Chapter 39 #2
“I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I think you need to call Maria and check what she knows for definite.”
“No,” Lily said. “My grandmother died twenty years ago after someone pushed her down stone steps.”
Flynn lifted her chin with his finger and held her gaze. “Call Maria, please.”
“Why?” she asked, her voice a strangled croak.
Tenderly, he pushed her hair from her face. “Because I can’t find a death certificate for Clara Cotton.”
“What?” She eyed him desperately.
“I just looked. Death certificates are public records. I can’t find one for her.”
“She’s not dead?” Lily asked.
He cocked his head. “I don’t think so.”
“No. This isn’t happening. You’re talking nonsense. I’m not listening to this.” Twisting away from Flynn, she stormed from the kitchen. Not knowing what to do with herself, she went to the bedroom to continue packing.
With her suitcase on the bed, she threw in anything she could find that was hers, then paused when she realised the T-shirt in her hand was Flynn’s. She folded it and put it in her case, then took it out and refolded it.
“Lily,” Flynn whispered from the doorway.
“She can’t be alive,” she snapped, setting his T-shirt on the bed and snatching his hoodie from the back of the chair and shaking it out.
“There’s no way.” She folded the hoodie and slammed it on top of the T-shirt.
“If she is alive, how come she’s been sending Christmas cards to a man she barely knows, but not…
” Her voice cracked and she looked up at Flynn. “But not to me,” she said sadly.
“I have a theory about that.”
“What?” She picked up the hoodie and set it down again.
“Maybe the cards weren’t for Mr Harper’s benefit.”
“What do you mean?” She dragged the zip closed on her case and hated the way Flynn was looking at her. “You’re going to need to tell me what you’re thinking,” she said impatiently. “My brain isn’t working properly. I don’t know what you’re thinking.”
“When you first spoke to Mr Harper, he said he thought you might track him down one day. What if your grandmother had the same thought?”
“You think she sent him the cards so if I went to him, he’d mention them and…” She trailed off, unable to voice the words.
“So you’d go and find her,” Flynn said.
Pushing Flynn’s clothes aside, Lily sank onto the bed. A moment later, Flynn moved her suitcase and sat beside her.
Lily heaved in a breath. “What are the chances you couldn’t find the death certificate because of a computer glitch or something?”
“Slim,” he said. “The only issue could be if Clara Cotton wasn’t her legal name.”
“I’m sure it was.”
“In that case, I think there’s a strong possibility she’s still alive.”
“Or she was last Christmas,” Lily said bitterly. “It’d be just my luck that she’s died since then.”
“There’d be a death certificate,” Flynn said.
“Uncle Derek wouldn’t have let me think my grandmother was dead if she wasn’t.”
“Maybe he didn’t know. If the hospital staff told him she wasn’t going to survive maybe he took them at their word.”
“Surely he’d check?”
“She wasn’t his mother, was she?”
“No. She was my mum’s mum. But he’d still have checked.”
“There’s no chance he just assumed she’d died?” Flynn rubbed at her back. “From what we know, he was stressed. He thought someone was out to get you and he was hell bent on cutting all ties to keep you safe.”
She tilted her head, resting it against Flynn’s shoulder and taking comfort from his arm around her back.
“I can’t believe this is happening,” she murmured. Her emotions were all over the place, but it seemed so unlikely that her grandmother was still alive that her mind refused to believe it.
“We’ll look for her,” Flynn said.
She nodded and felt an inappropriate burst of laughter gather in her chest.
“What?” Flynn asked, when she smacked a hand over her mouth to smother a giggle.
“I spent six months searching for an ice cream shop!”
His eyebrows pulled together.
“I wanted to find some sort of family connection, so I spent six months tracking down an ice cream shop.” She shook her head. “All that time I could have spent looking for my grandmother.” She sighed. “Do you really think I might have a grandmother out there somewhere?”
“We’ll find out,” Flynn said reassuringly.
She nodded. “I need to get my hands on those Christmas cards. And I need to get to Truro.” Her gaze whipped to Flynn. “What about my flight? Should I still go back to St Mary’s? I need to get back to the shop.”
“Take a breath,” Flynn said calmly. “Maybe it’s better if you go back to St Mary’s and get your thoughts together. Then go to Truro when you’re feeling calmer.”
She nodded, then shook her head. “No. I don’t want to wait. I want to go to Truro. I can get the train there. Or rent a car. But I don’t want to put it off. Either Maria can continue looking after the shop, or it can close for a while. It’s not a big deal.”
“Okay,” he agreed hesitantly.
She searched his features. “Do you think I shouldn’t go to Truro?”
“You should do whatever you want,” he said with an uncertain smile. “But things are going to be hectic for me here – I won’t be able to come with you.”
“I know, but I’ll be okay.” She checked her watch. “I’ll cancel my flight and stay here tonight. Tomorrow, I’ll get the Christmas cards from Richard and figure out how to get to Truro.”
Her instincts told her that was where she should start her search for her grandmother. Plus, she could track down Samantha Weston and her old neighbours while she was there.
She had a few questions for them too.
To be continued…