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Chapter Forty-Six
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2024-10-29 19:42:56IN SPITE OF THE RECENT WARM WEATHER, Scott McGillikin pulled the collar of his wool overcoat up around his ears, hunched forward with his shoulders high, and slunk along the street Martha and Richard had played on as children. As he approached the Baimbridge home, a Saint Bernard across the street reeled off a string of low-pitched barks that sounded more like a car being started with a dying battery than any kind of living creature.
The neighborhood was actually safer now than it had been twenty years earlier. Transplants from the north were buying up all the older homes, restoring them to better-than-original condition, and adding decks, brick walks, outdoor lamps, and herb gardens.
As he turned up the Baimbridge sidewalk, a young girl next door leaned out over a porch railing to get a better look at him. He lowered his chin, mounted the steps, and had raised a gloved hand to knock when the door abruptly swung open.
Before him sat a startled woman in her wheel
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My Sister's Keeper Chapter Forty-Seven
AS I PULLED UP TO MY PARENTS’ HOUSE, I saw my mother flailing about the front yard flanked by two policemen and two neighbors attempting to console her. My first thoughts were that something had happened to Dad. I left the engine running and jumped out. “What happened?”Mother surged toward me screaming and crying, but her cries concealed her words. I took hold of her hands. “What? Slow down.”She tried to say something, but instead collapsed against me, her weight sending both of us against the side of the car.“What is it, Mama? Has something happened to Dad?”Like a wounded animal, she thrashed about sliding down the side of the car to the ground.“For Heaven’s sake, can’t someone tell me what’s going on?”The woman living next door stepped forward. “Your sister’s been in an accident.”“An accident?”Mom rolled to the ground
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Forty-Eight
A MISTY RAIN WAS FALLING as Ashleigh crossed from the parking garage to the lobby of Duke Medical Center in Durham. A clock high on a wall read 7:39 a.m. Collapsing her umbrella, she stepped to the main information desk where an elderly woman stared at a computer monitor.“Could you tell me which room David Matthews is in, please?” Ashleigh asked.Leaning forward, the woman clicked a few keys on her keyboard and squinted at the monitor. “Let’s see... Hmm. Is he a patient here?”“He was in surgery all day yesterday.”“Matthews...Matthews…Okay, here he is. Are you family?”“Sister.”“Well, he spent the night in Intensive Care, but he’s being moved to another room right now and I don’t have that number yet. Give me your name and I’ll page you when I have it.”“How long is that going to take?”“I don’t know
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Forty-Nine
DETECTIVE SAM JONES and his partner Crabby Staten stepped from their car and were met by a pudgy fifty-year-old with a two-day beard and a jaw full of chewing tobacco.“We jus’ put this asphalt down Monday,” the man slurred in a deep southern drawl. “And a piece of it caved in t’day when somebody drove over it. We figur’d we had us a water leak, but when we dug in, this is what we found.”The two detectives stepped to the edge of a hole that had been cut into the asphalt, looked down, and saw the crown of a man’s head exposed in the bottom. A wisp of water misting behind it had washed a trench around the body.“Anybody missing on your crew?” Sam asked the man.“Nope.”“Where’s the cutoff to that water line?”“Got no idea. We jus’ do the paving.”Sam pulled the tail of his long coat up around his waist, stepped into the hole, sli
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty
SYDNEY PICKED ME UP at the hospital and drove me to the site of Martha’s accident. A southwesterly breeze had brought in warm tropical air, and with it, the scent of the Japanese Cherry blossoms lining the other side of the road. As we stood at the corner with cars and trucks streaming past, I closed my eyes. Martha, what happened? Talk to me, Babe.Years of memories popped into my head, one on top the other like a Fourth of July fireworks show. Things I’d long ago forgotten. The time Martha went to Donald Wolfe’s house and punched him in the nose because he’d punched me at school. Martha pressing a towel to my bleeding leg after I fell over a chain-link fence and split my calf open. Martha lifting a neighbor’s dog off the street and carrying it all the way home after it had been hit by a car.I followed skid marks in front of me to where they jumped the curb.“See anything?” Sydney asked.I looked back u
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-One
I DROPPED SYDNEY OFF at her dance school and found Sam Jones in his office picking through a muddy stack of canceled checks and file folders. There were several more mud-caked boxes on the floor around him. He leaned back in his chair. “I’m sorry about your sister, Richard. I never expected Martha to do anything like that. She must have been a lot worse off than everyone thought.”“She didn’t do that to herself, Sam. Somebody pushed her.”“I know it’s hard to believe she’d—”“No, really, Sam. That’s what I came to see you about. I found some things on her computer I think you need to see.” I set the laptop on his desk. “And I think I know who did it.”“Did what?”“Who tried to kill her.”“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Richard. Now you’re as bad as her—trying to play detective.”“
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Two
TIFFANY FOUND THE NOTE and the key, and immediately ripped the tags off a new string bikini her mother would never have allowed her to wear. Strutting about under the watchful eyes of every man on the dock, she cranked the engine, brought in the lines, shoved the magnificent sailboat off, and motored Steal Away out to the channel where she found a strong southerly breeze—perfect for a reach down the river.Bringing the vessel about, she headed directly into the wind, set the brake on the wheel, and raised the mizzen to steady the boat. Electing to keep the mainsail furled, she climbed barefooted onto the roof of the cabin, sidled toward the bow, and—bending her knees as the vessel rose to meet each wave—reached to the low side and tugged the line to release the jib. As the massive sail unrolled like a window shade, its bitter end flapped loosely in the wind, snapping and popping against the mainmast, sending her heart to racing as she jumped back to
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Three
MARTHA HELD ME TOGETHER all through high school when my relationship with Dad had totally come apart. What a blessing that was. No person should have to live without a sibling. If I ever have children, there’ll be at least two. But even with Martha there supporting me emotionally, I’d not been complete.Until Sydney.With Sydney, I felt I’d come full circle. As if she’d taken hold of my spine and given me some sort of adjustment. A spiritual realignment. My breathing slowed. My muscles relaxed. I felt a presence within me that had long been missing—a thousand voices singing.Looking at her leaning against the carved headboard of her bed holding a sheet to her breasts, I felt I was looking more into her than at her. I wanted her heart more than I wanted air to breathe.“Come home with me,” I said. “Have dinner with me. Have breakfast with me. Bring a plant if you like. I don’t
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Four
IN MY MIND, I SAW MYSELF LEAP from the shadows and lock my hands around his neck. I saw the shock in his blood-streaked eyes as I choked the life out of him with my bare hands. I felt panic ripple through his body as he realized that he was going to die and there was nothing he could do to stop it. In one glorious flicker of thought, I watched him die in my hands. But death would be too good for Scott—or Dane Bonner—or whoever the hell he was. I wanted him to suffer as my sister had, to know her pain, to curse my name every time his cell door closed for the rest of his tortured life.As his shadow followed him into the barn, I grasped a chunk of firewood, flattened myself against the rear of the building, and trod on quaking legs to the edge of the doorway. Drunk on hate, I didn’t care about the law. I didn’t care about the other lives he’d torn apart. He had destroyed my sister and I wanted to punish him for it. I wanted to be the one t
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OVER THE NEXT FEW MONTHS, we would come to know ourselves, Charlie, and Mother in ways we never imagined. I looked behind the disfigurement of my father and discovered myself within him. His love of the arts, his passion for the theatre, and his gentle manner mirrored mine, and made me as proud of him as he was of me. The tension in my life disappeared. Whatever I’d been running from no longer chased me. I’d been set free.Charlie and Mom married the following spring and she became Mrs. Winston Gaylord. She sold her house and moved to the farm. I’ve never seen her happier.Dane Bonner was eventually found guilty of the murders of Scott McGillikin and Ashleigh Matthews as well as two of the missing Wilmington girls. He was sentenced to death.Dane’s associate, Greg, left the gas station after the explosion and thumbed rides the rest of the way to Bonner's cabin in Boone. He still had the $2,000 in his pocket and the keys to the cabin. He a
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My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Eight
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My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Six
THE FIRE NOW CONSUMED the barn and licked high into the air. The cold water slowly filling the barrel helped to cool our brains, but I knew it was only a matter of time before it would eventually drown us. Ten minutes tops. Our only hope was a gun that wouldn’t fire even if I could get to it. And what would I shoot to get us out? More holes and we’d drown quicker.My right arm was pinned, but I could move my left…slightly. Sydney’s legs were wedged back against her chest and I was squashed against them upside down. Our heads rested near one another, mine bent under with my abdomen pressed against the back of her calves. I worked my hand down my left side and tried to find a way to get around her legs to her waist. The water was now midway up my thighs. Sydney had gone quiet—passed out from pain, heat, loss of blood, or a lack of oxygen. But she was still alive. I could feel her expand…occasionally…to take a breath of the r
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Five
THE TEMPERATURE INSIDE THE DRUM instantly began to rise and my claustrophobia drove me into a panic. Without air, we would suffocate in minutes. There was light coming through the opaque sides and I could see shadows moving around it as the drum tipped and fell on its side slamming us against the hard shell. My heart pounded so loudly I could hear it. A drum within a drum. Fear gripped me, its sharp spears ripping my senses. I pressed my knees against the lid and pushed. My muscles cramped, but nothing gave way.Scott’s shadow fell over the barrel and I could hear his clothes rubbing against it as we began to roll—the heavy container crunching the ground like shoes on soft rocks. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it, Baimbridge?” he grunted. “You and Sydney together forever? Is that what you wanted, Baimbridge?”The tank turned another revolution. My right arm was locked behind my back, and I could barely move my left. The temper
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Four
IN MY MIND, I SAW MYSELF LEAP from the shadows and lock my hands around his neck. I saw the shock in his blood-streaked eyes as I choked the life out of him with my bare hands. I felt panic ripple through his body as he realized that he was going to die and there was nothing he could do to stop it. In one glorious flicker of thought, I watched him die in my hands. But death would be too good for Scott—or Dane Bonner—or whoever the hell he was. I wanted him to suffer as my sister had, to know her pain, to curse my name every time his cell door closed for the rest of his tortured life.As his shadow followed him into the barn, I grasped a chunk of firewood, flattened myself against the rear of the building, and trod on quaking legs to the edge of the doorway. Drunk on hate, I didn’t care about the law. I didn’t care about the other lives he’d torn apart. He had destroyed my sister and I wanted to punish him for it. I wanted to be the one t
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Three
MARTHA HELD ME TOGETHER all through high school when my relationship with Dad had totally come apart. What a blessing that was. No person should have to live without a sibling. If I ever have children, there’ll be at least two. But even with Martha there supporting me emotionally, I’d not been complete.Until Sydney.With Sydney, I felt I’d come full circle. As if she’d taken hold of my spine and given me some sort of adjustment. A spiritual realignment. My breathing slowed. My muscles relaxed. I felt a presence within me that had long been missing—a thousand voices singing.Looking at her leaning against the carved headboard of her bed holding a sheet to her breasts, I felt I was looking more into her than at her. I wanted her heart more than I wanted air to breathe.“Come home with me,” I said. “Have dinner with me. Have breakfast with me. Bring a plant if you like. I don’t
My Sister's Keeper Chapter Fifty-Two
TIFFANY FOUND THE NOTE and the key, and immediately ripped the tags off a new string bikini her mother would never have allowed her to wear. Strutting about under the watchful eyes of every man on the dock, she cranked the engine, brought in the lines, shoved the magnificent sailboat off, and motored Steal Away out to the channel where she found a strong southerly breeze—perfect for a reach down the river.Bringing the vessel about, she headed directly into the wind, set the brake on the wheel, and raised the mizzen to steady the boat. Electing to keep the mainsail furled, she climbed barefooted onto the roof of the cabin, sidled toward the bow, and—bending her knees as the vessel rose to meet each wave—reached to the low side and tugged the line to release the jib. As the massive sail unrolled like a window shade, its bitter end flapped loosely in the wind, snapping and popping against the mainmast, sending her heart to racing as she jumped back to
