NINE

•   •   •

Lilly awoke to the sound of a man’s voice in her ear. At first, she thought it was one of the men beside her. Not Fisher —his voice was much too gruff, too deep and gravelly. The other man, the one to her left, had a nice voice, soft and smooth. Kind. When she first heard it, she thought it must be a nice singing voice.

But it wasn’t his voice, either. It was the voice, the one she’d been listening for, the one that brought hope and comfort.

DO NOT BE AFRAID, MY LITTLE ONE.

She was still in the backseat, wedged between Fisher and the other guy. She had no idea how long she’d been asleep. The day was still bright and the sun high in the sky, so it couldn’t have been for that long. She sat motionless, being very warm and finding some comfort in the lingering effects of sleep. She allowed her eyes to close again. The voice was there.

I WON’T LEAVE YOU. NOT EVER. I’LL HOLD YOUR HAND.

As the vehicle slowed, Lilly opened her eyes and saw they were approaching a building, an old warehouse of some kind. The building was big, three stories, and all brick. Some of the windows were broken and there was a bunch of graffiti on the lower part of the walls. Lilly tried to sit up straighter to get a better look, but the driver glared at her in the mirror. Those dark, lifeless eyes pushed her back into her seat.

The vehicle pulled close to one of the metal doors and stopped. The driver kept the engine running while he got out and walked around to the entrance. Fisher opened his door and stumbled out of the SUV, holding the bandage on his arm. His skin was pale and shiny with sweat, his lips a bluish-gray. He looked like he was ready to pass out.

“Get him inside,” Mr. Murphy said to the driver. “Quick now.”

The other man opened his door and stepped out of the vehicle. He turned to Lilly. “Come now, little sister. It’s okay.”

For some reason, Lilly trusted the man. His eyes were not like the driver’s; they were not the eyes of a carnivore, not those of a predator. She scooted across the seat and slid to the ground.

“This way,” the man said, motioning toward the building. He smiled and placed his hand gently on Lilly’s back.

He had a nice smile, and in his face Lilly found an odd mixture of kindness and fear. He had a good heart deep down, she could tell.

At the building, the man opened the door for Lilly. She hesitated. He nodded and smiled again. “It’s okay.”

“Do you have a daughter?” she asked him. He seemed like the kind of man who would have a daughter who called him Daddy.

He blinked quickly several times, obviously caught off guard by her question. “Let’s go,” he said, motioning for her to enter the building.

Lilly walked past him and into the building. “What’s your name?”

“I’m Agent Carson,” he said. “People call me House.” He pointed in the direction of an old metal staircase. The interior of the building was dark and empty. It wasn’t as dirty as she had expected it to be. It had been recently swept and cleaned. The walls were brick, the ceiling high with exposed pipes and big metal vents. Lights hung with no bulbs. The only light was what filtered in through the dirty windows. But it was muddy light, murky, like being underwater in a pond. There was no sign of Fisher or the driver or Mr. Murphy. They must have headed off to another part of the building.

The steps led to a room on a second floor that was much like the first. Open spaces, empty, but clean. The man pointed to a closed door along one of the walls of the empty room. “This way, sister.”

The door opened to a room that was well-lit and bright. It had been freshly painted and the tile on the floor looked brand-new. There were people in the room, five of them altogether: Mr. Murphy, the driver, Fisher, and two others dressed in green hospital clothes.

Fisher sat on a metal table, his shirt off, holding a clean bandage against his arm.

Lilly stopped not five feet into the room. She knew what this was. The driver approached her. His eyes looked hungry. He motioned to a hospital-style bed in the center of the room. “This way.”

Lilly glanced back at Agent Carson. He nodded and forced a small smile. “It’s okay.” Then he glared at the driver. “Easy does it.”

Lilly was led to the bed and climbed up on it. A woman approached her. She was young, younger than Lilly’s mom, and had the brightest blue eyes Lilly had ever seen. She bent at the waist and put a hand on Lilly’s arm. “We need you to cooperate, okay?”

There was not the kindness in her voice that had been in her gaze. Her voice was flat and cold. Lilly didn’t want to cooperate. For the first time since being taken from the cabin, she wanted to run, to fight and kick and scream her way out of that building.

She tried to slip off the bed, but Agent Carson was there to stop her. He placed a hand on her shoulder. His touch was gentle and reminded Lilly of her dad’s. “Little one,” he said, “you’ll be fine. I’m going to be with you the whole time.” He winked at her.

The woman with the bright eyes stood over her; she pursed her lips and firmed her jaw. “I’m going to put a needle in your arm now. You’re going to take a nap. Hold still.”

The needle pinched and Lilly had to fight not to flinch. The others gathered around her and talked in hushed tones. Lilly began to feel very tired. Fear crept in as she tried to hold on to consciousness. She wanted to know what they were going to do, what they were saying. Jesus help me. Help me.

A voice, his voice, whispered through her mind.

I’M HOLDING YOUR HAND, LITTLE ONE. YOU’RE MINE. I WILL PROTECT YOU.

Then she slipped into a pool of dark, inky nothingness.

•   •   •

Karen sat behind the wheel of the Silverado, engine off, and breathed deeply. Her cheeks were still tearstained and her eyes red and puffy around the lids. Her hands trembled. Was she going nuts? Being paranoid? She was so paralyzed by fear. She needed to get a grip; she needed to settle her nerves and refocus. She thought about Jed and wondered where he was and what he was doing. There was no way of knowing, of course. They had no way to communicate with each other. Then her mind went to Lilly, her baby. Was she okay? Was she managing? The thought of her little girl alone and scared wrought in Karen a streak of protective anger and a horrible, gut-wrenching guilt. But Lilly wasn’t alone. Karen clung to that fact. And Lilly’s faith was so strong; the girl might be coping better than Karen was.

Karen looked into the mirror and wiped again at the tears on her face. She ran her sleeve over her face, smoothed back her hair, and tightened her ponytail. After taking another deep breath and blowing it out slowly, she exited the truck and headed for the diner. She needed a place to sit and collect herself, gather her scrambled thoughts and evaluate them. She needed to plan and she needed to pray.

The parking lot was only half-full, mostly with pickups and SUVs and big rigs with their trailers in tow. Winters were tough in this part of the country and four-wheel drive was almost a necessity to get through them. At the far end of the lot was a black-and-white Nebraska state trooper highway patrol car.

The interior of the Starlight Diner was not unlike any other diner seen along any other stretch of rural highway in America. Booths on one side, a counter with barstools on the other. Just like the parking lot, the dining area was half-full. The booths were occupied mainly by elderly couples and one small family. At the counter, truckers and farmers and ranchers sat on stools, sipping coffee and quietly working on hot meals. The trooper sat on a stool at the far end of the counter. He was tall and broad in his black uniform and campaign hat, looked to be in his midfifties, and met Karen’s eyes when she looked at him. He did not smile, did not nod, but simply looked away disinterestedly and reached for his coffee.

Karen fought the surge of paranoia that threatened to lodge in her mind. He was just a cop, just taking a break from his patrol to enjoy a cup of coffee. He didn’t recognize her; he wasn’t planning anything nefarious; he wasn’t some covert operative for some covert government agency. He was just a cop.

She took a seat by the diner’s entrance, facing the door just like Jed had always instructed her to do, and put her head in her hands.

Moments later a voice interrupted her thoughts: “Miss? Can I get you something to drink?”

Karen dropped her hands and forced a tired smile. “Oh yes. An iced tea, please.”

“Sweet or unsweetened?” The waitress was young, twenties, with a shapely figure and natural blonde hair tucked back in a bun. She was pretty enough to lead in any Hollywood movie and had eyes that sparkled when she spoke.

“Sweetened, please.” Definitely sweet. She needed the sugar.

The waitress pointed to the menu on the table. “Take a look at that and I’ll be right back with your tea.”

“Thanks.”

When the waitress walked away, Karen took her head in her hands again and whispered a prayer: “God, help me. I’m going crazy here. I need my family. I need Jed and Lilly. Please, keep them safe and bring us all through this.”

“Miss?” It wasn’t the waitress’s voice.

Karen looked up and found an elderly woman standing by her table. She must have been in her eighties. She was short and round and wore a light-blue dress that reached nearly to her ankles. “Yes?”

She motioned to the bench seat across from Karen. “May I?”

“Oh, uh, sure. Yes. Sit, please.”

The woman had a pleasant smile and warm eyes the color of brushed steel. Her face was weathered with deep smile lines. She looked to be a farmer’s wife, a woman who had lived off the land for decades, enjoying the abundance it gave and the work it took to produce it. “I’m Emma and I’m sorry for intruding like this. I could tell you were having a private moment.”

Karen smiled. “That’s okay. It’s nice to see a friendly face.”

Emma leaned in and lowered her voice as if sharing a secret. “May I ask? Were you saying grace?”

“More like asking for it.”

Emma reached across the table and put her hand on Karen’s. Though her hands were worn and leathery from years of enduring the blustering wind and extremes in Nebraska weather, her touch was gentle and tender. “I knew from the moment you walked in here that you were hurting.”

Karen glanced around the diner. “Is it that obvious?”

Emma winked. “Only to those looking for it. And to those who have also lived it.”

Karen was now intrigued by this farmer’s wife. “Lived what?”

“Heartache. Loss. Fear. Such a heavy burden to carry.”

“Would you believe me if I said I’ll be okay?”

Emma’s smile pushed her eyes into crescents. “Not for a moment. I’m a good listener if you want to talk.”

Though Karen knew nothing of this stranger who had approached her so suddenly, she felt herself drawn to Emma, warmed by her friendliness and comfortable manner. She wanted to pour out her heart right there on the table and let Emma clean up the mess, but she knew she couldn’t. Her burden was for her alone. It was for no one else’s ears, not even a kind and wise woman. “I can’t. I wish I could but I just can’t.”

Rather than looking dejected or disappointed, Emma squeezed Karen’s hand. “I understand, of course. But I want you to realize you don’t have to carry any burden alone. Jesus has pretty broad shoulders and he wants to take that load for you. Give it to him. Let him bear the weight of it. He knows what’s best for you, you know.”

Did she know it? Her life had been turned upside down. Jed’s life, Lilly’s life . . . they were all tossed around in a hurricane of turmoil and grief and uncertainty. They lived every day constantly on the edge of disaster. She had no idea where her husband and baby girl were. Was that best for her? “Sometimes I wonder about that.” She’d surprised herself by saying it aloud, but Emma didn’t seem fazed.

“Why do you wonder?”

“If you knew what I’d been through, what my family has been through and is going through now, you’d wonder too.”

Emma didn’t push for information; she simply smiled that warm smile and said, “You’re not the first. God’s been down this road before with countless other folks. He knows the way. Trust him to lead you through it.”

Karen smirked. “That’s easy to say from where you’re sitting.”

“Darling,” Emma said, “I’m one of those countless other folks. If you knew what God has brought me through —the pain, the valleys so low and dark and abandoned I didn’t think there was any way out —if you knew that, you’d stand up right here and praise him with a loud voice.” She smiled again, and for the first time Karen noticed the shadows of deep pain and hurt and tragedy in her eyes. And she was sitting at Karen’s booth bearing witness to her salvation.

“How did you make it through with your sanity still in one piece?”

Emma laughed. “Who said it was? I did the only thing we can do: cling to God and trust him to carry me.” She squeezed Karen’s hand again. “He won’t drop you. His arms are strong and his footing is sure.”

“So just trust him, huh?”

“Faith, darling. It’s more than a feeling, more than talk and good intentions. Faith is action. It’s doing. It’s moving forward even when we don’t feel like it, trusting him when everything around us tells us not to. It’s stepping out of a boat in the middle of a raging storm and putting your feet in the water even when every thought in your head is screaming at you to stop because no one can walk on water. It’s such a ridiculous notion, isn’t it? Walking on water?”

The waitress returned then and handed Karen her iced tea. “Are you ready to order?”

Emma patted Karen’s hand. “I’ll leave you now, darling. Think about it, okay?”

Karen smiled and nodded. “Thank you, Emma.”

Emma stood and handed the waitress a small fold of money. “Don’t let this young lady pay a single cent for your delicious food.” She winked at Karen, then turned and left the diner, calling out over her shoulder, “Just get your feet wet, dear, and let God take care of the rest.”