KnockOut - Catherine Coulter [99]
“Say it. Say, ‘I promise, Uncle Blessed.’”
It was hard to get the words out, but she did, finally. “I-I promise.” She tried to say his name, but she simply couldn’t. She hated his name, it scared her. Autumn lowered her head and cried. Through her hiccups, she whispered, “I want my mama back.”
“You will have her, but just not yet,” Blessed said. “Sheriff, you will dig a grave for my brother.”
Ethan said, “I don’t have a shovel.”
Autumn’s head snapped up. Ethan sounded like himself, it was his voice, but in a way it wasn’t. His voice sounded dead, uncaring, flat as the strawberry pancakes she’d tried to make for her mother on her birthday.
Blessed said, “Then you will dig with sticks and your bare hands. Woman, you will help him. Both of you.”
He loosened his hold on Autumn’s arm. She ran to her mother, but Joanna ignored her, dropped to her knees beside Ethan, and began to dig, pulling up clumps of dirt and grass, tossing them as far as she could.
“Mama.” Autumn pulled on her sleeve, but Joanna paid her no attention. Autumn grabbed Ethan’s jacket, but, like her mother, it was as if he wasn’t even there. “Come back, come back,” she whispered, and couldn’t even whisper anymore because her throat was clogged with tears. She drew back her fist and hit Ethan as hard as she could. He didn’t flinch, he didn’t react at all, he continued digging up dirt, big handfuls of it, throwing it over his shoulder. It was horrible what she was seeing, but Autumn couldn’t do anything to stop it. She listened to the thuds of earth strike the ground. She didn’t look at Grace; she couldn’t. She fell to her knees and began to dig up clots of earth.
“Stop that! Come here, Autumn,” Blessed said, and pulled her away.
“I’ll help them. Let me help them. Let me dig too.”
“No.”
Blessed pulled Autumn down to the ground beside him and held her there. She sat beside the monster for what seemed like hours, watching her mother and Ethan dig a grave for Grace, and finally, so exhausted her brain finally closed down, she fell asleep.
When the grave was deep enough, Blessed wrapped Grace in a sleeping bag and told the sheriff to lay him at the bottom of the four-foot hole. He did.
“Now come out.”
Ethan climbed out of the hole and stood silently beside Grace’s grave.
Autumn slept, her face against her cupped hands. Blessed had taken off his jacket, covered her with it.
He said, “Now, both of you, fill the grave.”
Throwing handfuls of dirt over Grace’s body didn’t take as long as digging his grave. When it was done to Blessed’s satisfaction, he told them to stand respectfully on each side of Grace’s grave. “Sheriff, you and the—” He took a quick look at Autumn, saw that she was sleeping soundly, and said, “You and the bitch will pray for my brother.”
Ethan said, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…” After a moment, Joanna joined him.
Blessed thought of his mother, at the awful soul-tearing grief she’d feel, and felt his throat clog. He prayed she’d understand. She had to. He’d had no choice. He listened to the smooth, even cadence, a monotone really, no feeling to the words at all. At least they knew all the words. It was good.
Blessed slapped his hands against his arms. He was getting cold without his jacket, but that was all right, Autumn needed warmth more than he did. She was only a little girl, after all, so small and fragile, and she was his niece. She was important. He wished she understood. But it was too soon and the child was too young, too dependent on her mother, the bitch who controlled her. She would come to understand, to know he’d done the right thing. Blessed tucked his jacket more closely around her. He didn’t want her to get sick. Autumn still slept—a blessing, Blessed thought, and smiled at the