The Chesapeake Diaries Series 7-Book Bundle: Coming HOme, Home Again, Almost Home, Hometown Girl, Home for the Summer, The Long Way Home, At the River's Edge (22 page)

“I can fax the police report to your car company if you give me the info.” Hal had apparently overheard Grady. “Speed things up a bit for you.”

“I’d appreciate that.” Grady nodded. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” Hal lowered his voice. “I hear you kept an eye on my girl last night.”

Grady nodded, wondering what else Hal might have heard.

“Thank you.” Hal folded his arms across his chest. “Anyone hurts Vanessa, he’ll bring down the wrath of God. I guess you know what I mean.”

Grady nodded again. He was pretty sure he knew exactly what Hal meant.

“Yeah, when we get this guy who broke into her shop, tossed her place, there will be hell to pay. Like I said, no one hurts our girl.” Hal slapped Grady on the back and went for the coffee.

Vanessa’s mother had helped herself to coffee from the large carafe that stood on the buffet table, and had strolled over to the doorway to look out upon the passing cars. Grady grabbed a cup for himself and joined her.

“So did you enjoy the wedding, Mrs. Turner?” he asked.

She turned and looked up at him as if surprised that he’d sought her out, but she smiled and said, “It was just beautiful. I’m so glad I came, even if my son
wasn’t happy about it. I must say, though, that your sister made me feel welcome.”

“She’s a welcoming kind of person.”

“I hope Beck appreciates her.”

“I’m sure he does.” Grady toyed with an idea for a moment, then asked, “Mrs. Turner, whatever happened to Vanessa’s first husband?”

“Craig?” She shrugged her shoulders. “Last I heard, he was remarried and the father of three little ones and living in New Mexico. Why?”

“Just wondering.” He took a sip from the cup. “And the one she sent to prison …”

Maggie wrinkled her nose to show her displeasure. “Gene. The bastard.”

“Do you know for a fact that he’s still in prison?”

She nodded. “He was, last I heard, maybe six, seven months ago.”

“Has anyone in his family ever contacted you to find out where she is?”

Maggie shook her head. “Nope. Not a one. Fact is, no one has ever even asked about her.” She paused. “Well, except for that girl a week or two ago.”

“What girl?”

“A girl Ness went to high school with was sending out notices about their upcoming reunion and wanted Ness’s address.”

“Now, which reunion would this be?” he asked.

“Well, let’s see now.” Maggie thought it over. “She graduated in 1998 … that would make it her twelfth reunion.”

“That’s odd, don’t you think?” Grady said. “Usually reunions are the tenth, or the fifteenth. Did anyone notify her about the tenth reunion?”

Maggie shook her head. “No. Nothing before this.”

Vanessa walked over, a mimosa in her hand. She eyed Maggie suspiciously.

“I was just telling Grady about Shannon calling about your upcoming reunion,” Maggie explained.

“I still have no idea who she is,” Vanessa said.

“You didn’t have a friend named Shannon?” Grady asked.

“I had no friends at all back then,” Vanessa told him.

Maggie frowned. “That is simply not true, Vanessa. Don’t make this nice young man think you were a social outcast.”

Vanessa turned to Grady. “I was.”

“I guess you wouldn’t have a copy of your high school yearbook handy?” he asked.

“I never got one. There wasn’t anything I wanted to remember. Why? You want to see how weird I was back then?”

“Maybe if you looked at Shannon’s picture, you’d remember her.”

“There was no Shannon in my class,” Vanessa insisted.

He was staring, prompting her to ask, “What?”

“I’m going to have someone track down this ex of yours. I want to confirm that he is in fact still in prison.”

“I told you, the D.A. promised to let me know if he was going to get out.” She sighed, exasperated.

“Did you provide the police back in Wisconsin with a forwarding address?”

“Well, no. But I’m sure they’d contact Maggie.”

“How many times has Maggie moved since the trial?”

“Twice,” she told him.

“Maggie”—Grady turned to Vanessa’s mother, who’d fallen silent—“have you given the D.A. your new address?”

“Ahhh … well, actually, now that you ask, I didn’t.” Maggie appeared slightly embarrassed to admit it.

“So the D.A.’s office would find you, how?” he asked.

“I don’t know.” Maggie shrugged her shoulders. “I guess the same way Shannon did.”

“And how was that?” he persisted.

Maggie tilted her head, as if considering the question. Finally, she said, “I don’t know. I guess she could have asked around the neighborhood where I was living during the trial. I still have friends there.”

“You moved to Indiana after that,” Vanessa reminded her, “and from there, you went to North Dakota.”

“Yes, but Shelley always knows where I am. We’ve kept in close touch.” Maggie turned to Grady. “I suppose someone could have come around asking about me. My upstairs neighbor from those days knows where I live.”

“Would you mind giving her a call and asking if someone’s done that lately?” Grady couldn’t believe how easy it would have been for anyone looking for Vanessa to have found her.

“I gave that girl your address and your phone number.” Maggie was shaken.

Vanessa frowned. “You think that Shannon was someone of Gene’s?”

“How many high schools have twelfth reunions?” he asked.

“You think maybe he’s out and no one told us?” Vanessa’s face drained of color.

“Someone has you targeted for something that is not good. If your ex was released early on parole, he could be that someone. He’d certainly be the prime suspect.”

“You think he could be here, in St. Dennis?” Vanessa blanched. “You think he could have broken into my shop?”

“It’s possible. Look, maybe you should go stay with Steffie until this thing is figured out.”

Vanessa shook her head. “I’m not going to make her a target.”

“Then Hal.”

“No. If anything happened to him because of me, I’d kill myself.”

“Hal can probably take care of himself.”

“No.” She shook her head again.

“Do you have a gun?” He suspected she did not, but wanted to be sure.

“A gun?” She stared at him as if he’d lost his mind. “
A gun?
No, I don’t have a gun. What would I do with a gun? Guns can hurt people.”

Grady’s phone began to ring. He glanced at the caller ID, excused himself, and walked outside to take the call.

“Grady, it’s Will Fletcher,” the voice on the other end said. “John called this morning and asked me to run something down ASAP. He said it was for you.”

“Yeah, thanks for getting right on it.”

“How’ve you been, man? We all miss you,” Will told him.

“I occasionally miss a few of you, too. How’s that fiancée of yours?” Grady asked.

“Miranda is fine,” Will said. “I keep asking her to make an honest man out of me but she keeps postponing the date.”

“Hey, if you were engaged to marry you, how much of a hurry would you be in?”

“You have a point.” Will paused. “What are the chances we’ll be seeing you back in the office sometime soon?”

“Unlikely.” Grady hated having these discussions, and he hoped Will wouldn’t press. To his relief, he didn’t.

“Well, anytime you’re in the neighborhood and just want to hang out, give us a call, hear?”

“I will, thanks.”

“So, back to Eugene Medford.”

Grady heard some papers rustling on Will’s end of the line.

“I ran a check, traced him to a prison in Wisconsin, where he was sent to serve a seven-year term for assault.”

“I know that part,” Grady told him. “I need to know if he’s still in there now.”

“Well, he was, up until three weeks ago.”

“He was paroled?” Grady asked.

“No,” Will told him. “He was in a fight with another inmate and his neck was broken.”

Grady hesitated before asking, “Are you telling me …”

“Yeah,” Will told him. “The guy is dead.”

Diary—

When I said the wedding would be one people would be talking about for a long time, I never dreamed … Well, where to begin? I’m fanning myself with the program from the ceremony and hoping that my poor old heart holds out! The day ran the gamut from the sublime to the scandalous to the … well, I hardly have words for what happened here!

First—the wedding. It was, in a word, perfect. The bride was as beautiful as a fairy tale princess, the groom her story-book prince. The Inn looked fabulous—if I do say so myself—the flowers glorious, the food divine. The weather was warm and balmy. What more could one have asked for on their wedding day?

Next—the scandal. The mother of the groom showed up uninvited! Yes, that woman who to the best of my knowledge hasn’t laid eyes on that boy of hers since she dumped him—yes, I said dumped—on the front doorstep of his unsuspecting father. She had the gall to show up at the wedding, and unless my hearing is going, she was put out because Beck wouldn’t speak to her! Can you imagine? What in the name of decency was that woman thinking? There will be more on this, I feel certain!

Finally—the unthinkable. Vanessa’s sweet little boutique, Bling, was broken into and robbed! Right there on
Charles Street, while her brother’s wedding reception was taking place, someone broke into the shop and—from what I heard at the day-after-the-wedding brunch—the burglars trashed the shop before they left! Yes, that’s what I said—as if it wasn’t enough to rob the poor girl, they tossed her lovely merchandise on the floor and broke the glass in some of her cases!

Now, I ask you: What kind of person would do something like that? Obviously, it’s someone from out of town. No one in St. Dennis would stoop so low! And then … just moments later, the car that nice young Grady Shields rented and which he left parked in the lower town lot while he took Vanessa to inspect the damages at Bling … didn’t someone come along and smash out every window? I hear through the grape vine that Hal believes both acts were committed by the same criminally-minded individual
.

Breaking into shops! Smashing car windows! What kind of riff-raff are we allowing into our fair town? What has this world come to?!

I must work on an editorial for this week’s paper.…

—
Grace

Hal did his best to talk Vanessa out of taking a walk through town that afternoon.

“Honey, I agree with Grady that something’s afoot, that someone here has got it in for you. I don’t think you ought to be putting yourself out there.”

“There are tons of walkers out today,” she pointed out. “We’ll be on the main street, and you can have an armed guard follow me if it makes you feel better, but I need to focus on something besides the fact that I’m afraid and confused right now. All this conjecture is making me nuts.” She softened. “Grady will be with me. He won’t let anything happen to me.”

“Then just do the short tour.” Hal knew when to compromise. “Just up to the square and back. Leave the side streets for another day.”

There isn’t going to be another day
, she wanted to remind him. Grady would be gone in a few hours, and chances were good he wouldn’t be back anytime soon.

Playing tour guide actually did relax her, in spite of the fact that patrol cars seemed to be constantly driving by, circling the block like black-and-white sharks.

“The town was under siege during the War of 1812, but no buildings were destroyed. The townspeople had a plan, you see,” she told Grady as they walked along. “The British approached the harbor at night, but as soon as they started firing, all the candles in town were snuffed out so that the entire town was dark. Some houses closest to the water took direct shots—a couple even still have cannonballs lodged in their walls—but none came down.”

“If I remember my American history, that was the war when the British attacked the city of Baltimore and Francis Scott Key saw the flag flying above Fort McHenry the next morning and was inspired to write ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’ ”

“Well, here’s a little did-you-know. The commanding officer wanted a really huge flag to fly over the fort, so he commissioned a woman from Baltimore to make one. And it
was
huge, like thirty feet high and forty-two feet long. That was the flag that Key saw the next morning.”

“I did pay attention in my American history class. Major George Armistead was the commander. He wanted to make sure that the British could see the flag from their ships.” Grady added, “I suppose it was the 1814 equivalent of getting in someone’s face.”

“Do you know the name of the flag maker?” she countered.

“No. Do you?”

“You betcha. Mary Pickersgill. There’s a book in the Historical Society library that talks about how she was asked to make that flag and she only had a very limited time to do it. The flag is in the Smithsonian now.”

Grady had made a move to take her hand but she walked with both hands linked behind her back so they were out of reach. When her arms grew tired, she switched her shoulder bag to her left side and looped her hand through the strap to occupy it. It wasn’t that she didn’t want that casual contact with him—she did. In fact, she’d been aching to touch him all day. But he’d be leaving town in a matter of hours, and a public display would only invite questions. She was under constant scrutiny by the police department, and all day long, people she knew had been driving past and waving. She couldn’t bear the looks of pity she knew she’d get when she walked into Cuppachino in the morning. Or the questions that would inevitably come, the speculation that would be made. St. Dennis was still, after all, a small town, and there was little that could stop the gossip once it got rolling. There’d be enough attention on her in the coming days, with her shop having been the victim of the first burglary since the town started trying to attract tourists. To have that same light shining on her love life right now would be overkill.

“This area up here, we call the square,” she continued. “The houses on each corner were among the first built when the town was officially laid out in 1685. Before that, there were land grants, maybe around 1650 or so, that pretty much defined the village area. The brick was all locally made, and the wooden sections that you see were all from trees cut down to clear the area.” She smiled. “Sometimes I like to walk along here and try to picture the way it was back then, with only those few houses, and dirt paths between them. No roads, no cars … just horses and a
wagon here and there.” She pointed beyond the square. “You see those woods off to the right? There are trees there that have been standing for more than three hundred years. It’s believed that’s the last of the forest that the early settlers found when they first came here.”