Somewhere Between Luck and Trust

“Then you think I should pursue this?”

“As long as you realize it might be a dead end. It’s not much to go on. But if you did discover something important, wouldn’t that be the best birthday present you could give yourself?”

Edna came to the doorway. “Your timer’s going off.”

Georgia realized she could hear beeping from the kitchen.

“Would you turn off the oven?” Samantha asked her daughter. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

Edna disappeared again.

“Thanks,” Georgia said. “I’ll give it more thought.”

“Nothing can top the bracelet as a subject, but before everything else gets away from us, have you given any more thought to teaching Cristy to read? If she’ll let you?”

Georgia was surprised her daughter had waited this long to ask, but Samantha was a patient woman. “I’m not sure she’ll be willing. She’s very closed off to the world right now.”

“That makes sense, don’t you think? The world closed her off, for a crime she says she didn’t commit.”

“Sam, don’t you think that’s what most inmates say? It’s part of a pattern. If they don’t admit to a crime, they don’t have to take responsibility.”

“I do know that, of course. But there’s more to this story than we know. She admits to one shoplifting offense as a teenager, but not to the one that landed her in Raleigh.”

“Whether she did it or she didn’t, do you have any real sense she wants her life to change?”

“Who can say but her?”

Georgia asked the question that most puzzled her. “What did you see in this girl that convinced you to help her? You told all of us the facts, but I don’t think you ever got down to the heart of it.”

Samantha laughed softly. “Nothing like a mother.”

“It might help me decide.”

Samantha hesitated, then she rested her hand on her mother’s knee. “I saw me. I looked into Cristy’s eyes and I saw a girl at the crossroads, just the way I stood at that same crossroads in my own life after I ran that car into a ditch. The feeling, the impact—they’re not something you ever forget. And I’ll tell you truthfully, I didn’t necessarily see that in the eyes of the other inmates I taught. But I sure saw it in hers.”

“Mom!” Edna shouted from the kitchen.

Samantha got to her feet. “You’ll think about it?”

“No,” Georgia said. “I guess I’ll do it. I’ve stood at a few crossroads myself. Cristy will need all the help we can give her to figure out which direction to go.”

Chapter Eleven

BY SATURDAY JACKSON hadn’t returned. Cristy still didn’t feel secure—she wasn’t sure she would ever feel secure again—but she had stopped jumping at every noise. Each evening since his visit she had checked windows and doors to the point of obsession, and now she slept on the sofa in the living room, where she would know immediately if someone tried to break in.

Despite her fear she was praying that, having delivered his message, Jackson was confident he had scared her into both submission and silence. Also, if Sully really had warned him to leave her alone, Jackson would know the deputy had his eye on the situation, making it more difficult to come after her.

The rain had slowed on Tuesday, and by Wednesday she had ventured out for her first walk alone. As a child she had been fearless, escaping the parsonage as often as possible to explore the streets and fields of Berle. In those days she had always trusted her ability to find her way home, but now she had to force herself to range a little farther every day. She kept busy on the walks gathering interesting dried weeds and grasses, using stem cutters Betsy’s daughter had sent, and arranging the cuttings in a motley assortment of vases and pots.

On Friday she managed to pull her car out of the barn and drive a few miles on the rural road, the smooth pull of the steering wheel under her hands a reminder of Jackson.

The first time she had met the man who’d almost destroyed her, she had been visiting his father’s “pre-owned” car dealership. Pinckney Motors was a rite of passage for Berle teenagers, an expansive lot just outside the city limits where everyone went to buy their first car.

Cristy’s first had come years later than most. Passing the written driver’s test had been a significant hurdle, which she had finally surmounted by asking for an oral one, despite a realistic fear that the word would get out. The next hurdle had been saving enough money to buy a car outright, since once she quit school her parents had washed their hands of her, and she had no credit to get a loan. She was almost twenty-one before she managed to save enough to buy something reliable. Until then she had used Betsy’s delivery van, but buying her own car? That was a dream come true.

The minute she stepped onto the lot, one of the older salesmen grabbed her to extoll the virtues of every car in her meager price range, none of which had looked like a good bet to her. Then he fell silent, and she looked up to discover that a younger man had waved him away.

The new man, with a blinding white smile and eyes so dark the pupils were lost, was Jackson Ford, son of Pinckney, who owned not only the car lot, but the General Motors dealership, the Buy-Now Supermarket, the two Laundromats that flanked a four-block stretch of Main Street, and the road construction company that got the contract for every stretch of asphalt in the county. Jackson had been just old enough that Cristy hadn’t known him at school, and after graduation he had gone away to college before dropping out a few years later to give professional baseball a try.

Immediately she realized that Jackson was planning to sell her more than a car. He listened to her requirements with respect and interest, asked about her preferences for foreign or domestic, automatic or stick shift, and somehow, as they discussed cars, he discovered everything that was most important about her.

By the time Cristy went home that day, she had promises that the late-model Subaru she liked would be hers, and that when she picked it up, every dent, speck of rust and rattle under the hood would be gone.

She was only able to afford the car because Jackson nonchalantly slashed the price by a third.

He had been as good as his word, and once the papers had been signed, he had taken her out on the town to celebrate. By the end of the next week he had taken her to bed.

While she was in prison, Cristy had fully expected the car to be towed back to Pinckney Motors due to some technicality. When it came right down to it, she had no idea what she’d signed that Friday evening in Jackson’s office. Betsy had offered to come with her, but Cristy hadn’t wanted to be embarrassed in front of a man she’d already begun to dream about, so she’d bravely—foolishly—signed the papers without reading a word, and hoped for the best.

Apparently the papers, at least, had been bona fide. The man himself had been a different matter.

The car was still in surprisingly good shape, thanks to Betsy’s daughter, who had parked it behind her own house and driven it weekly to make sure it continued to run. Cristy just wondered if she would think about Jackson and the real price she had paid every time she got behind the wheel.

By Saturday midmorning the weather had cleared and warmed enough that she dragged the cushions back to the porch and took a glass of lemonade to the glider to make plans. She couldn’t continue this way. She needed to see her son. She needed to find both a way to support herself and a place to live that didn’t depend on the goodwill of others. Her mental list was short but depressing. Even now that she’d proved she could drive again, she couldn’t make herself call Berdine and set up a visit. And supporting herself and finding another place to live seemed as far away as the moon.

An hour later she was still trying to figure out a first step when she saw a car snaking its way up the steep drive toward the house. She didn’t know what Jackson was driving these days. He had access to almost any car at his father’s dealership and liked to switch often, but she imagined that this one, a dated and inexpensive sedan, had never been on his wish list.

Even knowing that, she was relieved when a woman emerged a minute later and began the climb. She was lovely and young, although as she drew closer, Cristy could see perhaps not as young as she’d assumed. Thirties, probably, dark-haired and slender in a simple green dress, with a smile she aimed at Cristy now that she’d almost reached the porch.

“I’m Analiese Wagner,” she said, as if she understood Cristy needed to know that right up front. “I’m another of the trustees. Most people call me Ana, and you must be Cristy.”

Samantha had given Cristy a brief description of each of the “goddesses” who were responsible for the decisions made here. Cristy had yet to meet Taylor, the daughter of Charlotte Hale, whose family home this had been. The only other woman she hadn’t met was Charlotte’s minister, and while the woman’s relative youth was a surprise, her appearance at the house was not.

Cristy had been half waiting for the minister to show up and insist she confess her sins and beg for forgiveness.

Despite a surge of distaste she knew something was expected of her; after all, this was one of the women who had reached out to help her. She nodded politely and held up her glass. “May I get you something to drink? I’m drinking powdered lemonade.”

“Not a thing.” Analiese joined her on the glider. “I had an unexpected break in my schedule, so I thought I’d pop up to meet you. Yesterday was Georgia’s birthday.” She paused. “We’re bombarding you with new faces. Do you remember which one of us is Georgia?”

Cristy tried not to be offended. “Yes, of course.”

“Her daughter threw a surprise party last night. A bunch of us showed up after dinner for cake and ice cream. It was pretty last-minute, but Sam hoped you could come down for the festivities. I guess she tried to get you by phone, but you weren’t answering. She’s a little worried.”

Cristy felt a stab of guilt. The telephone had rung yesterday—several times, in fact. But fearing that Jackson had gotten the number, or even Berdine or Clara, she hadn’t answered.

“I’m sorry,” she said at last. “I... Well, it just didn’t occur to me it might be Samantha.”

Analiese drew a pillow behind her back and kicked off black flats with a thin gold band around the top. “I’ve been known to avoid phone calls if I’m afraid somebody I don’t want to talk to is on the other end of the line.”

Cristy was sorry to see the other woman making herself so comfortable. “I’m fine. Really. Nobody has to worry.”

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