Girls of Brackenhill(78)

Hannah had been asking the wrong question. “What about Ellie?”

“I don’t know who killed Ellie.”

“You have a theory. A suspicion.”

“I don’t. Even if I did, I wouldn’t share it. I have no proof of anything.” Jinny was starting to look like a trapped animal, eyes darting one way, then the other.

“I heard that Fae said Ellie was there. The day Ruby died,” Hannah pressed, leaning closer. She could smell Jinny’s perfume, cloying and organic.

“Fae said a lot of things. That didn’t make them true.”

“But she was there, wasn’t she?” Hannah reached out, gripped Jinny’s skinny wrist.

Jinny nodded.

“Did Ellie kill Ruby? On purpose?”

“I don’t know!” Jinny said finally. She stood up abruptly and scurried to the back room through a beaded partition. She reemerged with a yellowed envelope, folded in half and resealed with masking tape, careful and precise.

“What’s this?” Hannah asked as Jinny handed it to her.

“It’s a letter. The night before Fae died, she came to see me. She hadn’t come to town in months. She wanted me to have this; she said she was preparing for Uncle Stuart’s death and needed someone to guard her secrets.”

“What secrets?” Hannah pressed, and Jinny’s face crumpled.

“I don’t know! She asked me not to read it, just keep it. She said I could read it when she was gone.”

“Gone where?” Hannah’s voice was sharp.

“She meant dead.” Jinny’s chin wobbled, and she took a breath. “She wasn’t going to kill herself. I think she thought that without Stuart . . . she had no one to protect her.”

“From who?”

“I didn’t know! I was so thrown by her being in my shop. By how she looked—skinny and pale and her hair long and gray. I was consumed with my own guilt that I let her wither away up on that mountain.”

“Why wouldn’t you give this to police?” Hannah asked.

“Why would I? I don’t know what’s in it. I promised to protect my friend.” Jinny straightened her spine; her jaw jutted outward. “I wouldn’t let myself read it.”

“Did Fae kill Ellie because Ellie killed Ruby?”

“Hannah, hand to God, I have no idea. You have to believe that,” Jinny pleaded. Tears fell down her cheeks.

“You don’t believe in God,” Hannah said before she stood up.

She left Jinny at the table, crying.

On the street, she looked one way, then the other. She unfolded the envelope. It was addressed to Fae Webster at Brackenhill. No postage. No return address. The blue ink on the front was young and bubbly but faded.

In the distance, a shining black truck rumbled toward her. Wyatt. Hannah didn’t want to see him, talk to him. She didn’t want to relate what Jinny had told her or think about Jinny hiding Fae’s secrets for seventeen years. She tucked the envelope into her back jeans pocket and ducked into an alleyway a few buildings down. Hannah watched Wyatt as he parked the truck in front of the diner.

She expected him to enter. Sit down, have a cup of coffee. She didn’t expect him to furtively glance up and down the street and, when he was certain no one saw him, open the door to Jinny’s shop and disappear inside.





CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

To Fae, from Ellie

September 2001

Dear Fae,

I’m leaving Rockwell soon. I wanted to tell you that I was so sorry. I’ve thought of Ruby every single day for five years. You are the only mother I’ve ever really known. The only woman—person—who encouraged me, took care of me. But did you love me?

I was jealous of Ruby. It wasn’t fair that she got you, and Stuart, and also got to be beautiful. When you would parade Ruby around town like she was a show horse, people would constantly remark on her strawberry-blonde soup-can curls, soft and shiny. The spots of pink on her cheeks and her full red lips. Mrs. Jinny asked once if Ruby was wearing lipstick. For God’s sake, she was five.

I loved that you would pick me up at the little brown house and take me shopping. When Ruby was old enough to go, she would slide a little hand into mine and her skin felt squishy, like a puffy marshmallow. You’d introduce us as “Ellie and my daughter, Ruby.” I didn’t have a title.

I’d pretend to be your daughter, but everyone knew the truth. I was no one’s child. I was motherless. My own mama was a ghost—I’d only met her a few times. Daddy said she was on drugs. Whenever I saw her, her breath smelled sour like garbage. She had stringy hair and skinny arms and a brown tooth on the side. You were warm and smelled like cookies.

Mama hadn’t been back for a long time. Most of the time I couldn’t remember her face.

I tried so hard not to love you, in case you didn’t love me back. I knew you didn’t have to. I tried to do all the right things. You called me a “mother’s helper,” and I liked to make you happy. I liked to wash dishes, fold laundry, play with Ruby. A mother’s helper seemed like a better title than nothing.

For a while, I pretended Ruby and I were sisters. She was cute and funny. And I felt lucky to spend every weekend in a magical castle. I know I begged you to let me sleep over. I could tell that you didn’t want to say yes as much as you did. Maybe I was too loud or too hard or something else? I don’t know. I saw how you looked at Stuart and then would say my name, Ellie, like a little sigh.