long and wide. “This is a really big garden,” he murmured.
“A lot of people are here now,” Gemma said, “but it wasn’t this big when I was here originally. It’s definitely grown. A lot.” She opened the gate and let Becky in. Slowly they wandered up and down the aisles, where she could see everything growing, from beets and radishes to lettuce, carrots, potatoes, and even peanuts.
The back section had nut trees and fruit trees. When Becky saw the first recognizable vegetable she was enthralled. She asked a dozen questions, and Galen had to admit he was happy to see the innocence of her young mind as she caught on to where her food came from. She danced and clapped her hands with joy, even as the sun started to set. She looked over at the beautiful sunset and gave a happy sigh. “This is a beautiful place, Auntie Gemma.”
“It is. Now you know why I came here so often.”
“Why don’t you still come?” she asked. “I could come with you.”
She chuckled. “Who knows? But it is definitely time for bed.”
“Really? It’s too early. It’s time to go back maybe, but not to bed.”
“Well, I guess it depends on how tired you are,” she said. “Let’s head to the cabins before we can’t see the path in front of us. It gets really dark at night here.”
Galen noted Zack standing outside their cabin, and, as he saw them, he walked down the stairs to join them.
“How is my sister?” Gemma asked.
Zack shrugged. “I haven’t been back to her cabin yet.”
Gemma nodded and turned in the direction of their two cabins. “We should check in and make sure she doesn’t want that soup that Tim offered earlier and that I forgot to mention as I walked out.”
“Well then, we’ll ask her and come back if she does,” he said. As they headed down the pathway to the two nearby cabins, yet farther away from the rest of the group, Zack asked, “So how were the gardens?”
Becky bounced with all the answers about how wonderful it was.
He chuckled. “Glad to see you enjoyed it,” he said. “What will you do now? Bug your mom for a garden at home?”
“I wish,” she said, “but you know she’ll say no.”
Surprised at the answer and the wisdom behind it, Gemma turned to look at her niece. “Maybe she would let you have a pot at least. You could plant all kinds of things in a big pot.”
“Maybe,” she said, “but I figure that I might get bored with it real fast.”
“Will you?” Galen asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I do that now sometimes.”
“Maybe that’s just because you haven’t found anything that really interests you yet,” Galen said in surprise at her unusual maturity. As if bits of Gemma were showing up in her personality. He hoped so for the child’s sake.
“Maybe.”
As they headed to the cabin, Gemma called out, “Rebecca, how are you doing?”
No answer.
Zack jumped ahead of them and opened the door. “Rebecca?”
No answer. They immediately raced inside and spread out through the small cabin.
“She couldn’t have gone far,” Gemma said, looking at the others.
Galen shook his head and pointed out in the back, where they’d parked. Only Zack’s vehicle was there. Gemma’s was missing.
Chapter 9
Gemma stared at the empty space in shock. “She wouldn’t have left without us, would she?”
“I don’t know her anymore,” Zack said quietly. “She wasn’t very happy about being here.”
“No,” she said, “but surely no way she’d leave Becky behind.” That wasn’t the sister she knew. No, she’d have grabbed Becky, then buggered off without a care for anyone else.
“She left her with you, so that’s a different story,” Galen said.
Gemma shrugged. “I think that’s splitting hairs.”
“I’ll go check the laptops,” he said.
She looked at him with sudden understanding and nodded. “Good idea. Becky, let’s go see if your mom left a note, saying where she might have gone,” Gemma said. “Where do you think she would have hidden it?”
Immediately Becky headed to her bed. “There’s nothing on her pillow.”
“Great,” Gemma said as she searched every other surface. Inside, her heart slammed against her chest. “Are we thinking this is bad?” she murmured to Zack.
He looked at her steadily. “It’s not good.”
“After all the efforts we’ve gone through to keep her safe, I don’t understand why she would do this.”
“The trouble is,” he said, “do we know whether she’s actually done it or if somebody did it to her.”
Gemma winced at that. “I was trying to avoid that, which