Page 20 of Threat of Danger
He was a farmer, a strong man. He could haul hundred-pound seed bags all day long. When he came, he was going to kill the man in the mask who’d brought Hannah to this dark corner of hell. And then Daddy was going to take Hannah home. Then her mother was going to hug her and hug her, and she would be safe again, and her pain would go away.
Her fingers slippery with blood, Hannah dropped the chain. She wrapped her arms around her knees and rocked herself.
“Hurry, Daddy, please hurry,” she whispered into the darkness.
Chapter Six
Saturday
JESS GAZED AROUNDher old bedroom from under the covers as morning light filtered through the lace curtains.New day. Do over. Not going to get sucked into the past, or any weird emotions involving Derek.
What shewoulddo was find her old diary.
The room around her was as she’d left it at eighteen. Cheerleading trophies still lined the top of the dresser; Justin Timberlake posters covered the walls. Bold colors drew the eye everywhere—her favorite had been the deep red of chili peppers, the color of her bedspread and throw pillows, and the rug that covered hundred-year-old hardwood floors. Clearly, the whole earth-tones, shabby-chic trend hadn’t yet begun when she’d last lived here.
She glanced at her phone on the nightstand. Groaned.Aww, dammit.She’d forgotten to call Eliot last night. She would have to call later.
She slipped from her bed to stand at the window. Half a dozen hired hands were milling around the outbuildings already. Her gaze slid to the Daley farm. She could see Derek’s bedroom window—a small dark dot on the white house—right above the front entry. The amount of time she’d spent staring at that window in her misspent youth ...
I’m a different person now.
Her stomach growled, reminding her to get going. Jess turned from the window, cleaned up, dressed, then plodded downstairs, where Zelda was frying bacon in the kitchen.
Jess gave her a quick hug from behind. “I was going to cook breakfast.”
Zelda wiped her hands on her red apron, then turned and hugged her back. “I like cookin’ breakfast. Wakes me up. Can’t have coffee now. Caffeine messes with my blood pressure. Can’t have sugar anymore either. At least my cholesterol is fine. Now I wake myself up with the smell of bacon every mornin’.” She shuffled to the fridge. “Eggs?”
“Two, please.”
“Scrambled?”
“Boiled if it’s not too much trouble. Mind if I make coffee?”
“Go ahead. Fancy new machine. Brews a cup at a time, if you believe it. Your mother got it from Vermont Sugar Works for Christmas. They’re pretty nice to their suppliers.”
After Jess’s father’s death, her mother had begun selling the maple syrup wholesale to a large distributor. In one of their rare phone calls, Rose had explained to Jess that VSW was better at the packaging and marketing, experts in the new world of online advertising and Twitter and Instagram campaigns that Rose Taylor had no inclination to learn. Selling to a wholesaler cut the work down to a size that Rose could manage.
Jess picked a coffee pod from the little wicker basket on the counter. “They pay well?”
“Good enough. They love our syrup,” Zelda said with pride as she put the bacon and toast on the table.
The eggs were ready in minutes. By then, Jess had her coffee mug in hand, feeling halfway to human, sucking in that lovely, life-giving coffee scent.
Zelda came over to the table and sat. “Derek comin’ back to help you today?”
“No.”
“He didn’t offer? That’s unlike him. That boy asks me every single day if I or your mother need anythin’.”
Did he? Jess didn’t want to have to feel grateful. She didn’t want to feel anything toward him. She escaped into her coffee mug for as long as she could before saying, “He asked. I don’t want him to help.”
Zelda watched her with a troubled gaze. She opened her mouth, then closed it again. She just nodded and busied herself with eating her bacon.
After breakfast, Jess walked over to the sugar shack where the sap was boiled down to Grade A maple syrup, but she hesitated before going in. Derek wouldn’t be here, would he? He’d said last night that he’d asked Chuck if he needed help with the sugaring. Derek seemed to be over here a lot. Would he think that her request not to come around only concerned the house and didn’t extend to the sugar shack?
If he did, she’d just have to set him straight. Jess reached for the door and pulled it open.
Derek wasn’t there. Relief rushed through Jess. At least, she told herself it was relief, even if it felt an awful lot like disappointment.
