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“Everyone knows Shane’s death wasn’t an accident.” Pamela got up from the table and grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the liquor cabinet. “I always suspected my brother had something to do with it somehow.”
“No, Pamela.” Her lips pressed tight, Francie watched her sister pour a generous helping of whiskey into her coffee. “Raymond wouldn’t…”
“Valerie thought the same.” Ian nodded. At least, according to Sarah Benjamin, she did.
“I know, dear.” Pamela took hold of his hand. “It’s the very reason she kept Breanna far away and you close by her side.”
“I take it back.” Ted took the whiskey from Pamela and poured some into a glass. “I’m thinking that boy ain’t blowing smoke out his ass.”
No shit.
His cousin might think he was smart, but Ian was smarter.
He had the girl.
Now he was going to put an end to all this bullshit. And maybe, if it wasn’t too late, he could save Derek from himself.
He just wasn’t sure exactly how.
She sat down at her father’s desk with a sigh. Touching the things he’d once touched, Breanna closed her eyes as if that would bring him back somehow. After breakfast this morning and finishing the Christmas trees this afternoon, she just needed some time to herself.
What kind of sordid, mixed-up shit had she been born into? Secrets and lies. “God, I sure hope that’s the last of them.”
Because if there were any more skeletons in the proverbial family closet, she feared she might lose it.
Not wanting to think about cars plunging off the face of the mountain for one more minute, Breanna sifted through the stack of notebooks sitting beneath her fingertips. Her father’s novel, each word painstakingly written in his own hand. Placing them in sequential order, she packed the notebooks, along with other writings that she’d found, into a box. As long as she was here, she’d start transcribing his manuscript onto her laptop, where it could be kept safe in the cloud forever.
Cold hands. Kneading her shoulders, Sinjin bent down to kiss that place beneath her ear that tickled. Breanna giggled, jumping in her seat. “Were you outside? Your fingers are like icicles.”
“Want to warm them up for me?” He swung her chair around, and crouching on his haunches, shoved his hands beneath her sweater. “There. That feels nice.”
“That’s cold, baby.”
“Just give it a minute.” Sinjin kissed her on the nose, warming his hands on her skin. “What are you doing in here?”
“Organizing.” She nodded to the box on the floor. “I’m going to take those to my room.”
“I’ll bring it down for you.” He stood and hefted the box onto his shoulder.
Falling into place beside him, Breanna paused at the doorway. “Hey, I just had a thought. We haven’t looked in here. Do you think Grandmama could’ve stashed the papers here somewhere?”
“It’s possible, but I don’t think so. Valerie kept these rooms like a shrine. No one ever came in here—not even Francie,” Sinjin said, glancing around her father’s living room. “She wanted everything to remain just as Shane left it.”
“Where the fuck are they, then? And why hide them so they can’t be found?”
“Good question.” Holding the box on his shoulder, his free arm came around her. “It’s okay. I’ll get them from the office.”
“But what if Derek’s already destroyed them or they aren’t there?”
Because that was a distinct possibility, now wasn’t it?
Gazing down at her with a shrug, Sinjin blew out a breath. “Then we’re fucked.”
Not if I can help it.
And it wasn’t about the money, though admittedly, having it wouldn’t suck. Her family’s legacy, this mountain, the house they built, is what mattered. That, and she couldn’t let Derek get away with this. Breanna would not let him win.
“I’m guessing if she didn’t trust Raymond, then she didn’t trust his son very much, either.” Glancing up at him, a lightbulb went off in her head. “She hid those papers where she thought Derek would never think to look, but you would.”
