Desert Wives (9781615952267) by Betty Webb Page A

kill me.
    â€œAnd I’ll tell them that I took care of all the legal work through an attorney cousin of mine. I think they’ll swallow it. After all, that’s exactly the kind of stuff polygamists pull all the time.”
    Virginia’s voice revealed her enthusiasm for the idea. “You’ll need to act a little different, Lena. Kind of quiet. And obedient. Oh, absolutely more obedient!”
    Quiet. Obedient. Two words seldom used to describe Lena Jones.
    Noticing the doubtful expression on my face, she said, “Hey, it won’t be that hard. Just pretend you’ve had a real bad life and it’s left you all messed up.”
    Who had to pretend? I merely said, “I think I can manage that.”
    I mulled it over. Living in the compound would certainly be the best way to investigate Prophet Solomon’s murder, but at considerable risk to myself. Although the Lawlers obviously trusted Saul, I knew nothing about him. Come to think of it, I didn’t know anything about the Lawlers, either, just that Jimmy’s mother liked them.
    A little voice inside, a voice I’d heard a hundred times, warned, If you do this, you’re
nuts
. The voice had never been wrong.
    Then I remembered Esther’s terrified face. Rebecca’s.
    â€œI’ll do it,” I said.
    When we finished eating, Virginia took me upstairs to loan me one of the dresses discarded a few months back by a runaway polygamist wife. I studied myself in the mirror, aghast at what I saw. The long-sleeved, high-necked, ankle- length calico made me look like a refugee from the
Little House on the Prairie
television series. And underneath all that clothing? More clothing. The wool Temple underwear favored by Mormons in the nineteenth century and polygamists in the twenty-first made me itch in crevices I hadn’t even known were there.
    Those ridiculous layers of clothing did have one benefit, though. Even the most careful observer wouldn’t be able to spot the .38 holstered at my thigh.
    Pulling my hair tightly behind my head, I bobby-pinned it into a sloppy bun, exposing my scar even more than usual. I looked like a half-skinned rabbit, but apparently the men of Purity had a thing for half-skinned rabbits.
    I stepped back, studied myself again, and nodded in satisfaction.
    After Virginia went downstairs to help with the clearing up, I picked up the phone, hoping Jimmy remained at the office. Luck, and his workaholism, were with me and he answered on the first ring. When I told him my plans, though, he made his displeasure plain.
    â€œYou’ve done some crazy things in your life, but this is probably the craziest,” he said. “There’s no way you’ll be able to pass yourself off as some meek plural wife.”
    â€œBut there’s too much at stake for me
not
to try it.”
    After he finished lamenting my changed plans, I gave him a list of names I wanted run through the Lexis-Nexis Internet search. And if that didn’t work, to hack into whatever he had to hack into. When it came to unearthing information, Jimmy wasn’t always legal.
    â€œSaul Berkhauser might be a perfectly nice man, but I want to make sure,” I told him. “Same with Virginia and Leo. Yes, I know your mother likes them, but maybe they’re just a little too good to be true. Virginia worries me a lot. She’s down one minute, up the next. Maybe she’s just bi-polar or something, but I need to know what I’m dealing with. Saul mentioned she had a child who died, and the way he put it made it sound like the kid might not have been Leo’s. So see how many times she’s been married, okay? Maybe your mom knows her maiden name.”
    â€œYeah, yeah.” I heard the click of computer keys. He’d already begun searching the Internet. Then, “Lena?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œI’m begging you. Please don’t do this.”
    â€œIt’s the only way to help Esther