All That Lies Broken (Ashmore's Folly Book 2) (48 page)

Diana sent her a glance.

“Besides,” Lucy remembered, almost too late, that she wasn’t Diana’s lawyer, “don’t ask me. Ask Kevin.”

“Oh, screw that.” Diana waved a hand. “Can’t I even ask you a question?”

“No!” The end of the bridge-tunnel and the southern tip of the Eastern Shore loomed right ahead, not a moment too soon. “Damn it, Di, we’ve talked about this! You know better! I can’t give you advice. That’s what you have a lawyer for.”

“I don’t see why not. I’m not talking about suing Richard. Laurie isn’t your client.”

“Yes, she is. Sort of.” That blasted piano. This was a nightmare. She was going to resign from her family and go live on a mountaintop in Tibet. “I’m helping her – oh, never mind. It has nothing to do with you or Richard. What do you think you’re going to sue her for?”

“Alienation of affection.”

Diana knew. Oh, hell, she knew. Somehow, she had guessed.

“Or maybe conspiracy. She aided and abetted Francie in her little fling with Richard. They probably couldn’t have done it without her help. Can’t I sue her for that?”

Conspiracy
. Lucy wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. That was the problem with people; they read a true crime book or watched Court TV, and suddenly they were ready to sit on the Supreme Court. “Alienation of affection. Fine. Go ask Kevin. Be sure to tell him Laurie was a minor at the time. Oh, and tell him the statute of limitations ran years ago, and you’re only suing now because Laurie has a lot of money. I’m sure he’ll rush to draw up the papers. Then watch the lawyers line up, salivating to sue
you
for malicious prosecution.”

Kevin Stone might have the hots for Diana, but he wouldn’t risk his law practice for such nonsense. Surely he wouldn’t.

“Malicious prosecution? What’s that?”

“It means it’s an inane idea. Drop it. Drop it right this second.”

It was a relief, an hour later, to let her reluctant sister out at the old church that housed the county library. She gave Diana specific instructions, even if, dollars to donuts, Diana would get sidetracked and forget what she was looking for. “Meet me at the town square in,” she glanced at her watch, “one hour. That should give you enough time.”

“Only one hour? To go through the newspapers?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake. You’re only looking through a few months’ worth. You’ll probably be done before I am.”

“All right.” Diana hunched her shoulders and got out of the car. “Dead bodies. Unidentified. Floating in the bay. Anything else?”

Her casual attitude grated on Lucy. This was the body of their younger sister they were talking about, and if she had been floating in the Chesapeake, someone had put her there. “That’s it. See you in an hour.”

~•~

But Lucy found no dead bodies herself. She found something far worse.

She finished at the police station long before the allotted hour was up. Very few reports had ever been generated for Ash Marine; the Ashmores were law-abiding citizens, and Dominic Abbott had been an ideal tenant of the satellite cottage. Only twice in twenty years had the police ever been summoned – once for an attempted burglary five years before, and once on an August day eleven years before.

It had taken only a few minutes to find the police report, a paper time bomb ticking away, unseen, waiting to detonate. It might have lain there forever.

It took only a few minutes to copy the file and head out, eyes unseeing, into the growing sunniness of the day.

The sea air was fresh and cool; small-town America still reigned here on the Eastern Shore. People came to relax, picnic, get away from their daily stresses. Men came here with their families; teenagers came here with dates; honeymooners came to recover from their weddings. No one, Lucy thought blindly, came here to kill.

But someone had. And had nearly gotten away with it forever.

She sat outside the police station on a stone bench in the sunshine, waiting for – ironically! – the one person besides Julie safely in the clear, and she felt chilled straight through to her bones. The warmth of the July morning touched her skin; it did not touch her soul.

All her life, Lucy Abbott Maitland had believed in certain things. God. The importance of family. The certainty that she had a purpose in life. Her own gifts for negotiation and persuasion.

The innate goodness and integrity of the man and woman who had raised her.

And, despite his stumblings, the honor and decency of her foster brother.

She felt all at sea, untethered from her moorings, a little boat lashed around by the chaotic waters. How strange, she thought, watching Diana amble towards her, her arms swinging at her side, her face lifted to the sky, that suddenly her unstable sister, of all people, was her lifeboat in a roiling sea.

A leaky lifeboat, if she only had Diana to rely on.

“Hey,” Diana said, and dropped down beside her. “That was a big fat nothing. No bodies – none unidentified, that is. There were some drownings, but they were way up the coast – Lucy!” She grabbed her hands. “Lucy, what’s wrong?”

Lucy looked at her wordlessly.

“Is it the baby? Are you sick? Are you bleeding?”

She found herself long enough to shake her head. “No. The baby’s fine.”

“What’s wrong then?” Diana shifted into rare maternal form, smoothing back her hair from her face, touching her cheek. “Tell me, please. You look like – well, I don’t know what, but it’s not good. You have no color in your face.”

Lucy roused herself. She had to say something; she had to keep Diana from marching into the substation and finding the same thing she had found.

“I’m going to run you back to the club. We don’t need to go to Ash Marine.”

Diana looked at her, startled. “What do you mean? I thought you wanted me to walk the scene so I could remember.”

She shook her head. “It’s not necessary.”

Her sister sat back warily. “Why? What did you find out?”

“Same as you,” Lucy said. She knew Diana didn’t believe her. “A big fat nothing. No bodies, no – nothing. Laurie must have dreamed this up.”

Diana stared at her hard, and Lucy saw the intelligence too often hidden behind a bottle of Scotch. “You don’t think that,” she said finally. “You found something, didn’t you? I want to know. If I’m going to be accused of slitting someone’s throat, I have the right to know why.”

Oh, God. Diana had to pick now, of all times, to sober up and use her head.

Lucy stared off into the distance, the sun sparkling off the Chesapeake, the gulls swooping down over the shore line. In the far distance, a little spit of land – barely visible – poked its head from the waters. To that land, eleven years ago, someone had come with dark heart and evil intent. Someone had rearranged history to cover up the woman lying in the cove, life seeping away.

She had to do more digging. The hand of the
deus ex machina
at work remained obscured. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to make sure that the truth never came out.

She had to know for sure. Then she could decide the best way to protect her family.

“Let’s go.” Lucy gathered her purse. “I’ve got things to do.”

“Lucy—”

She turned around fiercely. “Let it go, all right? Just do what I say.”

She led the way to her car, her mind churning, Diana following in high dudgeon. Where to turn, where to look next… the most logical course of action was to question Laura, but Laura, again ironically, probably knew less than she herself now knew. How could she? And one other person still living, damn his lying self, probably had a real good idea, but before she confronted him, she needed more facts in hand. She needed what any lawyer prized – documentation.

Oh, God, Dad, what did you do? What did you do?

“Here.” She tossed her phone at her sister and started the car. “Call that airport. You know, where Richard keeps his plane. Oak Bend Regional. Find out how far back their records go.”

“Why?” said Diana, even as she followed orders. “What’s the airport to do with anything?”

This was safe enough to admit. Diana would never follow her line of thinking. “Because,” said Lucy, “in addition to the co-op fees, they bill for every landing and takeoff.”

Diana gave her a bewildered look and lifted the phone to her ear.

Safe, indeed. Even if Diana decided to do some detective work on her own – and she wouldn’t, she hadn’t the knack for looking for connections – she would never know what to look for.

Who had taken off that day eleven years ago.

More to the point, who had landed.

~•~

Meg St. Bride was an early riser. She was also a slob.

She’d already been in the kitchen, mixing herself some sort of powdered drink and leaving fine grains spilled on the counter. On the stove, the teapot furiously boiled away water. Richard Ashmore turned off the burner and reached for a cloth to wipe the counter, then changed his mind.

Over the sound of the dryer – Laura’s shirt that, twenty minutes earlier, had lain on the back of a chair in his room was now tumbling dry – he listened to the house. No telling if Laura was up, and he hoped that she wasn’t. When he had shown her to the guest room opposite his, sorrier than he could say that they weren’t heading for bed together, he had suggested that she sleep in. She had nodded a sleepy agreement, and her hand had lifted unconsciously towards his face before he hastily stepped back. Meg had been watching them both, that god-awful awareness on her face.

No, the sounds he heard weren’t Laura. He followed the noise into the front entry hall and looked through the open French doors, through the library, and into Julie’s music room.

Meg had wasted no time in setting up shop. She had shoved Julie’s harp into the corner, set up her barre, and placed her workout mat on the floor next to the piano. He watched her for a minute. He didn’t know much about ballet, but her routine looked smooth and precise. She was executing deep knee bends – there was probably some technical term – while keeping her back straight and her left arm carefully curved over her head. It struck him again, the smallness and fragility of her body, now clad in workout tights and toe shoes and submitting to what looked like a demanding workout.

Strange, in a child who, he was still convinced, was probably a hellion, strategist or not. She must work out like this every day.

She turned around and executed another set of pliés, and only her altered facial expression indicated that she saw him. She dipped again and rose slowly – good Lord, the girl must have leg muscles like iron – and then she broke her perfect body line and gestured impatiently at him to move.

“What?” He glanced behind him and realized that he was standing between her and the hallway mirror. She needed to watch herself. He moved to the side and watched for a few seconds more before he walked around the library and into the conservatory from the great room.

“Hi,” Meg said, and never took her eyes from the mirror.

“Good morning.” Richard waited for her to stop, but apparently she had no intention of stopping just because the person whose house she was commandeering was waiting to talk to her.

“Did you go for a run?” Still not looking at him, not breaking her movements. “You look all sweaty.”

“I run every day.” He waited another couple of seconds, then said pointedly, “I’m going to take a shower. When you finish here, please clean up the mess you left in the kitchen.”

She nodded and continued to watch herself in the mirror.

When he came downstairs again, ready for the day, Meg St. Bride was nowhere to be seen, but a quick glance showed a half-hearted attempt to wipe down the counter. Her used glass lay in the sink, and the half-eaten piece of toast had vanished. She’d paid attention and obeyed, then; they were making progress. Surely Laura, who kept a neat house – Peggy had trained her, after all – did not let her daughter get away with such sloppiness.

Or maybe she spent every day nagging Meg to pick up after herself.

He checked his overnight emails and was responding to a terse message from Tom about the proposed restraining order against Diana when he became aware of eyes on him. Meg St. Bride was leaning over the balcony, her arms crossed on the balustrade and an interested look on her face, with all the air of one prepared to wait as long as she needed to get his attention.

“You look mad about something.”

Not mad, precisely. Just wearily convinced that the TRO would do nothing except set Diana’s back up. He did not stop typing. “Thank you for cleaning up the kitchen.”

His formality seemed to take her aback. “Sure, no
problemo
. Sorry I made a mess. Hey, can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”
If possible, file for the TRO today. I’ll rearrange my schedule next week if I need to be present for a hearing.

“What are those drawings behind you?”

He glanced around and turned back to his email. “A library I’m designing.”

“Oh, you design buildings? You’re a – um, what do you call it—”

“Architect.”
Diana will go out of her way to ignore a TRO, but—