Page 95 of Fallen

“Didn’t need that rotator cuff anyway.” But he manages a half smile.

Snapping on the gloves, I turn my attention back to the injured woman. I open the gauze and press it firmly over the wound.

Loretta squeezes her eyes closed against the pain. “It was me,” she whispers.

Blood soaks quickly through the gauze. I look up at Skid. He nods, letting me know he’s listening, and he hands me a fresh wad. Saying nothing, I press it to the wound.

“Rachael,” the Amish woman says. “She asked me to meet her at the motel. She’d been calling. I knew what she wanted.”

“Fannie?” I ask.

“She said she wanted to know her daughter. I didn’t believe her. Not for a moment. Rachael might’ve been curious, but she had no use for a twelve-year-old girl. Not with the kind of lifestyle she led. All she cared about was the money.”

“What money?” I ask.

“I paid her four thousand dollars. To stay away from us. Away from Painters Mill. It wasn’t enough. I knew it would never be enough. So I stopped her. To protect Fannie.”

“How did you stop her?” I ask.

Her face screws up, in pain from the gunshot wound—or anguish because of what she did. I don’t know. “I remember getting Fannie’s bat out of the buggy. I was just going to scare her, you know. Tell her to take the money. To go away and never come back.”

Loretta begins to cry. “She was actually happy to see me. Can you imagine? And then I just … I don’t know what happened. I was so angry. I hit her and then she was on the floor. The bat was in my hand. It was as if the devil took over my body. He made me do ungodly things.”

Skid hands me another wad of gauze and I put it to use. “How much does Ben know?” I ask.

“He didn’t know any of it. Just that Fannie was adopted. He never questioned me. It all came out the night that deputy attacked me in the barn. I told him everything.”

I hear the wail of sirens. I’m aware of Pickles and Skid standing next to us. The bark and hiss of their radios. Most of all, I’m aware of the blood soaking the gauze, oozing between my fingers at an alarming rate, and the growing pool beneath her.

“I was always the good one,” she whispers.

“Loretta, stay with me,” I say. “Stay with me.”

The Amish woman fades to unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 41

There is comfort in what is familiar. An inner calm that comes with ritual and routine. We find reprieve from turmoil when we partake in the things we know. The heart finds solace in the company of those we love. I’m lucky to have all of those elements in my life, especially the people I love.

I’m sitting on a gurney in the emergency room of Pomerene Hospital, wondering where the doctor has gone, debating whether I should make my getaway while the getting away is good. The side of my head is numb where two nasty lacerations were cleaned and closed. I’ve been X-rayed, injected, and CT-scanned. Hopefully I’ll get a clean bill of health and be on my way soon. I’ve no intention of spending the night.

I’m wearing a hospital gown with a paper sheet covering my legs, which are bruised and smeared with mud. Someone tucked my trousers, shirt, and boots into a bag and placed them on a shelf. I can see the caked mud from where I’m sitting.

Through all the tests and good humor, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the case. About Rachael Schwartz. About Loretta and Ben Bontrager. And, of course, Fannie.

I understand why they did what they did. To protect the child they’d loved since birth and raised as their own. Rachael Schwartz threatened to destroy all of it. After she was gone, I became a threat. What I can’t reconcile is that these two people were willing to commit multiple violent crimes—including murder—to protect their secrets. What they did goes against the very foundation of what it means to be Amish. How could they possibly believe that God would forgive them their sins and they would be welcomed into heaven? Were the stakes so high that they convinced themselves the risk of hell was worth the gain?

Ben Bontrager was booked into the Holmes County jail. Loretta was taken by ambulance to Pomerene Hospital. Last I heard, Fannie was picked up by Children Services shortly after. The girl faces a great deal of upheaval in the coming hours and days and weeks. Likely, she’ll be placed with a foster family initially, and then probably with her biological grandparents Rhoda and Dan Schwartz. I don’t know how she’ll fare. The one thing I do know is that the Amish community will step in to help with the transition and support her.

“Someone said there’s a dirty cop back here.”

I look up to see Glock shove aside the privacy curtain and pause upon seeing me.

“Dude, we’re not supposed to be back here.” Behind him, Skid glances over his shoulder as if expecting some stout nurse to stop them and escort them out.

Next to him, Pickles and Mona struggle to see past the curtain.

“You decent, Chief?” Mona asks.