Chapter One
The beer RA handed her had beads of moisture rolling off the bottle. Her uncle and RA picked her up at the airport. The red-eye flight out of Anchorage as Gentry called it, left the airport at 10 pm. She had a long layover in Minneapolis and a run to the plane in Detroit. And she thanked her foresight in traveling light or she wouldn't have made the plane in time.
After a dash through a drive-thru for food, the three of them now sat in the old Reynolds farmhouse. Set far back on the one hundred-twenty-acre plot, several large trees shaded the old place. A narrow gravel drive gave access to the old two-story frame home.
The kitchen that the three of them lounged in was large enough to feed a family with six kids and two farm hands, the size of her Great-grandparents' generation. The Reynolds boy who inherited the place wasn't as prolific. Her grandparents had only two kids, her mother Sheila and Thaddeus, the Uncle who sat across the old worn kitchen table from Crystal.
She took a swallow of the cold brew and waited to see which of the two men, her brother or uncle, intended to get the ball rolling. Would the first topic of conversation be Gentry or her missing-and-presumed-dead mother? Crystal bet on RA and hoped Gentry would come first. It was too late in the day to listen to RA's accusations against Augie.
Maybe the old bastard killed her and maybe he didn't. Crystal thought at the time that their mother walked away. Augie could have hit her hard enough to stun Sheila who zombied her way out to the highway. Or perhaps he hit her hard enough to kill. With Augie anything was possible when drunk.
After joining up, she made peace with the situation. Her mother wasn't coming back, and they might never know what happened. RA couldn't seem to let go. Once Carver was out as Sheriff and Mullin in, RA ragged on Grant's ass over it every chance he got.
"How is she doing up there?"
Bingo! Royce Augustus right on target. Crystal grinned at him. "She's gained about ten pounds and runs around in 45-degree weather with nothing but a long-sleeved thermal shirt on."
"That doesn't tell me if she's happy up there or how the kid is treating her."
A shrug accompanied her kicking the chair back on two legs and putting both feet on the corner of the table. Crystal took another swallow from the bottle. Her kid brother had better learn she didn't get to be a sergeant because of her looks.
"She seems happy enough. They live in a cabin on the other side of Kachemak Bay from Homer in a place called Seldovia Village. The joint is tight, she has electricity and running water, a real luxury up there. He should graduate this year and has a good job waiting. Gentry doesn't need to put up with the old man's or Johnny's B.S. What's not to like?"
"Is Gentry pregnant? I wondered if something happened and she latched on to the kid as a way out of here."
"Royce, you got a suspicious mind. Gentry isn't pregnant. From what she said, they are holding off on kids until he's working. Sounded like a reasonable plan to me."
He jerked a chair away from the table and sat. "The whole deal sounded crazy as hell. So, she meets the kid online and he drives all the way down from Alaska to fetch her? Who the hell does that?"
Head back, Crystal drained the bottle and set it on the table. "I think there might have been more to the situation, but you need to look at it from Gentry's point of view. We all left her here. She got stuck, and I detected a residue of resentment for that from the girl."
"What the hell was I supposed to do? What the hell would I have done with her? Even after Gentry turned eighteen, no one would let some PFC's kid sister hang out on base."
"And with Augie's temper, I couldn't chance him burning this joint to the ground." Thad cut in.
She glanced at her uncle then back to her kid brother. "I planned to get her out of here but was too late. By the time I got an opportunity to fly back and snatch her away, her husband had already taken care of things."
"I guess it was for the best." RA used one finger to push his beer bottle around on the wooden surface. "Gentry wouldn't have done well in the service and that's all I can see any of us offering her."
The front two legs of her chair thudded onto the old plank floor. "Gentry is getting on just fine up there. That's good enough for me. It's been a long day and I'm ready to hit the hay. We can resume talks tomorrow."
"What about Mullin? Don't you want to hear about his investigation…"
"Into Mom's disappearance? Nope. That's your hang-up, not mine. I need sleep and I'm done. Night, Uncle, RA. See you both in the morning. Oh, and don’t expect me to cook a damn thing. I'm not Ma or Gentry."
As she stomped out of the kitchen, she heard her uncle's laugh boom out behind her. They might work out a schedule of some sort, but she didn't leave a good career to become their chief cook and bottle washer. They needed to get clear on this right out of the gate.
The old bedstead's paint had plenty of chips out and the overhead fixture was one of those square, dished in shades. With the collection of dead bugs in the bottom, it seemed the thing hadn't had a cleaning in years. Crystal thought the whole place could use a good going over with a high-pressure hose.
Peeling wallpaper in some big flowery design covered the walls. Crystal wondered if there were lath and plaster behind the old covering or wood. As old as the place was, who knew.
What served as a closet might hold a coat and a couple of pairs of jeans and shirts. Not a lot else would fit. An old-fashioned wardrobe would give her a place to put stuff and she wondered what one would cost.
She didn't have a lot of things right now so didn't need much space. The service taught her to travel light. But she might want a few things she left behind. Had Johnny and the old man trashed the stuff she left in the old bedroom?
Gentry might know. But she didn't want to ask the kid while up there visiting. She tried to keep things light and kept all talk of the Dane family bullshit to a minimum. When she crawled into bed, the old mattress didn't wheeze out a ton of dust. Someone must have aired it out.
Crystal bet on Thad. The youngest of the Reynolds kids, he was still at home when his father took sick, according to her mother, Thad helped their mother in the evenings after taking care of the farm chores.
She understood why he bailed and joined the Marines as soon as both her grandparents, his parents, died. He must have been desperate to do anything other than farm work and household chores. Over her head hung the string for the light. Crystal tugged on it and the light went out.
But her brain didn't switch off right away. She gave it a minute to wind down. They had a lot of shit to get decided come morning. What in the world would they do for money?
No one needed another horse boarding joint. There had to be enough bed-and-breakfast places. If they wanted to grow something or raise animals, it might take more than the three of them.
The big elephant in the room, the sandy-haired one, all six feet three inches of him invaded her thoughts. They hadn't parted on good terms. It wasn't a huge argument, but they ended the relationship. Well, not quite, she cut it off. She didn't want to hold him back and there wasn't much he could do from a hospital bed.
Funny how life screwed with a person's plans. That car accident cost Grant his place in West Point. But she went into the Army and loved it.
Now feelings of guilt over not taking better care of Gentry with a dose of responsibility to keep RA from doing something stupid had her back in Chandler County. Added to the strange twist, Grant Mullin was the sheriff. Crystal turned on her side and pulled the spare pillow tight. She might have left the service but for her this was a war zone just like all the rest she had been in.
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