Not Quite Right (A Lowcountry Mystery) (Lowcountry Mysteries Book 6) (2 page)

My tires slip on the wet roads, and as Drayton Hall draws nearer, the back lanes grow more pitted. The holes are filled with dirt and gravel that pings off my undercarriage, the small clinks playing background to the loud rumbles and flashes outside my windows. I squint, sweat forming on my face and palms even though the temperature is dropping along with the barometric pressure.

The one thing I feel sure of is that Dylan Travis
believes
he’s my brother. His adoptive parents believe it, too, and if they took a baby from my mother, it’s hard to blame them. Why would they assume she’d lie about something like that?

I press my lips together, taking the turnoff onto a dirt trail that winds around to the marsh that butts up to the Drayton property. At least I have a way to get in and out without putting Jenna’s job as the preservationist here in jeopardy any more than I already have.

If Frank doesn’t know or won’t tell me about Dylan’s parentage, then maybe my aunt Karen will. It pisses me off to think that Karen could have known about Travis this whole time and not said a word, but that alone convinces me she didn’t have a clue. My aunt loves nothing more than to be the one to drop painful gossip on unsuspecting folks; if she’d guessed it would upset me, there’s no way she could have kept the secret this long.

I throw the car into park and grab the rain jacket that I found in the front closet at my grandparents’ house out of the backseat, pausing for a moment to hold it to my nose and breathe in. After all these months, my grandmother’s scent clings with stubborn perseverance. I try to believe that slipping it over my head and flipping up the hood will make me as fearless and strong as Grams had been, but it doesn’t totally work.

Grams would have told Mama Lottie where she could go, and where to stick her curse on the way there. Me? The bats in my belly make me seriously consider hurling into the soggy marsh, promising that I’m terrified. And not only for me. Right now, the lives of my cousin and her baby ride on my shoulders, as heavy as a herd of elephants.

Beau’s soft, golden eyes appear in my mind, crinkling around the edges with hurt and betrayal. Despite the hot rush of pain in my chest at the reminder of what else this situation has cost me, I know that he’s another reason for me to be brave. I gave him up, and it can’t be for nothing.

With one more deep breath and a kick in the rear over the fact that I
still
haven’t stashed an umbrella in the car, I shove open the door and step out into the bog. My rain boots sink up to the calf.

“It had to be storming.” I spread my arms wide and turn my face up to the sky, and am immediately pelted with water in my eyes, nose, and mouth. I spit it out, glaring at the heavens. “Can’t a girl catch a single break?”

As per usual, the sky and whoever resides there decline to answer. I doubt they even heard.

“Bastards.”

I trek forward as quickly as possible, stopping to check my purse twice to make sure that the jar containing the last bit of Drayton family DNA hasn’t somehow disappeared. It’s the reason I’m here, to give Mama Lottie the glob of hair so she can complete her curse on the Drayton family and remove the one from mine. As much as going back to her chafes, we can’t do it alone.

That thought sits front and center in my mind as I slog through the marsh and step onto Drayton property. I skirt the edges, following the river around to the quiet, hidden spot where Mama Lottie prefers to linger in this world.
 

We need her help. I have to do and say whatever it takes to secure it, happiness be damned.

T
he last time I saw Mama Lottie, she was pretty pissed off about her curse not working. Her anger was frenzied, terrifying and huge, and as electric as the storm still swirling overhead. Tonight, though, she appears the moment I step closer to her favorite twisted old tree. Her aura feels calm.

Too calm.

My stomach twists, a wave of dizziness overtaking me along with the sensation that a volcano is about to erupt. An earthquake, or a tsunami, or a hurricane lurks just off the shore of my world, set to crash into me at any minute and knock everything so far sideways it can never find right-side up again.

I put my hands on my knees, ignoring the clinging, sour scent of otherworldly power on the wind as well as the ghost stalking toward me, and try to pull my shit together for the hundredth time since I returned to Heron Creek.

What finally does the trick is remembering that my world is already sideways. With the ghosts in my life determined to keep coming, maybe it’s past time for me to accept that off-kilter is the new orientation of normal, for better or for worse.

“You’re late.” The voice, deep and guttural, hisses over the grounds like a hundred slinking snakes while
real
snakes, like the venomous African one she used to snare my attention—nearly killing Beau in the process—wind around her arms and ankles in various stages of agitation.

I straighten up and look her in the eye, oddly detached from my fear now. Even if ghosts can’t kill people—which, I don’t know for sure because I keep forgetting to ask Daria—Mama Lottie’s refusal to help us with the curse could accomplish the same end result.

She appears as unaffected by my attempt at bravery as she is by the squall overhead. Her hair is covered by a scarf, her body concealed by a loose, flowing garment with a faded floral pattern, and her feet are bare. Instead of sinking into the muck the way mine have, hers hover just above the ground. That, combined with the shimmering nature of her entire being, leaves no doubt as to exactly what she is.

The undiluted power and menace she exudes makes my heart beat faster.

“I’m sorry.” My mouth is so dry it’s hard to speak. “The storm.”

“The storm is not the problem.” Her dark eyes flash, brighter than any strike of lightning and with the potential for more destruction.
“You
are the problem, Graciela Harper. Perhaps Mama Lottie will decide you are not worth helping after all and leave you with the terrible curse on your family. Maybe make it stronger, to teach you a lesson.”

I bite my bottom lip to stop from arguing with her. It would do no good, would likely do nothing but bolster her pride. “I know why the curse didn’t work. I brought something to fix it.”

My offering seems to please her, and pacify her to a degree, but she doesn’t come any closer. My ghosts have touched me before, and the experience is always God-awful, like frozen leeches all over my skin. A shudder works its way down my spine at the thought of her hands on me.

“Leave it,” she demands.

“If I do, are you going to help us?”

“Mama Lottie keeps her word. Ask around.”

“Well, no offense, but everyone who knew you is dead.”

“Not a problem for you, daft girl. When will you learn to be thankful for the gifts you’ve been given?” Her eyes glitter under a fresh bolt of lightning. “Anger God, you will.”

I have no idea why she’s started talking like Yoda, or if I’m supposed to be learning lessons from her now on how to live my life. From where I’m standing, she didn’t do such a bang-up job with her own, carrying this much anger into the afterlife, but saying something would come off as a bit judgy.

“I’ll work on it,” I say, aware before the last word leaves my lips that my tone contains too much sarcasm to miss.

“You’d do well to work on your smart mouth, too.” The ghost’s gaze drops to the jar in my hands, empty except for a small gathering of dark hair at the bottom. “Why didn’t it work the first time? What did you miss?”

“There’s a line of illegitimate Draytons,” I confess. “I didn’t know.”

Her eyebrows shoot up, surprise clear in the deep grooves of her face. In the trees at my back, a gasp diverts my attention, and I whirl around, catching sight of the ghost of a little white boy. I’ve seen him out here before. His breeches are ironed and clean, and the horror on his face is unmistakable. Our eyes meet, his round and huge like saucers, and he shakes his head hard.

Dread fills my heart. Wherever the illegitimate line of Draytons began, it’s clear enough that he wishes I hadn’t revealed its existence to Mama Lottie.

“Be gone, brat!” Her voice booms, and the ghost of the small boy squeals, disappearing into a mist before he is two feet away.

I turn back to Mama Lottie, water dripping from my bangs onto my forehead. I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve given away something I shouldn’t have, but the mysteries at Drayton Hall are too many and too hidden for me to understand how they weave together.

“Who is he?” I ask, unable to stop my curiosity even when everything else is falling apart.

“No one who matters anymore.” She waves her hand dismissively, gaze fixed on the jar of hair I’ve yet to set down for her. “Leave that, and be gone with you.”

I have no idea if she’ll keep her promise, no matter her boast regarding her reputation. No idea why the boy thought it would have been better if she never found out about the missing Draytons. No idea if the actions I’m taking, and have already taken, are going to screw with the cosmos and destroy the future of the world, even if it does save my family in the process.

I don’t care. Right now, I want out of Mama Lottie’s presence and away from Drayton Hall. If I never see either again in my entire life it will be too soon.

Greed twists her expression into a terrible mask of manic glee as she stares at the jar. The strands of hair I pulled from that shower drain in Savannah are all she needs to complete her curse on my boyfriend’s family. Ex-boyfriend? I don’t even know, but after this, it’s not hard to guess which way we’ll end up.

I shouldn’t do this. I know it, feel it deep down in my bones, but as hard as we’ve tried, there are no alternatives. I’ve learned nothing about Mama Lottie that I can use to deter her from her evil mission. No way to convince her to simply give up the ghost—literally—and move on from this place of hatred.

Tears burn in my eyes. Thoughts of everything my family has suffered, the deaths of children, generation after generation, do a macabre dance in my mind. Memories of what Amelia has been through trying to bring baby Jack into the world knock the wind out of me, and the knowledge that I’m doing that to another family threatens to push tears from my eyes.

“Please,” I try, unable to stop myself. “Please don’t do this. You can change your mind. The Draytons are good people. They cared for you.”

The malevolence that leaps out of her is so black I can see it. It reminds me of the shadows inside the terrible house I visited with Daria, the ones that made me feel as though I’d never be warm again. They fly at me along the riverside, and the ensuing touch against my cheeks is as bad as the caress of any ghost.

“Do not dare defend them to me. Do not dare.” She’s gone still again. Terror grabs hold of me, begging me to run. “You know nothing of my life, of my sacrifices. You could never. You
will
never, because of the circumstances of your birth, have such a precious thing as your
life
stolen from you.”

I stare at her, frozen. Words form in my mind but my mouth remains still, locked open by the force of her hatred. It’s created the black creatures that surround me, and they hold any action at bay. Maybe there are no words, no response, because she’s not wrong. Not about this, anyway.

“Get out of my sight, you wretch.” She steps forward, the malice coloring her face enough to convince me she would be only too happy to curse me again, if only she could. My heart squeezes, desperate to obtain her promise that she’ll fulfill her end of the bargain, and the disgust that curls up her lips in a smile says she reads it. “I’ll help you remove the curse on Anne Bonny’s maternal line. Come back in three days. Do not be late.”

With that, she’s gone. The creatures evaporate with her, dumping me onto my hands and knees in the muddy grass. Only the snakes remain, watching me through slitted, glassy eyes and encouraging me to my feet. I beat a hasty retreat the way I came, trying to be thankful that the curse is almost over. I’ve delivered what she wants, I haven’t been arrested, and I’m still alive.

Things could always be worse,
I remind myself as I climb into my car and bend over the steering wheel, trying and failing to hold back tears. It must be true, but no matter how hard I try to come up with how, nothing comes to mind.
 

Chapter Two