Chapter 38 Olivia
A not-so-gentle nudge woke Olivia, practically shoving her off the mattress.
For so long, she’d wanted to hear God’s voice, but she didn’t expect Him to wake her in the middle of the night and tell her to drive home. Especially now when she was trying to hide from the man who could easily walk through her front door.
If she saw a light inside, she’d wake the police chief. If not, she’d call a locksmith in the morning and rekey the doors. Then she’d hire a couple, like Simon had done in Winfield, to care for the property so she no longer lived there alone.
She should have left Jillian a note, but the thought didn’t occur to her until after she’d grabbed her overnight case and drove away. Garrett would be upset that she hadn’t asked him to accompany her, but she’d never place a member of the Lamb family in harm’s way.
After switching off her headlights, she pulled tentatively up the drive. Ice pierced her spine as she braked near the top. Two cars, both unfamiliar, were parked by the front porch.
While she saw no lights inside the windows, it was time to contact the police.
Perhaps she could never prove that Simon had harmed Hattie, but she’d start with her suspicions and then tell Chief Logan about Simon stealing her money.
Maybe the chief could help her obtain a peace bond until the attorney finished the separation paperwork.
Either way, Simon would never be allowed back in her house.
Olivia shifted into reverse, but she didn’t get far. Before she backed down the drive, she saw a girl—no, a woman—run to the front door. The woman twisted the knob, trying to get inside.
Olivia switched on her headlights and rolled down the window. “Who are you?”
“Quiet,” the woman pleaded.
Olivia recognized Simon’s housekeeper in the spray of light, but she didn’t understand. Why was Izzy at her door?
The woman slumped against the doorframe, leaning like a felled tree.
Olivia hopped out of her car. “What’s wrong?”
“Men at the lake,” Izzy said, her eyes closed. “They’re looking for me.”
Did Simon bring Izzy to the house? If he was at the lake, they both needed to get away from here.
“Where’s your baby?” she asked. The sweet girl from Winfield.
“He took her—no.” She shook her head like she was trying to loosen something. “He’s upstairs.”
“Simon?”
Izzy waved her hand. “The baby.”
Poor girl. Had the fear of Simon crippled her tongue? Maybe she was just confused. They needed to retrieve her child before Simon returned and then find Chief Logan. “Is Greta upstairs?”
“He—” The woman teetered again. “He killed her.”
The ice froze in Olivia’s veins. “Izzy?”
A dozen words stammered in reply, none of them making sense. Olivia wanted to shake the words free until a cry rained down from the second floor.
Thank God, Greta had only been asleep.
The ice dissolved quickly into action. “I’ll get her.”
Izzy caught herself on the doorpost, and Olivia saw a bloody gash on her hand. “You’re hurt.”
“The moon seeds.”
Olivia shivered. What had happened in her hours away?
Izzy reached up to rub her face, but Olivia swatted her hand. If she’d touched the moonflower seeds, if the toxins had seeped into her wound, rubbing her eyes could blind her.
She turned her toward the sedan. “Don’t touch anything until we wash your hands.”
Izzy wouldn’t move. “I have to get my babies.”
“I’ll find her.” Olivia turned off the headlights. “Please, get in the car.”
She couldn’t force Izzy to leave, but she could fetch the woman’s daughter.
Olivia raced up the steps and into Hattie’s room.
The girl should be bigger, she thought, as she lifted her from the makeshift crib, but she’d no time to ponder the child’s size.
As she ran back downstairs, the girl crying in her arms, the kitchen door hit the back wall. Then feet pounded across the floor.
Olivia flung open the front door. Thank God, Izzy waited in the front seat of her sedan.
Izzy stretched out one of her arms as if she wanted to hold her child, but Olivia kept the girl on her lap as they bumped down the lane. Through her open window, she could hear shouts behind them.
“We need to rinse off the moonflower oil,” Olivia said, the child crying in her lap. “Before the poison spreads.”
“Car—” Izzy sputtered, her chin bobbing as she fought the flower’s grip. “Below.”
“We have to hurry.”
“I can’t leave her.”
“We aren’t leaving her, Izzy,” she said, her voice as steady as she could manage knowing that Simon and the others were on their way downhill.
“Have to get—” Izzy started to nod again before catching herself. “Have to find Greta.”
“She’s right here,” Olivia said, but Izzy had drifted away.
The moonflowers, she prayed, wouldn’t take Izzy’s life.
A light flickered in the trees above as Olivia parked beside the Chevrolet. She grabbed a sweater from her satchel, doused it in the river, and quickly wrapped Izzy’s limp hand to protect her and her daughter. Then she reached inside Izzy’s car and tossed the woman’s suitcases into the sedan.
Headlights sped down the hill as Olivia turned away from the door.
Drive.
That voice. She could hear it again, louder than the cries.
Her headlights dimmed, she trailed the moonlight along familiar back roads, praying that Izzy’s body would fight against the poison. That the effects would only be temporary.
The baby slept between them, so tiny in the shadows, and she worried now that it wasn’t the same child she’d met at Simon’s. Hopefully, Greta was safe with her father in Winfield. She would ask Izzy the moment that she woke.
As the hours passed, their flight away from Haven House began to feel like a new beginning. For the first time in years, even with the enemy right behind her, peace reined again in Olivia’s heart.