The Cedar Hollow Series by Melinda Clayton

Author:Melinda Clayton
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: historical fiction, literary fiction, psychological fiction, southern fiction, cultural heritage, small town and rural
Publisher: Thomas-Jacob Publishing, LLC
Published: 2016-11-29T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 39

“ONE MORE MINUTE, JESSIE,” Nora held out a hand to stop me as I stood to leave. We still don’t have all the answers.”

I doubted we would ever have all the answers, but I sank tiredly back onto the couch. “What do you mean? Nora, I really don’t want to do this any longer tonight.”

“The fire,” she said. “The break in. The chemicals. What about those things? Jessie, that’s what got you out here to begin with.” I was reeling so much from all the revelations of the evening that I’d completely forgotten.

Nora looked at the Huffmans. “Am I to assume you’re responsible for those things?”

“No ma’am,” Mr. Huffman answered emphatically as Mrs. Huffman vehemently shook her head. “Absolutely not. We didn’t have nothing to do with those things. We’d never do something that might hurt these kids. You’ve got to believe that.”

“Don’t you think it’s a little too much of a coincidence that they happened right after you started working here?” Nora pressed him.

“Yes ma’am, I do,” Mr. Huffman answered, “and that worries me. But we didn’t have nothing to do with them things happening. It’s true as soon as Rogers found out about this place we went and applied for a position. Didn’t get hired on at first, so we reapplied when we saw the ads in the paper for a groundskeeper and a housekeeper.

“I didn’t know how often Ms. McIntosh visited, but I figured before long we’d come in contact with her if we was here. We’d have a chance to get to know her a little bit, have a chance to get some DNA. Up until then, we hadn’t figured how to go about getting a sample. Thought about sending Rogers out to California to see if he could get one somehow, but he’s older now, you know. Not working as much.

“When this come up, it was just perfect. If it turned out for sure you was mine, Ms. McIntosh, we’d be set to tell you the truth about things. Didn’t know exactly how we’d do it, but that was the plan.”

“Did you ever consider approaching me directly?” I asked. “Just explaining and asking me for a sample?” It seemed like such a simple solution.

“Would you have given it?” Mr. Huffman asked.

That was a good question. I didn’t know the answer. More than likely I would have thought they were kooks. When you have a lot of money, people do unbelievable things to try to get their hands on it. What would I have done if a strange, elderly couple had approached me in L.A., told this fantastic story, and asked for a DNA sample? I probably would have thought they were pulling some sort of scam and called security. I wasn’t sure what made it different hearing it up on Crutcher Mountain, but for some reason it was.

“Ms. McIntosh,” he continued, “the way we went about planning things out might be wrong, but we didn’t mean no harm to nobody, and we did not do them things y'all are asking me about.

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