House Of Reckoning Part 13

Then, just as she was about to close the drawer, she noticed something odd.

The drawer's face seemed to be a few inches taller than the drawer was deep.

She closed the drawer and looked at the front of it, measuring its depth with her fingers, hand, and forearm. Then she opened it again and repeated the exercise. Sure enough, the bottom of the drawer was nearly three inches higher than it needed to be.

And when she felt the exterior bottom of the drawer, it was nearly even with the bottom of the drawer's face.

The drawer had a false bottom.

Bettina lifted the files out of the drawer, stacking them on the desk.

Barely visible at the back of the drawer, she found a small notch in the drawer's bottom. Taking a paper clip from the top drawer, she straightened it out, bent it so it formed a right angle, then fit it into the notch.

It came up without so much as a squeal.

And there, hidden away in the secret compartment that had been built into the desk, was a sheaf of handwritten pages.

A ma.n.u.script?

Bettina carefully pulled the papers out of the drawer.

AN HOMAGE TO E. A. POE.

BY BOONE PHILIPS.

Her thrice-great-grandfather was a writer? What had he written?

She quickly replaced the false bottom, put the files back where they'd originally been, and closed the drawer.

The house plans-even if they were here-could wait.

Leaving Sarah Crane's drawing on the desk, she took the ma.n.u.script back to her studio, curled up on the chaise with a thick wool throw, and began to read.

With her coat b.u.t.toned up tight, her scarf wrapped around her mouth and nose, and the knit cap pulled well down over her ears, Sarah made her way slowly down the last few yards of the driveway, feeling each step out carefully.

The last thing she needed to do was trip in the dark.

And with her hands plunged deep in the warmth of her pockets, she might not be able to pull them out in time to catch herself if she fell. Then what would she do? There was no way Bettina Philips could hear her from here, and even if a car pa.s.sed on the road, its windows would be closed. But if she pulled her hands out now, her fingers would freeze.

At last she came to the road, turned left, and started down into the village. For the first part of the long walk back to the Garveys', all she'd been able to think about was the macabre drawing she'd made at Shutters. Where had it come from? And why couldn't she remember drawing it? Was it possible that she hadn't hadn't drawn it? That was certainly how it felt: like some strange force had just taken over, moving the charcoal all by itself. But as she came to the bright streetlight across from the town square, her mind s.h.i.+fted from where she'd been to where she was going. drawn it? That was certainly how it felt: like some strange force had just taken over, moving the charcoal all by itself. But as she came to the bright streetlight across from the town square, her mind s.h.i.+fted from where she'd been to where she was going.

What would it to be like to face the wrath of Angie Garvey?

A cold that was different from the icy chill in the air penetrated deep into her, making the night seem almost warm by comparison.

What was she going to say when her foster mother demanded to know where she'd been?

Should she try to lie and say she was at the library?

But she wasn't very good at lying, and Angie would know right away that she wasn't telling the truth.

Just walking out had been bad enough; if she lied about where she'd been- She didn't even want to think about what Angie might do. Not letting her visit her father would only be the beginning of it.

Five minutes later she turned the corner onto Quail Run, and stopped for a moment, still trying to think what she might say. The Garvey house was dark except for the bluish cast from the big-screen television that showed through the draperies. Still uncertain what she was going to say, Sarah took a deep breath and crossed the street. A moment later she climbed the three steps to the front porch, steeled herself, and opened the storm door.

The front door was locked.

Sarah moved to the window, peered through the sheer curtains, and saw Mitch Garvey's foot propped up on the coffee table as he lay sprawled on the sofa that faced the television.

She knocked on the gla.s.s, but his foot didn't even twitch.

She rang the bell and waited, s.h.i.+vering in the cold, but there were no answering lights, no sound, no movement of any kind.

Maybe they'd left the back door open for her.

Sarah closed the storm door, went around to the back of the house, and was about to try the back door when she saw a rolled up sleeping bag standing on its end right next to the dog door. Sitting on top of it was a small plate-not even covered-that held half a sandwich.

There was a note pinned to the bread with a toothpick.

Sarah's heart faltered as she began to understand her punishment.

She unpinned the note and held it up to the glow of the porch light.

You don't storm out in a temper tantrum and come back whenever you want to. Good night.

She read the note again, barely believing that someone would lock her out of the house, leaving her to sleep on a porch in November.

Even the dog got to sleep in the laundry room.

But what else could she do?

Maybe she should go back to Shutters. Bettina would let her sleep there-she'd already offered.

But the cold was penetrating deeper and deeper into her, and her hip was throbbing and her leg aching so badly she'd barely made it the last couple of blocks before she got back to the Garveys'.

She'd never make it all the way back to Shutters.

Sighing, she unrolled the heavy down sleeping bag and kicked off her shoes. Then, still wearing her coat, knit cap, and scarf, she wriggled into the sleeping bag and pulled it close around her.

She reached out a hand into the cold and picked up the sandwich from the plate.

She nibbled at it, and then, as the cold began to ebb out of her body, quickly finished the rest of it.

She stretched out flat on her back, and felt the throbbing in her hip begin to ease, despite the hardness of the porch. As her body warmed, exhaustion flowed through her, and suddenly even the wooden floor of the porch didn't seem so bad.

Better, anyway, than trying to keep on walking through the cold and darkness. Letting the last piece of bread crust fall from her fingers, Sarah gave herself up to sleep.

Tiffany smiled in the darkness of her room when she heard the doorbell ring, and a tingle of excitement ran through her as she waited to see if her parents were really going to make Sarah sleep outside all night.

She'd never seen her mother as furious as she'd been when Sarah just walked out of the house before dinner. Her mother hadn't even been that mad when she had to pick Zach up at the Morganton police station after he took her car for a joyride with Conner West.

And the best thing was that her mother's fury had only gotten worse as the evening went on and Sarah didn't come back and apologize. Still, even given how angry her mother was, Tiffany couldn't quite believe she'd actually make her sleep outside. She'd probably let Sarah s.h.i.+ver out there for a little while longer, then let her in and start yelling at her.

The doorbell turned into a couple of knocks, but Tiffany knew it didn't matter how hard she knocked-her mother had gone to bed-or at least disappeared into the big bedroom at the end of the hall, and her father would be asleep on the sofa.

Except he wasn't really asleep-he was pa.s.sed out, and no amount of ringing or knocking would wake him up.

So it was true-n.o.body was going to let her in until morning.

Then an ugly thought occurred to her: What if her mother did the same thing to her?

Behave, or you'll sleep on the porch.

No. Doing it to Sarah Crane was one thing, but her parents would never do that to her. Sarah was no more than a way for her folks to get some extra money, and the way she'd acted, she needed a good slap in the face to learn her place in the family.

Which was no place at all.

Suddenly, Tiffany wanted to actually see what was happening, to witness it with her own eyes, so she could relate every detail to everyone at school tomorrow. If people were snickering about Sarah already, just wait until they heard this one-they'd all die laughing.

She slid out of bed, put on the robe she'd tossed over her desk chair, and silently slipped out of her room on bare feet. She stepped over the creaky step on the stairs just in case her father wasn't quite as pa.s.sed out as she thought he'd be, but when she went through the living room, he didn't so much as twitch.

Pepper was in his bed in the laundry room, and he got up and wagged his little stump of a tail when she came in, and she crouched down and petted him for a second just to make sure he didn't start whimpering or barking.

Then she peeked out the back door window.

Sarah was in Zach's sleeping bag.

Lying on the porch.

Still wearing her hat.

Perfect! Exactly what she deserved.

And for tonight, at least, she had her room all to herself again, the way it should be.

Which gave her another idea.

Giving Pepper one more pat on his head, Tiffany quietly retraced her steps until she was safely back in her room, then locked the door, just in case.

She crouched down in front of the dresser and opened the bottom drawer.

Sarah's drawer.

The bottle of pain pills was right where she'd left it when she took a few last week. She'd earned enough money from those to buy a new sweater, and now she wanted a skirt to go with it.

She even knew who her best customer was going to be: Conner West, who'd bought one of the pills last week and asked her for more.

Now she had more.

Silently, she closed the drawer, then unzipped her backpack, put the pills in her makeup kit and buried it in the bottom of her pack.

Then she took off her robe, slipped back into her warm bed, and snuggled down into her soft mattress, thinking of Sarah s.h.i.+vering out on the porch.

Whatever happened tomorrow, tonight at least had been a great evening.

No Sarah, and plenty of pills to sell in the morning.

Chapter Twelve.

Nick stamped his feet against the cold and flexed his fingers inside the mittens his mother had knit for him. He knew he'd be warmer if he kept moving but decided to try to walk to school with Sarah this morning, so for the last twenty minutes he'd been hanging around the corner closest to the Garveys' house, trying to keep an eye out for her while not appearing to wait for her. By now he was freezing, and if she didn't show up soon, he knew they'd never make it on time.

Maybe she was sick.

Maybe she wasn't coming at all.

Tiffany and Zach had left the house at least ten minutes ago and were probably inside the school building by now.

The nice, warm warm school building. school building.

When Conner West drove by-flipping Nick the bird as he pa.s.sed-Nick glanced at his watch. He'd give her another minute and then- The Garveys' front door opened and Sarah appeared, gripping the railing tightly as she made her way down the three steps of the front porch.

And then the voices in Nick's head-the voices that had begun babbling angrily as Conner West lifted his finger at him a minute ago-fell silent as Sarah caught sight of him and waved.

Nick hurried toward her. Maybe if he carried her book bag they could still get to school on time, but when he caught up to Sarah, he stopped short. She looked as if she'd barely slept at all. "Hey," he said. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," she said, but the way she kept her eyes down told him she wasn't telling the truth.

"You don't look fine," he said, then realizing how that sounded, felt his face burning and tried to find better words. "I mean, you look great-really pretty, but-" He reached for her backpack. "Let me carry that, okay?"

Sarah stopped long enough to let him slip it off her shoulders. "I didn't get much sleep."

"What happened?" Nick pressed.

Sarah hesitated, then offered Nick a careless shrug that he didn't believe any more than he'd believed her words when she told him she was fine. "They made me sleep outside," she finally admitted.

Nick stopped short, staring at her. "They made you sleep outside? Why?" outside? Why?"

Instead of answering his question, Sarah pulled the collar of her coat tighter and started down the street. "We have to hurry or we'll be late."

"It's November! They can't make you sleep outside." Nick tugged on the shoulder of her coat until she stopped walking. "You should tell someone. Don't you have, like, a social worker or something?"

"No!" Sarah looked up at him with such fear that Nick took a step backward. "If I tell anyone, the Garveys won't let me go see my father."