Dark and Shallow Lies(20)

I nod and crawl up on the tall stool behind the register. “It’s hard being here without her, that’s all.”

It’s not like I made a conscious decision not to tell her about my late-night visitor. Or about what happened before that. Evie crying in the night. My near-death experience on the dock. I hadn’t even realized I was going to lie – at least by omission – until I did it. But once the decision is made, I don’t know how to undo it. I’ve been home twenty-four hours, and I’m already juggling secrets like knives.

Honey nods. “Anything we lose comes around in another form,” she reminds me. “But that doesn’t mean we don’t grieve.”

I still want to believe Elora’s alive somewhere, but with every one of those terrifying flashes, that hope gets harder and harder to hang on to. It’s like trying to hold an ice cube while it melts and drips between my fingers.

“Do you think she’s dead?”

Honey stops rearranging bottles to look at me. “Are you asking me what I think? Or what I know?”

“The second one, I guess.”

Honey sighs. “I wish I could tell you for sure, Grey. But it doesn’t work like that. If it did, we’d all be lottery winners, wouldn’t we?” She squeezes the last delicate bottle on to the tray. “It isn’t like placing an order at a restaurant or picking something out of a catalog. I tried to explain that to the sheriff. The dead tell us what they want us to know. Not what we want to know for ourselves.”

“I miss her,” I say, because it seems like the only thing I can say for certain.

“Oh, Sugar Bee,” Honey says, and she lays her hand on my cheek. “I know you do. And I wish I had the answers you need. It’s so hard when someone goes away and leaves a hole.”

I don’t mean to ask the next question. It just falls out of my mouth.

“Did my mom love me?”

Honey turns back to the tiny bottles. She picks up an orange one and holds it up close to squint at the label. “You were her whole world, but there were things that were hard for her to live with.” She puts the little bottle back in its place. “Things that ate away at her until there wasn’t much left. Especially the last few years.”

Before I can ask what things she’s talking about, the bell over the door jingles and the next group of tourists comes in to poke around. We offer them water and sandwiches and books on astrology. They pay for a thirty-minute reading, and Honey asks me to watch the register before she leads them over to the little alcove in the corner and pulls the privacy curtain.

When the bell jingles again, I look up, ready to say, “Welcome to the Mystic Rose, gentle spirits.” Like Honey taught me when I was barely old enough to talk. But it’s only Hart.

It makes me a little sick to see him, because I already know I’m not going to tell him about my stranger. Or about those drawings the twins showed me. The missing black trunk.

He wouldn’t want me protecting him. He’d be pissed as hell. But I can’t stand to cause him any more hurt.

Not until I have an idea what it all means.

Hart saunters up to the counter like I’m an Old West bartender and he’s here to order a double shot of whiskey. He rests his elbows on the glass top and runs his fingers through his hair.

“I’ve been thinking about what you told me.” He looks around the store and lowers his voice. “About those visions you’ve been having of Elora.” I have to lean in so I can hear. He smells like chicory coffee and cigarettes. “Her runnin’ from somebody.”

Our heads are almost touching. His hair brushes my cheek, and it scares me to be this close to him. I’m worried that he’ll be able to feel me. The fact that I’m hiding things. Or maybe just the way my fingers occasionally long for those dark curls on his forehead.

“It’s gotta be Case,” Hart says. His eyes have clouded over. There’s a bayou lightning storm building inside him. “That’s the only thing that makes sense. Him and that damn jealous temper of his.”

I try to fight it off, but that fear I felt in the shed comes slithering back like a cottonmouth. It prickles at the backs of my arms and climbs up my neck to wrap itself tight around my throat.

“He came to see me last night,” I admit. “Case. He told me he thought Elora was cheating on him. That she was in love with someone else.” Hart jerks his head up and frowns. His face has gone white. “And he wanted me to tell him who.”

“See what I’m sayin’, Greycie? Now that’s a buncha bullshit, right there.” Hart clenches his jaw tight and runs another hand through his hair. “But hell, if Case even thought it was true . . . if he got that idea into his head somehow . . . that’s more than enough motive for –”

“For murder,” I say, and he nods, but I still don’t want to believe it. “Can’t you feel anything from him? From Case?”

“Shit yeah,” Hart tells me. “That’s the damn problem. There’s too much there. Guilt. Anger. Hurt. Jealousy. Fear.” His muscles twitch in frustration. “Take your pick. The guy’s a fuckin’ mess. I can’t wade through it all.”

“None of that means he killed her,” I offer. “I feel all those things, too. Every single one of them.”

“Yeah.” Hart’s face softens. “I know you do, Greycie.”