Read Online The Heat of the Moon: A Rachel Goddard Mystery (Rachel Goddard Mysteries) by Sandra Parshall - Free Book Online
Authors: Sandra Parshall
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phantoms were roaming free again. Staring into the dark woods that loomed beyond the lawn, listening to the spring frogs along Dead Run, alternately shrill and throaty, I sensed the shadowy presence of the sad-faced woman, the angry man. And I had a clear vision of my little sister crying in the rain, wet strands of blond hair clinging to her cheeks, her blue flowered dress soaked through.
Blue flowered dress? Oh, dear God. Now my imagination was filling in details.
I forced myself to make the connection between what Mother had told me and what I alone knew. Grief had unbalanced me at a critical point in my childhood. It left a wound that had never healed. It made me do things I couldn’t remember, and remember things that had never happened.
I turned toward the house and saw Mother in the rear window of her study, the room bright behind her as she peered into the dark. She couldn’t see me, I knew. After a moment she moved out of sight.
I wasn’t surprised that she’d wanted to protect me from memories of a ravaging grief. She’d always tried to shelter Michelle and me from the worst in life.
But I sensed that something more, something far worse, that she couldn’t or wouldn’t talk about, still lurked behind her words. What was she holding back? What else was she protecting me from?
Chapter Five
With a tin plate of raw rabbit meat in one hand, I walked down the driveway to the front of the house, wondering what had happened to Luke after I heard his Range Rover pull in. He was in the front yard, contemplating the blossom-heavy weeping cherry.
I watched him from the driveway. He looked different, dressed in gray slacks and a navy sports jacket over a white tieless shirt, with polished loafers on his feet. All this, no doubt, because he expected to meet my mother and sister. Today I was the one in jeans.
He turned with a smile. “That tree’s a knockout,” he said.
And so are you, I thought. “My mother had it planted on my thirteenth birthday. I got it in my head that I couldn’t live without one.”
He nodded, seeming to approve the sentiment. “Someday I’d like to have a house with one of these in the yard.”
For a moment we stood smiling at each other. More than once that morning I’d almost called and told him not to come. I couldn’t shake off the things Mother had said to me the night before; her words trailed through my head like smoke, poisonous and smothering. I couldn’t find the lightness of spirit to play flirtatious games with Luke. But now that he was here, all slicked up and making the same general impression as a gust of fresh air, I was ridiculously happy I’d let him come.
He nodded at the plate of rabbit meat. “Lunch?”
I laughed. “For the hawk. Let’s go down and see him.”
The back lawn sloped away from the house, with Mother’s perennial beds on either side and her roses in the sunny center. Tulips and late daffodils dotted the borders with pink and red and yellow. The rosebushes bristled with thorns and tiny new leaves.
Luke turned and walked backward for a few steps, looking up at the house, then around at the trees that ringed the yard. “How much belongs to your mother?”
“An acre and a half,” I said. “All the trees on either side, and down to the stream in back. We’ve got our own private little woods.”
“Sure beats apartment living. Now I see why you don’t want to leave home.”
I let that go without an answer, unwilling to start a discussion of my living arrangements.
At the bottom of the yard, we followed a path through a shield of evergreen shrubs and came into a streamside clearing. The four large rehab cages, which I’d built myself with lumber and chicken wire, were mounted on platforms four feet off the ground.
Luke peered into the cages. His thick sandy hair had been neatly combed back but now drifted across his forehead again, and the inevitability of it made me smile.
At the moment the only animal I had besides the hawk
Blue flowered dress? Oh, dear God. Now my imagination was filling in details.
I forced myself to make the connection between what Mother had told me and what I alone knew. Grief had unbalanced me at a critical point in my childhood. It left a wound that had never healed. It made me do things I couldn’t remember, and remember things that had never happened.
I turned toward the house and saw Mother in the rear window of her study, the room bright behind her as she peered into the dark. She couldn’t see me, I knew. After a moment she moved out of sight.
I wasn’t surprised that she’d wanted to protect me from memories of a ravaging grief. She’d always tried to shelter Michelle and me from the worst in life.
But I sensed that something more, something far worse, that she couldn’t or wouldn’t talk about, still lurked behind her words. What was she holding back? What else was she protecting me from?
Chapter Five
With a tin plate of raw rabbit meat in one hand, I walked down the driveway to the front of the house, wondering what had happened to Luke after I heard his Range Rover pull in. He was in the front yard, contemplating the blossom-heavy weeping cherry.
I watched him from the driveway. He looked different, dressed in gray slacks and a navy sports jacket over a white tieless shirt, with polished loafers on his feet. All this, no doubt, because he expected to meet my mother and sister. Today I was the one in jeans.
He turned with a smile. “That tree’s a knockout,” he said.
And so are you, I thought. “My mother had it planted on my thirteenth birthday. I got it in my head that I couldn’t live without one.”
He nodded, seeming to approve the sentiment. “Someday I’d like to have a house with one of these in the yard.”
For a moment we stood smiling at each other. More than once that morning I’d almost called and told him not to come. I couldn’t shake off the things Mother had said to me the night before; her words trailed through my head like smoke, poisonous and smothering. I couldn’t find the lightness of spirit to play flirtatious games with Luke. But now that he was here, all slicked up and making the same general impression as a gust of fresh air, I was ridiculously happy I’d let him come.
He nodded at the plate of rabbit meat. “Lunch?”
I laughed. “For the hawk. Let’s go down and see him.”
The back lawn sloped away from the house, with Mother’s perennial beds on either side and her roses in the sunny center. Tulips and late daffodils dotted the borders with pink and red and yellow. The rosebushes bristled with thorns and tiny new leaves.
Luke turned and walked backward for a few steps, looking up at the house, then around at the trees that ringed the yard. “How much belongs to your mother?”
“An acre and a half,” I said. “All the trees on either side, and down to the stream in back. We’ve got our own private little woods.”
“Sure beats apartment living. Now I see why you don’t want to leave home.”
I let that go without an answer, unwilling to start a discussion of my living arrangements.
At the bottom of the yard, we followed a path through a shield of evergreen shrubs and came into a streamside clearing. The four large rehab cages, which I’d built myself with lumber and chicken wire, were mounted on platforms four feet off the ground.
Luke peered into the cages. His thick sandy hair had been neatly combed back but now drifted across his forehead again, and the inevitability of it made me smile.
At the moment the only animal I had besides the hawk
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