Not Quite Mine

by Lyla Payne

  He shakes his head again, his gaze fixed on the horizon. “I don’t…you’re sure this woman is telling the truth? That she’s not trying to throw you off?”

  “I’m sure.” Daria’s a lot of things, but she’s not the type of person to kill a stranger.

  And even if she were, what would she have done with the baby?

  “I can’t imagine Ellen trusting anyone, unless she made a new friend during the time we weren’t speaking.”

  “Not even Autumn?” I suggest, watching for his reaction.

  He laughs again, the hard one. “Especially not Autumn.”

  I want to know what he means by the comment about Autumn but something tells me to let it sit, for now. That if I go right at it, he’ll clam up. “Why weren’t you and Ellen speaking? Did something happen, or was it just a regular fight?”

  Trent sits in silence for so long I start to wonder if that was the wrong tack, too.

  “Look, I messed up, okay? She had left me again and I was upset, but I should have waited. I should have known she’d come back. She always came back.” His voice breaks, shame hovering in the air around him like a cloud.

  I wait, unsure what exactly he’s referring to and not wanting to shatter the moment.

  Patience, Gracie.

  “I slept with Autumn. Just once, but Ellen found out and she said…she said it was really over.” His tears flow harder, and his fingers wrap so tight around his beer bottle that I’m afraid it might crack. “Autumn…I was drunk out of my mind, and she came over, said she was supposed to pick up something of Ellen’s but I didn’t have it. She would have known I didn’t have it.”

  I squeeze his free hand tighter and tighter until he looks up at me. The misery and regret about him make more sense than ever, and my heart breaks for him—for having messed up and now being forced to face the fact that he will never have the chance to set it right.

  It explains, maybe, why Ellen never told him about the baby.

  “We all make mistakes, Trent.”

  He shakes his head, almost sobbing now. I scoot closer and say nothing more as he cries and I watch the waves lap at the sides of the boat. Our feet sway with the current, and I’m not feeling lulled any longer—I’m feeling slightly nauseated.

  It’s after nine and I need to get going, but I can’t leave him here, not like this.

  “Will you tell her how sorry I am?” he whispers.

  I’ve been so long in my own head that I hadn’t noticed him calm down, and him speaking gives me a start.

  “She knows,” I tell him. It’s true. My ghosts always seem to know how the world is in their absence. “For what it’s worth, Trent…I think she regrets how things ended, too.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Even though it’s late, my brain and emotions are speeding on overdrive and I don’t want to go home. I’ll just lie awake wondering where on earth Ellen went if she hadn’t gone home and she hadn’t gone to Trent. She could have made a new friend, but if she’d been sleeping in an abandoned house, it doesn’t seem likely.

  It also doesn’t seem likely that she’d go to Autumn after what Trent had told me, but I still need to talk to her again. She hadn’t been honest with me, for one thing. For another, what if Ellen had gone to her? She must have gone somewhere, and heaven knows girls their age get into fights and manage to convince themselves they can still be friends all the time. No matter how upset Ellen had been with Autumn, she had been scared. Alone. And about to have a baby.

  After seeing Trent tonight, and how much he clearly loved Ellen, I wish there were a way to turn back the clock. If she had gone to him, every piece of me believes she’d be alive. That they would be a happy little family.

  My throat throbs for several miles before I manage to shove my emotions back into a box.

  Instead of driving straight past Driftwood I pull off the highway and wind through the quiet streets until I get to the restaurant down by the water. Unlike in Heron Creek, places in Driftwood stay open late on account of their tourist trade. They’re not Charleston, but they do a festival of lights and elaborate nightly Christmas pageants in December that keep people visiting. And after a hard night of corralling whining, screaming kids and sharing stories about Jesus, people are bound to need a drink or five.

  The lights are still on in the restaurant, but there are only maybe half a dozen cars in the parking lot. Inside, I feel short of breath, anxious to confront Autumn again now that I’m armed with quite a bit more information.

  There are three tables full of customers and one waitress who isn’t Autumn scuttling between them. Lindsay is behind the bar, and when she sees me she rolls her eyes toward the heavens as if she’s asking the good Lord for help not hurling one of the glasses she’s drying at my head.

  “Hey,” I say, doing my best not to duck as I slide into a chair. “Could I have a water please?”

  “We’re getting ready to close. It’s after eleven.”

  There’s no question, but I hear one anyway: What are you doing here?

  I’ve answered that a couple of times tonight, and I’m too tired to do it again, especially since it’s none of her business. “I know. I’m not staying. I just need to talk to Autumn again. Is she here?”

  “What on earth do you want with that poor girl? She was as jumpy as a sinner on Sunday morning after you left the last time. Dropped a whole tray of food right on someone’s lap and had to pay for it besides.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say because it’s expected, not because I give a crap. She might have been upset, but after the conversation I had with Trent Boone, I’m inclined to think he’s much more so. “Is she here?”

  “No. Her kid is sick so she had someone cover.”

  “Damn. Okay. I guess it can wait.”

  It’s like as soon as the words slip out, exhaustion crowds past and straight into my blood. It’s been a long day working alone and staring at the computer, four-plus hours of driving, poker, beer, and enough emotional overload to last me the rest of the year—the next one, too.

  “You look like someone kicked your teeth in tonight.” Lindsay shrugs when I give her a look like I can’t believe she’s making conversation with me. “I guess it wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “Not lately, no. Today has been more of an emotional gut punch, not an actual punch.”

  “Hmm.” She keeps drying glasses, and it’s almost as though she’s trying not to talk to me but can’t help it.

  She’s probably bored, for one thing. Or maybe there’s just something about being behind a bar that encourages a desire to hold conversations with the people sitting on the other side.

  “I heard you and your mayor had dinner with Leo and Victoria the other night.” Lindsay frowns at a stubborn water spot. “How’d that go?”

  “I’m sure Leo told you it didn’t go all that well.”

  Her eyebrows shoot up. “He said it was fun, actually.”

  I snort and almost spit out my sip of water. “Fun? Maybe if you like having lunch at a war crimes trial.”

  Her frown deepens, and she rubs harder at the spot marring a white wineglass. “You don’t like her. I guess that shouldn’t surprise me.”

  “Hey!” My tone is so defensive it makes me cringe. “She was being rude to me, not the other way around. I tried to be nice and everything, I swear.”

  Lindsay sets down the glass and puts her palms on the bar, leveling me with a stare that says, We’re about to have a come-to-Jesus moment and you don’t have a choice in the matter. If I weren’t so tired, I’d get up and run.

  “And why do you suppose that is?”

  I think about it for a minute while I crunch a piece of ice. When the sound makes her flinch I chomp another for good measure, then congratulate myself on my lack of maturity. “Amelia says it’s because my friendship with Leo makes the people we’re dating uncomfortable.”

  “Your cousin is the smart one.”

  “And the pretty one,” I agree.

  “
So which one of you was it that thought this double date was a good idea? My boneheaded brother or you?”

  I think about it for a second. “Mine, I think? But he’s the one who organized it so the fault is probably fifty-fifty.”

  “You’re both idiots.” She picks up a rag and starts to wipe down the bar, one eye over my shoulder.

  I turn around to see a man, who must be the manager based on his attire and the watchful way he’s surveying the restaurant, then swivel back to Lindsay. “Look, here’s the thing. I went along with it because I don’t want to lose Leo as a friend. That would be the worst thing in the world, so I figure if he and Beau can get along and I can get along with Victoria, if she’s going to be around for a while, then no one has any reason to suggest maybe the two of us shouldn’t spend time together.”

  Lindsay presses her lips together, wiping down the entire U-shaped bar before coming back and answering me. Her blue eyes, copies of both Leo’s and Trent’s and every Boone’s I’ve ever met, are different now. Softer, more sympathetic, and the switch is so sudden it’s hard to trust.

  “I believe that you value your friendship with my brother. You must know that he feels the same way. But the two of you have gotten as thick as thieves, and you must be able to see why it bothers the people you date.” She waits for me to respond and takes my shrug as tacit agreement. “For what it’s worth, I do kind of think Victoria might be around for a little while.”

  Victoria is the last thing I want to talk about, regardless of our small but holding truce in the bathroom at the restaurant. Instead, while I’m gathering the energy to get up and drive my butt the last twenty minutes home, I might as well see what she’ll tell me about Leo.

  “Why does Leo have so much trouble settling on one thing? Women, jobs…”

  “I think you have to have more than two things for something to qualify as a trend.”

  I make a face at her. “You know what I mean.”

  She looks as though she’s thinking about it while she opens her drawer and starts to count out the cash. When she’s done, the bills in neat stacks with numbers on scraps of papers, she washes her hands and wanders back toward me. Her expression is serious, thoughtful, but not snotty.

  “I think you’d be surprised by his reasons for not settling down with a woman up to this point. As far as a job, he had more of a direction before our father…died.”

  “And you had a falling out with the rest of your family?” I prompt, unable to stop myself.

  Her eyes narrow on my face, suspicion creeping in and turning them hard. “What do you mean by that?”

  “Nothing. I just know that’s when Leo stopped talking to his brothers, that’s all.”

  “He told you that?”

  I shrug, starting to sweat a little under her razor-sharp inquisition and sure in my twisted guts this was a mistake. She’ll tell Leo what I said, and he’ll know that I’ve gone behind his back talking to Trent. It will hurt him, and I hate that.

  “He didn’t tell me anything,” I say softly. “I put it together, but I don’t know anything about what happened or why.”

  She nods several times, but it’s hard to tell if she’s actually heard me. “He wanted to restore and renovate houses. Did you know that?”

  “No.” I had gone a long time without visiting. Too long. Not only had I let Grams down by not being here when she died, but the longer I’ve been back, the more I realize how many other things I missed. How much I don’t know anymore and how having to ask makes me an outsider in ways that chafe.

  “He and Dad were going to start a business together, once Leo had enough saved to make the initial investment. He’s real good at it, too. Great eye for beautiful things.”

  I can’t for the life of me figure out the contempt in her face or why she sounds angry, when she spits out that last statement.

  All I know is that for some reason, Lindsay has decided to maybe not hate me. That should feel nice, and maybe it would if I could stop feeling like she keeps trying to tell me something I can’t quite hear.

  “So what happened?”

  She stares at me with an incredulous expression but never answers, just shaking her head with a frown. It feels as if I might have backtracked on our minimal steps toward friendship.

  Oops.

  I jump off the stool, and she immediately picks up my water glass and dumps it out in the sink. “Do you know when Autumn’s going to be back in?”

  “No. Depends on how sick her kid is, I guess.”

  “Could you ask her to call me?” I have my doubts as to whether Autumn will do any such thing, but it can’t hurt to ask. My car has been logging a lot of miles, and it’s hard to say how many he might have left.

  Lindsay goes still, watching me. Not saying no, which is kind of a shocker. “Is it important?”

  My throat tightens at the question, at the brief flash of Trent’s wrecked face in my mind. Maybe it should be Ellen whose tragedy moves me, and it does…but she’s gone. Trent’s alive, and maybe so is his son.

  I swallow hard. “It’s important.”

  “Okay.”

  We stare at each other for another couple of seconds when, to my surprise, she gives me the slightest smile. She’s so pretty, despite the extra lines and years that prison dug into her skin. “Good night, Gracie.”

  “Night, Lindsay.”

  Amelia and I both worked today and it was a good thing since the library was hopping. I’m not sure whether it’s the nice weather driving mothers out on a day other than Tuesday, desperate for entertainment, or if the book club is growing without Mrs. Walters in it to scare everyone away, but the library was busier than normal from the time we opened until the time I closed. After a quick text to Travis, I sent Millie home an hour early because she looked like she was going to fall over, plus neither of us had a chance to sit down and eat lunch. My feet and back ache from it all, too, so I can’t imagine how Millie feels since she’s unbalanced and hauling around a bunch of extra weight at this point.

  A smile finds my face at the thought of the baby and how he’s going to be here sooner than later. It’s going to be great to see him, for our family to have something to celebrate. We need that, and we’ve all fought so hard to give him the very best chance in this world.

  My stomach growls on my way out the front door a bit after five, and I think about stopping for a snack or even searching the bottom of my purse for chips or maybe a Ho-Ho, but there must be something better at home.

  The evening is so nice I decide to leave my car in the lot and walk home, despite my hunger. I’ll probably regret it in the morning when it’s rainy and cold or something, because that’s my luck and I still don’t own an umbrella, but for now, the exercise feels good.

  I use the time to ponder my feelings, the ones I don’t have time for when I’m hot on the trail of one ghost or another. At the moment, those types of thoughts range from Beau and this congressional job to Leo finding out that I discussed his family with Trent. About how, for both of them, the influence of their family and upbringing runs deep.

  For all of us, I suppose.

  My lips twist at the mere thought of Felicia and how she’s managing to make my life harder from the grave. There’s no telling why she thought she couldn’t be honest with me about…well, anything. I’m starting to think she didn’t even have a reason, or didn’t know what it was, but that’s probably not fair. The only thing I know for sure is that the woman might as well have been a stranger for all I understand about her.

  People smile and wave, ask me how my day was and tell me to have a good weekend, on the few blocks between town and the home on the river that will always have a place in my heart. Everyone’s moods seem to be buoyed by the respite from the cold, or perhaps it’s the fact that lush green garlands, bright red bows, and twinkle lights have gone up all over town. I’ve never been here at Christmas before, and there’s something about it that makes Heron Creek feel more magical than ever.

  The d
ecorations almost make me wish the weather would turn at least a little colder. Snow isn’t out of the question for this part of the country, though chances of it actually sticking around for more than a few hours are unlikely.

  My steps slow as I approach the house, my eyes lifted a few doors beyond, where I glimpse Cade Walters dragging more crap out to the curb. He’s sweating and maybe cursing, though the distance between us is too far to say for sure. Despite his blinding good looks, the conversation I overheard between him and Leo the other night softened my heart toward the guy.

  If he had issues, it was because of his family. He belongs to my club of friends damaged by the people who should have loved us. Who should have done their best to let us develop into normal adults but failed spectacularly.

  I was lucky. I had Amelia and my friends here. Grams and Gramps and Uncle Wally, and sure, even Aunt Karen. Mel and I both had Will, and Leo has Lindsay.

  Surveying the slump of Cade’s shoulders, the unhappiness on his face, I can’t help but wonder who he had that might have shown him what unconditional love looked like.

  I realize I’m staring and shake myself. My thoughts have run amok—perhaps Cade had a whole slew of people who had been there for him every step of the way. Maybe Mrs. Walters had given his mother good reason to keep them apart. Heaven knows she gave me plenty of reasons to hate her. I need to stop making up stories for people in my head. It’s like my curiosity is on overdrive, and given the lack of any facts, my imagination has decided to create morbid tales about my new neighbor.

  “Whatcha starin’ at, darlin’?” The drawl from my front porch jerks my attention from my new neighbor.

  I turn to find Frank Fournier lounging on the front porch. Instead of the swing, he’s chosen the front steps, his long legs folded to keep his feet on the ground, which gives the impression that he wants to be in the best position to run. In that moment, more than any before, he strikes me as a man with the kind of paranoia that always keeps his back to a wall, like Jesse James or John Dillinger.