31

EFFIE

May 1901
Shepherd, Iowa

SHE HAD NEVER BEEN so grateful to see her father in all her life. She’d been limping as fast as she could toward help. Carlton James leaped from his carriage as it rumbled to a halt beside her. Two more carriages, including Gus’s, raced by. She thought she caught a glimpse of Constable Talbot in one next to Gerald Ambrose’s.

As it was, she collapsed into her father’s arms. The heel of her shoe had been broken. Her hair stuck to her cheek where blood had dried from her nosebleed. Her legs were quivering.

“Euphemia!” Her father hoisted her up, guiding her to the carriage. “I’m taking you home right away.”

“No! Anderson! He’s in trouble. It’s Patrick, Father—Patrick Charlemagne!”

“Charlemagne?” Carlton drew back in shock. “I don’t understand.”

“Please, Papa.” Effie reverted to her childhood endearment out of instinct, but it must have moved something in him.

“Yes. Yes!” Carlton helped her into the carriage and vaulted up beside her. With a slap of the reins, they barreled toward 322 Predicament Avenue.

Effie had never been so thankful as the moment they pulled to a lurching halt in front of the dilapidated house. Anderson sat on the front porch steps. His face was swollen, his eye already turning shades of purple. His shirt was half ripped off his shoulder, revealing part of his lean chest.

Gerald Ambrose had Patrick pinned to the ground in the yard as Constable Talbot secured him.

“Anderson!” Effie climbed down from the carriage before her father could help her out.

Anderson’s head shot up, and he struggled to stand. Effie didn’t think, didn’t bother to consider, she just threw herself into his chest. He stumbled back, and she released him instantly.

“I’m so sorry!”

The first hint of a smile she’d ever seen on him touched his face. Anderson winced and held his ribs.

“Did I break them?” Effie cried, knowing how ridiculous she sounded when the question popped out.

Anderson laughed, then winced again. “No. I’m afraid that honor goes to the rat over there.” He glared at Patrick, who had steeled his features and maintained a stony silence.

Ambrose hauled him to his feet, and Constable Talbot shoved Patrick forward. Patrick looked as bruised and beaten as Anderson did. Effie looked down at Anderson’s left hand. It was wrapped in cloth that was already showing red.

“Your hand!” she said.

“Apparently, glass and flesh don’t get along well.” Anderson’s statement reminded Effie of the smashed window.

Anderson lifted his good hand and pushed hair from her face.

“I think Floyd has baby Cora!” Effie declared.

“What?” Anderson bit out.

“What baby?” Carlton James approached them.

Gerald Ambrose stilled. “Baby?”

Effie ignored them and focused on Anderson. “Mr. Charlemagne alluded to Floyd somehow being involved in Isabelle’s death. But I think he tried to save her. And I think maybe his mother has tried to protect this place and him and baby Cora. That’s why she attacked me. They thought I was here to hurt the baby!”

Understanding seeped into Anderson’s face. “Good heavens,” he muttered.

“What baby?” Effie’s father demanded.

Effie turned to explain. “Anderson’s daughter. She was taken from their home in England. He’s been chasing Isabelle Addington to get baby Cora back.”

Carlton’s shocked expression mirrored the constable’s and Gerald Ambrose’s.

“Did you find Floyd?” Anderson gritted out against the pain from his beating.

“No.” Carlton shook his head. His hand went protectively to Effie’s elbow. “We thought he was here actually—it’s why we came.”

Effie frowned, then eyed Anderson. “How did you know I was here—with Mr. Charlemagne?”

Anderson gave her a pained expression as he adjusted his position on the stairs. “I came by the manor. Miss Todd was there and your mother. When they invited me in, I saw the music box on the table. It had belonged to Isabelle. She used to play it for Cora. The pieces fell together then. Miss Todd affirmed that Mr. Charlemagne had indeed visited England last year. The timeline made sense.”

“And Miss Todd told you Mr. Charlemagne and I had seen Floyd?” Effie verified.

Anderson gave a short nod. “Yes. So I came here. It was the natural conclusion, although you would think Charlemagne would avoid this place.” He grunted against the pain he was feeling.

“Come on, man.” Gerald Ambrose reached out. “We need to get you to the doctor. And you, Miss James.”

“No,” Anderson snapped. “I am going to find my daughter.”

“Then we need to find Floyd,” Carlton added. “And his mother.”

NORAH

“Why?”

It was the burning question. The one Norah had always dreamed of asking Naomi’s killer. She just hadn’t imagined it would have been directed at Otto. That Otto would be some sick sociopath who kept girls locked under his toolshed.

Lyla’s comments that Naomi’s belongings had been down in the bunker came back to Norah. Had Otto kept Naomi there? For how long? She’d been missing for three months. Her remains had reflected that approximate amount of time.

“Why?” Norah asked again.

Otto rested on one of his lawn mowers. The atmosphere felt as though they were having a chat just like the good old times. But it wasn’t the good old times. Those times didn’t exist anymore.

He sniffed and wiped his nose on his sleeve. “Well, there’s not a great answer to that, I suppose.” Otto was so calm, so resigned. Maybe it was his age. Maybe if he hadn’t been in his late seventies, he’d have reacted with intent to kill Norah. To protect his dirty secret. As it was, Norah wasn’t even afraid of him.

He was a feeble old man, stooped-shouldered and just . . . pathetic.

“See, Naomi always liked helpin’ me, and I was the first one she told about that baby of hers.” Otto seemed almost proud of himself.

Norah tried not to be sick.

He went on, “Fact is, I’ve helped a couple young women in past years. You know, they don’t got anyone to help them through—some of ’em at least.”

Norah stared at him in disbelief. Wordless.

“There’s only been two ’sides Lyla. Lyla was homeless a few towns over from Shepherd. I met her one day about six months ago.”

“Two other women?” Norah repeated, ignoring Otto’s explanation of how he’d met Lyla.

“Yup, two. First one goes back a ways—a bit before you were born actually. Tried to get her help ’cause her brother was always knockin’ her around. So I had her come over one day, and I showed her the bunker. She decided to stay.”

Norah had a strong feeling it hadn’t been that compliant of a situation.

“Then she up and passed on one night. I brought her breakfast, and she’d used a sheet to—” he shook his head and gave Norah a sad look—“well, after that I learned not to put sheets on the bed for those girls. Didn’t want another gal hangin’ herself.”

Norah’s throat burned, and she swallowed back the need to vomit once again. “What about my sister?”

“Naomi?”

“Don’t use her name.” Hearing Otto say her sister’s name so casually—so normally—filled Norah with a ferocity she could scarcely comprehend. She looked around. There were plenty of tools. If she wanted to, she could take him out. Didn’t Naomi deserve that?

Otto didn’t seem to pick up on the violence that was swirling in Norah’s mind. The vengeance. The desire for justice. “Well, Naomi came over to help me, and I told her that the best thing to do is to get away and have her baby in peace. LeRoy Anderson was nothin’ but a loathsome bar-hopper, and he wouldn’t’ve made a good daddy.”

“She had us,” Norah pointed out, glaring at him.

“Sure. An’ you’d have fussed and fretted until you made Naomi run away from all the suffocatin’ worry. And your parents? Churchgoin’ folk that they are, they’d have been praying for some sort of confession. An’ your aunt Eleanor would’ve only smothered Naomi. No, she was better off with me here. Where I could take care of her.” He dropped his gaze. “Only . . .”

“Only what?” Norah demanded.

“Well, you know your sister!” Otto scowled. “She’s so strong-willed an’ all. Kept trying to get away, until one night I told her I’d drive her home. We got in the car, and I realized then that she wasn’t ever goin’ to be happy. There was just no way. So I drove out to the woods and . . . well, I made her happy.”

“You made her happy,” Norah repeated, her voice devoid of emotion.

“Yeah. I mean, eternal life and all that. Most of us are much better off dead.”

Norah’s scream of outrage turned into a bloodcurdling growl. She flew at Otto and slammed her palms into his chest.

The elderly man flipped over off the lawn mower and landed with a thud on the floor of the shed. He looked up at Norah in consternation and not a little fear.

She stood over him. “How dare you! That’s not how it works! You don’t get to play God and decide when someone goes! Naomi had her whole life to live! And we would have loved that baby no matter whose it was or how it was conceived. You twisted, narrow-minded—” Norah drew back her foot to kick Otto as hard as she could.

“Norah!” Sebastian’s voice broke through the shed, and Norah stopped. Her body shook violently. She lifted her eyes to see through the open shed door that Otto had left behind him. Sebastian rushed toward them. Ralph was close behind him, moving much slower and wobbling from side to side.

The trauma began to take over. The shock. Norah’s knees gave out, and she collapsed to the ground next to Otto. She felt Sebastian’s arms come up beneath hers, hauling her away from Otto, holding her against his strong chest. She saw Ralph as he approached his brother, Otto still sprawled on the floor of his shed.

Then, in the shock of the moment, Norah heard Ralph’s voice, a distant echo in her fading consciousness. “Yeah. I need to report a crime . . . Predicament Avenue . . . yeah. My brother. Otto Middleford.”