Page 119 of Capturing You

Even as the harsh word crossed her mind, she winced at it.

Not a liar. A man who’d lived his entire life in hiding. Maybe she could give him a little leeway because of that.

After a quick snack, Brooklynn shoved her phone into her pocket, grabbed her backpack, and headed for the stairs that led to the attic.

Ford Baker might’ve been a lie, but the smugglers who’d chased her had been very real. If she wanted her life back, she had to figure out who they were.

* * *

Brooklynn had purchasedthe building that housed her gallery a couple of years before. On one side, an alley led to a narrow road parallel to Center Street. On the other side, her gallery and second-story apartment shared a wall with Elvis’s souvenir shop. Beyond that, multiple businesses were housed in this single building, one of which was Maury Stratton’s real estate office.

It wasn’t the real estate office that mattered to Brooklynn today, but the Shadow Cove Historical Society, which was located on Maury’s second floor.

When Brooklynn had first seen this attic, she’d been amazed. Not that it was unusual, with its exposed rafters and plywood floors. What captivated her was the sheer expanse of it. No walls separated the different spaces, so she could see all the way to the far side of the building at the end of the block—a good hundred yards away.

It was hot and stuffy, as she’d expected it to be. She crept softly, not wanting to give her presence away. Unless someone heard her, she shouldn’t see anybody in this barely used space.

She hadn’t walked to the far end since she’d moved into the space. It was filled with boxes and crates and old furniture, most of which were so dusty she wondered if the owners even remembered the things were up here.

Signs on doors leading to staircases indicated the businesses below. At the far end, she found the one with a handwritten note that readStratton Realty.

This was it. She turned the knob, not surprised to find it unlocked. She and her neighbors locked their exterior doors, of course, but they trusted each other. Nobody would take advantage of this shared attic space.

A twinge of guilt had her hesitating, but only for a moment. She needed to do this, and she needed to do it secretly. She’d apologize to Maury later.

Brooklynn let herself in and tiptoed down the stairs, then paused outside the door to the small room that housed the historical society.

Guests used a staircase that rose from the foyer, right outside Maury’s office. Nobody would use this one. These hidden staircases were dark and dingy, unsuitable for tourists and customers.

Brooklynn listened for a few moments, then opened the door.

A creak had her pausing, but nobody reacted.

She let herself in, then closed the door behind her.

It’d been a while since she’d been to the town’s historical society, a couple of years at least. But the dusty bookshelves were exactly the same as they’d always been. An antique desk sat in the middle of the room with a couple of chairs pushed beneath it. Other chairs were stacked in a corner.

Silently, she put her backpack on the floor beside the table and crossed to the bookshelves to search.

She needed to find the book Arthur had produced from Brooklynn’s high school art project. She had a copy of it somewhere, but not in her apartment. It was probably at her parents’ house, but she couldn’t figure a way to go there without being discovered. The house was surely being watched, and the only way to get through the gate was to tap in the code. While doing that, she’d be seen for sure.

No. This was the better choice, even if it involved breaking and entering, or…well, just entering. Probably a misdemeanor at worst, not that Maury would press charges.

The woman was a friend to her family, and the last thing Brooklynn wanted was to put a target on anyone else’s back.

A few minutes later, she slid the book out of the stacks and carried it to the table in the center of the room, bending over it because she didn’t want to risk the noise of a chair scraping across the floor.

She flipped from page to page, certain the distinctive seagull logo was in here, somewhere. She remembered seeing the outline of it floating in the pungent developing chemicals at Arthur’s lab. She could visualize it hanging from clothespins in his old darkroom.

She skimmed past the town’s first church, complete with a bell tower and steeple, and the forties-era World War II monument in the town common. Photos of old buildings had captions explaining when they were built and who’d first owned them. There was an animal pen made of stacked rocks, where early settlers would put sheep and cows at night to protect them from predators.

She turned to photos of the harbor and the text explaining the fishing enterprises that had built the town. She studied the boats, thinking maybe the logo was painted on a side or decorated a sail.

But no.

The next page’s picture displayed downtown from the grassy area that ran along the middle of Center Street. The next photo had been taken from the sidewalk. In the foreground was the hanging sign advertising Arthur’s gallery. The camera was aimed down the hill toward the cove, so that the other shops’ signs looked layered like bricks. The picture had been taken in springtime, and flowers overflowed from pots and window boxes.

At the time, she’d been so proud of the photo. She’d needed to borrow a ladder to get it just right. Now, she saw all the things she’d done wrong. Even so, it was visually impressive.