Page 60 of Somebody's Watching Me
Jamison’s brow pinched with confusion. “I live in Texas.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
“Visiting?”
“You can do that?”
“Uh, yeah?”
Flopping back in her rocker, the woman mumbled to herself. “I learn something new every time.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” The woman stuck her hand out. “My name is Laura Jean, by the way.”
Jamison shook her dead mother’s hand. “I know who you are.”
Releasing a laugh, Laura Jean Eddins’ eyes sparkled with a mischievousness others would later describe as magical. Her mother was magic. That’s all Jamison ever knew.
“Word gets around amongst your kind, does it?”
“I guess?” Jamison rocked her chair in time with her mother’s. “Where is everyone else?”
An explosion of feet answered the question. A herd of children rushed through the front door and out onto the lawn. They were silent as they went, but once out in the grass, screams and laughter competed with the hum of chainsaws.
“Our brood,” Laura Jean said. “God help us.”
Jamison smiled at Evie and Selah sword fighting with some of the fallen limbs while the other children cheered.
“I want that.” Watching her brother and sister, Jamison had never been surer of the fact. “I want kids, and I’m not afraid.”
The soft smile on Laura Jean’s face faded. “Why would you be afraid?”
Jamison turned away from the chaos, noticing how even the driveway looked different without the barrier of hedges dividing the lawn and the gravel drive. That section of landscaping wouldn’t come into existence for years.
“Because things happen for a reason.” A tear fell, and she didn’t bother to wipe it away. This was a dream. It didn’t matter who saw her pain. “I chose to end things with the man I love, but I still want him. I’ll always want him.”
Taking her hand, Laura Jean continued to rock. “Keep talking. It will help.”
“We fell in love instantly. There wasn’t any hesitation. The moment we came together, we knew it was going to be a forever kind of thing.” More tears, and she let those go, too. “He’s my best friend and always listens to what I have to say like it’s important.”
Seeming to understand,Laura Jean nodded. “Sometimes being friends first makes the fall easier, but no less exhilarating.”
“We should have married years ago, but there was always something in our way. Lockdowns, catching up at work, and then his assignments.”
“Assignments?”
“He works–” Jamison shook her head. “He worked for the FBI but quit recently, claiming that his job cost him everything.”
“You,” her mother concluded. “It cost him you, didn’t it?”
“Not exactly.” Closing her eyes, she focused on the feel of her mother’s tiny hand. A weird detail someone must have supplied her with. “He was involved with cases where children were being sold into slavery, and it started to warp his brain.”
“God, how horrible.”
“I saw some of the stuff he was dealing with, and looking back, I should have known how it was affecting him. But I didn’t really take the blinders off until a few months before our wedding.”
“Please say you didn’t call it off right before the wedding.”
