Wednesday's Child: Full of Woe

By Polly Becks

Life in the fast lane has never been an easy place for twitchy high-society event planner Sloane Wallace, a woman born to privilege and pristine family lineage. But when a freak snowstorm and auto mishap leaves her stranded in the freezing mountains in her designer heels, a burly mountain man, unimpressed with her pedigree, shows up in time to save her couture-covered backside—and completely mess up her world.

WEDNESDAY’S CHILD: Full of Woe is the fourth book in the eight-book series The Extraordinary Days by breakthrough novelist Polly Becks. The first book, set in 1991, No Ordinary Day, tells the tale of an epic tragedy that changes life forever in a small town in the wild, mystic Adirondack Mountains of upstate New York, especially for eight special women, and the mystery surrounding that tragedy.

Each book in the Extraordinary Days series makes a direct cash donation to a different charity or non-profit organization. Your purchase of Wednesday’s Child: Full of Woe benefits The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, a national nonprofit public charity dedicated exclusively to finding permanent homes for the more than 130,000 children waiting in North America’s foster care systems.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Polly Becks
• Release date: Apr 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310293870

Polly Becks

Polly Becks is the bestselling author of the new Extraordinary Days series of books, and has been making her living with the written word for 20 years as a writer and also working as an editor, curriculum developer, and teaching secondary-school Spanish. She has more than 350 books to her credit, mostly educational materials, as well as professionally published fiction in both the adult and YA market in a variety of genres, plus more than 30 Children’s books. She is excited about exploring the digital literature frontier and is honored to be the launch series for GMLTJoseph, LLC. She has two (or three!) children, and may or may not like cats.

Book preview

WEDNESDAY’S CHILD

Full of Woe

Polly Becks

Book 4 in the EXTRAORDINARY DAYS series

Copyright © 2015 by Polly Becks

Published by GMLT Joseph, Inc., LLC

All rights reserved

ISBN 978-0-9908840-3-3

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale, or established organizations is entirely coincidental.

An original work by Polly Becks

WEDNESDAY’S CHILD: Full of Woe © 2015 by Polly Becks

Cover Art by Patricia A. Downes, Dutch Hill Design

Copy Editor/Proofreader: Susan M. Haydon

For more information, go to www.pollybecks.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/pollybecks

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Epigraph

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

About the Author

Other books in the Extraordinary Days series

FLOWER IMAGERY

The flower featured on the cover is a Bird of Paradise,

which represents magnificence, excellence, royalty, and joy

Your purchase of this e-book provides a direct cash donation to

The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption

Their mission is to dramatically increase the number of adoptions

of waiting children from North America’s foster care systems.

For more information about The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, go to:

www.davethomasfoundation.org

Monday’s child is fair of face,

Tuesday’s child is full of grace,

Wednesday’s child is full of woe,

Thursday’s child has far to go,

Friday’s child is loving and giving,

Saturday’s child works hard for a living,

But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day

Is bonny and blithe and good and gay.

This rhyme was first recorded in A. E. Bray’s Traditions of Devonshire

(Volume II, pp. 287–288) in 1838

To

Kandice, Jeff, and Mitch

with love

In the late spring of 1991, a flood and fire of historic proportions tore through the pretty resort town of Obergrande, New York, in the central region of the Adirondack mountains.

The twin disasters destroyed a large part of the east side of the town that bordered the Hudson River and Lake Obergrande.

In the aftermath, a new dam was built, and that damaged part of the town drowned, covered by the new, larger lake.

During that terrible flood, five kindergarten girls were trapped in their drowning school, huddled together as the water rose higher, rescued just in the nick of time. The nightmare bonded them to each other for life.

These are their stories.

Prologue

August 25th, present day, 3:15 PM

City of Niagara Falls, New York

The American side of the Falls always had a little nip in the air, the man with the camera noted.

Even on hot, end-of-summer days.

He had been standing in the same area of the park, within sight of the bridge to Canada, pretending to take pictures all day.

This gig is getting old, he thought.

Finally, as he set up his tripod for yet one more round of shots of the Horseshoe Falls across the gorge on the Canadian side, he glanced up to see a non-descript man in a black summer coat, his back to him, staring out at the water in the distance.

Clearly blocking the camera’s shot.

Hey, buddy! the man called, sounding annoyed, your shadow’s spoiling my view of the Falls. Can you step one way or the other?

Then he watched for the man’s reaction.

He had saluted two other gentlemen earlier in the day with the same countersign, only to have them rapidly move out of the way, one with a quick apology.

But this guy turned around slowly and stared at him.

As he was most likely supposed to do.

The man with the camera waited, pleased, as the wiry man in the black coat approached. Aside from very dark eyes and matching brows above them, he had a face that would have been impossible to remember or describe after seeing it once.

Precisely as he was alleged to have.

Well, that was subtle, the new man said quietly as he stopped in front of the tripod. How long did it take you to come up with that?

The man with the camera shrugged.

How long did it take you to come up with ‘the Shadow’ for your handle? he asked, smirking slightly. Was that your nickname as a kid? Or are you a fan of old radio detective shows from before our parents were born?

He reached into the pocket of his windbreaker and pulled out several Niagara Falls flyers. When he dropped them ‘accidentally’ at his feet, the Shadow scooped up the hidden envelope of money as he helped the man pick up the rest of the flyers. This acting job, caught on any surveillance camera pointed their way, would qualify them both for Oscars.

The man known as the Shadow handed him back the extra flyers pleasantly.

You got it all down? the man with the camera asked him.

The Shadow nodded slightly.

They verified that the church is always closed on Thursdays. It’s the only day of the week it’s not crawling with people. You heard that already?

The Shadow nodded, a little irritated this time.

Good. Get in and get out quick—and if you get caught—

Won’t happen.

So I hear. Impressive that you don’t have at least a short rap sheet, the man with the camera said, looking through his view finder again as the Shadow turned away, preparing to leave. Everybody else I know does, including me. But if it happens, keep your mouth shut. There are assets in place to help you. You know we’ll get you out sooner or later.

Bad weather comin’ up the coast, the Shadow muttered quietly. Maybe even snow in that area, I hear.

"Bull. It’s August."

The Shadow shrugged. OK.

So dress warm, the man with the camera said, clicking off more useless pictures he would delete later that night.

He was speaking to no one.

The park was empty.

The man with the admittedly silly alias opened the door of the stolen car that had been re-outfitted with fake plates and a new paint job in the chop shop in the depths of the seediest part of Niagara Falls and left for him in the parking lot of the Botanical Gardens.

Away from where everyone in the network knew the cameras were pointed.

He tore open the envelope he had just received, put the cash in his jacket pocket, and removed the only other object it contained.

The remade car key.

He exhaled as he turned the car on.

He had memorized the route to his destination a few days before.

Obergrande, New York, in the Adirondack Park.

I get all the high-end jobs, he thought sourly. Never even heard of the place. Bet it’s a hole.

He tossed the flyers out the window as he pulled out of the parking lot.

In the rearview mirror he saw them catch the wind and whip around prettily as he drove off.

Chapter 1

Two days later, Monday, August 27th, present day, 5:46 AM

On Blue Ridge Road, heading to the Northway, Rte 87, from Obergrande, NY to Montreal

Sloane Wallace was ruing the day she was born.

In times gone by, whenever her mother had threatened her with ruing that day, whatever ‘ruing’ meant, Sloane had tuned her out, much as she had each time Cynthia Wallace had said anything.

Mark my words, Missy, you keep that up and you’ll rue the day you were born.

Sloane could finish the phrase from the word ‘Missy’ on by the age of three and would recite it flawlessly from her high chair in a high-pitched shriek that was an accurate rendition of her mother’s voice, to the great amusement of her father’s friends, though not her mother.

Meesy—you keep dat up an’ you’ll WOOOOO da day you were borned.

She had pretty much accepted ruing the day of her birth and stopped listening altogether somewhere around the age of seven.

But now, as she struggled to keep her Lexus on the road in the freak snowstorm that had hit the northeastern United States in August, for cripe’s sake, she was finally grasping the concept of ruing the first day of her life.

Or at least regretting her decision to return for a visit to her birthplace, the small town of Obergrande, in the heart of the Adirondack Park in northeastern New York State.

Because it was entirely possible that decision would be bringing about the last day of her life.

Sloane spat a stream of vile curse words under her breath as the car swerved back and forth on the slick road.

Why is it that the first sign of snow makes people who have lived in the North Country all their lives completely forget how to drive in it? she said out loud, barely avoiding a collision with a slow-moving mini-van.

Maybe, she thought after a moment, that seeing snow in August might have people worried that the world was ending.

Or that Hell had actually frozen over.

That may be my fault, she mused, trying to keep her foot off the brake, as she had learned in Driver’s Ed at age sixteen. I’ve repeatedly said that I’d come back to Obergrande when Hell froze over—so maybe because I came back, it did.

She pushed her red-gold hair out of her eyes where it had fallen in the course of the car sliding on the road.

IN FIFTEEN KILOMETERS, TURN RIGHT ONTO ROUTE 87, THE NORTHWAY, the GPS voice intoned in a sexy French accent.

Just fifteen more kilometers to Northway exit 28, she thought, mentally computing the mileage to just over nine. Having lived in Montreal for more than ten years, Sloane’s mind automatically calculated everything in the metric scale.

It was hard to come back to the Adirondacks.

For that, and a million other reasons.

Just at that thought, the minivan in front of her went into a terrible spin, sliding helplessly across both lanes and coming violently to a stop, facing backwards, in the median, tipped precariously.

Sloane gasped.

Then she hit the hands-free Bluetooth button on her dashboard.

911, what’s your emergency?

I—I’m on Blue Ridge Road, approaching the Northway, and a red minivan just spun a hundred eighty degrees and slid into the median, she said, her voice shaking slightly.

Is anyone hurt, ma’am?

Not that I can tell, Sloane replied, her voice sounding calmer. It didn’t hit anything that I can see—but the visibility is crappy, so I don’t know for sure. And it’s at a bad angle, tilted toward the driver’s side.

What mile marker are you at on Blue Ridge Road?

Sloane glanced around.

I don’t know, she said. I can’t read anything on the road signs. I’m about fifteen, maybe twenty minutes out of Obergrande, nine or so miles before the Northway.

The Northway is closed, ma’am, came the voice over the speaker. You’re gonna wanna get off at the nearest crossroad on Blue Ridge—an advisory has been issued for no unnecessary travel. This freak snowstorm is turning into a blizzard.

You and I have different definitions of ‘unnecessary,’ officer, Sloane thought bitterly. I have to get home to Montreal before my mother discovers I’m in the Adirondack Park. Nothing in the world is more necessary than that.

OK, she said instead.

Thanks for your report—response has been undertaken.

Thank you, said Sloane.

Get somewhere safe, ma’am.

Working on it, said Sloane. She pushed the hands-free button again, turning the Bluetooth off.

Blacktooth, she thought sourly.

Then let loose a volcanic eruption of colorful curse words.

IN TEN KILOMETERS, TURN RIGHT ONTO ROUTE 87, THE NORTHWAY, the GPS said.

Oh, shut up, said Sloane.

Sloane had not driven Blue Ridge Road more than ten times over the last eight years, and was happy that was the case.

Except when she was trying to remember where the exits would take her.

There were very few exits off of Blue Ridge Road between Obergrande and the now-closed Northway, and the ones that she passed mostly led to parks, municipal buildings, and out-of-town stores, many of which sold or rented watercraft to be used on Lake Obergrande or other area Adirondack lakes when they were not filled with snow.

Nothing useful at all, Sloane thought. Marvelous.

The road was becoming more treacherous as the snow fell harder. Traffic was at a crawl now, a single center pathway on the slushy road made not by the town’s snowplows, which were still in mothballs until at least the end of September, but by the travelers ahead of her, driving slowly in the white muck.

Sloane, a woman who had been planning and directing some of the highest-end events in the world for almost eight years, the toast of Montreal society and the owner of the most highly sought-after agency for event planning on the east coast of North America, was struggling to keep from crying like a baby.

She had slid her driving foot out of her right four-inch Jimmy Choo ultra high-heeled sandal, cursing the fact that the weather had been suitable for her to wear it just the day before.

And the snap she heard on the floor below her feet as she kicked it off.

Damndamndamndamn, she thought.

Then, almost as if the snow clouds had parted, the sky had opened to a bright, glistening blue, and voices of angels could be heard singing above her slush-covered sunroof, an idea struck Sloane.

Bear’s Claw, she thought, her eyes wide with shock and delight at the idea.

The Great Camp her family owned on the shores of Hacksaw Lake, a small, pristine body of water surrounded by trees to the west of Lake Obergrande.

A place her mother would never come in a snowstorm.

Accessible via Dutch Hill Crossing.

Which she had just passed.

Freaking GPS, she snarled aloud. "Can’t you just read my mind and know what I want? Why the hell am I paying so much for you?!"

Her mind calmed down a moment later as she pictured Bear’s Claw, a gorgeous luxury retreat, built in 1914 with every technological advance of the time and the most beautiful Great Camp architecture she had seen, short of Sagamore, an outsized palace of a camp.

I can hang out there in peace and quiet, without anyone knowing I’m still sort of in town, until this f-ing snow melts and goes away, she thought as she hurried back in the direction she had come from, which it should by tomorrow or Wednesday at the latest. Crapcrapcrap—I have so much work to reschedule. Arrrrghhh.

Sloane availed herself of the police turnaround on her left, assuming the cops on the road were probably assisting the minivan she had called 911 about. She turned around and started back toward Dutch Hill.

On both sides of her, cars came out of the sheets of blizzard snow, wailing and screeching in the attempt to avoid hitting her.

Sloane gripped the wheel and closed her eyes.

When she opened them a second later, both cars had passed her and disappeared into the blizzard again.

I imagine I just got called some ugly words, she thought. Oh well.

She crept along the highway until the GPS said she was at the entrance of Dutch Hill Crossing.

She put on her emergency flashers and turned right onto the steep road, which she knew would dip down quickly in less than half a mile.

When she got to the intersection of Dutch Hill Crossing and Wallace Road, she put on her directional signal and turned left.

And almost immediately began going faster than she meant to.

The road was slicker than she expected, and she downshifted in an attempt to gain traction. The car slithered back and forth across the road named for her family, pumping up her adrenaline.

Hail—Mary, full of—Grace— she began chanting aloud, her eyes wide open as she resisted the urge to slam on the brakes, steering into the skid as she had known how to do since high school.

Ahead of her, approximately where she thought the uphill driveway into Bear’s Claw might be, a car, or perhaps a truck, was descending that driveway, also without traction or reliable brakes.

At the bottom of the driveway, it started to spin.

SHHHIIiiiii—! Sloane gasped, and, against her better judgment, plowed her naked right foot into the brake pedal.

Sending the car’s back end screeching around, utterly out of control.

Sloane gripped the wheel in terror as the back quarter panel of the Lexus smashed into the front of whatever vehicle had been descending the driveway, shoving it into the ditch along Wallace Road, and sending her car spinning uncontrollably into the massive Adirondack Spruce tree at the driveway’s end.

As the passenger’s side of the car slammed into the tree, she was tossed forward into the exploding driver’s side airbag, with powder from it and the passenger’s side bag sprinkling her simultaneously in an interior snowstorm.

As her world went white and dark simultaneously, her face slapped vigorously by the airbag, then her body tossed back against the headrest, three thoughts came randomly into Sloane’s mind.

Her first was of Pfeffernusse, her beloved chinchilla, who was no doubt missing her by now. The dust cloud explosion from the airbags reminded her of the clay-dust baths that Pfeffernusse took twice a week in a little plastic tub to keep her exquisite coat clean, flipping and rolling in it much like the car had just done. Poor Pfeffie. Well, the housekeeper’s taking good care of her, she thought hazily. I hope.

The second was a montage of all the business calls she imagined she was making over the Bluetooth, canceling and rescheduling the million appointments and events the damned snow was causing her to miss. But it was just her imagination—every call was answered by Mickey Mouse.

Awww—hi! Hee heee heee. Uh, there’s, aw, nobody here, uh, to take your call, uh huh—

Get off the phone, you castrated rodent, Sloane thought, her head pounding. Put me on with Tristan.

But her gorgeous administrative assistant’s gorgeous voice was nowhere to be heard.

And the third thought, just before beaded safety glass from the right side of the front window came raining down on her, which she shook out of her hair, sending more glass flying, was perhaps the saddest of all.

It’s gonna be a bitch getting this airbag powder out of my suede jacket.

Chapter 2

How long Sloane lay, covered in the beaded glass of the windshield and the dust she had complained about ruining her suede jacket, was hard to gauge.

The shattered windshield had maintained some of its integrity; a large hole in the center of a spider web of cracks stretched over the right side of the car’s dashboard, letting in brisk, cold gusts of wind. But the driver’s side of the glass was still intact, meaning that Sloane at least was not being directly snowed on as she lay trapped in what used to be her beloved Lexus.

She flickered in and out of consciousness, mostly wakened by the slap of the wind or an especially cold fall of snow. As she lay still, unsure of what to do, she thought back to the night before, Sunday night, wondering if it might have been the last one of her life.

She had come in from Montreal the day before, Saturday, for the surprise homecoming party for her beloved kindergarten teacher, a woman she remembered as Miss Sullivan, now just ‘Lucy’ to Sloane and her best friends.

Those friends were the four other five-year-olds Lucy Sullivan had rescued from the flooding elementary school in 1991, when Obergrande was half-swallowed by a raging flood, and half-burned by a roaring fire. In addition to being a trauma from which Sloane had scarcely recovered, it had been a bonding experience, cementing a group friendship that was dearer to her than any other relationships she had experienced.

Her four best friends who had survived the flood together with her were, with the exception of her own father, the people she loved most in the world.

Sarah, who the world called Briony, a semi-retired supermodel, still hiding from that world for the time being in the tree-covered mountains of the place where she was born.

Grace, a petite ordained minister and counselor who Sloane thought of as a kind of younger sister, even if they were the same age, and from whom she could hardly be more different.

Corinne, an African-American veterinarian who had been a superior athlete in high school and college, whose easy-going, no-nonsense attitude Sloane respected greatly.

And Elisa, who had been born in Colombia and was now an American citizen and a well-regarded attorney, the only other member of the group besides Grace who was shorter than Sloane.

The group of then-little girls had been nicknamed the Five Princesses of Obergrande, first by their teacher to keep their spirits up after their rescue helicopter ride away from the flooding school, then later, officially, by the town historian, who wrote a manuscript and book about them.

They had also been dubbed the Fearless Fivesome by the National Guardsman who had assisted their teacher in rescuing them, a man she really only remembered calling Prince Charming. Sloane herself had named him that in the course of his coming to get them out of the classroom where they were waiting in terror, and he had good-naturedly played along with the name.

He had married their teacher. In their wedding, she and the other four had been flower girls.

He was a kind, handsome, really brave man.

A man whom she had recently discovered had died in the Pentagon on 9/11.

Even though she remembered very little of the Obergrande tragedy more than twenty years before, she still could recall Prince Charming scooping her out from under the water of the flooded stairway into which she had fallen, almost drowning. She could still hear what he had said to her upon pulling her out of the watery nightmare, could still see his face looking into hers.

Y’allright?

She had broken into hiccupping sobs, coughing pathetically.

Take some easy breaths, Cinderella, he had said to her gently. You’re OK.

The knowledge that he was gone from the world made her sick to the point of tears every time she thought about it now.

The Fivesome had, just the Saturday before, accompanied his widow, Lucy, to New York City to an event for the family members of victims of 9/11, put on by an organization called Never Forget. It had been a tremendously valuable experience, where Lucy had met other people who actually understood her loss. They had all returned on Sunday, yesterday, to a surprise lunch and supper that Sloane had planned, a reunion of some of the people in town who loved Lucy and wanted to welcome her home.

Sloane was so abuzz with good-deed-doing and selfless helpfulness that she was almost sick to her stomach.

And now, after all that generosity of spirit, she was wrapped around an enormous tree, in the mangled corpse of her car, in the freaking snow in freaking August.

Unable to extricate herself.

Screw all this charitable giving, this generous self-sacrifice, she thought bitterly, her mind hazy with