AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Holy shit,” Josie said.
Anya’s was much more defined, even though the scar was older and her skin white and slightly raised, whereas Sharon Eddy’s brand was still raw and bloodied. No bigger than the size of a coaster, it was a horseshoe shot through the middle with an arrow. The fletching on the arrow was represented by two lines on each side.
Anya said, “My ex-husband gave me this right before I left him over ten years ago.”
SEVEN
Anya dissolved into tears. Gretchen stepped forward and gently pushed her hands aside, pulling her waistband back up and shirt back down. Then she took Anya into her arms, tucking the doctor’s head against her shoulder and letting her cry. Josie covered Sharon Eddy back up, trying to order her thoughts. She’d known Anya Feist for eight years, and yet she hadn’t even known that she had ever been married. The scar running down the side of Josie’s face stung. She walked over to the two women and put a hand between Anya’s shoulder blades, feeling the knobs of her vertebrae.
After a few moments, Anya’s sobs subsided. She extricated herself from the two detectives and walked toward the back of the room where she found a couple of paper towels. Dabbing at her face, she said, “Thank you.”
Gretchen said, “We’ve all got scars, Doc.”
“And trauma,” Josie said. “Just between the two of us, Gretchen and I have enough trauma to keep a whole army of therapists busy.”
“For decades,” Gretchen added.
Anya laughed. “I don’t normally talk about it.”
Josie pointed back and forth between herself and Gretchen. “Neither do we.”
Some of the tension in Anya’s shoulders loosened. “You’re not angry? We’ve known each other for so long. Not just through work. Josie, you and I have lunch regularly.”
Josie rubbed at where her scar ended beneath her chin. “No, not at you. I’m a little angry with myself for not making more of an effort to know more about you.”
“Josie,” said Anya. “I’m a closed book, just like you. Just like Gretchen. We do the job. We talk about the present. We try not to look back.” She glanced at Sharon Eddy’s face with a small shudder. “Until we have to.”
Gretchen pulled her notebook out from her coat pocket and a pen from behind her ear. “When is the last time you saw your ex-husband?”
“About ten years ago,” said Anya, twisting the damp paper towel in her hands.
Josie said, “No contact at all?”
“None. The first few years, after I moved here, I was a paranoid wreck. Always thinking I saw him on the street or following me in a car. But it was never him.”
“You didn’t press charges against him?” Gretchen said. “For the…branding?”
She squeezed the paper towel inside her fist. “Oh, I did. He pled down. His father intervened. Where we grew up, his dad had a lot of influence with everyone, including the county judges. In fact, my ex-father-in-law was on the town council for many years. As a result of his meddling, my ex-husband ended up on house arrest instead of prison. He was free in a matter of months. I kind of thought he learned his lesson after that but I couldn’t be sure so I moved. Got this job. Started over. I’ve been happy here.”
Her last statement was wistful, as if that happiness had now been tainted by the ugly intrusion of her past. She turned toward Sharon Eddy and stared down at the girl for several seconds, her expression tortured. Gently, she placed her empty palm over Sharon’s eyes, closing them.
Gretchen said, “Can you tell us about the branding?”
Anya tucked the paper towel into her scrub pocket and pulled the sheet up over Sharon’s head. Taking in a long breath, she turned back to them. “My ex-husband lived on a dairy farm. A family farm. Huge, very successful.”
Josie said, “I know this was ten years ago, but I thought that farmers were moving away from hot branding to RFID tags.”
Gretchen said, “What are RFID tags?”
“RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification,” said Josie.
Anya jammed her hands into her pockets. “They’re plastic tags that farmers can affix to the ears of livestock to keep track of them. They usually have a number on them and are readable with handheld or stationary devices. Basically, it’s like piercing the animal’s ear rather than branding their skin. Freeze branding was in vogue for a while, and a lot of farms still use it as a more humane alternative to hot branding, but there was always a dispute over whether or not freeze branding really was more humane. RFID is far less barbaric than either of those, and yes, my ex-father-in-law moved to RFID tags as soon as they became available, before most farms in the country were using them.”
Gretchen tapped her pen against her notepad. “Sounds like you were poised to inherit the farm.”
“Vance was—that’s my ex-husband’s name. Vance Hadlee of Hadlee Farms.”
The name was familiar. “Where is the farm?” Josie asked.
