House of Reckoning

  Passed her without so much as a glance, let alone a word.

  As if she didn’t exist.

  But Sarah, obviously not yet used to the role the kids had already cast her in—that of outcast—had looked up eagerly as Heather and Jolene came abreast of her, only to fall back into a slump as they hurried past.

  Bettina moved the car forward, then slowed to a stop alongside Sarah.

  She rolled down the passenger side window.

  “Hi,” she said. “Hop in and I’ll give you a lift.”

  Sarah paused, her breath condensing in the cold air. But instead of hurrying toward the warmth of the car, she hesitated, looked both ways up and down the street, then shook her head. “No, thanks.”

  No, thanks. The words echoed in Bettina’s mind, and she knew instantly what had happened.

  Someone—probably Angie Garvey—had told Sarah all the rumors. For an instant Bettina was tempted to stamp on the accelerator and send the car flying away, but she suppressed the urge just as quickly as it rose inside her. No sense taking her own anger out on Sarah. So she stayed where she was. “C’mon, you’re freezing,” she urged.

  Once again Sarah hesitated, and again looked up and down the street as if to see if someone might be watching. Then, as Bettina glanced in the rearview mirror and saw Tiffany Garvey turning the corner from Quail Run, Sarah looked Bettina squarely in the eye. “Thank you,” she said firmly, “but I can’t. I really can’t.” Turning away from the car, she started once more toward the school.

  “Okay, then,” Bettina called after her. “I’ll see you in class.”

  But Sarah Crane didn’t so much as lift her hand to wave, let alone look back to acknowledge Bettina’s words, and finally Bettina put the window back up and drove on, past Sarah, past Heather and Jolene, and on toward the school.

  Bettina knew perfectly well what so many people in Warwick said about her, especially those who gathered every Sunday at the old white-clapboard community church whose congregation had grown since the new pastor came to town five years ago and found out that Bettina Philips was not only an artist, but dabbled in fortune-telling with tarot cards, palmistry, and astrology, as well as medicinal herbs, homeopathics, and everything else that interested her.

  The terrible disrepair of her house hadn’t helped; even when she’d been Sarah’s age, many of her classmates wouldn’t come near the old mansion on the lake, given the stories not only about the house, but the long-closed “retreat for the criminally insane,” which had been told and retold until most of the children “knew” that the house was haunted and that she was a witch.

  Then, when Reverend Bradley Keener came to town, he began convincing the parents as well, and though Bettina hadn’t yet lost her job, she knew it wasn’t for the lack of the minister trying to get her fired.

  Rather, it was the fact that she did her job well, and no one ever had cause to complain about her.

  And now they’d told Sarah Crane about her, and either Sarah was afraid of her or had been told to stay away from her.

  But Sarah was different.

  As Bettina turned into the school’s parking lot, she decided she would set the record straight with her, perhaps today.

  Sarah Crane had a talent.

  A very special talent.

  And she would do her best to help Sarah make the most of her gifts, just as she herself had always tried to make the most of her own.

  Normally, Kate Williams would have called to make an appointment to check up on a foster child, but when she found herself in Warwick on another case that morning, she suddenly thought of Sarah Crane.

  Maybe she should just drop by and see how things were going.

  Why not? After all, her office encouraged drop-in visits, and she always tried to stop in unannounced at least once early in every placement. Besides, letting her see what the home was like when there was no notification that she would visit also served notice on the foster family that she was watching. Angie Garvey would certainly be within her rights to refuse to let her in the door, but most foster parents never exercised that right. After all, if someone refused her a look inside a house where one of her kids lived, it would send her back with a warrant until she found out what was going on.

  Her mind made up, Kate pulled to a stop in front of the Garvey house, picked up her shoulder bag and strode quickly up the walk. Shivering in the cold morning air, she rang the bell.

  The look of surprise on Angie’s face when she opened the door seemed genuine, and when the woman immediately opened the door wide, Kate was already sure she would find nothing amiss.

  “Kate! What a surprise!” Angie said as she stepped back to let Sarah’s caseworker in. “Come in. The house is a mess, but I think I still have some coffee.”

  “I was in the neighborhood,” Kate said. “So I just thought I’d drop by.”

  “I’m so glad you did,” Angie said, picking up a jacket and hat from the sofa and hanging them on the coat tree by the door. “Do you have time for a cup of coffee?”

  “I wish I did,” Kate said, her eyes quickly appraising the room and finding it no messier than the last time she’d been there. “I just wanted to see how Sarah’s doing.”

  Angie shrugged. “Well, all things considered, I think she’s doing pretty well. Would you like to see her room?”

  Another good sign, Kate thought as she nodded and began following Angie up the stairs. Most foster parents—especially the bad ones—couldn’t say enough about how well their charges were doing. The really good ones recognized that nothing was going to be perfect, especially at the beginning, and Angie Garvey certainly seemed to be aware of it. “She’s doing all right with these stairs?” Kate asked as they came to the top.

  “Well, they’re not easy for her, but she won’t use her crutches and she insists she’s fine, so I let her get the exercise and try to keep an eye on her in case she trips.” Angie opened the bedroom door and Kate followed her into the girls’ room.

  Both beds had been made and everything was orderly. The bed by the window was covered with stuffed animals, and the other bed was bare, with only a clock and light on the nightstand, and the sight gave Kate a little pang. She should have thought to bring a stuffed animal for Sarah’s bed. “Very nice,” Kate said. “Actually, it’s a lot neater than most teenagers’ rooms I see.”

  “Mitch and I insist on it,” Angie said. “We bring our kids up right, and we’ll do the same with Sarah.”

  “How’s she getting along with Tiffany and Zach?”

  Angie sighed. “As well as can be expected, I think. Needless to say, Tiffany isn’t quite used to sharing her room yet, but she’ll get over it. At least they’re not tearing each other’s hair out.”

  “Has she talked about school yet?”

  “I think she’s a little bit behind in her studies,” Angie said, “but she’s smart and should catch right up.” Angie paused. “It’s the social part I’m more concerned about.”

  Kate felt the first pang of concern since she’d arrived at the Garveys’, but thought she knew what was happening. “It’s her leg, isn’t it?”

  “Well, that’s probably part of it, I suppose,” Angie mused. “But she’s a troubled girl.” She offered Kate a wan smile. “But then, that’s why she’s here, isn’t it?”

  Kate turned Angie’s words over in her mind as she looked again at Sarah’s side of the bedroom, bare of any decoration at all. She had never thought of Sarah as “troubled,” at least not in the way the Protective Services people defined it. On the other hand, the girl had not only been torn out of her home, but away from everything else familiar to her as well. Why wouldn’t she be having some adjustment problems? At least Angie Garvey seemed to understand what Sarah was going through.

  “It’ll all be just fine,” Angie assured her. “We’ll introduce her to the whole community in church on Sunday, and our family is one hundred percent committed to bringing her into our love. Don’t worry—she’ll be lucky if we don’t just
smother her with love.”

  Kate followed Angie out of the bedroom and back down the stairs, deciding she had, indeed, made the right choice in picking the Garveys for Sarah.

  “You just pop in on us any time,” Angie said as Kate walked toward the front door. “Any time at all.”

  “Thanks,” Kate said. “I don’t usually come unannounced.”

  “Doesn’t matter to me,” Angie said, smiling broadly. “I’m usually here.”

  Kate returned Angie’s smile, then headed back to her car. For a moment she considered dropping by the school to check up on Sarah personally, then changed her mind. Better just to let Angie handle things for now. She could spend some time with Sarah by herself later.

  Whatever fears she’d had about Sarah’s placement well allayed, Kate started her car and headed back to Burlington. Her caseload was overwhelming right now, and each placement seemed harder and more complicated than the last. If Sarah Crane was happy and adjusting well, it was at least one case she didn’t have to worry about.

  At least for now.

  Sarah Crane filled her lunch tray, steeling herself against the words she could already hear being whispered and the mocking eyes that were watching her limp through the cafeteria line. She paid for her macaroni and cheese and a tiny dish of fruit with the three dollar bills Angie had given her that morning, pocketed the change, then took a deep breath and turned around to face the crowded lunchroom.

  Just like yesterday, almost every chair in the room was already taken. But now her backpack was starting to slide off her shoulders, and if she didn’t find a place to put her tray down within the next few seconds, it might slide all the way down her right arm, bang into her bad hip, and throw her off her feet. She turned back toward the cashier, but another student was standing there, paying for his meal.

  Maybe over by the busing station.

  Now there was someone behind her, probably trying to put his own tray away.

  Or getting ready to trip her.

  Sarah stiffened, leaning her good hip against the metal cabinet to steady herself, getting ready for whatever was about to happen. But instead of feeling an “accidental” bump or feeling a foot at her ankle, she heard a soft, uncertain voice.

  “Can I help you?”

  Was it a trick? Was someone just setting her up? But when she turned around to see who it was—sending her backpack sliding down to the crook of her elbow—she saw a face she recognized.

  The boy she’d seen watching her from across the street the day she arrived at the Garveys’ house.

  The boy who sat alone at the back of the cafeteria yesterday.

  The boy who looked down when she looked at him.

  Now, instead of waiting for her to answer his question, he simply took the tray away from her. “You can sit by me if you want,” he said, flushing a deep enough red that Sarah knew he was expecting her to refuse the offer.

  Hoisting her backpack onto her shoulders as soon as her hands were free, she followed the boy through the maze of tables and chairs, ignoring the whispers and snickers—and a single wolf whistle that she would have known wasn’t meant as a compliment even if it hadn’t been followed by a wave of laughter. After what felt like an eternity but couldn’t have been more than thirty seconds, they were at an empty table in the back of the room, and the rest of the kids finally seemed to find something else to talk about.

  Sarah sat down across from the boy and pulled her tray close enough to move the food and utensils off it. “I remember you,” she said. “I saw you on the street the day I moved into the Garveys’.”

  He nodded, blushing again, but not quite as badly as before. “I wasn’t staring,” he said. “I’m Nick Dunnigan.”

  “I’m Sarah Crane.” She tipped her head toward the tray. “Thanks for the help. I was afraid I was going to fall.”

  “Actually, you don’t need to fall for them to make fun of you. All you have to do is—” His words were cut off by a series of loud beeps coming from his shirt pocket. He quickly silenced the cell phone, blushing again.

  “Thanks for reminding us again, Nick,” someone yelled from across the room. “We wouldn’t want to forget you’re a fruitcake, would we?”

  So that was it—at Warwick High, Nick was in the same boat she was.

  “Meds,” Nick muttered, fumbling a pill bottle out of his pocket, shaking two into his hand and washing them down with a swallow of milk.

  “How come the alarm?” she asked. “They might not tease you if you didn’t beep.”

  Nick shrugged. “They’ll tease me anyway. And I can’t trust myself to remember to take the pills.”

  “Even if it’s the same time every day?” Sarah asked, frowning in puzzlement.

  He nodded, his lips twisting into a wry grimace that Sarah was pretty sure was meant to be a smile. Should she volunteer to remind him herself, the way he’d volunteered to carry her tray? Or would that make him feel even worse? She picked up her fork and began to poke at her macaroni and cheese, but Nick just sat silently, staring at the hamburger and fries on his tray. Sarah paused, her fork hovering in the air.

  “Aren’t you going to eat?”

  He nodded, but made no move to pick up his fork.

  Sarah glanced around, but no one seemed to be looking at them. “What is it?” she asked quietly. “What’s wrong?” He glanced up at her, and she could see the fear in his eyes. “Just tell me,” she pressed. “Maybe I can help.”

  Nick looked at her again. “Promise not to laugh?” he whispered.

  Sarah rolled her eyes. “Oh, sure, I’m going to laugh my head off, just like you did when I couldn’t even hold on to my tray any longer.”

  Nick still hesitated but finally leaned closer, and when he spoke, his voice was so soft she could barely hear him. “I see things sometimes. Things that aren’t there. That’s what the pills are for.”

  Saw things? What did he mean? What was he, some kind of a nu—Sarah cut off the thought even before it was fully formed, but still felt a wave of shame—she wasn’t any better than the other kids in the room.

  Except that at least she hadn’t said what she’d thought out loud, and from now on, she promised herself, she wouldn’t even think it. “So are you seeing something right now?” she asked, keeping her voice as level as if they were just talking about the weather.

  Nick nodded.

  “What?” Sarah asked, her own lunch forgotten for the moment. “What do you see?”

  He hesitated, but then looked straight at her. “Worms,” he said. “I know there’s supposed to be french fries on my plate, but that’s not what I’m seeing.”

  Sarah glanced at Nick’s plate and saw the tangle of skinny fries. Reaching over she picked one up. “Mind if I eat one?” she asked. “I always used to like worms with my mud pies when I was little.” Without waiting for an answer, she popped the fry into her mouth, chewed it, and swallowed. “Pretty good—tastes exactly like french fries. Looks sort of like worms, though, doesn’t it?”

  “But it’s not, right?” Nick asked.

  “It’s not,” Sarah promised. “It’s just french fries.”

  Nick took a deep breath, nibbled a fry, then picked up his hamburger and bit into it. As he chewed, Sarah finally took her first forkful of the macaroni and cheese, then pulled all but the first taste back out of her mouth. “You sure it wasn’t this that looked like worms?” she asked.

  Nick just shook his head. “That always looks like maggots.” Abruptly, he grinned. “But I’m not sure that’s a hallucination at all.”

  Staring at the lunch she now knew she wasn’t going to finish, Sarah decided she liked Nick Dunnigan.

  At least she liked him a lot better than the macaroni and cheese.

  Chapter Eight

  Sarah sat quietly at her table in Miss Philips’s room as her classmates disappeared out the door into the corridor.

  What had she done?

  Why had Miss Philips told her to stay after school?

 
Had she done something wrong today? But there wasn’t even an assignment—all they’d done was listen as Miss Philips talked about still life drawings and how the really good ones were so carefully composed they didn’t look composed at all. And Sarah knew she certainly hadn’t done anything wrong—in fact, she hadn’t done anything at all, except take notes.

  When the room was finally empty except for the two of them, the teacher pushed the big door closed and perched on the edge of her desk. Sarah’s heart began to pound.

  Witch.

  Her foster mother’s words from last night rose in Sarah’s mind, and she glanced at the window in the door to make certain Tiffany and Zach weren’t peering in, ready to tell their mother that she had stayed after school.

  “What did you think of the class today?” Miss Philips asked. “It must have seemed pretty simple, given your talent.”

  Sarah shrugged, saying nothing.

  The teacher paused, shifting her weight, and then Sarah knew that whatever this was about, it wasn’t today’s class. Sure enough, Bettina Philips’s next words confirmed it.

  “Sarah, did I embarrass you when I stopped to offer you a ride this morning?”

  Sarah felt the color rise in her cheeks, but shook her head.

  “Then what was the problem?” Miss Philips went on.

  Sarah cast around in her mind for something that might sound reasonable, then remembered the kids in the cafeteria. “You didn’t offer the other kids a ride,” she said quietly. “Just because I can’t walk very well doesn’t mean I need a ride. And if the rest of the kids had seen me taking it, things would have just gotten—”

  She cut herself off—if she started complaining about the kids who were teasing her, Miss Philips might go to the principal, and the principal might go to the kids’ folks, and then things would get really bad.

  “You’re sure that was it?” Bettina asked. “There wasn’t anything else?”

  Sarah hesitated, then decided there wasn’t any reason not to tell Miss Philips the truth, even if it did make her foster mother look—”Stupid” was the word that came to mind, but she quickly rejected it. Anyway, it didn’t matter how it made Angie Garvey look—she wasn’t going to lie about what her foster mother had said. Sarah cleared her throat and looked directly at Bettina. “My foster mother says I can’t spend time with you except in class.”