Chapter 1

Discovery

He was picking at the mystery of a disappeared desert southwest civilization when somebody knocked on his RV door. Grumbling to himself at the interruption, Reese lifted himself off the bench seat and lurched to the door.

Damn! I’ve been sitting too long at this keyboard!

He unlatched the door, pushed it open and growled “What?”

A girl jumped back, trying to keep her balance. She fell backwards, sat down hard and flopped over onto her side. She scrambled to her hands and knees to regain her feet.

“Hey, there. I’m sorry, Missy. I didn’t mean to scare you,” Reese called. “Are you okay?”

She was young, way too young to be knocking on a stranger’s door. She was a big-boned girl with tawny skin, black hair and the facial features of Latina heritage. Tears streaked down her dusky cheeks.

“Come here, girl. What’s got you so upset? Why’d you come knocking on my door?”

“Y-you’re the closest one ... the closest neighbor who looks like ... like maybe you could help,” she sobbed. “It’s our granny. She’s sick, real sick. She’s in bed and she can’t hardly get up. It’s been a couple weeks and she’s not gettin’ better and we’re all afraid and we can’t do nothin’ and they’re all cryin’ and hungry and ... and ... please, Mister! If you don’t help us, she’s maybe gonna die and we’re out of food and ... and ... our mama dumped us ‘cause they’re running from bad guys, and all us kids are alone and we’re scared and we’re hungry!”

Reese patted his pocket to be sure he had his trailer keys. He stepped through the door and motioned for the girl to back up a bit. He pulled the door shut and locked it.

“Lead on, Missy. Let’s take a look.”

She led him across the lane to one of a few permanent mobile homes set back from the seasonal RV spaces. He leased a prime riverside site on an annual contract. It was always available when he’d had enough roaming and researching and he’d decided to settle for a while. He preferred to write where he was unlikely to be disturbed. That’s why he’d grumbled when she knocked on his door. In the week since he’d been parked there nobody had intruded. Until now.

He stopped to regard the sorry shambles of a 10 by 50 stick-and-tin mobile home, aged far beyond its useful life. A glance showed that whoever lived there lived on ‘lean fixings.’ He knew time would make it harder. He stepped forward when the girl opened the trailer door and climbed inside. She turned to face him, waving at him to hurry up.

The smell of unwashed bodies, moldy carpet, garbage and stale air forced him to cover his mouth and nose. A glance around showed the living conditions were far worse than it looked from outside.

The girl grabbed his hand to tug him to the back bedroom. Its cracked door stood sagging on a loose hinge. It opened into the main bedroom. There he saw an older woman laying in bed, her stringy gray hair sweat-matted and spread on a soiled pillow. She lay with her eyes half-closed; he heard her struggling for each breath under layers of blankets and a patchwork quilt. A half-empty water glass and an aspirin bottle sat on a night stand beside her. A scattering of wadded tissues lay discarded around a wastebasket.

“Gran? I’ve brought help. It’s the man from across the road, the one in the big silver trailer. He’s here to help. Gran? Can you hear me?” the girl pleaded.

The woman’s eyes opened; she looked up to see who her granddaughter had brought. She pulled a bony hand from under the covers, raised it weakly, and gestured to Reese.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbled. “I’ve got the flu, I think. It’s been a couple of weeks. It hit me hard ... harder’n ever before. I’ve never been down this long. I can’t ... I haven’t been ... I’ve not been able to get up much. The girls, they’re bad off because of me bein’ so sick.”

Reese knew immediately that she needed help. And he needed to know how many other children were in the trailer besides the one who’d summoned him.

“My name is Reese Adams, Ma’am. I’ll help as much as I can. How many of you live here?”

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Adams. There’s Nita, there, who brought you. She’s thirteen. And ... I guess the others are ... they’re shy. They’re hiding, three girls in the other bedroom. The twins, Shy and Shay, they’re eight, and the little one, Bug, she’s four. They’re all my granddaughters. That’s us. Four girls and me.

Reese nodded.

“Nita, go check on the girls,” she asked. “Tell them to stay put and to be quiet, but don’t worry. Everything will be okay. Please, go do that?”

“Sure, Granny. I’ll tell ‘em.”