Page 25 of The Souls of Lost Lake

Noah stilled, working his mouth from side to side, contemplating. His hands were at his waist. Ava noted the cords in the backs of them, the bronzed skin, the trimmed nails. They were strong hands. She averted her eyes.

“Ava...” Noah dared a step closer toward her.

She looked down and off to the side, away from him.

He stopped. “Arewesure you didn’t do anything to Jipsy?”

And there it was. The reason he’d let the town believe and get in a fury that she’d up and left with Jipsy’s body somehow in tow. The reason he was himself a liar. The reason he didn’t want to let anyone know she was still under his roof.

Ava lifted accusing eyes. “You think I killed her, don’t ya?”

Noah’s eyes never flinched. Small embers brewed in them as he looked directly back at her. “I need to know.”

“And Hanny?”

“What about Hanny?” Noah asked.

“Does she think maybe I killed Jipsy too? And Hubbard? What reason would I have? You all think I’m a monster?”

“Ava.”

“No!” Ava raised her palms toward Noah. “Now you’ve got me in a fix and a fiddle. I look like I’m on the run and I done hacked away at two of the town’s members. But I’m here. Here and right as rain. I didn’tdonothin’ to Jipsy!”

Noah evaded her proclamation of innocence and countered it with conversation, as if she’d not just ranted a few inches from his face. “Until we figure out how to prove you didn’t kill Matthew Hubbard, or have anything to do with Jipsy, you’re safer here with no one knowing your whereabouts. Otherwise you’re going to get locked up with no proof of the crime, or worse, someone’s going to enact their own justice.”

“You’re all heartless beasts,” Ava mumbled. “And what makes you sure I won’t kill you or Hanny?”

Noah didn’t answer right away. Instead, he reached for a letter on the desk in front of him, lifted it, studied the writing, then set it back down. Finally he looked at her. This time, truly looked. Deep into her heart, she was sure of it, and that was troubling.

“I don’t know, Ava, but I know everyone needs someone to believe in them.”

“And you’re sayin’ that’s you? That you’re goin’ to risk believin’ in me? Risk your life even on the chance you’re wrong and I’ll sneak into your room tonight and chop you up like kindling?” Ava challenged.

Noah’s laugh was sad and not at all laced with humor or even irony. It was just sad. Colorless. Hopeless, if Ava were to really try to pinpoint it. His smile was more of a wince.

“I owe it to God.”

“Well, that’s just heartwarmin’.” Ava sank back into the chair. So, she was penance for Noah Pritchard. Which meant if she turned out to be a murdering vixen—as the town of Tempter’s Creek thought her to be—then he’d done something so bad that his life was worth the risk to gain forgiveness. And was forgiveness even worth a person’s life? Ava was hard-pressed to believe that it was.

If Ava was going to hide away in the parsonage, then Hanny had to go. At least that was Hanny’s argument, which was now being vehemently protested against by Noah. Ava could hear the two through the open doorway of the front room. Their voices carried from the kitchen through the tiny dining area.

“If I stay, they’ll all know there’s a reason for me to still be here with you. Now, there’s nothing untoward about that, but if they figure out the reason is that Ava is here, well then your secret is out and she’s back on the chopping block.”

“If you don’t stay, then I’m a single man living alone with a single woman, and that scandal will ruin me.”

“And you didn’t think of thatbeforeyou volunteered to watch over her?”

Noah’s frustration dropped from his voice, and he almost sounded like a scolded schoolboy. “I banked on prayer you’d be willing to help me out.”

“And I was. Iam. Silly boy, you’re a wretch.”

“I am.” A huge sigh.

“That’snotwhat I meant.” Hanny banged a pot.

Ava strained to hear over the clatter.

“You’re in a pickle. What excuse will you give them when my little house stays dark at night, and you still have an eighty-two-year-old woman playing grandmother to you in the parsonage? Hmmm? No one is going to believeIneed help.”