Till Death(12)

Tipping my head back, I laughed. “I was talking about the hair. It’s new.”

“You like?” She patted her braids. “I had to drive over an hour to find someone who knew what the hell they were doing. Not like I was trusting anyone in this town to touch my hair. That was the only good thing about you living in Atlanta. Salon options were limitless whenever I visited you.”

I giggled. “Want to get something to drink and go out back? It’s not too cold outside. I was just up here checking out the reservation book.”

“Has your mom made her sweet tea? If so, then it’s a yes,” Miranda returned. “Her tea is like crack—the good kind of crack that doesn’t rot your teeth or make you pick your face.”

I laughed again. Damn, I missed how often Miranda made me laugh. The sparse in-person visits and weekly phone chats were so not the same thing. “She always has a pitcher of sweet tea ready.”

James was in the kitchen, fussing with two rotisserie chickens he had in the oven. The lemon and herbs smelled something wonderful, but when Miranda said so James grumbled something inaudible back to her.

Mr. Jordan was not much of a talker.

“Is there anything I can help with?” I asked as I placed the pitcher of tea back in the fridge.

James grabbed an oven mitt. “Best you can do is stay out of the way.”

Miranda’s dark eyes widened, but I grinned. “That we can do,” I said, starting toward the back door that led to the old kitchen.

“You been down in the basement?” James asked, stopping me.

“No.” I glanced at Miranda, frowning. “Why?”

“Light was on down in the wine cellar when I came in,” he replied. “Make sure you turn it off. Those wires are old.”

I didn’t bother telling him again that I hadn’t been down in the cellar, so I nodded and then pushed open the door. The room was full of the old furniture, most covered in white sheets, and it was much cooler than the rest of the house. Along the back wall was a corkboard with several keys attached. On the other side of the long, narrow room was a door that opened onto the old staircase that led down to an old wine-and-root cellar that always smelled like rich soil. Only part of the basement was in use. The rest was just packed dirt and bare stone. The ancient tunnels that used to run from the cellar out into the backyard had long since been sealed off.

As I opened up the door to the veranda, the keys on the corkboard rattled. “He’s a lovable fella.”

“Seems like it.” Miranda wrinkled her nose. “Personality must not be a requirement to work in the kitchen.”

“Pretty much cooking skills is the only requirement,” I replied.

As we walked across the vacant veranda, I told her about what happened to my car. Even though it was January, it was unseasonably warm for the area, pushing into the midfifties. With the sun so bright, it would be comfortable for at least another hour or so, I decided as we sat at the glass table in the Adirondack chairs.

“The car thing is really weird.” Miranda twisted her wrist, knocking the cubes of ice around in her drink. “Like really weird.”

“I know. When Officer Bradshaw started asking me if I knew anyone who might be bothered by me being back here, it kind of freaked me out.” With my glass on the table, I sat back in the thick-cushioned chair and folded my arms across my belly. “I mean, I’m sure it was just some kids bored and completely random, because I don’t think my mother told a lot of people and then there’s just you.”

“Well . . .” Miranda drew the word out and then took a drink.

I waited for her to continue. “Well what?”

“I might’ve told someone,” she said, crossing her legs. “But it wasn’t like a random person. It was Jason.”

“Jason? Oh my God, he’s still around here?” Jason King went to college with us. The three of us had met during orientation and had shared several classes the one and a half years I’d been in attendance. Jason was a good, fun guy from what I remembered. My age. Nerdy in a cute, boy-next-door kind of way. A whiz at math and statistics, which I could respect.

And I’d seen him after I got out of the hospital. He’d been the only one who had gotten past the news reporters and my mom. The last time we’d talked he held me while I sat on my bed, held me while I sobbed, and the last thing he ever said to me was that I was safe now.

I left him behind too.

Nodding, Miranda eyed me over the rim of her glass. “Yep. Like me. You know how it is. If you don’t leave this damn town by the age of twenty-one, you don’t ever leave.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” I replied, stretching over and picking up my glass. “You can leave whenever you want.”

“Uh-huh.” Dark eyes rolled. “Anyway, he graduated college and ended up opening his own insurance agency about two years ago. He stayed even though he never found his father. Do you remember that?”

I nodded. Jason’s mother and stepfather had passed away tragically in a house fire when he’d turned eighteen. From what I remembered, it had been during a cold snap and they’d been using a kerosene heater to thaw out their pipes. Their deaths had been what spurned Jason to find his real father. “Yeah, he came here because he’d been told his real father was from Hedgesville. So, he never did find his dad then?”