The Last of the Moon Girls(70)

Lizzy watched from the doorway as the squad car backed down the drive. Thank the goddess that was over. She closed the door, leaning her forehead against it with a groan. Be patient. Were they kidding? She’d been patient for eight years. She was done being patient.

“Hello.”

She hadn’t heard Andrew come up behind her. She whirled, glaring as she waited for him to explain himself. At least he had the good grace to look sheepish.

“I saw Evvie in the kitchen. She told me to come in. She said she was pretty sure you wanted to talk to me.”

Lizzy folded her arms, eyeing him frostily. “I can’t imagine why.”

“I’m sorry. I wanted to get here before they did.”

“And that would make it better how?”

“I know you’re mad, but they needed to know, Lizzy. They needed to know all of it.”

“And you thought you should be the one to tell them?”

“You weren’t going to, so I did.”

“The fact that I told you I didn’t want them involved didn’t matter to you?”

“No. Yes.” He scrubbed a hand through his hair. “Damn it. Of course it mattered. Just not as much as keeping you safe.”

Lizzy closed her eyes and pulled in a breath, shaking her head as she slowly let it out. “I don’t need to be kept safe, Andrew. I need answers. I’ve spent the last two weeks trying to find someone, anyone, who knows how those girls ended up in my grandmother’s pond, and trying to stay under the radar while I did it, because that’s what you have to do when your last name is Moon. You have to not bother anyone. And then you go dragging the police into it. Who’s going to talk to me now?”

“I get it. I do. It’s about Althea. But your grandmother would back me up on this. She wouldn’t want you putting yourself in danger.”

“If they wanted to hurt me, they could just as easily have set fire to the house. Instead, they burned an empty shed. They wanted to scare me.”

“And did they?”

She stared at him, unwilling to admit that, yes, they had in fact scared her. Because that was the point of it all. “I’m tired of being bullied, Andrew. Tired of tiptoeing around lies and silly superstitions. Tired of having to apologize for my family.”

“I know you are.”

She sighed, dropping her arms to her sides. “Then help me.”

“How?”

“By letting me do what I have to. Stop trying to rescue me, and just . . . be on my side.”

“I’ve always been on your side, Lizzy. Always.”

It was true. He had been. Long before the Gilman girls had become a part of their lives. But she needed something else from him now. “I mean about this. All of this. Selling the farm, dealing with my mother, trying to find out what happened to two dead girls eight years ago. I need you to tell me I’m doing the right things—and that I’m doing them for the right reason.”

Her voice cracked. She bowed her head, suddenly exhausted. “I’m sorry. I’m just tired. I didn’t expect any of this when I came back. I thought I’d swoop in, pack up a few things, put the farm on the market, and go back to New York. Instead, the place is falling apart, there’s no money to fix anything, my mother shows up out of the blue, and there might be an arsonist on the loose. Every time I turn around, something else is imploding. And I have no idea how to deal with any of it.”

Andrew closed the distance between them, took her hands, and pulled her close. “And everyone keeps telling you you’re doing it wrong—including me.”

Lizzy leaned into him, folding against his chest like a sulky child. She didn’t care. She felt sulky. And tired. And lost. “Maybe I am doing it wrong. Maybe none of this is what Althea would want. Maybe it’s what I want, and I’m just mucking through it all so I can feel better. So that this time, when I walk away, my conscience will be clean.”

“Is that really what you think? That this is just some selfish quest for absolution?” He cupped her chin, tilting her face up toward his. “How is it possible that you know yourself so little, Lizzy Moon?”

Lizzy met his gaze, breath held as she plumbed the depths of those warm amber eyes. Familiar eyes, she realized. The kind a less wary woman could get lost in.

She took an abrupt step back, holding him at arm’s length. “I don’t know anything anymore, Andrew. Except that when I leave here, I don’t want any unfinished business. I don’t want to have to look back—ever.”





TWENTY-SEVEN

Lizzy hovered in the shop doorway, glad for a few minutes alone with her thoughts. The birds had quieted, the void filled with a deepening chorus of peepers and crickets. In the distance, fireflies winked on and off, random yellow pulses in the rapidly falling dusk. It was her favorite time of day. Her mother’s too, apparently.

She’d left Rhanna in the kitchen, helping Evvie wash up the supper dishes. To say she’d been surprised by her mother’s sudden willingness to pitch in was an understatement. But even more astonishing than the sight of Rhanna with a dish towel in her hand was the sight of her blowing Evvie a trio of noisy air kisses, followed by the announcement that she’d decided they should be friends. Evvie had rolled her eyes, grumbling that she didn’t have time for foolishness, but Rhanna was a skilled charmer when she needed to be. A full thaw was only a matter of time. And then what? Surely there was some motive behind all this sweetness, some angle she was working.