Stunned silence is all I can manage in response. I’m not sure whether I’m excited or scared to death…or if I’m crazy for even thinking about visiting a stranger’s house in the middle of the night.
On the other hand, he is a reputable and well-known businessman on the island.
A businessman who now knows that I’ve unearthed at least some part of a secret.
His grandfather’s deathbed secret.
What if there’s a sinister intention behind this midnight invitation? No one will even know where I am. Who can I tell?
I can’t think of anybody I’d want to let in on this right now.
I’ll leave a note…here in the cottage….
No…wait. I’ll send myself an email. If I go missing, that’s the first place they’ll check.
The thought feels melodramatic and silly, and then again, it doesn’t. “I’ll grab my keys and—”
“You won’t need your car. I’m four cottages down.”
“You’re right in the neighborhood?” Parting the kitchen curtains, I try to see through the wall of yaupon and live oak. All this time, he was practically next door?
“It’s quicker by the beach. I’ll turn the back-porch light on.”
“I’ll be right there.”
I rattle around the cottage looking for a flashlight and batteries. Fortunately, whatever relatives have been using the place did leave the basics. My phone rings as I’m thumb-typing an email to myself, documenting my whereabouts and my time of departure. I jump at least three feet, then land hard in a pit of dread. Trent changed his mind already….
But the phone number is Elliot’s. I’m too wound up to calculate what time it is in Milan right now, but no doubt he’s working. “I was tied up when you called yesterday. Sorry,” he says.
“I figured. Busy day?”
“Rather,” he says vaguely, as usual. In his family, the women aren’t interested in business. “How are things on Edisto?”
Honestly, the grapevine in our family is better than microchip tracking. “How did you know I was here?”
“Mother told me,” he sighs. “She’d been over to Drayden Hill to get a baby fix, since your sister and Courtney and the boys are visiting. Now she’s on the grandkid kick again.” Elliot is understandably frustrated. “She reminded me that I’m thirty-one already, and she’s fifty-seven, and she doesn’t want to be an old grandmother.”
“Uh-oh.” I wonder sometimes what it’ll be like to have Bitsy as a mother-in-law. I love her, and she means well, but she makes Honeybee look subtle.
“Can we book your sister and the triplets to go stay at Mother’s for a few days?” Elliot suggests ruefully. “Maybe that’ll cure her.”
Even though I get the joke, it stings. I adore the triplets, even if they are little wild men. “You could ask.” Despite the fact Elliot and I have only talked about kids as an eventual part of our life plan, he’s already concerned that multiple births run in my family. He doesn’t think he could handle more than one at a time. Every once in a while, I worry that having kids someday might be never for Elliot. I know we’ll work these things out as we go. Don’t most couples have to?
“So how long are you at the beach?” he says, changing the subject.
“Just a couple days. If I stay any longer, Leslie will send someone to hunt me down.”
“Well, Leslie is looking out for your best interests. You need to be seen. That’s the reason you moved home.”
I moved home to look after my dad, I want to say, but with Elliot, everything is a step toward something. He’s the most achievement-oriented person I’ve ever met. “I know. But it’s nice to have a little breather. You sound like you could use one too. Get some rest while you’re over there, okay? And don’t worry about your mother and the grandkid thing. She’ll be focused on something else tomorrow.”
We say goodbye, and I finish the precautionary email to myself. If I’m never heard from again, someone will eventually check there. Midnight Tuesday evening. I’m going four doors down from the Edisto cottage to talk to Trent Turner about something involving Grandma Judy. Should be back in an hour or so. Leaving this message just in case.
It feels dorky, but I send it anyway before slipping out the door.
Outside, the night is quiet and deep as I walk the path through the dunes, shining my flashlight to keep a lookout for snakes. Along the shore, most of the cottages have gone dark,