The Secrets She Carried

by Davis, Barbara

  The thought left her hollow, but then so did the thought of Jimmy, camped out on her doorstep. Too restless to sit, she pushed out of her chair and stepped to the window. Her knees felt like Slinkies as she stared at the cars crawling like so many ants on the street below. The vodka was doing its work. A few more and she wouldn’t give a damn.

  Except she had to give a damn. She had to make a decision.

  Jimmy’s message said a couple of weeks. That wasn’t much time. Thirty years was a lot of time, though. Thirty years since the inquest into her mother’s death. Thirty years trying to outrun demons she wasn’t even sure were real. Maybe Jimmy wasn’t the only reason to return to Peak, or even the best one. New York didn’t offer much at the moment—no work, no love life, a handful of acquaintances she barely saw anymore. Maybe it was time to stop running and finally confront those demons—real or imagined—while Peak still belonged to her. Maybe it was simply time to go home.

  Leslie felt stiff and cranky, the highway a blur of asphalt and gritty guardrail as she crossed over into North Carolina. It had taken just three days to tie up the loose ends of her life, a fact she found too depressing to examine in any depth. The truth was, aside from her apartment, which she’d managed to sublet to an old work colleague, and a designer wardrobe she had consigned to storage with the certainty that she’d never wear any of it again, there had been precious little to handle.

  She still wasn’t convinced that going back wasn’t a huge mistake. She just hadn’t been able to find enough reasons to stay. Jimmy would go to New York, but this time when he knocked on her door she wouldn’t be there. There wasn’t much about her father that made her laugh, but it was hard not to smirk at the thought of him being greeted by Doug Somers, with his eyebrow ring and platinum hair, or better yet, by his partner, Stephen, whose weekend tastes tended toward knockoff Vera Wang.

  A sign for SR 86 suddenly loomed. Leslie jerked the wheel, waving an apology to the blaring horn behind her as she jumped three lanes of traffic. The sign at the foot of the ramp said fifty miles to Gavin. She wished it was more.

  Her stomach clenched unpleasantly when she finally turned onto Gavin Boulevard, the two-lane road that cut through the heart of town. Almost nothing had changed. Here and there, pale steeples thrust themselves against the hot blue sky—Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, in place since time immemorial. The Gavin town hall still stood proudly, every brick and blade as it ever was, on what had once been an honest-to-God drilling green. The Mule and Tobacco Exchange still occupied the block between Meeting and Market, though a good half century had passed since it had traded either.

  It took less than five minutes to cover downtown. On the way out she passed the Anytime Diner, a tarnished silver box in a half-paved parking lot, it’s neon sign flickering: LAST CHANCE FOR EATS. It had been her favorite place once, a reward for good report cards and As on spelling tests. Then Jimmy had started sneaking around with Rachel Ranson, whose daddy owned the place, and no one would take her there anymore.

  Goosing the pedal, she pushed through a wide curve, then flattened out on the narrow road that skirted Gavin, two lanes of pocked gray pavement that sent the late-day heat up in shiny waves. The air was full of hay and horse and fertilizer. She was getting close.

  When Peak finally came into view it was unexpected somehow, like a full white moon at four in the afternoon. Leslie let the car slow to a crawl. She had expected it to be smaller, like all childhood places when you visited them as an adult. She had also expected it to be half falling down. It was neither. It was just as she remembered, lofty and bone white on its jade green hill, boasting a full complement of freshly painted porches and columns.

  She parked on a patch of gravel meant for guests and sat with the car running, knuckles white against the wheel. She wasn’t ready to be here. Maybe it wasn’t too late to turn around and go back to New York. Maybe Doug and Stephen would let her have the spare room.

  After a few moments she killed the engine and got out. The air was as thick as syrup, sticky and still and humming with tiny insects. A film of sweat beaded her upper lip as she paused in the driveway to take in old landmarks: the small cottage back in the trees, the lake where she’d learned to swim, and in the distance, the jutting shelf of land named for the great-grandfather she had never known, Henry’s Ridge.

  Pivoting slowly, Leslie let her eyes roam the fields, scanning row upon row of trellised vines where acres of bright leaf once stood. She hadn’t expected tobacco—her grandmother had put a stop to that the day they buried her husband, a martyr to his two-pack-a-day habit. But she certainly hadn’t expected grapes either. Whose idea…? Never mind. It would keep until tomorrow when she met with the attorneys. Right now all she wanted was to get through this part. Seeing the foyer and the stairs would be the worst. After that she’d be fine.

  She was halfway up the walk when she realized she hadn’t given a thought to how she might get in the house. It simply hadn’t occurred to her. Maggie had never locked the doors. No one in Gavin did. She eyed the knocker a moment, a big brass oval with a cursive P carved into its heart, then realized with a small shock that the door was actually ajar.

  Giving it a nudge, she stepped inside. Her eyes were slow to adjust, but gradually, shadows grew solid; a ladder-back chair, a heavy oak hall tree, a banjo clock. Her gaze slid to the foot of the stairs, to the small Turkish rug at the base of the last step. What would she find if she lifted it? Would the stain still be visible after so many years?

  Leslie’s throat thickened as the memory surfaced, the dark, vicious pool of her mother’s blood spreading over the freshly polished floorboards, the scissors glittering sharply between her ribs. Pressing back against the wall, she sidled toward the parlor. She wasn’t ready to think about that day. Not yet.

  “Hello?”

  Leslie’s head snapped up as if it were on marionette strings.

  The disembodied voice came again, louder this time, echoing down the staircase. “Is someone there?”

  There were footsteps on the landing now. He—whoever he was—stood midway down the stairs, a stepladder dangling from one shoulder. He wore jeans with one knee blown out, work boots worn dark at the toes, and a shirt that was more out than in. A repairman, Leslie guessed, probably sent by the attorneys after she called to tell them she was on her way.

  “Well, well, well,” he said, propping the ladder against the bannister. “The prodigal granddaughter has returned at last.”

  Leslie blinked up at him, startled by the undisguised hostility in his voice. Before she could think of a response, he was down the stairs and standing in front of her. His eyes raked her coolly, missing nothing along the way.

  “Jay Davenport,” he said at last, extending a hand. Leslie shook it briefly, registering calloused fingers, nails white with caulk. She could see his face now, angled and tan, with a fresh overlay of sunburn. Pale creases fanned out from the corners of eyes the smoky amber of single-malt scotch.

  “You work here, I assume?”

  “Something like that,” he answered without a hint of smile. “Goddard said you’d finally decided to show up.”

  There it was again, that snarky, undisguised antagonism. Leslie let her breath out slowly. She was too tired for a battle with a handyman, or anyone for that matter. “What is it you do around here, Mr. Davenport? Maggie’s been gone almost a year.”

  The amber eyes narrowed. “You call her Maggie?”

  “It was her name. And you’ve changed the subject.”

  A tiny pulse appeared along the right side of his jaw. “Your grandmother and I had an arrangement, Miss Nichols, which you’d know if you’d ever bothered to pick up a phone. I must say, your devotion is touching. It only took you a year to get here.”

  Leslie’s mouth worked mutely as she shuffled through her deck of excuses, discarding them one by one. She deserved every word, of course, though certainly not from this stranger, whoever he might be. She would have told him so, too, if he hadn’t a
lready stalked past her and out the door.

  Standing alone in the foyer, Leslie felt the silence crowding in, thick with time and memory. From somewhere in the house came the distant tick of a clock, as steady and sure as a heartbeat, unnerving somehow against the quiet. Could she do this? Live in this house with its uneasy memories? She had convinced herself it was what she needed to do, face it all head-on, stare down her guilt, sort out her questions. Now she wasn’t sure.

  Stepping into the parlor, she let her eyes roam the familiar, resting a moment to digest some small memory before moving on. The furniture was far from grand, a striped sofa of green and gold brocade that had once been plush but now leaned toward shabby, a pair of brocade wingbacks a bit saggy in the seat, a walnut table scattered with family photos.

  The closest one was framed in heavy silver. She picked it up. She had no memory of Henry Gavin, Maggie’s father and the man who’d made Peak the legend it had once been. He looked to have been in his thirties when the photograph was taken, roughhewn and handsome in a Gary Cooper sort of way, his dark suit hanging on his lean frame like someone else’s skin.

  Returning Henry’s photo to its place, she moved on to the next, a colt-legged version of herself at five or six, preening in a swimsuit with a frilly ballerina skirt. Her mother’s picture was there too, a dark-haired beauty of sixteen or so in a sundress and sandals. Seeing it beside her own took Leslie off guard. It was startling to realize just how much she resembled Amanda Nichols. How many times had she tried in vain to conjure her mother’s face, when all she needed to do was look in a mirror? Her eyes slid to the portrait above the mantel. Maggie in bridal lace and the Gavin family pearls. Here too her own features were visible. Clearly, the Gavin genes ran strong.

  Maggie’s room, at the back of the house, was eerily unchanged. The old tester bed Leslie had napped in as a child still bloomed with pink and yellow roses. The vanity where she had played dress-up still winked with its collection of silver-topped jars. And Maggie’s jewelry box. Lifting the lid, she picked through the tangle of costume pieces, looking for the pair of black velvet pouches her grandmother had always nestled near the bottom. She hadn’t thought of them in years but was strangely relieved now to find them where they belonged. Breath held, she poured out the contents of the first pouch, a strand of creamy pearls, as cool and smooth as satin against her palm, a bloodred garnet winking in the heavy filigree gold clasp.

  One day these will be yours. One day when I’m gone.

  She had never bothered to inquire just where it was her grandmother was going, but then children never put much stock in one day—perhaps because one day never seemed to come. Her throat burned a little as she returned the first pouch to the jewelry box and picked up the second. Its contents had always been a mystery, presumably too fragile or precious for dress-up. But she was all grown up now, and there was no one to tell her no.

  She worked a moment at the strings, then teased out the contents, gasping as the pale blue cameo fell into her hand. It was a beautiful piece, exquisitely carved, set in intricately woven loops of silver. But she had no recollection of Maggie ever wearing it. Lifting the cameo to her throat, she peered at her reflection in the trifold mirror and found herself startled again by her resemblance to Maggie, and to her mother.

  Ghosts. Everywhere she looked—ghosts.

  Chapter 2

  Jay

  Peak Plantation, 2013

  Jay laid a second batch of bacon in the skillet, gave the potatoes a shake, then turned to take his frustrations out on a waiting bowl of eggs. He had posts to repair and the rest of the spraying to finish, and the tractor was on life support again. Instead, here he stood in Maggie’s kitchen, burning daylight. Apparently, Peak’s new mistress required a lesson in the differences between a working farm and a bed-and-breakfast.

  But that wasn’t what this morning was supposed to be about. After the mess he’d made of their initial meeting, he’d meant for breakfast to be a kind of peace offering. He had never expected her to turn up. Now that she had, he needed to make nice, despite his overwhelming desire to tell her exactly what he thought—that after all this time she had no right to her grandmother’s legacy, no right to be here at all. Except she was here, and somewhere in some dark corner of his mind, he swore he heard Maggie’s papery whisper.

  I told you so.

  Damn the Old Broad for being right after all. She’d always said Leslie would find her way home one day. Too bad it was only to collect her share of the inheritance.

  Before he could work up a fresh head of steam, he heard the scuff of feet on the back stairs, followed by a whiff of something spicy and expensive. Pasting on a smile, he turned to find Leslie at the foot of the stairs, runway perfect in a white blouse and tailored black slacks, her dark hair scraped into a ponytail so tight it lifted the corners of her eyes.

  She propped a hand on one hip and glared at him. “What are you doing here?”

  Jay ignored the question as he filled a mug with coffee and placed it on the table beside the cream and sugar. “That’s yours.”

  Leslie eyed it warily but finally dropped into a chair and reached for the sugar. “Thank you. Now let’s try it again. What are you doing here?”

  Jay divided scrambled eggs between two plates, then added bacon. “That’s fairly obvious, isn’t it? I’m making you breakfast.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I thought you might be hungry. I knew there wasn’t much in the house.”

  Her eyes were narrowed on him—startling eyes he saw now, mossy green with a blaze of bronze around the pupil. He set both plates on the table, then slid into the chair beside her. He managed a sheepish smile.

  “Last night, when you came in, I was—”

  “Rude?”

  It was all Jay could do to keep the smile in place. “I was going to say inhospitable, but I guess rude works too.”

  She had been peering sideways at him over her mug. She lowered it now. “Are you always so…inhospitable?”

  “Only when I’ve had a lousy day, which I had.” He picked up his fork and used it to point to her plate. “Go on and eat. I put dill in the eggs. I only do that for visiting dignitaries.”

  Leslie shot him a look but picked up her fork, poking dubiously at her breakfast. “You seem pretty comfortable in the kitchen.”

  Jay shrugged. “I like to cook.”

  “I meant you seem pretty comfortable in this kitchen.”

  Ah, now they were getting down to it. Next would come the questions, followed by the answers she didn’t want to hear, followed by God knew what. Draining his mug, he stood to retrieve the pot from the counter, as good a way as any to stall for time. The eager tap of nails alerted him that they had company, but before he had time to turn and open his mouth, Belle was already making a beeline for Leslie. He smothered a laugh as she shoved back from the table, eyes wide with alarm.

  “It’s a Weimaraner, Leslie, not a lion.”

  “I know that, but where did he come from?”

  “He’s a she, actually. And she’s mine. Her name is Belle.”

  “As in silver bells?”

  “No. As in Belle Watling from Gone with the Wind. Maggie named her.”

  Leslie stroked one of Belle’s ears cautiously. “She always loved that movie.”

  Jay brought the pot to the table and topped off her mug. “She did. I finally broke down and bought her a copy so she could watch it whenever she wanted.”

  Leslie frowned but said nothing as she picked up her fork again. They ate in silence for a while, with Belle waiting nearby to scarf up the results of any mishaps. He was just beginning to think he’d sidestepped the worst of it, when Leslie pushed back her plate and turned her green eyes on him.

  “So,” she said, folding her arms on the edge of the table. “We’ve established that Maggie named your dog and that you know your way around her kitchen even better than I do. What we haven’t established is why.”

  Jay picked up his last
strip of bacon and folded it into his mouth, then stood to collect his plate and silverware. He said nothing as he carried them to the sink, content to let her wait while he peeled back his sleeves and flipped on the tap.

  Leslie joined him at the sink with her plate. “Is there a reason you won’t answer me?”

  “There is, as a matter of fact,” he said, turning off the tap and firing the sponge into the sink. “For starters, it was a stupid question. It’s also one you already know the answer to, but here it is anyway. For the last five years, while you were off somewhere being important, I was right here—when she got sick, when they buried her, and every day since.”

  Jay wanted to regret the words but couldn’t. They were true. For a moment she stood there with her plate and fistful of dirty silverware, so stunned and still he thought she might actually cry. Instead, she dumped her plate in the sink, clearly not caring that she had soaked the front of his shirt in the process.

  “Why I stayed away is none of your business. Neither is why I’m back. Why you’re here, however, is very much my business. Now, for the last time, I’d like an answer.”

  Jay grabbed the dish towel, making a pretense of drying himself off while he cast about for something like an answer. How much did he volunteer, and how much did he let her find out on her own? His gut told him the truth might go down more easily coming from someone else.

  “Have you spoken to the lawyers?”

  “Today, at one.”

  “And have you given any thought as to what you might do with the place?”

  Leslie folded her arms. “I’m not sure how that’s any of your business. I’m also not sure why my being here has pissed you off, but I am here, and I’ll make my decisions when I’m good and ready.”

  Jay went still while the words sank in. If she decided to sell, she would blow their plans sky-high. In all his careful planning, he had never planned for this, never let himself think it could all slip through his fingers. He opened his mouth, then closed it. He simply couldn’t afford to go to war with this woman. Not that he’d have much choice after she spoke to Maggie’s attorney.