Dark and Shallow Lies(64)

“Your dad called this evening,” she goes on. “I told him I’d take you up to Shreveport with me when I leave day after tomorrow. He’ll pick you up there.”

So that’s it, then. One full day left. Not nearly enough time to untangle all this mess.

I stand up and push my chair back.

“Grey. Wait.” Honey finally looks at me. “Sit a minute. Please.”

Heavy dread settles in my stomach, and it pulls me back down into the chair.

“I know you have questions,” she says. “Now that you’re growing up, I know there are things you want to know.” She looks down at the picture again and sighs. “Need to know. About your mama. And I haven’t been great about giving you real answers.”

“My mother could start fires, couldn’t she?”

Honey stares at me like I hauled off and slapped her. I didn’t mean to blurt it out like that. But everything seems so urgent now.

“Your mother could do a lot of things, Grey. I don’t know what all talents she had. I don’t even think she knew. She was still figuring it out.”

“But she burned down the cabin back at Keller’s Island. Didn’t she? Dempsey Fontenot’s cabin.”

Honey nods reluctantly. “She did.”

“Did she know about the little boy? Aeron?” The stricken look on Honey’s face almost makes me back down. But it’s too late for that. “The one she killed?”

“How do you know about that?” Honey’s voice shakes. But she holds that picture steady in her hands.

“Does it matter?” I ask. “What kind of person does that?”

Honey wilts right in front of me. “She didn’t know he was in there,” she says, and it’s like she’s aged ten years in ten seconds. “She didn’t know.”

“Why did she do it?”

“You don’t know how angry this whole town was, Sugar Bee. The grief. How it tore us all to pieces when those babies went missing.”

“Ember and Orli.” I whisper the names like an old prayer.

“You weren’t old enough to know how deep it shook people,” Honey goes on, and I see her shudder. “Finding those sweet girls out there. Like that.”

“But that little boy . . .” I say. And Honey nods.

“But that little boy,” she repeats.

“How could she live with it?” I ask. “Knowing she killed a child?”

And when Honey doesn’t answer, I realize that’s a stupid question.

Because, obviously, she couldn’t.

Honey looks down at the photo again. Then she hands it to me, and I stare down at those haunted eyes.

“She tried to do the right thing, Grey. After.” Honey pauses to look at me. “She went back and buried him. Did you know that?”

I shake my head. “Where?”

“Back at Keller’s Island. There’s a big old two-trunked cypress tree that grows off to the edge of the clearing. She put him there. At the base of it.”

“You should’ve told me,” I say, and suddenly I’m so angry at her. Honey sighs. Her sadness fills up the whole kitchen.

“You’re right, Sugar Bee.” She reaches for my hand, but I pull it back. I’m not ready to forgive her for keeping all this from me. Not yet.

“Did she kill Dempsey Fontenot, too?” I’m making wild leaps with nothing to back them up. But we’re short on time, and I’m getting desperate.

The radio station signs off for the night, and the harsh buzz of static sets my teeth on edge. “No, Grey.” Honey sighs. “Your mother didn’t kill Dempsey Fontenot.”

“Are you sure?” I ask, and I feel relief wash over me like floodwater. At least I won’t have to break that news to Zale.

“I am,” she tells me. “That’s a thing I can say for certain.” Honey gets up and turns off the radio. No more static. But the tinkling of wind chimes moves in to fill the silence.

“Who did, then?” Honey doesn’t answer me. “Somebody here did. Didn’t they?”

“It was a long time ago,” Honey starts. And I am so sick of hearing that. I push myself to my feet.

“I’m not eight years old any more. You need to stop protecting me.”

“Grey, please. It’s late and –”

“I need you to tell me what happened!” I’ve never raised my voice to Honey. Not ever in my whole life. Until now. “Please!” This desperate need to know is threatening to consume me. If I can’t know what happened to Elora – if I can’t put that mystery to rest for myself – then at least let me put an end to Zale’s years of wondering.

“Grey –”

Sweet-N-Low is sitting up on his pillow now, looking back and forth between me and Honey. He’s almost deaf, but even he can hear this. I’m not giving up, though. Not this time.

“You said he was innocent. You told me you never believed he killed Ember and Orli. Now tell me the rest of the truth! Who killed Dempsey Fontenot?”

“I don’t know!” Honey’s standing at the sink with her back to me. Her hands grip the edges of the counter like she’s afraid to let go. “I don’t know, Grey. I never wanted to know. And that’s the truth. I used to be afraid that I’d hear from him. From Dempsey.” She pauses. “That he’d reach out to me. Tell me who it was. And I didn’t want that knowledge.”