Hesitating, Olivia smoothed out the letter’s envelope in her lap. She didn’t answer for a long time. “I do. I think someone recently discovered that he and I are related and decided to profit from that knowledge. For example, my father could be in a hospital where one of his nurses figured out our connection.” She pointed at the letter. “This person wrote me because my father is sick. That strikes me as being the truth.”
Rawlings considered this theory. “Not a nurse. Someone with less education.” he said. “So we’re assuming that your father has been lying low for thirty years?”
“Yes,” Olivia answered through tight lips.
“Without filing for taxes or leaving a paper trail of any kind.” The chief appeared impressed. “Your grandmother hired a private investigator to search for him, didn’t she?”
“Several. They all came up empty-handed. My father’s boat was found adrift with all his gear aboard. I don’t see how he could make a living without that trawler.” Her memory strayed back to the night she’d pushed the little dingy away from the hull of her father’s boat, away from his rage and his raised fist, the hate in his black eyes and the stink of whiskey on his breath. “They found several empty liquor bottles on board. Everyone came to the conclusion he’d drowned. He was an alcoholic. He was depressed. And that night, he was raving. I could see him—have often imagined him—losing his balance and pitching backward into the ocean.”
Rawlings sat very still. “Thereby acquiring peace.”
Olivia nodded, her throat tight with emotion. “I know he felt responsible for my mother’s death. I did too. He couldn’t run away from the guilt, but he tried. He took long fishing trips, leaving me alone at home. I preferred to have him at sea, because when he was around, our little house was too small for his grief, the whiskey, and my mother’s ghost.”
Now Rawlings did come around his desk. He sat down in the chair next to Olivia, his knees touching hers. He put a large, warm hand over her thinner, colder one. “I can see that you want to answer this letter, but as your friend, I have to warn you against doing so. Let’s say that your father is alive and you pay thousands of dollars to discover his whereabouts. You rush to his bedside and then what? What are you hoping for?”
“I don’t know!” Olivia’s reply held anger, but it was not directed at Rawlings. “Maybe I want to have a copy of his medical history so I can see what I’ve got in store! Maybe I want the chance to call him a bastard to his face before he dies. Maybe I want to spit in his face and ask him what kind of man leaves a little girl all alone day after day and then, one day, abandons her forever!”
Horrified to notice that tears wet her cheeks, Olivia pulled her hand out from under the chief’s and turned away.
“You want the truth,” he finished her thought, his tone quiet and soothing. “Even if it opens old wounds or causes fresh ones. You want the truth, no matter what the cost.”
Her eyes met his. Olivia nodded, grateful for both his words and his gentleness. He understood. He understood everything. “Just promise me one thing,” he said. “If this turns out to be a hoax and we’re able to track down the letter writer, then you hand him or her over to me. If there ends up being no truth, then I will give you something else. Justice.”
She could have kissed him then. His entire body was radiating a righteous authority and his eyes gleamed with conviction, the muddy brown alive with glints of gold. And she knew at that moment that he would do a great deal to defend and to protect her and that something had changed between them on this day.
She had laid herself bare to Rawlings and he had treated her naked emotions with care.
Reclaiming the letter from his desk, Olivia was afraid to look at him again for fear he’d see that she was, at that moment in time, completely in awe of him. Instead, she put her palm on his forearm and let it linger there for a brief second, before rising and pulling open his office door. “I’ll see you Saturday, Chief. Thank you for your time.”
As she walked away Olivia sensed that she had stirred something inside Rawlings, something that might have been lying dormant in the depths of his heart for a long time.
She wondered, glancing at the purple crape myrtle blooms beneath his window, what would become of this newfound longing between them.
Chapter 5
There is nothing like looking, if you want to find something. You certainly usually find something, if you look, but it is not always quite the something you were after.
—J. R. R. TOLKIEN
O
livia told no one else about the letter. She put it away in a desk drawer at home, beneath a utility bill. Even though it was out of sight, the letter called to her. Whenever she sat down at the desk to work on her manuscript, her concentration was completely ruined by the knowledge of what sat in her bill drawer.
Until she had found the body on the beach, Olivia had been making steady progress on her novel, becoming fully immersed in her fictionalized version of Egypt during the reign of Ramses the Second. But neither her character, a concubine named Kamila, nor the charisma of the famous Nineteenth Dynasty pharaoh could draw Olivia’s attention from the letter.
Finally, on Friday, she took the envelope from the drawer, yanked out the single piece of paper, and read the scant lines though she already knew every word by heart. Her computer screen was covered by images of the clothing and jewelry worn by the nobility of Ancient Egypt, but Olivia closed every website window and began a new search. She knew the pull of her novel wasn’t strong enough to distract her from the letter and that she needed to take action. In this case, Olivia required the services of the sharpest private investigator in Wilmington.
After researching several firms, she made a decision, picked up the phone, and asked to speak to the agency’s owner. Coming right to the point, Olivia explained that she wanted eyes on a particular mailbox housed in The UPS Store.
“I want photographs of this RB person. I want a background check. I want to know where he lives, the details of his family life, his profession, and what he does in his spare time. I want a week’s worth of information on this man so that by the time you’ve cashed my sizable check, I’ll feel like I’ve known him my whole life,” Olivia directed.
When the investigator probed her for more explanation, the only response Olivia gave was, “Let’s just say that he’s invited me to make an investment, and before I send him money, I need to learn what kind of man I’d be dealing with.”
Olivia could tell the PI wasn’t convinced, but he was wise enough not to push the matter. It was an easy, low-risk assignment and would bring in much-needed revenue.
“I’ll pay you half of your fee up front,” Olivia offered quickly. “But I want your promise that you’ll handle this job yourself. I read about the profiling classes you took and I want
your
take on this man. No one else’s will suffice.”
Assurances were given and she was transferred to a secretary who took her credit card number and billing information. Olivia hung up the phone in higher spirits. Hiring the detective had allowed her to regain a sense of control. She folded the letter, tucked it back into its envelope, and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves flanking the stone fireplace.
After studying the books for several moments, she took down a hardcover called
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
and slipped the letter between its pages. Since the novel centered on a series of secret letters written in code on a Japanese fan, Olivia found the book an appropriate hiding place for her troublesome missive.
She then replenished her empty coffee cup and gave Haviland a kiss on his cool black nose, feeling ready to devote her complete attention to her character’s dilemma. Kamila’s sycophantic aunt had given the young concubine to the pharaoh’s sandal bearer as though she were chattel, when in truth she was an intelligent young woman and a skilled dancer. Told by the other concubines that her only chance to secure a future in the palace was to bear Pharaoh a child, Kamila waited to be called to the king’s bed.
Olivia had written to the scene where the Living God finally requested Kamila’s presence. She now needed to describe the young woman’s failure to seduce mighty Ramses.
Kamila had been meticulously prepared for a night of lovemaking with the king. Servants had washed and waxed her, rubbed and oiled her, perfumed her wig, and clothed her in a linen shift so fine that it appeared to have been spun out of filaments of mist.
One of Pharaoh’s eunuchs came to collect Kamila. The other concubines and lesser wives tittered excitedly as she was led away, but Kamila trembled behind the giant mute as he led her through the cool passageways. Their shadows rippled on the walls and a thousand fears coursed through Kamila’s mind. Would the Living God be gentle or would he pin her down on the sleeping couch, his regal hands encircling her wrists and squeezing, tighter and tighter, as his desire grew? Would her inexperience repulse or delight him? The other girls spoke boldly of Ramses’ skill as an adept lover. Surely the act could not be painful if they wanted to repeat it even after bearing the king a son.
Ramses was seated on a gilded stool examining a papyrus drawing when Kamila entered the chamber. She prostrated herself before the Lord of the Two Lands but he quickly bade her rise, dismissed the eunuch, and gestured for her to approach his royal person. He was tall and muscular with a firm jaw and a strong nose. His eyes were dark as night in the dim chamber, but he smiled at her kindly and she was finally able to breathe.
“I have been anxiously awaiting these plans. This is how I shall improve upon the temple of Amun-Re,” he told her, gesturing at the scroll. “Would you like to see?”
Kamila crept closer to the man, curiosity overwhelming her unease. She forced her gaze from his noble profile to the drawing laid out before him.
“It is magnificent! The gods will be very pleased!” she declared a trifle too loudly, but Ramses laughed.
“I have lost much sleep over this project.” He stared at the plans again. “And because of other cares as well.” His eyes slid to her face. “Tell me. How do you find sleep when you are troubled?”
Kamila flushed. She hadn’t expected the king to ask her such an intimate question, but she answered truthfully. “I sing to myself, Great One. Always the same tune. It was my mother’s favorite song. My voice is not as lovely as hers, but as I grow older I sound more and more like her.”
Ramses turned from her and stretched out on the sleeping couch. Folding his arms over his chest, he closed his eyes and commanded, “Sing it for me.”
For a moment, Kamila didn’t move. This was not what she had expected, but a command was a command. Softly, she began to sing.
“The lotus petals come floating past/ carried in the river’s arms/ the reeds whisper a tale to me/ and the ibis flies where I cannot go/ but I have fields to tend and oxen to lead/ the soil is more precious than lapis stones . . .” Kamila trailed off, her mind skipping to the next stanza in which the farmer touches the freshly turned earth and knows he is blessed to be an Egyptian. Omitting the words, she softly hummed the melody instead, seeing that the king had fallen asleep.
She hummed until the candle burned low. Silently, the eunuch reappeared and beckoned for her to exit the chamber. He led her to her own pallet in a room filled with the sighs and stirrings of sleeping women and then left, noiseless as a breath of air.
Kamila’s friend, Mery, was a very light sleeper. The moment Kamila curled up on her pallet, Mery sat up on an elbow and whispered, “Well? Did you please him?”
Kamila closed her heavy eyes. “I do not know.”
Mery reached over and touched Kamila’s hand. “There will be another time. You’re one of the most beautiful women in the entire palace.”
“I need to be more than that. The king is surrounded by beauty. I must offer him something he does not have in excess, but what do I give that would please one who owns everything?” Kamila asked miserably and then, hearing no reply from her perplexed friend, fell into a troubled sleep.
Olivia’s fingers moved swiftly over the keyboard. Ramses sent for Kamila twice more and each night she sang him to sleep, acting the part of nursemaid instead of lover. One day, the king and his retinue abruptly left the palace to meet with a team of architects and stonemasons at Karnak. Unsure of what Kamila would do in the pharaoh’s absence, Olivia saved what she’d written and closed the file.
Stretching her arms over her head, she wondered if there was enough time to read the chief’s chapter before heading out to her lunch date. She had requested a meeting with an agent from Coastal Realty. The Realtor, a polished, seventy-year-old matron named Millicent Banks, promised to bring Olivia a file folder stuffed with documents pertaining to the crumbling warehouse on the waterfront.
“I could probably critique two pages before I have to go,” Olivia said, removing the stapled packet Rawlings had distributed to the Bayside Book Writers last Saturday. The chief had already confessed that his book was yet untitled so she searched for the beginning of chapter one. However, the first two pages were stuck together and as Olivia peeled them apart, she realized they were identical. Flipping through the packet, she noted that every page was a copy of page one.
Pulling up her online address book, she called Harris at work.
“You got fifteen copies of the same page too, huh?” Harris laughed. “I guess we’re all busted for putting off our critique homework ’til this late in the week. Millay called me at two in the morning to tell me about the duplicate pages. I figured she’d get a hold of Rawlings and set him straight. Personally, I don’t have the guts to dial the chief of police’s number just to point out that he screwed up.”