The Last of the Moon Girls(76)

“Not again,” Rhanna whimpered, as if she hadn’t heard. “Please. Please. Not again.”

Lizzy smothered a groan, caught between sympathy and impatience. “I don’t understand. You can’t go through what again?”

A pair of tears escaped as Rhanna reopened her eyes. She wiped them away with a shuddering breath. “Will you go with me somewhere?”

Lizzy blinked at her. “Go with you where?”

“Please.” A fresh swell of tears pooled in her eyes. “Have I ever asked you to do anything for me? Ever?”

“No,” Lizzy said, realizing it was true. “You haven’t.”

“Get your keys then. We’ll take your car.”

Lizzy turned to look at the window. The rain had started again, fat drops pelting the panes with heavy splats. “We’re going now? In this?”

“Yes. Right now.”





TWENTY-NINE

The rain was coming down in buckets by the time Rhanna slid into the passenger seat of Lizzy’s car, her purse clutched against an oversize denim jacket.

“Seat belt,” Lizzy reminded her as she backed down the drive. “And tell me where I’m going.”

“Go to the bottom of the hill. I’ll tell you where to turn when it’s time.”

Lizzy’s patience was already beginning to fray. “What’s going on, Rhanna? Where are we going? And why in the world do we have to go now?”

Rhanna stared at the windshield, unblinking. “There’s something I should have told you too. Something terrible.”

Lizzy slid her a look, feeling the old familiar dread. She’d seen her mother in every state imaginable over the years—drunk, high, and just plain crazy—but never like this. Never terrified. “Talk to me, Rhanna. Tell me what’s going on.”

“You need to turn here.”

Lizzy glanced at the street sign: OLD STAGE ROAD. “There’s nothing up here but the cemetery.”

“I know.”

“Rhanna—”

“Go to the end and stop the car.”

Lizzy did as she was told, parking just outside the cemetery gates. Granite monuments dark with rain stretched in all directions. They were spaced at irregular intervals, and varied in shape and size, giving them an oddly haphazard feel, like an ill-planned garden.

“All right,” Lizzy said, over the slap of the wipers. “We’re here. Now tell me why.”

Before Lizzy knew what was happening, Rhanna was out of the car, lurching out into the cold, gray rain. Lizzy fumbled with her seat belt and set out after her. “What are you . . . Rhanna! Where are you going?”

She was soaked in seconds, struggling to see through the near-blinding rain. Rhanna was already through the gates, wending her way between the gravestones like a woman on a mission. Lizzy scrambled to catch up, slipping twice on the rain-slick grass. Finally, Rhanna stopped, coming to such an abrupt halt that Lizzy nearly piled into the back of her.

“Are you crazy? What are you . . .” Lizzy’s voice trailed off as she followed Rhanna’s gaze.

HEATHER & DARCY GILMAN.

BELOVED DAUGHTERS OF FRED AND CHRISTINA GILMAN

SISTERS IN LIFE AND IN DEATH.

Rhanna stood motionless, rain dripping from her nose and chin. “They were buried together,” she said finally, over the steady drumming of rain. “In one coffin. Did you know that?”

Lizzy felt a chill crawl down her back. “What are we doing here, Rhanna?”

“It was white. Covered with baby’s breath and pink roses. It rained that day too.”

Lizzy blinked at her, stunned. Rose petals and wet earth. “You were here. The afternoon of the funeral, when you disappeared—this is where you were. You came home drenched and wasted, and never said a word.”

Rhanna was shivering now, her gaze still locked on the headstone. “I had to come. I watched from a distance so no one would see me, but I had to come.”

“Why?”

“Because it was my fault.”

Lizzy went cold all over. “What was your fault?”

“All of it. Them. The water.” She buried her face in her hands then, shoulders heaving. “I just . . . I had to see it finished.”

“See what finished? What are you saying?” Lizzy grabbed both sleeves of her jacket, and yanked her hands from her face. “Look at me! See what finished?”

Rhanna stared back, gray eyes wide and unseeing.

She was somewhere else, Lizzy realized. Somewhere terrible. And she had no idea how to pull her back. But standing in the rain wasn’t going to help. She grabbed a fistful of drenched denim, saying nothing as they marched through the gate and back to the car.

Rhanna remained mute as Lizzy opened the car door and gave her a shove. She landed in the passenger seat like a sack of seed, and was still staring blindly when Lizzy slid behind the wheel. Her skin was a pasty shade of gray, her teeth clenched tight to keep them from chattering.

Lizzy reached for the sweater she kept in the back seat and tucked it around Rhanna’s shoulders. “It’s okay,” she said, rubbing Rhanna’s arms briskly. “You’re okay.”

Rhanna blinked heavily, as if coming out of a deep sleep. “We’re in the car.”

“Yes. And I need you to pull yourself together. Can you do that?”