Secret Weapon Spouse - By B. J. Daniels Page 0,51
found it.”
AS SAMANTHA CAUGHT a glimpse of the house set back in the woods, she felt her stomach knot. The house had once been white but was now in desperate need of paint. Wash flapped on the clothesline out back and trash burned in a fifty-five-gallon barrel off to the side, the smoke rising slowly to fill the air with a rank smell.
Alex brought the rental SUV to a stop in the rutted yard sending a half-dozen chickens scurrying across the bare dusty ground. Several old dogs slept in the shade, not even stirring as flies swarmed around them. Through the tall weeds along the side of the house she could make out the remains of aging vehicles rusting in the sun.
“You all right?” Alex asked as he parked next to a battered old pickup.
She could only stare at the house. She knew this kind of poverty, this kind of despair. She’d lived it in Iowa, where she’d grown up, and had run like hell from it the first chance she got.
“Samantha?”
She nodded, not trusting her voice, as she caught movement behind the faded curtains. Faded like her mother after having so many children and being caught in a cycle of hopelessness.
“You don’t have to come with me if you don’t want to,” Alex said, obviously seeing her hesitation to get out of the car.
She could feel his gaze on her, that same curious searching look he’d been giving her for several days now. How much could he see? Could he see her fear at the possibility of witnessing her earlier life in this family’s faces? Did he have any idea what a coward she was when it came to her past?
She’d been running all her life, she thought as she opened her car door in answer and got out. A rusted sprinkler spat out a trickle of water in a tight circle near the porch on what might have once been a lawn but was now a mud hole. The sun was an oppressive ball of heat directly overhead. It beat down on her as she walked toward the rotting porch steps, Alex by her side.
The porch sat at a slant, the boards weathered and rotted. The smell from the trash hit her again and Samantha was struck with the image of her mother, her body thin and stooped, wearing a worn old housedress and slippers, taking out the trash to be burned.
The woman who opened the door could have been Samantha’s mother. She wore a worn-thin homemade housedress, her graying hair limp and hanging around her narrow weary face.
“Yes?” she asked, squinting into the bright day as she eyed first Alex, then Samantha.
“Mrs. Wells?” Alex asked.
“Yes?” She looked at them suspiciously as if they were bill collectors.
Alex seemed at a loss as to what to say to the woman and glanced at Samantha. “I know your son Presley,” she said.
The woman raised a brow, her narrowed eyes filled with even more suspicion. “He done something?”
“No, it’s nothing like that,” Samantha assured her. “His fiancé has been in an accident and we’re just trying to find him to let him know.” Her voice sounded shaky but not half as unsteady as she felt.
The woman looked more than skeptical and Samantha realized it was the kind of story that bill collectors used to come up with when they were trying to track down her daddy.
“I’m Samantha Peters,” she said, holding out her hand to the woman.
Mrs. Wells ignored it.
“I’m planning Caroline and Presley’s wedding and this is her brother Alex Graham,” Samantha continued, dropping her trembling hand to her side again, feeling the dampness. She wiped her palm on her skirt trying to find that cool she’d once been so famous for. It had deserted her.
The woman frowned. “Caroline? That the woman he goin’ to marry?”
“Could we step inside?” Alex asked, swatting at the flies swarming around them.
With obvious reluctance the woman stepped back. “But I ain’t got no idea where he is.”
Samantha stepped into the living room. Even the smells took her back to her childhood. The house was unbearably hot and dank. Everything looked as worn-out as Presley’s mother.
“He don’t come here no more,” she said, wiping her hands on her dress. “Ya’ll want to sit down. I got some sweet tea—”
Samantha glanced toward the sagging couch and felt Alex’s gaze on her. “Are you all right?” he whispered.
She felt light-headed but nodded. “Fine.”
“Thank you, but we can’t stay,” he said to Mrs. Wells.
“Did Presley tell you anything