Free Ruin Falls by Jenny Milchman Page A

fine,” Jill shouted, reading her, somewhere away from the phone. “I’ll call you as soon as I get there,” she added, and ended the call.
    For a few minutes, Liz switched between staring down at the phone’s blank face, willing it to light up, and forcing herself to walk back and forth across the room, saying things inside her head about watched pots. Finally she acknowledged two things. First, that it would take Jill at least twenty minutes to get to Liz’s house, even if she tore down the road that left town and snaked out to the valley, and second that Liz could smell the acrid stink of her own body, an accumulation of sweat and fear and at least one missed shower.
    She had left all her clothes in her suitcase back in the hotel; the idea of going anywhere near the fourth floor again had been anathema to her. The ones she was wearing would have to do, slack and wrinkled as they were. They felt a little fresher once Liz had located the tiny bathroom and sluiced off her skin under an icy rush of water, turning no hot on at all.
    Dressed again, hair wet upon her back, Liz stepped out into the hall. There was a harsh, rasping sound coming from downstairs, and she followed it. Her father-in-law’s form blocked sight, but the motions he was making were unmistakable. His big hand concealed a square of sandpaper, and the other held a brush that began to stroke on a fresh layer of paint.
    Mary emerged from the kitchen, twisting the hem of her apron between her hands. “It’s too hot to eat,” she said, as if she were to blame for the weather. “But suppertime has come and gone, so I fixed us all a little something. Come in.”
    The kitchen was at the back of the house, where the sun had longsince passed overhead, making the temperature marginally cooler. Matthew sat at the head of the table, and Liz took a seat on the opposite side, vinyl chair cushion sticking to her thighs. A bowl of chicken salad and another of cut-up fruit sat on the speckled surface. Mary poured cold tea, and Liz, who couldn’t have taken a bite of anything solid, downed a glass gratefully.
    Only Matthew’s appetite appeared to be intact. He shoveled chunks of chicken onto his fork, using one finger to push.
    “I put my purse in Paul’s old bedroom,” Liz said. “Is that where you’d like me to sleep?”
    Matthew and Mary exchanged glances.
    “Don’t see as there’s much choice,” Matthew said.
    “We only have the one spare,” Mary apologized. “Paul was our only.”
    Liz looked up.
    “Is our only,” Mary corrected hurriedly.
    Matthew’s eyebrows intersected in a frown. “We’re modest people, and it’s served us well. I tried to teach my son to live that way, too.” His own tone contained no note of apology. Rather, his implication seemed to be that Paul had strayed from the family tradition.
    “I think we’ve done the same,” Liz retorted.
    But she couldn’t keep up any sort of bold front. Thinking of the ways they’d tried to connect both children to nature and the earth, to help them understand where their sustenance came from and what went into its creation, made Liz long with a dizzying pang for Ally’s eager affinity. She even missed the constant squabbles required to stop Reid from forming a Jenga pile with rocks, or making him weed in the gardens as opposed to locating buried seeds with fingers that seemed able to see beneath dirt.
    She fingered the slick oilcloth on the table. “Why has Paul done this? You must know something. It was like you were expecting me when I arrived.”
    Matthew’s gaze fell hot upon her. “We figured you’d be coming because a cop paid a visit before you got here. It wasn’t any surprise to see you after that.”
    The piece of chicken that Liz had been trying to chew turned topaste in her mouth as understanding finally dawned. The babysitting cop’s friend on the Junction Bridge force. He had delivered on his promise.
    Liz brought her napkin up and spat out the lump.
    “The