disappearance, and you thought that someone was me?” he asked, sounding astonished.
She nodded and looked away, too embarrassed to meet his gaze. “You’re the only person in my life right now from my past.”
Sebastian reached out and gently turned her face so that she had no choice but to look at him again. “I can understand why you might reach that conclusion. Don’t beat yourself up about it. How about I help you find out who the ghost is talking about?”
“How?” she asked.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Make a list of everyone who was in your life at the time, and we’ll see if we can track them down.” Sebastian gave her a reassuring smile. “I do have resources for that sort of thing.”
Since he was a lawyer, she had no doubt that he did. Why hadn’t she just talked to him first?
Trust.
That was the problem. It was the major problem and also the key ingredient to figuring out the mystery of her mother’s disappearance according to yet another ghost. And without it, history would repeat itself. A shiver ran through her, and no matter how much she wanted to burrow and hideaway from everything like she had been doing her entire adult life, it was time to face it. Both for her mother and herself.
“You don’t mind?” she asked. “I don’t want to be a burden.”
He gazed down at her, his eyes piercing hers. “Gigi, you have never been a burden. Now stop overthinking this and just say thank you.”
Her lips curved up into a small half smile. “Okay. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He pulled her into him, giving her a long hug.
When she finally pulled away, she got up and disappeared into her office to grab a notebook and pen. On her way back to the living room, she stopped in the powder room to wash her face and give herself a pep talk. Looking in the mirror, she said, “No more crying. No more falling apart in front of Sebastian. Got it?”
Her eyes were red and slightly puffy. It had been an emotional evening, leaving her drained, but she was going to see this through. Sebastian was her best shot at finally getting to the bottom of her mother’s disappearance.
After returning to the living room, she once again sat next to Sebastian and opened the notebook. “Okay, time to list everyone we remember who might know anything about what happened to Mom.”
“Your next-door neighbor?” Sebastian asked.
“Liza?” Gigi’s eyebrows shot up. She was the older neighbor next door who’d looked out for both of them. Gigi couldn’t imagine she’d held anything back from her or the detective when they’d interviewed her, but Gigi wasn’t going to rule anyone out. Maybe she had new information or hadn’t thought a detail was important.
“Yes. What’s her last name?”
“Liza Crane. But she must be in her eighties by now.”
“I’ll check,” Sebastian said, taking the notebook from her and writing the name down.
“My mom’s boss. Ricky something. He managed the magazine she worked for,” Gigi said, frowning as she tried to remember his last name. “Ricky Kemp? Kent? Something like that.”
“What magazine?”
“Central Coast Secrets.” It had been a travel magazine highlighting the small tourist towns on the Central California coast. Gigi wasn’t even sure if it was still being published.
“Got it,” he said, making another note. They went through a dozen or more names of people in Bellside that Gigi and her mother both knew, no matter how insignificant they were. Like the yoga instructor from their weekly class as well as the manager at the local café who’d had an obvious crush on Carolyn.
“We have a lot of people here without last names,” Sebastian said, rubbing his jaw.
“Will that make it impossible to trace them?” she asked, leaning back into the couch.
“Not necessarily. The firm has access to PIs that can find just about anything, but it will cost us.”
“That’s fine. I can afford it.”
Sebastian glanced around the house and nodded. “Looks like money isn’t a problem.”
“Family trust,” she said with a humorless chuckle. “After knowing how I grew up, would you ever have guessed there was a trust out there that contained the kind of money that would put me in a beach house and—”
“Attract a man who was only interested in your investment accounts?” Sebastian asked bitterly.
Gigi blinked up at him, her mouth open, shocked at his bluntness.
“Sorry, I—”
She started to laugh, cutting him off. “Please. Don’t be. You’re only speaking the truth. If I’d left the money untouched, perhaps I’d