Mittman, Stephanie by Bridge to Yesterday Read Free Book Online

to
realize how much he had loved the boy.
    Maybe
he wouldn't be dead, she thought, if Ben had cared enough to keep him on the
right path while he was alive.
    ***
    A
baby without a mother. Mary Grace let her imagination soar as she held the
Tates' nephew in her arms. If only this were her baby. But she knew better than
to indulge herself in the world of "if onlies." She had spent a long
time in that world, and it had tortured her in the end.
    And
now she had foolishly agreed to watch the baby while her hosts ran what they
called an important errand. What else could she do? The men had just lost their
sister, and there was no one else to take care of the child. She couldn't bring
herself to think of him as Horace. A baby as handsome as he was ought to have a
better name. Like Paddy. Patrick Sean O'Reilly. It had a nice ring to it.
    Her
imagination was getting the best of her again, and she chided herself. People
didn't get second chances in this world, and she knew it. Knew it better than
anyone, maybe. If she couldn't change the past, she was determined to learn
from it at least. The baby in her arms clutched a fistful of her hair and
pushed it into his mouth.
    "No,"
she said gently, pulling the hair out from between his chubby fingers and kissing
his fist in payment. The baby turned his head in toward her breast, nuzzling
her and smacking his lips as he looked for nourishment.
    "No,"
she said again, but this time tears choked her voice. She knew she had to leave
before this baby found the place in her heart she had closed and locked years
before. As soon as his uncles returned, she would have to be on her way.
    Her
hope was that they would return with Benjamin. In their grief she was sure she
could make them understand that Benjamin belonged with his mother. Every child
had that right.
    She
wiped a stray tear with the back of her hand and sniffed back the rest that
threatened. She was ready to kill Benjamin's father with her own bare hands for
putting her in this position to begin with. How could he have arranged to take
his son to the most backward place on the face of the earth? Even Appalachia
had TVs now, she thought.
    Did
they still bury people outside of cemeteries anywhere but here? It reminded her
of the time she had trailed Jessica Chandler's kidnappers into the Ozark
Mountains. But there she'd been close enough to her car to alert the
authorities. She remembered looking down the barrel of a rifle and being told
to "git." The authorities had credited her with saving Jessica's
life. Jessica was too young for it to have any lasting effect on her, but Mary
Grace would never forget the cabin she had found the baby in—dank, dirty,
without electricity or running water.
    And
behind the house, the old family graveyard had stood, a laundry line hanging above
it, a testament to the idea that life goes on. Not here, she thought as she
busied herself in the kitchen getting something for the baby to eat.
Here, someone died. And whether the men brought Benjamin back or not, she was
leaving the moment they returned. The baby smiled at her and the mashed potato
she was feeding him oozed out of his mouth.
    "And
I'll send the authorities back for you," she assured him. "This is no
way for a baby to live." She looked down at the skirt and blouse she had
on. How Emily had managed to stand her brothers' ridiculous old-fashioned ideas
was beyond Mary Grace. Mason had asked her nicely not to wear the jeans she had
come in around his brothers, and she'd complied, but what she could manage for
a couple of days was a whole lot different than what she could tolerate as a
way of life.
    The
men didn't even have a car, as far as she could tell. They'd ridden off to town
like cowboys, and when she'd asked to accompany them, they'd promised to take
her to town as soon as they returned from their important errand. There, they
assured her, she could telephone her office. And so she waited. And waited.
    She
and the baby were both asleep when the men