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There weren’t any condoms in the nightstand, either—just an e-reader. “Jesus,” he muttered. “Do you care aboutanythingexcept books?”
Where had he gone to college? Bastian wondered. Somewhere in the south? Apparently, he had family in Louisiana...
The bed had been made, but when Bastian brought one of the pillows to his nose, he thought he could smell Ismay. There was definitely perfume on the pillowcase, but he’d already guessed they’d spent the night together. It’d been all too apparent when they’d walked out of the house this morning.
He was planning to return to the kitchen so he could finish his dinner when he realized what was wrong. Bo had no personal effects. No pictures of his mother, father, siblings, or any family. He had no letters or documents lying around. His house had none of the mementos most people would add, not even a single photograph of him with a dog or a friend.
Beginning to search more earnestly, looking for anything that might reveal some weakness or vulnerability, Bastian used his hand to check under each drawer, in case Bo had taped something there.
Nothing.
He dragged out the weights Bo kept under his bed, so he could search there.
No luck.
It wasn’t until he lifted the mattress that he found something that wouldn’t normally have been there. A wallet had been shoved there, pushed way into the middle.
At first, Bastian didn’t think much about it. It could be that Bo had stuck it there to hide it in case someone broke in. But he’d just left town. If this was the wallet he used on a daily basis, wouldn’t he have taken it with him?
Shoving the mattress farther so he could reach it, he flipped it open. Finally, he’d found pictures, but only a few. One was of Bo when he was about ten with what looked like a little sister, one was of Bo, more recently, with an old man, and the last one was a pregnant woman from possibly the ’90s.
There were also a couple of credit cards and a driver’s license.
Bastian almost closed it and tossed it back into the middle of the bed. He didn’t think it was any kind of big revelation, but then he realized Bo would’ve needed his ID to get on the plane. So why’d he leave it?
He pulled out the driver’s license. It’d been issued in Louisiana and was expired by nearly a year. Nothing unusual about that. Plenty of people held on to an expired license for several months in case they lost their new one.
But then Bastian’s heart began to beat a little faster. Something was up, all right. The driver’s license had Bo’s picture with a different name. It didn’t say Bo Broussard, it said Beau Landry. And when he took a closer look, the credit cards did, too.
Why?
Grand Isle sat at the end of Louisiana Highway 1, about fifty miles south of New Orleans. It was the only inhabited barrier island in Louisiana, and as far as Bo was concerned, there was no other place like it. Some of the families who’d lived here for generations, including his uncle Chester and his grandparents before they passed, claimed they’d never leave.
Today, there were only about a thousand locals on the island, down from thirteen hundred not many years ago, and that number was continuing to shrink. Those who remained were determined to keep fighting the wind and the waves that were slowly washing away their beloved home.
Climate change would eventually win, which made Bo sad. He loved Grand Isle almost as much as Chester did. He was just more pragmatic. Plus, he didn’t want to stay in a place where so many people believed he was guilty of the crime of which he’d been convicted.
Half a dozen chickens pecked in the dirt beneath the weathered stilted shack where Chester had finished raising him. Once Bo got out of his rental car, the smell of the earth and trees brought him back to the days he’d walked around barefoot wearing the same dirty jeans and often no shirt as a young teen. Back then, he’d always had a fishing rod in his hands. His uncle had taught him to fish as soon as he’d arrived on Grand Isle, and he’d loved it.
A calico three-legged mutt Chester had found roaming the island, foraging to stay alive, while Bo was locked up, stood from where he’d been sleeping at the front door and started to bark as Bo climbed the stairs.
“Hey, boy.” At Bo’s suggestion, Chester had named the dog Long John Silver—an ode to the one-legged pirate captain inTreasure Island. “You been taking good care of Chester?” he asked the dog and was surprised to hear a human voice answer from inside the house.
“I’vebeen doing that.”
If the weather was warm enough, the door stood open—there was no air-conditioning—and today it was a humid eight-five degrees. The shadows created by the porch were too deep and dark for Bo to be able to see who was talking. But he recognized the voice.
Matilda.
Straightening, he considered driving straight back to the airport. But now that he’d come all the way from Mariners, he had to see the old man. With Chester’s age and failing health, for all Bo knew, it could be the last time. “Why didn’t you tell me you were going to be here?” he asked.
“Would you have come if you knew?” She pushed open the screen door from the inside and stood in the opening, and he caught his first glimpse of his younger sister in fourteen years. Her face was rounder but she was pretty as ever with her hazel eyes and dark wavy hair falling below her shoulders. She looked older than thirty, though. They’d both had to grow up fast.
“Probably not,” he admitted. “So you baited the trap by acting as though Chester needed me? Why?”
“Because it’s time we made our peace.”
Again, he felt the impulse to walk away. This discussion was fraught with too many emotional landmines he’d sooner avoid. “There will never be a time. What sister turns on her own brother?”
