Page 5 of The Sheriff's Mistletoe Bride
Another bridge was crossed and then the sign welcoming her to the state of Texas appeared through the rain and, as if on cue, the rain lessened and through the remaining drops on the windshield, she could see that sunshine shone ahead even though the rain was still falling.How strange!She shook her head.It was something she had not seen before.But she’d take it.The dark clouds had decided to stay in Arkansas.Whatever it was, Ally would take it as a good omen for their trip.
“Wake up, Teddy.Some copilot you are,” she commented as she took an exit onto a side road to pull into a large convenience store/gas station.“Thanks for the help during that storm.Glad it didn’t interrupt your nap.”She grinned at her companion as he raised himself up and stretched, looking out the passenger side window to see where they were stopping.Her words did not faze him.
The tank full once again, she pulled into a parking place and then took Teddy out to enjoy the dog park that was part of the amenities of their stop.It seemed to be quite a popular spot judging by all the cars and people.Securing the dog back inside the car, she ventured inside to grab a snack and check out what was the draw for such a place.It was apparent the moment she walked in and was greeted with so many smiles and welcomes.Texas friendliness was certainly the order of the day.It wasn’t just a slogan on a sign.
The aroma of the fresh-baked foods caught her attention and before long she had bought a sandwich and some other items.When she glanced at her watch, she was surprised at how time had gotten away from her as she browsed one aisle after another.After paying for her items, she returned to the car.
“Remind me to stop here again,” she told Teddy as he eyed her sack.“This is quite a place.But I want to reach our destination before dark.And no, I didn’t forget you.”She smiled at him as she withdrew a dog chew bone from the sack between them.Teddy’s body began to wag in anticipation as he watched her unwrap it and then present it to him on his blanket.He immediately went to work enjoying it.
“Okay, let’s head due west and see this place Annie loved so much.”
The road was definitely headed due west as the sun was intent on trying to beat them to the horizon ahead.Its brightness gave Ally a headache and the sunglasses were not much help with the constant glare.She was glad that she had some reprieve while maneuvering the traffic through Dallas and then through Fort Worth, both huge cities along her route.For someone who had little experience of highway driving, she was fast becoming attuned to it, but she still was on alert and followed the speed limits when very few others did.
“I guess the posted signs are just suggestions and not the rule,” she joked to the animal beside her.But it was still nerve-racking for a person not used to driving much at all.
Once past the cities, the country became rolling hills, which were a change from the previous scenery.The GPS on her phone alerted her an hour later that she would need to turn off the main interstate and take a two-lane blacktop country road to the southwest.The hills became even more pronounced, and Ally’s attention was divided more and more between the winding road and the changing countryside with its tall trees and intermittent creeks running through fields that appeared now and then.The grass was more brownish and tanner in this area, and here and there black cattle could be seen in pastures.
She was getting closer to what Annie had described over and over.Sunbeams skipping off the trickling waters of a lazy creek as it rolls and circles stones in its path between massive roots of towering trees called cypresses that gravitated to the banks of rivers and lakes set amongst towering hillsides like blue gems.Annie always sounded like a writer when describing the land she loved.Ally would often close her eyes and travel across the miles to the far-off landscapes of that distant place called Destiny’s River, Texas.
She would rather think of those more pleasant moments than the ones in her life before she met Annie and everything changed for her.The time scale on her lifespan would come to be known in her mind asBefore AnnieandAfter Annie.That was how she cataloged her memories.Before Annie, she had been just one of thousands of runaways who ended up lost in the cement caverns of the city and never searched for.Losing her mother at age thirteen, she was then dumped on a street corner by her third stepfather when she was sixteen and too much of a troublemaker, according to him when he opened the car door and told her to get out.
She learned soon enough to leave tears out of things.They showed weakness.She had to be tough.And resourceful.Many times, she wanted to just give up, but something inside her would not allow that.And then one day, when the rain was pouring down and she was on a street corner trying to hand out the flyers she was getting ten dollars to distribute to passersby for a new pizza place, a woman had walked up and offered to give her twenty for the stack she had left.Then she had offered to buy Ally something to eat in the café two doors down.
Ally had been hungry and cold and wet.The hot meal sounded good.And that was how she met Annie Destino Pickett.Annie and she visited for an hour, then two, while the rain cleared.And then Annie handed Ally a card and told her about a job at a bakery four blocks away.She could go there and apply for a job and use Annie as a reference.She had nothing to lose, so she did.And she found herself employed.Then she found out the identity of the owner.It was Annie.Over the next few weeks, she was allowed to sleep in the back office of the business.Then about three months later, Annie offered her a room in her house.She had already observed how much Annie was respected by the neighborhood people who stopped in each day for homemade loaves of bread and pastries.
Ally took up the offer and that was how the pair of them became the first semblance of family that Ally had known in her life.A real family that was built on trust and love.She learned so much from Annie and the long talks they would share in the evenings.Annie had saved her.And only lately had Ally begun to feel that perhaps she might have brought something to Annie’s life that she had searched for also.But thoughts of that life and Annie now were laced with a fragile heartache.
All things magical and heartbreaking and a glint of unshed tears often ended the tour of Annie’s beloved memories.And thus, Destiny’s River was the reason she had set off on a solo journey.Now, Ally was seeing it for herself.Would there be magic or… The next instant a flash of something she barely registered and a squeal of tires on pavement, mingled with a scream of shock that escaped from her throat as in slow motion the car left the roadway and became airborne as it topped the rise in the road.One hand gripped the steering wheel and the other instinctively shot out to shield the dog beside her and then it all went black.
*
Mathew Parker watchedthe scene unfolding in slow motion.Yet, it happened in a blinding split second of time.One moment he opened his door to get out of his sheriff’s vehicle while telling his daughter to stay in the car.But she moved faster than his words.He only got the scream of her name out before the squeal of brakes on pavement sounded as loud as a freight train in his brain.Then he began to run to where his child stood clutching the runaway kitten, frozen in her arms in terror.The child was a statue with bated breath.All this registered in his brain as he made it to the other side of the pavement to wrap Jillie in his arms and try to shield them all from the loud crunching of metal on gravel, and then a deafening silence followed.
Moving on adrenaline-spiked instinct, Matt carried his daughter swiftly across to the SUV and tucked her, still clutching the kitten, in the back seat while his hand went to his radio, and he called for ambulance and more help.Then he jumped into the front seat and put his lights on to bright flashing yellow as he quickly maneuvered the vehicle across the roadway to block both lanes.He was out and leaning into the back seat again.
“I have a lot of work right now to see if the people in that car need help and you need to not move from this vehicle.Understand what I just said?Say yes, Jillie.”
First a nod and then a shaky voice responded: “Yes, Daddy.I’m sorry, Daddy.”
“Just stay put.I love you.”He dropped a swift kiss on her head and stepped back, shutting the door.The dad transformed into the official lawman with a job to do.
He went back across the road and was glad to see a pickup had pulled to a stop just a few yards down.He recognized the man as a rancher who lived a couple miles down the road.He could use him.
“Jason, if you would pull your vehicle across the top of the rise and until a patrol gets here?Shouldn’t be long.Help is on the way.”
“You got it, Matt,” he responded with a shout and wave.
His attention turned to the vehicle and to his surprise and somewhat relief, he noted it hadn’t rolled over but had slid down the steep side on the tall grass to land with its midsection lodged against two trees that seemed to have been placed there for this very situation.Whatever it was, he was glad of it.He slipped and slid a bit down the steep side until he reached the car.Glass had shattered due to the impact he assumed, so he was able to look inside and see there was one person, the driver presumably, a woman who was unconscious…he hoped.He had to pull more than a few times to get the door open wide enough to allow him to reach her hand and feel for a pulse.Relief and a thank you went upward, as she was still alive.Her head looked like it had taken a good hit and probably part of the missing windshield might be responsible for the gash on her forehead that was bleeding quite a bit.He knew from training and experience that head wounds always bled more and looked worse than they usually were, and he hoped this might be the case.
“Ma’am, are you okay?Can you hear me?Help is on the way.Can you hear me?Just stay still and answer if you can,” he repeated and there was a faint flutter of eyelashes.A soft moan escaped her lips.She seemed to be in distress as she woke.He needed to keep her still until the ambulance arrived.There was a faint siren in the distance, and he hoped it was the ambulance in the lead.
“It’s okay.Help is on the way.I’m not leaving until they get here.”
“Teddy…I want Teddy.Where is Teddy?Annie…is she okay?Got to get them both.”The words were hard to make out at first but were there others involved and not in the car?
“Who is Teddy?Who is Annie?Were they here in the car with you?”
“Yes!You must find them.Need them.”Her lashes rose a bit in a wince of pain, and he saw bright blue glints through them.She was pleading.“Please find them.I was supposed to take care of them.I didn’t see the child… Did I hit her?Oh no!Please help her…”
