Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Wyn
“You’re going to have to talk to me eventually, Professor,” he seethes.
Twelve weeks, and I haven’t said a single word.
My skin feels like it’s crawling with tiny bugs, but it’s simply the feeling of sweat dripping and slowly evaporating with the extreme changes in temperature—a sweltering humidity to the crisp cold.
A train car came first, but I was in and out of consciousness for the ride.
Then I was kept in a dark, smaller space, bound and gagged, brakes jerking me around enough to feel sick to my stomach. And now, I’m here.
Time doesn’t feel like it's moving, but as I study the hairs that’ve grown from my legs and the length of my nails, time isn't slowing down. Maybe death is just taking its time deciding if I’m worthy of it.
I’m almost certain if anyone had started looking, they would have stopped by now.
I know I’ll die here. The sharp sawing of a serrated knife cuts through skin with a burning sensation at first, and then sheer pressure and pain rattles my nerve endings as it seesaws through muscle up my side.
I swallow a scream and plead with any kind of higher power that the depths of this will stop.
Fear lingers like an old habit. Defeat doesn’t feel like losing. Bravery never arrives.
The sound of cabinets closing and glass bottles clanging on the counter pulls me from the memory. I blink away emotion that threatens to drench me—not here, not now, not in front of them.
After a few moments, I finally focus on Birdie and my mother laughing at something I missed. The fact that I’m trying to pause a panic attack so my mother and grandmother can tell me how they’ve likely killed a man is so troubling that maybe I should just start laughing too.
The only relief is that I know these women—they raised me. And watching the easy way they are with one another has me feeling more jealous of not having that ease with them than scared at hearing about what they’ve done.
“I think Mr. Colton might have been right, Wyn,” Birdie says, holding up the bottle of limoncello I brought over. She glances at me, her eyebrow quirked. “You looked like you were more than comfortable behind the bar tonight . . .” She trails off.
“Maybe so,” I answer, smiling. “Felt good to be back there with Stevie and Jo.”
My grandmother reads the undercurrent of things. She’s always been good at that. An empath who could effortlessly read between the lines of what wasn’t being said. There’s too much more to my story that she doesn’t push me to know.
“Birdie’s right; interesting display at the bar, Wynona .
. .” Lu gives me a pointed look. Opening the fridge, she fills her arms with limes and drops them onto the counter so that they almost roll off and fall everywhere.
“There’s a jam cake in here with your name on it,” she says, tipping her head toward the refrigerator, like making an entire cake for a single person is a completely acceptable practice.
And even though her tone sounds annoyed, like it was something she had to do, cakes are her olive branch.
Tallulah Crowne is good at a lot of things, but she’s exceptional at holding grudges, running a bar, and making the most delicious desserts—specifically, cakes.
Until about seven months ago, the last cake she made for me was when I was still living at home.
Sweets are the only language my mother and I speak flawlessly.
We didn’t have massive heartfelt moments or paint each other's nails to bond over bullshit. I know she missed me because she’s been leaving me cakes ever since I’ve been back—a thief who breaks into my house simply to leave me a baked good, even after being a dick to my face.
“I’m rationing the last one you left me. It came out too good,” I tell her honestly, and I catch her lips twitch with a smile as she turns back toward the margarita assembly line she and Birdie have going.
I watch the two of them behind the counter.
They’ve always operated more like sisters than mother and daughter.
When my sisters and I were young, we moved into Birdie’s place.
Our father up and left my mother without so much as a note.
Disappeared, moved on, left his family behind for something or someone else.
People have always had a funny way of disappearing in Rumor. And now, watching Birdie cut limes as my mother scoots around, looking for tequila, there’s a nagging feeling that my mother and grandmother know a bit more about that than they’ve let on.
And I can’t help but wonder if Stan Billings isn’t the first.
Birdie always said, “There’s always a dab of truth in every rumor; it’s up to us to decide what to believe.” But what she’s gearing up to tell me—a truth I’ve already mostly figured out on my own—I haven’t considered what that could mean.
“You can’t use whiskey for margaritas, Lu,” Birdie says in her low and slow drawl.
But it’s the echo of both me and my mother saying, “Yes, you can,” that has her eating her words. I smile to myself. At least we can agree on some things.
“After midnight, margaritas should only be made with whiskey,” Lu says, tossing in the entirety of the quartered limes. Next comes a can of coconut milk into the blender and a hefty pinch of salt. She pops the top back on and flips the blender on for another thirty seconds.
I rub at my wrist, feeling the smooth leather of the cuff beneath my fingers. I work to focus on its texture instead of the sound and my creeping nerves. Stay present. Take a breath.
When the blender stops, the room is quiet as Lu pours out three large glasses of the thick, slushy drinks.
Birdie circles around the counter, plucking two glasses.
She passes one to me, glancing up at my mother as she grabs hers, and they exchange a brief look.
Birdie moves toward the archway on the opposite side of the room, tipping her head for me to follow her.
The house has always been referred to as Birdie’s place, but my mother lives here too—this room is evident of that.
She likely read everything in this place twice.
The alcove-like sitting area is covered in wall-to-wall shelves stacked with thrillers and romances, well-worn favorites, how-to guides, and farmers’ almanacs from nearly five decades ago, and everything in between.
Peppered around the stories are glass jars filled with dried herbs and other tinctures.
Birdie holds up her glass and says, “To my darling girls.”
My mother clinks Birdie’s glass, and then mine, before they both take a sip. The moment feels heavy, like what comes after this drink can’t be undone.
I lick along the rim of the glass, getting a mouthful of coarse salt. I let it rest on my tongue for a moment before my sip, bracing myself for what’s coming. Paying attention to textures and tastes keeps me focused on the moment and prevents me from simply reacting.
Settling into my chair, my drink coats my throat just after the whiskey burns across my tongue.
I watch my mother give a nod and then perch herself on the built-in bench below the window as Birdie sits in the chair across from me, sets her margarita down next to her, and then leans forward with her elbows perched on her knees.
“This was never meant to be your burden, Wyn.” She looks at my mother and gives her a tight-lipped smile before adding, “It was never meant to be your mother’s either, but life has a real nasty way of reminding me that I only have so much control over how it goes.
“You’re smart, Wyn. Always have been, maybe even more than we ever gave you credit for.” She blows out a breath, her cheeks puffing on the exhale. “What do you know about Stan Billings?”
I glance at my mother first, who’s watching me as she leans against the wall. “I know he was probably the situation that was being cleaned up inside The Whispering Fool the night I walked in on Julian.”
“Anything else?” Birdie prompts before she looks at my mother.
“You’ve already started. Keep going,” my mother says, wordlessly answering what Birdie’s look was asking.
Birdie takes a drink, and then gives me a smile before she says, “I asked what you knew about Deputy Stan Billings, not his demise.” Her eyebrow raises in challenge.
“I don’t know much about him, but Cora, on the other hand,” I say, rifling through my memories of a woman who just loved leaning into the nastiest of the rumors when it came to my mother.
She’s been calling Lu all sorts of colorful things for as long as I can remember.
I didn’t even know why, other than she seems to be the opposite of what my mom represents.
I tilt my head and look at my mom. “Cora loves her conservative values. I can’t remember if she’s Southern Baptist or Catholic, maybe something else entirely, but whatever it is that she believes, she looks at you as the antithesis of it. ”
“Don’t get me wrong, Cora is an asshole. Don’t let her pearls fool you,” my mom chimes in. “But she didn’t deserve the shit Stan dealt. And I’m not talking about the drugs he was dealing.”
I raise my eyebrow and look at Birdie.
“He beat—” Birdie’s eyes water as she cuts her words and looks up.
When she swipes them away, she takes a sip of her drink, draining it halfway.
“It didn't matter that he was a cop, or that he swore to protect, because what I’ve learned, my darling, is that monsters aren’t only found in the dark.
Sometimes it’s the ones we’re meant to trust in the light of day who turn out to be the scariest.”