The Outsider Series: The Complete Omnibus Collection

Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

Andy sat in his truck, gazing out the window at the acres of pasture, the corral, the barn, just staring into the miles of forest that backed onto their land. A tap on the window had him sitting up, turning the key so he could roll down the window.

“Everything okay, boss?” asked Ben, the young stable hand, with auburn curly hair.

Andy opened his door and stepped out. He could feel Ben watching him as he stared at the back door. Ben cleared his throat, and Andy said, “Fine, Ben. Did you get those stalls cleaned out?”

“Almost done, sir,” he said eagerly.

“Well, get to it,” he snapped, heading toward the back door and dreading each step the closer he got. He listened to the gravel crunching under his booted feet. He rubbed his hand over his face.

He stepped inside and wiped his feet on the mat. This was probably the first time he’d ever been so meticulous. He was stalling and he knew it as he stepped to the kitchen door and took a breath, then another before pushing open the door and taking in the dinner-hour chaos. Food covered the counter, steam rose from the stove, and Jules, Aida, and three other servants all stopped and stared at him.

It was Jules who spoke first. “Sir, is there something I can get for you?” He didn’t miss how nervous she was, and then she pointed to the door.

Andy ignored Jules and said, “Everyone, out. I need to talk to Aida.” He didn’t really care how he sounded, because he was worried how Aida would react to what he had to tell her about Laura. The fact was that Andy had screwed up, and he dreaded telling the one person with the gumption to stand up to him the way she did. To Andy, well, Aida mattered because of that.

The other servants left, but Jules stopped in front of him, wringing her hands. “Sir, your mother is entertaining through the holidays, and this is not the time to lose the cook.…”

“Jules,” Andy interrupted in a sharp voice he couldn’t hide if he wanted to, “leave us now!”

Jules’ face tinged pink, and she nodded, skirting around Andy and leaving the kitchen. Aida glanced up at Andy and then continued rolling out pastry dough. She said nothing but pursed her lips, her face taking on a hardness he didn’t want to see.

“Aida, I went to Laura’s today. And she was gone.”

“Gone where?” She kept rolling the dough and then lined a pie plate. There were seven lined up.

“I don’t know. That dump she lived in, the scumbag who owns it was there. He threw her out, said she couldn’t pay the rent. The lady upstairs said Laura loaded her car last night and she hadn’t seen her since.” Andy rested his hand on the counter, waiting for the woman to start yelling, to say she quit, to call him a pig. Anything.

Instead, she calmly laid down the rolling pin and looked up at Andy with a hint of sadness in her eyes. “Did you know that girl is from Arlington? She got herself in trouble at fifteen, pregnant. Her parents threw her out when they found out. They didn’t want her influencing her siblings with her seedy behavior, as they worded it, or rather, her mother did. Her father just turned his back on her. They said she was a bad influence and didn’t want her around as a role model. All that girl did was have a momentary lapse, and, unlike many teens, she got pregnant. The boy, the father, treated her like a leper and would have nothing to do with her or the baby. So, with no money, she lived in a shelter in Arlington during the day, working part time at a fast food restaurant until the baby was born. But the social workers were sniffing around, looking to take her baby, and when she went into labor, the hospital notified social services because she was so young, and the social workers flocked in like vultures.

“She called her parents, but her mother said to her that if she wanted to come home, she’d have to give up the baby. Less than twelve hours after she gave birth, she walked out of the hospital with her baby and never looked back. She’s been living here ever since. Do you know what that kind of fear and constant worry whispering in your ear does to a person? Gabriel is hers. She is young. She is honest. And that girl works harder than anyone I know and doesn’t complain about anything. Working for a pittance, barely getting by, I think. Oh, she’d not speak of it. But I knew. I had eyes and could see the strain, the stress that she’d always cover up with a smile. But she was also beaten down. She had to shake off your daddy’s advances more than once.”

Aida watched him closely, but Andy was speechless and didn’t know what to say. Hearing that his dad had hit on Laura had a rage building to a slow boil inside him. He wanted to hit something. Maybe that was what she saw when he swiped his hand roughly over his face.

“Andy Friessen, maybe there is hope for you. But there is a difference, too, between being angry about someone wronged and doing something about it. So what do you plan on doing?”

She watched him closely, her arms crossed, and at any moment Andy half expected her to toss her apron and stomp out the door, telling him to shove this job. He could see the stubborn stance written all over her. All the years she’d worked for his family, he’d never really known her, which was a pity. He liked all of her “Right is right, and wrong is wrong” stance. It was refreshing to meet someone who didn’t give a crap about what everyone thought or go along just because it was easier.

“I’ll find her,” he promised, but he was unsure of where to start and unwilling to admit even to himself that he needed to find Laura and her little boy for his own peace of mind. No one deserved how she had been treated.

Aida nodded. “Then you’d best go find her.” She picked up the rolling pin and set about making her pies. “Now get out of my kitchen, Andy Friessen.”