Yours,
Nicholas
* * *
Mrs. Lanigan’s hands shook. “My father always told me he was an orphan, which I took to mean his family died when he was young. He never mentioned a brother.”
“He said he knows who killed him. Do you think the answers are in these letters?”
“How many are there?”
“Probably a hundred.” I explained how they looked like they’d just been tossed into the box. “Most aren’t dated and have no envelopes, like they were hand delivered by this Fred. I’d have to read them all to try and piece together the order.”
“Would you?”
“It’ll take a while, but yes. I’d be happy to.”
She touched her trembling fingers to her temple. “I don’t know what to think.”
It occurred to me these letters could be used as bargaining chips to coax Mrs. Lanigan back into life. “Let’s make a deal. One letter in exchange for a walk and a meal that you actually eat instead of throw at the wall?”
“For the record, I was frustrated because I burned my mouth.”
“I can see how that would frustrate you.” How terrifying it must be to face this without any tools. I added that to my list of items to conquer. Mrs. Lanigan must learn how to navigate the world without her sight. “Next meal, I’ll be here to describe where everything is and to make sure nothing’s too hot.”
“This is extortion,” she said. “Using the letters to make me do your bidding.”
“It’s for your own good.”
She released a shaky breath. “How fitting that you’re bribing me with the past. I have no future, I may as well go back.”
I moved from the chair to perch on the edge of the bed. “I know you’re frightened. Who wouldn’t be?”
“I’d be better off dead.”
“Your children don’t think so,” I said.
“You sure about that?”
“Is that your fear or the truth?”
“It’s the truth.” She sighed. “Believe me, I know my own children.”
My mother always told me the way to get people to open up to you was to be vulnerable about your own fears and worries. “I’m scared too.”
“Of what? Not me, apparently.”
I smiled. “Not you, no. But most other things. Failure. Loneliness. Dying alone with a cat who eats me before anyone discovers my body.”
Mrs. Lanigan shook her head and smiled. Not just a twitch, but a full smile. “That’s a bit far-fetched.”
“I was afraid to come here. Just driving here was scary. Then, the elk were there, which made it even worse.”
“You have your whole life ahead of you. Mine is over.” A lone tear leaked from one eye and rolled down her cheek. “I don’t know how to live this way.”
“I’ll help you. We’ll figure it out together.” I took one of her hands. “You won’t be alone.”
“We’re always alone. We come in alone and go out alone.”
“But there’s all that time in between where we can be together.”
“You may go now, Miss Wilde.”
“Please, call me Charlotte.”
“Very well. I’ll remain Mrs. Lanigan.”
“Yes ma’am.”
Ardan was coming in from the patio when I walked into the main living room carrying the box of letters. “How did it go?” he asked.
“Quite well.”
“Really?” He raised an eyebrow.
“I made some inroads.” I set the box of letters on the coffee table.
“What did you do? And what’s in the box?”
I quickly told him about the contents and how the letters arrived here. “Read this.” I handed him the letter I’d read to Mrs. Lanigan and waited while he read.
“This is astonishing on many levels,” Ardan said.
“Your mother thought so too. Her father told her he had no family.”
“That’s what we’ve always believed.”
“We know he had a brother,” I said. “Who was murdered in 1938. I plan on sorting through the box to see if I can get more information.”
“Isn’t it odd you happened to pick this one?” he asked as he peered into the box. “I mean, this is a mess in here.”
“That’s exactly what I thought. Like it was meant to be. Your mother needs something to interest her, to motivate her to start living again. And bam, I pull out this letter. It’s like magic.”
“Or a higher power,” Ardan said. “I have been praying for a miracle.”
“We might just have found one.” I shared with him my strategy to motivate Mrs. Lanigan with the letters. “She called it extortion but agreed to it anyway.”
“A mystery writer unfolds a mystery right here in my own house,” he said.
“I can’t wait to sort through these letters. It’s going to take a while.”
“I’ll help,” he said. “We can use my study. There’s a table in there. We can spread them all out and see if we can put them in chronological order.”
A project. Time with Ardan. Sign me up.
He smiled. “I’m glad you’re here. The tightness in my chest has lessened.”
“It’s good to feel useful.” I smiled back at him. The current buzzed between us.
“Come on, I’ll show you to your room. I already took your suitcases up.” He grabbed the box of letters and asked me to follow. “We’ll get your car tomorrow, if that’s okay?”
“Fine with me,” I said.
We walked up a two-level staircase to the second floor. He chatted about the house along the way, telling me he’d had it built just after his brother Finn died to busy himself in the details of the construction. “I found it easier to cope with my grief when surrounded by minutiae.”
“I remember how that is,” I said.
He shot me a quizzical look.
“When I was fourteen, my best friend was murdered.” I didn’t usually talk about Roberta. People always wanted to know more, and I didn’t enjoy reliving that awful time. Ardan, however, was not like other people. If he asked questions, I wouldn’t mind. “I buried myself in schoolwork and swimming. But the grief’s still there anyway. There’s not a day I don’t think about Roberta.”
“Is that why you decided to become a mystery novelist?”
No one had ever asked me that before. My parents knew this to be true, but it was an unspoken understanding between us that almost every aspect of my life had been shaped by Roberta’s death. “I think so. My friend Susan’s a romance writer. She hasn’t yet found her Prince Charming, but she believes if she keeps writing about love eventually it will come to her real life. I like that I can always solve the crime, unlike real life.”
We arrived at the end of the hallway. “This is your room,” he said.
He held the door open for me. I passed by him, inhaling his spicy scent. The smell of Ardan. Like nothing else. It was already familiar to me, as was the curve of his jawline and the particular blue of his eyes.
My suitcases were tucked beside a dresser. I thanked him for bringing them upstairs.
“You’re welcome. Will this do?” he asked.
“Sure. It’s fantastic.” The room was larger than I’d expected and decorated in pink and white accessories. The furniture was wood with a black finish, including a queen bed, dresser, and desk.
“Will the pink bother you? I had this room decorated for my smallest niece, Clementine—Blythe’s daughter. The girls stay with me sometimes in the summer when their parents want privacy. I asked Clemmie what she wanted, and she said pink. Her sister picked turquoise and black.”
“I love pink. How sweet of you to give them their own rooms.”
“They’ve wrapped me around their pretty little fingers. I love being an uncle.”
“I’d like to be your niece.” I blurted it out before thinking. My cheeks burned. “Sorry, that sounded dirty.” Yet another inappropriate sentence out of my mouth before I could stop it.
The corners
of his eyes crinkled. “It did sound a little dirty.”
“I’m sorry. The altitude’s making me loopy.” It wasn’t the altitude unless its name was Ardan Lanigan.
“I hope that’s not all it is,” he said.
“What else could it be?” I flashed him a flirtatious smile. What was happening to me? I did not flirt with men I’d just met, especially ones who were technically my boss. Ardan was different. I knew him already. There was a connection, like a current of electricity that no one could see or feel but us.
“Maybe you have a little crush on me?” he asked. “Could that be it?”
“Maybe.” We smiled like goons at each other for a moment before he crossed over to the windows and opened the curtains.
“You have a view of Blue Mountain from the desk.” He opened the window a few inches. “I thought you’d like that for writing.”
I went to the window to get a better view. The top of the mountain was still covered in snow, stark white against the cobalt blue sky. A shaft of sunlight kissed my skin. I caught a whiff of fir trees. “I feel alive here.”
A muscle in his jaw twitched. He turned slightly to gaze down at me. “I do too. More than anywhere in the world.”
“Have you been a lot of places?”
“I have, yes.”
“I’ve never been out of the country,” I said. “I’d like to travel but haven’t had the funds so far.”
I’ll take you everywhere you want to go.
I started. Had he said that aloud? His face was impassive. I’d imagined the words, perhaps because I wanted to hear them.
“Why is it named Blue Mountain?” I asked.
“At twilight it looks blue,” he said. “That’s my guess. No one knows for sure.”
“I’ll love writing in here. I’ll never want to leave.”
“You can stay as long as you like.”
Stay forever.
That time I knew I was imagining it.
“I’m relieved Mother didn’t make you cry. The other two cried within the first hour.”
“I’m tougher than I look,” I said.
“I noticed.”
“I find her funny.”
“Funny?”
“She makes grumpiness an art form. Plus, I know just where I stand with her. I find it refreshing.”
“Refreshing’s one way to put it.”
“She’s surprisingly perceptive.” I rubbed the window with my sleeve, pretending there was a spot, to distract myself from the urge to lean against him. “She was right about my luck with men.”
“Bliss told me what happened,” he said.
I turned to him, surprised. “She told you about Zeke?”
“No. I meant about the guy who harassed you at the company party.”
“Oh, right. That thing.”
“Sadly, it seems most women have a similar story,” Ardan said.
“I’m fine. It’s not like what’s happened to so many others. He tried to put his hand up my skirt, but he didn’t get very far. I was too fast for him. The second I felt him go for it, I stabbed his hand with a fork.” I’d been about to stab a brownie when I’d felt his greasy breath on my neck.
“Did you hurt him?”
I grimaced. “Not any permanent damage. Barely punctured the skin. I did negotiate a nice settlement though. It was the first brave thing I’ve ever done. I walked into the Human Resources office and told them what happened and what I wanted. I’d calculated it out that if I lived frugally, the money would give me five years to write before I’d have to get a real job again. I made a bargain with myself. Choose myself for once. That’s how I got the first book written and published. Then I messed it up by getting involved with Zeke.”
He sat down in the cozy white chair in the corner. “Zeke?”
I crossed the room and sat on the bed. “He’s my ex-boyfriend. We broke up after he threatened to kill me, drained my savings account, and took off with my nubile neighbor for a gambling binge in Vegas.”
His eyes widened. “No!”
“Yes. I didn’t know everything about him. Obviously.” At the time, he’d seemed like the perfect man. Medical student. Wealthy family.
“I’d say. Did you get your money back?” he asked.
“No. It was lost on the ponies, so to speak.” The entire advance from my book and the settlement, gone in a weekend. I didn’t know if it was ponies or casino tables. In the end, it didn’t matter. Nothing was left. “That money was supposed to keep me from a day job, so I could keep writing.”
“Is he dangerous?” he asked.
“Not anymore. He’s dead.”
“Dead?”
“Yes, it really takes the sting out of hating his guts,” I said.
“What happened to him?”
“Someone shot him. The authorities suspect it was gambling related. Fortunately, I had a rock-solid alibi or they might have suspected me.” I smiled to let him know I was joking. “I was at the gym swimming my half mile, like every morning. The staff vouched for me.”
“They say exercise helps all areas of one’s life.”
I laughed. “This was certainly a good example.”
“How long ago did this happen?”
“Ten months ago. Honestly, this job was like a lifesaver. I didn’t want to go back to a corporate job. Bliss said the Idaho air would be good for my creativity.”
“Are you angry?” he asked.
“It’s over now. I mean, I was angry. Absolutely furious, especially because I couldn’t do anything about it. Then the asshole ends up dead, so I couldn’t even have my day in court.”
“It’s not as satisfying as you might think.” His voice deepened a register. “Your person’s still gone.”
“Yes. And this was just money. Not the life of someone I loved. That’s something you can never forgive.”
“Did they ever find Roberta’s killer?” he asked.
“Yes, they did.” I loved that he said her name. “He was someone we knew. They say that’s usually the case.”
“It was for us.”
“I knew the minute I heard the news. I’d been home sick from school that day. Normally, Roberta and I walked to and from school together. Her house was two doors down from mine.” I gritted my teeth to stop the tremor in my voice before continuing. “All year I’d noticed one of the janitors at school staring at her in the hallways and the lunchroom. When we left school in the afternoons, he was always over by the dumpsters, watching us. We talked about it many times. I realized too late we should have told an adult, but we thought he was just a creepy guy. Roberta was beautiful. A lot of guys stared at her.”
“Did you speak up right away?”
“Yes. The minute my parents told me the news, I knew with complete certainty. Have you ever had that feeling? Like you know something deep in your bones?”
“Once or twice.”
“He’d been waiting for a time when she was alone. When the police came to our house to question me, I told them my suspicion. They brought him in for questioning and matched the DNA evidence he’d left. He raped her before he choked her to death.” I bit the inside of my mouth to keep from crying. The thought of what she endured in her last minutes of life was a black, helpless rage that closed around my heart, even after all these years. “They convicted him. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.” I blinked back tears. “When I think of how…of what he did…and that they were her last moments on earth, I just can’t understand why.”
“I wish I didn’t get it, but I do.”
He did, of course, only too well. The shared language of grief did not need words or even descriptions. From one battered heart to another, we understood.
Ardan tilted his head, studying me. “Talking to you it’s as if we’ve known each other—”
I finished the sentence for him. “Forever.” The sensation of belonging to him, of being understood by him in ways no one else ever could, washed over me in warm waves.
He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “You’ll need a pair of boots if you stay past the summer.”
“What?”
“I don’t know why I said that—it just slipped out.” It was his turn to blush.
I grinned at his discomfort. “We’re even then. One inappropriate comment about being your niece. One outlandish comment about how long I’ll be here. Check and check.”
He laughed. “After you unpack, come down for lunch. Effie’s making chopped salads.”
“With garbanzo beans and salami?” My mouth watered. “That’s my favorite.”
“I believe so.” I watched as he crossed to the doorway and into the hallway. Could his backside look any better in those jeans?
He turned back to me. “I’m sorry the elk scared you, but I’m glad Mother didn’t.”
“It was an inauspicious start to my time here. However, the ensuing rescue made it all worth it.”
“What kind of host would I be if I let you ruin your pretty shoes upon your arrival?” He winked and left.
I unpack faster than I’d ever unpacked in my life. All I wanted was to be near him. And that salad sounded darn good. Effie was going to make me fatter.
As I hung clothes and organized my toiletries in the bathroom, I thought over the morning’s events. It was as if my life before was a distant dream. I loved this new world of elk, Effie, and Mrs. Lanigan. And Ardan Lanigan. Especially him.
Ardan wasn’t like the men I knew in Portland. They were hipsters with beards and tattoos who lacked any sense of chivalry, perhaps in the name of feminism, but it was more likely laziness mixed with improper etiquette training. Men no longer opened doors or held the elevator, perhaps too busy looking at memes on their phones. Ardan was like a man from another era. Polite and just on the edge of shy, he had an old school formality about him, yet was approachable and seemingly without affect.
After I finished unpacking, I freshened my makeup and changed into a cotton skirt and t-shirt. I looked at myself in the full-length mirror. Was I losing my mind, or did I look better in Idaho? Or maybe it was just the glow of Ardan Lanigan?
Blue Ink Page 5
