Poisoned Secrets

“Are you all right?” Maggie asked when she thought her voice would work.

Ashley’s shudder rippled along Maggie’s body. The child nodded but kept her arms locked about Maggie while dragging in deep breaths. She stroked the little girl’s long brown hair and thanked the Lord.

“You’ll be okay now,” Maggie whispered as much to reassure herself as her sister. Never in her life had she felt so scared as she had when she had seen Ashley unable to suck in air.

The five-year-old sobbed against Maggie’s chest, tremor after tremor passing through her small body into hers. “I—I couldn’t—breathe.”

“I know, honey.” Her arms around Ashley tightened as though Maggie could absorb the child’s fear and wipe from her mind the past few minutes. What if she hadn’t been here to help? She clung tighter to the child.

“What happened?” Kane asked from the doorway.

“Maggie saved Ashley’s life,” Kenny said, his face still registering his own fear and panic. “She was blue!”

Maggie looked up at Kane, his gaze ensnaring hers. “She’ll be all right now. A peanut went down the wrong way.”

For a brief moment distress lined his face until Kane visibly took command of his emotions. He glanced from Maggie to Ashley. Crossing the room, he took the child into his arms. The small girl wrapped herself against him as he held her cradled to him, his eyes soft with concern, a smile of reassurance on his face.

“Uncle Kane, I tried to. Really I tried.” Ashley hiccupped between her words, tears cascading down her cheeks.

An ashen cast to his skin sharpened the hard planes of his face. “Shh,” Kane whispered while he held Ashley in his arms. “I won’t let anything else happen to you.”

He walked down the hallway toward the bedrooms and disappeared inside one. Maggie stood. All strength flowed from her legs. She clutched a dining room chair to steady herself, trying to assimilate what had just taken place.

“Kenny! What’s going on in here?”

Both Maggie and Kenny turned at the sound of the woman’s voice. Maggie felt paralyzed, staring at the woman who had given birth to her. In that instant when their gazes touched, time came to a standstill for Maggie. She didn’t have to be introduced to Victoria Pennington to know the woman standing inside the doorway was her birth mother. She was a stranger, yet she was familiar at the same time. Maggie experienced the most disconcerting feeling.

“Who is this woman, Kenny? You know my rule. No one is allowed in this apartment when I’m gone.” Victoria’s gaze swung from Kenny to Maggie. Victoria placed her hands on her son’s shoulders, her stance protective, her expression accusing as she continued to scrutinize Maggie, stranger to stranger.

Don’t you recognize me? Don’t you know who I am?

Maggie pushed away from the chair holding her up, a taut band about her chest making each breath difficult. “I’m your new neighbor, Maggie Ridgeway.” The words came out in a whisper, her mouth parched. It took all her strength to remain standing a few feet from Victoria Pennington and not shout the truth. Maggie wanted to run; she felt as if her carefully thought-out plan was blowing up in her face, leaving fragments behind to slice her composure to shreds.

“Kenny, that still doesn’t excuse you from breaking an important rule,” the woman said in a softer tone.

Maggie backed away, beads of sweat coating her brow. She needed to leave before she hyperventilated.

“She saved Ashley’s life. She wasn’t breathing—”

“What? Where’s Ashley?”

“In her room with Uncle Kane,” Kenny answered.

Victoria rushed down the hall as Kane came out of Ashley’s bedroom. “Vicky, she’s okay. She’s sleeping now.”

With hands clenched at her sides, fingernails digging into her palms, Maggie took another step toward the door, the air charged with intense emotions that demanded she feel something other than indignation. But at this moment she couldn’t deny the anger deep in her heart.

While Kane briefly explained what happened, Vicky peered into the room and sighed. “She fell asleep the minute I put her down.”

“I should have been here. I got held up at the office. The police came again to the campus to question everyone who knew Henry.”

“Yeah, I know. They talked with me.” Kane shot Kenny a look.

Vicky closed her daughter’s bedroom door and headed toward the living area with Kane. “I wish I didn’t have to work. Then that wouldn’t have happened.”

“It could have happened with you sitting right here.”

“John and I are so lucky to have you here. You’re like a member of the family. I miss not living near mine.”

Maggie felt as if she had been slapped in the face. To them she was an outsider. But I belong. She bit the inside of her mouth to keep from shouting the truth. The realization that the words she had no intention of saying had been on the tip of her tongue sent alarm through her.

Kane nodded toward Maggie. “Thankfully Maggie was home to help Kenny.”

“I’m sorry about the earlier reception. As you may have gathered by now, I’m Kenny and Ashley’s mother, Vicky Pennington. Thanks for saving,” her voice faltered for a few seconds before she swallowed hard and finished, “my little girl.”

My little girl. But I am also. Lord, I can’t do this.

Both Kane and Vicky waited for a response. Maggie fought down the panic surfacing. She needed to escape, retreat to her apartment and regroup.

“I’m glad I was here to help out,” Maggie finally said, her throat closing about the words. Her anger swelled to the surface, her fingernails cutting deeper into her palms. Why did you give me up? She was afraid to say anything for fear that question would tumble out.

“I helped Maggie move in yesterday,” Kenny said, breaking the awkward moment of silence. “She paid me ten dollars!” He took the money out of his pocket and waved it in the air.

Vicky shifted her attention to her son. “Ten dollars?”

Envy, doubt and anger constricted Maggie’s stomach. She prayed none of her confused feelings were showing on her face. As Kenny and Vicky talked, Maggie saw her chance to escape. She took the few steps to the entrance and fled into the hallway.

Her gaze fastened on her door, she headed for it. The sound of the one behind her closing relaxed some of the tension in her until she heard Kane say, “Are you all right?”

“Great,” she murmured and thrust open her door. Safe.

She turned to close it, but Kane had already slipped inside her apartment. She rotated away from his probing gaze. It was bad enough she felt this seesawing between anger and hurt. She certainly didn’t want him to see it in her expression.

The sight of the disarray and stacked boxes accentuated her loneliness, a sense of abandonment. She hadn’t been prepared for this tangle of confusion twisting her stomach. In St. Louis she had thought she could handle this objectively as she did most things in her life. Wrong. There was nothing objective about this situation.

“Maggie?”

The sound of her front door finally being closed echoed through the apartment—her home now, hundreds of miles away from anything familiar. Why did I do this? Why couldn’t I be happy not ever knowing why my mother gave me up, what my heritage is? Lord, why do I have two mothers who don’t really want me? She desperately sought the strength she always gained when she turned to God for reassurance and comfort.

“Maggie, you aren’t all right.” Kane touched her hand, sending a bolt of recognition up her arm.

His nearness further eroded her self-confidence, making herself doubt her sanity for even considering this move. She’d gone through life insulating herself from others, and suddenly the walls were crumbling, her usual defenses no longer working. She stepped away, needing to put some distance between them.

His worried expression prompted her to say, “I’m fine. Why do you ask?” None of the nonchalance she wanted to project came across. She held herself so taut that her body ached.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe it was the pale tone to your skin or the fact you didn’t even tell Kenny and Vicky goodbye.”

Feigning an interest in an open box, she lifted her shoulders in a shrug. “It isn’t every day I save someone’s life.”