Holding Out for a Hero
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Pamela Tracy
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Chapter One
“IF YOU HAVE enough money for your son to be in the only private preschool in Sarasota Falls, you have enough money to pay me back. You owe me.” The anger behind the words was palpable. Shelley Brubaker disconnected the call.
Sarasota Falls, New Mexico, was a small town, and while Shelley didn’t know everyone by name or voice, she knew almost all by face.
They all—thanks to social media—knew her face.
So many people hurting, and her ex-husband was to blame.
In a few minutes, she would take her son to preschool—late, because the baby kicked most of the night and Abigail Simms’s dog kept barking, keeping Shelley awake. And echoes of the unpleasant phone call would follow her.
Shelley was never late. It bothered her.
Ryan could attend preschool only because she’d been awarded one of their benevolence tuitions. Mostly because of all the years her father had donated fund-raiser items from the grocery store he managed.
“Phone!” Ryan had the endearing habit of announcing a phone call well after all conversation ended. His words jarred her from her reverie.
“Thanks for letting me know.” She scooped the three-year-old up and did a half twirl. She used to do five of them, quickly, making Ryan scream with delight.
As she gave Ryan a quick sponge bath and dressed him, she figured it was time to change her number again. She couldn’t count how many people had demanded she pay them back these past six months, since Larry Wagner, aka lousy ex-husband, disappeared into thin air the first week in December. Most calls were local, but some were from as far away as Maine. Never mind that her ex-husband had robbed her of every penny she had.
At first, she’d attempted to explain. The callers weren’t interested. After explanations, she’d tried apologies, especially to the people she’d recommended her husband to. When the dust settled and she realized the extent of her ex-husband’s crimes, she’d almost had a breakdown—which she neither had the time nor the money for.
“Mommy, play.” Ryan, the spitting image of Larry with slightly curling golden hair and dimples, collapsed against her knee, all clean and dressed for fun, and looked up at her with a brown-eyed expression of glee.
There’d been a time when Ryan’s requests to play were met with enthusiasm. Shelley really wanted to say, “Yes! You can jump on my bed, and I’ll throw a ball to you.” But now her bed pulled out from the sofa, and at eight months pregnant, it was all she could do to play his second-favorite game of chasing him around the one-room apartment while he wore a mask and pretended to be a monster.
Shelley tried not to analyze why he was a monster being chased by a nonscary but very pregnant woman.
Right now, though, the caller’s raspy voice kept playing over and over in her head—you owe me, you owe me, you owe me—until Shelley couldn’t breathe.
Ryan took matters into his own hands by heading to his toy box, grabbing his Thomas the Train hat and saying, “Let’s walk.”
He mimicked her tone exactly. At least three times a day, she suggested, “Let’s walk.” Anything to get out of the tiny garage apartment, out into the air. This part of Sarasota Falls, on the edge of town, was a mixture of old and new. If she looked to the right, from the large picture window she could see a block of fairly new homes with a bed-and-breakfast—one of the oldest buildings in town—on the cul-de-sac. To her left, an established subdivision that led to the center of town.
“Okay, let me use the restroom first and then we’ll eat and head to your preschool.” This, her first pregnancy—as Ryan was her stepson—was a study in “Always go to the bathroom first,” and “Eat or you’ll soon feel nauseated,” as well as, “You will feel nauseated no matter what you do.”
Ryan was patient. He’d learned to be during the course of the investigation after his father disappeared. He’d done a lot of waiting for her, sitting on hard chairs in strange rooms with authority figures as Shelley’d been questioned. It had felt weird because some of the people asking her questions, especially the local chief of police, knew her well. Tom Riley knew the answers to the questions he was asking, but still he asked them.
It had been the other agencies, though, state and federal, that truly scared her. They tried to press her into admitting she knew where Larry was.
She didn’t know, didn’t even care where he was. She never wanted to see the man again.
Finally she and Ryan were ready. She opened the front door and went ahead of him. He could go down the stairs by himself, but if he tripped, she wanted him to fall into her instead of down to the ground.
Their new place was over the garage of Robert Tellmaster’s house. He’d been hesitant to rent to her. After all, most of the town had fallen victim to her husband’s crimes, but in the end, because he knew her mother, he’d relented. He was a computer geek who rarely left his house and had been alone since his mother died many years ago. He never so much as smiled at Ryan or offered a kind word to her.
There was no traffic on the street. At nine in the morning, most people had already left for work. Shelley had lived in the apartment only two weeks, and during that time the parking lot at Bianca’s Bed-and-Breakfast had been pretty much empty except for an oversize motorcycle. So far, Shelley hadn’t figured out who the motorcycle’s owner was, just that he worked strange hours. Bianca was one of the few in town who still nodded to Shelley when they passed each other. She’d even brought over some diapers and a crocheted blanket for the “little one.”
Speaking of little ones. “We’re going to be a tad late.” Shelley awkwardly bent to tie Ryan’s shoe. “But you’ll be there in time for play.”
Ryan didn’t seem to care. He was watching a bird fly across the street and land in a tree in front of the house belonging to the newlyweds.
They had to be newlyweds; they seemed so happy.
Shelley turned to the left. She’d pass the cul-de-sac that Bianca shared with Abigail Simms. Abigail was in her fifties and gardened but always much earlier than nine. Her son was unemployed and in and out, but he’d never be up this early. She also had a tiny white poodle that barked constantly.
Shelley knew most of her neighbors, thanks to her mother and all the years Shelley had helped deliver baked goods to parties and such. The only family in the neighborhood—besides the newlyweds—who weren’t Sarasota Falls natives were the Duponts, living farther down from Bianca. They had a special-needs son who kept Mrs. Dupont busy.
Shelley didn’t think too much of Mr. Dupont. The first week she’d been in the garage apartment, he’d approached her, and she’d gotten the idea he was trying—in a smarmy way—to figure out how desperate for company she was.
Not that desperate. If she’d learned one thing from her ex-husband, it was that love could be an illusion. She intended never to let her guard down again, not with a man who promised the moon but delivered only heartache.
Her distrust of relationships grew as her pregnancy progressed and her responsibilities to her father, Ryan and now the little one fell on her shoulders alone.
She’d expected a love like the newlyweds had. Thanks to her picture window, Shelley had seen them together fairly often. The woman was probably a few years younger than Shelley. She left in the morning carrying a tote bag. The husband worked for Little’s Supermarket, the grocery store Shelley’s father had managed before he got too sick to work.
The husband was gone long hours.
Yeah, Shelley knew about husbands being gone for long hours. Hers used those hours to steal and cheat. Yet when the young husband came home, he always seemed happy and rushed inside, often with flowers in hand.
The wife had family who’d already come to visit twice since Shelley’d moved in. An older man—probably the woman’s father—came once bringing a kitchen table and chairs and a second time with food. A woman came, too, probably a sister.
Interesting.
Shelley took a deep breath, hoping to ease some of her back pain, and hurried to keep up with Ryan as he sped down the sidewalk. Today it appeared Ryan had places to go, people to meet, things to do. His Thomas the Train engineer’s cap bounced up and down with each step he took. Yup, preschool was the social event of his season.
Shelley wished she had a place to go, anyplace other than here. A place where she could start a new life, make new friends, and where people might not remember that she was the hometown girl who’d married Larry Wagner, the villain who brought a small town to its knees. Thanks to social media, for a few days there her long jet-black hair and six-foot frame were the focus of a lot of attention.
The only thing she was thankful for was that her parents hadn’t witnessed her fall from grace. Her dad, thanks to his job, had known almost everyone. Beyond that, he’d been the guy who could fix anything. Right now, he couldn’t fix himself. Alzheimer’s was like that.
Her mother had, at one time, been in charge of the store’s bakery. When Shelley came along, her mom had started her own business and baked from home. For twenty-some years, she’d made the town’s wedding cakes, baby-shower cakes and designer cupcakes. She’d wanted Shelley to take over the business.
But Shelley’d been a dreamer and thought the big city offered something small towns didn’t. She’d been college-bound and career-ready. Now she was garage apartment–bound and unsteady.
She shouldn’t have to hide. After all, she hadn’t really been married to Larry Wagner because Larry Wagner hadn’t been his real name. She’d found that out too late. It was a name—one of many—he’d used to con people, and he’d certainly pulled the wool over her eyes during the lowest, most vulnerable point of her life.
Now she was too busy and too angry to let anyone take advantage. Or help. She had to take care of Ryan and get ready for baby Isabelle’s entrance into the world. So far, it felt like she was carrying a quarterback or trapeze artist in her belly. As if to prove the point, Isabelle kicked and Shelley whistled.
“I see dog,” Ryan said happily, and before Shelley had time to focus, he was in the street, crossing to the other side.
Large dog, Shelley noted as she sped up, putting a hand on her stomach and hoping the animal had a big heart, because no way was Ryan not going to pet it.
“Honey, wait a minute...”
The dog’s owner paused, seemed to realize he couldn’t get out of the way in time and, to Shelley’s surprise, stopped and calmly said, “Sit, Peeve.”
The dog obeyed, tongue lolling, just as Ryan wrapped his arms around the animal’s neck. Peeve looked like a stoic old man—er, old dog—resigned to the attention of small beings who tugged on his collar and gave hugs.
Shelley slowed, disaster averted. There’d been a time when she wasn’t afraid of anything. Now everything, everyone, every action needed to be thought over, accepted or rejected, and it all fell to her. Maybe it was just the pregnancy. She hoped so. Because then, after the baby was born, things would go back to normal.
Normal? She wondered if she’d ever see normal again.
“Peeve likes kids.” The voice was deep, the smile broad.
So were the shoulders. He was tall, taller than her, square-chinned, with black hair cut short but still managing to look somewhat shaggy. Shelley might have added gorgeous to her assessment. Instead, thanks to Larry, she looked for a flaw.
Not his eyes. They were so deep a brown they bordered on black. Bushy eyebrows. Yes, that was it. His eyebrows were too bushy. He reminded her of someone; she couldn’t place who.
“You have kids?” she asked. Maybe he was the dad of one of Ryan’s preschool peers.
“No, just the dog. He’s enough.”
“I want dog,” Ryan said, letting go of Peeve’s collar. “Big one.”
“Not until after the baby’s born,” Shelley said, silently adding the words years after. By her best estimate, if she were careful, she had enough money to support her, her children and her father for a few months. Now was not the best time to put in job applications.
“Soon,” the dog’s owner said to Ryan with a quick glance to her stomach, “you’ll have someone to play with who’s even better than a puppy.”
Ryan didn’t look convinced.
“Boy or girl?” the man asked.
“Girl.”
“Must be an exciting time for you,” he observed. Shelley had no response, just an empty, festering feeling that took her breath away—right when she needed it most. The back pain had her closing her eyes. She squelched the tears. She wasn’t even sure which of her many messes she wanted to cry about this time: her ex-husband, missing and wanted by the police, her father’s worsening Alzheimer’s or the loneliness that dogged her steps.
After a minute, she opened her eyes and cleared her throat, her mind scrambling for a response. She didn’t need to bother. Tall, dark and bushy knew a messed-up female when he saw one. He took about three steps back, his eyes guarded. “There’s such a thing as too much excitement. You all right?”
“I’m fine. We’re running late. Ryan, come on. Time to go.”
Ryan, however, had left the sidewalk and was hurrying toward the large front window of the house whose sidewalk they were standing on: the newlyweds’. Shelley’d waved a brief hello a time or two but never stopped to chat. If you didn’t count Mr. Dupont, tall, dark and bushy was the first neighbor she’d spoken more than a greeting to, apart from Bianca.
Not really a successful encounter for either of them. The man and his pet were already at the next house. Not looking back.
“Ryan, wait!” She skipped the walkway and rushed across the grass and around the back of the red Prius in the carport.
Ryan peered inside the house—a short, unafraid Peeping Tom—and asked, “Asleep?”
Great—just what Shelley needed. She didn’t want to deal with the woman waking up and seeing two people looking in the window as if they were spying. “Come on, Ryan. We need to get to your school. Then you can have something to drink.”
Shelley carefully bent down, her hands cupping Ryan under his arms, and started to scoop him up. Since his father disappeared, Ryan spent half his time being clingy and the other half being angry. She was doing her best to deal with both, but she’d had only a little over a year to practice. Ryan was Larry’s son, but Larry had gotten full custody when Ryan’s mother went to prison.
So many secrets in her ex’s life.
Ryan, giggling, struggled and pulled away. She understood. The mommy in her wanted to swing him high, tickle his stomach, get him laughing, maybe laugh herself. Ryan escaped her fingers and turned back to the window.
Shelley followed and stepped closer to the window. Judging by the blood and open, unblinking eyes, the woman who lay on the floor wasn’t asleep. She was dead.
Worst of all, Shelley recognized the man standing behind the woman.
Larry Wagner, her ex-husband.
