Big Lies in a Small Town - Diane Chamberlain Page 0,53

dropped, and I could tell I’d left him speechless.

“She won’t inherit it,” I said. “Not only that, but if I don’t have the mural done by then, I don’t get paid and I’ll end up back in prison.”

“What? That’s insane.”

“Jesse Williams specified that the mural had to be done in order for the gallery to open, so—”

“Did Lisa tell you all this?”

I nodded.

He looked away from me, out toward the glass wall of the foyer. “She did tell me—several times—that everything has to be up and running by our opening date, but nothing about her house. Could she be making that up for some reason? To put pressure on you, maybe? Jesse was a real character, but I can’t imagine him disinheriting his daughter just because she can’t get the gallery ready by an arbitrary date.”

“I don’t think she was lying. I caught her crying and then she told me.”

Oliver grimaced. “Wow,” he said. “Well, I guess if I were in danger of losing something precious to me, I’d be a nasty SOB myself.”

“You’d always be nice,” I blurted out, then felt myself blush. Oliver struck me as perpetually calm, perpetually kind. “Seriously,” I said. “Thank you for helping me so much.”

He smiled, and I wondered if he knew I was developing the teensiest crush on him. “We’d better get back to work,” he said. “Let’s stay one step ahead of the boss lady.”

Adam and Wyatt came into the gallery around four and began taking measurements for the long “information counter” that would run parallel to the wall where the mural would be displayed. My ladder and supplies were in their way and after dozens of “can I move this?” and “excuse us” and a few other comments that let me know they thought their work was more important than mine, I called it quits. The air-conditioning wasn’t working properly, either, and being up on the ladder only added to my misery. I’d finished my quota of squares for the day, anyhow, and I left the gallery and headed back to Lisa’s.

“Done for the day?” Lisa asked when I walked in the front door, and I explained about Adam and Wyatt taking measurements in the foyer. For the first time since I’d met her, Lisa was dressed in jeans. They were dressy jeans, but still. She wore a loose embroidered yellow blouse and her hair was pulled back in a small ponytail at the nape of her neck. She looked very pretty and the closest to relaxed I’d seen her.

“Hmm,” she said. “Those guys are going to have to stay out of your way as they build that thing.” Then she looked into the air above my head as if pondering something. “Well, listen,” she said. “Would you like to see where my father grew up?”

The invitation was so out of character that it took me a moment to understand it. “Tonight?” I asked.

“Uh-huh. It’s my aunt’s birthday. Mama Nelle. My father’s baby sister.”

“Wow,” I said. Did I want to spend a whole evening with Lisa? But the thought of seeing where Jesse Williams grew up was enticing. “All right,” I said. “Give me a minute to change?”

Lisa looked at her phone. “Hurry up,” she said. “I want to leave in five.”

I raced to the sunroom. I had little in the way of nice clothes. Everything I’d bought after being sprung from prison had been with the idea that I’d spend the bulk of my time working on the mural. But I put on a pair of clean jeans and the only decent top I owned—the blue sleeveless blouse I’d worn the day I left prison. I ran a comb through my hair and hurried out front, where Lisa was already waiting in her car.

“How far is it?” I asked as Lisa began driving.

“Just a little ways outside town.”

“So, this ‘Mama Nelle’ is Jesse’s sister?”

“Yes.”

“How come you call her ‘Mama’ then?”

“Everybody does. Don’t know when that started, but everybody treats her like she’s their mama. She’s eighty-seven and has a serious heart condition and some of that come-and-go type of dementia, so we’re all thinkin’ this may be her last birthday.”

Lisa sounded different. The change in her voice was fascinating, actually. Her tone was more casual, her language looser. She was definitely off duty tonight.

“He grew up out in the country?” I asked as the town gave way to fields that stretched far into the distance.

Lisa nodded. “The Williams farm’s been in our extended family one way or ’nother pretty