Not Quite Right (A Lowcountry Mystery) (Lowcountry Mysteries Book 6) (21 page)

“We can go see her if you want.” Beau’s eyes sparkle. He’s excited, and it’s hard to blame him. After all of these years, he’s going to talk to someone who had known Lucy after she left him. Someone who might hold a clue, however remote, as to what happened to her. “She’s down in Beaufort.”

“What is she doing in Beaufort?” I can’t help but ask. Once a bustling, wealthy seaport, the town now has that run-down feel that crept over so many Southern cities after the Civil War.

The brothers exchange a glance, but it’s Brick who speaks. “We don’t know. She had some family money, which is how she could afford to take off after college and do the Peace Corps for a few years, and then accept a low-paying position for a small volunteer agency in the Middle East.”

“Her family is from Beaufort?” I guess.

“Yes. Six generations or something.”

Ah. So the woman doesn’t
live
in South Carolina, she’s
from
South Carolina. An important distinction that only people born south of the Mason-Dixon Line understand.

“When can we go?” Mr. Freedman doesn’t expect me back until all of this is settled, however it turns out. I can’t explain how I know that Amelia won’t be one of those cases like Lucy’s and a hundred others, where the families wait in agony for decades without news. When they never know.

For better or worse, I have a feeling that Amelia will turn up again.
 

“I have some meetings this afternoon,” Beau says, regret lining his face. “I can’t move them.”

“That will give me time to dig into Bette and Randall’s list of sins a little more.” Brick’s lips set in a grim line.

“Are you going to be okay here?” my sort-of-maybe-ex-boyfriend asks, concern in his hazel eyes that, thanks to Charlotta’s journal, I know are hand-me-downs.

Beautiful, breath-stealing hand-me-downs.

I nod, biting my lower lip to stop myself from asking him to stay. “Yeah. I can do tomorrow, either early or late. I need to spend a few hours in Charleston, too.”

“How about evening?” Beau suggests. “You can get your errands done, and Brick and I can make sure we’ve got clear schedules.”

“Are we going to tell her we’re coming?” I ask.

We fall silent, eyeing one another as we assess our thoughts. Anyway that’s what I’m doing. On the one hand, showing up at people’s houses unannounced is rude. On the other, what if she runs? What if she disappears, like Lucy or Paul Adams? I can’t be responsible for anyone else’s life. I’ve all but proven I shouldn’t even be responsible for my own, if I want it to go well.

“No,” Beau decides for all of us, but it’s a simple answer that makes sense, at least to me.

It must to Brick, as well, or maybe he’s too out of sorts to argue. Either way, we’re set for tomorrow night. That just means I need to talk Leo or Mel into meeting me in Charleston tomorrow. First, I’ll have lunch with Jenna, but then I’m determined to find Odette.

I
’m so relieved to see Jenna the next day that it makes me smile involuntarily. She looks different in the cooler weather—no cutoffs and no T-shirt bearing a funny history pun. Her silky, jet-black hair piles on top of her head in a messy bun, and there are circles under her eyes that suggest perhaps she’s been working late nights on her thesis, or Mrs. Drayton has been keeping her busy with preservation efforts.

Her jeans are tight and dark, and she’s paired her faithful black Converse with a lilac, long-sleeved T-shirt under a puffy white vest. She looks adorable, as usual, but instead of her normal, exuberant greeting, Jenna’s bottomless almond eyes are wary. They dart around the room before landing back on me, as though she’s worried someone might be watching.

It raises my hackles in a heartbeat. I’ve put Jenna in an awkward position, and while she’s not culpable for the things she’s done to help me in the way Mel and Leo are, Mrs. Drayton doesn’t need to prove anything in court to give Jenna her walking papers—and the woman is spiteful enough to ruin Jenna’s career as a parting gift.
 

I can’t let that happen. Determination to do at least one thing right floods my veins as I slide into the seat across from her at SNOB and pull a piece of warm cornbread from under the cloth napkin.
 

“I’m so sorry about Amelia,” she starts, her gaze the slightest bit wet. “We just met, of course, but she’s so sweet. And the baby…” Jenna trails off, frowning down at her hands.
 

“Thanks.” I wipe the crumbs off my face. “Are you okay?”

“Me? Sure. I mean…I heard that Mrs. Drayton caught you on the property again.” Her words are slow, halting, as though she’s considering each one before sending it away.

My heart stops. “Did you get into trouble?”

She shakes her head. “No. But she suspects someone was helping you, since a few of the cameras have been off and no one mentioned it.”

“I told them I snuck in through the marsh, and it’s true. There’s no way to trace it to you, right?” I’m trying to convince myself as much as her, I think. I’m not sure it’s working on either one of us.

“I’ll be fine. You’re right, and besides, she can get as mad as an ol’ wet hen if she wants. Mrs. Drayton knows she’ll never find anyone as good as I am to work for basically free.”

“She knows she’ll never find anyone as good as you are, period.”

A smile lights her face finally. “Thanks.”

We order two plates of shrimp and grits when the waitress comes by, plus two glasses of sweet iced tea despite the chilly weather. Once we’re alone again, I decide it’s time to get down to business. Mel and Leo are meeting me at the Market in an hour.

“So you said you had something to tell me?”

“Yes. I was talking to Sean the other day after Mrs. Drayton questioned the staff about if they’d seen you or if you’d asked anyone for help getting onto the property. I was playing dumb, of course, because everyone knows Sean’s her little lackey spy, no matter how good of an archivist he is.” She waits for me to nod my agreement, taking a sip of her tea, and then continues. “Anyway, I told him all secret-like that I’d overheard that you were out there looking for Mama Lottie’s ghost and asked if he knew what had ever become of her back then.”

“And?” Despite everything, excitement tightens my fingers around my own glass of tea. Not even the temptation of hot cornbread can distract me now.

“He says it’s true that none of the staff knows, not even him. But he also said there has been gossip for years that there are more of Charlotta’s journals that aren’t available to the public.”

My head tips to the side as I consider that. “Well, not the public, but surely the archivists have access?”

Jenna is shaking her head no before the question leaves my lips. “That’s the thing. That’s why he called it gossip. The archivist who trained him before she left told him about them, but said he would have to get used to the fact that the family only shares the parts of their history that they deem fit for the public or of interest on a national-history level.”

That sinks in as the waitress sets down our steaming plates, makes sure we don’t need anything else, and scoots away to deal with the growing lunch crowd making it hard to hear.
 

“So, basically, if there’s something that embarrasses the family and they can deem it private information—like an unwanted pregnancy—they can just keep it to themselves.”

“Sure.” Jenna shrugs. “I know you and I are really into all this stuff, but honestly, the Draytons don’t have any more of a responsibility to share their secrets than any other American family.”

“Well, except their family helped shape this country. Some for better, others for worse.”

“They do a pretty good job keeping anything like that public. And right or wrong, there are people who still think the kind of scandal Charlotta and James stirred up counts as a family embarrassment.”

“I guess.” My shrimp and grits is delicious, as usual, and for the first time in days I don’t have to force food past my lips. Thoughts parade through my head, and at the moment, I can’t help but wonder if there’s a way to get my hands on those journals.

Jenna might think it’s merely academic curiosity that drives my need to know, but like Leo guessed, there’s no way I’m done with Mama Lottie. I need to know everything I can about what became of her son and her grandson, and if the Draytons are guilty of anything more than covering it up.

“There’s no way to get your hands on them, then?”

“I assume they keep them close, so not unless you want to steal them.” Her smile is conspiratorial, as always, but it’s half-hearted. We both know I’ll never ask her to put her future on the line like that.

Now, me? I’ve listed the whole future-happiness thing under critical condition the way it is, so I’m not so concerned about myself. “Do you know where they keep them?”

She shakes her head. “No idea. I would say maybe at home, but if they’re really that concerned with the illegitimate line becoming public knowledge, they could take it one step further and have them in a safe deposit box or something.”

Or buried in the backyard. Though probably not. I can’t imagine any of the Draytons getting their hands dirty enough to bury it, and they wouldn’t trust anyone else.
 

We finish our lunch in mostly silence. I summon enough energy to make small talk, to care about anything but the mountain of trouble sitting in my own lap. Jenna wolfs down her entire plate of food and more than half the cornbread, her appetite as huge as ever. She’s quiet, but Amelia being missing is affecting everyone, not only me. I have no doubt that I love her the most, but everyone who knows my cousin can’t help but love her at least a little.
 

“You’ve got to find her, Gracie—your cousin.” Jenna gets up, shrugging into her coat after we’ve paid the bill.
 

I’m thankful for her intuition, for her not making me go through the motions of conversation when all I want to do is wallow in silence. “I will. I swear.”

“If you need anything at all, don’t hesitate to ask. I love my job, but if I can help get Amelia back, nothing else matters. Got it?”

“Got it.”
 

We leave, parting ways outside the restaurant. I do my best to swallow the lump in my throat all the way down to the Market, but it doesn’t do any good.

I need to call Beau and see if he’s had any luck getting his mother to back off her instructions to arrest me on sight. And if what Jenna says is true, then he might have an even bigger favor request coming his way—because if Mrs. Drayton doesn’t want me at the Hall, I can’t imagine she’s going to be too thrilled about inviting me into her house.

Chapter Thirteen

I
decide to wait inside the glassed-in Market area to try to stay warmer, and then text Mel to let her know where I am. I get a text from Leo five minutes later that makes me frown.

Where are you? Freezing my balls off out here.

I’m inside. I texted Mel.

Hold on.

He blows in with a gust of cold wind a minute later, and he’s alone.
 

I frown harder. “Where’s Mel?”

“She couldn’t find a sitter, so I guess you’re stuck with just me.”

“I don’t know if Odette’s gonna like you.” I give him an appraising once-over, but he looks presentable enough in his flannel shirt, non-ripped jeans, and beat-up leather jacket. “You’ll have to dust off some of that infamous Leo Boone charm.”

“Dust it off? It’s always shiny and well-used, darlin’,” he drawls. “Don’t think it isn’t, just because I choose not to turn it on you.”

I shake my head and lead him toward East Bay. We ignore the shopkeepers and their wares, which earns us more than one exasperated glance on our way past.
 

“I think you’ve got it wrong. I’m just immune to your charms.”

“Hmm.”

I glance sideways and catch a wink from Leo, an action that somehow warms up my cheeks. Damn him. Maybe he
has
been holding back all this time. Even as far back as middle school, Leo had no trouble attracting the females. To hear him tell it, his bigger problem has always been getting rid of them.