“Well then, where is it? I certainly haven’t seen any Rutledge money come my way.”
He gives this some thought.
“Maybe that’s what Adaire found out about? Money for you—I can’t imagine Lorelei is the sharing kind of person. That family has never been generous. Doubtful she’d want you to have any of it. Maybe she didn’t want you to know who you really were.”
Greed will make folks do all kinds of wrong, Papaw used to say. I nod, letting the idea take root.
“You think Lorelei faked her father’s suicide?” Davis asks.
Our father—my father—skips through my mind. I try the words on for size, and they just don’t fit. It feels like a truth for someone else.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. Stone knew she killed Adaire, and he covered it up for her. And when Ellis found out, I think Lorelei killed him. Or at least she tried to stop him from telling, and he died in the process. I don’t even know if she cared. And I believe that’s what pushed Stone over the edge, knowing she had killed a second time. A daughter he could not control. One he could not save. Sheriff said there wasn’t a suicide note. What if there was, but Lorelei found it first and destroyed it?” Probably something we’ll never find out. “It’s gotta be her who’s trying to make me look guilty with that Sin Eater Oil—though I haven’t figured out how she got ahold of it yet. But Ellis knew her secret. So did Stone. Ellis wasn’t going to let Lorelei get away with it. And you know what?” I lean into Davis, all my gumption revving itself up. “I’m not going to let her get away with any of it, either. Give me your keys.”
I open my palm to Davis.
If I want justice for Adaire, I’m going to have to take it myself.
Davis steps back, wary, as if I’ve just asked him to rob a bank. “Why? So you can do something stupid?”
“No. So I can finally give Adaire the closure her soul deserves.” This softens him. I can see it in the way his posture wilts and how he ponders the idea that maybe Adaire—or at least her spirit—is not at rest.
I jab my open hand at him again. “Can I borrow your truck or not?”
If I have to, I’ll get Aunt Violet’s car. She’d probably drive me to Sugar Hill herself. I’ve just about decided that’s a better option when Davis hands over the keys to the Boneyard’s wrecker.
Determination and fight rise up in me as I make my way across the hospital’s parking lot. I’m not leaving that mansion until Lorelei owns up to what she did.
After I jump in the truck, I’m about to crank the ignition when something sitting in the front seat catches my eye.
The little red suitcase.
Davis must have rescued it from our truck when he towed it to the junkyard.
In light of everything that’s happened the last twenty-four hours, it honestly slipped my mind.
But there the suitcase is, ready and waiting.
TWENTY-TWO
Death Be on Your Tongue
Insects swarm a lamppost in the parking lot. It casts down a harsh beam on Davis’s tow truck. I lightly smile at one of the nurses who’s on her way inside. From the seat next to me, I slide the little red suitcase into my lap.
My thumbs poise over the metal clasps. The latches spring open with a bounced thung.
I don’t know what I was hoping for, really. A treasure trove of something; not sure of what, though.
There’s only one item inside.
A single manila envelope with an official law office logo printed in the return-address portion. My mother’s name typed in the center with our home address. I tilt the postage stamp in the dim light. The postmark is dated two weeks after my birth.
Inside, legal documents my mother signed, promising to keep my father’s identity a secret in exchange for a huge chunk of money.
“Holy shit.” I sit back against the truck seat and give my mind a second to digest the number. “What in the world would I do with a million dollars?” I huff a laugh. I continue reading the paperwork.
The money is supposed to sit in a trust fund, earning interest, until I turn twenty-five—just one year away. Every year thereafter, an additional fifty-thousand dollar bonus to stay quiet.
“Wow.”
There, at the bottom of the page, two signatures.
Darbee May Wilder.
Stone Ellison Rutledge.
I don’t know what hits me harder—that both my parents gave me up as easily as trash or learning for certain who my father is and knowing he’s dead.
I tell myself I don’t give a damn. Two people who loved each other enough to make a child but didn’t leave enough behind when the child came.
But then maybe I’m looking at this wrong.
If this was about money for my mother, why set up a trust fund solely for me? Why not get a chunk for herself, too? My mom doesn’t have two nickels to rub together. This couldn’t have been about money for her. My father signed this document because he chose money and the power of his family’s status over her.
Over us.
She had some wild oats to sow—heartache will do that to you. That’s what Aunt Violet told me when I asked about my father.
So it was too painful for her to stay. I can’t imagine how I would feel, looking at my baby every day and being reminded of the love I could never have. Somehow, this sliver of a thought cracks the surface of this grudge I’ve been holding on to ever since she left, and I can almost understand it.
