Czytaj książkę: «Guarding The Amish Midwife»

ONE

“Wait here.”

Lizzy Miller watched from where she sat in the front passenger seat, stunned, as her Englisch hired driver, Bill Allister, shifted his car into Park in the empty lot before throwing the door open and jumping out of the vehicle, ignoring the rain that pelted him. The drops made wet smacking sounds as they hit his worn leather jacket. He left the car running as he moved toward the back door. She craned her neck to watch him, incredulous. She couldn’t believe that he was planning on leaving her here, alone. But clearly, that was exactly what he had in mind as he pulled the back door open. Grabbing a bag, he slammed the door and bolted around the side of the building, never glancing in her direction.

Beyond irritated now, Lizzy waited. And waited. She glanced at the clock on the dashboard several times. Fifteen minutes went by. Then twenty. Why were they stopped here? There were no other cars around. The building in front of her was obviously abandoned. Half the roof was caved in, and the windows were broken. Graffiti covered the exterior walls. Grass and weeds grew up through cracks in the parking lot.

Lizzy drummed her fingers on the hard plastic surface where the door met the window. Amish people did not operate motor vehicles, but instead hired Englisch people to drive them when their buggies were not practical. Therefore, she had made arrangements and hired a driver. Bill, however, was not the driver she had expected. She should have followed her instincts when he had shown up to take her to Ohio that morning. Lizzy had hired a woman named Sue to drive her. Sue was trustworthy, reliable and, most importantly, female. Lizzy didn’t trust most men. She’d had an experience several years ago that had left her shattered and insecure, and unable to tolerate the presence of strange men.

For a while, she’d suffered panic attacks. Those had faded as time passed, but her mistrust of men had not.

So when Sue had come down with food poisoning and had sent her brother, Bill, in her place that morning, Lizzy had almost canceled her plans. Not that Bill looked like a bad person. Quite the opposite. She remembered her impression when she had first seen him a few hours earlier. Nothing about him screamed untrustworthy. He was in his twenties, maybe twenty-five or -six, she would guess. Not a man one would take a second look at on the street. His hair was a little long; it just brushed his collar. It was that undefinable shade somewhere between black and brown, but not really either. He was wearing tinted glasses, so it was hard to guess at the true color of his eyes. Just an ordinary young man doing a favor for his sick sister.

She still didn’t trust him.

There were two things that convinced her to get into the car with him. First, he had a letter of apology from Sue, and she knew Sue would feel horrible if Lizzy had decided not to go due to her illness. And second, she had promised her cousin Addie that she would come and stay with her for the last month of her pregnancy and assist with the delivery. Promises had to be kept.

Lizzy glanced at the clock on the dashboard again. Bill had been gone for thirty minutes. What was left of her patience vanished. She had hired a driver to take her to Ohio, not so that she could sit in a parking lot while rain hit the windshield of the car. She gritted her teeth. She had known when she had first seen him that she would not be happy with him as her driver. Sue had always been punctual, and she had always gotten Lizzy where she needed to go on time.

She recalled when Bill had moved off the normal route. She had considered holding her silence.

Let it go, she told herself.

But she couldn’t. Lizzy liked to know where she was going. Being taken somewhere against her will once was enough for her. Since that time, she always knew where she was going. In the back of her mind, she knew that it was so if she ever needed to find help, she would have landmarks and locations to rely on. Right now, she didn’t have either, having never traveled to Ohio by this current route. It was more than she was comfortable with.

“Excuse me, Bill,” she had shouted to be heard above the radio. She had to shout twice before he responded.

Scowling, he had reached out and pushed a button as if she were inconveniencing him, and not the other way around. The song cut off mid-word. She was grateful for the quiet. “Yeah?”

She swallowed. “Um, I was just wondering why we weren’t taking I-80? That’s the way Sue normally takes.”

“I need to make a quick stop on the way there. An errand I need to take care of. It won’t take long.” He had then jabbed the button with his index finger and the raucous music again filled the car.

She had been irritated, both with him and with herself. She was especially annoyed with the lack of control she had over the entire situation. Her mood hadn’t improved when the rain had started to fall in fat, heavy drops on the windshield. She’d actually cringed when the man beside her had bitten off a word that was, at best, rude.

Biting her lip, Lizzy had done her best to ignore her growing anxiety. She saw the sign welcoming them into Ohio with a sigh of relief. At least she knew they were traveling in the correct direction. When Bill pulled off into an empty parking lot, she was confused. What could he be doing here? Lizzy glanced at the clock again. Thirty-five minutes had passed since Bill had left her in this car in the middle of nowhere.

Enough was enough. Lizzy was suddenly tired of allowing her anxiety to control her actions, and her life. She firmed her jaw and reached for the door handle, deliberately ignoring the way her stomach muscles tightened and clenched at the idea of an impending confrontation. She would not back down. Whatever his errand was, Bill needed to finish it quickly or come back to it after he dropped her off at her cousin’s house.

Lizzy straightened the black bonnet that covered the white prayer kapp she wore on her head. The bonnet would at least provide some protection from the rain. She stepped out and began to walk in the direction she’d seen Bill go. Within a minute, her cloak was soaked through. Ack! Her feet kicked up more rain onto her black stockings and the hem of her dark blue dress as she trod through the puddles. The sudden discomfort she was experiencing was just one more irritation.

Up ahead, she heard voices. Loud and angry voices. She paused; the manners her parents had instilled in her said it was rude to interrupt a conversation. Then she decided she didn’t care. As she drew closer, she could hear Bill’s voice raised. He sounded upset. She slowed again. Maybe she should go back and wait in the car again. No. She was done with waiting. It was bad enough that she had to travel with a man, even the brother of a friend. She just wanted to be on her way and get to Addie’s house.

Determined, Lizzy walked faster.

Rounding the building, she saw Bill standing with another man. At a glance, she noted that the second man had dark hair curling around his ears. He would have been handsome, but something about him was sinister. Even as she opened her mouth to call out to Bill, the other man pulled out a gun and shot him. Shocked, she watched, frozen, as Bill crumpled to the ground. For a few seconds, her mind refused to believe what her eyes had just seen.

I cannot stay here!

Spinning on her heel, Lizzy raced back to the car, the puddles making her steps slower than they would normally have been.

The sound her feet made slapping the water was also very loud in the silence following the shooting.

Within seconds, she heard a shout from where she’d just fled. She had been noticed. She didn’t slow down. The sound of running steps behind her encouraged her to run faster. She hopped into the idling car and muttered a prayer of thanksgiving. She hadn’t driven since her own rumspringa and wasn’t sure she’d be able to advance the vehicle quickly enough to escape. She hit the door locks. They clicked. The man slammed against the passenger window. Screaming, she jumped. Fury twisted his features as the man who had shot her driver pounded on the window.

He backed up. The gun was still in his hand. She knew he was going to try to shoot her, too. The adrenaline hit hard, and her heart rate sped up. She felt like she couldn’t get enough air as the panic began to ratchet up in her belly. She couldn’t afford to have a panic attack now.

She was not going to wait for it to happen. Thankfully, her sister, Rebecca, had taught her how to drive. Sort of. The tires squealed as she yanked the gearshift back. The car jerked forward. The front wheel rammed into the curb and the car rocked, hitting the ground again with a hard bounce.

A gunshot rang out and the back passenger window shattered.

Spinning the wheel, Lizzy pressed her foot down on the gas pedal so hard that she could feel the tires grinding into the gravel and spitting it out before the car jolted forward and sped down the road, away from the man who wanted her dead. A screech and a horn blaring behind her told her that she had cut someone off.

She kept going. The man who had shot Bill would recognize his car. She had to put as much distance between herself and the killer as possible.

* * *

Police officer Isaac Yoder sat up in his parked patrol car as a dark blue sedan that had seen better days raced toward him through the heavy rain, swerving on the wet roads. The driver went over the edge of the road and onto the shoulder three times, the way a frightened rabbit veers back and forth when trying to escape an oncoming car. At one point, Isaac was sure that he saw the vehicle’s left wheels lift off the surface of the road.

The driver had to be drunk or having some sort of issue, possibly health related, like a heart attack. It was also possible that it was a teenager texting. Whatever the reason for the erratic driving, he needed to pull the car over now. No one drove that way in fair weather if they were fully competent. Add in the rain pouring down, that driver was asking to hydroplane on the slick surface. Even as he watched, the back tires hit a pool of deeper water and the back end of the car fishtailed before straightening up again.

Flipping on the siren and his lights, he pulled out from beside the overpass where he had been partially hidden as he watched the traffic. Blue-and-red flashes reflected in the puddles on the road. His hands gripped the wheel as he gave chase. It was fortunate that it was midmorning and the traffic was light. Otherwise, he had no doubt that an accident would have already occurred.

The automated plate recognition system in his cruiser alerted him that the car ahead was owned by someone with a driving record. The car he was chasing down belonged to William Allister, a young man who had multiple tickets and two DUIs already on his record. Well, he was about to get another one.

Isaac wasn’t shocked when the car suddenly veered onto the narrow shoulder, although in his mind he had prepared for the scenario that Mr. Allister would try to make a run for it. A chase would not have been smart, but sometimes drivers panicked when faced with another DUI and the loss of their driver’s license.

He pulled up behind the vehicle, making sure his cruiser was partially on the road. That would make drivers move to the next lane, and it would give him a safe cushion to walk to the car without being too close to it. Isaac turned off the siren, but he left the lights on. He called in the situation to his station, along with the license plate number and the driver’s record. Patting his service weapon in his holster, he slowly exited his vehicle. It was always best to proceed with caution in these incidents. The last thing he wanted was for the person in the car to decide to pull a weapon on him or to attack. Given the way the guy had been driving, it would not shock Isaac if that was exactly what happened.

The rain poured down at a slant, hitting him clear in the face. He couldn’t afford to duck his head as he approached the car. He blinked his eyes to clear them. He needed to be able to see, to watch for potential threats. A lone car sped past him, not even bothering to move to the other side of the road. He narrowed his eyes as the vehicle continued down the road and disappeared. No doubt the driver was going above the speed limit.

As he approached, he could see that there was only one person in the car. He didn’t let himself relax. Far too often, people ducked down to hide in the floorboards. He could view into the backseat. No one was there. He scanned the rest of the vehicle. One of the back windows had been shattered. His suspicions heightened. He took a cautious step closer, enough that he could just barely make out the top of a head around the headrest. Two hands on the wheel. That was good. If he could see the hands, they weren’t reaching for a weapon. He arrived at the car window and stared. Realizing his jaw had dropped open, he closed it with a click.

William Allister might have owned the car, but he certainly wasn’t driving it. Inside the car was a young Amish woman, face wet with tears. She turned her terrified, brilliant blue eyes to him. He motioned for her to roll down the window. He had to repeat the motion twice before she complied. Suspicion darted across her face, but the terror was stronger. A tiny bit of relief mingled in her expression, as well.

Isaac understood the suspicion all too well. The Amish did not, as a rule, involve the police in their business. His own dat had refused to go to the police at a very critical time in Isaac’s life. Joshua had died, the victim of three drunk teens who had found a blind Amish youth an easy mark, and his father would not be moved to see that justice was done. Isaac pushed his memories of his younger brother from his mind. The bitterness was still too strong, even after seven years.

So was the guilt. Isaac had argued with his father, the first time in his life he had refused to give in to his dat’s commands. He’d been so angry, in fact, that Isaac had left his Amish community, and the Plain tradition in which he was raised, instead of being baptized in the faith. His father had died two years ago, and they had never reconciled. A circumstance that weighed heavy on his conscience every single day of his life. With his father’s death, any hope he might have had of ever rejoining the Amish community that his mother and sister still lived in had also died. It didn’t matter that he had not been baptized, therefore meaning he could technically maintain his ties with his community, since his father had made it very clear that if he left, he would not be welcome there anymore. He couldn’t have stayed, though. He needed to find some justice for his brother. Nothing mattered until he’d accomplished that.

He pulled his mind back to the car in front of him.

The young woman finally managed to roll the window down. It was an older vehicle, so the windows were manually controlled. Judging by the way she had to resort to using both hands, they weren’t in the best of condition, either. Her hands were shaking hard and her face was as pale as milk. Was she injured? He slid his glance over her, doing a rapid assessment. No visible injuries. Still, he couldn’t rule out injury or illness.

She was breathing fast and shallow, he noted.

“Miss, do you need help? You’re very pale, and you were driving all over the road.”

When she didn’t respond immediately, he asked again if she needed help, this time in the American-flavored German used by the Amish, sometimes known as Pennsylvania Dutch. He didn’t even stop to think about it. It had been a while since he’d spoken that dialect.

Seven years, to be exact.

Her dark blue eyes widened. She finally responded, though. “Jah, I need help.”

She burst into sobs again, burying her face in her hands. Her shoulders heaved. All he could see now was the black bonnet on her head. He frowned. Her cloak looked wet. She must have been out in the rain. Leaning over slightly, he saw the seat on the other side of her was drenched. Yep, she had definitely been out in the downpour.

An unlikely thought occurred to him. He was pretty sure she wouldn’t have stolen a vehicle, but there was still a slight possibility that she had.

“Um, ma’am, this car, did you, um, borrow it?” He didn’t want to outright ask her if she took it.

She lifted her face and bobbed her head. “Jah, I did borrow it. My driver, Bill, got out to do something, and he left me in the car for a long time. I got tired of waiting for him, so I went to find him. He was with another man. They were arguing. The other man shot him. I think he’s dead.”