The Splendour Falls (16 page)

Annoyance chased away any lingering unease. ‘Just exploring.' My tone was unapologetic, maybe even a bit challenging. ‘What are you doing home? I thought you had school.'

She didn't like the reminder that I was past all that. ‘Did you lose track of time while you were catching up on your soap operas?' she asked. ‘School is out.'

Now I noticed Caitlin and a girl I didn't know petting and giggling over Gigi in the den. My dog was still on the sofa, receiving their worship as her due. I hadn't heard a car arrive, but the TV was still on, and I'd been pretty intent on following … nothing, it seemed.

‘Hey, Sylvie,' said Caitlin, as I crossed the foyer to the den. ‘This is Melissa. She's on the TTC too.'

I exchanged greetings, but Addie wasn't bothering with niceties. She looked pointedly at my dog, the remote still in my hand and the pillow I'd thrown onto the coffee table so I could prop up my leg. Then she dropped her book bag where I'd been sitting, a territorial display that I didn't miss. ‘We usually study in here after school.'

For all my protestations that this wasn't my home, that it was Paula's house and I wanted no claim to it, Addie's implied order that I vacate
my spot
sent a surge of possessiveness through me. I met her eye and held my ground, just long enough to make sure she knew I was doing her a favour by moving.

When I saw the realization flicker in her eyes, I clicked off the TV and tossed the remote on the cushions. ‘Knock yourself out.'

Calling for Gigi, I headed up the stairs to my room.

I
n my room, I contemplated the secret drawer in the desk, wondering how I'd found the latch so easily before, yet couldn't seem to manage it now. I was just about to see if I could crawl under the desk to look from below, when Paula knocked on the door. Her rap was distinctive.

I flipped open the Davis book, and called for her to come in. Gigi, lying in the reading chair, pricked her ears forward, but didn't bother to try more charm than that. She had Paula figured out. Or maybe she saw the
frown my cousin shot her before she got down to business.

‘Addie and the girls are going to get something to eat at a hamburger place out on the highway. They asked if you'd like to come with them.'

Somehow, I had trouble picturing this invitation, even with my overactive imagination. It made me a little snarky, especially as I was still sore over the earlier implication that I was being vegetarian just to be difficult. ‘Come along and watch them eat hamburgers, you mean?'

Paula got that tight-lipped ‘pick your battles' expression. ‘I'm sure they have salads and things. Most places do. I think you should go. You can't sulk in here all day and all night.'

I'd been ‘sulking' in the garden and in the den, too, but I didn't point that out. ‘If I go, will you let Gigi spend the night inside?'

She sighed and set her hands on her hips. ‘No. But I won't complain about her staying with you as long as you're awake.'

I agreed. It wouldn't stop me from sneaking Gigi in after dark, but it would save me some grief the rest of the time.

And seriously, when your day includes making a list to see if you're crazy or not, there's not much further downhill things could go.

I predicted the outing would be excruciating, and was pleasantly surprised that it was only intermittently
unpleasant. Joe's Big Burger, located halfway to Selma on the state highway, was a popular place, and I had no trouble finding something to eat, as long as I wanted a wedge of iceberg lettuce or a grilled cheese sandwich. Addie, Caitlin and Melissa discussed people I didn't know, parties I hadn't been to and things I'd never heard of. Which suited me fine, because it meant I didn't have to talk about myself.

When they asked me about life in New York, I answered a few questions, then turned the conversational burden back to them. ‘So, what do you guys do for fun around here?' I asked, figuring everyone liked to talk about their pastimes. ‘Besides build summerhouses and plot world domination through catfish.'

Caitlin and Melissa laughed. ‘We keep busy,' said Melissa. ‘There's football in the fall, and basketball in the spring. School dances are fun.'

‘And like you mentioned, there
is
the Catfish Festival coming up,' said Caitlin. ‘You're coming to that, right?'

‘I'll have to check my social calendar,' I drawled, and they laughed again – not Addie, of course, but the other two – missing the edge to my remark. Just as well. They seemed like nice girls.

‘So if you live in Maddox Landing,' I said, ‘then what is Cahaba? Another town?'

‘Oh, Cahaba was the first capital of Alabama.' Melissa dragged a fry through her ketchup. ‘Now it's a ghost town on the other side of your house.'

‘A ghost town?' I deliberately didn't look at Addie, though after Shawn's jokes at breakfast and Addie
finding me hunting shadows that afternoon, I wondered if I'd been set up.

But Melissa meant it colloquially. ‘It doesn't exist any more. There's a couple of old buildings, and they've made a historic park there. Old Cahawba. With a
w.
'

I looked at Addie for clarification. ‘But the sign on the wagon says Bluestone Hill Inn, Cahawba.'

She'd defrosted somewhat during dinner, as long as the conversation was about her and her friends, and not about me. Now she answered almost nicely. ‘They can say whatever they want, since it's not in Maddox Landing, either.'

‘Don't mention Old Cahawba to Shawn,' warned Caitlin. ‘His dad is trying to develop some land on the other side of the park and the state is being kind of a bear about it.'

‘I'll keep that in mind.' I made one of those connections that makes you feel a little slow in retrospect. ‘So, Shawn's family … Maddox Landing is named after them? They must go way back.'

I'd finished my sandwich – as much as I was going to eat of it, anyway – and it was a good thing, since Addie's icicle stare would have congealed the melted cheese in a hurry. ‘The Maddox and Davis families go way back together.'

The other two girls held in giggles. But not very well. ‘Oh my gosh, Sylvie.' Caitlin's eyes brimmed with matchmaking fire. ‘Shawn was
totally
talking about you today too.'

Crap. They'd clearly taken my interest the wrong way. Well, maybe the right way, but a whole lot further.
‘I only ask because I saw the Maddox name in a book I was reading about my own family history. I was wondering if we were cousins.'

Melissa grinned broadly, taking my clarification as confirmation instead of denial. ‘Don't worry. If you are, it's far enough back not to matter.'

‘It's never mattered much anyway,' drawled Addie. ‘Y'all's families are as inbred as a redneck joke.'

‘Don't listen to her,' said Caitlin. ‘That's just a Southern cliché.'

That didn't make me feel better. I'd seen some reallife clichés since I'd arrived. I slid a covertly curious glance at Addie. Was this assumption I was going after Shawn the root of her dislike? Her digs were at my sense of entitlement. Maybe she thought
I
thought I was entitled to Shawn.

‘I don't want to poach on anyone's territory,' I said, just to see what would happen. Addie rolled her eyes and the other two girls laughed, and this time, I didn't get why. ‘What's so funny?'

‘Nothing,' said Addie, with a repressive look at Melissa and Caitlin, and their in-joke giggles. ‘Let's get out of here.
Some
of us have things to do tomorrow.'

The house was quiet when Caitlin dropped Addie and me back at Bluestone Hill. Paula had left lights burning on the front porch and in the foyer. In the kitchen, too, I saw, as the car pulled in front of the garage to let us out.

My hand on the door latch, I turned to the other three girls in the car. ‘Thanks for inviting me to dinner,' I said, twisting to include Melissa and Addie in the back seat. ‘I'll tell Gigi you said hi, Caitlin. It was nice meeting you, Melissa.'

She waved. ‘You, too. I guess I'll see you Thursday night.'

I cast back through the conversation at dinner, trying to find a reference to an event. ‘What's Thursday night?'

‘The circle.' The ‘of course' was unspoken.

‘She means the Teen Town Council circle,' said Caitlin smoothly, though I hadn't missed the poke Addie had given Melissa in the ribs. ‘That's what we call our closed meetings.'

‘Which only Shawn can invite anyone to,' Addie said pointedly.

Melissa glared back at Addie. ‘Sorry. I assumed he had.'

‘Why?' I asked, curious at the underlying dynamic.

Caitlin smiled, her drawl widening too. ‘Because you're a Davis, of course.'

But I was only here for a month, and had no desire to get involved in junior politics. Not that I had a chance to point that out, since Addie was already climbing out of the car. I got out too, slowed by my stiff leg, then waved as Caitlin pulled from the driveway.

Addie didn't wait for me, heading straight for the stairs to her apartment. I wondered, thanks to the subtext in the car, if maybe she wasn't as territorial about Shawn as about this inner circle. I could explain to her
that I wasn't interested in infringing on her position as alpha bitch of this pack. Though maybe I should put it in more tactful terms.

It would have to wait, though. By the time I reached the sidewalk that connected the apartment stairs with the back door of the house, Addie was already on her landing, letting herself in. And she didn't even say goodnight.

Gigi gave a yodelling bark of welcome as I came in the screen door to the back porch. I shushed her, in case Paula had gone to her own room to watch TV or go to sleep; there had been no light on in the den, and I didn't see anyone in the kitchen. I hoped I could let Gigi out for her last walk of the night, then slip upstairs and be done with sneaking around.

When I opened her crate, she bounded out with a playful growl, then went straight for the screen door. I grabbed a scooper bag and let us both out, easing the door so it didn't bang closed. Gigi made a full-tilt circuit of the back yard; then, while I was carefully making my way down the rail-less stairs, she shot off down the terrace steps to the great lawn.

‘Dammit, Gigi!'

The worst thing I could do was run after her. Fortunately, at the end of the long day, the best I could manage was a hobble. She paused to pee, allowing me to keep her in sight. Then, reaching the open area that stretched between the house and the woods on the left,
and the inlet on the right, she headed purposefully for the trees.

Snakes, coyotes, bobcats – I could barely see Gigi at the edge of the brush, but in my mind I could picture any one of those things snatching her up and making a meal out of her. Desperate to stop her, I reached down beneath the panic for the alpha-dog voice I'd never managed before.

‘Gigi, stay!'

She planted her feet. It was too dark and too far to tell, but I imagined she was quite surprised. I certainly was.