The Courage Tree - Diane Chamberlain [79]
But Sophie was still there, a fragile little waif in Marti’s bed, sleeping free of nightmares for the first time in days.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
At six-twenty, after an hour or two of fitful sleep, Janine and Lucas waited in the motel parking lot, leaning against Joe’s car. They had no car with them, since they’d arrived in the area by helicopter, so they would have to ride with Joe and Paula to the command post.
After Joe’s visit the night before, Janine had gone to the second floor of the motel to the Krafts’ room. The door to the room had been open, and the sheriff was still there, quietly talking with Steve, while Rebecca sat on edge of one of the beds, her head buried in her hands.
Janine had sat down next to her, putting her arm around her.
“I’m so sorry, Rebecca,” she said.
Rebecca lifted her head slowly, her face red and damp. “I can’t believe it,” she said. “I just can’t…”
“I know,” Janine hugged her gently, as a strange sensation came over her. She knew she was sitting on the bed with Rebecca, but she felt as though she were merely an observer of the scene. She was detached from this woman and her tragedy. There was no longer any possibility of Sophie being the child in that body bag. Somehow, she could not let Rebecca’s pain get inside her, and when she spoke, it was by rote, without feeling. “It’s completely unfair,” she said.
Rebecca leaned away to look at her squarely. “Sophie’s probably dead, too,” she said. “You know that, don’t you? I mean, I really hope she’s not, but you’d better get yourself ready to hear that news. Prepare yourself. I wasn’t ready for it…for this.”
What could she say to that? Janine wanted to respond to Rebecca’s cruel remark with one equally as hurtful, but she knew the grief-stricken woman was only speaking out of pain. So she said nothing, just leaned her head against Rebecca’s, rocking her gently while she cried, and hating her just a little for suggesting that Sophie had met the same fate as her daughter.
Upstairs, she’d found Lucas in his room, sitting in the dark by the window. “How are they doing?” he asked when she walked in.
“I’m angry that they don’t have people out looking for Sophie during the night,” she said instead of answering his question. She sat down on his bed, but was up again instantly. “This will be her third night alone out there. She hates the dark.”
Lucas nodded. “I remember the night you two were at the tree house and the lights went out.”
Janine could not help but smile at the memory. Sophie had panicked in the darkness, which had been truly impenetrable and eerie in the woods behind Lucas’s house. But Lucas had lit candles and told Sophie a story about a girl who lived in a tree house who had tried to read a book using only lightning as her source of light. So only a few words here and there were legible to her, and it made for a very funny story. Sophie had giggled. She always thought there was something magical about Lucas.
But Lucas wasn’t with Sophie in these West Virginia woods.
“She must be terrified out there,” Janine had said, looking out the window into the darkness. Lucas had not replied, and she’d wondered if he thought she was deluding herself. Did he, like Rebecca, think Sophie was dead? Is that what he was thinking about now, as they waited for Joe and Paula in the parking lot?
“I wish they’d hurry up.” She looked up at the door to Joe’s motel room.
“I bet he’s not pleased at finding you in my room last night,” Lucas said.
She hadn’t thought about that. Joe must have gone to her room first only to find it empty and then realized she was with Lucas.
“He probably didn’t give it a second thought,” she said. “He was just thinking about Sophie, like I was.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Lucas said, turning at the sound of Joe’s motel door opening. They watched as Joe and Paula made their way down the three flights of stairs. Paula was carrying a coffee cup in her hand.
“Morning,” Joe said as he neared his car. He clicked the remote button on his key chain,