Bonnie's Tale Chapter Thirteen
Excerpt from Ch 12
Once he heard the barn door shut, Nick walked over to the loft doors and opened them up. He could see Mary sitting on a blanket underneath a tree that grew maybe forty feet from the fence. She had a light coat on and was reading a book. 'What's wrong with me?" he silently asked himself. He did like Mary, and liked her a lot. So... why was he-for the first time in his life-holding back? It made no sense to him...and it bothered him. He shut the loft doors, finished what he was doing and then headed for his horse. Daylight was burning, and he needed to keep moving.
Mary hummed softly as she rocked Bonnie, though her mind wandered to the past.
"You cannot be serious!" Mary stood at the foot of the bed her 'sister' lay in. The young woman was holding her newborn daughter in her hands. "No one is going to believe it! You have no husband! No orphanage will back up the lie!"
"Did you tell anyone you were staying in California when you came to meet me?" Isabella held her daughter a little closer.
"No, but what difference does that make?" Mary was confused, and it showed.
"I'll just tell them I adopted her in Montana or Wyoming. It's such wild country up there, no one is going to bother checking anything out." Isabella kept her eyes on the young infant in her arms.
"If anyone find outs out, it will be Sheriff Reed. And, if he is indeed the guilty party, no good will come from keeping the child. He is a callous, selfish, greedy man. He's bad to the bone. For Liberty's sake, put her up for adoption." Mary urged her friend.
Isabella sighed. A portion told her to do just that. Only the louder part wanted the child-even if she hadn't been asked for at first. "You don't know how it is to go through what I went through. You have never been faced with the dilemma of giving up a child you brought into this life or keeping it. I can't give her away. I just can't. She looks like my grandmother to the T. No one has met her, no one will make the connection."
Mary let out a sigh. She has started to confess that she knew exactly how it was...well, to a point. She'd lost the child she'd carried when she as a mere four months along. In her eyes it had been a good thing since she hadn't been able to bring herself to confess the truth of the matter to her husband for one simple reason-she'd been terrified her husband would kill the man and then be hung for it. Also, she was going to confess that she'd long since wondered just how many times the 'good man' had accosted someone. Only, before she could make either confession, the nurse had come in.
"Hope they nail the man to the wall!" Mary repeated the words she'd spoken to Jarrod only to practically jump as one very loud voice behind her assure her things would be fine.
"Sorry." Nick finished entering the room and leaned against the dresser. "I wanted to check in on Bonnie before I left on the round up. I bet you by the time I get back Jarrod and the others will have returned, and you'll see the justice done for your 'sister'."
"And for others," Mary, who had never meant to verbally express the thought, was appalled to realize she'd actually said the words out loud. The shock she felt at having the courage to admit such a thing matched the shocked looked that leapt onto Nick's face.
Nick couldn't believe what he'd just heard… especially since he caught the unspoken words that were in Mary's eyes. He felt his blood begin to boil worse than when he'd heard Mary confirm what Jarrod had told him. "He forced himself on you as well...and others?"
Mary sighed and shrugged her shoulders. "Me.. yes-before he became sheriff. My husband and I were visiting friends in the same town he was living it at the time. Isabella...high chance. Others? I guess I cannot honestly say because I do not know for sure only a person like that…" she involuntarily shuddered while her stomach churned.
"His choices will bite his him...and bite him hard." Nick laid his hand on her shoulder. "Though, for now, believe me when I say you are safe here. Sheriff Reed will never lay a hand on you again-in any way."
Mary didn't want to break down in front of anyone only the tears she'd held in for years started pouring out and her shoulders shook. Nick quickly knelt down wrapped on arm around her while sliding the other one under Bonnie. Not that he thought Mary would drop the child on purpose, he didn't. It was simply an automatic reaction on his part.
"Let it out, girl." Nick gave her a hug. Then, not knowing what was going on outside Lodi, he swore up and down to have it out with the Lodi sheriff first chance he got. Oh, he wouldn't kill him, only he was going to make sure the man would be begging for such an action by the time Nick was through with him.
The sun would soon begin to set. Jarrod didn't like it. None of them could risk staying in the woods once the sun set. The darkness would be an ally to the sheriff. That was something they could not risk. He couldn't help thinking about one case or another that he'd dealt with through the years or the experiences he and his brothers had had. None of them made him as sick, and as mad, as the story told to him by Mary. No, that wasn't quite true. Unbeknownst to Mary, while he'd not voiced it out loud, he'd heard what she had not admitted while she was telling him Isabella's story. That… the stories that never got told...made him sicker than he thought possible. It made him want to beat any person who would do such a thing to a pulp. However, when he heard approaching footsteps, Jarrod quickly came out of his thoughts and sat straight up, his hand dropping to rest near his gun.