WE LAY STRETCHED OUT SIDE BY SIDE ON THE CHAISES on my deck, the fading sun still carrying enough warmth to make us drowsy. After lunch, we’d meandered back up the beach, then driven the Jaguar to the office. I’d printed off a copy of the employment contract I’d had drawn up by our attorney in case I ever wanted to hire someone. In a matter of moments, Red had become an official employee, temporarily anyway, of Simpson & Tanner, Inquiry Agents.
Back at the house, I’d given him the file on Kimmie Eastman to read while I fixed a pitcher of iced tea. Thankfully, Red hadn’t asked for a beer. I’d definitely need to add a six-pack to Dolores’s shopping list since I’d dumped his last three bottles down the drain. I set the glasses on the round table between us and flopped back onto the chaise.
“So what do you think?” I asked.
Red’s eyes had drifted closed, and he didn’t answer right away. I glanced over at him and saw the troubled creases wrinkling his brow.
“That is almost too sad to think about,” he said softly.
“I know.” I brought him up to date with a verbal report on my efforts to find Joline’s sisters and my conversation that morning with Dr. Eastman. “What else should I have done? What did I miss?”
“About the only thing would have been to ask me to check the sisters out for criminal records. If they’ve ever been in the system, we might have gotten a more current address.”
Erik had suggested it, but I’d balked at the idea, primarily because Red and I hadn’t been on the best of terms at the time. I hoped my stupid pride hadn’t made things worse for Kimmie.
Red turned his head to face me. “Chances are it wouldn’t have helped, but it would have eliminated one more avenue of investigation.”
“Any chance of it now?”
“Doubtful. Although I do still have some friends at the office who might be willing to bend the rules a little. I’ll make a couple of calls tomorrow.”
I relaxed at his words. “Good. What else?”
“This guy Deshawn is intriguing. Do you seriously think he might be the girl’s father? I could check to see if there was a rape reported around that time.”
“I’m not even sure there was one. I could be way off base. But if Joline was attacked, I’m betting the family hushed it up. Otherwise everyone would know about it, don’t you think? And the guy would be in jail.”
“I suppose. I could check for convicted rapists named Deshawn, but that’s the longest of long shots.”
I shook my head. “I just don’t understand why she didn’t tell me the truth. I can’t believe she’s more interested in covering up her attack than saving her daughter.”
“I know. But we can’t judge how deeply it might have affected her emotionally. She might have blocked it out so well that she doesn’t consciously remember exactly what happened. I’ve seen it before. Remember—if it happened—she was just a kid.”
The sun had disappeared behind the house, and a cool wind off the ocean set the Spanish moss rustling in the live oaks. Without thinking, I reached for Red’s hand. His warm fingers grasped mine and held on tightly.
“Well, whatever happened, there’s nothing we can do about it tonight. What do you want for dinner?” I asked.
Without letting go of my hand, he rolled onto his side and gently kissed the soft skin on the inside of my elbow. “You,” he said, and I smiled.
When I awoke, the sun had just begun to streak the darkness out over the ocean. I lay wrapped in Red’s arms, my head nestled against his shoulder. Even before, when he’d all but officially moved in after Christmas, there hadn’t been many mornings when he wasn’t gone by the time I woke up. I sighed contentedly, savoring the warmth of his body.
I disentangled my left hand and squinted into the dark, turning my fingers in different directions in an effort to capture the sparkle of my engagement ring. After dinner the night before—delightfully postponed for a couple of hours—I’d retrieved it from the floor safe. In the great room, Red had dropped to one knee and ceremoniously slid it onto my damaged ring finger. I smiled into the lightening room. “God’s in his heaven—All’s right with the world,” I thought. Robert Browning. Pippa Passes. Two points.
I snuggled back down under the duvet. Red mumbled something unintelligible and gathered me closer.
I must have dropped back to sleep, because the sound of the shower across the hall roused me for the second time. That and Red’s slightly off-key bellowing of “Yellow Submarine.” A diehard Beatles fan, he knew the lyrics to every song they’d ever recorded. I smiled and kicked off the covers.
Half an hour later we faced each other across the breakfast table in the kitchen, downing eggs and shuffling sections of the Island Packet back and forth. I’d asked Red the night before if he wanted to go home and change, but he sheepishly admitted that he’d never taken his clothes out of the Bronco. In a matter of a few minutes, everything was back in place as if our brief breakup had never happened.
I checked my watch. “Time to get rolling.”
I carried plates and cups to the sink, and Red stacked them in the dishwasher.
“How do you think Erik’s going to react?” he asked without looking at me.
“He’ll be fine. The biggest problem is where you’re going to sit. We only have two desks. And no room for another one.”
He waved off my concern. “I don’t need a desk. If I’m going to be any help to you, it isn’t going to happen staring at a computer. Let me do the legwork. I’ve built up a lot of connections over the years. Time to put them to good use.”
I gathered up my bag and a light blazer. “We should take two cars, don’t you think?”
“Absolutely. If I have to go chasing down leads, I don’t want to leave you stranded.”
I opened the door to the garage and paused. “You sure you’re okay with this? Working for me, I mean? We don’t always see eye to eye on things.”
He gripped my shoulders and kissed me soundly. “That’s what makes life with you so interesting, sweetheart.” He stepped back and grinned. “Come on, let’s get going. I hear the boss can be a real terror if you’re late for work.”
Erik’s grin when I explained Red’s presence—in civvies—told me all I needed to know about how he would deal with our having another employee. I started to explain that Red’s salary would come out of my share of the profits, but he wasn’t having any of that.
“He’s on the payroll, just like I am. No different.”
Erik had been gradually buying into the business over the years, insisting that he wouldn’t accept a full partnership until he could pay his own way.
I resisted the urge to hug him. “All right, then, let’s get cracking.”
We rolled out my chair and the one for clients that usually sat in front of my desk and gathered in the reception area. I filled Erik in on Jerrold Eastman’s visit on Sunday morning, and he typed while I talked.
“Red is going to see if someone at the sheriff’s office will run a check on Maeline and Contessa Mitchell. Don’t forget to try the married names as well. Erik will print you out the details.”
“Done,” Erik said, and a moment later the printer whirred to life.
“I want to find this Deshawn guy,” I said, “whether he’s Kimmie’s father or not. He may know something that could help us find the rest of the family. Suggestions?”
The silence lasted for a solid minute. “I’ve been thinking about something,” Erik said, his index finger working the scrolling wheel on his mouse. “Here it is. You said that when you talked to Patience Brawley on Saturday she hinted at some big blowup in the family, something that made them estranged. Let’s look at that and see if it has any connection. Seems to me the timing is about right. Didn’t she say she hadn’t had any contact for ten or fifteen years?”
“It’s a possibility. You’re thinking maybe somehow the possible attack on Joline is related to the family rift?” I asked, and he nodded. “We need a time line. Can you work on that? Factor in the probable date the rape would have occurred based on Kimmie’s birth date. I think Joline would have been around seventeen. Double-check that, too. And when her mother and grandmother were killed in that accident.”
Erik’s excitement had translated to his fingers, which were already dancing across his keyboard. “I’ll lay everything out in a database and get it organized. Give me a couple of hours to do the research and get it all together.”
“Great. Red, see what you can shake out of your former colleagues. We still need to find the sisters. And one of them may know how to track down Deshawn.”
Red gave me a mock salute. “I’m on it, chief,” he said and grinned. “Probably best to do it in person. I have some paperwork to fill out at the office about my pension and a few other things.” He turned and retrieved the single sheet from the printer tray. “I’ll call you.”
I saw him hesitate, then decide kissing the boss goodbye probably wasn’t good office etiquette. With a wave, he disappeared out the door.
“You sure you’re okay with this?” I asked.
Erik nodded. “I think it’s a great idea, especially on this case.” His face sobered. “We’re running out of time, and another pair of eyes and legs could make the difference for Kimmie Eastman.”
“Okay. I’m going to go through those letters Joline gave us, the ones between her grandparents during the war. I didn’t think they had any relevance at first—and it felt too much like prying into their private lives—but now I’m wondering if there might be some usable clues. And maybe I can fill in some more of the blanks on that genealogy.”
“I could get you a program for that,” Erik said. “There’s a couple out there we can download.”
“I’ll let you know,” I said. “Sometimes I think better with a pen in my hand.”
I returned the chairs to their rightful places in my office and cleared off the top of my desk. I retrieved the envelope that held the letters Joline Eastman had left with me along with the sparsely filled-in family tree and spread them out. I pulled a Diet Coke from the mini-fridge, hung my jacket on the hook behind my door, and rolled up my sleeves.
I picked up the first envelope, the one on which the postmark hadn’t been completely obliterated, and studied the smeared ink. What little I could still see of the water-damaged handwriting looked almost like a child’s, like the kind of stilted, formal penmanship once taught in elementary school. It reminded me in a way of my father’s ornate writing style, and the thought stopped me in my tracks. I swallowed the knot of guilt and picked up the phone.
“Lavinia, it’s me.”
“Why didn’t you come to dinner yesterday, child? Your father wasn’t happy, I can tell you that.”
The unspoken tradition of my taking Sunday dinner at Presqu’isle had gone completely out of my mind the day before. What’s more, I hadn’t even called to check on the Judge’s condition. Whatever misery Lavinia wanted to heap on my head would be well deserved.
“I’m sorry,” I said, meaning it. “Red came back.”
Her soft laugh absolved me. “I understand. And so will Tally. So everything’s all right with you two?”
I smiled, remembering the hours we’d spent reconciling in the king-sized bed. “Yes, ma’am. I’m wearing the ring.”
“I’m happy for you.”
“So how is the Judge?”
“He’s still a little weak, and shoveling that medicine down him takes up most of my time. I told him last night that all his fussin’ and complaining is grating on my last nerve.”
I laughed. “You’re wonderful, do you know that?”
I could almost feel the heat of her blush through the telephone. “Why don’t you and Redmond come to dinner tonight? I’ll make something special. To celebrate.”
“We’d love to,” I said, for once not having to check with Red to see when he was scheduled to be on duty. “Seven?”
“Make it a little earlier. Your father tends to flag as the day wears on. He’ll be better company around six.”
“Six it is,” I said, then a sobering thought struck. “We’re working on this case of the sick little girl. Red’s helping me. The only thing would be if we get held up chasing down a lead on that.”
“Understood. You do what you have to. If you can’t make it, we’ll do it some other time. Nothing’s more important than saving a child.”
“Amen,” I whispered and laid the phone gently back in its cradle.