Scandal in Copper Lake

by Marilyn Pappano

  Rick and Amanda joined them, the latter carrying Anamaria’s purse. She handed it over with a hug. “Come to dinner tonight,” she murmured. “It’ll be good for you.”

  Rick laid his hand on Robbie’s shoulder. “We’ll be at Mom’s, or I’ve got my cell if you need anything.”

  “Thanks, bubba.”

  Rick and Amanda went back the way they’d come. Robbie kept one arm around Anamaria and hustled her across the road to the car. “Well, Annie,” he said, reluctant to let go of her so she could get in. “There’s only one person left to talk to.”

  She swallowed hard and nodded. “Kent.”

  He nodded, too. “Are you up to it?”

  “With you there? You bet.” It was mostly bravado, but she would find the courage. She always did.

  A phone call to Kent’s house confirmed that he was out for the day. “Fishing,” Robbie said when he hung up. “That means he’s at the cabin. Excuse me, the lodge. How about I take you out to Mom’s, and you spend some time getting acquainted with her and Amanda. Then I’ll pick you up on my way home.”

  “You’re not going to talk to him without me.”

  He was worried about her. She still looked pale, still troubled. She’d come to the conclusion back there in the deli that her mother’s death might not have been accidental—that even if the fall had been, either Cyrus or Kent, or maybe even both, had done nothing to help her. They had let her die.

  She had come to Copper Lake looking for a few details about her mother’s last days, and she’d learned more than any daughter would want to know about her last night.

  They followed River Road out of town, turning back west onto a narrow dirt road before they reached Calloway Plantation. The road was still muddy from the last rain, and he thought more than once that he should have borrowed Sara’s SUV. But they made it through the worst spots and were soon on the uphill slope to the cabin, built atop the riverbank.

  Robbie saw no point to a fishing camp when the comforts of home were just a few miles away. Cyrus had seen no point to going home when he could bring the comforts to his camp. The log cabin was built of far more substance than most camps generally were, with a front porch running the length of the building and a back porch on stilts that stretched out over the river for easy fishing. The furniture inside was made of leather and wood, the rugs Navajo, the art fairly good. When Robbie was young, it had been used for entertaining out-of-town business associates, but most of the family had preferred to do their fishing from a boat or sitting on a quiet bank somewhere.

  A black Escalade was parked in front of the cabin. Robbie pulled in next to it, got out and circled the car to help Anamaria out. The scene was quiet—no television or music from inside, no rocking or conversation on the front porch.

  They climbed the steps to the porch and he rang the doorbell, listening to it echo inside. Before it faded away, a board creaked to his left and Kent stepped around the corner.

  “What do you want?”

  Kent’s welcomes were never very welcoming. He disliked everyone to some extent, and he disliked Robbie and his brothers more. Maybe it was because they’d had a lousy father, too, but they hadn’t let it hold them back. Maybe because their mother wasn’t lousy. Sara had devoted herself to raising her kids, while Mary had just abandoned hers.

  “Anamaria and I wanted to talk to you.”

  Kent came a few steps closer, then eased one hip onto the porch railing. “I figured you’d come along eventually, if you were smart enough to figure it out.”

  “We’ve figured out a few things.”

  “Like what?”

  Robbie faced Kent fully. “That Glory was your father’s mistress. That she was sleeping with you, too. That Cyrus got her pregnant.”

  Kent bitterly shook his head. “Now, I missed that. I never knew about him and her until that night. I thought the baby was mine. The timing was right. She told me I was the only one she’d been with. Lying whore. Even when she broke up with me a few weeks before the baby was due, even when she said then that the baby wasn’t mine, I didn’t believe her. All I wanted was to marry her and stop sneaking around and live like normal people, her and me and our baby. Just be a real family.”

  “She had another baby,” Robbie pointed out, gesturing toward Anamaria. “What about her?”

  Kent’s gaze flickered over her derisively. “She had family to take her in. She didn’t need to be with us.”

  It sounded callous—it was callous. But given Glory’s history, who could blame Kent for thinking she would agree? She’d given away custody of her first two daughters; why not the third?

  “But Glory turned you down,” Robbie prompted.

  “No, she didn’t,” Kent hastily responded. “She said she needed some time. Said she needed to get herself together for the baby’s birth, and then we’d talk.

  “I kept waiting for her to call, but she never did. Every day, every night. Then that night I was on my way over to Aunt Lydia’s and I saw her leaving. It was raining real hard, and that car of hers was always giving her trouble, so I decided to follow her home, just to make sure she got there. Only she didn’t go home.”

  The downpour would have made it cold and miserable, Anamaria thought, and would have turned the road to the cabin into soupy mud. In her mind, she could see Glory in her little secondhand car—It may be a junker, but God love her, she’s my junker—trying to navigate the road. Cyrus waited at this end in his fancy fishing cabin, with more money than he knew what to do with and a baby or grandbaby about to make an appearance in the world. She could have turned around at any point and gone home, but she’d forged ahead for Charlotte’s sake, for her family’s sake.

  “When she saw my headlights behind her, she thought I was my father,” Kent said, his voice flat and distant. “She pulled over, hoping to avoid the rest of the drive up here. She about jumped out of her skin when she saw it was me at her window. She told me to go home, told me I was going to ruin everything. I didn’t know what she was talking about. God, I was a damn fool.

  “That was when she told me, standing in the rain down there on the road, freezing our asses off. She’d been sleeping with my father longer than she’d known me. This kid that I was willing to marry her for, to give up everything for, was his snot-nosed bastard. My own freakin’ half sister.”

  Anamaria walked to the top of the steps, facing out, the scene playing out in her mind as his words continued. He’d howled like a wounded animal when Glory had told him Cyrus was Charlotte’s father, and he’d slapped her, knocking her to the ground. Immediately apologetic, he’d offered his hand, but instead she’d kicked out at him, hitting him squarely in the testicles. As he’d sunk to the ground with another howl of pain, she’d pushed to her feet and started running. Her shawl was all she had to keep her dry, and it wasn’t made for that. It slipped and tree branches snagged at it, but she clenched the ends tightly in her hands and ran on, heart pounding, abdomen cramping, angling through the woods for the river.

  Kent had lain there in the mud, sniveling, trying twice to get to his feet before managing to do so. Soaked to the skin, in pain, sucking air in small gasps, he’d taken a few halting steps after her. Every movement throbbed, fueling his disillusionment and betrayal, until rage overcame pain. He’d caught her on the path, roaring her name. She’d looked over her shoulder, crying loudly enough for him to hear over the rain, and then she’d turned back and fallen.

  “You didn’t go for help,” Robbie said quietly, his voice jarring Anamaria from the scene. Hugging herself tightly, she turned to look at them: Kent, once a twenty-year-old boy, in love and determined to be a better father than his father could have ever been…only to find out that Cyrus had been Glory’s lover first. Had fathered the child Kent believed was his own.

  And Robbie…somber, strong, capable, concerned for her. I’m the shallow one, the superficial one, the irresponsible one, he’d said, but it was so much bull. Maybe when he was a boy, but boys were allowed those f
aults. He was a man to be proud of. A man who would do what was right.

  Kent’s voice was barely audible. “She was hurt bad. Her head was all gashed open, and she was having trouble breathing and seeing things that weren’t there. I couldn’t have carried her back, and if I’d left to get someone, it would have been too late. The baby was already coming, and Glory was already going.”

  She wasn’t seeing things that weren’t there. It was Grandma Chessie, Moon, Florence and plenty of the others who’d gone on before. They’d been waiting to welcome her. Birthing was the hard part, coming into the world all alone. Passing to meet again with people you loved, who loved you back, was sweet and easy.

  Tears moistened Anamaria’s cheeks as she spoke for the first time. “You were there when our sister was born.”

  Kent stared at her as if he’d never seen her before, then swallowed hard, making the connection. His father, her mother. “She came sliding out into the water. I wrapped her in Glory’s shawl. I was going to leave her there, but…”

  It was likely true that he couldn’t help Glory, but the baby was another matter. If he took her, she would live; if he left her, she would die. Anamaria couldn’t help but think Cyrus would have made a different decision.

  “Where did you take her?”

  “Someplace safe.”

  “Where?” Robbie asked.

  But Kent’s eyes darkened, his jaw clamped shut and he folded his arms over his chest for emphasis.

  A long moment passed, birds singing, sun shining, a boat putting by on the river. A perfectly normal day. And all Anamaria wanted to do was grieve in Robbie’s arms.

  Robbie finally broke the silence. He moved closer to Kent, laying his hand on his shoulder, the way Rick had done with him a short time earlier. “Will you go into town with us and talk to Tommy?”

  Kent turned away, staring out over the woods through which Glory had fled to her death, and his sigh seemed to well up from the depths of his soul. “Why not? What’s left to lose? Let me lock up the cabin.”

  The screen door bumped shut behind him. Robbie joined Anamaria at the steps, wrapping his arms around her from behind. “You were right. Charlotte survived.”

  She smiled thinly. “Yeah. I wonder how many tens of thousands of mixed-race twenty-three-year-old girls I’ll have to go through to find her. Because, you know, Mama Odette won’t be able to die in peace without seeing her grandbaby.”

  “That should keep her around another twenty years at least. Maybe she’ll give Chessie a run for the money in the age department.”

  Anamaria was thinking about the small pleasure that Robbie remembered the many names and details of the Duquesne family she’d thrown out over the past few days, and about the bigger pleasure when he would get to meet them—the living ones, at least—hopefully soon. They would be so happy to find out that she was in love and pregnant, and they would be shocked to hear that she’d decided curses were for lesser women than Duquesnes. If Robbie was willing to take a chance on her, the least she could do was take the same chance on him. For their baby’s sake. For their sake.

  And who knew? Maybe Kent would relent before then and tell them where he’d taken Charlotte. Maybe the sister everyone had thought dead could be at her wedding to the man she would live the rest of her life with.

  Then a gunshot rang out.

  Robbie and Anamaria sat on the porch steps, Rick on one side, Tommy on the other. The sheriff and his deputies were inside the cabin, along with the medical examiner’s staff. Suicide, they all agreed. No one could have known. No one could have prevented it.

  Robbie wasn’t so sure.

  As if he’d read his mind, Rick slid his arm around Robbie’s shoulders, mussed his hair, then pulled his head to his own shoulder. “It’s not your fault, bubba. People are gonna do what they’re gonna do. Kent’s never been happy a day in his life, except maybe those months with Glory. He wasn’t making a plea for help. It wasn’t a gesture. He wanted it done.”

  A single bullet to the brain had certainly gotten it done. “Still…I shouldn’t have let him go into the cabin alone. I should have known he wouldn’t have come out here without a gun. Granddad taught us better than that.”

  “Granddad taught us a lot,” Rick said. “Some of it didn’t take with Kent.”

  “He’s right, Rob,” Tommy said. “Kent’s been miserable the last twenty-three years. Maybe now he can find some peace.” He glanced over his shoulder, then stood up and offered his hand to Anamaria. “They’re ready to bring his body out. Why don’t you two go on?”

  Robbie didn’t look over his shoulder, didn’t want to see into the living room with its leather furniture and Navajo rugs, stained now with blood, didn’t want to see the zippered bag that contained Kent’s body. He hadn’t cared much for Kent, but, God, he hadn’t wanted this.

  The four of them walked to the Vette in silence, and he and Anamaria headed back toward town in the same, heavy silence. She kept her hand on his thigh, her touch reassuring. He could live with that touch for the next sixty years and never grow tired of its comfort, its familiarity.

  If she would have him.

  As he turned onto the highway, she asked, “Where would he have gone that night, Robbie? He was twenty years old, he had a newborn child in need of food, clothing and attention, and he had a car to move to make sure that no one connected Glory’s last night with his family. Where would he have taken Charlotte? Who could he have trusted with her?”

  The answer was simple, sure. “Lydia.” She had loved Kent like a son. She would have accepted whatever story he told her and would have taken his secret to her grave.

  Lydia. Glory’s friend. But blood was thicker than water.

  He drove through town, then turned east on Carolina. They passed the mall, the turn that led to Marguerite and the nursing home, the elaborate brick-and-iron gates that led to Cyrus’s property and finally reached Twin Oaks. Lydia was sitting in a rocker on the broad porch, her head bowed over a small bundle in her arms.

  “She knows,” Anamaria murmured.

  “Yeah.” He didn’t have to be a psychic to see.

  Robbie parked next to her car, then took Anamaria’s hand as they crossed the drive to the steps. Lydia didn’t look up but continued her slow, steady rocking. “Glory used to say that when we die, the people who loved us are waiting to meet us. I like that idea, seeing all those people who have already passed on. But who do you suppose was there to meet Kent?”

  Anamaria pulled free of Robbie and crouched in front of the rocker. “Mr. John was there, and another man—tall, slender, with big hands and big ears.”

  Robbie stiffened, but Lydia smiled even though her eyes were damp. “That’s his granddad Jed. Jed’s mama used to say that God gave him those ears so she’d have something to hold on to when she had to wallop him for misbehaving.”

  Anamaria had seen his granddad at the cabin. The news knocked Robbie back on his heels. He hadn’t noticed—she hadn’t said…But in eight words, she’d given a perfect description of a man she’d never seen. And if he believed in spirits and crossing over, Granddad was the one person who would always be there to welcome his grandchildren. Even when they’d exasperated or disappointed him, he’d still loved them. Always loved them.

  “Miss Lydia, Kent told us he took the baby. He wrapped her in Mama’s shawl, and he took her someplace safe.” Anamaria’s voice was soft and unsteady, and so was her hand as she touched the bundle Lydia cradled. “He brought her to you, didn’t he?”

  It was the shawl she held, Robbie realized. Duquesne family history, taken from Glory as she lay dying, and Lydia had had it all these years.

  Before Lydia could answer, the front door slammed open with a bang and Harrison Kennedy strode out. “What the hell are you doing here? I told you you couldn’t talk to her! I forbade you—”

  “Harrison,” Lydia interrupted. “For heaven’s sake, it’s Robbie. He’s family. Of course he can talk to me. I was just about to tell them about the
baby. About Charlotte.”

  Harrison stabbed a finger in her direction. “You don’t tell them anything. We agreed never to discuss it, remember?”

  She made a dismissive gesture. “That was years ago, and Kent’s gone now, bless his heart. He doesn’t need our protection anymore.”

  Harrison mimicked the same gesture. “It was never about protecting him, Liddy! Maybe if he’d had to face the consequences of his actions, it would have turned him into a man. But he couldn’t have paid without dragging you into it, and I never would have let that happen. I won’t let that happen.” Abruptly, he stabbed his finger at Robbie. “You’re still our damn lawyer. Anything she says to you is privileged. You can’t tell a soul.”

  “That was why you insisted I handle this myself, wasn’t it?” Robbie asked. “You didn’t want a private investigator because privilege wouldn’t apply. If he found evidence of a crime, he would have to report it, but I couldn’t.”

  Lydia shooed Anamaria back, then got to her feet to face her husband. “Harrison, just what crime do you think I committed?”

  “That woman…the baby…” He dragged his fingers through his hair. “She was here that night—came to swindle Liddy out of more money. I left to have dinner at the country club and play a few hands of poker. When I came home, Kent was tearing up the driveway like a bat out of hell, the woman was gone and Liddy was sitting in the parlor holding that damn baby, cooing, going on like it was her own.”

  “You thought I—” Lydia blanched, and her mouth worked a moment before she started again. “You thought I—I did something to Glory to get her baby? You thought I killed her?”

  Harrison’s face turned as red as hers was pale. “She was alive and well and pregnant when I left, and when I come back, there’s no sign of her but the baby? And the next morning she’s found dead by the river on the other side of town? What was I supposed to think?”

  “Mr. Kennedy, my mother died where her body was found,” Anamaria said quietly. “She and Kent were arguing. She ran into the woods to get away from him, and she fell. He left her there, but he brought the baby to Miss Lydia.”