Scraps of Evidence: Quilts of Love Series Page 18

  And Gordon didn’t.

  But there were too many people in the room. Logan knew—knew—at a deep gut level—if he acted and someone got hurt Tess would never forgive him. Or herself.

  Suddenly, Tess was snatching up a walker sitting beside a table and smashing it over Gordon’s head, hitting him several times and then trapping him in the metal frame as he lay on the floor.

  Diners screamed and began diving under tables and rushing from the room.

  Logan ran to help her as she threw herself on Gordon as he fought back, his head bloody. A shot rang out, and she slumped on top of him but before Logan got to her, she was beating at Gordon with her fists, beating at the hand that held the gun until she captured it.

  She fought him as he dragged her off Gordon. The security guard and Ed rushed to immobilize Gordon, pulling the mangled walker off him, flipping him over and snapping handcuffs on him.

  “Machiavelli,” she scoffed, breathing hard as Logan held onto her for dear life. “Gordon, you’re nothing but a pathetic excuse for a man.”

  Logan held her steady when she sagged against him. “Thanks,” she said at last.

  “For what? You saved yourself.”

  She stared at him, her face white. “For pulling me off him. I wanted to kill him. I never felt like that before.”

  Logan pushed her hair back with hands that shook. “He killed your friend and we don’t know how many other women. He hurt your aunt. And I have a suspicion he’s been making the Chief sick. I’m glad I didn’t get my hands on him.”

  She rested her forehead on his. “It’s for the courts to punish him. And he’ll answer to God one day.”

  Sighing, she drew away and grimaced. “I need to go apologize to that poor woman whose walker I ruined.”

  “Sit down,” he said, pushing her into a chair. “I’ll go talk to her. Let me do one thing for you, okay?”

  Tess stared at him. “You did more than one,” she said quietly. “I knew I could rely on you. That made it possible for me to keep looking for a way out.”

  He found himself smiling. “You can always rely on me. I’ve got your back, partner.”

  “Well, we had some excitement tonight, didn’t we?” the woman said as Logan walked up to her with the mangled walker in his hands.

  “We did indeed. Are you okay?”

  She nodded. “It’ll take more than that to rattle me. I raised six sons who were always walloping each other. What did that man do?”

  “We arrested him for murdering several young women. He was trying to take my partner with him to avoid going to jail.”

  “Ah. Well, your partner sure beat the stuffing out of him for trying to do that, didn’t she? Good for her. Just shows women can take care of themselves.”

  Logan grinned. “Yes, ma’am. She wants me to apologize to you for appropriating your walker. I’m sending one of our officers to borrow you one from the hospital. I’ll bring you a new walker tomorrow.”

  She reached for the walker and tried to pull out a bent leg. Logan did his best to help her but it wouldn’t cooperate.

  “I’m afraid it’s a goner,” he told her. “I guess we can say it died in the line of duty.”

  “That’s a shame. Would have been quite the conversation piece to take to the senior center.”

  He was glad to see an officer wheeling a new walker to the table.

  “Why, thank you, young man,” the woman told him.

  “My pleasure, ma’am. And Officer Jenkins here will see you out to your car.”

  “I’m sure going to have a story for the ladies at the bridge game at the senior center,” he heard her say as he returned to Tess.

  “Ready to go?” he asked her.

  “I wish you meant home,” she said. “That’s hours off. We have reports to do.” She sighed. “First, I need to go talk to my aunt.”

  She still looked a little in shock to him, but it was the right thing to do. He was proud of her for wanting to do it.

  “How about you do that, and I’ll go give a quick report to the Chief?”

  “Deal.”

  Logan left her at her aunt’s room and checked in with the Chief. When he returned to get Tess, she was still sitting by her aunt’s bed, holding her hand, talking quietly to her, while Kathy cried.

  He’d passed by the chapel on the same floor earlier when he’d been looking for Tess. There hadn’t been time to go inside and pray for His help. He’d done it on the run and hoped He’d understand and go before him to save Tess. Now it was time to say thanks.

  The small chapel was empty, and he was grateful for the chance to sit and look at the stained glass window illuminated by a soft light behind it. Jesus sat in a field surrounded by his flock, a gentle-looking shepherd watching over it. Tess had been watched over—he’d been watched over that night.

  An evil man had a plan, but God had a greater one: helping bring justice here until divine justice could prevail.

  And God had a plan for him, Logan realized. He’d been led here to meet an amazing woman who had helped him realize he’d strayed in his faith. He bent his head, thanked God, and felt His peace settle on him.

  He became aware someone had come into the chapel a few minutes later. He opened his eyes and turned, intending to leave so they might have the same time to reflect in solitude. Tess stood a few feet from him. He held out his hand, and she walked forward to take it and sit beside him.

  “I was going to the Chief’s room to get you and thought I’d come in here and say a thank you prayer first.”

  “We thought alike. Do you want some time alone?”

  She shook her head slowly, looking deep into his eyes. “No, I’d like you to be here when I say thanks to Him for helping me tonight. And for sending you to me.”

  “So you’re feeling His plan for us, too?” he asked carefully, his heart beating faster.

  She nodded. “I love you.”

  He touched her cheek. “I think I started falling in love with you the first day I met you. Marry me, Tess. Here.”

  Tess looked up at the stained glass window, then at him. She smiled. “Here.”

  Discussion Questions

  Please don’t read before completing the book, as the questions contain spoilers!

  1. Tess Villanova has spent most of her adult life in a passionate pursuit for justice for her best friend. Do you believe her friend would have wanted her to do this? Why or why not?

  2. When Tess meets a man who seems to support who and what she is, she finds herself putting up defenses. Do you think she secretly doesn’t believe she’s worthy? Have you ever felt you’re not worthy of someone’s love and respect?

  3. Tess uses quilting to relax and to work out a problem in her professional life. What do you use to help you relax? How do you problem-solve? Do you craft or have a hobby? What is it? Why were you drawn to it?

  4. Logan McMillan is looking for a new start in a new city. Have you ever moved thinking that something will be different but found the move was geographic and you didn’t find the change you hoped for? What did you do?

  5. Tess and Logan both blame God for the loss of best friends. Have you ever blamed God for making you unhappy? What was the situation? How did you cope? Did you eventually change your mind about being angry with God? How did you do this?

  6. Tess’s aunt has become a mother figure and her uncle a mentor, but she suspects that he is hurting her aunt. What would you do in a similar situation? Do you know someone who is being abused? Have you tried to help her or him?

  7. Both Tess and Logan are committed to their jobs to the point some might call them workaholics. Are you? How do you force yourself to back away from work to have something more in your life?

  8. Tess doesn’t believe in ghosts, but sometimes she feels her life has been haunted by an event beyond her control. Have you ever had something change your life and affect you for years? How did you handle it?

  9. When a woman is murdered, suspicion falls on a homeless man. L
ike many cities, Tess’s community has struggled with how to solve homelessness. How is your community working—or not working—to eliminate homelessness?

  10. When Tess invites Logan to attend her church, he jokes that the walls might fall down because he hasn’t attended a church in a long time. How do you feel about what he says? Do you think God listens to you? When did you feel He didn’t? What did you do?

  11. Sometimes bad things happen to good people. How do you think God used Sam’s death for good in Tess’s life?

  12. Logan realizes that God had a plan for him in the midst of the sadness he felt when his friend died. He moves to St. Augustine and finds purpose in his new job, helps to solve a crime, and meets Tess. What do you feel is God’s plan for you?

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  We hope you enjoyed Scraps of Evidence and that you will continue to read the Quilts of Love series of books from Abingdon Press. Here’s an excerpt from Linda S. Clare’s A Sky Without Stars.

  Prologue

  Pine Ridge, South Dakota

  Frankie Chasing Bear

  I did not come to quilt-making easily. The urge to piece together shapes and colors wasn’t my gift.

  But when I was twelve, Grandmother said soon the quilt might be all that was left of what we once were. By the time your children wrap quilts around themselves, she told me, the star and all it stands for may be a dim memory, lit only by the fire of ancestors, clouded by ruddy smoke hanging in the sky.

  Grandmother’s face was crisscrossed with fine lines showing off sharp cheekbones, a strong square jaw, hard work. A silvery gray braid, straight as the truth, hung down her back. I tried to make my stitches as small and even as hers, but my childish hands proved slow and awkward. She said I only needed practice and showed me again: up, pulled through, and down.

  Just before she died, Grandmother and I sat together one last time. She stopped to smooth a small wrinkle in the quilt top. “Lakota were favored among tribes,” she said. “Our people stood at the top of the hills. The buffalo and the deer bowed to our warriors and we lived together in peace. The peace pipe showed us how to live and the stars helped us find good hunting grounds.”

  Grandmother had told the story a thousand times, but I didn’t interrupt. I was fighting the thread again, scribbled into a hopeless knot. She looked up and said, “Keep the thread short.” I obeyed.

  Her brown fingers reminded me of an old tree branch, but they deftly worked the needle: up, pulled through and down, up, through and down. “One day, the sun rose on white men. They brought their religion, but they often did not listen to their God’s teachings.” She paused to watch my crooked stitches take shape, nodding when I got them even. “We were brought low and herded like animals.”

  Again the nod of approval for my efforts. “They had no explanation, except to point to their Book. We were to love their God and love each other.”

  Grandmother laughed. “Lakota need no instruction on love.” Tears glistened in her tired black eyes. She’d seen something terrible in the smoke, she said for the hundredth time. A red rose, unopened. Blood, a river of blood. Another day was coming, she said, when words from the Book would take place: We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.

  I dared not remind her she prayed to the God of the Bible. That she stood in two worlds, fully Lakota, fully Christian. I worry it’s not possible for me. Indians who go to the church are shunned by their kin and by the whites. Outcasts, their feet in no world at all.

  Before we traveled to Arizona, Grandmother made me promise to make this Lakota Star for my son. Sew love into every stitch and remember: abed without a quilt is like a sky without stars. The quilt will help this child remember who he is, she said. The star will tell him how much he is loved and the light will save him at the last day.

  1

  Mid-August 1951

  Outside Phoenix, Arizona

  Frankie Chasing Bear eased the old Chevy pickup to the side of the rutted dirt road. If she hadn’t run out of quilting thread, they’d have stayed home on a day this hot. A plume of steam rose from the radiator and disappeared into the pale sun-bleached sky.

  She slapped the steering wheel with the heel of her hand. “Not again!” A stab of guilt penetrated deep, an ache she’d carried since Hank’s death. At the time, leaving South Dakota for the West seemed to be the only answer. But now, Arizona looked a lot like the moon, dry and far away. And life here wasn’t any better.

  She squinted out the driver’s side window. Dotted with the gray-greens of mesquite and cactus, the desert went on for miles. She swiped at her cheeks—her son shouldn’t see her cry. Was getting stranded out here worth a few spools of thread?

  Ten year-old Harold shifted in his seat. Frankie already knew how he felt about the Lakota Star quilt. As far as he was concerned, quilts were for babies. And why, he’d asked, would you need one in a place this hot?

  She’d told her son the story again and again. Before her death, Grandmother had made Frankie promise to finish the coverlet depicting stories once told around tribal fires. Grandmother had been adamant—the quilt should also reflect faith in God. Today, Frankie wasn’t sure about any of it, but she’d promised. If nothing else, her son should learn to keep his word.

  “Rotten luck,” she said, smiling at her son.

  Harold’s smooth face remained impassive. “We should’ve checked the water back at the store.”

  Her son had wisdom beyond his years. She patted his hand. “Good thing we wore our walking shoes, eh?” Her eyes closed, she sighed. “I’ll get the cans.” Harold shook his head and stared at the floorboard.

  Frankie got out of the cab and went around to the truck’s rusty tailgate. The blue cotton dress she wore was no match for the wind, which kicked up her skirt unless she held it down. She used her free hand for a visor and searched the road, hoping to spot the dust cloud from another vehicle. The heat of summer combined with a light wind to blast every inch of her as she scanned the horizon, but the only movement was from a couple of dust devils twirling in the distance.

  She hefted the empty cans out of the bed and tapped on the truck’s back window. “C’mon, it’s only a mile or so to the gas station.”

  Getting out of the cab, her son moved like a tortoise, the way he did when he was being stubborn. With the heat bearing down on the crown of her head, she was crankier than usual. “Harold. Come on.”

  They started toward the gas station Frankie had hoped they could avoid. The fabric store had been bad enough. Elbow to elbow with a bunch of ladies wearing shapeless dresses and face powder the color of dust. All scooting away from her and Harold.

  She’d figured the old truck had enough water in it to make it home, but she’d figured wrong. Now Stu, the sassy guy who manned the pumps at the Texaco might taunt her son—call him little Hiawatha, like last time. Stu’s kid Orval, a pudgy boy with an ax to grind, had already jumped Harold once after school. Bully. Her mouth was dry. She ran her tongue across her teeth.

  She glanced at Harold. He was a good boy and handsome, too, or at least he would be in a couple more years. Tall for his age, he could outrun the kids back home. And he hardly ever complained. Frankie had been thankful for it, all the way here. She smiled as she tried to match his stride. The kid probably weighed as much as the empty gallon can which knocked against his knees.

  She pushed her damp bangs off her forehead. �
��Want me to spot you?”

  “Naw. I got it.” Harold’s face glistened with sweat that dripped onto his brown plaid shirt.

  Harold’s stick-straight hair was cut short for summer. Even without braids, he looked like his father, Hank Sr. But she was determined he wouldn’t turn out like his old man: prone to drink and violence. She shuddered at the memory of Hank’s murder only six months before, still ashamed of the small ways she was glad. He could never hurt her or Harold again. If there was a God, her husband’s passing was a gift.

  Frankie kept a bright look on her face and began singing one of the Lakota songs she’d learned as a child. “C’mon, it’ll pass the time,” she said, and started again. In Pine Ridge, Harold was always a good sport about these things. But now he stared ahead, as if he didn’t want to associate with his own mother. She walked on the road’s soft shoulder and hummed to herself. Like it or not, Harold was growing up.

  Ahead, the station shimmered, mirage-like—the red Texaco star a gleaming beacon. As they walked across the blacktop, heat radiated through the bottoms of her cheap sneakers. She glanced at Harold, who ran up to the concrete islands in front of the pumps. She walked faster.

  The smart-mouth owner was on duty. Stu, dressed in white from head to toe, a cap sitting sideways on his pathetic crew cut. “Hey,” he said to Harold. He turned to Frankie. “It’d be nice if you bought something now and then.” He wiped his hands on a rag. The place reeked of oil and gas.

  She pulled out her charm, the same charm she’d used to get that radiator filled a dozen times. She brushed her bangs aside. “Hey, Stu. You wouldn’t mind helping a lady out would you?” Maybe she should’ve worn the red top with the ruffles again. Gas station attendants seemed to like red. She laughed behind her hand, an old Lakota habit she’d grown up with. When she was nervous, he couldn’t stop.