She had written it in early June. There was no mention of Ben or sunrises. She spoke of long walks alone on the shore and tossing stranded starfish back into the ocean the way we’d done as children. She asked me if I remembered our family vacations, knowing full well I would never forget them. We stayed at Seagrove Beach between Destin and Panama City because it was cheaper if you were okay being a few blocks from the water.
In her letter, Stella reminisced about the days Mom would slather us with sunscreen. She reminded me of the way Lesroy always got burned in strange places, like behind his ears and under his armpits, because he was unable to stand still enough for his mother to even out the thick gooey lotion over his wriggly little body. She wrote of the times we spent all day at the beach constructing sand cities, designed to Lesroy’s specifications, and roasting marshmallows over the fire Gran built.
She spoke of the bunk beds in the hallway and of Lesroy curling up in a sleeping bag on the floor. And sneaking out after dark to chase crabs and tell ghost stories.
I closed my eyes and for a minute I saw us throwing ourselves into waves bigger than we were. Lesroy would almost always go under, and we’d scream and laugh until the surf tossed him onto the shore where he’d shake himself like a wild little terrier. I wondered if Stella had been recalling happier days or if she had been playing me, knowing the effect these memories would have. Then her letter took a strange turn.
Remember how quiet and still he got when we asked him why Aunt Rita stopped coming? And how he finally broke and told us it must have had something to do with the night his daddy disappeared? He’d heard Gran and our mothers arguing a few weeks after Uncle Roy left. His mother had said there were some things you could never forgive, but Lesroy didn’t know what they were and who couldn’t be forgiven for them.
I never forgot what he told us, but when I mentioned it to him last year, he acted like he didn’t remember it at all. That seemed strange because Lesroy never forgets anything. If you ever read this, you should ask him about those things that can never be forgiven.
The rest of her letter focused on how hard it was to fill the long days, but that she was at least making headway with Eva. The housekeeper had moved from tolerating her to enjoying her company. She hoped they might become real friends.
I wanted to dismiss my sister’s words as an attempt to make me feel sorry for her. But I kept seeing the little girl on the beach, sand flying as, desperate to keep up, she ran behind me and Lesroy. I walked to the balcony and stared below. From my vantage point, the people hustling and bustling all seemed to be going to some happy or important place. Or were they, too, trying to keep up with the ones they loved?
I realized I’d spent over thirty minutes on one letter. If I kept letting my emotions get in the way, I would never finish reading through the packets before my meeting with Ben. Even if I distanced myself from the lonely melody threaded throughout my sister’s words, it would take hours—hours I might not have, depending on how quickly Harry arranged things.
Time wasn’t the only problem. It was as if Stella was speaking to me as I read. She had a lovely voice, clear and strong, warmed with a gentle Southern drawl. For about half a minute, she considered a singing career but never pursued it. The realization I’d never hear her again filled me with a heaviness that threatened to suffocate me. I needed help.
Justin was the logical choice. Through his connection to Mike and his unholy alliance with my mother, he had some insight into my family. My instincts told me he wasn’t a cold-blooded killer. But they had also told me Ben would make a good husband, so there was that.
Cold-blooded killer or not, Justin McElroy was my best option for discovering clues hidden in Stella’s letters.
I called to explain what I needed, and he showed up in less than ten minutes. His wavy hair was damp from the shower, and he smelled like fresh-cut lemons.
“I really appreciate this. There are so many of them. I’m usually a fast reader and an excellent skimmer, but for some reason I keep getting bogged down.” My throat thickened as I ran out of reasons for my inefficiency.
“Not a problem,” he said, touching me lightly on the shoulder. He took the envelope marked July and picked up a highlighter I’d placed on the square glass-topped table near the window. “We’ve got at least three hours before dinner. Both of us will mark anything that looks helpful. Then we’ll trade letters.”
His plan helped me distance myself from Stella and her loneliness. Her voice faded as I read four remaining ones from June. It seemed she had made friends other than her housekeeper. She mentioned learning to surf and hanging out at several bars.
Despite my increased speed, Justin had already finished August and September when we stopped to review each other’s work. I’ve never been a very precise highlighter. Once I get started, I have trouble stopping. My system in college was complicated and clumsy. I used yellow for what would definitely be on the test, blue for what might be on the test, and green for stuff that would never be on the test but was kind of interesting. The bookstore never gave me any trade-in credit, and my roommate asked to document my biology book as data for a psychology paper she was writing on the connection between sociopathic behavior and OCD in women ages eighteen to twenty-five.
It was no surprise it took Justin almost as long to get through my June highlights as it did for me to read his July, August, and. September.
“Now we need to chart our ideas,” he said. “Note cards would be great, but we can fold and tear….”
Before he finished, I pulled a small packet from my bag and put it on the table in front of him.
“You scare me a little, Grace.” He took a few index cards and gave me back my letters. “Write down anything about people and places she mentions. Include any social stuff—parties, shopping trips, lunches, and any references to Ben. Add the month and letter number on the bottom.”
In less than ten minutes, we covered most of the bed. Eva’s stack was the thickest.
“Now we’ve got a pretty good idea about the beginning of Stella’s life in Montañita. Let’s work on the rest of her first year. Look for more info on the people and locations we marked and any new names and places. You’re better at picking up mood shifts in your sister, so mark those, too. But for God’s sake, go easy with the highlighter or we’ll never get through them.”
I worked on October and November while he took December through March. I breezed through until I hit Halloween, Stella’s favorite holiday. My sister loved being scared or pretending to be since she was fearless. She adored the excess of all the candy you could carry and intricate jack-o’-lantern carvings. She even enjoyed scooping pumpkin goo with her hands and squeezing the seeds out for Gran to bake.
But most of all, Stella was crazy for costumes. When we were little, our grandmother would coordinate our outfits with Lesroy. We hit all the popular choices: 101 Dalmatians; Huey, Louie, and Dewey; Dorothy, Toto, and the Wicked Witch (Lesroy’s favorite of all). After we were too big to go trick or treating, we threw extravagant parties as an excuse to continue the tradition. The pressure to become more elaborate got old for me, and by my first year in college I was over it. Stella was devastated when she found out I wasn’t coming home to celebrate the holiday. Lesroy volunteered to be her costume buddy, but she turned him down. Without me, she said, it wouldn’t be the same. So, she became a solo act on Halloween: Cher, Madonna, Marilyn. Stella was the most herself when she was someone else. I wondered if she became me when she was with Ben.
When she discovered Halloween in Montañita was little more than an excuse for heavy drinking, she decided to throw her own party. Her last October letter detailed the plans. She had pumpkins shipped in from the States and got Eva to help her put together a haunted house in the garage. Since people weren’t accustomed t
o dressing up for the occasion, Stella ordered costumes in all shapes and sizes. She chose her absolute favorite, Scarlett O’Hara in the famous green outfit made from curtains. She thought Ben would be super pissed when he saw the bill, but it would be too late by then. I highlighted only one line from her narrative: “But Ben’s super pissed most of the time anyway, so no big deal.”
I expected a detailed description of the party in Stella’s first November letter, but it was surprisingly stark. She said everyone loved her costume, but Ben had refused to don the Rhett Butler outfit she ordered for him. He went with Phantom of the Opera instead. Someone else had been Rhett, and he made a very interesting counterpart to her Scarlett, much better than Ben would have. After that, “Rhett” appeared frequently.
“I’ve got some Rhett guy showing up in just about every letter from December through March,” Justin said when we were ready to compare notes.
I explained how and when he had shown up, and we speculated who he might be. The obvious choice was Adelmo Balsuto, but he insisted we shouldn’t jump to that conclusion. He pointed out a place she had frequented, Olon. “It’s so much quieter and gentler than Montañita,” she wrote. She described houses built on top of cliffs dangerously close to disintegration and spoke of hiking to a waterfall and swimming in the cold, clear water. My sister mentioned hummingbirds hovering like jeweled clouds, creating a shimmering light across the entire sky. She never came out and said Rhett was with her, but there was no way she would have traipsed through the forest alone. Stella was athletic but had never been interested in being one with nature.
“I think we made some real progress.” He stood and stretched. His shirt slid up enough to give me a quick view of the bottom third of what appeared to be a very impressive six-pack.
“Me, too. But I won’t be able to sleep in the middle of an active investigation.” I pointed at the cluttered bedspread.
“It would be a shame to destroy our hard work. Let’s see if we can come up with some other place you might spend the night. Strictly in the interest of preserving research.” He smiled and wriggled his eyebrows up and down.
I felt a flutter south of my waistline but ignored it. “If we’re careful, we should be able to move the bedspread to the floor without messing up the cards.”
Justin laughed and took out his cell phone. “I’ll take some pictures. Then we can transfer our stacks to the table.”
After he snapped a few shots, I busied myself with organizing our work.
“Harry should be in the lobby in about thirty minutes. Meet you there.”
I walked with him to the door where he stopped and turned to me.
“And Grace.” He leaned close.
I held my breath and looked into his dark blue eyes. He grasped my chin in one hand, and I parted my lips. Then he said, “You’ve got highlighter on your face.”
Chapter 17
As usual, the men were already in the lobby when I arrived five minutes early. They were so engrossed in conversation, neither noticed me until I was in front of them.
“You look especially lovely tonight,” Harry said, as he pulled out my chair.
“Thanks for noticing.” After scrubbing the highlighter off my face, I spent extra time with my make-up and hair.
“You clean up good, but I kind of miss the highlighter,” Justin added.
I ignored him and asked Harry if he’d gotten in touch with Ben. I was second-guessing my decision to have him make the initial contact since I was the better choice for gauging Ben’s reactions first-hand and in person.
“I left two messages,” he answered. “Don’t worry. It’s only been a few hours.”
“Harry’s right,” Justin said. “Men like Ben always want the last word. And then there’s seeing you. No way he’ll let you leave the country before you talk to him.”
“Relax, Grace. There’s a great restaurant about fifteen minutes from here. It started as a curbside grill. Now it’s tucked in a nice little neighborhood. More locals than tourists.” Harry threaded his arm through mine and ushered me out the shiny chrome and glass doors.
Traffic thinned as we drove farther from the river. The streets narrowed, and harsh modern lighting dissolved into a softer glow from European-style streetlamps. A pastel haze glimmered over sidewalks in front of two-story buildings, painted in pale shades of pink, blue, and green. Intricately patterned wrought iron framed narrow balconies. He parked on a side street, and we walked a short block to the restaurant.
As soon as we entered, a man in a black jacket greeted Harry. They clapped each other’s backs and chattered in Spanish while Justin and I looked on. Round tables covered with golden cloths, linen napkins and simple but elegant silverware filled the small dining area. Only the brilliant red and orange flowers in crystal vases hinted of the exotic nature of our locale. Harry’s friend seated us by the window.
We ordered wine, then Harry went over the menu, skipping an item I’d never heard of.
“Wait. What’s cuy? A local specialty?”
He grinned. “Well, I’ve never eaten it any other place. Cuy is guinea pig. Tried it once after three or four too many beers. Tastes like chicken.”
Mr. Reeces Cup, Lesroy’s chocolate and beige pet guinea pig, squealed in the back of my mind. The plump little creature danced in delight whenever we ran up to his cage.
“Okay, then. I’ll have the shrimp and coconut sauce.”
They each ordered steak cut in thin strips, served over rice and beans. We shared orders of yucca bread, fried in rounded pieces with warm, chewy centers, along with meat and cheese empanadas. Despite the memory of Lesroy’s beloved Mr. Reeces, my appetite returned, and I cleaned my plate.
Harry suggested we try aguardiente, a local favorite distilled from sugar cane and fruit juice. “Sounds harmless, but it packs a real punch,” he warned.
I took a sip, gasped for air, downed half a glass of bottled water, and coughed uncontrollably. Justin patted me on the back. The choking sensation subsided just as Harry’s phone sounded. He looked at caller ID and then at me. “Ben,” he said and left the table.
I pushed up from my chair to go with him, but Justin took my hand and shook his head. “It’s better if he handles it without you there.”
As infuriating as it was, he was right. Ben didn’t need to know I was there. And there was a good chance I’d start screaming and yelling obscenities at the sound of his voice. He paid the check, and we waited on the sidewalk. It was after eight and cooler, but the humidity seeped into my hair, frizzing it into a giant puffball.
“Why is it taking so long?” I paced beside him.
Before he replied, Harry came from the side of the building.
“What a jackass. He said you’re the only one he’ll talk to. I told him you got in late and were exhausted. He wants to see you as soon as possible. We set it up for tomorrow afternoon at his house in Montañita.”
“I’m not comfortable with that.” Justin faced me and held my shoulders. “He’s a complete asshole, and when assholes get desperate, they’re unpredictable.”
“He won’t hurt me,” I asserted. “If he did, he’d be the bad guy, and he always has to believe he’s a good guy.”
They continued to insist on accompanying me. Although their protective attitude was comforting, I resented the implication I was incapable of handling the situation. Whether it came from the need to prove something or from the perverse desire to confront my ex alone, I was determined to go on my own.
After a heated debate, I agreed to let them drop me off and stay as close as possible to the house. Neither was happy until Harry suggested I wear a wire in case I got in trouble. The prospect of being wired up excited me more t
han I cared to admit.
On our return trip, I remembered the folder. Several times I intended to ask what about my sister’s death warranted further investigation. But there had been no suitable moment for such a terrible revelation. With the evening almost over, we couldn’t afford to delay.
“I’m guessing you both examined Stella’s file. What was in it that made Luis so uncomfortable?”
Justin cleared his throat before explaining there were marks on the body, around the neck specifically. “I don’t see how drowning could have caused them.”
“Are you saying she was strangled?” It surprised me how easy it was for me to say the words, as if I were talking about someone else’s sister.
“We shouldn’t jump to conclusions. And without the pictures, there’s no way we could prove it.”
Normally, I would have demanded to read the report myself, but for once I was willing to accept Justin’s word.
When we reached the hotel, Harry dropped us at the front entrance, explaining he had things to do before morning. It was less than a two-hour drive to Montañita, and he wanted to leave me at the villa while he and Justin checked out Ben’s house. We would meet at 7:30 for a quick breakfast and an early check-out.
“Are you up for a drink?” he asked after Harry left.
I discovered grief has a dual effect. One minute, getting out of bed was an insurmountable task. The next, you’re filled with an erratic energy like tiny bolts of electricity shooting through your body. Ever since Harry confirmed my meeting with Ben, I sizzled with that current.
“I’m not in the mood for another drink. What if we just took a walk?” I hoped to learn if what I observed from my window was happiness or freneticism.
He liked the idea. We crossed through the lobby to the river walkway and strolled in silence. Not a comfortable one like people who’ve been married for over fifty years enjoy but not awkward either. Streetlights reflected off the black water, sending silver ribbons over the surface. We passed graceful structures of metalwork topped with airy sails. Abstract periscope pieces built into walls along the path blended with statues of famous Ecuadorians. Overhead, slashes of crimson, violet, and emerald flooded the sky, trailed by strains of classical music.
The Sometime Sister Page 9