Devil's Lake (Bittersweet Hollow Book 1) Read online

  Boone took down the large tea infuser and with a few hints from Dirk on how to work it, he got it set up. He took six clean mugs out of the dishwasher and set them on the table, where eager family hands quickly distributed them. It felt good to be helping, instead of sitting on his hands. These guys had been through hell and back, and he’d missed them all. Well, except maybe Grace.

  He glanced at her and was relieved to see she sat close to Anderson, one arm linked through his and her head resting on his shoulder.

  Good. Maybe she’s come to her senses.

  Dirk passed dessert plates around, set the butter on the table, and put the cornbread dish and spatula on a hotplate in the center.

  Boone liked the fact that they were modern men, unafraid to jump in and help.

  In his parents’ house, his mother had done all the serving her entire life, and when he’d gone to college he realized how unfair it all was. He’d shocked his mother when he came back to run the farm and started helping her in the kitchen, insisting she sit while he passed around the food. He’d even started doing dishes.

  It just felt right.

  The old ways were fine, if all parties agreed. But his mother was getting older, and he felt like helping. So, he did.

  Dirk had jumped into that role, too. With Daisy so upset about the loss of Portia, then with her cancer coming on so fast, Dirk had needed to become the caretaker. And it made Boone proud to watch this rugged farmer cut the cornbread and pass out napkins.

  Maybe that was the test of a real man. He could do kitchen work and still maintain his manly ways.

  The family talked quietly, but the air remained taut with expectation.

  Boone handed the infuser to Daisy, who filled everyone’s cups. Then he set it up for another brew.

  “Okay,” Daisy said. “Boone, take your seat. You’re family.”

  Boone pulled up between Dirk and Anderson. Portia’s parents flanked her on either side.

  Silence fell, and all eyes were on Portia, who sat like a stone statue, straight and unmoving. With a deep heaving sigh, she began to speak.

  Chapter 15

  “It happened at work,” Portia said. “I was just closing up the greenhouse for the night.”

  Portia’s thoughts went back to the day he’d taken her, and as she replayed the scene in her mind, she spoke the words aloud with eyes closed. She tried to separate her inner self from the voice that spoke, and not react to the gasps and comments of surprise that occasionally erupted from the ring of people around the table.

  After she’d earned her undergrad degree in biology, she decided to take a year off before applying to grad schools. To make some money and start paying off her exorbitant school loans, she’d taken a nice no-brainer job at the local garden store.

  To her surprise, she’d fallen in love with the job, and had secretly realized if she made enough to live on, she could happily work among the plants for the rest of her life. She’d checked out a few grad schools, but only half-heartedly. There was something so calming and satisfying about working with plants, her hands in the soft soil, the fresh green sprouts that popped up from the dirt, the aroma of flowers that filled the greenhouses…It had become her oasis, and she’d begun to wonder if she really wanted to go forward with her childhood dream of becoming a horse veterinarian.

  The Green Mountain Nursery was open from nine-to-nine in the summer. Over time, Portia had moved into a trusted position, quickly becoming indispensable to owner Marty McGorkin, a seventy-something woman who still spoke with a Scottish accent and who was stronger and more energetic than most twenty-year-olds Portia knew.

  That night, she’d been left to tend the register and close up. Marty had left at five, to get ready for her usual bridge date with her gal pals. Since it was mid-June, most of the vegetable gardeners had already bought and planted their tomatoes, peppers, and other hothouse vegetables, so the crazy planting season had begun to wane.

  A few couples wandered among the herb plants, rubbing leaves and sniffing their fingers to decide which scents they preferred. One elderly gentleman examined the berry bushes just outside the main building, and a family with three kids pushed a green cart through the annuals, choosing a bright assortment of potted zinnias, African daisies, and petunias.

  She’d noticed the man puttering around the leftover geraniums an hour earlier. The big push had been in May, for Mother’s Day, but they still had a good assortment of reds, pinks, and whites, and they were on sale now, which probably attracted the man to the display.

  He wasn’t a local customer, at least not one of her regulars. He’d put three plants in his cart, taken them out again, and chosen two more twenty minutes later. As the rest of the customers checked out and drove off, she checked her watch. Almost closing time.

  She wondered if he needed help, but he hadn’t raised his eyes from the plants for the past half hour, so she’d held back. Some folks just needed time to choose the perfect plants for their yard or porch.

  He was a tall man, probably six foot two or three. Broad shoulders, ruddy complexion, pitted cheeks where he’d obviously suffered from a bad case of acne in his youth. A baseball cap mashed down the straight gray hair that reached to his collar, and he wore the regulation jeans and tee shirt that most folks did when they visited her store.

  At five ’til nine, she headed over to him. “Sir?”

  He looked up, and with a start, she reeled back from the intense expression in his black eyes.

  Why had it seemed so odd? The focused, stabbing look he gave her didn’t match the image she had of a doddering, indecisive shopper.

  “Sir, I'm sorry, but we’re closing in five minutes. Can I help you decide?”

  With a sigh, he put all the plants back except one bright red geranium. “No. I think I’ll just get this one.”

  His voice was deep, gravelly sounding. Almost as if he had something wrong with his throat, like surgery or something on his vocal chords that made it sound a little bit mechanical or robotic.

  She’d smiled automatically and led the way back to the counter. “Of course. Come on over and I’ll ring you up.”

  He’d paid with cash, his cap pulled low over his eyes again.

  Those eyes.

  They’d almost burned her when they lit on her face earlier.

  He pocketed his change and picked up the plant, heading toward his car in the back of the lot. “See you around.”

  Although she felt unsettled, she went through her usual nighttime routine. Count the money. Put it in the safe. Shut off all the lights except the few they left on for security reasons. Lock the greenhouse doors. Lock all doors in the main building. Grab her purse and sweater.

  She backed out of the main door, checking it to be sure it was locked up tight. Feeling hungry, she began to plan a run to the local Chinese restaurant for a container of wonton soup. She loved the crunchy noodles they served with it, and always felt good about all the fresh broccoli and pea pods they mixed in with the savory stuffed wontons.

  Her old, beat-up Camry sat alone by the back of the greenhouse. With keys in hand, she hurried toward it, feeling a slight chill in the night air. Behind the building, the outline of an unfamiliar vehicle took shape.

  Someone’s truck?

  Why had they parked it there, and left it? Was it one of the delivery guys? But why wouldn’t they have told her they’d left it out back?

  When she bent down to unlock her car door, a dark form loomed out of the shadows and a strong arm reached around her body, pinning her to him.

  No! With quick instincts, she jabbed backwards with an elbow, like her self-defense teacher had taught her in college.

  The big man uttered a low “oof” but didn’t release her.

  “Shhh,” he said, and in that moment, she recognized the mechanical sound of his voice. “It’s okay. You’re with me now, sugar.”

  Struggling harder, she twisted and turned but couldn’t evade his strong grip. A sharp odor filled the air, and with
in seconds, he’d clamped a rag over her nose.

  She slumped against him and everything went black.

  Portia roused herself from the memory. “That’s it. That’s how he did it.”

  Chapter 16

  Daisy folded Portia in her arms when she finished. “Oh, baby.”

  Portia let her mother embrace her, but this time the tears didn’t come. Leaning against Daisy, she listened to the snippets of conversation around the table.

  Grace: “I knew it! I knew she wouldn’t leave on her own. Stupid cops and all that crap they started about her running away…”

  Dirk blurted, “Where did he keep you? Was it near here?”

  Boone said, “How’d you get that truck? And what part of Wisconsin did it come from?”

  Anderson shouted, “What was his name? We ought to report it to the police, right now.”

  Portia stiffened, feeling bombarded by all the questions. “I don’t know his real name. He made me call him Murphy. I don’t know if it was his first or last name.”

  Her father leaned toward her. “Okay. Murphy. Over six feet, longish gray hair, well-muscled, funny sounding voice. Is that right?”

  Portia nodded. “And pockmarked skin.”

  He started to jot down the particulars. “Where did he take you, honey? Was it all the way up in Wisconsin, like Boone said?”

  She sat up straighter. “Yes. I don’t know the town name, but maybe we could find it from the registration papers in the truck? When I left the cabin, I just drove like a maniac to the interstate, and didn’t look back.”

  “A cabin?” Grace said, with wide eyes. “In the woods?”

  “Yes.” Portia looked down at her hands, finding it harder to go on. “It was surrounded by woods, with just dirt tracks going in and out of the place. But I never saw the outside. Until the day I escaped.”

  Boone leaned forward, his face a study in horror. “He kept you inside for two years?”

  Portia’s hand flew to her face, which temporarily crumpled. “Yes.” She reached for strength, found it in her father’s hand that squeezed hers, and took a deep breath. “Except when he tied me to the porch on that last day.”

  Boone stood up and started pacing. “We’ve gotta tell the cops who this guy is, the sick f—” He stopped, realized there were ladies present, and turned to Dirk and Anderson. “Or we could go out there, find the bastard, and beat him to death.”

  Anderson held up a hand. “Not that the idea doesn’t have merit,” he said quietly. “But he may be armed.”

  Boone’s face turned dull red. “I’ve got a rifle and I know how to use it. I’m not afraid of that bastard.”

  Daisy’s face went gray. “What if he has another girl in there? Maybe someone else’s daughter.”

  Portia stiffened and squirmed in her seat. She needed to tell them. “Um.”

  Her father picked up on her distress. “What is it, sweetheart?”

  “You can’t tell the police where he is.”

  Boone almost shouted his answer, seeming angrier by the moment. “Why the hell not?”

  She put both hands over her face and mumbled her words. “Because,” she said. “Because I think I may have killed him.”

  She felt her father stiffen beside her. “What?”

  The tears came, freely again. They traced her cheeks and made her voice hitch. “I think I may have… I may have killed him. It was the only way I could get away.”

  Grace jumped up and ran to her sister, pulling her into a hug. “It’s okay. We’ll take care of you. And I don’t blame you one bit. That prick should’ve been strung up to die from the worst kind of torture. If you killed him,” she wailed, suddenly in tears herself, “then good for you.”

  Anderson added his counsel again, the voice of reason in a sea of chaos. “But Portia’s right. The innocent don’t always get the benefit of the law. If she did kill him, they might charge her. But if they don’t know who she is…”

  Boone stopped pacing and looked toward the barn. “We’ve gotta dump that truck. And its plates. It needs to disappear, forever.”

  Her mother’s face had turned paler than before. “I don’t know about this. We’re talking about conspiring to break the law.”

  Portia sat still, crying silently, but the tears still wet her cheeks. “Mom? Do you want me to go to jail?”

  Daisy turned to her, resolve stamped on her face. “Goodness, no, baby. I’m sorry.” She stood, placing her hands on Portia’s shoulders. “I'm with you all. Let’s do what we have to do to protect our girl.”

  Dirk stood, looking out the window. “We’ve got to go out there, find out if he’s dead or alive.”

  Anderson nodded solemnly. “It has to be done quietly. There needs to be a good excuse for us to be there. Something completely innocent and believable.”

  Grace swung toward Anderson. “Us?”

  His face hardened. “Of course, us. I’m not going to let your father and Boone face this monster alone.”

  Grace slumped back in her chair. “Right.”

  “No!” Portia bolted from her seat, ran to her father, and started pulling on his arm. “You can’t go out there. If I didn’t kill him, if I just knocked him out…he’ll kill you. He’s ruthless. He’s strong. He’s smart.” She sobbed the last words. “He’s a monster.”

  Boone stepped toward her. “How would he know us, Peaches?”

  “He had no television. But you guys were all over the newspapers. He bought several papers each week, clipped the articles. He knows you all by name.” She turned to Anderson. “Except you. I don’t think he knew you guys were married.”

  Grace looked scared. “Oh my God.”

  Dirk turned from the window. “We can’t assume he isn’t capable of retribution.” He thought for a moment. “We’ve gotta find out what happened to him. Carefully. Without alarming anyone.”

  Grace said, “What about the papers? We can do a search on the town. Look at the obits online. That kind of thing.”

  “That’ll work if his body was found,” Boone said. “But if he lived like a hermit, which I’m assuming is why Portia was never found, he could still be lying there.” Boone pulled out a chair again and sat down, running his hands through his shaggy blond hair. “I’ve got some ideas. Let me think on it. Meanwhile, Peaches, can you tell us more about the place? What did you see the first day you arrived?”

  Chapter 17

  The ride to the cabin had been long and filled with blackness and distortion. He had settled Portia on the seat beside him, and when she began to wake up, he’d clamped the horrible cloth over her face again, pushing her back to the darkness.

  “I remember a few things on the way up there, but mostly I was drugged. Chloroform, I think. He poured it out of a bottle and put it on a cloth over my nose.”

  They listened closely while she mentally returned to the trip that had begun her two years in hell.

  “He threw my purse out the window at one point. I remember feeling a sense of terrible loss. Everything was in there. My license. My cell phone. Everything.”

  Boone spoke up. “No one ever reported finding it.”

  “It was very rural. I’d just woken up because cold air came in the window, and when he leaned over to toss it out, I saw it go sailing past me in what felt like slow motion. I was so dizzy. But I seem to remember going over a bridge. Maybe a river.”

  “That would explain it,” Boone said.

  Dirk continued to take notes. “Bridge. River. Okay. What else?”

  “There was a town called Middleton. I remember signs for hotels lit up. It was night.”

  Anderson looked up. “I know where that is. I did an undergrad semester at the university in Madison, Wisconsin. It’s just next door.”

  Grace and Daisy watched and listened with intent expressions on their faces, as if they were trying to absorb as much as possible and somehow, through the powers of their minds, find answers.

  Portia turned to Boone. “In the truck behind the
barn, there are papers in the glove box. Probably his registration and insurance. Can you get them?”

  He was out the door in a flash, and back in a few minutes with the folder in hand. “Here you go.”

  “Give it to Dad, please.” She motioned to her father. “Check out the address.”

  Dirk rummaged through the papers and peered at them closely. “Daisy? Have you got your glasses on? What’s that say?” He handed the paper to his wife.

  “Looks like his name is Budley McVail. And it’s a place called Baraboo, Wisconsin. What a funny name. For both of them.”

  “I don’t think that’s his real name,” Portia said, sounding defeated. “He might have stolen the truck.”

  Portia’s father jumped up and grabbed a US Atlas from the desk in the living room, flipping through the pages until he found Wisconsin. “Let see. Here’s Madison.” He moved his finger up the map. “And here’s Middleton.”

  Boone and Anderson got up and watched over his shoulder. Dirk’s finger moved on the map. “There it is. Baraboo. Looks like it’s about thirty or forty miles north of Middleton.”

  Portia sat quietly while they talked about the landscape, and possible approaches. She waited until their comments had slowed, and said. “There’s more. We were right next to a lake.”

  “Hmm. There’s a lake just south of the town called Devil’s Lake. Could be a possibility. Lots of woods and state land there, too.”

  “That’s it!” Portia said with a shiver. “Devil’s Lake.”

  Her father looked up with an encouraging smile. “Please, go on.”

  “The road to the cabin woke me up. It was so bumpy, like it wasn’t even meant for cars, you know? I remember hearing the axle hit roots or rocks, and occasionally he’d have to back up and go around another way.”

  She paused, closing her eyes to remember. “There was a pole at one intersection with deer antlers nailed to it. Like some sort of trophies. I remember the truck headlights lighting them up. Disgusting.” She shook her head and grimaced. “Of course, when I drove out of there I was in such a panic I don’t remember a thing about it. It was a miracle I found my way out.”