The Secret Sister (19 page)

“I don't need anyone else's money,” Maisey said. “I'll make my own.”

Her mother arched her eyebrows. “Working at the flower shop?”

She wanted to say, “You need me there as much as I need to be there,” but she knew her mother would fire her simply to prove her wrong. So Maisey hefted the box higher, as if it was getting too heavy, and said, “I'll be on my feet again soon. Thanks for dinner.”

18

H
is mother was planning to go to the farmers' market in the morning, so Laney had begged to stay over again. They had some elaborate plan to make dinner for Maisey. News of that had come as a surprise to Rafe, but he'd guessed instantly what his mother was up to. So he'd taken her aside and told her to stop with the matchmaking, that he knew Maisey wasn't interested.

His words hadn't done much to dent her enthusiasm, however. Somehow she'd been able to ascertain
his
interest, which was all she needed to get excited. She and Laney had continued to plan their special meal the whole time he was fixing the icemaker in her fridge. His mother whispered in his ear when she hugged him before he left that any woman would love him if she'd just give him a chance.

By the time he walked out, he had no doubt that it was going to be one awkward dinner...

He figured he'd talk to Maisey about it, make sure she understood it wasn't his idea. But he didn't know how to bring it up. She seemed so distracted when she climbed into his truck. After a rather subdued greeting, she slid a box between them, put on her seat belt and stared at Coldiron House until he'd turned around and she couldn't see it anymore. Even as he pulled out of the drive, she didn't speak. She seemed...pensive.

“How was it?” he asked.

She roused herself from whatever she was thinking about. “Same as always.”

He took that to mean it wasn't great. “What's in the box? If it's leftovers, that was some meal.”

He'd been hoping to get a smile out of her, but it didn't work. “Just a few things I might need. When I moved, I shipped most everything I didn't sell.” Belatedly, she twisted around in her seat. “Where's Laney?”

“She's spending another night with her grandma.” He thought he might as well move right into the issue of tomorrow's ambush. He wasn't likely to get a better opportunity. “I guess she and my mother are having you to dinner?”

“She and your mother? You won't be there?”

“It might be easier on both of us if I stayed away. My mother can be a little too blatant about trying to find me a wife,” he said with an apologetic glance. “And I think she currently has her sights on you.”

Even that didn't get much of a reaction. “I wondered if that was the reason she wanted me to come, but...I'd hate for you to miss it because of me. I can cancel...”

“No, don't do that,” he broke in. “You're Laney's new favorite person. She'd be disappointed. I'll be fine on my own. There's a football game I'm going to watch.”

“If it's on TV, you can watch it at your mother's. You should go. We can outmaneuver one little old lady.”

He wasn't as optimistic. “You have no idea how obvious she can be.”

“I do. Trust me, my mother can be obvious about certain things, too—mostly when she doesn't approve,” she added drolly.

“Am I supposed to connect those two statements? Are you saying she wouldn't approve of me—because that's what you were thinking, right?”

She blushed. “She doesn't approve of anyone she hasn't recommended.”

Maisey had dodged his question, but her body language had given her away so he let it go. He knew what Josephine was like. Maisey's mother didn't view him as an equal, so of course she wouldn't deem him good enough for her daughter, who would one day inherit half of what she owned. Josephine wouldn't want to see her empire fall into the hands of a simple contractor.

“Who would she recommend?” he asked.

“Someone who worshipped her instead of me.”

The fact that they were alone provided Maisey with the perfect opportunity to drill him about how he'd become a single parent. She'd admitted she was curious. But she seemed to have forgotten the discussion they'd had before. She didn't speak the whole way home, not until he pulled into her drive. And then it was only to thank him for the ride.

He almost offered to carry that box in for her. Judging by how heavy it had looked when she brought it out of Coldiron House, it wouldn't be easy to haul up so many steps. But before he could open his mouth to suggest it, he saw Keith sitting on her porch.

She noticed her brother at virtually the same instant. “Look who's back,” she muttered.

* * *

Maisey supported the box with one knee so she could wave as Rafe shifted into Reverse and backed down her drive.

“So you've been staying with Nancy?” she asked Keith when he came down to take the box and follow her up the stairs.

“Did you get that information from her?”

Apparently Nancy had been too afraid to let him know about their conversation at the flower shop. “I guessed,” Maisey said to protect her. “Is she the one who brought you here?”

“I borrowed her car.”

“I didn't see...”

“It's out on the street.”

She unlocked the door. “Nancy's a nice person.”

“No doubt about it,” Keith said, but it was a throwaway statement and that bothered Maisey.

“
Too
nice.”

“What do you mean?” He'd picked up on the censure in her tone—and responded with some belligerence.

She stepped out of the way so he could deposit the box on the floor. “She's in love with you. You understand that, don't you?”

He yawned and stretched as if he hadn't been getting enough sleep. “I care about her, too.”

Care.
That wasn't the same thing. Not by a long shot. “It wouldn't be right to break her heart,” she said.

“Don't start on me. Nancy and I are friends. I've never promised her any more.”

“That doesn't mean she won't hope for it.”

He shrugged. “You can't stop someone from hoping.”

Maisey scowled at him. “Come on, I work with her.”

“Because I walked out and left you a job.”

“What? Mom was going to give me one, anyway. You can't be mad about that. Nancy's the issue here. I don't want to see this end up where I think it's going.”

“What happens between Nancy and me is none of your business,” he growled.

Clenching her jaw, Maisey bit back the rest of what she'd been about to say. She didn't want to get into an argument with her brother. Maybe she
was
sticking her nose in where it didn't belong...

“You hungry?” she asked as she tossed her house key on the counter.

“No, Nancy and I had dinner earlier.”

Yeah, and
she'd
probably done the cooking. Nancy would do anything to make him happy and comfortable. Maisey's irritation rose up again, but she stifled it. “Are you going to let Mom know you're back on Fairham?”

“When I'm ready.”

When Nancy was tired of giving him money, in other words. Maisey didn't like how cynical she was becoming in regard to her brother, but she couldn't seem to avoid it. She found it much harder to feel the sympathy she'd felt for him when she was living in New York.

“Where'd you go with Raphael?” he asked. “Don't tell me you're dating him. Mom'll shit a brick if she thinks you're with some blue collar guy now.”

“I'm not dating him.” She opened the flaps of the box she'd brought home from Coldiron House. “Mom had me over for dinner, and he gave me a ride since he was going to town, anyway.”

“Did Mom say anything about me?”

“No, not really. I asked her if she'd heard from you, and she said she hadn't.” Maisey left out the other part, the part about how he'd come back when he had no other option. That would only make him angry, even though it was true.

He used one foot to nudge the box he'd hauled in. “So what's this?”

“Some extra clothes and books I had shipped to Coldiron House.” She dug deep, down to the bottom, and pulled out the stack of envelopes she'd hidden there. “And some letters I found in Dad's stuff.”

Keith slumped onto the couch. “Why were you going through Dad's stuff?”

“I was looking for answers.”

“To what question?”

She blinked at him. “The obvious question. Who's the girl in the photographs I told you about?”

“That's why I came,” he said, sounding disgruntled again. “I want to see those pictures.”

She went to get the metal container, which she'd slid under her bed. “Here you go.”

Putting it on the coffee table, she sat down to await his reaction.

He stared at her apprehensively before taking off the lid. Then his face went stone-cold—no expression whatsoever.

“Do you remember her?” Maisey prompted.

He gazed at the picture, which showed a girl who looked a lot like her but was older than he was.

“Keith?”

After dropping that picture in the box, he put the lid back on and shoved it away. “We don't want to deal with this,” he said. “This is a nightmare waiting to happen. We need to leave it alone. Burn these. Or bury them.”

She studied him. What did he know? More than she did; that was clear. “Why?”

He sprang to his feet and began to pace. “Why do you think? Do you want to destroy our family? The Coldiron name? See Mom go to
prison
?”

Maisey's fingernails curled into her palms. “Don't tell me she had something to do with this child's disappearance.”

“Oh, don't be naive! Whatever happened couldn't have been aboveboard. We'd know a hell of a lot more about our sister—and that's who I'm
sure
she was—if that was the case. It wouldn't be like this. She wouldn't have been...cut out of our lives as if she never existed.”

“Do you realize what you're saying?” Maisey asked. “Because it sounds to me like you believe Mom might've killed her. And that's crazy!” She
hoped
.

He whirled around to confront her. “You know what Mom was like. How...vicious she could get whenever she felt there was discipline to be meted out. What else might've happened?”

“Maybe she was...taken. Rich people can be a target for that sort of thing, a—a ransom situation. Or she could've run away or been accidentally left behind or lost. She could even have been put up for adoption. You've heard Mom say she never wanted kids to begin with.”

“And no one ever said a word to us about any of that?”

“Grief—or shame—could've prevented Mom and Dad from talking about it.”

“Shame is what I'm afraid of! Or self-preservation. In any of those scenarios, there would've been people who remembered her, people who would've mentioned her to us.”

“The same holds true for
any
scenario,” Maisey argued. “A child doesn't disappear without anyone noticing.”

“Mom could make it happen. Pay for...for whatever cover-up she needed. She'd have
no
compunction about doing everything possible to save her own skin.”

“But surely Mom's not a
killer
!”

When he said nothing, just stared at her, she could tell he wasn't going to refute that.

“Don't you think?” she prompted.

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “She was so big on discipline. She believed children should be seen and not heard, didn't want any of us to slow her down or get in her way. If we did, we'd be punished. She probably hit Annabelle too hard. Maybe Annabelle couldn't take it like I could.”

Annabelle.
Although there was a lot to respond to in what he'd said, chills rolled down Maisey's spine at the mention of this name. “You remember what she was called.”

He grimaced. “It just popped into my head. Annabelle. I called her Bella. It was easier.”

“You said Mom probably hit... Bella.” She fumbled, could hardly get her mind around having another sibling, let alone referring to that sibling directly. “Then what? What else do you recall?”

“I said ‘probably.' If you think I can tell you what happened, I can't. I remember playing with her, okay? I remember her trying to protect me when Mom got mad. I remember—” he scrunched up his face as if he couldn't bear to see what his memory was showing him and grabbed his hair with a fist “—I remember her being locked in her room, crying. She peed on the floor because she couldn't get to the bathroom and Mom spanked her.”

Maisey felt sick to her stomach. “How old was she the last time you saw her?”

“I can't even tell you when the ‘last' time was! I had to be three or four years old. The memories are convoluted, blurry. I've dreamed about this so much that I can't say what's real anymore. I know she was our sister. For a while. She must have been. And then...she was gone.”

Maisey shook her head, rejecting the scenario he'd put forward, even though she'd considered it herself. “If Mom hit her too hard and ended up...ended up hurting her that badly, Dad would've gone for help. He wouldn't have covered up a murder.”

“Dad did anything for Mom. He had to. He had no choice. Not if he wanted to live any kind of normal life and be with us.”

“He did let her get away with a lot,” Maisey conceded, “but he also did what he could to protect us.”

“To protect
you
. Somehow you brought out the best in him. He never did much for me.”

Because he couldn't. Keith was every bit as quarrelsome, stubborn and difficult as Josephine. But Maisey had to acknowledge the severe beatings Keith had received. She'd been a witness to many of them. “If that's true—and I'm not saying I believe it—what did they do with her body? How would they answer to everyone who inquired after their oldest daughter?”

“I'm guessing there was no body. A body would trigger an investigation, and there was no investigation or we would've heard about it. I think she just...disappeared. Anyway, I can't answer those questions. I can't even ask them,” he replied. “I don't want to discover the truth.”