Waiting For Eden (Eden Series) (5 page)

“Yeah.  Filthy bast- well, idiots, all of them.  If they had their way, there’d be no trees left ‘round here.  You been up in the woods behind my place?”

“Yes.  It was... magnificent,” she said simply.

“Well, I want it to stay that way.  Magnificent is a right good word.  Marta’s probably rollin’ in her grave over this whole business of loggers after our land.  She was born in that house, so was her momma.  We was married in that house.  Built in 1896.  It was Indian land, you know.  It’s got history.”

A
slow smile crept over Alex’s face, and the excitement it contained warmed his heart.  “That’s wonderful.  Marta was your wife?” she asked.

“That’s right, b
y near on fifty-one years.  They say she committed suicide over the cancer, but...”  Ezra caught himself before the word
murder
could tumble out of his fool mouth again. 

He’d been chastised and reprimanded
well enough for such talk, called a delusional old nitwit,
ain’t no one killed Marta, you know better, Ezra!
  Yeah he knew better, he knew what he
saw
, and what the killer’s note had
said!  Time’s up old man...
               

But when the postal worker had conveyed their mail to the front door later that afternoon, (to the kitchen door, actually, cause Marta always fed him
cookies for such a fine hand-delivery service), and found a great big nasty surprise, there had been no such note.  Only toppled old folks... her a suicide by cut wrists and him a heart attack.  Little stroke thrown in for good measure.

The ache of loss encircled his muc
h abused heart like a swarm of riled hornets, stinging fiercely.  Ezra sighed and squeezed his eyes shut, knowing damned well his wife never would have done so much as kill herself over a little pain! 

Marta was a God-
fearin’, Christian woman and she had told him she was gonna fight that cancer like she had fought every other battle in her life, head up and fists flailin’... Ezra blinked and found the girl’s eyes on him, waiting curiously.

“I just
cain’t believe she done it,” he muttered, dropping his gaze in defeat.  He probably was senile and just didn’t know it yet.  He knew it likely the brain could not see or hear anything in the midst of a heart attack.

No need to get the girl up in arms, for she was young and had the strong defense of money behind her.  Ridgeway would back off for sure, cause when the shit hit the fan this
feisty and city-smart little gal couldn’t be deemed a senile old fool, or intimidated.  This might be the way to foil Ridgeway.  Ezra only had to say the word.

“I’m
askin’ two hundred fifty thousand.”  He knew it was worth much, much more.  He only hoped it didn’t cost her in a different way.

“I’ll have it, two weeks from today.”

He nodded, folding his hands together and steepling the gnarled index fingers, wondering if he was doing a wrong here.  But his land needed protected, and he felt in his bones this girl could be the one to do it.  But she wasn’t Susquehannock. 
What would Marta want for him to do?

Finally, he sighed. 
“That’s fine, then.  Don’t think Liddy’ll let me go before then anyway.  That woman ain’t done torturin’ me yet.”

“Mr. Wilkens, you won’t regret this decision.” She gave him a brilliant smile,
her hazel eyes lit with a lovely light from within, and finally pulling a grin right outta his reluctant bones in return.

“Nope.  Don’t suppose I will.”  He hoped.
 

“But just be careful and keep your eyes open
miss,” he added suddenly, guilt nagging at his hopes.  “There’s people that want that piece of land bad enough to do nasty things.  It will always need protected.  Don’t forget the name Ridgeway.”

Alex laughed. 
Protected?  “I dealt with nasty people every day at my husband’s law firm.  I can play nasty right back.”

Ezra didn’t laugh, because Ridgeway was no joke, but this girlie had pluck.  He just nodded at her.  And prayed he wasn’t putting her in harm’s way.

Alex pulled her car keys from within her blazer.  “Well, I guess I have a lot of business to take care of.  Phone calls, paperwork... I’ll see you in two weeks, Ezra. I hope you are up and about by then.”  With a little wave, she started for the door again, steps light and energetic this time around.

“Miss Alex.  Sorry to hear about yer husband.”

She paused and looked over her shoulder.  Her troubled eyes found his own and held them, touching him gently like a soft hand on a weathered cheek.  “Thank you, Mr. Wilkens.  I know I would have liked your Marta.” 

She disappeared through his doorway, but her perfume, like
lavender on a summer’s breeze, stayed with him awhile.

Strangely contented, Ezra leaned back into his pillows and waited for the heavy tread of Liddy’s bunion-peppered feet.  When his stomach growled a few minutes later, there was still no sign of the nurse. 

“Never around when you need ‘em, but buzzin’ around like a mosquito when you want a little peace,” he muttered.  ‘Cept Liddy never did much in the way of any flittin’ or buzzin’.  If he were able, he’d put his ear to the floorboards to check for vibration, like the Natives did when they wanted to locate the buffalo herd.

“Hey, Florence
Nightingirth!” he hollered at the door.  “Where you be, oh Big Mother of Theresa’s?”

Libby’s bulk squeezed through the doorjamb like a ship through a narrow inlet.  She had an enema tube slung over one shoulder.  “You’d best pipe down old man.”

Ezra Wilkens piped down mighty fast.

Waiting for Eden

~*~*~*~*~*~

Chapter 5

The mellow tones of jazz drifted
throughout the truck cab’s interior
.
  On sudden impulse, Alexandra turned off the satellite channel and spun the dial on the radio.

“Lord... I was born a ramblin’ man...”
  Alex settled back and hummed along with the tune. 
“Tryin’ to make a livin’... doing the best I can...”
  The rumble of the diesel pickup’s Cummings engine was infinitely different than the smooth purr of her Mercedes sedan, but she decided that she liked it. 

As she decelerated, and swung the pickup onto the unpaved
Stony Run Road, her insides thrummed with nervous excitement.  She was approaching her new home, with little more than two suitcases of clothes to her name.  Goodwill had received an enormous pile of clothes; Richard’s mainly- suits, sweaters, shoes... all of it. 

“You’d be proud of the tax write-off, honey,” she mumbled to herself, refusing to feel the sting of guilt over her actions.
  It felt like she was throwing him away.

Negotiations had progressed fairly well over the past two weeks.  Alex arranged to meet Vince Wycoff at the Montgomery Grill, a favorite hang-out on the corner of Wisconsin and Bethesda. 
Not at the firm.

She simply
couldn’t bear the thought of returning to the office, even for a few hours.  Alex had been Richard’s personal secretary, created and trained by him alone, having dropped out of college to support him through his final tough year at law school.  Her sacrifice had paid off, for Richard had graduated from the University of Maryland with high honors, a feat that he would never had accomplished had he needed to hold a steady job. 

Surprisingly,
it seemed that Vince Wycoff had actually been anticipating her decision to sell Richard’s half of the partnership, and had an offer already prepared for her.  His eyes were hooded and shifty, and never met hers directly. 

Vince had known
why she couldn’t go back.  It disgusted her.

At first, h
is offer had seemed low-ball to Alex; he obviously thought she was stupid.  She
had
been stupid.  Very stupid.  But not anymore.

So
she determinedly made a couple of phone calls and hired an advisor.  They had bartered for several days before she was satisfied with the figure.  But in the end, he had caved.  Vince was avoiding a company scandal.

But Alexandra had been left with a shit-ton of Richard’s debt.  He had been a busy, busy boy in the months prior to his death.  She ground her teeth at the betrayal.

So, after deducting the cost of Ezra’s farm, Alex figured that she only had about two-hundred thirty thousand left to her name.  But it would be enough to get a business off the ground. 
Her business
.

“Jesus!”  Alex hit a pot hole head on, and if not for the seat-belt, she would have bopped her head on the roof. She had made sure that the pick-up was
a hearty one, a Dodge Ram four-wheel drive turbo diesel, but it was still no match for the back-woods road.  “Must have had a rough winter out here.”

She approached an ancient mailbox, hanging on its hinges
only by the grace of God, and realized
this was it
.  56 Stony Run Road.  She turned up the long drive, past the lengths of decrepit fencing, much of it sagging in disrepair.  In the morose lighting of the rain-swept afternoon, the house looked downright bedraggled. 

The shutters sagged,
and the window panes appeared even darker and sootier than the afternoon she had first peered through them.  The grass in the pastures and front yard had greened up a bit, but the lack of flower beds around the home lent the dwelling an aura of barrenness.

“Well, Alex, what did you expect?” she grumbled to herself.  “You knew it would be a ton of work.”  More like ten tons.  She p
laced the pickup in park, and hopped out of the cab.  The large rut that she landed in knocked her off balance and nearly toppled her.  Alex made a mental note to have gravel brought in for the muddy, pock-marked driveway. 

Drawing the new set of keys from her pocket, she approached
her new residence hesitantly, suddenly overcome by an odd feeling of shyness.  She mounted the porch, and looked at the solidly imposing front door.  “Hello, house...  I’m Alex.”  She laughed self-consciously, plunging the key into the lock, and opened the door. 

It was very gloomy, and she fumbled for the light-switch for a few moments, with the awful thought that nothing would happen when she flipped it anyway.  But a pale, overhead light flickered, then held steady.

“We have electric.  Hallelujah.”  Alex moved slowly throughout the disheveled room.  Some of the furniture was overturned, drawers on an old roll-top desk were hanging open, and books had been pulled from the wooden shelving of an oak cabinet.  She observed a couch, two easy chairs, and an empty wheelchair. 

A shudder passed through her, as she remembered that Ezra’s wife had committed suicide.  If there had been blood, she prayed that someone had cleaned up the mess.

Giving the wheelchair a wide berth, Alex passed through an open archway into the kitchen, flipping on any switches or lamps she could find, hungry for light.  The dusty windowpanes hampered any natural illumination from the heavy, gray skies outside. 

The kitchen table, a massive thing with hand-carved legs and six chairs to match stood in the center of the room.  Some of the chairs were weathered and missing
parts, but Alex assumed they certainly could be fixed or replaced.  Obviously an antique, the gorgeous table was a keeper, definitely worth re-finishing.

Again, the various drawers and cupboards in the room were pulled open or ajar, and papers cluttered the counters.  “Ezra, you must have been quite a slob,” she murmured.  The rooms actually had the look of being ransacked.

With that disturbing thought, a screen door banged, and Alex had the sudden, horrible fear that
somebody was in the house with her
. She forced herself to move toward the sound, her heart beginning to race erratically.  As she moved slowly through the adjoining pantry, Alex yanked out her car keys with a little vial of mace attached, and brandished the capsule in front of her like it was a formidable weapon. 

“Who’s there?” she demanded loudly.  The back door was wide open, and she inched her way up to it.  The screen door hung askew.  Alex realized that she had discovered the back porch, where several weeks ago, lost and hopeful, she had knocked and peered through the window.  The
interior door had definitely been closed and locked then.

Anxiously, she scanned the small back yard, and the line of trees at the edge of the forest beyond.  She saw nothing but two squirrels chasing one another, and a
blue jay swooping and squawking in heated affront.  Slowly, the thudding of her heart dimmed, and she lowered the trembling vial of mace.

The dreary day was wreaking havoc with her imagination.  Ezra surely had someone check the house for him a final time, and that person had forgotten to shut the rear door.  Simple.

Although the open screening issued a shaft of pale light into the narrow pantry, she closed the door anyway.  Tightly.  Sighing, Alex picked up where she had left off in her explorations. 

She
soon found a small sitting room adjoining the living area, decorated with fossilized Victorian-style chairs covered with plastic runners, a dusty coffee table, and a faded rose rug.  All four walls were sparsely decorated, adorned only with an occasional country do-dad. 

Alex then
discovered a functional half-bath adjacent to the kitchen, and a door leading down into the basement, which she quickly re-closed, chuckling nervously.  She would explore those depths later, after her horror movie creeps had faded entirely.

Back in the living area, Alex mounted the steep stairwell to the upstairs rooms.  There were three bedrooms, a full bath, and she was pleasantly surprised with the furnishings. 
There were actually antiques in each room at which nobody could thumb their nose. 

Two of the rooms had beautiful, hand-carved sleigh beds, and some of the chairs and one chest of drawers were worth saving.  Hardwood floors ran throughout, although they were drab and needed
to be re-sanded and finished.  The third room was filled with boxes of clothes and other assorted junk.  Most of the items had been removed and strewn across the floor.  The drawers and closets in the bedrooms were in similar disarray.

Alex
chewed her lip, wandering how everything had got so messed up.  She just hoped that the certain someone Ezra had sent earlier had packed up the clothing and other items he wanted to keep.  After all, Goodwill was waiting, and Alex didn’t want to waste any time cleaning up.

A shaft of blazing light poured through the bedroom window, and Alex jumped with the notion that someone had pointed a spotlight at the house. 
Moving to the window, she peered outside and realized that the clouds were lifting off, leaving the afternoon bathed in gloriously warm spring sunshine.

Grinning, she bounded down the stairs and out to the truck to collect her large stash of cleaning supplies.  She had a lot of work to do just to clear a spot for her to sleep tonight. 

As she pulled the two boxes and her suitcases off of the pickup bed, she spotted a small, propane stove tucked in the corner.  Guiltily, she recalled her promise to return the stove to the District Headquarters after her hike.  In all the excitement of purchasing the property, she had completely forgotten about it.

Alex left the stove in the pickup, vowing to make a trip to the Headquarters that evening, after she had finished her work for the day.  “Better late than never,” she muttered, hoping Mr. James Sheldon
the forester would feel that way too.