The lieutenant’s expression turned grim. “Yeah. You know Cyrus Calloway was the father of her baby?”
“Really.” Ty knew Glory had been involved with the Calloways—she’d been involved with a lot of people—but he hadn’t heard that detail. Small towns were rightly known for their gossip but also for their impressive ability to keep secrets.
“Kent thought the baby was his. Wanted her to run away with him so they could make a new start and be a family. He didn’t have a clue about her and his old man, and when he found out, he went a little crazy. He hit her, she hit him back, she ran, and he went after her. She made it from up by Cyrus’s cabin almost to where that old boat dock used to be by your place, where she fell, hit her head, went into labor and died. Fisherman found her the next morning right next to that old tree.” The lieutenant took a sip of his coffee and then moved the chipped mug to the file cabinet behind his desk.
She fell, hit her head, went into labor and died. Not in that order. According to Nev, the labor started first. Who would know that besides Glory and Kent?
Ty shook his head in disbelief. He really did believe Nev had witnessed a death in her dreams that happened before she was even born.
“Kent gave the baby to someone to find a home for her,” Maricci finished. “Robbie spent a fortune trying to find her, but they had nothing to go on. Why the questions?”
Ty shrugged as he stood. “Nev and Anamaria are friendly, and it just got me curious about something that happened practically in my backyard.” Picking up the near-empty box and taking his coffee, he went to the door and then looked back. “Do you know what the weather was like when she died?”
“It was pouring rain that night. The hideout we’d built on Holigan Creek got washed away in a flood.”
It was raining and dark. How many people remembered that?
“Thanks, Lieutenant.” His strides long, Ty went down the hall and around a corner to the cramped space called the dispatcher’s shack. It was apparently a quiet morning since only Wendell Marsh sat at the computer, and he was flipping through a magazine. The room smelled of burned coffee, fatty fast food and the other day dispatcher’s perfume.
“Man, when are you gonna learn that that greasy stuff is gonna kill you?”
A smile had already split Wendell’s face when he swiveled his chair around. “I’ve been eating that stuff most my life, and I’m seventy-eight years old. Do I look almost dead to you?”
“No, sir, you don’t.”
Wendell was a skinny guy, thin enough to justify both suspenders and a belt to hold up the brown trousers he’d worn virtually every day of his life, along with a white button-down shirt, a bowtie and, the moment he stepped outside, a hat. Brown felt in winter, straw in summer. He considered taking care with his appearance a matter of self-respect, and he’d certainly earned the right to respect himself.
“I knew you’d already had your grease for the day, so I brought you something to soak up a little bit of it before it hardens in your arteries.” Ty set the box in front of the man, who took a healthy bite of an apricot-filled cream puff, signaling his approval with a thumbs-up. “Seventy-eight, huh? Does Miss Eleanor know that? ’Cause from what I’ve seen, she’s determined to be your girlfriend, but I heard she only likes older men.”
“She may like ’em older, but when you get to be eighty, beggars can’t be choosers.” Wendell polished off the cream puff, gave the other cinnamon roll a longing look, and then closed the box and slid it in his desk drawer. “Speaking of girlfriends, how’s yours?”
Wildfire gossip and deeply buried secrets, Ty thought as he sat in the empty chair at the next console. “She’s fine.”
“Don’t believe I’ve ever seen a stranger come to town and show up in so many police reports so fast. You think she’s got a jealous boyfriend followed her here?”
“I’m not real sure what to think, Mr. Wendell.” He hesitated, thinking of Kiki at her desk at the other end of the building. Just a cop doing her job? Or an unstable ex-girlfriend and Nev’s attacker? “Can you tell me who’s requested info on Nev in the last few days?”
“Sure.” Wendell typed and scrolled through several screens and then said, “The first time her name showed up in the system was Sunday. Just owner registration.”
Which included the owner’s name, address, make and model. “You mean Monday, when the Holigans vandalized the car.”
Wendell’s thick black-framed glasses magnified his eyes as he chided Ty. “If I’d meant Monday, son, I’d’ve said Monday. Right here, see?” He pointed one unsteady index finger at the screen, and sure enough, there it was: Sunday afternoon, right about the time he’d been showing Nev his house.
Just before Kiki had shown up there.
“Who was asking?”
“Detective Isaacs.”
Damn. She had even commented on the car in Granddad’s driveway that day. Anyone I know? And Granddad had said she’d stopped there for a moment on her way to Ty’s house, probably copying down Nev’s tag number. She would have run it before she’d asked Ty about the visitor, testing to see how he answered. Those trust issues were hard to overcome.
That request was the only one not tied to an incident. Kiki had identified the stranger in the Gadney men’s lives, found out where Nev was staying and arranged to meet her the next morning. She’d questioned Ty about her later that day, and that night the trouble had started.
Lieutenant Maricci’s warning echoed in his mind as he thanked Wendell and then headed for his desk. Never date within the department. Never date a woman who can take you in a fair fight. Never date a woman who’s a better shot than you. And never date a woman who’s just freaking nuts. It gets ugly when it goes bad.
And it always goes bad.
God, if anything happened to Nev because of his ex-girlfriend, he would never forgive himself.
* * *
“I hate to impose,” Nev said, fingers curled tightly around the phone, “but I’d like to talk to you this morning if I could.”
Anamaria’s voice was friendly and warm, touched with a sincerity most people couldn’t fake. “It’s no imposition at all. I’ve got to drop the kids off at preschool. Then I’ll head that way.”
“I can meet you— No.” Nev suddenly remembered, and dejection fluttered through her. “I can’t.”
“I heard what happened to your car. Thank God you weren’t in it. Don’t worry, sweetie. I should be there in half an hour.”
“Okay, thanks.” Setting the phone aside, Nev looked down at herself. Nine in the morning, and she’d had breakfast, fed Frank, had a second cup of coffee on the porch while he wandered and started a batch of cookies baking, all in the red satin pajamas and bare feet. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d spent more than fifteen minutes out of bed without getting dressed, putting on makeup and fussing with her hair.
This whole trip was including a lot of first times.
By the time she’d applied a coat of lipstick and swiped over it with gloss, a car was pulling into the driveway. She slipped into her sandals and then followed the sound of Frank’s swishing, happy tail to the door, where Anamaria waited. Unexpectedly, the taller woman gathered her into a hug, murmuring, “I’m sorry about your car and everything else.”
This was how Nev imagined a sister’s hug would feel, warm and comforting and affectionate, and it stirred something inside her: sweet, pure belonging. Tears she didn’t expect welled in her eyes, and when Anamaria released her, she swiped them away with the tip of her little finger, careful not to smudge her eye makeup. “I loved that car,” she said with a laugh that was part chagrin, part genuine truth. “When I bought it, my sister said I wasn’t the cute, sporty convertible type. She thought I should have bought a nice midsize sedan while she should have had the sleek, sexy car.”
“Isn’t that a mature w
ay to behave,” Anamaria remarked.
“Well, no one’s ever accused Marieka of being mature.” Nev led the way into the kitchen, where the air smelled of sugar, dough and almonds, with rich brewed coffee underlying, and a dozen cookies cooled on a wire rack while another dozen baked.
Anamaria stopped a few feet into the room, the air around her unnaturally still. Nev felt the shift before she turned and saw Anamaria’s eyes were closed and she was breathing slowly, deeply.
“They say smells are important to memory,” she said, sounding lost in the past. “One whiff of corn bread reminds me of Aunt Lueena’s diner. Musk aftershave takes me back to my first boyfriend. Tobacco conjures images of Mama Odette’s younger sister, who liked a good cigar and a glass of whiskey after dinner.” She said the last in a husky, Caribbean accent, and then a faint smile crossed her face, and she opened her eyes. “Almonds always remind me of my last day with Mama. We baked cookies that afternoon.” After tasting one, she added, “These cookies.”
Nev swallowed hard, not sure whether she’d stirred a happy memory or one Anamaria would rather leave buried. “I—I’ve never baked almond cookies before, but I had a craving. I got the recipe and most of the ingredients from Mr. Obadiah, in exchange for saving him a dozen.”
“Mama gave him the recipe. We baked them for everyone in the neighborhood from time to time.”
Another hard swallow. Nev had unknowingly baked Glory’s cookies. It felt...intimate. Connected, in a way she didn’t understand.
Anamaria helped herself to a cup of coffee, took the cookie and sat at the table. As soon as Nev slid in across from her, she asked, “When did the dreams start?”
Nev stiffened, startled, and then heaved a sigh of relief. “Ty told you—”
“No.”
“Then how—?”
Waggling her index finger, Anamaria teased, “I know things. More things than I’ll ever make sense of. But this... You were brought here for a purpose, weren’t you?”
Nev took a bite of cookie, savoring the flavors, thinking idly that they might have been her favorite cookie her whole life if she’d ever had one before. Then, with determination straightening her spine, she told Anamaria everything. Every detail of every dream. Everything she saw, heard, felt of Glory’s last minutes on earth.
When she was done, silence settled between them. Anamaria gazed unseeingly at the wall, and Nev focused on not crying, not asking for answers, not intruding on the other woman.
After a time, Anamaria smiled—a beautiful thing but paling in comparison with that smile of Glory’s. “Being birthed is the hard part, the Duquesne women always say. Passing to be with the people you loved—that’s sweet and easy. There were generations of Duquesnes waiting for Mama.”
The timer went off, an annoying beep, and Nev hastily stopped it and then removed the cookie sheet from the oven. Moving on autopilot, she spooned another twelve lumps of dough onto the second sheet and slid them inside, and then she faced Anamaria from across the room. “Is that why she brought me here? To let you know that she passed sweet and easy?”
“I don’t think so. She already told that to Mama Odette.” After a long moment of silence, Anamaria went on. “I don’t think you’re here to deliver a message, Nev. I think you’re here to get one.”
Numbly, Nev returned to the chair, sinking into it, trying to get a grip on what she’d just heard. A message? For her? It didn’t seem possible. The only person she’d been really close to who had passed was her father. Why would he do it like this? Surely there were better ways, ways to be sure that she understand exactly what he wanted to say. Why not simply appear in her dreams himself?
Maybe that wasn’t the way it worked. Maybe he lacked the ability.
“When did the dreams start?” Anamaria asked again, her voice gentle.
“I was a little girl. Eight, maybe ten.”
“You usually see the future.”
“Yes, but minor things. Never anything really important.”
“It’s all important to someone.”
Anamaria took another bite of her cookie, and Nev followed suit, wondering how many times their aroma had filled this house. Glory’s house.
“Did you tell anyone?”
“My parents, my grandmother, my sister. My mother didn’t approve.”
“People who don’t understand usually don’t.” Wiping her fingers delicately on a napkin, Anamaria extended her hands. “Can I...?”
Nev’s chest tightened and her stomach threatened a flip-flop as she stared at Anamaria’s palm, the gleam of rings on long slender fingers. With a deep breath, she dusted her own hands and then offered the left one.
Instantly Nev remembered their meeting at Ellie’s Deli, the spark that had flared when Anamaria had touched her the second time. It had been fleeting, a tingle fading as it spread, warm and familiar, gone so quickly she might have imagined it, except that she felt it again, stronger this time, more intense. Intimate. It gave her the sensation of homecoming. Belonging.
“What kind of message could Glory possibly have for me?” she asked in a whisper. Part of her was afraid to hear it, but the bigger part wanted to know more than she’d ever wanted anything before.
“I’m not sure, but there’s...something. I feel it. I know you feel it, too.” Anamaria’s smile contained a bit of self-mockery. “Your heart rate practically doubled when I touched you. How old are you?”
It took a moment for Nev to follow the abrupt change of topic. “Twenty-eight last May. Marieka will be twenty-seven the end of February. We’re exactly ten months apart. Daddy said they loved being parents so much that they couldn’t wait to do it again. They wanted a houseful of kids, but after Marieka was born, Mama couldn’t have any more babies. Marieka said they stopped because the second time was the charm. They couldn’t improve on her perfection.” She managed a fluttery smile. “Sorry. Too much information, I know. I go on sometimes.”
“Do you have any pictures of your family?”
“Um, yes, sure. On my phone.” She retrieved the phone from the kitchen counter and paged to the photographs before giving it to Anamaria. The timer’s beep was a convenient distraction for her, though she sneaked glances at the other woman, wondering what she saw, what she thought. Anamaria’s expression gave away nothing.
Neither did the tone of her voice when she finally spoke. “There’s no doubt there’s shared blood between your sister, your mother and your grandmother.”
“No.”
“But you...”
“I know. I don’t look anything like them. Or my father. My skin is a lot lighter. My eyes are lighter. The shape of my eyes, the shape of my face, my hair...” Nev’s chest squeezed tighter, making her voice go breathy at the end. The spoon slid from her nerveless fingers back into the bowl, and she breathed, once, twice, forcing air into her lungs. “Daddy said I was a throwback to another generation.”
Seemingly unaware of her distress, Anamaria continued to study the pictures, scrolling through them with one white-tipped nail. After a time, she tilted her head to one side and studied her. “Maybe not another generation. Maybe another family. Nev...is it possible you’re adopted?”
Chapter 12
“Is it?” Ty asked.
Nev didn’t seem to know what to do with her hands. She picked up her fork, put it down, traced the grain of the wood tabletop and then laced her fingers together before picking up the fork again. He clasped her right hand in his, giving her a little squeeze. A tiny smile crossed her lips before her expression turned troubled again. “I don’t know. It never occurred to me. Except...
“One time Marieka was in one of her moods, and she said I wasn’t a real Wilson. Mama told her to go to her room if she couldn’t be civil, and YaYa laughed it off. I never considered for a moment that it could be true.”
“Kids say hurtful things to their brothers and sisters.”
“It was right after Daddy died,” she said ruefully. “She was twenty-two.”
So not a jab from a spoiled, overly dramatic child. Was it possible she’d told the truth?
“It would explain...” Her voice trailed off, but Ty didn’t need for her to finish. It would explain why she didn’t share the Wilson women’s features. Why she didn’t feel as if she belonged in her own family. Why her mother had always preferred Marieka. Why her sister didn’t have any sisterly feelings toward her. Why she’d felt an immediate connection to Anamaria.
He rubbed his thumb gently across her knuckles. Compared with his, her hands were small and delicate, the skin soft, the fingers surprisingly strong. They were capable hands. Nurturing. Perfect for patting a baby’s back, wiping away tears, expressing emotion.
Anamaria had just left the house when he’d called to see if Nev wanted to go out to lunch. He’d planned to take her for the best pizza in eastern Georgia, but she sounded so vague and confused that he’d asked the lieutenant for the rest of the day off and brought the pizza to her. She loved pizza, she said, though she’d eaten only a slice—with a fork, no less—before losing interest.
“Even if I am adopted, what are the odds I’d be Glory’s missing baby? I’m not even the right age. Anamaria’s sister is Marieka’s age, not mine.”
They were big odds, Ty acknowledged. But if Anamaria thought it possible... She’d known things no one else did. No one else could. “Kent Calloway didn’t want Glory’s baby found. Whoever helped him hide her would have given her a different name, a different birth date and place of birth. If you’re looking for a black baby girl born in February, you’re not going to pay attention to the ones born in other months.”
He considered it a moment and then conceded, “Ten months is a big difference with infants. But after a kid turns two or three, maybe four, there are so many variables that no one’s going to look at him and be able to say, ‘He’s three, not four.’”
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