by Lyla Payne
“When can we expect the papers?” Will asks. At least he’s thinking clearly because that’s important.
“As soon as tomorrow morning. I’ll call my attorneys as soon as we leave.”
“We’ll have them notarized, but won’t hand them over until the charges have been officially dropped.”
“Understood.” Now that he’s beaten, it’s clear the senator wants this over and done with, probably because he knows after looking at that file that he’s gotten off easy.
There’s a trail that would be simple enough for even a halfway competent investigator to follow, one that would end in significant jail time. If they could prove that anyone was killed as a direct result of the trials, the death penalty could be on the table.
I don’t think men like Randall Middleton get the death penalty, but I don’t think they fare well in prison, either. It’s not enough to imagine him there, or any of the jackasses who think people who have no money or education or status are no better than mice in cages, bred and waiting to be used however the powers that be deem necessary.
My vision is red by the time Leo drags me into the street. None of us say a word as we walk back to the SUV and pile in for the short drive back to Heron Creek. We might have won this battle, but as good as it is to not have to worry about Leo’s and Mel’s arrests anymore, the sour tinge to the air in the car suggests none of us is happy. This was a battle, sure, but it was a small one.
We didn’t beat them. We didn’t win.
Maybe people like the Middletons and the ones who run Allied Pharmaceuticals never really lose. Not to people like us.
Mel’s at the house the next morning, helping me skim through Charlotta’s journals. It’s nice to have her here. It stops the place from feeling so cavernous and empty without Amelia. I can’t go to Daria for help until I’m ready to face Mama Lottie, and I can’t confront Mama Lottie again without having all of the possible information about her son. There are too many mundane entries in the journal to go through between the ones that mention him, and every hour that passes twists my nerves tighter.
The root doctor hasn’t contacted me. I don’t know what soon means in his world, but it’s been almost three days. If I haven’t heard from him by the weekend, I’m heading back to at least talk to Odette. I can use the excuse of bringing her some soup, maybe. The last time Amelia was sick, LeighAnn brought a massive vat of matzo ball soup, and at least half of it is still in the freezer. Apparently Jewish women have some root magic of their own.
“Anything?” I ask.
Mel shakes her head, her eyes drooping. Grant’s asleep on the couch in the living room, within eyesight, and his little body, all cozy beneath one of Grams’s afghans, is making me tired, too.
“There’s a passing mention here, but just that the weather has been bad for days and Charles Jr. has been sick. She’s going crazy.” Mel smiles. “And she’s talking a lot about the baby moving.”
“I imagine it’s pretty freaky,” I murmur, skimming my own pages and finding similar stuff.
Her phone rings, and she almost knocks it off the table in her haste to silence the ringer before it wakes up her peaceful toddler. “Hello?”
I watch her, popping my neck and stretching my arms to loosen the kinks. Her expression goes from wary to worried as she checks on Grant, and then relief floods her eyes with such force I grip the edge of the table.
“I’m at Gracie’s. Yeah, we’ll call Leo. See you soon.” She hangs up, a huge grin stretching from ear to ear. “That was Brick. He’s coming by with the documents for us to sign.”
“So soon?”
She nods, already dialing her phone. “I’m calling Will. Can you text Leo? They’re going to be here in ten or fifteen minutes.”
“They?”
“Yeah, his sister’s coming. I’m sure she doesn’t know about all of his double-dealing.”
“She doesn’t,” I confirm, my fingers typing out a request for Leo to stop by as soon as he can.
“Will? Hey. I’m at Gracie’s, and the Draytons are coming by soon with the papers to sign. Can you get away?” She bites her lower lip, sliding a glance my direction. “Okay. Yeah. See you soon.”
“What was that all about?”
“He said he can get away, but he was worried about Travis hearing he was coming here since the detective is going about as mad as a hatter wanting to talk to you.”
“I just saw him the other night when he brought the state police by for a statement.”
“You know what I mean. About his being your brother, or thinking he is or whatever.” She sets her elbows on the table, chin in her palms as her light hair falls over one shoulder. “What are you going to do about that, anyway?”
“Not a damn thing right now. My plate is full with two curses and Amelia missing.” I shrug. “If I can ever get Frank to call me back or give me answers that aren’t as crooked as a snake, I’ll talk to him. Until then, he can take a number.”
Talking about Travis makes me think of Clete and the fact that I still haven’t told him that I’m thinking the Middletons are clean as far as Amelia’s kidnapping. She’s not close enough to the Allied case for them to have gone after her. If anyone, it would have been me or Will, since we were the ones who talked to Paul Adams. It doesn’t make sense that Marcia would have been so close all these years with no trouble of her own, but she’d never talked to anyone since returning to the States. Never told a soul she’d gathered that file until we came knocking.
It’s odd, especially since she seemed to have reservations about everything that was done—and not done—to combat their influence in the Middle East, but she had signed the nondisclosure. And people get scared. If even a small part of her worried that Lucy’s disappearance had been connected to her investigation into Allied, it could have been a powerful motivator to stay silent.
We put the journals away, and then I make a pot of coffee while Mel carries Grant upstairs to Amelia’s empty bedroom and tucks him in. I’m jumpy. It feels as though there are eyes on me that even I can’t see, and I can’t help but wonder if the young Mama Lottie is keeping tabs. She chased little Charles away, and Henry is still absent, too.
It feels like too many things are missing from my life.
My phone buzzes, and it’s Leo letting me know he can swing by but can’t stay, since he needs to pick up Marcella later. I have no idea what he’s up to today because his many jobs are too much to keep track of. Mel returns, and I wonder who will give her a job now, even if the Middletons do drop the charges. No one that handles any kind of private account information, that’s for sure.
“What are you going to do now, Mel? I mean…have you been looking for another job?”
She shakes her head. “No. I’ve been preoccupied with all of this cloak-and-dagger stuff, but the truth is…I kind of like it.”
“That doesn’t surprise me. You were always the first one to follow me into any kind of scheme, and usually with a half a dozen ideas on how to do it better.”
“Yeah, well, you never worried about getting caught. The flouting of the law is a Gracie flaw.”
“Maybe you should go into poetry,” I tease.
“Nah. If I want to be poor for the rest of my life I’ll go back to school and get a doctorate in history.”
It feels nice, teasing each other with a lightness in the room that comes from knowing she’ll get to do whatever she wants with the rest of her life, with no state record hanging over her head. At the same time, the easy friendship between us makes me hyper-aware of missing Amelia, because in Heron Creek, our group was never a twosome. It was always at least three, and most often four.
The front door opens and shuts, and a moment later, Will appears to add at least one more. There’s an Amelia-sized hole, as though we’ve set an empty place at our imaginary round table.
With her husband there, Mel stops talking about jobs and the future, leaving me to wonder if there was more to the conversation that went unsaid. I make a
mental note to ask her about it later, with the full knowledge that I’ll most likely forget. Things are falling out of my overfull brain these days, and until I find out what happened to James and hear from the mysterious root doctor so we can move forward with helping Amelia, I’ve got no time for anything else.
Leo comes in right after Will, and the men are pouring cups of coffee still when Brick and Birdie show up. They’re dressed impeccably, him in a gray suit and purple flecked tie, her in a skirt and jacket, a soft pink blouse billowing underneath it and three-inch heels that are probably leaving dents in my grandparents’ old hardwood floors.
They aren’t showing their hands as far as feelings go, which is par for the course. I expect Birdie to shoot me some kind of evil eye, or at least acknowledge me in some way, but she doesn’t, simply setting her briefcase on a chair and clicking it open.
“You’re all here, good. We’re here on behalf of our clients to discuss the charges they’ve brought against you, Leonardo Boone, and you, Melanie Massie Gayle. They’ve asked that we draw up two sets of paperwork for the two of you to sign.” She extracts the binder-clipped bundles from her case and lays them on the table. One goes in front of Mel, the other an empty chair that Leo takes a moment later.
I want to make fun of him for being named Leonardo, because that’s what I do, but it doesn’t seem like the time or place. Maybe I am maturing, because that never would have stopped me before.
“The first is a nondisclosure agreement, which is completely binding. It means that the documents and investigator’s notes that were disclosed to the senator and his wife last night will not be handed over to or discussed with any member of the press, law enforcement, attorneys, etc. No one.” She stares them down. “You got it?”
They nod. Her gaze shifts to me, and then I see the burning contempt in her eyes. She looks toward Will next and presses her lips together before grabbing two additional sets of documents.
“Since the two of you were also present for the handover of these sensitive documents, the Middletons also request that you sign identical agreements.”
She pauses as if she thinks we’re going to protest, but Birdie should know better, because she’s aware of what comes next. When none of us objects, she pulls two more bundles out of her briefcase. She’s like the Mary Poppins of lawyers with that thing.
“Once those are signed and notarized, I’m authorized to give you these copies of their official request to drop all charges pending against the two of you, on behalf of my clients, of course. We’ll drop them at the police station on our way back to the office.”
“Who’s going to notarize them?” I ask.
“I’m a notary,” Leo volunteers. “But I can’t do my own.”
I just shake my head at his revelation of yet another job.
Birdie purses her lips and rolls her eyes toward the heavens, as though asking for the patience to deal with schmucks like us for another five minutes. “Brick is a notary. He’ll suffice.”
For his part, Brick hasn’t said a word this entire time. He’s letting his sister do the talking and he looks almost like a disciplined puppy. I wonder how much she’s guessed about his involvement. I suspect whatever she knows, it will cost him in the long run.
Without any fanfare, the four of us sign the first set of documents promising to leave the Middletons alone and never tell a soul they’re majority owners of a company that runs illegal human drug testing. It leaves a slick, sour taste on my tongue.
Once Brick notarizes them all and Birdie tucks them away, she hands over the copies of the paperwork that says Leo and Mel will soon be able to go back to their lives with nothing hanging over their heads. It’s hard to believe it happened, that we were able to find what we needed. In some ways, I wonder if Lucy is gone but watching over us and if she led our little joint investigation in the right direction.
I don’t want to think that’s true. I want her to be okay, because if she’s not, the responsibility for avenging what happened to her will fall solely on our little group. And no matter what piece of paper I just signed, I know I’m not going to be able to turn my back on her. None of us will.
Chapter Nineteen
It’s not long after everyone leaves that Travis shows up. After what Will said to Mel, I don’t know why I didn’t expect him. Maybe my spidey-senses are off, without any ghosts to talk to for days now.
“Oh, hi,” I say when I see that it’s him standing on the front porch. “Come on in.”
I stand aside and let him pass, noting that his hair could use a wash and his eyes and cheeks appear oddly sunken. He pulls his hat off and twists the brim in his hands as we settle in the living room—me on the couch and Travis perched on the edge of Gramps’s old chair. He looks as though he’d prefer to be pacing but probably figures I’ll kill him if he does, which is true.
“What’s up?” I nudge, though I’m not sure what the hurry is. I think about taking a nap but doubt it would work with the way my mind is refusing to shut down.
“I came to give you an update on the case.”
Relief unwinds a knot at the base of my neck. There’s no space in my head for dealing with Travis or all of the questions surrounding my mother. Not now.
“The state and federal police completed all of their paperwork to get Amelia listed among official missing persons. They’ve got a photo of her and they poked around, did an investigation and talked to people. The ladies at the coffee shop were quite forthcoming, though not so much with helpful information.” A tired smile tugs at the edges of his lips.
“I can imagine,” I tell him, trying my best not to be resentful of that old bat. “No one saw anything? Not even Mrs. Walters?”
Our nosy neighbor would probably be the best bet for someone having actually gotten a glimpse of Amelia leaving the house that night, since she’s always spying on us. The thought sits me up straighter.
“No, unfortunately not. From what you said about the timing, it was late. She was likely in bed.”
“Likely?”
“She’s been ill. I’ve only been able to trade voice messages with her.”
I slump back against the couch cushions. “That sucks.”
“They didn’t find anything of note. No leads.” Travis shakes his head, a pained expression darkening his eyes. “It’s like she vanished into thin air, Gracie.”
It’s not so hard to believe if you’ve been told a ghost took her, but even if one of the Mama Lotties stole Millie, it’s not as though she could make her disappear…right? Amelia would have had to walk out of here on her own two feet, if not of her own volition, in order to get wherever the ghost is holding her prisoner.
I think.
I make a mental note to ask Daria about that the next time we talk. I’m starting to think I should pay her tuition and go ahead and sign up for an official course on ghost hunting.
“So we’re back where we started.”
“Yeah. Unless you’ve come up with anything?” He looks too hopeful for a detective. He’s the one who’s supposed to be making me feel better, not the other way around.
I shake my head, annoyed by his being here with nothing to really update. “No. I don’t think the Middletons are behind it, but they’re still worth looking into.”
“We are doing that, but as you know, they’ve got some fantastic lawyers and hate publicity.” He presses his lips together, looking as annoyed as I feel when I have to deal with those people. “And you and I both know they would have hired someone, and that’s going to take more time to track down.”
Maybe it’s a good thing I haven’t had time to tell Clete to back off. He doesn’t have nearly as many yards of red tape to wrestle through as far as talking to people, and he’s more in touch with the element that would be on the hiring end of a kidnapping request. Still, I believe Charles. Mama Lottie has Amelia, but where? How? Can a ghost take care of my cousin, a real, still-breathing person, and keep her alive?
My mouth feels dry at the thou
ght, kept so effectively at bay before now by all of the running around and other things that have soaked up my focus. Maybe I don’t want Travis to leave. Being here alone isn’t going to work, not unless I want to have a full-blown heart attack at the age of twenty-six.
“You can’t think of anyone else who would take her?” Travis asks, watching me like he knows things are going on in my head that I’m not saying. He’s a good cop, that’s for sure.
At least, he’s good at being a cop. His record and reasons for leaving his previous jobs are still a mystery to me, so maybe he’s not a good cop, in the literal sense.
“No. I really can’t.” There’s no way I’m telling him my main suspect died a hundred years ago, and there’s nothing he could do about it even if I did and he believed me. “Aside from the Middletons, no one has a reason to hate Millie. No one hates Millie.”
“So it was either them or it was random,” he concludes, not looking happy about either option.
For what it’s worth, neither am I.
“Have you ever worked a kidnapping like this before?” I don’t know what makes me ask, but maybe it’s the feeling that Clete is going to ask for dirt on Travis again sooner or later.
And maybe a small part of me thinks his leaving Heron Creek wouldn’t be such a bad thing. It would make my life less complicated, and I could go back to pretending that my family and history are what I always believed they were.
I frown, aware that isn’t true. Amelia being missing and Mama Lottie, the curse, Leo and Mel—it’s all making it possible for me to act as though Travis’s mere existence won’t change everything I know about me, but it won’t last forever. I’m not the kind of girl who can pretend very well, at least not with myself.
“Yeah. A couple. They never…” He blanches, shaking his head. His dark hair falls over his forehead, and when his stormy gray eyes meet mine, they’re sad. “They never turn out well, Graciela. I’m sorry.”
“Tell me about one. Maybe it would help me think of something. Like, maybe I saw someone or thought something was off, I don’t know. How did you solve the others?”