The bitch had shamed him in the eyes of the message board. Whoever she was, she was as bad as his wife. Always blowing the whistle on him, spoiling his projects. No matter how hard he tried, it had never been good enough for her. Just like White Dawn—ruining his plans. And his reputation. He had carefully constructed the whole thing, and White Dawn had brought it down like a house of cards.
What if Secret Agent had really had a sister—and what if she had really lost her house in a severe hurricane? All it took was one vindictive bitch to take the candy cane away. Take the goodwill away. Take the money right out of homeless people’s hands. All that money Secret Agent had collected—what if he had really sent it to his sister? These were the kinds of issues a vindictive bitch had no idea about.
White Dawn.
He signed onto the board, clicked onto her profile. What he saw gave him a start. Before, when he had looked, she had nothing listed there. Now he saw that she had filled in a name:
“Patty Nanouk.” Patricia—that was his wife’s real name. Could it really be her? Out there in cyberspace, bringing him down? And what did “Nanouk” mean?
He scrolled a few lines down, to the place where it said “occupation.” Then he read what she—White Dawn, Patty Nanouk, whoever she was—had written:
“Crusader for justice against psychopathic con men.”
It was her. It really was. How often had she called him a psychopath? And how often had he tried to soothe her, telling her that yes—he was one, it was true. But that was just because of his terrible, abusive childhood. No one had ever, ever loved him as she did, no one else was capable of healing him as she was.
He was getting therapy, he had told her. He was going to workshops. There was help available—he was trying to get better. Didn’t she understand that? Was she willing to just walk away—throw it all away? Destroy him in the process? Because if she did, then she was no better than he was. In fact, she was worse.
He couldn’t help who he was. Depression was an accepted illness, and so was what he had. He wanted to love her, and he was trying—but being a psychopath was hard. When they said he had no conscience or empathy, well, that just wasn’t true. He did have empathy. He felt things. Deep in his soul, he felt the pain of being an abused child, and of what that made him. It kept him from all the pleasure he should have as an adult—as a husband or father. He grieved for himself!
How could they say he had no empathy?
Well, fuck White Dawn, Patty Nanouk, and his wife. He wondered whether they were all the same person. Honestly, he didn’t really care. He had porn open at the same time, and he was in an incest survivor’s chat room with a girl he’d met online last night, and he was totally over what had happened at SpiritTown.
Over it. There were plenty of other message boards out there, plenty of other bleeding hearts with too much money and a need to give it away—and Secret Agent had a PayRight account.
No more “Secret Agent” for him. That name was toast. From now on, at least until he found an interesting prospect that required a more creative handle, he’d just go by “Edward.”
Patrick finally made it back to the Cape Hawk Inn, just as the sun was setting over the harbor. The last of the whale boats was steaming back to the dock, leaving a wake of silver out behind. The big lightbulb going on about Maeve had thrown him into a dark sadness—he had thought they trusted each other.
He felt a tug to walk down to the water, get aboard a boat. He didn’t like having ground beneath his feet for too long—he needed the feel of a deck, and the waves rocking. He hoped that Flora was okay without him, guarding the Probable Cause along with Angelo. More than anything, he hoped he would have this case solved for good by the end of the night.
Pushing those thoughts from his mind, he again climbed the porch steps to the inn. Inside, the lobby was lively. Strains of Celtic music wafted down the hall from the bar. People dressed for dinner walked in and out of the formal dining room. Waiters served drinks by the lobby fireplace, which was crackling with a fire. Even though it was July, the northern air had a slight chill.
The minute he stepped through the door, he noticed a semicircle of women looking over at him. The woman who had first greeted him—and sent him to Rose Gables—stood out front, and he made his way across the room to her. The women behind her were not smiling.
“Well, well,” he said. “If it isn’t the lady who told me there was no room at the inn. I really have to thank you—sending me along to Casa de Grilled Cheese. That was a clever diversion.”
“Marlena sends her apologies. I really caught her up short. She’s quite an excellent cook, but I didn’t give her enough notice. I’m sorry.”
He ignored the apology. “Is there really a Camille Neill?”
“There is. I’m her daughter-in-law, Anne Neill.”
“So, that part’s true.”
“Yes. I’m sorry to say, though, that she really is asleep right now. She’ll be up tomorrow morning. You can ask her anything you want then.”
“Why are you stonewalling me,” he asked, “when it’s obvious that you know Mara Jameson?”
“How is it obvious?” Anne asked. She was tall and elegant, and she had a lot of practice dealing with people. Working at an inn, she probably had to handle lots of drunks and jerks. But Patrick’s patience was pretty thin right now.
“Lady,” Patrick said, trying to stay polite, “it’s obvious because your eyes practically jumped out of your face when you saw her picture. And because you sent me on a wild-goose chase to poor Marlena’s house—what the hell do you know about me? What if I were a serial killer? I’m a total stranger, and you sent me to your friend’s house to take a freaking nap. Oh—and because she told me about the Nanouks.”
“Excuse me?” Anne asked, and it was echoed by several of the women standing behind her, glaring at Patrick with daggers.
“The Nanouks. She said the Nanouks got her through her divorce, and then I knew.”
“And just what do you think you know?” one of the other women asked.
“She told me they’re a tribe of warrior women,” he said. “Some ancient crew of women who wear the dawn and sunset or something like that.”
“Ancient,” one of the other women said, chuckling.
“The aurora borealis, not the dawn and sunset,” someone else corrected.
“We’re the Nanouks,” Anne explained. “We’re a club of friends.”
“Friends?” he said, gazing across their heads at a poster advertising whale-watch cruises—with the outline of a whale’s tail flaring out of the sea.
“Yes,” she said. “We support each other.”
Patrick frowned, puzzled. If that was true … he put it all together with the embroidered glasses case that he had seen at Maeve’s. Just a small thing, always on her side table, with her stack of books—the eyeglass case had a cream background, with the word “Nanouk” done in block letters, in several different shades of blue yarn. And the very faint outline of a whale’s tail, the stitches wearing out.
“If that’s true,” he said, “then I believe that Mara Jameson is a member of your club.”
“We don’t know any Mara Jameson,” Anne said as Patrick began to pass her picture around the group.
“You may not know her by that name,” he said. “But she’s here, I know it. And she has a nine-year-old daughter.”
Marisa and Jessica sat in Anne’s office, off the lobby, watching everything through the glass door. Anne had warned Marisa about the detective’s visit. She had intercepted Marisa and Jess earlier, when they had arrived with the latest batch of pine pillows. Because of the confusion—having a retired police officer here, looking for a woman who had disappeared nine years earlier—Anne had called a meeting of the Nanouks, to decide what to do.
Some of the women, having been victims of domestic violence, had had bad run-ins with the police and courts. The legal system didn’t understand the problem. They would look at a handsome, well-spoken man lik
e Ted, and at a shrieking, dissembling woman like Marisa, and more often than not, they would believe the man.
Once Marisa went to court to ask for a restraining order against him—but since she didn’t have any physical evidence of beatings, and since his threats were over ten hours old, the judge had refused to grant an order. Marisa had left, trembling. How could she explain that she was in so much shock, she could hardly remember the details of what he had said, the terror of having him hold her by the hair and tell her that if she ever tried to run away from him, he’d track her down and make her daughter suffer?
Marisa knew that some of the Nanouks—older, wiser, and more recovered than Marisa—had had similar experiences with the police. Anne knew it too, and hadn’t wanted to make any decisions without consulting with everyone. And Marisa had certainly needed her friends’ advice, regarding the best tack to take.
“If you tell him, maybe Ted will go to jail,” Jessica said, peeking out the window.
“Or maybe he won’t,” Marisa said.
“He killed Tally.”
“I know, honey.”
“And he said he’d hurt us.”
“Exactly. That’s why I want to be careful. Telling on Ted isn’t necessarily safe.”
“You mean people might not believe us?”
“Yes,” Marisa said. But she couldn’t look Jessica straight in the eye as she said it. She no longer felt sure about that. Back when she had first run away, she had been so afraid—a quivering wreck of her former self. But she had had the guts to pack up her daughter, take her to safety. Over the last month, she had made friends with these great women, and they had believed her—every single one of them. Making Marisa finally able to believe in herself.
“What would be so bad, telling?” Jessica asked. “We’ve already told the Nanouks our real names. We could go right out there and tell the policeman. And he could arrest Ted.”
“Hmm.”
“We could see our friends, back home. Aunt Sam … I wouldn’t want to leave Cape Hawk for good—I’d miss Rose too much. But Mommy—don’t you want to be able to go home again? If we want to?”
“Yes,” Marisa said quietly, missing her old life so much she ached.
“So do I. Let’s go out there, Mommy.”
“Are you sure? Are we doing the right thing?”
Her daughter looked at her, long and hard. She tilted her head, touched Marisa’s cheek. Her eyes were pleading with her, and Marisa could read the message even before Jessica said it out loud.
“You’re the mother,” she said. “You have to decide.”
And Marisa knew she was right. She kissed the top of her daughter’s head, took a deep breath, and because she was the mother, opened the office door.
The flight had been long, and the drive from the airport had taken forever, but to Lily’s amazement, Rose was wide awake and feeling strong. The windows of Liam’s truck were down, and cool, fresh Cape Hawk salt air blew through the cab. Lily had her arm around Rose’s shoulders, and she breathed in the spruce and pine.
“Smells like my pillows,” Rose said.
“It does,” Lily said.
“Jess’s card said they’re selling them at the inn,” Rose said. “Next to a picture of you and me.”
“Wow,” Lily said. “That’s so nice.”
“It’s true,” Liam said. “It’s a big display, right in the lobby.”
“Can we see it?” Rose asked. “On our way home?”
“Oh, sweetheart—it’s so late. We have to get you to bed.”
“But I’m excited,” Rose said. “I want to see. And besides, don’t you want to see Anne? And maybe some of the other Nanouks? And show them I’m okay?”
Lily’s lips tightened. She had been longing so deeply to see her own most beloved relative—missing her so much during this last difficult time with Rose. Having Liam with her had been wonderful, but she had a primal need to connect with her grandmother, the closest person she had to a mother. Or in her place, the Nanouk Girls of the Frozen North.
Even if only one of them was at the inn—and she was sure that at least Anne would be there—she would so deeply love a hug, and the chance to celebrate with the friends who had been so supportive of her and Rose. She glanced over at Liam, concentrating on the road. It was as if her grandmother had tapped her shoulder, telling her to pull over.
“Would you mind if we stopped there?” she asked. “You must want to get home.”
“Lily,” he said, “if you and Rose want to go there, I’m going with you.”
“So we can?” Rose asked, as the truck crossed the bridge over the fjord, and the lights of Cape Hawk—nestled in the valley between two formidable rock cliffs—came into view.
“We can,” Lily said.
Anne was a nervous wreck. A total, complete basket case. Duplicity had never been her strong suit—she could barely even handle telling a white lie to Camille, telling her she looked pretty when in fact she looked very cranky and mean. But she had started lying almost from the minute Detective Murphy had arrived—and she hadn’t stopped yet.
Getting poor Marlena to pretend she was running a bed-and-breakfast—and then practically mortifying her by getting her to serve a cheese sandwich with all the fanfare of a cordon bleu chef! God, the Nanouks would be teasing her about that forever.
Having the presence of mind to whisk Marisa aside, tell her to hide Jessica—and keep her hidden, until the coast was clear, and they were sure Murphy had departed—where had that come from? Anne was on top of her game, that was for sure—thinking fast, making sure all her friends were protected.
She had called in the Nanouks for reinforcements, and of course everyone who could get away had come—Cindy, Doreen, Alison, Suzanne, Kathy, Paula, Claire, and even Marlena, just behind Patrick Murphy. They all gathered around him, passing the very familiar photo—God, she had been so young, smiling and innocent—around the circle. Everyone had been coached to say the same thing: “She looks familiar.”
A comment about her hair, her smile, her beautiful shining eyes. She had been so sweet, pregnant with the girl that they all loved so much. Just knowing that—and what she had run from—brought tears to Anne’s eyes. She wiped them away, but they just kept coming.
“Mother in heaven,” said Cindy, under her breath.
Anne looked up, and here came Camille, limping down the hall that led to the family’s private quarters. Anne lurched, to try to stop her, but she knew she would look too obvious and forced herself to hold back.
“Good evening,” Camille said, giving Anne a strange look. “Aren’t you working tonight?”
“Genny is covering in the dining room,” Anne said.
“I noticed this gentleman arriving earlier,” Camille said, approaching Patrick. “Talking to you in the garden. Where ever is Jude? Still out on the boat?”
“Yes,” Anne said.
“Hi, Camille,” Marlena said from across the circle. She was trying to be helpful, but in that instant, Anne knew they were sunk.
“Camille Neill?” Patrick asked.
“Yes. And who might you be?”
“I am Patrick Murphy. Are you the same Camille Neill as mentioned in this article?”
Camille put on her reading glasses and looked at the yellowed newspaper clipping. She gasped, looking up at Patrick. “This is from the Ard na Mara paper—about Frederic’s memorial. What are you doing with it? Did you know Frederic?”
“No, ma’am,” he said. “I’m investigating the disappearance, nine years ago, of Mara Jameson.” He took the photo back from Cindy, handed it to Camille. “Do you recognize her?”
Anne felt her pulse beating in her throat. It was just a matter of time now—before Camille blurted out the truth, and Patrick knew where to look. She glanced over at the office door—and froze. There were Marisa and Jessica, letting themselves out of the office, walking this way.
Camille cleared her throat, slid a glance at Anne. She shook her head. “No,” she said fir
mly. “I don’t recognize her.”
But it was too late. Anne couldn’t believe her eyes. She stared at Marisa, seeing steel in her posture she’d never seen before. Jessica skipped ahead, flinging herself into the circle, right in front of Patrick Murphy. And he turned—his long, lanky body just wheeling around, as if he had noticed the nine-year-old girl and wanted to see her mother—just as the front door of the inn opened.
Liam, Lily, and Rose stood there.
Everyone started shouting, shrieking, laughing, and crying. Every last Nanouk rushed across the lobby, arms open wide, to greet Lily and Rose. Marisa and Jessica were first in line, and the four of them hugged and kissed, and wept, jumbled in a pack by the other Nanouk Girls, all wanting to get close.
Anne held Camille’s hand, walking a little behind the others, alongside Patrick Murphy. Camille squeezed Anne’s hand, and Anne squeezed back.
“I’ve always felt bad, you know, Anne, dear,” Camille whispered. “I’ve tried to help Rose in my own way, financially.” She lifted her chin. “Even if I’m not a Nanouk.”
Anne whirled to look at her mother-in-law with amazement, and to whisper back, “After what you just did, you’re in, Camille.”
The women were all clustered together, Liam off to the side, and as Anne got closer, she saw that everyone was hovering around Rose. They didn’t want to get too close, to crush her—but they wanted to touch her, caress her, let her know how grateful they were that their girl had come home safely. The reunion was for everyone and Rose, and for Lily too. Anne watched as Marisa gave Lily a huge hug, then whispered something in her ear.
The room was buzzing so loudly—with everyone’s laughter, tears, and talk, and with the Celtic music from down the hall, and from Anne’s heartbeat thudding in her ears—she wondered whether anyone would hear him.
“Mara,” Patrick Murphy called sharply.
And both Marisa and Lily looked up.
Chapter 25
Luanne Rice Page 26