Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
I got downstairs at the tail end of breakfast and managed to grab some oatmeal and fruit before the servers started clearing. There was a new crew of guests in the dining room, no one I recognized, and maybe that was a good thing. I saw only polite smiles, no suspicious ones.
As I finished breakfast, Ellen came into the dining room and slid into the chair across from me. She had a folder in her hand.
"Good morning," I said tentatively.
"You want to learn more about our family, so I pulled together a few photos." She opened the folder and took out the first one. "This is your grandfather and me on our wedding day, fifty-eight years ago. I was eighteen when I married him. And I had your father nine months later."
"You were young," I said, staring at the picture for a long minute.
My grandmother looked like a beautiful teenager with long brown hair and a hopeful, joyous smile that I'd never seen on her face.
My grandfather was tall and lean with a warmth to his happy grin that made me want to instantly like him.
Ellen had said he was rigid and demanding and set in his ways, but that's not what this man looked like.
"We were very young," Ellen said, a nostalgic note in her voice.
"I met Richard the summer I came here to visit my aunt, uncle, and cousins.
I grew up about two hours south of here.
Richard was the cutest boy I'd ever seen.
He was tall and tan with a sunburned nose that always freckled.
He loved boats and being out on the ocean.
He was full of life, and I was immediately taken with him.
I was supposed to go home at the end of the summer.
I was supposed to go to college, but I couldn't leave him.
We got married that September. My parents were furious. But I was in love."
I lifted my gaze from the photo to look at her. "Was it a happy marriage?"
"For many, many years," she said, a nostalgic gleam in her eyes that turned a little sad.
"But we had our share of challenges, arguments, differences of opinion.
We grew up, and we weren't always on the same page.
Richard wanted a stay-at-home wife who just wanted to take care of her son and husband.
And I did those things for a long time, but I wanted more.
I wanted to have something that was mine. "
"He let you sell your house and buy this inn, so he must have come around."
"To be honest, I forced his hand. Your father was almost out of high school, and I told Richard that it was my turn to have something of my own.
" She paused. "He said I'd have plenty to do with my volunteer work.
I helped out at the library. I was on the social committee for town events.
It all sounded like more of the same, and I couldn't stomach the thought that that was all there was going to be. "
I was shocked at how much she was revealing, and I didn't want to stop her by asking a question, so I waited for her to continue.
She cleared her throat. "After many discussions, some of which were very loud and very angry, I told Richard that wasn't going to work for me. The inn was up for sale, and I wanted to buy it. And if he didn't agree, then I was going to leave and find some other way to do what I wanted to do."
"That couldn't have gone over well."
"It was a difficult time," she said. "And there weren't just fights between me and Richard, but also between Richard and David.
Our lives were changing, and we all wanted something different.
But I believed in my heart that we would all be better off if we pursued our dreams. For me, that was this inn.
For David, it was going to college and making something of his life. "
"And for my grandfather?"
"He had his life. He had his business, his family. He had everything he'd ever wanted. It was our turn."
"So, you were on my father's side in terms of him leaving town?"
"Yes. He was too smart to just do carpentry at the Boatworks. I saw a bigger future for him, and I wanted to make sure he had it. But…"
"But?" I prodded.
"I had to walk a fine line. I needed Richard's support to buy the inn, so sometimes I didn't speak up the way David wanted me to.
I thought it would all work out in the end.
The inn deal was happening while David was still in high school.
Once that was done, I could turn my attention to David's situation. "
Her story cleared up a few things in my mind but also raised more questions. Before I could ask, she handed me the other photo in the folder. "This was taken at the church right after your father's first communion."
I looked at a slightly older version of my grandparents standing on either side of my father, who had a smile on his face that I had never seen. "He looks like a happy kid."
"He was happy when he was young. As he got older, not so much."
"Why? You have to tell me what happened. You can't take me this far and then stop."
"It's not my story, Cassidy." She gave a questioning look. "And would you even believe me if I did? You don't trust me. At times, I believe you think I'm a monster."
"Persuade me otherwise," I said, not denying that I had mixed feelings about her.
"I don't think I could," she said.
"I don't think you want to. Something is going on here."
"Sometimes it's safer not to know everything, Cassidy. Sometimes silence protects you."
"I don't believe that's true."
"Well, I do. The photos are yours to keep if you want to take them home with you."
"I would like to keep them. But I'm not leaving until tomorrow. That's when Tessa is being released from the hospital. I'd like to stay here one more night. Unless you don't think I'll be safe here?"
Ellen met my gaze head-on. "You'll be safe here, but I don't know about anywhere else. I watched your podcast this morning. I read the comments. Some were threatening. You're stirring up a hornet's nest. That's a mistake."
"I'm not going to let anonymous threats drive me away.
That just means I'm getting closer to finding out what happened to Natalie and Jessica.
You should want to help me so that you can clear up the inn's reputation, put the rumors away for good.
If you have nothing to hide, why are you acting like you do? "
"If I could help you, I would, but I can't," she said with an unmistakable finality. Then she got up and walked away.
I watched her leave the dining room, her posture always straight, proud, confident, unbending. But I couldn’t help thinking that can't wasn't a word my grandmother used often.
If she wanted something, she went out and got it, just like she'd gotten this inn. She could help me if she wanted to; she just didn't want to, and I still didn't know why. But I was going to keep asking questions until I found out.
Three hours later, my initial optimism had completely faded. No one in town would talk to me. Finn had gone to Cork Harbor to see Nathan. Tyler wasn't answering my texts. My allies were definitely not helping me, and neither was anyone else.
I grabbed a quick salad for lunch and took it down to the beach to eat, needing time away from the suspicious looks that seemed to follow me wherever I went.
It was a Thursday afternoon, and the beach was fairly empty, but there were a couple of kids with their mother, making sandcastles and running back and forth to the ocean to fill their buckets with water.
An older couple sat in chairs under a shaded tree, the woman reading, the man stretched out on a lounger.
It was a pretty, peaceful day, completely opposite to the turmoil in my head.
As I watched the young boy, I thought of my dad. He'd probably played on this very beach, Ellen watching over him. But maybe her gaze hadn't been on him. Maybe she'd looked up the coast to the impressive Victorian, the one she hoped to turn into a bed-and-breakfast.
She'd married so young. And while she'd spoken of instant love, she'd also mentioned troubles in her marriage.
That was probably typical of all long-term relationships, but I couldn't tell just how happy she and my grandfather had actually been when they got farther away from the idyllic photo taken on their wedding day.
But I shouldn't be thinking about my grandparents and their wedding day when I had a limited amount of time to find out what happened to Natalie or Jessica before I had to leave town.
Picking up my phone, I tried Tyler again, relieved when he answered. "Hi," I said. "Where have you been? I texted you a few times."
"I know. I'm sorry. I've been trying to chase down a lead on Jessica."
"What kind of lead? The security footage?"
"Yes, I think I might have spotted the truck that picked her up."
"Really?" I asked with excitement. "That's great. Did you actually see her in the truck? Is she still alive?"
"I didn't get a good enough look at the passenger to know for sure, but if it was her, then she was alive the day Nathan found her boat."
"Do you think he saw her? Or who took her? Have you heard any more about his condition?"
"I heard that he survived the night, but I don't think anyone has spoken to him yet. Does that match what you know?"
"Finn went to see him, but I haven't heard back. So, how are you tracking this truck down?"
"I have a friend who's trying to clean up the video enough to see a license plate, but I'm not sure I need it."
"Why not?"
"Because there's a logo on the door of the truck, and it looks like the Stonecross Inn logo."
My heart leapt against my chest. "Are you serious? Are you saying it's Ray's truck?"
"I think so, but I don't have a clear enough view to take it to the police yet. And I'd really like to get facial recognition on the passenger, which my friend is also trying to do. You know this video will just get buried if it's not irrefutable."