Brett Battles - The Silenced

“He loved her,” Quinn finished. “And that was enough.”

No one who came to the Olivers’farm that afternoon arrived empty-handed. There were casseroles and sandwiches and baked chicken and pans of Jell-O and cakes and pies and cookies and almost anything you would want to drink.

Quinn guessed that at least twice as many people had jammed into his mother’s house as had come to the chapel. When it got to the point where he couldn’t turn around without bumping into someone, he caught Orlando’s eye and motioned to the back door.

The yard was considerably less crowded than inside the house, but it was something equally annoying to Quinn.

Cold.

He shivered as they walked down the steps. Anything below sixty degrees just felt wrong, and the current temperature was definitely well south of that mark. If this had been Los Angeles, the day would have been considered full-on winter. But here in northern Minnesota, it was merely typical fall. And, as if to emphasize that point, several of the dozen or so people who had also opted for the outside weren’t even wearing jackets.

Quinn shivered again, then pointed at a couple of empty chairs. After he and Orlando were seated, he began picking at his food, but nothing looked appetizing. After only a few minutes, Orlando set her equally untouched plate on the ground and said, “I should check on Garrett.”

She had left her son at home in San Francisco under the watchful care of Mr. and Mrs. Vo. Orlando and Quinn had agreed that this was not the time for Garrett to be introduced to Quinn’s family. Perhaps the following summer.

Before she could retrieve her phone, though, several women approached them.

“Jake, that was just lovely-what you said about your father,” one of the women said.

“Thank you,” Quinn replied. He remembered her as the mother of someone he’d gone to school with, but her name escaped him.

“Yes,” one of the other women said.

“Absolutely lovely,” the last told him.

“Thank you.”

“I can’t believe how grown up you are now. And who is this beautiful woman you’re with?” the first asked.

Quinn could feel Orlando tense beside him. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said. “This is my girlfriend, Claire.”

The first woman smiled. “Nice to meet you, Claire. I’m Mrs. Patterson.”

“How nice you could come with Jake,” the third said. “I’m Mrs. Moore.”

“Claire? I wouldn’t have expected that name,” the second one said.

Quinn frowned, annoyed, but Orlando immediately put a calming hand on his thigh and said, “My father was part Irish.” It wasn’t a lie. Her father was half-Irish, but her father had also been half-Thai, and her mother one hundred percent Korean. When someone looked at Orlando, her Irish ancestry was the last thing she saw.

“What name do you want my family to call you?” Quinn had asked Orlando before they’d left for Minnesota. “Your real name?” Orlando was not the name she’d been born with. Like most in the secret world, she’d taken on a new identity, burying who she had been.

She scoffed. “I hate my real name.” She was silent for a moment. This would be the name Quinn’s family would always know her by, so it wasn’t something to be taken lightly. “Claire was one of my father’s favorite names. He always said he wished it had been mine.”

“Then that’s what it is now.”

After the women left, Quinn said, “Sorry.”

Orlando smiled. “It’s fine.”

Quinn was just raising his beer to his lips when the back door to the house swung open and Liz stepped out. She looked around at those milling outside, then spotted Quinn. With sudden determination, she began walking toward him.

“Uh-oh,” he said.

“It’s okay,” Orlando murmured. “She’s not going to cause a scene. Not here.”

As he watched his sister approach, Quinn couldn’t help but be amazed at how the little tomboy he used to know had grown into such a beautiful woman. Not model beautiful, not put-together beautiful. Naturally beautiful, the kind of beauty not everyone noticed right away, but once they did, they would never forget. Liz could just roll out of bed, throw on a T-shirt, a pair of jeans, and a baseball cap, and she’d still be more attractive than most women.

Of course, the half scowl on her face wasn’t particularly helping her looks at the moment.

“Would you mind if I borrowed my brother for a few minutes?” she asked Orlando once she reached them.

“Not at all.” Orlando started to stand. “I have a call I need to make anyway.”

“No need to get up. I feel like a walk. Thought maybe Jake could go with me.”

They both looked at Quinn.

“Sure,” he said. “Here.” He handed his plate to Orlando, grabbed his bottle of beer, and stood up. “Let’s go.”

They walked in silence, Liz striding out a few feet ahead of him. She guided him down the dirt road that led to the barn. The building was big and white and in need of a new coat of paint. It had been at least six years since their father had stopped actively farming, so after the animals had been sold off and the fields on either side of the house had been leased to a neighbor, maintenance of the barn had no longer been a priority.

Liz turned onto the path leading around the left side of the barn and into the woods.

Once they were among the trees, the trail narrowed, much of it overgrown from disuse. For several years when Quinn had been a kid, he had taken the path every day. When his sister, eight years younger than him, had been old enough, she had done the same.

They walked for ten minutes before Liz finally stopped exactly where he knew she would-the site of the old fort he’d built for himself. It wasn’t long after he outgrew it that Liz had made it her own. Only the fort was gone now, reclaimed by nature, the wooden walls rotted and turned to mulch. Quinn could see a few rusty nails protruding from the surrounding trees, but that was about all that was left.

“I used to think you made this for me,” Liz said.

Quinn took a couple of steps forward. The ground was covered in brush and saplings, just like it had been when he’d first chosen the spot. Back then he had cleared it, and built a wooden floor that sat a foot above the soil on two-by-four beams and old bricks.

“I guess maybe I built it for both of us,” he said.

Something caught his eye. It was black and half-buried next to a tree. He knelt down and tugged on it until it came free. It was a license plate. Black background with faded orange-yellow letters. The three upper quarters were taken up with the number, while below was a single line: 19 CALIFORNIA 54

He had found it in a neighbor’s barn and had taken it when no one was home. It had been in a dusty pile with several other plates from various states. He didn’t think it would be missed.

It was the only one he took, though. California. It had seemed exotic and exciting and, most of all, far from Minnesota. He remembered staring at it for hours, dreaming about escaping to San Francisco or Los Angeles or San Diego. He smiled at the realization he’d actually achieved the dream.

“What?” Liz asked.

“Huh? Oh.” Quinn tossed the plate on the ground. “Nothing. Just… nothing.”

She stared at it for a moment. “Mom’s going to need help,” she finally blurted out.

“Is that what you wanted to talk about?”

“I have to go back to Paris tomorrow. I’m already missing too many classes as it is.”

“I can stay for a couple more days,” he told her. “But after that, I have to return to work.”

As far as Liz and his mother knew, Quinn was an international banker. It was a cover he often used on the job, too. It helped explain his extensive travel.