The dove fluttered to the windowsill, then hopped back and forth, its shadow sliding over the gray marble top of the writing desk. A yellowed Thom McAn shoe box sat on the edge, the lid ajar, a piece of gold rickrack trailing from the corner. On the windowsill, half a dozen scraps of ribbon lay strewn about. As the dove’s shadow passed again, I noticed something else. Little specks of gold shimmered in the dust on the sill. I wanted to walk into the room and look closer, but there wasn’t time. The deputies were headed to the door.
Hugging my arms tightly, I followed the men downstairs and onto the front porch. It wasn’t until we’d reached the driveway that I looked at the cottage and my stomach began churning for a different reason. With Iola gone, it would only be a matter of time before Alice Faye Tucker came to evict us. I had less than fifty dollars left, and that was from the last thing I could find to pawn —a sterling watch that Trammel had given me. The watch was only in my suitcase by accident —left behind after a trip to a horse event somewhere, undoubtedly in better times. If Trammel knew I still had it, he would have taken it away, along with everything else of value. He made sure I never had access to enough money to get out.
What were the kids and I going to do now?
The question gained weight and muscle as the afternoon passed. The coroner’s van had just left when Zoey and J.T. came in from school. I didn’t even tell them our new landlady had died. They’d find out soon enough. At nine years old, J.T. might not make the connections, but at fourteen-going-on-thirty, Zoey would know that the loss of the cottage spelled disaster for us. The minute we reemerged on the grid —credit card payment at a motel, job application with actual references provided, visit to a bank for cash —Trammel Clarke would find us.
I slipped into bed at twelve thirty, boneless and weary, guilt ridden for not being honest with the kids, even though it was nothing new. Outside, the water teased the shores of the sedges, and a slow-rising Hatteras moon climbed the roof of Iola’s house, hanging above the turret like a scoop of vanilla ice cream on an upside-down cone.
How could someone who owned an estate like this one end up alone in her room, gone from this world without a soul to cry at her bedside?
The image of Iola as a young woman taunted my thoughts. I imagined her walking the veranda in a milky-white dress. The moon shadows shifted and danced among the live oaks and the loblolly pines, and I felt the old house calling to me, whispering the secrets of the long and mysterious life of Iola Anne Poole.
CHAPTER 2
IT’S AMAZING HOW ENDLESS a week can be when you’re wondering if you’re about to be living in your car. Iola Poole’s house had been quiet for days —no sign of Alice Faye Tucker, sheriff’s deputies, or any family members or friends. I’d slipped into Bink’s Village Market on Fairhope Inlet twice now and looked for a funeral flyer among the notes taped to the front of the counter, but I hadn’t seen Iola’s.
It was as if she’d never existed at all, but of course I’d found her in the blue room, and that meant that sooner or later our time in the cottage would end. I had no idea what I’d do when it happened. After weeks of looking for work around the Outer Banks, I’d figured out that between the hurricane damage and this being the off-season, no place was hiring, and even if they were, a woman with no references and no past history to offer isn’t too tempting. The last official job I’d had was riding Trammel Clarke’s show horses, and that was before one of them hooked a toe on the top rail of a jump at a grand prix event and cartwheeled to the ground with me on board. A botched surgery and a long recovery had led me down a dark hole I was still trying to climb out of.
No matter what it took now, I had to keep moving forward. I might’ve fallen short in the mothering department over the years, but I’d always promised myself that Zoey and J.T. wouldn’t have the kind of life my sister and I had. If it came down to scrubbing streets with a toothbrush, I was going to find a way to take care of us and keep Trammel out of our lives for good. He’d already done enough damage.
If worse came to worst, Ross had said that we could move into his place, as soon as he was back in town. He had a saltbox house on Ocracoke, but most of the time he stayed in beachfront rental homes his father owned. He did light repair work and maintenance on them when he wasn’t gone delivering long-haul orders for the family lumber company. Meeting Ross at Frisco Pier was one of the good things that had happened since we’d been here. But I’d picked up on the fact that Ross wasn’t too much on kids in general. Zoey and J.T. would grow on him over time, but I knew better than to rush things.
It was probably too much to hope that we could keep Iola’s cottage until a job came through, but as each day came and passed, I grew slightly more optimistic.
When I heard car doors shutting outside on the seventh day, I felt the ax tipping over my head again.
We were going to end up at Ross’s, like it or not. He was due back from a long haul tonight. I’d have to pack what we had in the cottage and be ready when the kids came home from hanging out at the beach with a boy Zoey had met at school.
Anxiety hit me like a wave striking shore, dragging me out to sea in bits and pieces. More than anything I wanted to pop an OxyContin to tamp it down. But when we left Texas in the middle of the night, I’d made a promise —no more pills and no more Trammel Clarke. So far I’d held true on both.
I stepped out of the cottage with a greeting and a big smile, to make it look less like we’d been squatting there on purpose. Growing up in the family I had, I’d learned so much about delivering the kind of smooth story that could hide all sorts of ugly truths underneath. The lines I’d been crafting all week rehearsed themselves in my head. After she passed away, poor thing, and I didn’t hear from anyone, I wasn’t sure what to do. I hated to just leave the place unsupervised and her cat with no one to take care of it. We’ve been keeping an eye on things —putting out food and water. The cat comes and goes from the house, so there must be a pet door somewhere, but I couldn’t find it. The night after she died, I was worried because the cat was locked inside, but then the next day, he was out in the yard again. I thought we should look after him anyway, poor thing. I hope that’s all right. . . .
I really would miss this place. Nestled between the towering Victorian and an old horse corral that stretched to the parking lot of Fairhope Fellowship Church, it seemed protected from the things that were chasing us, its routines a sort of salve on wounds that were still bleeding. I would miss the sounds of fishermen readying their gear in the dim hours of the morning and boats rumbling out of Fairhope Marina. I’d even miss the church bells marking the time of day, over and over and over.
In the driveway, a man was unloading a riding lawn mower from the back of a pickup filled with yard-care equipment, chain saws, and ladders. I stopped at the top of the porch steps, craning sideways to get a better view around the crape myrtles. He seemed young, in his twenties or maybe even a teenager. He was wearing orange tennis shoes and red-flowered swim shorts, topped off with a lime-green Windbreaker with palm trees and lizards on it. A floppy fishing hat cast a shadow over his face and hid all but the endmost curls of his hair, reddish blond. All in all, he looked like he’d raided Jimmy Buffett’s closet and then gotten dressed in the dark.
He didn’t seem to be searching for anyone in particular, and my hopes flitted from the muck, taking flight like a marsh bird. Maybe he was just here to mow. Maybe we were safe for another day.
No sense giving anyone a reason to ask questions. I’d just tiptoe back inside and stay away from the windows until he left. . . .
“Afternoon.” His greeting stopped me as I reached for the door. I paused midstride, a trespasser caught in the act.
Be calm. Be calm. Don’t look guilty. Remember the story about keeping an eye on the house and the pet cat.
Smoothing my T-shirt over the old, holey jeans that I loved but Trammel would have frowned on, I turned slowly and flashed a smile. “Hi. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to get in your way. You look like you’ve got a job to do.”
He shooed a carpenter bee away from his tools, his face still concealed by the shadow of the paint-spattered fishing hat. “Just finished mowing at the church.” A shrug indicated Fairhope Fellowship next door. He walked closer to me, carrying a weed whacker. “Had the mower all loaded, and then I noticed how bad this place looked. Thought I’d do the church a favor and knock down the grass a little. Looks like I’ll need a hay cutter and a baler, not a lawn mower.”
I chuckled, still playing it low-key, yet friendly. “Too much rain lately.” The yard had been a swamp most of the time we’d been here. When we moved in, there’d been some mention of a lawn service, but with all the moisture, no one had shown up. This guy didn’t look like he was from a lawn service, though. I hoped he didn’t try to give me a bill when he was done with the work.