Why the Girl Hid Under Table Seven

CHAPTER 3 - THE BACK DOOR

By the time I reached the kitchen, the cook had already yelled, "Out back!"

I pushed through the swinging door into the alley behind the diner. Cold night air hit my face. The smell of fryer grease and wet asphalt sat heavy in the dark.

The man in the blue shirt was halfway to the dumpsters.

He nearly made it.

Then a trucker stepping out for a smoke stuck out one boot and sent him sprawling onto the pavement.

He came up cursing, one sleeve torn back.

Around his wrist was a leather cord with a small silver saint medal.

Donna had been right to call. But the sheriff's deputy who arrived five minutes later made things worse before he made them better.

He looked at the cuffed man, then at Lucy, then at me. "You know this child?"

"No."

He frowned. "And yet she's hiding under your table."

Lucy clung to my jacket before I could answer.

That made me look suspicious too.

So I told him the truth. I was a retired county investigator driving home from Tulsa after identifying my son's body three years too late.

Silence followed that.

I hadn't planned to say it out loud. Not to strangers. Not in a diner parking lot under a flickering light.

The deputy's face softened, but only a little. "We'll sort it out."

Inside, Lucy sat in the booth with hot chocolate she wasn't drinking. Her black canvas shoes barely touched the floor. She watched the door like fear itself might return if she blinked.

Then another car pulled in.

An older woman rushed through the diner, gray coat half-buttoned, hair coming loose, one hand wrapped in a torn napkin. Blood had seeped through it.

"Lucy!"

The girl flew off the booth and ran straight into her arms.

I let out the first full breath I'd taken all night.

But relief lasted only seconds.

The grandmother turned to the deputy and said, "That man is my former son-in-law."

Then she looked at Lucy and added, shaking, "And he thinks if he takes you first, no one will ever hear what your mother said before she died."