Clay, her mother, Molly—they deserved the chance to forget and move on. This was something she could do for all of them.
The deep croak of a toad broke the silence as she crossed the cotton fields toward the farm. The pond wasn’t far. She could hear the trickle of water as she drew closer and struggled to concentrate on that instead of the creak of the weather vane atop the barn, which shifted at unexpected moments. That creak set her teeth on edge. She could remember lying in bed the summer the reverend died, her windows open wide to catch any hint of a breeze, and hearing that sound. No matter how hard she tried not to, she’d think it was the barn door sliding open and imagine the reverend leaving his office for the night—and coming for her. Pulling the sheet up to her chin even though she was already damp with sweat, she’d stare at the darkness beyond her window until her eyes burned, or the sun finally came up.
Those memories threatened to rob her of the strength she needed to use her shovel. Stopping, she bent over to catch her breath, but then marched on. She’d made her decision. She couldn’t live in Stillwater another day knowing that proof of what had happened was right on the farm, exactly where so many people suspected it to be.
To get through this, she had to break what she was doing into very small steps. Perform one action at a time and think no further. Soon it would be over. And afterward, without the constant fear of discovery, she’d be fine. There were too many other, happier things to dwell on now.
When she reached the clearing on the other side of a copse of trees about twenty yards from the barn, she set the shovel against the trunk of a weeping willow and pulled on her gloves. This was the spot. She felt as though she could’ve found it with her eyes shut. It was far enough from the barn that Jed hadn’t been able to hear them above the radio he had blaring, but close enough that Clay didn’t have to push the wheelbarrow over too much rough terrain. Time had been an issue that night. They’d had far too little of it….
Don’t remember. Act. For Kennedy. For Teddy and Heath. For everyone I love.
Her flashlight swept over a cotton baler, a wagon, a tractor and some tractor wheels piled next to a relatively new shed. There was also a ’57 Chevy truck parked beside a plough. Because Clay wasn’t a horse lover—his only experience with horses had been with the reverend’s stallion, which had bitten him at every opportunity—he’d ripped out the stalls and used the space to restore old cars. He was working on a Thunderbird and a Mustang. She’d seen them when she and Clay had dismantled the reverend’s office, and figured this truck was either a future project or a rejected one. In any case, Grace was pretty sure it was parked right on top of the reverend’s grave. Which made sense—but also made her task more difficult.
How would she accomplish this? And how gruesome would it get? Her professional background assured her that after eighteen years, the reverend would be reduced to bones and bits of fabric. But Grace wasn’t sure she could stomach even that much. Not when she was pulling it from the ground.
Pretend you’re somewhere else. At the office in Jackson. Pretend this is no one you know, simply Exhibit A from one of the many cases you’ve worked on. One step at a time, remember? One step at a time…
Circling the vehicle, she forced open the old door, which complained loudly, and wiped away the cobwebs that suggested this truck had been sitting there for years. The keys dangled from the ignition, but the truck wouldn’t start. It was in pretty bad shape. She doubted it even had an engine.
She’d have to excavate the dirt from the side, she decided as she climbed out. But how long would that take? The sun would be up in three hours—and Clay with it.
Leaving the door of the truck ajar, because she couldn’t stand the noise of closing it, she got on her hands and knees and shined her flashlight beneath the truck. They’d buried Barker in a tattered quilt her mother had bought at a garage sale when Grace was just a baby.
She looked for any hint of that blanket, or anything else that would indicate Barker’s remains might be as easy to uncover as she’d always feared. If she found it, she’d dig tonight. A foot of soft dirt couldn’t take too long to move. If she found nothing, she’d get an earlier start tomorrow night.
A sound brought Grace’s head up. Holding her breath, she listened.
The weather vane creaked, but she couldn’t hear anything else. Only the cicadas and the frogs.
It’s the wind. That’s all.
Flipping her hair over her shoulder to relieve the heat of it on her neck, she crouched closer to the ground and angled her light toward the back tires. She thought she saw something pink in a narrow rut. Was it part of the blanket?
Grabbing her shovel, she swung it under the truck, trying to scrape what she’d found toward her. But the snap of a twig made her freeze in midmotion. As much as she wanted to attribute that sound to an animal or the wind, she knew she wasn’t as alone as she’d assumed.
Was it Clay? She wanted to call out to him, in case he had his gun. He might well shoot first and ask questions later. But she wasn’t willing to give herself away just yet. What if he’d seen a glimmer of light and was only coming to investigate? She could still hide. If he caught her out here tonight, she’d have a much more difficult time slipping onto the property tomorrow.
Snapping off her flashlight, she shoved it beneath the truck and rolled under with it. The smell of damp leaves filled her nostrils as she lay flat on her stomach and waited. She tried not to think about the reverend in the ground directly beneath her. That invited images of a bony skeleton reaching through the dirt to pull her into his grave….
Another twig snapped as whoever it was drew closer. Grace told herself to breathe lightly and evenly. She wasn’t afraid of Clay, only of the risk that he’d catch her and make it impossible for her to do what had to be done. She couldn’t rest until she’d hidden the reverend’s remains in a place where they’d never be found.
She’d scatter his bones deep in the forests of Tennessee. Then, even if some part of him was eventually found, no one would be able to connect it to a person who’d gone missing two decades earlier in another state.
Lee Barker would finally be gone. For good. She’d be free to marry Kennedy.
But the boots that slowly approached didn’t look like Clay’s boots. They were some kind of fancy cowboy boots. Even in the dark she could tell that much, just as she knew that this person didn’t walk the way her brother walked.