Rita Herron - The Missing Twin

“I didn’t see anything,” he said gruffly. “It was just dark and…I felt an emptiness. I…can’t explain it. Sometimes my senses, my visions aren’t correct. Sometimes they don’t even make sense.”

The heartbeat of silence while Madelyn stared at him felt like an eternity. “Just don’t lie to me,” she said. “I may seem like a fragile woman to you, but I can handle whatever happens.”

Caleb’s hearing suddenly seemed more acute. He could hear the scene behind him, the voices of the sheriff and funeral workers. Twigs snapped in the wind, leaves rustled, the shovel crunched dry dirt….

“How long has Sara had these nightmares about Cissy?” he asked.

Madelyn sighed, the weary sound of a worried mother. “I told you, the past two months, ever since we moved back to Sanctuary.”

“But you said she talked about her twin before?”

Madelyn nodded. “At eighteen months, she started acting as if she was playing with her. Even now, when she has tea parties, she sets a place for Cissy. When she colors, she draws Cissy and those sunflowers. When she plays on the seesaw, Cissy is always on the other end.”

Her voice broke, and she pressed a hand to her mouth to regain control, then forged ahead as if she needed to share her story. “When she was a baby, she’d lay on her side and giggle and reach out as if someone was there.”

Caleb’s mind raced to paranormal research he’d done. “Parapsychologists believe that children can see ghosts when they’re babies. They have a connection then, but once their innocence is lost and society trains them, they no longer believe, so the spirits don’t appear to them anymore.”

Madelyn chewed her bottom lip. “I read that, too. But Sara never lost that ability. In fact, her connection only seemed to grow stronger. Last year she started insisting that Cissy was alive, telling me stories about things she did, places she went. That’s when I got really worried.”

Caleb heard the pain in her voice. “When you consulted the shrinks?”

“Yes.” The wind swept Madelyn’s hair into her face, and she tucked it back with her fingers. “Sara seems so certain that her dreams are real, that her sister is alive, that I started to believe her.” Her shoulders fell. “Maybe because I really wanted to so badly.”

“That’s understandable.” Caleb ached to touch her, to soothe the torment in her voice, but the only way to help Madelyn was to uncover the truth.

If Sara was right, then her sister had been kidnapped and adopted by another family, she might be in danger…. And if she was wrong, Sara’s visions might be ESP—or she might have some form of mental illness.

Or she might be communing with a dead girl….

A noise down the hill jarred him, and he jerked his head toward the gravesite. Sheriff Gray had stepped outside the tent and was motioning for him.

“Walker, we’re ready,” Gray shouted.

Madelyn’s legs buckled, and he caught her around the waist. “Sit down on that bench by the fountain. Let me see what they found.”

Too weak to argue, she nodded and allowed him to guide her to the bench. His heart climbed into his throat as he left her small form hunched inside her coat, shivering on that cold, stone slab.

But he squared his shoulders, determined to end the questions in her mind. It was the only way she and her daughter could find closure and move on.

Clenching his jaw, he raced down the hill and stepped inside the tent beside Amanda. The mood was somber, reverent, racked with tension and dread.

Slowly the E.H. Officer opened the casket.

Caleb braced himself but shock still ripped through him.

The casket was empty.

MADELYN TWISTED HER HANDS together, willing herself to remain calm as she waited. But every second that ticked by felt like someone was pulling out her fingernails one by one. The sound of a car motor drew her gaze back to the parking lot, and she saw an elderly man exit a sedan and hobble toward a grave near the church. Probably his wife’s.

Poor man. How long had they been married before he’d lost her?

She’d thought she and Tim would grow old together, not that he would abandon her and Sara when they needed him most.

Bitterness threatened but she tamped it down. She’d long ago vowed not to indulge herself in that emotion for fear Sara would pick up on it.

She never wanted her daughter to know the truth about her father.

Voices carried in the wind, and she spotted Caleb walking toward her. Her lungs squeezed for air at his bleak expression. A bird chirped from a tree nearby, and leaves fluttered down into the fountain. One landed on the wings of the angel, another at her feet.

She gripped her hands together, waiting, watching for the small casket to appear.

“Madelyn,” he said in a gruff voice. “I’m sorry.”

She lunged to her feet. “What’s wrong?” Her voice cracked, and for the first time, she realized that she’d actually held out hope that Sara might be right. That Cissy was alive.

Suddenly oblivious to her surroundings, she vaulted down the hill, stumbling blindly. Whatever he had seen, she had to know.

“Madelyn, wait!”

Her boots pounded the ground as she ran down the hill. All she could think of was seeing that tiny casket, knowing whether her daughter was in there…

Her pulse pounded, sweat slid down her temple, and she stumbled over a loose rock and felt herself flailing to remain on two feet.

Caleb caught her arm and righted her, then helped her to the tent. Her heart pounded as she stepped beneath the tarp.

Dear God…

She gaped at Caleb. “I don’t understand,” she whispered.

A muscle ticked in Caleb’s jaw. “Someone lied to you, Madelyn. Dr. Emery, the funeral director maybe. But you didn’t bury your daughter five years ago. You buried an empty casket.”

Anger, shock and betrayal slammed into her along with a million questions. But the one fact that she latched onto was the one she wanted to believe more than anything.

The casket was empty because Sara was right.

Cissy was alive.

CISSY RAN AND HID BEHIND the door between the den and the kitchen clutching her dolly to her chest. They were screaming again. They’d been at it for a long time now.

“How could you do this?” her mama shouted. “Why?”

“Because you wanted a kid, you were grieving over losing Doug.”

“I know, but you lied to me.”

“Just keep your mouth shut!” the big man yelled.

Cissy peered around the corner and saw her mama reach for the phone. “It’s not right,” her mama cried. “What you’ve done… It’s not right. No wonder Cissy has bad dreams.”

“That kid is crazy. She always has been.” He grabbed her mama’s shoulders and shook her. “Listen to me. You call, you’ll lose her, and I’ll go to jail. You wouldn’t do that to your own family, would you?”

“But Cissy has a right to know the truth,” her mama argued. “And I won’t go to jail because I’ll tell the truth.”

“The truth. Hell, you don’t even know the truth, you stupid bitch.” He slapped her mother across the face. “You’re up to your damn eyeballs in this. The kid is evidence, and we can’t leave evidence behind.”

“What are you talking about?” Cissy’s mama looked terrified as she leaned against the sink.

Terror streaked through Cissy, and she backed into the hallway, but she tripped over a pair of work boots and yelped. He heard the noise and swung around. His face was red, his nostrils wide. His eyes bulged like a madman’s.

He was going to kill her.

“Damn kid,” he mumbled then turned and stomped toward Cissy, his big footsteps pounding the floor like a giant’s.

“No, I won’t let you hurt my baby.” Her mama grabbed his arm to stop him, but he swung his arm back with such force that he slung her to the floor. Her mama hit her head on the table with a whack and blood spurted and ran down her face.