Poisoned Soil: A Supernatural Thriller Page 16

  “So, are you all packed?” Angelica asked.

  “Oh yeah,” Rose answered. “Even packed a bikini if I can get up the nerve to put it on. Maybe at night.” Rose laughed.

  “Now Rose, stop it. You have a great body and you know it,” Angelica placed her hand on Rose’s forearm to offer reassurance, although she couldn’t imagine why Rose would need any. She needn’t worry. Indeed, Rose was beautiful as well as smart. The sheen of her black hair matched Angelica’s, though Rose kept hers shorter, never letting it drape over her shoulders. Like Angelica, Rose had inherited her mother’s green eyes and they seemed to be able to see inside you, what you were thinking, what you were feeling. They gripped and held their prey until truth was revealed, and only then softened their grip.

  “Hey, you wanna take some of my sunscreen with you?” Angelica offered.

  Rose laughed. “I’ve got my sunscreen already packed, silly. But don’t worry, it’s SPF 50.”

  Angelica frowned at Rose. “Please tell me that you don’t put those chemicals on your skin. Do you even know what’s in it?”

  “Now who’s being silly?” Rose asked. “It’s FDA approved, sis. You think they’d approve it to use on children if it wasn’t tested? Safe?”

  Rose cast her green eyes at her country bumpkin sister in both a loving and condescending way, as if to say, “Poor Angelica. Didn’t want to go to college and learn about scientific progress. Instead just kept her feet stuck in the mud back in the hills, going backwards in time instead of forward, clinging to Grandma’s Cherokee traditions.”

  Rose had fond memories of the mountains, but going to Athens and meeting so many new and enlightened people and professors at UGA had liberated her from the parochial views on religion, family, and science that had clouded her thinking as a child. Once she stepped out of that circle and opened her eyes, she found she couldn’t move back, even when her parents were killed shortly after her graduation and she was so worried about Angelica. Instead, she had hoped to lure Angelica away, even offered her a place to stay in Athens. But Angelica was as stubborn as her Cherokee ancestors had been two centuries before, Rose reasoned, staying entrenched on her land, handcuffed by ancient religious beliefs, and refusing to surrender herself to progress.

  “Are you taking the echinacea tincture that I gave you to boost your immune system?” Angelica asked. Rose reached into her purse and pulled out the small bottle. “Every day,” she said.

  “Good. Because wasn’t that peanut butter sold in the stores FDA approved? You know, the stuff with the salmonella?” Angelica asked, without looking at Rose.

  “Now wait a–” Rose began before Angelica interrupted.

  “And wasn’t that spinach approved...the bags coated in e.coli?” Angelica turned and looked Rose squarely in the eye. Angelica despised confrontation and almost never raised her voice, the only exception being if one of her dearest beliefs was challenged. She knew there was much of the modern scientific world she didn’t know and didn’t care to know. But she also knew what she did know, and that was the natural world and the Bible.

  “Come on!” Rose said, glancing over her shoulder to see if the girls had been disturbed. They stayed under Ariel’s hypnotic spell, so Rose continued. “Those are rare exceptions, Angelica. Accidents do happen, you know. The world isn’t perfect!” Rose didn’t like having to defend herself and preferred to squash questions as they arose so that she could then control the progression and content of the discussion.

  “Nature is,” Angelica said.

  “Is what?”

  “Is perfect. There’s no waste. Everything is in God’s landscape for a reason.”

  Rose rolled her eyes.

  “Do you think people went out in the sun a hundred years ago...two hundred years ago?” Angelica asked. “Did you know that they knew how to protect their skin? Do you think there was widespread skin cancer back then?”

  Rose was tempted to take the bait, to challenge Angelica to a debate. Instead, she chose to sit back and let Angelica have her moment.

  “So tell me, little sister, what’s in your magic skin potion?”

  Angelica smiled, happy that any contention was over.

  “Well, as Grandma would probably say...”

  Both Angelica and Rose smiled, remembering the way their grandmother never followed recipes with precise measurements, instead relying on cute and cryptic phrases.

  “A pinch of carrot seed oil, a hunk of beeswax, a smidgen of Shea butter, a dash of zinc oxide and some drops of vitamin E and lavender oils,” Angelica said. “And then, I melt the oils, beeswax and butter in a double boiler and—”

  “You mean in your cauldron over the fire pit, right?” Rose said with amusement. Angelica brushed the comment aside and continued.

  “AND...I let it cool a bit, add the oils and zinc oxide. Then I push it into a container and, voila!

  Angelica walked to the sink window that overlooked the forest and retrieved a newly made container of sunscreen.

  “Here,” Angelica said as she placed it in Rose’s hand and narrowed her eyes on her, “Take it and use it. And here’s a bottle of yarrow spray too. Directions are on it. Stop dousing your body and your food with chemicals, Rose.”

  Angelica walked back to the sink.

  “Oh, before I forget,” Rose began, “here’s a gift card for McDonald’s in case you want to take the girls in town for lunch and a play date, seeing as Clayton finally got a McDonalds.”

  Angelica turned her head slowly and bore her eyes directly into Rose’s. “I most certainly will not take them to McDonald’s, Rose. Please tell me you don’t take the girls to eat fast food!”

  “Oh c’mon!” Rose exclaimed. “You gonna tell me that’s all unsafe too? You don’t see their parking lots littered with dead bodies do you, little sister?”

  Angelica cast a disapproving eye as Rose embellished the words “little sister” with as much sarcasm as she could.

  “Stop calling me little sister. You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?”

  Rose crossed her arms and put on a smug grin.

  “It isn’t just the nutrition Rose, or lack of nutrition,” Angelica said. “You KNOW how horribly those animals are treated in factory farms, and that’s where their meat comes from.”

  As Rose opened her mouth to address that last remark, her cell phone buzzed in her purse. She reached in the side pocket and looked at the iPhone’s display. “It’s John,” she said. “Hang on a minute.”

  “Hi, John.”

  “Hey, Rose. So...you w –to –ar–vacation a little ea–?” John asked.

  “What? You’re breaking up on me,” Rose said as she looked at her phone and saw only one bar.

  “Don’t you guys have any towers around here, or are you afraid they’re gonna kill you too?” Rose quipped to Angelica as she cupped her hand over the phone.

  “I said, do you want to start vacation early?” John repeated.

  “What do you mean?” Rose replied.

  “My angel investor, Wade Ferry, just called me and invited us to a secret supper club dinner tomorrow night,” John gushed with enthusiasm.

  “Oh,” Rose said, interested, but clearly not as excited about the idea as John was. John picked up on the tone and decided to sell the notion.

  “This is one of Nick Vegas’s special dinners, part of that 50-Forks thing we heard about on Fox News last week. It’s only for the members of 50-Forks and even then you have to be invited to join,” he added.

  “How did you...we get invited?” Rose asked.

  “A couple of members can’t make it. You believe that? Shell out seventy-five grand and you can’t make the first event?”

  “Where will it be?” Rose asked.

  “A house here in Athens. Not sure where. Wade said we’d get an email tomorrow morning telling us where to go. He said there’s going to be amazing food that can’t be found anywhere else. Sounds like a great start to the vacation to me!” Rose thought about it fo
r a moment. She didn’t care as much for the hobnobbing and social scenes as John did, preferring a more quiet life at home in front of a good movie with John and the girls. She pondered that for a second, realizing that maybe she and Angelica weren’t as different as she had thought.

  “Sounds like fun,” she said, knowing how excited John was about it.

  “You betcha!” John said. “Then Sunday morning we’re off on our private flight to San Salvador, and a couple of hours later we’ll be walking on Grotto beach!”

  Angelica sipped her tea as she watched Rose on the phone. She couldn’t hear the conversation but could hear the mumblings of John’s excitement, of good news he had that he wanted to share with Rose. She picked up on Rose’s sensitivity to John’s needs, giving in when necessary and standing firm when necessary. A marriage based on loving give and take. She glanced over at Rose’s girls, who were happily lost in a world of make believe. Angelica was thrilled that Rose was letting her keep her nieces for so long. She would take them out to the garden and show them another world, one that wasn’t make believe, one that was real, alive, and wondrous.

  Rose had it all, Angelica thought. Beautiful girls, a loving husband and security, although she had almost become a little too big for her britches just like pretty much everyone that went off to college. She had lost her way with nature and with God, but she had the children and a loving relationship that Angelica longed for.

  Why can’t I have that? Why doesn’t Blake talk to me that way, doesn’t spend time with me the way John does with Rose? John is much busier with his business and he finds time for Rose and the girls. He always puts them first.

  “Anything new on tropical storm Isabel?” Rose asked John.

  “They say it should pass south of Puerto Rico and go south of Florida,” John said. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll know in advance if the course changes and we’ll have plenty of time to leave if we have to. The pilot will be on call.”

  “Good. That’s what I want to hear. All right, I’ll see you tonight. Love you!” Rose said as she pressed the button to end the call.

  “Did you get some good news?” Angelica asked.

  “John got an invitation to a fancy dinner tomorrow night. He’s all excited.” Rose knew the dinner wouldn’t interest Angelica much so she skipped the details. Angelica smiled. As Rose figured, she didn’t get what the big deal was. No dinner would be more special to Angelica than a home cooked meal with a husband and children that she not only cooked herself, but also from food that she grew, raised, and produced herself. The simple life was all she hoped for or aspired to.

  “What storm are you talking about?” Angelica asked.

  “Don’t y’all get the news up here in Clayton? You know man walked on the moon too, has that news reached here yet?

  Angelica cocked her head at Rose and raised her eyebrows.

  “Nothing, just your typical October tropical storm brewing in the Caribbean. They say it will become a hurricane, but John says it’s going west into the gulf.”

  “Cuckoo-Cuckoo.” The clock in the kitchen struck one and somehow managed to penetrate the girls’ bubble. Their eyes marveled at the bird that came out and announced the time. The girls rolled on the floor and laughed with silly hysterics, the way that only little girls can.

  “Oh jeez,” Rose said. “I lost track of the time this morning. I need to get back to Athens. I’ve got to go by the post office and cancel mail delivery before our trip.”

  Rose got up to give her girls a hug. They accepted it begrudgingly as Ariel had captured their attention once again.

  “You girls mind what your Auntie Angelica says,” Rose said to the ears in the living room deaf to all sounds not from The Little Mermaid.

  Angelica walked with Rose out to the car.

  “Looks like the fog’s about burned off,” Rose said to Angelica at the car door, and reached her arms around her sister. Angelica closed her eyes and hugged Rose’s middle as she normally did when Rose draped her arms around Angelica’s neck. As she did, Angelica opened her eyes as...she felt something deep inside. She concentrated on the feeling and looked around to see if something around her was out of place or was wrong. It wasn’t. It was coming from within, from Rose. Angelica grew uneasy, but felt it must be silly. But still...something didn’t feel right to her.

  She pushed back from Rose and looked into her eyes.

  “Rose,” Angelica began, “be careful.”

  Rose smiled. “Don’t worry, silly. We’ll be careful and we’ll see you in about ten days. Just have a great time with the girls!” Rose got in the car, buckled her seat belt and put the Honda Odyssey into reverse. She looked through the windshield at Angelica, waved goodbye, and left.

  Angelica stood for a moment trying to put her finger on what she had felt. She turned to go in and get the girls, but had the most troubling feeling in her gut. A feeling she hadn’t had since the last time she saw her parents alive.

  Chapter 19

  Blake sat in his truck in the parking lot of The Federal, paralyzed by fear. All of his worst thoughts and fears raced round and round, crashing into one another inside his head like unruly kids in bumper cars.

  Slow down. Think!

  He tried to calm himself the way he had done in college football when opposing fans would stomp their feet and scream, trying to make so much noise that Blake would be forced into a mistake. A hurried snap, an errant throw. But Blake had mastered those fans, those sweaty palms, time and time again.

  Think! What could happen? What are you afraid of? He asked himself silently. Money. Money was the first worry that popped into Blake’s head because it was what Nick had just mentioned. No...he had threatened it. Threatened to reveal that he had paid Blake a lot of money and that maybe someone should review Blake’s tax filings. Nick knew that Blake hadn’t reported that income, that he had cashed those checks instead of depositing them. There was no doubt that Nick had looked at Blake’s signature on the checks, that he had kept them stowed away just in case he ever needed them.

  So? What would happen if Nick did report me? Blake thought.

  Tax evasion! He felt his body shrivel like an overripe blueberry as he thought about the real trouble he could be in. He didn’t believe that Nick would really report him, but that wasn’t what bothered him. What scared him, what infuriated him, was that Nick knew! He flat out could report it, as he had made painfully clear. Nick could do that today, a year from now, or hold it over Blake’s head for years. The threat would just linger and follow Blake, keeping him awake at night, causing him to look over his shoulder in public. Causing him to dread going to the mailbox, to shudder anytime the phone rang. If Nick ever did report it then Blake would have to explain to an IRS criminal investigator what had happened to the money and why it wasn’t reported. At a minimum, they’d slap a seventy-five percent penalty on him and he’d have to pay that, plus interest, from the first day he should have filed his return. He knew this because he had curiously looked it up when he cashed Nick’s first five thousand dollar check a year and a half before. Since then he had cashed almost thirty of them and still had over ninety thousand dollars in cash tucked away at home that no one knew about, that he couldn’t invest or deposit because then there would be an audit trail. Cash that he couldn’t tell Angelica about, because how would he explain such an obscene amount of cash to her?

  Sitting in the parking lot, Blake began adding and multiplying the best he could. If Nick ever reported him then Blake would have to explain, when all was said and done, about a quarter million dollars in income. Tax on that figure at thirty percent, would have been seventy-five grand. Add a seventy-five percent penalty to that and Blake figured that was well over a hundred thousand dollars due before the interest charges were added. But that’s if the IRS found out now. The penalties would become more severe with each passing day.

  If Nick reported that, years from now I’d be screwed, Blake concluded. They’d take the house, everything. I might even get jai
l time! Shit! The thought of jail time reminded Blake of the visit from the sheriff. The sheriff’s vehicle trailing him out of Rabun County. Maybe that was just a coincidence, Blake thought. Maybe they weren’t trailing me.

  He didn’t believe that. No, that would have been too much of a coincidence. A visit from the sheriff himself in the morning, and then less than a half hour later followed all the way out of the county by a separate patrol car? No, it couldn’t have been a coincidence. But what have I done?

  Blake thought about it, momentarily relieved that, he believed, he hadn’t actually done anything wrong. Even if them boys are found and they’re dead, heads ripped clean off their bodies, what does that have to do with me? Even if the sheriff finds out they may have done some work for me, I didn’t kill ’em. I didn’t send them off.

  Blake started making his argument to the judge, to the jury, the way he had seen so many times on television.

  Your Honor, what happened to those boys was tragic. An awful tragedy for the community to have to cope with. But, Your Honor, it was an accident. Those boys got lost in the woods on their own and couldn’t find their way out because they was stupid. My client, Blake Savage, is as distraught about this as the rest of the community, your honor, but he is guilty of no crime. So just leave him the fuck alone! Case dismissed!

  Blake exhaled after listening to his lawyer’s well-reasoned defense. He didn’t believe that he had done anything. So why was the sheriff after him? What had the sheriff said?

  Do you know anything? Do you know them boys?

  That’s what the sheriff had asked and Blake had lied. That realization is what made the hair on Blake’s arms stand up, the fact that, just that morning he had lied not once, but twice to the sheriff. If the sheriff found out he had lied about that then he would be under suspicion for...Blake didn’t know. But for something else.