A Parthan Summer - Julie Steimle (large ebook reader TXT) 📗

aunt really was murdered. The FBI knows it. And so were her parents. I mean, come on. Look at her. Look at her hair.”

Giisa moaned with a glance at Zormna.

Zormna stepped back, suddenly self-conscious that the woman was staring at her. She crossed her arms over herself, subconsciously reaching to cover her right shoulder.

Giisa drew in a breath and stared more, especially at that gesture. “No way…”

Jeff moaned. “Zormna! Could you not stand like that?”

Looking about herself, Zormna then immediately removed her hand from her shoulder. She had never really been conscious of the mark branded into her right shoulder until after it was seen at the school Olympics in May and the McLenna parents blew their top. Now she felt like everyone was staring at it.

“She’s a—”

Jeff quickly covered Giisa’s mouth, hissing. “This is need-to-know. You must tell no one what you just figured out.”

“But her?” Giisa stared more, looking like she would be sick. “Why her?”

Zormna retreated farther, looking to the ground.

Shaking his head, Jeff replied, “Giisa, please. You understand now why this whole thing is important?”

“Are you positively sure?” Giisa glared at him.

Peeking at Zormna, Jeff said, “I saw it with my own eyes, and I touched it. She also has her family medallion. Do you understand? She is the last of the Clendar Tarrns.”

Giisa stared once more at Zormna.

Zormna shifted her feet uncomfortably, her eyes still on the ground. She muttered. “I’m sorry for… I was raised to be…” She shook her head. “I can’t change the past. Ok? I just don’t want to pretend that my parents died in some fire and that my uncle did not exist, just to save my neck. Those people in Ireland can believe they were a fantasy. But I’m not going to pretend it. I don’t want to disrespect the sacrifice they made for me so that I could live.”

“Ok.” Giisa said. She was staring though, as if she had not truly seen Zormna before.

Peeking back at the lodge, Jeff could hear the announcements start. He wondered if there was any food left. But instead he turned to the social worker and said, “Giisa, there’s another thing. The family Zormna is staying with is most likely intending to send her into the foster system. Is there some way we can rig up one of our guys to be her—”

Giisa shook her head. “You know we can’t. If they put her in the system, the system will assign her a caseworker. And we aren’t really in the system.”

He nodded. “Yes. But could a family request to take her in?”

“You’re the one who told Brian?” Zormna stared at him.

Jeff shrugged. “I have to protect you. And I knew they occasionally took in foster kids.”

“But would they get hurt by me moving in with them?” Zormna asked.

The social worker grew even more surprised, listening as Zormna softly expressed her concern.

“No,” Jeff said, shaking his head. “And it is a better option than where you are living right now anyway.”

Zormna massaged her forehead.

“You’re different from how I imagined,” Giisa finally said. She then turned to Jeff. “I’ve changed my mind. I’ll talk to Kevin and see if we can come up with a less…lunatic explanation. And you’re probably right. The FBI would see right through it anyway.”

With so much relief, Jeff nodded then looked to Zormna. “Sounds good?”

She slowly nodded. Though she looked to Giisa. “What changed your mind?”

The woman stared silently before she replied, “You actually do care about those you’ve hurt.”

Zormna lowered her eyes.

Jeff nodded, though he didn’t say anything. His eyes replied once more that he was sure Zormna was the real deal.

Sighing, Giisa snapped her briefcase closed and shook her head. “Ok. I will go take care of the rest then send you word.”

She bid the two goodbye and walked back to her car, glancing back a few times in puzzled amazement at the turn of events. 

Both Zormna and Jeff watched her pull out of the gravel parking lot and down the mountain path. Zormna leaned near him and whispered, “Are you sure she is trustworthy?”

He nodded. “Indubitably. I trust her with my life.”

Zormna nodded to herself, then sighed, shaking her head, muttering, “Schizophrenic…”

He chuckled, following her toward the lodge. “Trust me. That was the least offensive suggestion anyone has made since I told people we were getting you an alibi.”

Zormna halted. “How many people have you told?”

“Before you panic,” he said. “I haven’t told anybody the whole story. Just that you have joined our side and intend to help us.”

“And how many have you told that?” she asked, exasperated.

“Don’t worry.” Jeff said, continuing on to the main lodge. He really wanted lunch now. “Very few. And I haven’t disclosed your location to anyone except Giisa.”

Zormna looked back to the road and stared after the departing car.

“And how many want revenge?” she muttered.

But Jeff had already gone inside. Still, he knew her question. It was the same thing, really. How many people wanted her dead?

 

Chapter Four: A Sprained Ankle and a Bloody Nose

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist—Indra Gandhi—

 

 

The afternoon camp activities started immediately after lunch. Once Jeff and Zormna reached the lodge, both joined their teammates back at their tables. Jeff grabbed some scraps of what was left of the food, though Brian had also saved a sloppy Joe for him. When Zormna returned to the Pennington cheer table, the girls started teasing her, asking her about Jeff and if they snuck off to make out. Zormna almost punched Stacey for making the suggestion. Yet, with all the self-restraint she had, she replied while keeping her fists at her sides, “Nothing of the sort! His social worker was here to meet me. I might have to move out of the McLenna’s house, and he thought she could help me.”

Joy looked shocked, yet she said, “Jeff did that for you?”

Zormna huffed as she nodded. “Before you guys get all your romantic imaginations up, Jafarr and I simply have come to an understanding. He gets what I’m going through, and he has decided to be nice and help. That’s all.”

Most of the girls looked disappointed, though Joy grew a great deal more cheerful. In fact, she nodded in approval.

Yet one of the other girls said with a wink, “I wonder, though, what changed his mind.”

Zormna glowered at her. “Would you stop that?”

Jennifer and Stacey shared surreptitious looks.

Zormna barely cleared her lunch tray when the camp director (some man in a khaki outfit) stood at the front of the lodge and dismissed them to their activities.

Miss Betiford called to all the cheerleaders to join them at the north door. As she did this, other camp leaders called out and divided their groups so they could split off. Zormna had already seen the map. The campers would divide up so that each sports division would occupy a section of the campground. The cheer teams had the grassy lawn northeast of the lodge which stood above a sandy slope that dropped toward the lake. The wrestlers would stay in the lodge, removing the tables and setting up mats that would also be use by gymnastics after them. The soccer, baseball, and football teams would gather in the grassy valley behind the lodge, and the basketball and tennis teams would have to hike to the paved and fenced lots over the hill near the boys’ cabins. The other groups, such as track and gymnastics, would travel around the camp doing various strength training exercises—mostly because a number of their team members were involved in other sports.

As it turned out, Miss Betiford was also the head of the cheer division of camp, besides being the ‘cabin mother’ for the Pennington cheer team. Her assistants were the other cabin mothers for Monroe, Billsburg and Harvest High. As she led the cheer group up to the lawn, cheerfully describing how much fun they would have that year, she didn’t seem to notice the dirty looks passing between the Monroe cheerleaders and the Pennington cheerleaders. Or their snide whispers. The Billsburg and Harvest girls got out of their way though, snickering at how oblivious Miss Betiford was. The other counselors were no so much, but they seemed to be working on the theory of non-interference.

Oddly enough, the only one who appeared to be more oblivious than Miss Betiford was Zormna, who was busy thinking about the social worker and the small fact sheet the woman had left her with to memorize. Names. Dates. And locations. Not that Zormna couldn’t do it. She just didn’t like lying much. Yet when Marissa Williams (a Monroe cheerleader with mahogany-colored hair and a bronzish sort of color on her skin) tried to trip her, Zormna merely stepped over her leg and continued on as if nothing had happened.

“Oh, excuse me,” Joy stumbled into Marissa, shoving her aside. “I didn’t see you there.” Her blinking, innocent eyes almost looked genuine. Yet she hooked her arm into Zormna’s to steer her away. 

Marissa glowered back. “Yeah, right.”

Zormna blinked at Joy, wondering why she bothered. But she shrugged that off too.

The moment they reached the grassy lawn, the girls had a clear view of the lake. They could see down sandy slope that led down from the grass to the rocky shore. A small pier stood in the lake with canoes tied to it, which gave many of the girls hope that they would not have to strictly do cheerleader the entire time at camp. The sun reflected off the water, sparkling in way Zormna had never seen before, and she lost all previous thought to awe.

Drawing in a breath, she stared at it, mouth open. Never in her whole life had she ever seen so much water in one spot—so much more than the school swimming pool. And never before had she conceived of it being a good thing, until now. Rain had always felt like an irritating cold, wet waste. But staring at the fresh lake, envy swelled inside her. So unfair. How was it that one place could have so much water just sitting there? And why couldn’t everyone back Home have part of it? —if only to see it.

Zormna hardly noticed when Miss Betiford halted alongside her. The woman observed Zormna’s appreciation of nature with pleasure, smiling with approval. Yet immediately she turned, going straight to the head of the group to begin their training session. As she went off, Marissa walked up behind Zormna, hissing into her ear.

“Teacher’s pet.”

She then grabbed the back of Zormna’s bra and snapped it.

Jerking away, Zormna clenched her back and stared with bewilderment as the Monroe cheerleader skipped off to the others in her team. Bras themselves were not things from Home. Their clothing fitted women’s figures differently. And though Zormna had thought bras were inconvenient and uncomfortable clothing pieces before, she had never conceived they could become weapons in the hands of others.

Joy walked up behind Zormna, took hold of her wrist and drew her over to their spot of the grass for her to sit by her. “Ignore her.”

It had been Zormna’s plan anyway. So, with a shrug, Zormna did not resist Joy as she sat down among the other Pennington cheerleaders.

Joy whispered as they took their spots, “By the way, I love the way you handled