Ramona Richards - The Taking Of Carly Bradford

He sighed as he turned on to his street, his mind flipping back to the day he’d met her, not long after she’d arrived in Mercer. Tyler and Fletcher had grown close over the past couple of years, and he often ate dinner with the MacAllisters and the writers at the retreat. One day, a few months ago, Dee had joined them. She’d been polite but reserved, and had spent most of the meal watching birds whisk to and fro at the feeders on the back deck of the lodge.

Tyler, on the other hand, spent the time watching her, drawn in even more when Fletcher had recounted her full story to him later that evening. The two of them had retreated to the basement game room of the lodge with hot cups of coffee to discuss cases and long days on the job. Then, when Tyler’s increasingly curious questions about the new writer started to amuse Fletcher, he switched the subject to Dee. Fletcher’s tale captured both Tyler’s imagination…and a bit of his heart.

Fletcher explained that Dee had seldom left her small Southern town before the accident. “She did, however, spend a lot of time on the Internet, which is where she met Aaron.” Aaron Jackson, a best-selling novelist, had started Jackson’s Retreat as his literary legacy, and he’d sung its praises to Dee when they had met during a writers’ conference. An immediate connection had sprung up between them, and they found a lasting friendship in their common beliefs. Aaron and Dee had e-mailed almost every day, sharing stories and problems.

Aaron had also been one of the few out-of-town friends to come to the funeral of her husband and son three years ago, following the car accident that had destroyed Dee’s world. Aaron had even remained several days afterward, holding her and letting her sob and rage at someone other than her parents and God.

Aaron’s murder a year later had been the last straw for Dee’s already fragile mind, and she had descended into a darkness she thought endless. A darkness completely devoid of hope, faith, and love. Devoid of God.

Her mother, however, remembered Aaron’s retreat and found some of the correspondence on Dee’s computer. Her parents, conspiring with Maggie, had put Dee on a plane.

Tyler had scowled at Fletcher. “Why am I just meeting her now?”

Fletcher sipped his coffee. “Because she’s just now emerging from her cabin. She’s not done much except stare at the walls.”

The first month at the retreat had been more darkness, with Dee lying for hours on the bed in her cabin. Maggie, with a new baby on her hip, had gone to the cabin every morning, opened the blinds and windows, turned on the lights and ceiling fan, and booted up Dee’s computer. Maggie had returned in the evening with Fletcher to insist Dee join the group for dinner. Dee had initially refused, and Fletcher and Maggie had stayed with her, eating dinner in her cabin and forcing her to talk to them. They learned the more intimate details of Dee’s life, during those first days, when Dee began to share her words with them, long before she started coming to the lodge for dinner.

Slow therapy, but it worked. Listening to other writers around the large dining table had finally engaged Dee in challenging conversation, and, eventually, had inspired her to sit at the computer, if only to stare at the blank screen. Six weeks later, she started to write. A journal, at first, then essays, two of which she sold to parents’ magazines. Those first paychecks buoyed her in a way she had not expected, letting a tiny glimmer of hope into her mind and heart. Tyler had met her as that glimmer of hope had begun to grow. Yet, the one thing still missing in her life was God. She had not reopened her heart to Him at all.

The bump that edged the entrance to his drive yanked Tyler back to the present, and he now prayed silently that God would make sure Dee held on to that hope. “She needs You more than ever, Lord, even if she doesn’t think she does,” he whispered, as he pulled into the drive at the side of the house and let the car roll to a halt in front of a garage near the back of the property.

Well, it was supposed to be a garage, but the building had never held a car as long as Tyler could remember. The previous owner had been on his way to an assisted living facility when he sold the house, and had left the garage stuffed with all the yard tools Tyler would ever need, plus some he didn’t even recognize.

The owner also left Tyler a dog, which now stood peering at him from the back porch, her front half outside the pet door, looking calm. The back half, however, gyrated so violently that the pet door bounced up and down on her back. Patty, a supremely obedient peekapoo named for the New England Patriots’ mascot, always waited for permission to welcome him home, but she jiggled, wagged, and whimpered until she seemed ready to split apart at the seams if he didn’t give it.

Tyler couldn’t help but grin. He got out of the car, and Patty’s increased excitement made the entire back door vibrate in its frame. He clucked his tongue and patted his thigh, and Patty launched herself off the porch, propelled by healthy muscles and pure love. When she got close, she bounced up on her hind legs, dancing a bit until he scratched her under the chin and praised her, their welcome-home routine. Then she whimpered with pleasure and pressed herself up against his leg briefly before prancing alongside him as he entered the house.

Tyler paused and let out a deep sigh as he closed the door and removed his gun and holster and placed them in a cabinet near the door. Home. It felt good. He’d waited so long to buy his own place that some folks thought he never would. But Tyler wanted just the right house, and he was patient. This former residence of a retired teacher and confirmed bachelor had been just the right house. Well-kept and already decorated in the dark greens, blues and browns that Tyler found comforting. He’d changed very little in the house, but it was still his space.

I wonder if Dee would like it. Images of the short brunette slipped in and out of Tyler’s mind as he prepared dinner—a scoop of dry food for Patty and a sandwich and chips for himself—then cleaned the kitchen and stretched out to watch one of the news channels for a bit. He liked Dee’s laugh, and he thought again of their great chats over lunch at the Federal Café. He found her questions about his life and his faith intelligent and curious without being intrusive. He’d encouraged her to look to God again, trying to give examples of perseverance and success from his own life as well as his friends’. She still resisted, even if her curiosity about his own faith never waned. Maybe, as she healed from her grief…. He sighed. “Special lady.”

Patty, who had parked herself by the couch within reach of his petting hand, perked up at his muttered words, tilting her head to one side, as if to ask, “Did you say ‘walk’?” She twisted in the other direction.

Tyler scratched her head. “Let me change, and we’ll go out. Maybe this will clear my head.”

Patty bounded up and over to the row of pegs behind the back door where her leash hung. He laughed, then went upstairs to the bedroom to change into shorts and a long-sleeved T-shirt. By the time he had his running shoes on, Patty had turned into a wriggling maniac, and he calmed her down, then snapped on the leash.

They started out with a slow walk, with Patty darting around him, sniffing every post, mailbox or clump of grass that hinted of a previous dog’s passing. They circled the block near his house, and he waved to any neighbors out for late evening chores or porch sits. Mrs. Adams, eighty-three and still a pistol, flagged him down to complain about a stray dog that had been digging in her yard. Tyler promised he’d speak to the county’s animal control folks and complimented her on her beds of spring flowers. The Beekers, transplants from Boston, asked about the spring arts festival, and he referred them to the gallery owner who organized it.