He was going to recover on a cursed island? What else could go wrong?
* * *
I walked into Tucker’s hospital room as the man was practicing walking with a pair of crutches. He didn’t notice me at first. I waited quietly by the door, watching him. Though the crutches were awkward, he moved with a practiced grace, as if he’d had to use them before.
I revised my estimation of his age, adding a few more years. A sprinkling of gray lightly frosted his temples. The day’s growth of beard and mustache gave him a craggy look.
He pivoted and spotted me. His eyes opened slightly and a soft smile appeared on his lips.
The heat started in my neck and rushed to my face. Rats! I ducked, letting my hair swing forward, and inspected the bathroom doorknob. A sideways peek told me he wasn’t buying my fascination with the hardware. I cleared my throat. “Um . . . are you ready to leave?”
“More than ready. Next stop, the airport?”
“We’ll be taking a slight detour.”
“Oh? Maybe a little sightseeing? I haven’t had a chance to visit Fort Sumter.”
“More like Fort Raven. My sister has a journal supposedly written by a shipwreck survivor. I want to see if she still has it. And I want to find out about a certain key.”
He hobbled closer to me. “That sounds mysterious and intriguing.”
His ultramarine-blue eyes were outlined by black lashes and matching brows, his skin tone now a healthy shade of tan. He reminded me of Matthew McConaughey in Sahara—
“Piper?”
“Um . . . yes. Sorry. Woolgathering. There was an article on the internet about a curse—”
“I read it.”
“Oh. Well, don’t worry, the island isn’t cursed, but that legend was, to my knowledge, only ever mentioned in that single book about the area. We’re going to swing by Raven’s condo and see if she still has it. That reporter had to have had a source.” And if I’m going to see my sister after all these years, Tucker will make good backup.
Before leaving the room, Tucker moved over to the bedside table, picked up three pebbles, and placed them in his pocket. I wanted to ask what he was doing but didn’t want to intrude.
We made it to the car without incident, meaning without notice by the press, and didn’t speak for the first few miles. I tried to concentrate on driving, but his presence seemed to fill the confined space and suck up the available air.
The closer I got to Mount Pleasant, the more my mind danced through various scenarios. What would I say to Raven? Hi. I know we haven’t spoken in a long time. Maybe it was my fault—I don’t even remember after all this time, but I need to borrow a book. By the way, why did you give me a key ring with a blank key? Would my sister be happy to see me? Angry? Would she even see me? What if Raven slammed the door in my face?
Come to think of it, I hoped I remembered how to get there. Mount Pleasant, located across the Cooper River from Charleston, was one of the fastest-growing cities in South Carolina. New neighborhoods sprang up quickly after Hurricane Hugo in 1989.
Fortunately Raven’s condo was in an older neighborhood that had changed little since I’d last visited the area. The town houses were a different color and the landscaping more mature, but nothing else was different. Raven’s condo was an end unit, facing away from the other condos. I parked in front.
“Do you want me to come in with you?” Tucker asked.
In a heartbeat. I cleared my throat, ridiculously grateful for his offer. “If you don’t mind, that would be wonderful.”
Slipping from the car, I grabbed his crutches from the back seat and brought them around to the passenger side. Tucker had already maneuvered from his seat. As he took the crutches from me, his hand grazed mine. A tingling jolt ran up my arm. I snatched my hand away. Fool. Why am I even thinking like this?
When he told me about himself, he hadn’t mentioned if he was married. He didn’t wear a ring, but that didn’t mean anything—
“Piper? Hello? You’ve got a very pensive look on your face. Again.” Tucker was smiling at me.
I raced toward the condo before the blush made it to my face. “Just thinking,” I said over my shoulder.
I rang the doorbell before I lost my courage. The sound carried faintly through the door. Tucker joined me on the small stoop, and once again I was hyperaware of his presence. I rang the bell again.
“Doesn’t look as if she’s home.” Tucker moved back, then hobbled to the window on the right and peeked inside. “Actually, it doesn’t look as if she even lives here. The place is empty.”
“You’re kidding.” I moved to where I could look inside as well. Tucker was correct. The room was bare of furniture. “Oh no.”
“How long since you were here?”
“It’s been . . . a few years.”
“And your sister never mentioned that she moved?”
I looked at my shoe. Yet another failure on my part. “It’s a long story.”
“How badly did you want this journal? Or to see your sister?”
Before I could come up with some lame excuse, a voice came from behind us. “Hello?”
An elderly woman in a leopard-patterned tunic and black leggings, with a bizarre-looking, three-legged dog on a leash, stood in the parking lot behind us. “There’s no solicitation here.”
Tucker pivoted. “We’re not—”
“And you’d better not be one of those door-to-door religious types. So beat it.”
My face burned.
“Say, that’s a cute dog.” Tucker smiled.
“You think so?” The woman reached down and patted the dog’s hairless back. The only fur appeared as tufts on its head, tail, and feet. “She’s a little odd looking on account of the three legs.”
I bit my lip. The three legs were the most normal-looking part of the dog.
The woman straightened. “She’s a Chinese Crested. Hypoallergenic.”
“Ah.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. Saying someone’s precious dog looked like a refugee from Chernobyl probably wouldn’t warm her heart.
Tucker indicated the condo. “We’re looking—”
“To buy it? Don’t bother.” She took a puff on a cigarette I hadn’t noticed her holding. “I tried. A bunch of times. I guess they just want the place empty. Pity.” She gave Tucker a once-over. “’Course, maybe you might be able to talk them into selling. I could use a good-looking neighbor.”
I opened my mouth to answer when Tucker poked me in the back.
“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “If this place has been empty for so long, maybe there’s something wrong with it.”
“Nah.” Another drag on the cigarette. “Nothing’s wrong with it.”
“How can you be so sure?” I gave Tucker a sideways glance. I thought I’d delivered that line with conviction. Maybe I was the next Meryl Streep.
She turned and pointed at a solid-looking fence. “See that? Used to be, back when I first moved in, you could drive up to this condo without anyone the wiser. There was a small road there, and a garage where you could park your car out of sight. That’s what made it such a catch. Privacy. Then someone had that fence built, the garage torn down, and anyone coming to this place had to come past the other units. A cleaning and maintenance crew comes in once a month.”
“So how long have you lived here?” I asked.
“Moved in when it was first built. About eighteen to twenty years ago.”
I tried to keep from bouncing with excitement. She’d lived here while Raven did! “Did you know the occupant?”
“Nope.” She took a thoughtful drag on her cigarette. “Like I said, private.”
“So you didn’t see the previous owner?” Tucker asked.
“Maybe once or twice. Years ago. Pretty lady. Saw her husband a few times.”
Raven never married . . . at least that I was aware of. She used to have plenty of boyfriends. “I see.” How to ask more about this? “Um, when did . . . they move out?” Loo
sening my clenched fingers, I pasted a hopeful smile on my face. Please remember something.
“A long time ago, maybe ten years or more now, a moving van drove up and emptied the place out. While they were busy hauling furniture, I decided to take a look around. I walked in as pretty as you please and wandered through the whole place. No one stopped me. I coulda been a crook or something. The furniture was beautiful, really pricey stuff. Lots of books and knickknacks.”
I wanted to ask her the name of the moving company, the husband, anything else she could remember, but considering I was supposed to be interested in buying the unit, that would trigger her alarm. Asking about an old journal would raise the same level of suspicion.
The woman tugged on the dog and pursed her lips. Her gaze went back and forth between Tucker and me, as if regretting saying too much. Ask about the condo.
“Thank you so much for the information. The place might be too small, though. We’ll keep looking.” Nice, Meryl. I stepped forward as if to leave.
“It’s plenty big.” She relaxed. “Two bedrooms on the second floor, one on the third. One of the two bedrooms had been turned into an office. The third bedroom was empty. Not even curtains on the windows.”
Tucker nodded. “That does sound big. If I wanted to convince someone to sell, who would I contact?”
“I’d guess the folks who own the whole building.”
“And that would be?” I asked.
“Boone Industries.”
Chapter 10
The older woman didn’t move as they made their way back to the car. They drove away in silence. Once more on the road to the airport, Tucker twisted in his seat to see Piper more clearly. The faint flush in her cheeks told him she was aware of his attention. “Did you know your family owned that building?”
“No, but they do own a lot of real estate.”
“What about Raven’s work? Her job. You could ask there.”
“Raven, well, you could say she enjoyed her freedom. Even though she had a degree in business, she didn’t hold a job. The family money provided her with enough income, as long as she was reasonable in her spending.” She gave him a quick sideways glance.
“Someone in your family should know where your sister moved.”
Piper caught her lower lip with her teeth. “Maybe. We, that is, my family, tend to go our own ways. I’m closest to my brother, Tern. I think . . .”
He waited for her to continue.
She gave a tiny shake of her head.
“You think . . . ?”
“Nothing. Never mind.”
“What about the family business—maybe you could find out about the condo?”
“I don’t know how I’d explain my sudden interest. My mother and brother run the company . . . Well, I should say Tern oversees everything, as Mother appointed him CEO a few years ago.”
“Did that make you jealous?”
She glanced at him with a look of genuine surprise. “Not at all. Grandfather started the company, then passed it on to his son, my father, Montgomery. Father died in an accident, so control passed on to his son, my brother. I never expected it to come to me.”
“You mentioned a stockholders’ meeting. You own stock?”
“It’s a privately held corporation with Mother, Raven, Tern, Ashlee, and me as shareholders. If anyone passes away, the shares are equally divided among the survivors—except for Ashlee, whose shares don’t change.” Piper parked in the parking garage across from the airport terminal.
“You mentioned that article. Could someone be trying to cause the company—or the family—problems?”
“Maybe.” Piper frowned.
“We could ask the reporter where she got the information,” Tucker said.
“That sounds like a plan.”
He jumped from the car before she had a chance to ask him to wait and maneuvered his crutches from the back seat.
She pulled out a wide-brimmed hat and put it on. As they moved into the sunshine and crossed the street, the hat allowed a pattern of sun-dots to freckle her face. She looked beautiful.
“How will you recognize Hannah?” he asked once they’d entered the terminal.
Piper scanned the arriving flight information on the screen in front of her. “I’m hoping she’ll see me. I said I’d wear this hat. She seemed pretty confident we wouldn’t have a problem.”
Arriving passengers streamed around them heading to baggage claim. Piper examined the faces of passing women. “This should be her flight . . .”
A striking young woman with long blond hair appeared, staring to her left.
Piper stepped forward and raised her hand.
The woman swung her gaze around, checking the waiting crowd. Massive scar tissue marred the left side of her face. A black eyepatch with a sequin butterfly covered her eye on that side. Her ear was a lump of tissue.
Piper’s face drained of color. Tucker fully expected her to turn and bolt.
She raised her hand higher and waved. “Hannah?”
The young woman paused as if waiting for Piper to change her mind.
Piper raced forward and embraced Hannah in a hug. “I am so happy to meet you. Welcome to South Carolina.”
He slowly nodded. Piper’s complexion was still pale, but she greeted the badly burned woman as if meeting Miss America.
“Anything new on Grandma’s whereabouts?” Hannah asked.
“She hasn’t shown up.” Piper took a deep breath. “But we’ll keep on the police.” She pulled Hannah out of the main stream of passengers. “How was your flight? Is this your first visit to South Carolina? Do you have luggage?” Piper barely paused for breath. “Are you hungry?”
Hannah opened her eyes wide. “Wow. And I thought you’d be a bit distant. More of, like, a Southern belle. Grandma always said you were, like, proper. That I should be more like you.”
“Oh my. Dr. Mueller said that?” Piper ducked her head for a moment. “No one should be like me,” she whispered, then straightened. “I am being rude. Hannah . . . um, is your last name Mueller?”
“It is now. I took my grandmother’s name.”
“Hannah, I’d like you to meet my friend Tucker Landry.” Piper lightly touched him on the arm. “Tucker, this is Hannah Mueller. Now then, the formalities are over.” Piper let go of Tucker’s arm. “Luggage?”
Hannah nodded.
He could still feel Piper’s hand on his arm. He liked the feeling.
* * *
The people by the baggage carousel parted as we approached, glancing at Hannah and just as quickly looking away. Hannah seemed oblivious to their stares. I knew my face would be showing my distress, but I wrapped one arm around the girl’s waist. If Hannah could breeze through this crowd with such dignity, so could I.
Once we retrieved Hannah’s suitcase, the three of us headed to the car. “I thought you might need to stay at the guesthouse, but the police aren’t going to process your grandmother’s place, so there’s no reason you can’t stay there.” After placing the suitcase and crutches in the trunk, we got into the car.
“I know she’s missing and something bad happened to her.” Tears pooled in her unscarred eye.
“Don’t worry, Hannah.” I turned and gave her an encouraging smile. “I won’t let them stop looking.”
“Thank you,” Hannah said. “You’ve been awesome.”
No one spoke as I maneuvered along the highway heading south. Finally, as the traffic thinned, I spoke. “I have to apologize. I never knew your grandmother had children. I never even thought to ask.”
“Grandma just had one daughter, my mother. My parents died in a house fire, which is why I look like this. I ended up living with Grandma.”
“How old were you?” Tucker asked.
“Grandma said I was almost five when I came to live with her, which was twelve years ago.”
That made her a year younger than my Dove would have been. They might have been friends. Will I ever get over thinking about what woulda-coulda
-shoulda happened if Dove hadn’t gone on that boat ride that day? If I hadn’t insisted Ashlee take her . . .
“That must have been a rough time for you,” I said.
“Grandma was there all the time, at least at first. She finally sent me to a special boarding school where there were other kids . . . like me. They became like an extended family.”
“That explains how Joyce was able to come to the island for the past few years.”
She nodded. “She’d leave in the winter when I was in school.”
“That must have been hard on you.” I watched her expression in the rearview mirror.
She looked out the window and nodded.
* * *
Piper took the exit to Marion Inlet, then pulled into a small farmer’s market. “Almost there. Just a quick stop.”
“Good.” Hannah leaned over. “Do I have time to use the restroom?”
Piper parked, then pointed to a row of blue porta potties.
“Mind if I stretch out a bit?” Tucker asked.
“Not at all.” Piper brought him his crutches from the trunk. She carried several woven tote bags. They made their way to a double row of white pop-up tents where spicy fragrances wafted through the air. The vendors called out greetings as they passed.
“Afternoon, Miss Piper. I have some spices Mildred might like.”
“I’ve set aside some new baskets for you, Miss Piper.”
“Miss Piper! You’re looking fine. Check out these new soaps.”
“Boiled peanuts, Miss Piper.”
Piper would pause at the tent, quickly check out the wares, then make a purchase or move on. Unlike her hesitant approach to life, she knew exactly what she was looking for. He let her move ahead of him, watching her in action.
She passed a few booths without stopping. That’s when he noticed it.
Several of the vendors crossed themselves as she passed. One of them made a spitting sound three times.
He was about to catch up with her when a movement caught his attention. A woman with long red hair and pale skin was keeping pace with Piper on the far side of the booths to his left. He crossed toward her through the line of vendors.
Bailey Norton, the reporter from the Charleston Times, was snapping photos of Piper with her cell. She spotted him and nonchalantly snapped a few shots in his direction.
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