Red Velvet Slippers

By Margaret Johnson

June Parks has a flat tire in a rainstorm. A passer by stops to help as she is putting on the last lug nut. The next time she is conscious she is on the floor of truck being taken somewhere by an unknown person. The book is of her survival, the help of a hound and his owner a recluse x-military who lives on top of a mountain in the Ozarks of Arkansas. Her daughter calls an infamous Apache tracker to find her mother. He, his crew and local law enforcement team up to lure her abductor using June for bait. They discover that this is not the first time nor is the abductor the only person involved. When several cold cases start to connect to June's abduction, a cadaver dog and his handler is called in. Blue Mountain is the key to solving Ms. Parks abduction and the cold cases, as well as the hound that belongs to the man on the mountain origins.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Margaret Johnson
• Release date: Nov 6, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005225872

Margaret Johnson

Margaret was born and raised in rural Tioga County in upstate NY, where she lived until the late 80s. Since then she has lived all over the southeast, southwest and a few months in southern England. She lives now in the Ozark Mountains of Arkansas, off grid and way off the beaten path. Drawing on her experiences of life and the study of people she started writing years ago, her work published in a variety of periodicals and books. The books here on Smashwords are her first e-books.

Book preview

June blindly grabbed a tissue from her purse and wiped the condensation from her windshield. The defroster wasn’t keeping up with the humidity in the car. She didn’t want to turn the temperature up because it would only make it worse. If it rained any harder, she was going to have to find a place to pull off the road safely and wait for this storm to pass. God only knew how long that would take. She had watched the weather forecast the evening before and this damn storm wasn’t supposed to hit until after dark tonight. By then she would have been well south of its predicted path. As angry as she was at the meteorologist it didn’t help her now, knowing they were dead wrong.

She reached over punching the off button for her radio. She couldn’t hear it for the rain and the crackling noise it emitted was annoying. She tried to get her bearings, not sure exactly where she was. She had made this trip dozens of times, knew the road well, but because of the rain, she hadn’t seen a familiar landmark for over an hour. She glanced at her fuel gauge, she was going to have to fill up soon and normally she stopped at a truck stop on the east side of the highway after coming down a long hill. Today all the hills were long as she struggled to keep her car between the lines and prayed that some idiot wouldn’t pop up in front of her without their lights on. Although this was a state-maintained highway, it wove through the farms, hamlets, and the small towns of the Arkansas Ozark Mountains. Tourist traps, little mom and pop restaurants, and places to get the best prices on tickets for the shows in Branson dotted the road side. Normally a scenic trip, with panoramic views of blue mountains and darling little communities with speed traps to help the local revenue. She had passed over the Buffalo River although she wasn’t positive that she had. The guard rails over the bridge were different than the others so even though she couldn’t see the river, she assumed she had passed it. On a clear day she would sneak a peek at the colorful canoes, kayaks, tubes and people beached or floating down the river. Today she had been following a semi-truck, and had to pass him going uphill, so she was fairly sure she was just north of a small town whose name she forgot. There was a traffic light on the highway there, if she could even see the thing. The spray from oncoming vehicles filled her windshield with even more water. She wondered if it was possible to upgrade the windshield wiper motor to something that moved fast enough to clear her view in situations like this.

When she came up on the blurry lights of another semi, it had turn signals on and was slowing down.

Beyond the semi, she could see the lights of the truck stop glowing ominously on her left. Apparently, she had missed that town light after all. She slowed and breathed a sigh of relief; she was ready for a break. She prayed that no one would rear end her while she waited for the big rig to make its turn so she could follow it into the fuel stop.

Once she safely pulled alongside the pump, she let out her breath that she hadn’t realized she had been holding since she waited for the truck to make its turn. Her hands had been clamped so tightly to the steering wheel that when she let loose her fingers tingled as the blood rushed back into them. The canopy over the pumps went all the way to the building, it was a welcome respite from the downpour. Lightening cracked and snapped all around her, with thunder so loud that it shook the ground.

She paid for her fuel at the pump with her credit card then pulled into a slot up by the doors. She needed a trip to the lady’s room and a little more time off the road. Before she went inside, she placed a call to her daughter and got the answering machine. Hi honey, it’s Mom. I am going to be running late and may have to spend the night at a motel and finish up driving in the morning. Hit a bad rain storm the minute I crossed the Missouri line and it has taken me forever to get as far as I am now. From the looks of things, I am running about two hours late as it is. She sighed then finished with Give my grandbaby a big hug from his Grammy and I will talk to you later should I decided to stay at a motel. Love you she clicked off her cell and tossed it into the console of the car. She heard it clank and remembered she had put her Smith and Wesson forty-four SP revolver in the console. She juggled things around and made room for the cell. She locked the console and then sat there for a while thinking about maybe trying to wait the storm out, or at least the worst of it. She knew her daughter would be disappointed if she had to wait until morning to continue the trip. They had planned this visit weeks ago and June was just thrilled that she was going to get to spend time with Clayton, her three-month-old grandson. She hadn’t seen him since the first day he came home from the hospital. Then the familiar ping, rang in her heart, wishing once again that her husband had lived to see him. He had been dead over fifteen years and she still missed him like he had passed only a short time ago. It hadn’t been easy on her and her young daughter, living alone without him. They had managed and June had given Kristen the best childhood and upbringing she could.

She smiled to herself, Kristen had done quite well in spite of being raised by a single mother. Unlike her friend’s single parents, her mom had never dated, so she didn’t have to concern herself about an endless string of men in and out of her life. No, June had not been interested in dating. She had a beautiful daughter and her husband had been the true love of her life. She lived for the child and for the memory. Now she had a beautiful grandson named after his long-deceased grandfather, and her daughter was in a marriage quite like her own had been. She was content with life, although now with baby Clayton in the picture, she was considering selling her home in Missouri and moving near her daughter in northern Texas. She still had time to think about that. For now, a good cup of sugar and a double dose of cream with a little coffee and she would hit the road again.

She grabbed the handle of the truck stop door and was hit with a wave of AC that felt like a blast from the artic circle. The sign to the rest rooms was above her head, as she walked down the hall to the designated female sign on the door. When she exited, she shivered a little at the cold as she walked over to the coffee counter and made her selections. She could over hear a conversation between some older gentlemen, sitting at a table off to her left. One said That stupid jerk on channel four must think he is something special. He lies as bad as a politician during election year. He would stand there with rain water a dripping off his chin and tell you the sun was a shining. June smiled knowing the whole world felt the same as she did about the prognosticators who call themselves weathermen.

The girl at the register was like kids most everywhere these days. Piercings in her eyebrow, lip, and when she spoke June could tell in her tongue as well, her speech was slurred. She had a tattoo that was playing peek a boo at her collar line, and one on each wrist. She wondered why young people did that sort of thing to themselves. Was it just a fad? Did they do it because it was cool, or was it for attention? Probably they did it because they didn’t like the way they looked and wanted to be someone they were not. June just kept her thoughts to herself as the girl rang up her purchases, grateful her daughter hadn’t partaken of that particular fad.

Want your receipt? the girl asked

No thank you. She replied then added a question Have any idea how long that mess out there is supposed to last?

No, they say probably all night and going to get worse before it gets better. It’s a real toad floater.

June smiled then said Yes it sure is, thanks and have a good day.

As June turned to exit the store, she brushed against a man, nearly spilled her coffee on him. She hadn’t seen him standing next to her. She murmured an apology, noticing he was quite tall and had on black rubber muck boots with grey soles. He mumbled something as she made her way to the door. She was a little embarrassed but blew it off.

She sat her coffee on the hood while she unlocked the door, noticing the man she had bumped into walk past her and get into a dark green pick-up truck. She started her car, got her coffee set into the cup holder, then backed out if her space to get back on the road again. She left her phone in the console with her weapon. It wasn’t raining quite as hard as it had been but it was still coming down at a good clip.

She got back on the highway and headed south toward Little Rock. The road through this area was narrow, with little to no shoulder. It wouldn’t widen out again for several more miles. In her mind she remembered there were a couple of places big enough to pull off but they were few and far between should she need to. She had paid attention to the route on previous trips to her daughters. Checking the places that she could get help should she need it or places to pull to the side of the road where it was safe. Her late husband had always said that you need to be observant, you never know what can happen and what you may need to know. Now that the rain had let up some she could see familiar land marks that she had noted before. Amusing billboards were now distinguishable and she chuckled as she read one about tossed rolls. One day she would have to visit that place to find out what tossed rolls were.

She came around a bend in the road and there was something laying across her lane, she hit her breaks but all she did was slide on the wet pavement and she felt her tires thump across it. Apparently, someone had lost a piece of lumber earlier in the day and had not bothered to stop to move it from the road. It was only a couple hundred yards ahead that she felt the car pulling to the right, and then thumping of her tire. Damnit all to hell she said out loud. She had damaged a tire on that piece of wood. Luckily one of the larger places to pull off was just ahead. She pulled off the road as far as she could, leaving on her flashers in hopes it would make her more visible. No raincoat, just and umbrella, and she had on a brand-new pair of white Nike jogging shoes with a cool reflective green strip around the sole and the same color laces, brand-new light-colored stone washed jeans and one of her favorite blouses. She had treated herself to the tennis shoes a week ago and this was the first time she wore them. They were going to get nasty out here in the mud as well as her jeans. She sat for about thirty seconds assessing her options. There was very little traffic, so chances of someone coming to her rescue were slim to none. She could call the tire service from her insurance company but it would probably take them an hour to get to her. She paid extra for the road hazard protection just for times like this but she didn’t want to wait. It wasn’t the first tire she had had to change, probably not the last either. Suck it up, the clothes will wash, the shoes can be cleaned, all you’re going to have to deal with is being wet and dirty for a while. Grabbing her umbrella, she got out of the car and went around to the passenger side. The rim was sitting on the ground, the tire could not have gotten any flatter. She opened the passenger door and reached across to pop the trunk lock. She closed the umbrella and sat it on the passenger side floor board, she couldn’t hang onto it and change the tire. She got out the jack and managed to get it under the frame on the car and then began to loosen the lug nuts. Once they were loose, she jacked the car up, removed the tire and got the spare from the trunk, putting the flat one in its place.

About that time, the heavens let loose again and it was raining so hard she could barely hang onto the wet tire. Water was running in her eyes and it stung from the hair spray she had used. It was not easy and she wound up having to kneel int the mud to get it on. She was tightening up the nuts when a vehicle pulled over and parked Infront of her car backing all the way to her bumper.

Sure she thought Now that I have the freaking tire changed, I am soaking wet, covered in mud, and just about finished and a good Samaritan comes along.

She didn’t stop and was still bent over when she noticed that someone was standing beside her. That someone had boots just like the man at the truck stop, she thought, then everything went dark and she felt the ground coming up to meet her. Gravel bit her cheek and she rolled over onto her back in the mud. She didn’t feel the wet, the cold or the gravel.

Chapter 2

He watched the rain falling on the shed roof. The corrugated steel separated the water into even rivulets that fell into the gutter, which emptied into a large rain water storage tank that he used for his garden and laundry. The tank was full and over flowing. He wished he had another tank but he played hell getting that one up the mountain. Several days of sore muscles, scrapes, bruises, but he had managed the task dauting as it was. Blue, his hound, was watching him from inside the shed. He opened the door and the dog made a dash for it, slipping as his feet hit the wood floor, feet eventually gaining purchase. Blue waited to get behind him before he shook off the rain, all over the floor and Sam. Thanks for sharing. He told him. The dog he stood there looking at him like Hey, what was I supposed to do? the smell of wet dog permeated the house. Sam still had chores to do, so he pulled on his rain gear and told Blue Stay off the couch, no getting on the bed, and no going in the kitchen. Blues ears perked with that Who me? look and then headed for his spot in front of the wood heater.

Sam picked up his water jugs and headed for the spring. Once filled he sat them inside the door and went to the root cellar to get a slab of bacon and some potatoes. He sat them down in the wood shed while he filled his arm with wood for the cook stove. When he got back to the house, Blue greeted him with dog smiles, an intent look, and a fiercely wagging tail. Not on your life my friend. He told the dog as he held the bacon high You had yours this morning, that’s why you had to go out in the rain. This is mine and I will take a big bite out of that nasty hide of yours if you so much as sniff my way. The dog politely followed him, knowing at some point, he would get something of whatever Sam was going to cook.

After removing his rain gear, Sam deposited the wood near the heater then made his way to the kitchen. Blue stood in the door waiting to be invited into the sanctuary where good food was always cooking. Sam was busy cutting up potatoes to boil. He glanced over his shoulder at the old clock on the wall. It was well after four, too late to start a batch of bread. He dumped the potatoes in a pot, poured some water over them, then started to slice the bacon. When the meat started to cook the dog took on his most intelligent look, sitting in the doorway still waiting for his invitation.

When the potatoes had boiled, he set them aside, and lifted the lid of the pot that had been cooking all day on the back of the stove. Pinto beans and chunks of pork floated in the pot, the garlic and onions smelled wonderful. His stomach growled and Blue whined, he ignored both. He fixed himself a plate and sat down at the table. He glanced at the calendar on the wall before he folded his hands and bowed his head. Thank you, Lord, for this day, for this food, for my life and for sobriety. I ask you to bless all those I love and this food. I ask in Jesus’ name, amen.

His glance at the calendar told him that he had a few more days and he would be three years sober and three years here in this house. It had been near the end of February when he had chosen to get sober. He had worked real hard the night before to drink himself to death. He was found face first in the gutter, in a pool of his own vomit and blood. He had awakened on the twenty seventh of February in the hospital. The doctor told him that he had nearly died of alcohol toxic shock. If he didn’t stop drinking, he would be dead, no if, ands or buts about it. The booze was going to kill him. He had heard it before, been there done that, had the T shirt and cap to prove it. He had been trying to kill himself, with booze instead of a gun, drugs, or driving head long off a cliff. The doctor had said that he understood I probably had my reasons for drinking like I did but it was time I got a grip or I would be under the grass not on top of it. For the first time the words stuck home and he chose life, God had kept him here for a purpose and given him another chance. Apparently, the good Lord had something else in mind for him yet to achieve. His time wasn’t done here and he knew what he had to do first. Two hours later he signed himself out of the hospital. He walked home because he knew his one and only friend was at work. On the way home he made up his mind what he was going to do. Once there, he packed his ruck sack with clothes, a few mementos, a couple of hand guns, some ammunition, a couple of books and then went to the bar where he had apparently left his car the night before. He returned home and put everything into his car including a shot gun, a rifle, and a couple weeks’ worth of MREs. He got in the car and drove to his buddy’s job, waited for him to come out on break for a smoke and told him his plans. His buddy had gone back into his job, took the rest of the afternoon off and came out to help him move, no questions asked. Four hours later they were at the base of this mountain. He had given his buddy the keys to his car, told him the title was signed and in the glove compartment. He gave him the keys to his apartment and told him the rent was paid for two more months, he could have everything what was left in it. His buddy only nodded then asked one question Why? Sam had shrugged and spoke. My uncle left me this place, told me in a letter that whenever I was tired of playing war or trying to pay for playing war, that I would have a use for it. I realized what he was trying to say without saying it. It’s time now, I will give you a call in a couple of months. With that he shook his friends’ hand, turned and started up a trail that he had known since he was a boy of ten.

Sam knew his buddy would worry but he also knew that he would pray. He was not coming up here to end his life but to end this chapter, his addiction and put some reason into his days. Apparently, he still had a job to do. He wanted to heal, he wanted to live and the only way he could think of to do both was to come here. It was a hard hike up the mountain, that day it had snowed and he had to pick his steps carefully. When he reached the old house, it was very close to complete darkness. He jumped a group of deer that were near the old spring, he wasn’t sure if he scared them as much as they had him.

Once inside he found the oil lamp where it had sat when he was a boy. He wiped it off as best he could, grateful that his uncle had been a creature of habit. Everything had a place and it had never changed. There was still a trace of oil in the lamp, he lit it and went about checking out the wood heater, its chimney and built a fire. The place smelled of dust and rodents. It was too late and cold to open the windows, he would do that in the morning. He lit oil lamps in all the rooms, amazed that nothing had changed except for the layer of dust and cob webs on everything. He collapsed on the bed with his clothes still on, and woke that way when dawn began to creep through the dirty windows. He scolded himself for letting the lamps burn dry. It had been a dreamless night. That was a good thing, but he had to deal with a bad case of the shakes. He nearly poured coffee all over the counter as he scooped it into the pot. Chances were good the coffee was going to taste stale. He hadn’t brought any along and his uncle had been dead for several years and had left it behind.

He worked himself hard for the next week. He ate little, drank enough spring water to float a row boat, and he barely slept. The demons came when he slowed down, so he tried not to slow down before he was so tired that he had to stop. He knew that it was going to be a hard run for a while. His body no longer had what he had put into it for the past two years. The shakes weren’t bad so long as he was busy, and after a few days they stopped altogether. His body complained from the hard work. He had forgotten how much it took to keep up with firewood and without a chain saw it was a chore that sapped his strength. He had blisters under callouses and they gave him painful reminder all day long.

By the time the end of March rolled around, he was much better. He took the time to trim his hair, his beard and find something appropriate to wear to go into town. He emptied his ruck sack taking one pistol that he wore on his hip and started down the mountain. He knew the man who owned the first house he would come to. The man’s name was Chester and had been his uncle’s closest friend for years. He hoped that Chester would remember him and that he could pay the old man to take him to town.

That worked out well, Chester remembered him straight off and wouldn’t hear of him paying him to do a neighbor a favor. Instead, Sam had treated him to lunch, where they spent their time talking about Sam’s uncle Ben. They laughed at the way Ben would bristle when Sam had used uncle and Ben together. I aint no freaking bag of rice boy, just call me Ben, uncle or sir. As a child Sam had not understood what his uncle had been talking about until one day, he had accompanied him to the store and Ben had pointed out the box of rice and said See boy, I don’t look nothing like that uncle on that box.

Sam had made the trip back up the mountain with the provisions in his ruck. On the way up the mountain, he caught sight of Blue for the first time. The dog was shadowing him through the woods. At first, he thought it might be a coyote. The dog was thin and had a limp. Sam figured he might belong to one of the farms down in the valley or was a stray someone had turned loose on the federally owned side of the mountain. The dog never came close, but even when Sam reached the house, he could see the dog off just inside of the woods. Later that night he put a dish with some corn bread with gravy outside near the shed. If the dog was hungry, it would find his offerings.

The next morning the dish was clean so Sam refilled it. By afternoon the dog had slipped in while Sam wasn’t watching and cleaned it again. Sam repeated this feeding for a couple of days, then each day there after moved the dish closer to the house. After a week, Sam put down the dish and sat down a couple feet from it. When the dog snuck around the corner to find the dish it stopped dead in its tracks. It stood there watching Sam for quite a few minutes. It kept sniffing the air, putting its nose way up in the air, taking in as much of Sam’s sent that it could. Then Sam held his hand out, with a meaty beef bone in it. That was the dogs undoing. It crawled commando style over to Sam and took the bone. Sam didn’t move and the dog backed up like a crab, then jumped up and ran off. Sam left the dish and decided that the next day, there would be no bone and he would put some food in his hand and wait for the dog to come and eat it. The dog was so uneasy and appeared scared half to death. Sam could see a nasty sore on one of its hind legs. Eventually the dog would let him pet him and after a few days of trust he would see if the dog would let him take a look at that mess on its back leg.

That took longer than expected but inside of two weeks, the dog was there in the morning to greet Sam, waiting to be fed and petted. Sam started calling him Blue, after the name of the mountain. When Sam felt safe enough to take a look at the leg, Blue was forgiving and didn’t offer to snarl or bite. He seemed to know that Sam meant him no harm. The sore was pussy and nasty. When Sam pressed, he could feel something under the skin. He got a pair of shears and clipped the hair around the sore. He had dressed and cared for battlefield wounds and this was no different. He needed to either make an incision or compress this to get whatever was in there out. It was high enough on the hip that there was no way to put a compress on and bind it, so the dog wouldn’t tear it off. He went in the cabin and dug around in his uncle’s medicine cabinet until he found a bottle of a numbing agent used for tooth aches. He took it back out and rubbed it all around the sore on the dog. Unlike humans, when he pulled out his knife, the dog didn’t jump away. The numbing agent had done the trick and he made a cut into the wound on the dog. When he pressed the puss poured out and then a chunk of lead popped out. Sam poured peroxide over the cut, and mopped up the mess. When the bleeding stopped, he put on a layer of sulfur paste then cleaned up the supplies he had collected to use on the dog. He reached out and picked up the piece of lead and held it up. Twenty-two caliber from the looks of it. Blue you must have ticked someone off big time to have them shoot at you. He said to the dog. Blue just laid there and wagged his tail. That night was the first night Blue spent in the house. From that point on they were forever friends and housemates.

When Sam finished eating, he scrapped a few leavings into Blue’s dish and washed up his dishes. It had warmed up a bit during the day, enough that he debated if he needed to start a fire or not. A small one maybe, but that would be enough.

He read for a while before going to bed. His uncle had kept a journal all the time he had lived up here and Sam found it interesting to read the volumes of all those years. He laughed at what his uncle had written about him when he had been to visit. It was obvious that the man loved him like a child of his own. With the journal, he had a general idea of what to expect of the weather, how it affected the spring and what to expect out of the garden this year. The entries about his faith and his views on the world and people he occasionally interacted with, were thoughtful and inspiring. When he pulled the blankets up and Blue had settled on the floor near the bed, Sam slept a peace he had not known in years. He thanked God for letting him live and for the peace in his spirit.

That was all three years ago and the two had settled into a routine that both were comfortable with. Chester more or less kept an eye on them by gauging whatever Sam purchased with the amount of time it would be before he would see him coming across the field for a trip to town. Sam enjoyed the visits with Chester, the town hadn’t changed much since he was a child. There were a few new stores but for the most part it had remained the same. Faces were new, ownerships had changed hands, but like most small towns, they were content to stay small and contained.

Chapter 3

June was standing at the top of the big slide, her brother was at the bottom telling her not to be scared, just sit down and slide. He would be there to catch her. On shaky legs she got down on her butt and pushed off. Just as she came down, her brother had looked away. She shot off the end, smacking into him and her head went back and caught the edge of the slide. It had knocked her out for a couple seconds and she had a gash on the back of her head. Back then a cold rag with some ice was all that was needed, no trip to the emergency for assessment. It was fourth of July and that night she had gone with her family to the fireworks. The noise of the pyrotechnic display and fireworks felt like it was inside of her head. She had cried and begged to go home. They did and stopped for ice cream on the way. She had vomited her ice cream all over the back seat of her father’s car. Her head hurt so bad, her mother had cleaned her up and rocked her to sleep. When she awakened, she didn’t know where she was? Her head hurt so bad it took a while for her to open her eyes. She wasn’t home, she was starting at a rubber mat, she was nauseous and when she tried to move, she couldn’t. She dozed off for a little bit and when she opened her eyes again, she again tried to orient herself. She remembered she wasn’t a little girl anymore, her head hurt like it did back then, but this time was different. She could hear rain and was on the floor of a vehicle, she still couldn’t move, and realized her hands were behind her, her ankles were bound together and there was something across her mouth. She remembered being next to her car in the rain, and then darkness. She could hear muffled voices in the front of the vehicle. A vehicle that smelled like armor all and baby powder. She tried to think but couldn’t remember what had happened. She faded out again, regaining consciousness long enough to feel the vehicle come to a stop and someone get out of the front seat. The open-door warning bell dinged and dinged. It sounded like a drum and the inside of her head was the skin being smacked to make it ring and ring. Rain was running down the glass on the window. Someone got back in, pulled the door in but didn’t close it, the vehicle rolled ahead, then the person got out again. This time when they got back in, they closed the door. The vehicle didn’t travel very far and the process repeated. When the operator hit the brakes June saw something roll under the seat. It was a miniature truck, with tiny little wheels, a child’s toy.

Through the fog in her brain, she knew she was in trouble. Someone had taken her, bound her, covered her mouth and was taking her somewhere in a pickup truck with a crew cab. This someone had a child in this vehicle previously or had a thing for kid’s toys. The smell of the baby powder told her that there had been a child in this vehicle. The truck was slowing again, she tried looking out the windows but all she could see was grey sky and rain streaking the glass.

June was a survivor and knew that she had to think and fight back, but at this point there was nothing that she could do. Her screams would be muffled, she couldn’t get leverage to kick, and her hands were behind her back. Sooner or later, he would quit driving, he would take her out of the truck. Maybe then she would have a chance to do something, anything, to get away from whoever it was that had knocked her cold and was carrying her off somewhere. If his intention was to rape her, he would have to untie her feet. She could kick then, maybe a well-placed kick would allow her time to run. Anger welled up inside of her. She fed the anger; it would give her the strength to do what she had to and the courage to get out of this situation come hell or high water. The