By a Thread (4 page)

“Of course you do,” I said in a light tone, trying to match her mood. “I know how much you care about her, and I'm looking forward to meeting her. Maybe we can all go out for drinks one night and really get to know each other.”

Silence. Once again, I felt that anger rolling off Bria—this time, for my trying to butt into her plans.

“Sure,” Bria said, several seconds too late to be believable. “That sounds like fun.”

An awkward silence filled the car, dimming the brightness of the day. Bria hit the replay button on the radio, but she didn't sing along this time. Instead, her hands tightened on the steering wheel, and she sped up, as if she now wanted the drive to be over with as soon as possible.

I sighed, put my head back on the seat, and closed my eyes, wishing the wind could whip my troubles away as easily as it tangled my hair.

An hour later, Bria crossed a bridge, turned off the road, and steered the car through an open iron gate that was set into the middle of a ten-foot-high, white stone wall. A gold plaque on one of the gateposts read
The
Blue Sands est. 1899
.

We traveled along a curving
driveway made of smooth white cobblestones for the better part of a mile. A lush eighteen-hole golf course spread out like an emerald carpet to the left, while the beachfront glinted like bronze diamonds to the right. Copses of peach, pecan, and palmetto trees broke up the flat horizon, although the thick, humid air shimmered in waves that seemed to match the steady rise and fall of the ocean.

The Blue Sands hotel was sandwiched in between the golf course and the beach. The structure soared an impressive thirty stories into the salty sea air, its white stone facade matching the outer wall and the cobblestones we'd just rolled over. Wrought-iron balconies curled around the various floors like ropes of metal ivy, while the roof was made out of red slate, completing the beautiful seaside vista.

I concentrated, reaching out with my magic and listening to the stone of the hotel. Sun-blasted, sand-crusted, and alcohol-soaked murmurs filled my mind, matching the thoughts and actions of the thousands of people who had stayed here over the years. This was a place where people came to take in the sun and sea air, with a bottle of coconut oil in one hand and a freshly made mojito in the other. The easy, breezy sounds weren't unlike the clogged contentment that rippled through the brick of the Pork Pit.

Bria parked the Aston Martin at the end of a long line of cars waiting to be whisked away by the scurrying valets, and we got out of the convertible. I pushed my sunglasses on top of my head and squinted against the sun's brilliance, my eyes moving over everyone and everything around us. The men in
expensive polo shirts carrying heavy bags of golf clubs, hopping onto carts to be shuttled out to the back nine for their games. Their wives and girlfriends who were all tanned, trimmed, and toned to within an inch of their lives. The valets and bellmen in their white-linen jackets and pants hurrying to keep everyone happy and earn their tips for the day.

“We're staying here?” I asked. “This is a little more . . . visible than what I had in mind.”

I might be on vacation, but that didn't mean that I could completely relax my guard. I'd killed plenty of people in Ashland and beyond, and I wouldn't put it past any of my enemies to try and track me down here. The Blue Sands wasn't exactly low-profile.

Bria shrugged. “Well, it was my idea to come down here for the weekend, and Finn asked me for hotel recommendations, since I grew up on the island. It's the fanciest hotel in Blue Marsh. You know how he is.”

Finnegan Lane loved the finer things in life. Actually,
love
wasn't a strong enough word for his devotion to his own comfort and luxury—
obsessed
was more like it. My foster brother always had to have the best of everything, whether it was the latest Aston Martin car, a vintage wine, a decadent, outrageously expensive gourmet meal, or a slick new suit that fit him just so.

“The hotel has one of the best spas on the East Coast,” Bria continued. “As soon as I told Finn that, he made the reservation.”

“Of course he did,” I muttered.

Finn's enjoyment of fine things extended to pampering himself as often as possible, and he was secure enough in his masculinity to indulge
in everything from manicures to seaweed facials to full-body massages. Sometimes I thought Finn was more of a girl than I was.

A valet came over, took the convertible key from Bria, and opened the trunk for a bellman, who started putting our luggage onto a large brass cart. The bellman huffed a little when he lifted out my suitcase, and it thumped down onto the cart with an audible
clink-clink-clink
, like I'd filled it with loose change that was rattling around inside. His eyebrows drew together, and he looked at me, obviously wondering what I had in my suitcase that made it so heavy.

“My lucky golf clubs,” I chirped in a bright voice. “Both sets. I like to be prepared.”

I'd never played golf a day in my life, and I had no intention of starting while we were here. Although I wasn't above using one of the clubs to bludgeon someone to death, if the situation called for it.

The bellman shrugged and moved to get the next bag. Behind his back, Bria pulled down her sunglasses and narrowed her eyes at me in suspicion, but I just gave her a serene smile. If my sister thought that I would leave my silverstone knives and the other tools of my bloody, violent trade back home just because we'd come to the beach for a few days, well, she didn't know me at all.

The thought depressed me more than it should have.

Finn had put our suite for tonight in Bria's name, so she handled checking in while I kept an eye on our bags. Finally, twenty minutes later, the bellman grunted again as he heaved my suitcase onto the bed. Bria tipped him, and he left us alone, taking
the cart and closing the door on his way out.

It might not have been my preferred choice for a hotel, but even I had to admit that Finn had booked us an impressive suite. Three lavish bedrooms all featured king-size beds, mounds of pillows, and flat-screen TVs, while the matching bathrooms contained oversize porcelain tubs that rested on real golden claw feet, along with white wicker baskets full of expensive soaps and flowery lotions. The bedrooms all connected to an enormous central living room with furniture done in shades of white, black, and gray, as well as a fully stocked kitchen and a wet bar that had almost as many different kinds of liquor as Northern Aggression, a nightclub that we frequented back in Ashland. Two French doors led out to a patio complete with furniture and that overlooked the ocean. Tomorrow, when the boys arrived, Finn had arranged for Owen and me to share a similar suite while he and Bria stayed in this one.

“Now what?” I asked, watching Bria while she riffled through the various room service and spa menus that had been propped up on the kitchen counter.

“What do you mean, ‘Now what?'? Now we go out exploring. You know, see the sights, buy some souvenirs, things like that, before we go see Callie later this evening.” Bria looked at me. “You have been on vacation before, haven't you, Gin?”

I shifted on my feet. “Sure I have. I went to Key West just last fall.”

I didn't tell Bria that I'd spent most of my time down there reading, drinking, and brooding about a number of things, including
Fletcher's murder and my strange relationship with Donovan Caine, a cop that I'd been involved with before he dumped me and left Ashland for good.

“Well?” she said, grabbing her purse off the sofa where she'd thrown it when we'd first come into the suite. “Are you ready?”

“You betcha.”

Bria didn't seem to notice the sarcasm in my voice, and she turned toward the door so she didn't see the forced smile drop from my face. We'd just gotten here, but I could already tell that this was going to be a long, long weekend.

Watch out, tourists and locals alike. Gin Blanco is on the prowl.

One of the valets brought the car around, and we headed out. The resort hotel was close to one of the long, narrow bridges that connected the island and town of Blue Marsh to the outside world. Instead of crossing the bridge, Bria turned left and headed inland.

The farther we drove, the more the landscape shifted from smooth, sandy beaches to thick, swampy bogs choked with gray cypress trees full of thick wads of Spanish moss and neon green cattails that were taller than I was. But no matter the plant life that surrounded the soupy marshes, the still, shallow waters reflected back the brilliant blue sky overhead, until it seemed that the surface of the swamp was as bright and clear as the azure sky. Hence the name Blue Marsh, I guessed.

But the swampland was far from deserted. Through the twisted, gnarled trees, dozens of mansions could be seen clinging to what high ground
there was, along with several themed shopping developments, coffee shops, and high-end restaurants. Looked like Blue Marsh was a bit of a Southern boomtown.

“It reminds me of Northtown,” I said, watching something that looked like a gray-green log with eyes drift across a pond, disturbing the perfect reflection of the sky there. “But with gators.”

Northtown was the rich, fancy, highfalutin part of Ashland where the city's power players—magical, social, monetary, and otherwise—lived on their immaculately landscaped estates. McMansions just like the ones I was looking at right now filled Northtown, along with sly, uppity folks who'd call you
sugar
to your face and then stab you in the back with their dessert forks the second they got the chance. I had no doubt that the people who lived in the mansions down here were just as dangerous. Geography might change from place to place, but human emotions and appetites rarely did.

Bria nodded. “Blue Marsh is definitely more of a resort town these days. Developers are buying up all the land, filling in the swamps as best they can, and pushing out the middle- and lower-class folks, making it too expensive for them to live here anymore even though they work in all the restaurants and hotels on the island. It's a shame, really. Every time I've talked to Callie, she's told me that it's only gotten worse since I've been gone.”

“Ah, progress,” I mocked, and we drove on.

Bria parked the car in one of the lots in the downtown district, and we spent the next two hours exploring the Southern coastal town. It was quite a bit warmer here than in the cool
mountains of Ashland, and the oppressive humidity made the air thick and heavy, despite the steady breeze that blew in off the ocean. Shops, restaurants, and hotels filled the area, all facing the water to take advantage of the picturesque view and the strip of beach below.

We strolled along the cobblestone walkway that ran past the shops and cafés, ducking into the various storefronts and listening to the street musicians trying to impress passersby and pick up tips with their lively jazz tunes. In the distance, ships with glassed-in decks sailed up and down the waterfront, showing tourists all the sites worth seeing.

Shopping wasn't really my thing, but it seemed to make Bria happy, so I tagged along behind her, making the appropriate
oohing
and
aahing
noises when called upon. I even let her buy me a tacky T-shirt that said
I'm a real peach
above a picture of the fruit.

“Well,” I said as we left the shop. “Finn will certainly get a kick out of the shirt.”

Bria snickered. “I know.”

She bought a few more things, including a massive T-shirt for Xavier, the giant who was her partner on the police force back in Ashland, and a much smaller one for Roslyn Phillips, his main squeeze. Then she stopped at a flower stand and picked out two bouquets of blue and white forget-me-nots.

“Who are those for?” I asked. “Callie?”

The smile faded from her face. “No, not Callie. You'll see.”

We left the downtown district behind and walked through some of the island's historic gardens, passing more shops, restaurants,
and museums along the way. Eventually we left the tourist sites behind and came to a wrought-iron gate that wrapped around a small cemetery. Magnolia, cypress, and palmetto trees had been planted around the gate, and their thick branches arced from one side of the square cemetery to the other, creating a canopy that blotted out the blazing sun and cloaked everything below in soft, sleepy shadows. The air was hushed and heavy inside the cemetery, and even the drone of the dragonflies seemed muted and far away.

Bria opened the gate, wincing at the loud creak it made, and stepped inside. I followed her. My sister walked slowly, her eyes fixed straight ahead. All around me, the granite gravestones whispered with low, mournful notes, echoing all the heart-wrenching sobs and quiet tears that folks had cried here for their lost loved ones. I heard the same hollow, empty sounds whenever I visited Blue Ridge Cemetery, where Fletcher and the rest of the Snow family were buried.

Bria finally stopped in front of a simple marker that spanned two graves.
Coolidge
flowed across the top of the gray stone in an elegant script, and a small heart had been carved in between the two names below.
Harry Coolidge
.
Beloved husband and father
.
Henrietta Coolidge
.
Beloved wife and mother
.

The marker gave the dates of their deaths, which had been a couple of years ago. Bria didn't talk about her adoptive parents much, but I knew that her dad, Harry, had been a police detective and her inspiration to become a cop as well. He'd died of a heart attack, while her mother, Henrietta, had been hit and killed by a drunk driver a year later. They'd been good people, and they'd loved Bria just as much as I did.

Bria knelt and picked a few
dry, brittle leaves off the smooth grass before arranging the forget-me-nots on the two graves. White flowers for her mother, blue for her father—the colors made a pretty contrast against the lush greenery. She fussed with the stems and petals for several minutes, until they were arranged just so, while I stood still and silent behind her. These were her parents, this was her grief, and I didn't want to intrude.