Rachel Dahlrumple. Shea McMaster
whispered. “Chinese water torture is too good for him. Splinter those bamboo chopsticks and the minute he gets home, they’re going under his fingernails. After that, his balls.” I’d learned a few things from my father’s stories of ’Nam. And of course, reading about the war. After all, I was a librarian. A curious one. I’d read nearly every book on our well stocked shelves. Except the really dry science and technical books, which I left to the geeks. And I meant that in the nicest way. I liked geeks. Briefly, I considered doing a search on torture techniques when I returned to work Monday morning. If I could hold off that long.
The tanned face so near mine blanched as he flinched. “Easy going, ma’am.”
Right. I wasn’t known for saying such things. I wasn’t known for saying much.
“Well?” I demanded, possibly a tad harshly, but I’d earned the right. My fragile world had just vaporized before my eyes and it was far too soon to see what might be left. If anything. The only future visible looked like a rapidly expanding black hole.
Someone wanted me dead. But who? My husband? His girlfriend? God, that hurt. I hated cheaters. I hated what they did to families, especially the children. Even though I had no children, divorce loomed in front of me like a huge gaping maw. I wanted to wail, gnash my teeth, and obliterate something, anything. Of course, I was Rachel the Mouse, so I did my best to hide the violent urges building inside. Rachel the Meek never, ever, let loose with her most primitive emotions. She hid them deep, keeping a calm, submissive, accepting face turned toward the world at large.
Then again, my harsh tone might have been part of that breathing trouble I so very much wanted to control. “What would you do?”
For the first time I could remember in our long, long history, Dan looked directly, and very deeply, into my eyes. The sympathy, sincerity, and concern on his face hit me before the actual words did. Already overwhelmed from too many emotions boiling in my heart and head, I had no defense or response for his reply, or the way he ever so lightly caressed my cheek with the back of his fingers. When had he gotten so close?
“Well, Rachel, since I’m not the kind of idiotic ass your husband is, I wouldn’t be stupid enough to screw around on the most amazing woman anywhere. Were I the lucky one to have you, I wouldn’t leave you alone long enough for you to ever feel abandoned.”
Aside from the asthma and allergy thing, I was a healthy woman. I’d never, ever, once fainted in my life. But the shocks to my system that night hit too hard. A poisonous gift, a nasty note, knowledge I didn’t want of my husband’s cheating ways, and a gorgeous, younger man, telling me he considered me amazing and not plain, boring, and mousy… The zing I felt in my tummy from his touch did me in.
Black waves engulfing me, limbs losing strength, I slowly collapsed and Dan caught me at the last moment of consciousness. Like any nineteenth-century heiress worth her crumpets and tea, I fainted right into his arms.
Chapter 3
July 4, 2009, started out pretty much like any other Saturday morning.
Aside from the events of the previous night, that was. I certainly did my best to ignore them, not that it did any good. In order to continue, a brief explanation should suffice.
After fainting, I came to on the living room chaise with our EMT neighbor, Miguel, backed up by Dan and Cyndi, bent over me. A blanket covered my lower half. Too embarrassed to ask how much Dan had seen, I ignored him and concentrated on breathing per Miguel’s instructions. Cyndi, God love her, fussed about, pouring coffee and water. Trust her to turn my malaise into a tea party.
Miguel kept a bottle of oxygen and an Epi-pen on hand for the very rare times an attack overtook anyone in the neighborhood. As he usually looked at me when mentioning it, I’d pooh-poohed the implication for about three years. Only now his smug smile assured me he considered his forward thinking had finally proven my protests moot. Dan dashed upstairs to get my meds and it took an hour before they were all confident enough of my stability for me to kick them out.
From their silence on the issue of Burt, I suspected Dan hadn’t said a word–or they chose to ignore it. I did notice the flower box had been carefully bagged. He took it and the note for analyzing, after ordering me to lock and alarm the house, then go to bed. For a moment he sounded an awful lot like Burt and I wanted to stick my tongue out at him. Probably because, unlike Burt, he looked just the teeniest bit worried about me, I nodded instead.
So, Saturday morning, desperate to not think about the night before–seriously, fainting with no underwear on under a very short night shirt? I knew I’d never be able to look the deputy in the eye again as long as I lived–I rose after only two hours sleep, showered, dressed all the way, took care of my morning med doses and went downstairs for breakfast that might as well have been sawdust for all I noticed. While I drank my coffee on the back porch and did a visual inspection of the backyard–the coolers remained untouched–John brought over his secret weapon, his six-year-old steel magnolia, Mindy. Knowing I couldn’t hold out against the sweetest little girl ever born, they coerced me into meeting them in town for the parade. Over the years, John had learned to shamefully use his adorable child against me, and I’d yet to find a way to counterstrike. Okay, so she was my child of the heart and I would have stolen her from them in a heartbeat, and he very smugly knew it.
Because their car barely held the family of five, I had a choice; a five-mile drive and hassle with parking, or walk a few hundred yards across the seasonally low river and risk wet feet. In my present mood, a mixture of mystification, humiliation, denial and simmering anger, I did my best to focus on my surroundings rather than my anguish. In truth, I should have stayed home because I just couldn’t find it in me to put on my normal happy face. I’d completely fried my mind trying to figure out who’d sent the weeds. Since she–whoever she was–had made the delivery, did it mean Burt really was at a convention? And playing golf? The fact he hadn’t answered his cellphone in no way reassured me. Never mind he almost never answered his cell when I called, but he usually called back within an hour. Hadn’t happened yet.
I slung a tiny purse with keys, phone and cash over my shoulder, made a barely dignified slide down the river bank, and picked my way from sand bar to sand bar across the extremely low waterway that separated our neighborhood from town. I loved my Crocs and had made it a point to wear them specifically for crossing the river. They dried fast, and standing around in a wet pair of shoes and socks all day didn’t appeal. Besides, they were cute and matched my outfit. A tough combo to beat.
The walk gave me a chance to study our small town from an angle I rarely got the chance to savor. Typical of the stereotype, we weren’t much more than a wide spot around a county highway about twenty miles off I-5 running down California’s San Joaquin Valley. A farming community settled in the last half of the nineteenth century, most of its homes had started out Victorian, and then morphed with twentieth century modification.
The moment I scrambled up the far bank and crossed the sports fields where the fireworks would be set off later, I met people streaming from the houses, and heading toward downtown. Beneath the large trees, mostly oaks and sycamores, standing in the wide yards, natural shade covered the broad streets. The trees didn’t cool much as the ambient temperature soared, but I appreciated their protection from the direct sun. I strolled down the middle of the street–the sidewalks were all full–and exchanged greetings while looking away from curious stares. Burt’s absence was noted but generally ignored in the way that small town gossip always made the rounds but stopped short of the object, which saved me from a lot of poor dear comments. Looks, I could deal with. Pity? I could do without. I slowed my steps and let the people flow past, giving my attention to the little ones who knew me from the library.
At one point I had three of the little critters hanging off me, not normally something I considered a problem. Right then I couldn’t pretend they were mine. Instead, the hole inside felt bigger than ever. I’d always wanted kids, but they’d never happened. I extracted myself from the hugs and sent them off with their parents.
“Miss Rachel!” A masculine voice overrode the chatter going on around me and I considered ignoring it, but then