the yard outside the kitchen window. “Doesn’t look like enough snow. We’ll hit yucca and rocks.”

Ted lowered his voice. “Carly needs this. Isn’t a broken leg better than a broken heart?”

I hadn’t thought of that day in a long time. It had been a grand day, despite me getting a fat lip and Carly smashing a finger between the sled and a fencepost. The laughter and activity had helped her far more than the pain hurt.

What meaning should I take from this? That I ought to let Carly go? I couldn’t be her protector? What about Shelly?

I sighed. “Okay. Tomorrow we’ll talk to Barnett.”

Kyle’s hand tightened on his thigh. “Now. We need to go now.”

I glanced at him. “I need some time to think how to go about this. I’m out of my jurisdiction, and Barnett doesn’t like me. If I go barreling in without a plan, I won’t get anywhere.”

“Let me do the talking. I’ll get somewhere.”

I shook my head. “Nope. You aren’t going.”

“Screw that.”

His reaction didn’t surprise me. “You’re too hot. I’ll figure something out, maybe ask his advice about something. Go in through a window instead of breaking down the front door.”

There was serious danger of him pulverizing his jaw. “We should go now.

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