Chapter Twelve #2
She stood in the dark-paneled room and gently touched the image of Rusty’s face, remembering the way she had watched from the doorway on the day his body was recovered. It had washed up on shore. “Barely recognizable,” Dina had told her grimly. “Those boys bashed his face clean in with a rock.”
Dina had been caught off guard when Cora had turned her head and retched. She kept retching, and Dina had held back her hair. “Cora, golly. I didn’t know you were so sensitive,” she said.
But Cora’s life had altered forever in that moment, tilting off its axis.
She had tried to convince herself until then that maybe Rusty had been in on it somehow.
That he had aided Jack and Leo off the island and then fled, as convinced of their innocence as she had been.
But at Dina’s words she felt the truth of it all settle deep into the hollows of herself.
She had made a choice that had killed a man.
It could just as easily have been her own father they had pulled from the Bay.
That realization ricocheted through her, leaving a path in its wake as clear as a bullet, setting off dominoes that hadn’t stopped falling to this day.
But how had Jack managed to find his way here?
How had he gone from escaped fugitive to a guest of Truman Byrd?
He’d arrived on Pelican still practically a kid.
He’d spent two years as a prisoner, then escaped and lived as a fugitive.
How had he constructed the vast empire of money, prestige, and influence required to breach the Hill when he’d started out with less than nothing—no assets, no viable background, no birth certificate, not even a real name?
He had been little more than a wisp of smoke trailing a deep shadow, just like that stolen art that vanished and had never been recovered.
Where had all his money come from?
Cora felt in her pocket for the smoothness of stone, running her fingers over it.
Even split three ways between Jack, Leo, and their unnamed accomplice—those paintings would have given them each the sort of power mortals long for: enough money to bury their sins and start over.
To create an entirely new life from the ashes.
But the murders at the Bastion had been fifteen years ago, and the paintings had never resurfaced.
Jack’s voice kept returning to whisper low and dark in Cora’s ear.
Nothing here is what it seems.
She paused over the picture of him and Leo side by side in the ancient paper, struck by a new, troubling question. Jack Yates and his older brother Leo had been inseparable, from their childhood in Dorchester up until their imprisonment together at Pelican.
If Jack was on Enchanted Hill, then Leo couldn’t be far behind.
So where was he?
Truman Byrd emerged onto the esplanade just as evening was descending.
Electric white globes sat atop iron posts like moons between marble fountains and vast, swaying cypress trees.
The evening air had coaxed more and more partygoers outside to lean over the balconies and take up residence at the card tables set on the terra-cotta tiles.
Clementine was wearing a satin gown in the color of her namesake, a modest halter in the front that, when she turned, cut down the deep curve of her back and gathered in blush-colored panels at the base of her spine.
Her lips were a deep maroon, her ears studded with art deco earrings, and she carried an enormous feather around with her, ushering guests to sample the trays of fig tarts and golden caramelized pears.
Truman surveyed his kingdom. Trumpets and the sound of Duke Ellington floated on the breeze.
Fizzy laughter was quick on Clementine’s lips, and she blew kisses and reached down from one terrace to another to tickle one of the other starlets with the tip of her maroon feather.
Truman was pleased to see that his guests were beginning to settle into the week on Enchanted Hill.
A day in the sun had tanned their faces and made their careful facades slide off like film from the surface of fresh milk.
As the sun began to dip toward the hills, Truman made his evening rounds, talking about politics with Gilly, dividends with the banker John Hanson, and horse racing with Simon Leit.
Clem looked lovely, and he had her special drink sent over to her as a sign.
Clem’s eyes swept to him as the maid brought her the drink, and she fluttered her lashes, her red lips curving.
He cocked his head in acknowledgment and then began to slip away as he always did, at the height of the party, to pace the white rows of tomorrow’s news, red pen in hand.
But he stopped suddenly at the sound of an automobile door slamming. A ripple of his staff was gathering near where the boxwood maze spilled out onto the main terrace.
He turned, his interest growing.
“Nerts, is that Beau Remington?” Rita suddenly called out with delight. Lola looked up from the terrace, and Clementine set down her glass. Kitty Ryan smiled down into her drink, her dark lashes grazing her cheeks.
“Perhaps he’d like to join us for a midnight swim later?” she said.
Truman paused beneath the alcove, in the dusk.
His guests stood and left their cards and half-eaten plates, moving toward the boxwoods in waves to greet Beau.
The young man laughed in surprise at the reception as the starlets offered him cheeks to kiss and the men reached out with welcoming hands to shake.
Still, Truman bided his time. Waiting for the moment Clementine stepped forward to greet Beau.
“He’s going to be bloody bigger than Gable,” Albert Boyle said, suddenly appearing next to Truman. He drained his drink to the dregs.
“Yes. I think I’ll prefer not to stand right next to him, for comparison’s sake,” Governor Gilham said. He gave a chortle. “But you’re welcome to stay close, Berty.”
Albert retorted with an expletive, and they moved forward to greet Beau together.
Still Truman waited and watched. He remembered standing with Mabel the day another man had come up beside them.
Flirted with her; tried to grope her right in front of him.
It had been the same humiliating day Truman had realized that his fledgling paper wasn’t going to make it.
That he was going to have to return to his father and tell him that the money was gone.
And then he had been approached with an idea. A scheme that promised to change Truman Byrd’s entire life. It had been the last day he had ever felt desperate—or powerless.
Yet he had caught the way Clem’s face brightened upon seeing young Beau Remington. Like the flare of a match the moment it was struck: small, and definite.
Cora moved through the crowd. Always, she kept her senses trained on Jack.
He was standing to the right of railroad tycoon William Morton, sending a casual waterfall of playing cards between his fingers.
His navy suit was cut to a broad shoulder and followed the narrowing of his waist. It had been made to fit every angle of him, and it was the right color for him, too—a deep, lush blue.
She was aware of every time he threw back his head and laughed, when his fingers massaged his wrists, when he brought a glass to his lips.
She was careful not to look when his eyes came to rest on her, and she knew he was keeping track of her, too.
“When I was younger,” he had once told her, “I wanted to study the stars.”
“An astrologer?” she’d asked.
He had laughed. “Astronomer.” Then, seeing the flush on her face, he added “But I’d given that up long ago. I was working to become an engineer before … all this happened. I wanted to build bridges.”
She had recovered quickly, her wit working to cover her embarrassment.
“You didn’t want to be a gardener?” she had retorted; and when he smirked, a hot thrill had shot right down Cora’s spine.
Now Cora scanned the crowd, picking up an abandoned glass of icy lime, mint, and gin. A breeze shivered through the espaliered mimosa trees.
“Is that Beau Remington?” one of the starlets cried from below, and Cora watched as the party turned toward a new magnetic center.
Beau Remington had been in only two films, supporting roles that were both tragic enough to break hearts and set them racing.
He had golden skin and broad shoulders, cut cheekbones, and blazing blue eyes.
Cora watched as Daisy almost slid an entire army of cocktails off of her tray before righting it just in time.
In fact, Cora felt as though she were the only one to notice that Byrd had slipped to the periphery of his own party. The guests were moving past him to greet Beau, and Cora watched as Jack, amused, leaned against a marble banister, observing as he nursed a drink.
“So, he came after all,” Daisy suddenly said behind her. Cora turned as Daisy lowered her tray. “You setting your eyes on a new guest now?” Daisy asked playfully.
Cora ignored her.
“Here,” Daisy said, pushing a handful of crumpled bills toward Cora. “I forgot to tell you that Mr. Cobb tipped me for returning his tie. I thought you should have half.”
Cora felt strangely touched. “No,” she said. “You keep it.” She gave Daisy a firm smile that ensured she wouldn’t argue, and pushed the money down into Daisy’s apron pocket.
“So, what was that I saw in the ballroom earlier?” Daisy asked, shooting Cora a mischievous grin. “With Mr. Conner?”
For the first time, Cora wondered whether she should ask Daisy for help. Confiding in her about Jack was out of the question. But she could use a hand with Truman and Clem. She couldn’t be in two places at once.
Cora looked over at Jack.
The exchange with Daisy had been only a handful of seconds—but Beau’s arrival had stirred up the party, sending the guests into an eddy to welcome him and then to ripple out again. One minute, Jack had been there, on the party’s fringes.
And then he wasn’t.
Cora pushed past Daisy.