“Like Eileen. Even though she was only a child.” My God.
“She was twelve. That was the normal marrying age.”
Daisy remembered the details of the locket’s engraving. “Twelve branches on the olive tree.”
His gaze flew up, locking on Daisy’s. “How did you know that?”
“Trish took a photo of the locket before the police got there last night. She took photos of me, too, my throat, the scene, all that.” Her smile was small and rueful. “She watches a lot of cop shows on TV. Anyway, I asked her to send it to me. I wondered at the twelve branches. I thought that it was maybe the twelve tribes of Israel.”
“That may have been one of the meanings. But it was the age of womanhood.”
Daisy sighed. “Twelve. Just babies.”
“We grew up fast in Eden.”
“I guess you must have.” She dropped her brush into the cup of cleaner. The face in the portrait she’d been painting wasn’t recognizable yet, for which she was grateful. She wasn’t sure she wanted Gideon to know she was painting him. Not yet, anyway. She didn’t want to scare him away by appearing too eager. “I’m going to sit down now, but I can sit in the chair if you need your space.”
He held her gaze for a very long moment. “No,” he finally said. “Sit next to me.”
She did, folding her hands in her lap. “What happened to boys when they turned twelve?”
“Nothing. Manhood was achieved at thirteen.”
“Bar mitzvah.”
He shook his head. “They adopted some elements of Judaism, but they weren’t Jewish. They called it ‘ascension.’”
“Got it.”
She stole a glance at him. “Sasha said you had the locket’s design tattooed on your chest, but that you covered it up with a phoenix.”
He frowned. “Sasha was awfully observant for a girl who didn’t like boys.”
“She liked you. You’re like her brother.”
“So you said at dinner.” He was sitting on the sofa’s edge, his knees spread wide, leaning toward the cards he’d dealt on the coffee table. He began a new game, sorting and pairing, the muscles of his back rippling with each movement.
She hesitated, then figured she’d go big or go home. Easy to say, since she was home already and she knew he wouldn’t leave her, not until he had someone to take his place so that she’d be safe. So maybe I’m a horrible person for pushing this, but . . .
She wanted to touch him. So she did, spreading her fingers wide over his back and caressing him gently. He didn’t jerk away. Didn’t react at all. She guessed he’d been watching her from the corner of his eye, so she hadn’t surprised him. She kept up the soft touch, and after a few tense seconds, he relaxed under her palm and returned to his game.
“Tell me about the first tattoo,” she murmured.
“I got it on my thirteenth birthday. Happy, happy,” he added sarcastically.
“Did it hurt?”
“Like a fucking bitch. But I’d lived in the community for most of my life and I knew what happened to sissy-boys. I did not want to be a sissy-boy.”
Not stopping her caress, she asked, “You said you were thirteen when you escaped. How long was it after your birthday?”
“The very next day.”
She wondered which of the questions swirling in her mind she should ask next. How? Why? What about your sister? What about your mother? Why were you beaten? What happened to make you cover up the tattoo with a phoenix when you were eighteen? Why was the man who beat you not punished? Where was this place?
Finally she simply said, “Tell me.”
ELEVEN
SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 10:45 P.M.
Tell me. Gideon’s gaze was angled at the cards he’d dealt, but he’d closed his eyes, absorbing the feel of Daisy’s hand on his back. He wondered how much to tell this generous woman who wore her heart on her sleeve. She’d looked up at him like he was some kind of hero, had trusted him to keep her safe. Had grounded him when he needed her most. What would she do if she knew the truth?
She would say you were thirteen and did what you had to do. She would be happy that you protected yourself. That you made it out alive. She would say you shouldn’t feel guilty. And she wouldn’t look at you any differently.
All of that was probably true. Probably. He wasn’t sure if he was willing to risk it, though. To risk her looking at him like he was a monster. Or worse. With pity.
“I’m a vault,” she murmured. “I will keep your secrets.”
He didn’t doubt that. But would she still look at him like he was a hero?
He wasn’t sure what he’d tell her when he opened his mouth. But he had to tell her something. She was connected to this mess through that damn locket and the man who’d attacked her.
“The thirteenth birthday marked the rite of passage to manhood. We were assigned to a craftsman in the town as an apprentice. I was given to Edward McPhearson.”
Her hand paused for a second at the word “given,” but then resumed the caress.
“He was the smith. He forged the chain. Made the lockets. He was one of the founders.” He swallowed hard. “He’d been given Eileen in marriage the year before.”
“He’s the man in the first photo. The one you said was dead.”
“Yes. Eileen was his fourth wife.”
“What happened to his other three wives?”
“They were still around. It was a polygamist community.”
She released a slow breath. “I see.”
No, she really didn’t. “He’d had his eye on Eileen for a while. She cried the night before her birthday. He terrified her. Watched her like a wolf. I was old enough to understand why and I was afraid for her, too. We plotted together, she and I, on how we could get away, how I would save her.”
“But you couldn’t,” she said softly.
“No, I couldn’t. She got her locket and married McPhearson. The next day, after the wedding, my friend was gone. She was still breathing and existing, but her eyes were dead. I thought about the other girls I’d seen after their wedding nights. Some had worn that same vacant expression while others had seemed okay. But not Eileen.”
“He hurt her.”
“She had to go to the community doctor. I heard some of the women talking and they said he’d torn her up.” His voice broke.
Daisy leaned her cheek against his upper arm, continuing to rub his back. “I’m sorry, Gideon. I’m so sorry.”
He forced the emotion back. “She was called Miriam after that. It was her given name. Many of the girls were named Miriam. Those who weren’t often took that name on their wedding days. I often wondered why, but I got my answer when I was given my first walk-through of the smithy. There were a dozen lockets that said ‘Miriam,’ just waiting for their wearers to turn twelve. Only a few with other names. Rachel, Sarah, Rebekah, Hannah. Mostly Old Testament names. He had templates, each made a different name. It made his engraving job easier, I guess.”
“Did you want to be a smith?”
“No. But I knew if I was around, I could watch out for Eileen.” He let his head fall forward, stretching his neck, remembering to breathe again after her hand ran up his back to pet the back of his neck.
“But that’s not what happened.”
“No.” His body went rigid, his muscles tightening painfully, as he allowed himself to recall what had happened. The hand on his neck began long sweeps down his back and up his neck, over and over. She wrapped her other hand around his biceps, turning so that her forehead was pressed to his shoulder.
“You don’t have to tell me what happened,” she whispered.
Her forehead pivoted as her chin lifted, her lips brushing his arm. He could feel the soft movement through the fabric of his shirt, and suddenly he wished the shirt were gone so that he could feel her lips against his skin.
“McPhearson was an equal-opportunity abuser,” he bit out.
She didn’t gasp, didn’t stiffen, didn’t do anything other than to continue brushing kisses over his upper arm. But he heard her swallow, so he knew she’d understood.
“On their thirteenth birthday, the boys entered special training. I’d always believed that meant the beginning of the apprenticeship and the beginning of church training. It might have been for some of the others, if their master didn’t care for boys. When McPhearson took me to his home that night, I wasn’t expecting what he tried to do.”
She swallowed again. “Tried?”
“I . . . resisted.” He’d resisted so hard that McPhearson died. “I got away from him.” And left him bleeding on the floor of the smithy, his head busted open on the anvil.
Gideon hadn’t meant to kill him. He’d just been trying to get away.
But he hadn’t been sorry. Until he’d seen Ephraim Burton’s face on Daisy’s card table. Then sorry was all he’d been able to be. Because then he’d known who Eileen had been forced to marry. She’d gone from a degenerate pervert to a violent man with very big hands that he knew how to use to inflict the maximum pain.