Page 72 of At Midnight Comes the Cry
“Hurry it up!” This time it was Austin who yelled.
“Give me a break, you guys! I’m old enough to be your father.” Perish the thought, as Clare would say. He stretched upward, then flexed his arms back and forth as he turned toward them.
That was when he saw it. A wide clearing, due west of the range, with a blackened scorch mark the size of a mattress in the center. Whatever had burned there had been so hot the snow hadn’t been able to accumulate; the few patches that hadn’t melted couldn’t hide the ugly charred earth.
Could be a bomb,he heard Clare saying, as she handed out tea and cookies in their dining room.Acetylene and silver nitrate. You add some metal shavings. You can use the torch canister, so it’s pretty small.
“Enough slacking off, Grandpa! Get to work.”
Russ nodded, and half skidding, half walking, came down off the berm. He bent over the nearby ground, but his focus wasn’t on spent ammunition. How much acetylene and silver nitrate could they find in that large tent? How many improvised explosives? What was their target?
He spotted a bullet alongside the berm, just as he had expected. He bent to pick it up.
“Find anything?”
Any brass he could sequester was potential evidence. He eased it into his jeans pocket. “No, but I’ll keep looking.”I’ll keep looking.And then I need to get the hell out of this place.
10.
“No,” Tiny said.
Clare continued to stuff clothing and wipes into Ethan’s bag. “Tiny, he threatened me. And he actuallyhurtyou. If we don’t get the police involved, he’s going to hurt you again.” She didn’t bother with individual diapers, tucking a whole unopened pack beneath her arm.
“Clare, what about the portable playpen?” Hadley stood in the upper hall, where she could see Clare, in the nursery, and Tiny, sitting on the bed in the guest room.
“No, Margy’s got all that stuff.” Clare waved. “You try talking with her.” She emerged from the nursery and clattered downstairs to put the baby supplies in her car.
Hadley squatted in front of the small woman. “Look, Tiny—” She paused. “I feel like an idiot calling you that. What’s your real name?”
“Uh. Christine. But I been called Tiny since I was a baby.”
Of course she had. “I get it. My mom named me Honey. Which is cute for a little girl. And when I grew up, I ditched it, and picked my own name, because I didn’t want to be treated like a little girl for therest of my life. Do you want to be a little girl? Or do you want to be a grown-ass woman?”
“Uh… a grown woman?”
“Okay.Christine.I’m going to tell you something as a woman, and a mom. My ex-husband was a bad person. He didn’t hit me, but he made me feel terrible about myself, and he used to hint that if I left him, he’d keep my kids. Does any of that sound familiar?”
Tiny slowly nodded.
“Now I’m going to tell you something as a police officer. When a man strangles a woman, he’s telling youI can kill you. Men who choke their partners are four times more likely to use deadly violence on them. They’re also more likely to hurt their children, or pets, or cops who are trying to help.”
The other woman started, as if her baby, downstairs in the playpen, might be in danger.
“I know what it’s like to love your husband and to think and hope and pray that you’re going to change him. That if you can just do the right thing, and say the right thing, he’ll be happy with you.”
“Idolove Cal. I do. I just… I don’t want him in jail. I just want him to be sweet, like he was before. He was so much nicer than my dad and my brothers, and I thought… and then I got pregnant, which he was the one who wanted it, and after that it was like I couldn’t do nothing…”
“Right.”
Tiny nodded.
“If he’s arrested and charged, it’s almost certain he won’t get jail time.” She didn’t addunfortunately. “But he might go into a diversion program, where he gets therapy, and learns how to communicate and manage his anger without taking it out on you.”And it probably won’t work, but hopefully, you’ll be free of him by then.“Making a complaint against him is the first step toward getting him help. I know it’s hard. And I know you don’t want to do it. But think of it like taking your baby to the doctor to get shots. She doesn’t like it, but it’s good for her in the long run.”
“Oh, we don’t use any of those vaccines. Those can do terrible things to children.”
Hadley could swear she could feel the headache starting behind her eyes. “Okay. Does Rose ever scream or squirm to get out of her car seat?”
“Oh, yeah.”
