Bitterroot Lake, Alicia Beckman [good books to read for 12 year olds .TXT] 📗

Tomorrow. She’d call her mother tomorrow and let her know she was here.

The words “better safe …” echoed in her brain. It had been seventeen days since her husband’s death, and she had not felt safe for one minute.

Nothing in reach might double as a weapon. She stepped out of the car, leaving the engine running. Opened the rear door and dug in her suitcase for her heavy black flashlight, its heft a comfort.

The ten-foot-high garage door groaned at her touch, then slid open with a squeal. Her headlights picked out a white van, mud-splashed, Missoula County plates reading CKLDY.

She caught her breath. It had to be—it couldn’t be anyone else.

But why was the woman here?

“Janine?” Sarah called into the darkness. No answer. She tried the driver’s door. Locked. Circled the van, straining to see in each window. Empty, as far as she could tell. Touched a muddy tire. Fresh. Laid a palm on the hood—not hot, not cold.

What was going on? She slid open the other door, then pulled her SUV inside. She’d come back for her bags later.

The lodge loomed, tall and dark, casting deep shadows over the circular drive. She strode past the stone steps of the front porch, aiming for the forest path that led to the three log cabins. The evening clouds had begun to part, but there was no moon, leaving only the last hint of twilight to guide her.

It was enough. Her feet knew the way, and she didn’t want to telegraph her presence with a stray flashlight beam. Because who knew why her old friend was here, or if she was alone? With all the time and distance between them, Sarah could not count on being welcomed, even though this property belonged to her family.

Between the first two cabins, she paused to gaze out at Bitterroot Lake, listening to the waves lapping on the shore. Its waters ran deep, frigid even in summer. Now, not quite mid-May, the lake could be deadly.

Her steps slowed. She paused and took a deep breath, intent on the last cabin. The curtains had been pulled tight, but a soft glow leaked out, and she could see a battery-powered lantern on the window sill. Whitetail Lodge and its grounds had been a haven and retreat since early in the twentieth century, when a railroad tycoon built the lodge as a summer home. Her family had acquired the property—several hundred acres and a long stretch of lakeshore—in 1922. Her mother would have told her if any cabins were occupied.

No, this visitor had come here on the sly. Sarah did not begrudge the refuge or the intrusion. But she deserved to know the reason.

She strode to the weathered pine door. One foot on the path, the other on the stone step, she raised her hand and knocked. Heard the silence within. Knocked a second time.

“Janine? It’s Sarah Carter. Sarah McCaskill Carter.”

Silence, then footsteps, followed by a soft sound—a meow?

The door opened a few inches, a narrow swath of light playing on the worn wood floor. Janine Chapman peered around the edge of the door, gripping it with both hands. Her dark eyes were huge and red-rimmed, her olive skin tear-splotched. Was that blood on her white T-shirt?

“Lucas Erickson is dead,” she said. “And they’re going to think I did it.”

And with those words, all the ghosts in Sarah Carter’s past came back to life.

 2

Half an hour later, Sarah clutched a mug of hot tea and stared across the kitchen table. Her mother may have started cleaning the lodge—a bucket and sponge had been left in the deep white farmhouse sink—but she hadn’t gotten very far. Sarah had wiped down the chrome-trimmed Formica table and chrome chairs, their red vinyl seats showing wear at the corners, while the kettle heated. The tea was old, Twinings in bags, the sugar clumped with damp. She’d picked up a few things in a market not far from the train station, but tea and sugar weren’t among them—she’d make a full grocery run in a day or two, if she decided to stay.

But tea wasn’t the point.

“Tell me again,” Sarah told the woman she’d known since the seventh grade but hadn’t seen in years. “Start from the beginning.”

Janine spread her hands across the wrinkled letter that lay between them, smoothing the white paper. Capable hands, the fingers strong and supple. No rings, not worth the trouble of scrubbing them clean of flour and sugar, let alone keeping a shine. Despite their strength, the baker’s hands could not iron out the angry marks she’d made when she’d crumpled up the page and thrown it at the unseen, anonymous writer.

But the folds and furrows in the paper did not obscure the words, typed in a standard font, undated, unsigned.

“Only you know the truth of what happened twenty-five years ago,” the letter read. “Only you can decide what to do.”

“Did you bring the envelope?” Sarah asked. The cat—compact, its fur dark chocolate, coffee-tinged at the ears and paws—finished its circuit of the room and jumped into her lap. Her hands instinctively steadied the creature, and she added cat food to her unwritten shopping list.

Janine’s dark, wiry curls swung back and forth. “No return address.” Sarah had lent her a clean shirt, Janine’s bloodied T-shirt now draped over the back of a chair.

“The postmark?”

“Missoula.”

Montana’s second-largest city, home to the University of Montana. One hundred and fifty miles south. A long drive, simply to confront a man.

Nothing simple about it.

“But he lives here, in Deer Park. Why would you think he sent it?”

“Post office closed the sorting facility years ago. All the mail in western Montana goes through Missoula now. Unless it’s local, from one Deer Park address to another. And he might have gone down there, for court or legal business.” Janine drew her tea closer. “But it has to have come from him, doesn’t it? No one else …”

Her voice trailed off, not saying what didn’t need to be said. Twenty-five