I Blessed Her Wedding With My Life novel · Chapter 12 of 24

Chapter 12: Where They Keep Her

I did not go to my mother's house by myself.

I called the sheriff's office from Anson's kitchen at eight in the morning and said I was reporting that Tilda Prescott had been reported missing by her husband.

"I know where she is," I said. "She's at 14 Marsh Lane. I'd like a deputy to see her with his own eyes."

The woman on the phone took my name.

At nine the young deputy with the freckled neck pulled up outside the lake house.

"The sheriff says to do what you ask, ma'am," he said, "within reason."

"This is within reason."

Anson drove, and Dot sat in the back with her handbag in her lap.

The Alder house looked the same as ever from the street, white clapboard and hydrangeas, with lace curtains in every window.

My mother opened the front door before we reached the porch.

She wore a gray cardigan and her pearls, and she held a dish towel in her hands.

"Josephine," she said. "Whatever this is, it is very rude."

"My sister's husband says she's missing," I said. "The deputy needs to see her."

"She's resting."

"Then he'll see her resting."

"I will not have a deputy in my house."

"Ma'am," the deputy said, stepping up beside me, and his voice was polite and not at all unsure, "I have a report of a missing woman, and I have reason to think she's here. I can wait while you call the sheriff, but I'd rather not."

Up and down Marsh Lane, front doors were opening.

A man in a bathrobe stood on his lawn with a mug.

Two women in gardening gloves had stopped at the end of their drive.

My mother looked at them, and I watched her do the sum.

"Of course," she said, and stepped aside with a lovely smile. "I have nothing to hide."

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