Sisters in the Wind(95)
I arrive at the farm, pulling into the driveway as if no time has passed. How can one year, in which so much happened, feel like a blink? The tesseract from A Wrinkle in Time.
I force myself to remember. It feels important to do so now.
For the first six months, I lived on my own and worked at the diner. I had a small and quiet existence while trying to figure out how to create a life that felt more than happenstance. The last six months have felt like treading water, immobilized by my leg injury and court tether. But the time with Jamie and Daunis has also been a glimpse into a bigger life.
I’m too scared to look for any new trees in the hammock grove, focusing instead on the farmhouse ahead. As I step from Jamie’s car, the sounds of summer wash over me. Birds, frogs, the rustling of leaves. The air is full of nature but devoid of people.
My injured leg feels especially tight after the two-hour drive. I try shaking the cramp as if preparing for a track race. I mimic Jamie’s standing quad flexes from earlier. My jeans are uncomfortably damp from sweat and the sudden hit of humidity.
I walk to the main entrance at the space between the original farmhouse and the kitchen addition. The front door is open; only the screen door separates me from the inside.
Stacy told me where to come. Surely someone must be expecting me.
I barely glance at the kitchen with the long wooden table big enough for fourteen people. The noisy dinners are a distant memory from a tinny speaker. It fades as I walk through the living room. The furniture hasn’t changed. Diego and I slept on these sofas the night Emily had her baby. Other nights, we watched movies I hadn’t been allowed to see growing up.
Finally, I reach the door to the library. My library. I twist the brass knob and enter. It smells of old books still wanting to be read.
Stacy Sterling isn’t nine years old anymore. She’s twelve. Long, bare legs are tucked beneath her in a way that looks painful. Blond hair cascades over her shoulders. Her face has the beginnings of cheekbones. Her eyes are still big and bright blue.
She blinks as if not trusting the image before her.
“Hi, Stacy.” Calmly, I sit next to her on the floor. Her safety is my only charge.
Then she opens like a flower in the sun. I’m not an apparition. I’m really here.
Stacy slides an old paperback novel to me: Rachel Chance by Jean Thesman. Her cornflower-blue eyes plead for me to understand. She tried to send a coded message. If I knew the book, I’d know what she was warning me.
But I don’t know the book.
I keep failing you, sweet girl.
I’m so intent on Stacy and musty pages that I miss the other clue.
The scent that takes a beat too long to remember because it’s so unexpected.
I turn. It’s not Devery or Missus.
“Lucy,” Mrs. Sterling snips. Her sleepy lavender cologne burns in my nose.
Even worse is the patchouli and leather that choke any fresh air from the room as Mr. Sterling’s glare freezes my veins.
I don’t understand how the Sterlings and the Hoppys are connected, other than by me. Devery told Missus about Stacy. They used her as bait. I followed their instructions. I missed whatever clue Stacy tried to give me.
“Where are Mister and Missus?” I ask, looking around.
“They’re not ready for you just yet,” Mr. Sterling says.
It’s not his supercilious manner that frightens me, but the hint of a smirk. He’s a predator who enjoys torturing his prey. He wants me to beg him for the kind mercy of ending me.
The Hoppys want the key and the journal. I have no idea what the Sterlings want with me.
“I think it’s time we bring your brother down,” Mr. Sterling tells Stacy.
Steven. My heart jumps, filling my throat with a pulsating, choking terror.
She obeys her dad, taking the same delicate steps as her mother.
Steven has been upstairs this entire time.
What are they going to let him do? Why now? Have they been waiting until I aged out of the foster system? No more check-ins with my caseworker, no one to report me missing?
Before I can assess the risk and reward of diving through a window screen, a sound threatens to bring me to my knees.
Stacy walks into the room carrying a fifteen-month-old toddler with brown eyes and bouncy brown curls. He is chubby and beautiful and loves his big sister. He likes saying her name.
“Say-see. Say-see.”
The Sterlings have Luke.
RESPECT THE GRAYEST PILE
My arms tingle at my sides. My fingers alternate—paralyzed claws one second and wilted stems the next. I want to reach for my son. I want to rip apart the adults in my way.
I will do anything they want, for one minute of Luke in my arms.
Even as I think it, I know they will deny me.
“Stacy,” her father says imperturbably, “take Luke where I told you to play.”
They kept Luke’s name. I don’t understand why the Sterlings would keep this connection to me. It isn’t until I’ve watched Stacy carry Luke through the alcove and enter one of the first-floor bedrooms, and then turned my tear-filled eyes toward Mr. Sterling, that I get it.
It’s for this exact moment.
“Let’s talk,” he says benevolently before glancing at his watch.
Mrs. Sterling and I sit in the two chairs. Mr. Sterling stands at the threshold, blocking my exit in case I have any ideas of fleeing. Surrounded by tales of intrigue, revenge, love, and lust, we appear to be a small book club about to discuss a novel. In the background, a children’s show with silly songs plays loudly from the nursery wing. I’m grateful Luke and Stacy can’t hear what will be said in this room.