The Secret Sister (33 page)

They'd talked about this before. Maisey nodded. “You have to make up your mind—make up your mind and fight to stay clean. It'll get easier with time, but the first few weeks and months will be difficult. You know that.”

“God, yes.” He sat on the foot of the bed. “But I'll do it. I promise.”

“I believe you.”

“Thank you. No matter what I've done, you've always been willing to forgive me, always been there to encourage me.”

“Because I love you,” she said.

His smile hitched up on one side. “I love you, too,” he said, and hugged her again before he left.

As soon as the door closed, Maisey returned her attention to her phone.
It's very late, so I hope this doesn't wake you
, she wrote,
but you're not going to believe what's happened. It's huge. Shocking. Exciting. But this might surprise you even more: considering how badly I want to be with you right now, I think I'm in love with you, Rafe. Is that possible after so short a time?

Her stomach knotted as she read and reread her own words. They'd scare the hell out of him. She could easily imagine him telling her that they should take their relationship more slowly, maybe date other people
if
she decided to remain on Fairham. He had a daughter to consider, after all. Blah, blah, blah...

But once he said those things, once he bailed on her, she could move off the island without feeling she was leaving something important behind.

Taking a deep breath, she hit Send.

* * *

The following morning, Laney had to tap Rafe's leg several times to draw his attention away from Maisey's text. His heart was beating so hard and fast he thought his daughter could hear it. He hadn't received one word from Maisey all day yesterday, not even to let him know she'd landed safely in New Orleans. And then to get a response like this?

It was the last thing he'd been expecting...

“Daddy, what are you doing?” Laney asked. “Why are you so quiet?”

“I'm...reading something, Laney-bug,” he said, still so distracted he could barely manage a response.

“Reading what?” she asked. “Will you read it to me?”

Could he trust what Maisey had written? He almost wondered if someone else had gotten hold of her phone. She'd put so much effort into shutting him down and pushing him away.

What had made her change direction so abruptly? Could she have talked to her mother? Was it that he'd agreed to sign a prenup?

No. He was willing to bet his whole life's earnings that Josephine would never tell her what she'd soon have in her safekeeping.

So “I love you” was “I love you,” and it excited him so much that she'd suddenly declared herself he could hardly breathe.

“Daddy?” Laney tapped him again.

“Maisey sent me a message,” he said.

“Is she coming back?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Soon. I hope.”

“Is that what her message says?”

He felt a goofy smile coming on. “No. It says she might be in love with me. What do you think of that?”

“Does that mean she wants to
kiss
you?”

He tweaked the end of her nose. “I would guess it does.”

She gasped and covered her mouth. “Our dinner worked! Wait till I tell Grandma!”

He laughed as he scooped her up and twirled her around in his arms. “What should I say to Maisey?” he asked.

“Tell her you love her, too!” she cried. “Then see if she'll marry us!”

* * *

“What's wrong?” Roxanne asked.

Maisey was sitting at the breakfast table when Rafe's response came in. Even though she'd had only a few hours' sleep, she'd gotten up the moment she heard movement in the kitchen to help Rocki get the kids off to school. Being an aunt was new to her, and she wanted to take advantage of every minute.

When she didn't answer right away, the kids looked up from their food.

“You're turning red,” Chloe said.

“That text must be from a guy,” Brooklyn added with an insider's smile. Maisey guessed, since Brooklyn was a teenager, she had her own share of interest in the opposite sex.

Zac shoveled another spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth and spoke around it. “Do you have a boyfriend?”

“She does,” their mother replied. “His name's Rafe.”

“Is that Rafe who's texting you?” Brooklyn asked. “What's he saying?”

Maisey shook her head. “I can't...I can't believe it. This was
not
the response I was expecting.”

Rocki's eyebrows drew together. “Tell us!”

She put a hand to her chest as if she could control her excitement. “I think he's asking me to marry him.”

“You said it wasn't serious with this guy!” Rocki cried.

“This does sound pretty serious, doesn't it,” she murmured, still shocked.

“Let me see.” Rocki scooted closer. “Oh, my gosh!”

“What are you going to tell him, Aunt Maisey?” Brooklyn asked, her breakfast forgotten.

“I'm going to tell him we need to take the time to get to know each other properly before we have a wedding, but...”

“But it's a possibility,” Rocki finished.

The smile that spread across Maisey's face came from somewhere deep inside. “It's
definitely
a possibility.”

Chloe drummed her fingers on the table to create more urgency. “So answer him!”

Maisey's hands were shaking, but after several fixes she managed to write.
I'd love to be Laney's mother.

A ding alerted the whole table when he responded. “What'd he say now?” Rocki asked.

“Are you only interested in my daughter?”

Everyone hopped out of their chairs to crowd close so they could witness the exchange firsthand.
I'll put up with you to get her
, she wrote back.

“That isn't nice,” Brooklyn complained.

“He knows I'm joking.”

Another text arrived.
Then you'd better hurry home before I start auditioning other women for the part.

“He's funny,” Chloe said.

Maisey chuckled.
Don't you want to hear my good news?

Far as I'm concerned, no news could be better than this
, he wrote back.
I was expecting it to take months to convince you to open that stubborn heart of yours. But go ahead and bring me up to speed.

“You're going to tell him about Mom,” Brooklyn guessed.

“That's exactly what I'm going to do,” Maisey said.

My sister didn't fall off a cliff.

What happened to her?

Maisey used the camera in her phone to take a picture of Rocki, which she sent to Rafe.

Meet Annabelle aka Roxanne.
Happily married with three children in Lafitte, Louisiana.

Holy shit!
Does your mother know?

No
,
but she's about to find out.

* * *

Maisey and Keith spent three days with Roxanne and her family—three days without contacting Josephine or telling her what they'd found—before they were ready to go back to Fairham. It was hard for Maisey to leave her sister and her sister's family, but she missed Rafe and Laney and was excited to see them. Rafe claimed he'd made peace with her mother, which was completely unexpected. While Jack had never tried to bridge that gap, Rafe insisted it was important for her to feel comfortable on Fairham Island, even if she moved out of the bungalow and into town until they decided to proceed with the wedding.

Maisey was grateful that he cared enough to take that into consideration. She was becoming more and more convinced that, even though Rafe wasn't making the kind of money Jack was, he'd take better care of her. They'd take better care of each other.

He had Laney with him when he picked her and Keith up at the airport. They all had dinner together in Charleston. Then they drove to Coldiron House to drop off Keith.

When Maisey unfastened her seat belt, too, Rafe seemed surprised. “I assumed you'd come back tomorrow for the big talk. As far as we know, your mother's in bed.”

Even if Josephine was in bed, Keith would wake her up. No way would he be able to keep their secret until morning. And Maisey wanted to be there when Josephine learned about Annabelle, wanted to see if she could discern any relief or tenderness or gratitude that Annabelle was alive. Somehow that was important to her—probably because
she'd
lost a child and would give anything to have her back.

“No, I can't wait that long.” Maisey also couldn't feel comfortable returning to the bungalow unless she knew her mother didn't mind. It was a question of pride more than anything.

“Then do you want me to wait in town so I can come and get you when you're done?” Rafe asked.

“No need for that,” Keith said. “I'll drive her over.”

Rafe pulled Maisey toward him for a kiss. Then she kissed Laney. “See you later, bug,” she said, and climbed out.

“Do you really love my daddy?” Laney asked before Maisey could shut the door.

Maisey laughed. “It's pretty impossible not to love him, wouldn't you say?”

Laney grinned and Maisey ducked inside the car to kiss her again before trailing her brother to the grand entrance of the mansion where they'd been raised.

Keith let them in, although Maisey felt so much like a stranger, or an unwelcome guest, that her immediate instinct was to knock.

“Mom?” he yelled. “Mom, where are you?”

There was no response, not until he called several times. Finally, Josephine appeared at the top of the winding staircase, dressed in a silk robe. Even now, when they'd caught her while she was lying in bed, no doubt watching TV with her little lap dog, there wasn't a hair out of place.

“What's going on? Why are you yelling like that?” she asked. “Whatever you have to say, I don't want to hear it. I told you to leave the past alone.”

“Because you think something terrible happened, and it's so dark and upsetting you don't want to deal with it,” Keith said. “What happened back then
was
wrong, and upsetting, but it's not what you think. I didn't push Annabelle, Mom. I didn't hurt her at all.”

She gripped the railing. “Who told you that?”

“Annabelle did,” he replied.

She didn't say anything. She just stood there.

“Annabelle's alive, Mother,” Maisey added.

She didn't move, didn't flinch, but Maisey could see her shock in the stiffness of her posture.

“Can you believe it?” Keith asked. “No one pushed her. She didn't even fall. We found her! We stayed with her. That's where we've been all this time. We met her husband and her kids. She's beautiful and happy and well.”

“That can't be true,” she murmured.

“It is,” Keith insisted. “We'll prove it to you.”

Josephine started to speak but had to clear her throat first. “But how could that...how could she have disappeared without—”

Keith beckoned her toward them. “Come down, to the drawing room, and we'll tell you.”

As she descended the stairs, her hands were shaking. She clasped them in her lap once they reached the drawing room—she hated anyone knowing she was vulnerable even more than she hated being vulnerable—but Maisey wasn't fooled. Josephine cared about the child she'd lost. Maybe she didn't have the same feelings most mothers did, but she felt...
something
.

“Is she going to come and see me?” she asked when they'd told her everything and she'd had some time to digest it.

“She wants to come for Thanksgiving.”

“And will she bring my grandchildren?”

“Yes. You have three of them,” Keith said. This was repeated information, but no one cared. “Five, eight and fourteen.”

“They're already getting so big,” she mumbled.

“They're wonderful,” Maisey said.

Suddenly, her mother's knuckles whitened and her eyes narrowed. “How dare Gretchen do what she did!”

“It's no excuse, but she thought she was protecting someone she loved,” Maisey said. “Ranger thought the same thing.”

“From who? From
me
? As if
I've
ever done anything to hurt a child!”

Maisey and Keith exchanged a glance. Apparently their mother was living in denial. Maisey was tempted to call her on it, to make her admit the truth as she would've made anyone else admit it. But then Maisey realized there was no point in continuing to let those days ruin these. Josephine no longer held the power she once did. They were all safe.

Keith must've been thinking the same thing. “At least we've got her back,” he said. “At last. And that wouldn't have happened if Maisey hadn't continued to push. I'd still be here, thinking I must be some kind of psychopath to have done something so terrible. And you'd still be angry at her for digging into this and feeling you had to protect me from myself.”

Her nostrils flared. “It could've gone differently.”

“But it didn't.”

Josephine stared at the carpet for a moment. “Your father loved her so much. He was never the same after we lost her.”

It was a miracle Josephine had stayed the same. But her mother was nothing if not resilient. She was a survivor, a woman who never let anything defeat her.

“I'm exhausted,” Maisey said. “Now that you know, I'm going to have Keith take me home—as long as it's okay if I continue to stay in the bungalow.”

Josephine raised her eyes. “Of course it's fine.”

“Thank you.”

“Rafe came by while you were gone,” she said before Maisey could leave.

“I know,” she responded. “He doesn't want any animosity between you and me. He especially doesn't want to be the cause of it.”