The Way Home

Drawing on every bit of willpower at his command, Ty lifted his head, breaking off the kiss. Meg’s mouth clung to his with innocent hunger, weakening his determination. He stared down into her flushed face, watching as her lashes slowly came up, revealing the deep blue of her eyes. The look in those eyes was almost his undoing.

Ty swallowed a groan and forced his hands away from her. He should be horsewhipped. This was exactly what he’d sworn wasn’t going to happen, what he’d promised himself he could avoid. Well, he’d proved just how good he was at resisting temptation.

And the worst of it was that he wanted nothing so much as to pull her back into his arms and kiss her again.

A DELL BOOK

Dallas Schulze

THE WAY HOME

Published by Dell Publishing a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc. 1540 Broadway New York, New York 10036

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as ‘ ‘unsold and destroyed” to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

Copyright (c) 1995 by Dallas Schulze

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law.

The trademark Dell(r) is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

ISBN: 0-440-21465-3 Printed in the United States of America Published simultaneously in Canada January 1995

10 98765432

For Art.

Just ‘cause.

I’d like to thank several people who made the writing and publication of this book go more smoothly: Robin Kaigh, for believing in the story; Tina Moskow, for taking a chance on something a little unusual; Gretchen Susi, for maintaining order during a somewhat tumultuous time; Barbara Schenck, for taking the time to read the manuscript and correct any “Iowa” mistakes. Any errors remaining are strictly my own. And last, but definitely not least, Barbara Bretton, who told me I wasn’t crazy to do this book. Everyone should be blessed with a friend who tells such terrific lies.

CHAPTER 1

It was going to be a scorcher of a summer. Everyone agreed on that. It seemed as if winter had slipped right into summer with only a passing nod to spring. Regret, Iowa, baked under the big yellow sun hanging still and bright in the clear blue sky. Barely June and already the farmers were looking at the sky and shaking their heads over the possibilities for needed rain.

Tyler McKendrick was fourteen, and he was concerned with more important things than the crops baking in the fields outside town. His grandfather was a farmer, and Ty knew that rain was important for the crops so he dutifully hoped for rain. But he didn’t hope for it today.

Especially not today. Today he was going to catch enough catfish for supper. Never mind that he’d taken his fishing pole down to the creek twice this past week and both times he’d come back emptyhanded. Today was going to be different. He just knew it.

There was a feeling about the day. Something special was bound to happen. He’d felt it in his bones as soon as he woke this morning. Lying in bed, staring up at the ceiling, he’d felt an almost shivery excitement. It had to mean he was going to catch that big old catfish who’d been stealing his bait without getting himself hooked. There was just nothing else worth this feeling of anticipation.

Whistling under his breath, he climbed over the fence that edged old man Pettygrove’s field. Perched on the top rail, Ty scouted the field with a quick look, making sure no one was in sight. Old man Pettygrove wasn’t above peppering a trespasser’s behind with a bit of buckshot. As if a body had any right to fence off the best shortcut to the fishing hole, Ty thought indignantly.

Satisfied that the old man wasn’t around, he jumped off the fence, landing in the thick grass on the other side. His fishing pole balanced on one shoulder and the paper sack containing his lunch in his hand, he strode boldly across the lush field. He wasn’t scared of old man Pettygrove and that blunderbuss of his.

Still, he was just as glad to slip under the fence on the other side. The creek waited a few yards away, and he could just practically feel a big ol‘ catfish tugging on his line.

Passing the huge weeping willow that nodded over the stream, Ty stopped, cocking his head as a sound caught his attention. For a moment, he thought he might have imagined it but then it came again. Someone was crying. He scowled. He’d come to think of this as his own private spot, a secret place no one knew of but him. And now that privacy had been invaded. Probably by some girl, he thought, disgusted.

He started to walk on but another wrenching sob stopped him. There was something in the sound that tugged at him despite himself. Heartbreak, his sister Louise would call it. Louise was seventeen and the silliest thing he could imagine, always making a drama out of everything. She’d probably be happier than anything to have some unseen presence sobbing at her. Give her a chance to wring her hands and emote all over the place.

But Ty was just annoyed. That was it, he told himself. He was going to check on the source of the sobs just to make it clear that, whoever they were, they could take their crying somewhere else. This was his spot and he didn’t need some
girl
crying all over the place, scaring the fish more than likely.

As soon as he ducked through the willow’s soft branches, the crying broke off, ending on a startled little gasp. The bright sunlight was muted by the leafy cover, and for a moment Ty couldn’t see anything. But as his vision adjusted to the softer light, he saw the source of his annoyance.

A child was crouched on the ground next to the tree’s trunk. Tears had left clean streaks on her dirty face, making her eyes look huge. In a town the size of Regret, everybody knew just about everybody else, at least by sight, so Ty had no trouble putting a name to the child.

It was little Meg Harper. Her folks lived on the south side of town. Her older sister, Patsy, was a few years behind him in school. Meg was four or five, he guessed, hardly more than a baby, from the perspective of his own advanced years. She was watching him now with big blue eyes. Her thin frame shook with an occasional half sob but she said not a word.

He tried to scowl to show that he really didn’t care what had caused her tears. He couldn’t seem to put his heart into it, though. She reminded him of a puppy he’d seen once that didn’t have a home — too thin, eyes all sad and hopeless. His mother had refused to let him take that puppy home, saying that it wasn’t the sort of dog a McKendrick would have. He’d never quite forgotten the look in the puppy’s eyes when he’d walked away and left it. And now, here was Meg Harper looking at him with those same big, sad eyes.

“What’re you bawling about?” Ty asked gruffly.

Wordlessly she thrust out her arms. Cradled in them was a doll. It hadn’t been a particularly nice doll to start with. Louise had a whole shelfful of dolls in her room, and the cheapest of them was nicer than the one Meg held. But whatever slight charm the doll had once had was gone now. The head had been smashed in, destroying one painted eye completely. Despite a general contempt for “girl things” like dolls, Ty winced at the toy’s condition. From the ragged state of the doll’s cheap dress, he could guess that it was something Meg had treasured.

“Mary’s broke,” she told him. The simplicity of the statement tugged at emotions he was half ashamed to admit to having. Telling himself that he just wanted her to go away and if looking at her dumb doll would help accomplish that, he’d look, Ty crossed the short distance that separated them and crouched down next to her.

She allowed him to take the doll from her. Ty examined Mary solemnly as if her total destruction wasn’t obvious to even the most casual of glances.

“Can you fix her?” The question was asked without any real hope. Glancing at her, Ty was surprised by the strength of his desire to answer in the affirmative. There was something so hopeless in those wide blue eyes.

“She’s too broke to fix,” he admitted reluctantly.

Meg nodded, unsurprised by the verdict. She took the doll back from him, stroking a small hand over the ruined head.

“She was my friend,” she said simply.

“What happened to her?” he asked, for lack of being able to offer any real comfort.

“Daddy hit her against the wall. He was angry.”

She didn’t seem to find anything extraordinary in this bit of information, as if this was a normal thing in her life. Ty tried to imagine his own father getting angry enough to break anything and failed. His father rarely even raised his voice.

Looking at the bruises on Meg’s arms, it occurred to him that her father might have caused those. The thought sent a shiver through him. Never in his life had either of his parents raised a hand to him in anger.

“What happened to your arms?” he asked, forgetting to sound gruff and indifferent.

Meg’s small face closed up in a way that made her look older than her years. She seemed to draw in on herself, hugging the ruined doll against her narrow chest, her eyes slipping away from his. “I fell.”

“Oh.” He didn’t believe her. He knew, as sure as if he’d been there to witness it, that her father had left those bruises on her arms. His safe world was shaken by the idea of a parent capable of committing an act of violence toward his own child. He said nothing simply because he could think of nothing to say.

It was quiet under the willow tree, the outside world blocked by a wall of gentle green. Meg didn’t seem to feel any need to break the silence. She remained crouched against the trunk of the willow, the doll clutched to her as she rocked gently back and forth. Her silent grief chilled him despite the warmth of the day.

“Maybe we should bury her,” he said abruptly, needing to break the silence. “You know, have a funeral or something.”

Meg stopped rocking and looked at him, her hands tightening over the doll. “Say a prayer?”

“Sure.”

She appeared to consider the idea, her grubby face solemn. “Okay,” she said at last.

Having made the suggestion, it was Ty’s responsibility to find something with which to dig the grave. After some consideration, Meg agreed that the best place to lay Mary to rest was beneath the willow tree. Ty found a sturdy stick and managed to hack a hole of the proper dimensions in the soft earth.

When the time came to lay Mary in her final resting place, Meg did so with solemn care, straightening the doll’s worn dress around her, her tiny fingers lingering for a moment before she stood up and clasped her hands behind her back.

Ty filled in the grave, patting the earth carefully into place. He straightened, dusting his fingers on the sides of his pants. Catching Meg’s expectant gaze, he remembered his casual promise that they could say a prayer over the doll.
Was God likely to resent him saying a prayer for a doll?
he wondered uneasily. But there was no getting around the fact that he’d promised. And the look in Meg’s blue eyes seemed more important than the vague threat of eternal damnation.

A tendency to daydream in the middle of the sermon on Sundays had left him woefully short of prayers, particularly the sort suitable for a solemn occasion such as this. Racking his brain, he could come up with only one that he knew all the way through. He began hesitantly, groping for the words.

“Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep.” Meg’s hand stole into his and his fingers closed over hers. “If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.”

His voice seemed to echo in the stillness beneath the willow, giving the familiar prayer a significance he’d never noticed before. When it ended, the silence was absolute for the space of several slow heartbeats.