Читать книгу The Payback Man - Carolyn McSparren - Страница 10

“SO HOW DID YOUR FIRST DAY GO?” Precious stretched out her long legs and propped them on the nearest cardboard box in Eleanor’s small living room. The white walls were devoid of pictures. Except for an old leather couch and matching chair, a couple of end tables and a rolled-up rug in the corner, the room was furnished with cardboard boxes.

Eleanor handed her a glass of white wine, then took her own and sat on the chair across from her. “Weird.”

“How weird?”

“On the one hand, they seem like people you’d meet anywhere, might even like, and then some tiny thing sets them off and, bang, it’s World War III.” She shuddered. “Slow Rise, this country boy over sixty, nearly came to blows with Robert Dalrymple, a lanky black kid, when the kid said he was crazy. I don’t think Robert meant anything by it—just a casual remark.”

“I know Slow Rise,” Precious said, watching the wine swirl in her glass. “He’s usually very gentle, but he’s inside for killing his wife’s lover in a fit of rage.”

“My God! Now I’m terrified.”

“Don’t be. Most of the time he’s the soul of kindness. He’s got another ten years to serve before he can even think of applying for parole.”

“He probably won’t live that long.”

“No, he’ll likely die in prison.”

“Lord, how sad.”

“Don’t let the sad stories get to you, Eleanor. Remember he did kill a man.”

Eleanor leaned her head back against the chair. “You’re right. I had no idea I was this tired. Do you mind if we skip the unpacking tonight? I’m grateful for your help, but I really think I just want to go to bed. Tomorrow I’ve got the men in the morning, and then I’m working a full shift at the clinic in the afternoon and evening.”

Precious finished her wine and stood. “Girl, you are going to burn out at that rate.”

Eleanor didn’t bother to get up. She was sure her legs would be too weak to hold her.

“Want me to fix you some soup or a sandwich?”

“No thanks, Precious. I’m sorry to be such a poop.”

“Forgedaboudit, as they say in the gangster movies. We’ll do it this weekend.”

“You have things to do.”

Precious laughed. “Right. A couple of rich radiologists are just breaking down my door trying to take me away from all this. Girl, I so have nothing to do this Saturday except unpack your stuff. Now, go get some sleep.”

She moved to the door. “I’ll let myself out.”

Eleanor listened for the closing door without opening her eyes.

Not since the long nights and days nursing Jerry had she felt this completely depleted nor this close to despair. She roused herself long enough to call Raoul Torres. When he answered, she said, “Raoul, were you serious when you offered to give me some help understanding this place if I needed it?”

“Absolutely. You feeling overwhelmed on your first day? Want me to come over? I can be there in five minutes.”

“Thanks, but it’s not that urgent.” In the background, Eleanor heard the sound of at least two children, one of whom was screaming something in Spanish.

“Pipe down!” Raoul shouted. “Lupe, tell my children I will chain them to the whipping post and flog them as soon as I’m off the telephone.”

A woman’s voice said something indistinguishable, and the screaming children began to laugh.

“Okay, if not tonight, when would you like to get together? Tomorrow sometime?”

“What?” Eleanor had lost track of the conversation momentarily. “Oh, how about I buy you lunch tomorrow? Someplace close to the farm. I shouldn’t be as dirty as I was today.”

“You got it. I’ll pick you up at the barn about eleven-thirty.”

“Thanks, Raoul. I really need to talk about the men. If I’m going to work with them, I need to understand them.”

“Don’t worry about everything so much. It will work out.”

“I hope God’s listening to you on that one.”

She crawled into bed certain that she’d fall asleep instantly, but found she was too tired and ached in too many places to get comfortable.

How many nights after Jerry died had she slept rolled in a comforter in his old leather recliner, hoping to capture a fleeting scent of the man he had been before he got sick? How many days did she try to remember his face, his smile, the way his laughter crinkled the corners of his eyes?

Since his death no other man had stirred her blood. Her friends told her she was still young, still attractive. She didn’t feel either young or attractive. Until today she’d have sworn that the juices had all dried up. Until today when she’d felt Steve Chadwick’s strong arms around her waist.

Raoul would undoubtedly tell her she was attracted to Steve because he was completely out of her reach and therefore safe. But there was nothing safe about him. It was insane to feel attracted to him. He was a criminal, for God’s sake. A man who had done something dishonorable, and that made him unworthy to be Jerry’s successor.

That sounded priggish even to Eleanor, but it was true. Jerry had been the kindest, the most generous and honorable of men. He had devoted his relatively short life to saving the lives of animals, even though he could have gone to medical school and possibly made a lot more money.

Even more important, after Jerry died she’d sworn never to invest herself so completely again in any man or any relationship. No one should have to endure losing a true love even once, much less twice. She didn’t dare love that way again.

She would devote herself to her goal—saving enough money to buy a decent veterinary partnership. She had enough problems without Steve Chadwick.

Getting even slightly involved with any of the men she worked with would be a fatal error. Whatever crime Steve Chadwick committed probably had to do either with drugs or with money. He could never be considered a love interest.

She’d been wrong not to check her team members out. She did need to know what these men had done to land in prison. If it colored her opinion of them, so be it. She’d discovered that not knowing was much worse than knowing.

“MORNING, EVERYBODY,” Eleanor said with a cheeriness that made her want to throw up. So obviously phony, but then, no matter what she said or did outside of actual work seemed to sound phony. She climbed out of her truck, locked the doors and pocketed the keys, although the only people around were her crew and the new guard.

“Where’s La—uh—Mr. Newman?”

The new CO, a fiftyish woman who could probably have held her own in a fight with Big or Gil, grinned at her. “Mr. Newman is off today. I’m Officer Selma Maddox.” She turned to the men standing in a ragged line behind her. “And I do not want to hear one word about my ass or any other part of my anatomy, you got that?” No response. “I said,” Selma repeated patiently, “you got that?”

Heads nodded.

“Good, we understand each other. Now, Doc, what say we put these lazy bums to work? What you got for ’em to do?”

Eleanor motioned for Selma to follow her as she moved out of earshot. She didn’t want to put Selma on the spot, particularly since, unlike Mike Newman, she seemed to be a reasonable person.

“The painting crew should be here any minute,” Eleanor told her. “They have their own team leader, and I’ve already discussed with him what they need to do. I have a suspicion you don’t want my guys spreading out to check fence lines alone, do you?”

Selma laughed. “This may be minimum security, but it’s still a prison. Outside the compound the fences are intended only to keep the herd animals we’re going to be raising in separate pastures. Four-foot-high barbed wire will not keep your average inmate from climbing over and taking off. Then we have to go after them with bloodhounds. The bloodhounds enjoy it, but I don’t.”

“I take it that’s a no?”

“Right.”

“Okay, so we’ll put them to work helping the painters. They can start painting the one-by-six pine boards for the stall enclosures—they’re easier to paint flat before they’re nailed up. Tomorrow we can go do the fence lines as a group. I doubt anyone but Slow Rise knows how to tension a wire fence, so he can teach the others. It’ll be slow going, but we’ll get it done.” She leaned against the building. “Will you be back tomorrow?”

Selma snickered. “Maybe. I think Mike Newman is angling for a cushy job indoors. He’s not much into the great outdoors, ’specially when it’s still so warm.”

“I’ll ask the warden if we can keep you. You seem pretty relaxed around the men. They don’t tense up around you the way they did with Newman.”

“That’s because even the nastiest con usually has a soft spot for his mother. In some cases I can’t understand why they would, but they do. Anyway, that’s how they see me. I have kids and grandkids, and I try to keep my temper. But a couple of them already know I can come down on them hard if I have to.”

Eleanor raised her eyes as a truck labored up the rise toward the barn. In the back were a dozen prisoners. “The painters have arrived. Let’s get started.”

She walked back to her own team and told them what they’d be doing. She met the painters’ team leader, asked him to give her guys paint and brushes, and followed them to the piles of wood.

She knew immediately that something was wrong with Steve. He moved like an old man, carefully keeping his torso erect and shuffling his feet slowly, keeping his knees straight with obvious effort. She started to say something to him, then shut her mouth. She watched the men set up makeshift sawhorses and saw him bend to pick up one end of the first board.

He nearly fell on his face. Slow Rise caught the end of the board, hefted it easily and put a hand in the center of Steve’s back to help him straighten up. Something was very wrong, but the men apparently didn’t want anyone to know.

She went back to her truck, unlocked it, picked up her laptop computer and carried it back with her.

“Hey, Chadwick,” she called.

He turned pained eyes her way.

She’d better make this good. “You know anything about computers?”

He nodded.

“Good, then I’ve got some extra work for you. The rest of you keep on with what you’re doing. Chadwick, let’s go into the office.”

She turned on her heel and marched away through the barn as though oblivious to anything behind her.

The government-issue steel desk, two desk chairs, a table and a couple of file cabinets sat in a jumble in the middle of what would eventually be the cattle-operation office. An equally utilitarian steel credenza sat against the wall beside the door. She walked in, waited for Steve to pass her, then shut the door and set the computer on the credenza.

“Can you sit?”

“I’m not supposed to sit unless you do.”

“That wasn’t my question. Can you sit?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Of course you do. How badly are you hurt?”

The lines around his mouth tightened, his jaw clenched, his eyes narrowed. “I’m not hurt.”

“Bull. Turn around.”

He didn’t move.

“I said, turn around.”

“Against the rules to be alone without a guard and the door closed.”

“Then we’ll leave the door ajar.” She opened the door a dozen inches and called to Selma, “This shouldn’t take but a couple of minutes. Okay with you?”

“Whatever,” Selma replied. “It’s your show, Doc, within limits.”

“Thanks. Now,” she said to Steve, “do as I asked, please.”

He turned around carefully.

“Assume the position if you can. Hands flat on the desk.”

He managed not to groan, but she heard the sharp intake of breath. She hadn’t wanted to ask him to do that, but it was the only way she knew to make certain he wouldn’t interfere with her examination.

She reached for his shirt and began to tug it out of the waistband of his jeans, pulling slowly and with infinite care.

“Stop that.”

“Shut up. I want to find out what’s wrong with you.”

His shirt came free and she lifted it as high as she could. She caught her breath. “Oh, my God, who did this to you?”

“I fell over a curb.”

“Newman. How many times did he hit you?”

“He didn’t.”

“Steve—” She couldn’t conceal the anguish in her voice. “Please sit down. Let me help you.”

She slipped under his armpit, put her arm across his back to his shoulder and lifted to take the weight off his hands. She felt the tension in his muscles, heard his breath sough in his chest. She tried to turn him so that she could slide one of the desk chairs under him.

“No. Forwards.”

She caught the chair with her left foot and pulled it across in front of him, then lowered him so that he straddled it. She sat in the other chair, knee to knee with him. He closed his eyes.

“I’ll get you to the infirmary, then I’ll go straight to the warden. I’ll have that bastard fired.”

Steve shook his head. “He’s civil service and union with high seniority. You can’t touch him.”

“But if the others saw it…”

“They didn’t see anything.”

Eleanor was certain he was lying.

“Why did he do it?”

“He doesn’t need a reason.”

“It’s because I humiliated him in front of the men, isn’t it? He took it out on you.”

He looked up and into her eyes. He wasn’t certain she recognized the connection between them. Newman had certainly picked up on it. He guessed the others were aware of it, as well.

He nodded. “Yeah, I think that was his reason.”

He had rested his hands on the back of the chair he sat in. She covered them with hers. They were warm and strong, and yet gentle. The touch flashed along his nerve endings.

“I’m so sorry,” she said, and snatched her hands away as though she had only that moment recognized the intimacy of the gesture. She stood up and moved to the back of the office to look out the single dirty window. “I wanted to make things better, not worse.”

He was so used to hearing only commands from his captors that the pain in her voice caught him off guard.

He longed to stand, go to her, tell her he’d survive, that it wasn’t her fault, that he’d had worse, but he didn’t think he could manage to stand without help. “Newman was looking for an excuse. You were only the trigger. It’s personal with him.”

“Because you’re not like the others.”

“I’m exactly like the others. Don’t ever forget that.”

“No, you’re not. I don’t know what you did that brought you here, but I know that Newman is a redneck who resents you because you’ve managed to keep your dignity even in this place. He can’t endure it.”

“Then I’m the one who has to endure it. If I make trouble, he’ll find some way to send me back to Big Mountain. I can’t—I don’t want that.”

He could see from her expression that she thought she understood that he didn’t want the soul-numbing life behind steel bars, that he preferred to serve his time in the open air. He let her think that was what he meant. He wasn’t certain whether she would be a help or a hindrance in his flight plan. She was already a distraction.

She sighed deeply, then said, “I’ll have to respect your wishes this time. You understand the dynamics of the place better than I do.” She squared her shoulders and became all business. “I wasn’t kidding about needing some computer help. I hope you weren’t kidding about knowing how to work the things.”

“I’ve had experience.” More experience than anyone within ten miles, probably.

“I need a database to keep track of the cattle program, start to finish. I know the basic information I need to be able to track—vaccinations, insemination and calving dates, that sort of thing. I know some of the ways it should be cross-referenced, but I have no idea how to set up the program. Can you do something like that?”

“Doesn’t sound too difficult.”

She nodded. “That’s a legitimate way of keeping you in here and sitting down for a couple of days. Since Lard Ass isn’t here, at least he won’t know about today.”

“He’ll know, all right.”

“It will still be my choice, not yours. I’m going to request that we keep Selma and find another job for Newman. If he does come back, I’ll put the fear of God and the warden into him.”

He caught her hand. She drew in her breath sharply, braced against him.

“You will not.” It was the voice of command. He hadn’t used it in three years. Amazing how quickly it came back.

“Let go of me,” she said softly.

“Sorry.” He released her and struggled to his feet.

He could see from her eyes that she was suddenly uncomfortable with him, perhaps even a little afraid. He dropped his hands. “I apologize. But I’ve got to make you see that you can’t interfere with Newman on my behalf or the behalf of any of the other men.”

“Of course I can. He’s a stupid man.”

“He’s a sadistic bastard, but he’s clever at that, if nothing else. He’s also dangerous, and not only to me and the other men. If you cross him, he’ll find some way to hurt us. And he may hurt you, too.”

“Hurt me?” She laughed and walked to the computer. “He wouldn’t dare use his baton on me. What’s he going to do, get me fired? I don’t think so.”

Steve shook his head. “Not fired and not hit with a baton. And not by him directly. Probably not even on prison property, but hurt, nonetheless.”

“You’re serious.” She wrapped her arms around herself and hunched her shoulders.

He longed to pull her close, feel the warmth of her body against him. The very thought shredded his nerve endings. He didn’t dare allow her warmth to seep into his soul. He might begin to question his goals.

He had to teach her how to be careful. She was more vulnerable than she knew. “This place has its own unwritten rules. A man like Newman has power that reaches outside the prison gates, to men who owe him, who know they may be under his control again someday.”

She raised her eyes. They were hazel, the color of the last leaves of autumn. She leaned toward him and, without the consent of his body, his hands reached for her arms.

“Hey, Doc, you okay in there?”

They jumped apart like a couple of guilty adolescents caught in the hayloft.

“Absolutely.” Eleanor opened the door the rest of the way. “Come in, Selma. You need to know what’s been going on and what we’re planning.”

Steve shook his head. He knew she saw the gesture, but whether she’d keep her mouth shut about Newman’s attack, he had no idea.

She shut the door behind Selma and leaned against it. “Okay, here’s the deal. Chadwick, here, knows enough about computers to set me up a database to track the cow program. It’s fairly complicated, and heaven knows we can’t afford to pay one of the computer geeks at the university to do it. Any problem with that?”

Selma looked from one to the other. “Nope. He’s working for you. You want him to dig a hole to China, he starts digging.”

“Will the others resent it?”

“Sure. Not much we can do about that.”

“I can handle the others,” Steve said quietly.

“Good. Then let’s get started,” Eleanor said. “What’s happening with the painters?”

“I am going to kick Sweet Daddy all the way to the mess hall at lunch,” Selma replied. “Other than that, we’re okay.”

“I thought the men were brown-bagging it.”

“Not until tomorrow. You know changes take time when you work for the state.”

“Okay. Tomorrow. Today, I’m the one going out for lunch. Raoul Torres is picking me up here at eleven-thirty. I’ll get Steve—Chadwick—started with what I want and leave him with it.”

“Fine.” Selma turned to leave.

“Leave the door open all the way, will you?” Eleanor said.

“Sure thing.”

The moment the CO left, Eleanor said to Steve in a businesslike tone, “I spent last night making notes about what I want in the database, but they’re very rough. I’m not precisely certain what should connect with what.”

“I’ll take a look at what you’re proposing, then I can make suggestions about changes and additions. Okay with you?” He kept his voice as businesslike as hers. No one overhearing them would think they’d had any sort of personal encounter.

“Be my guest.” She pulled a folded-up sheaf of lined yellow pages out of her jacket pocket and dropped it on the desk. “Can I bring you some lunch? The walk up to the cafeteria is going to be painful.”

He shook his head. “Cheeseburgers alone down here? Against the rules. Don’t worry. I’ll make it. I’m already feeling better.”

“I’m only an animal doctor, so I can’t prescribe for human beings, but I can offer some horse liniment that might help, so long as it’s our little secret. I use it myself for aches.”

“Thanks.”

She picked up the computer and placed it on the desk. “Good luck.”

“Right.”

He sat behind the desk and watched her walk out of the room, back straight, hair swinging. Sweet Daddy would call her “fine”—if he called her anything printable. Fine she was, and not only her sleek body. There was a directness, an honesty about her that he found disarming even as it worried him. That very directness might be her downfall. He wouldn’t be able to watch his back and hers, too, not if he got out of here safely.

Somebody had to look out for her, that was for certain.

At the door she turned. “You said not to forget you’re just like them. I can’t believe that.”

As she turned and walked out of sight, he said softly, “One difference. I’m innocent.”

ELEANOR HAD NO IDEA whether Steve had intended her to hear his comment or not. But she had heard, and now she wondered….

At eleven-thirty Raoul Torres’s dusty white minivan pulled up by the barn. She hurried toward it and opened the passenger-side door.

“Oh, sorry,” he said. “Just dump that stuff in the back.”

She scooped up a stuffed bear, a plastic dinosaur, six CDs for children, and a stack of books and papers and laid them on the seat behind, next to a pink child’s seat. She climbed in and fastened her seat belt.

“Where to?”

“Anywhere as long as it’s out of here,” Eleanor said as they headed down the driveway toward the open gates at the front of the farm.

“Rough morning?”

She ran a hand over her hair and leaned back against the headrest. “You might say that. Lard Ass Newman beat up on one of my guys last night, and the victim won’t let me say anything.”

“He’s right.”

“Why?” She turned in her seat so that she could see Raoul’s profile. “Why is everybody so afraid of rocking the boat? There are rules against that sort of thing.”

“You ever have a really bad teacher?”

“Of course. Most people have at least one.”

“But they go on teaching every year because the rules and regulations they serve under require such meticulous documentation to do anything about them, and they have such power to pass or fail you that you just endure it.”

She shrugged. “Yeah. I guess.”

“Ratchet that power up to about a million, and that’s how much power the COs have. The pay is lousy, the hours suck, certainly the ambiance, if you can call it that, is one step lower than the sewers of New York, and the people they are supposed to guard are dangerous. They have to have leeway to protect themselves. They have to be able to count on the support of the warden and administrators. Most of the people who work here are decent people trying to do a decent job. But sometimes even the good ones can be corrupted.”

“Power corrupts, I know.”

“Yeah, and these guys have almost absolute power. It’s a battle between good and evil, and mostly evil wins.”

“Can I avoid corruption?”

He grinned at her. “I don’t know. Can you?” He pulled into a second-rate strip mall and parked. “You like Tex-Mex?”

She nodded.

“Then let’s go stuff ourselves.”

When they were settled in Texas Pete’s and busily scooping up salsa on tortilla chips, she said, “I think I need to know the criminal records of my team.”

“Not a good idea.”

“I already know about Slow Rise. I can’t believe it, but I know it. And what could a sweety like Big possibly do to wind up in prison? Somebody must have led him astray.”

“I warned you.”

“And this morning one of them said he’s innocent.”

Raoul laughed so loud he choked on a tortilla chip and had to wave her away while he gulped down half a glass of iced tea. When he finally got his breathing back to normal, his eyes were tearing and his nose was red. “Didn’t think it would happen so quick, that’s all. I warned you in that first interview that most of the people in prison say they’re innocent.”

“But—”

“Certainly there are miscarriages of justice. DNA testing has freed a lot of convicted rapists and murderers who turned out to have been innocent. But the odds are still very high in favor of the justice system. Confessions, plea bargains and smoking-gun evidence are the order of the day. Take it from me, if he’s in for it, he did it.”

“That’s the thing—I think I need to know what ‘it’ is.”

“Okay. Your choice. I can copy your team’s records. I still think it’s a mistake, but I’ll do it for you. I can drop them by your place on my way home tonight.”

“Thanks. Actually, Raoul, I may decide not to look at them after I have them. I just want the chance to make that choice.”

“Good. Ever hear of Pandora’s box? Or Bluebeard’s chamber? Open the box or the door, and you can’t ever shut it again.”

“What if I find that there has been a miscarriage of justice?”

He leaned back as the waiter set a steaming platter in front of him. “Ah, I hate to think of what these fajitas will do for my arteries, but I can’t resist.”

She looked down at the taco salad in front of her and wished she had ordered the fajitas, as well.

Raoul began wrapping fajitas in tortillas. “Don’t even go down that road. These guys have lawyers and families to handle their appeals or fight for new trials. You do not have a vested interest. You have no standing with the courts. Remember the rules. Keep your distance. Do not get involved. If you do, you’ll get hurt.”

“St—one of the team members intimated that if I rock the boat about Newman, I could get hurt—physically hurt.”

Raoul stopped with his fork in midair and set the unfinished tortilla down in front of him. “He could be right.”

Eleanor banged her fist on the table. “I hate this.”

“Do your job, follow the rules, stay out of the way of prison politics, and you’ll do fine.”

“And if not, I wind up in cement shoes?”

The only thing that kept Raoul from choking a second time was the fact that he had his tortilla only halfway to his mouth. “I doubt it. And he won’t rake your car with submachine gun fire, either.” His tone turned more serious. “But you could be mugged coming out of a department store, or carjacked at a fast-food drive-through. Totally random, no connection with Mike. Do you carry a gun?”

“Of course not!”

“Do you have a permit?”

“I had to go through the course and get a permit before they’d hire me at the farm, but I certainly don’t carry one. For one thing, it’s illegal inside the gates.”

“It’s not illegal in your house, and there are lockers outside the gates for you to store stuff in while you’re inside.”

“That’s such a bother.”

“Think about it, that’s all I’m saying. And I would definitely keep one beside your bed at night.”

“I’m beginning to wish I’d never taken this job.”

“Actually, you’re safer inside than outside.”

“That’s what Ernest Portree says. I’m starting to disagree.”

By common consent, they spent the remainder of their lunch talking about Raoul’s two children, on whom he obviously doted, and his wife, a speech pathologist, whom he adored. They were silent on the way back to the farm.

As he parked in front of the barn to let her out, he said, “There’s an old New Jersey saying—don’t mix in. So don’t.”

She nodded. “I’ll try.”

She had beaten the men back to the barn by ten minutes or so. The place was completely deserted. She walked into the now completely open barn, half-painted in white enamel.

She found her laptop still sitting plugged in on her desk. The screen saver flashed scenes of green fields and mountains.

She heard conversation outside, and a moment later Selma stuck her head in the door, saw the computer and said, “Damn. Didn’t think. You need to requisition a safe to lock that computer up when you’re not here.”

“The credenza locks.”

“I could open it with a paper clip. Besides, you’ll need to store paper and things, won’t you?”

“Why would they steal the computer? They couldn’t use it.”

Selma came in and leaned against the doorjamb, easing her back against the angle of the door like a bear. “God, that feels good. Listen, they snatch the computer, they stash it somewhere outside, call a buddy, and shazaam, that night it’s picked up and sold before morning. The men aren’t moving around much on their own yet, but they will be when they start working the cows, won’t they?”

“Yes.”

“So requisition a safe.”

Eleanor nodded. “Right. Okay. And the warden finally agreed to issue an extra set of clothing to each man to keep here for emergencies. I thought we could put each set into a grocery sack with each man’s name on it. Think that would do?”

“You’ll have to lock the clothes up, too,” Selma said. “Won’t be room in the safe or the credenza.”

Eleanor thought for a minute. “Okay. I’ve got an old footlocker at my place I used to pack books. It’s a little musty, but it’s got a good padlock. How about I bring that down tomorrow?”

“Sure.” Selma grinned. “The least I can do is contribute the grocery sacks. My family hoards them.”

Eleanor looked at her watch. “I’m leaving for my regular shift at the clinic in about fifteen minutes,” she said. “Will you take the laptop home with you for tonight?”

“Sure.”

“You will be back tomorrow, won’t you?”

“I think so. Will you?”

“I beg your pardon?” Eleanor asked.

“Pretty obvious this isn’t what you thought it was going to be. So, are you going to pack it in or stick it out?”

Eleanor didn’t answer her right away. Instead, she headed out to her truck, Selma right behind her. Part of her wanted to leave this place and never come back, even though it meant finding another place to live. At least she wouldn’t be faced with Steve Chadwick every day. She wouldn’t have feelings she didn’t want to admit to herself, nor would she have to worry whether he was innocent or guilty. And if he really was innocent, what on earth could she do about it?

She slid into the front seat of her truck. Selma stood outside the door, hands on her ample hips. Finally Eleanor leaned out the window. “I’ll be here tomorrow and the next day and the next. I’m not quitting.”

“Good,” Selma said, then laid her hand on Eleanor’s arm. “Remember, if you want to keep your peace of mind, keep your distance from the men—all the men.”