Page 44

Rowan

Hank’s mood never recovers. By ten p.m., I’m tipsy, but he’s officially drunk. And as Natalie would say, I’m so over this party. At least they fed me dinner. I ate every bite, including the appetizer, the slightly overcooked steak and sides, and a tiny cheesecake they served for dessert.

When Hank finally decides that it’s time to leave, we fetch my coat and step outside, where it’s now dark and rainy.

“I really can take an Uber,” I offer as the wind whips the lapels of my jacket around. “It’s no problem.”

“That’ll take forever,” Hank says, pronouncing his words carefully. “And there’s my guy already.”

Hank’s Jaguar glides into view and halts at the curb. An older gentleman gets out. “Ready, sir?”

I march to the car, open the back door, and slide in.

To my dismay, Hank slides in beside me.

“Home, then?” the driver asks mildly.

“Two stops if you wouldn’t mind,” I say quickly. “I’m on Spruce Street, number fifty. Near Clark. It’s just a few minutes from here.”

“Of course, miss.”

I sit back and try to relax. It’s not that I’m afraid Hank will murder me in his Jag in front of a witness. I’m just exhausted, and I have so many questions without answers.

Without warning, Hank puts his hand on my bare knee. “Can I ask you a question?”

My skin crawls, and surprise makes me slow to reply. “Um, sure.”

“How mad is Beatrice?”

“What?” I barely process the question, because his palm is still on my knee.

“I told her she wasn’t a good candidate.” He rests his head drunkenly against the seat’s back.

“Oh, the director job.” In what I hope is an unobtrusive maneuver, I cross my legs, and his hand slides off. “She’s... not happy,” I say brilliantly. “Because she knows she’s got a lot of skills that the job needs.”

“It’s not a matter of skills,” he says.

Tell me something I don’t know . “That doesn’t make her feel better,” I point out, “when she clearly cares so much about the mission.”

“She’s very loyal to the family.” His careful diction makes me wonder if he’s had a lot of practice trying to sound sober. “But loyalty only goes so far. You’ve also got to have the connections. You have to make it rain money.”

“Right,” I agree. “But maybe you’ll find something else for Beatrice. Director of Programming? You could lose her, you know.”

“Lose her?” He laughs. “Never.”

God, the arrogance in this family.

“I’m sorry my brother was a tool to you,” Hank says, as if reading my mind. “He’s like that to everyone, in case that helps.”

“Can I ask what his issue is? Does he hate the mansion?”

Hank goes silent, and as the moment stretches out, I wonder if I should have kept my mouth closed. “He likes to play the martyr,” he says eventually. “Any bad PR for the family makes him cranky.”

Cranky is an understatement.

“He thinks it’s bad taste to draw any kind of attention. That we shouldn’t show off our family’s two hundred years of history in Portland. It might make it harder to fly under the radar when he’s laying off American factory workers or whatever he’s up to this week.”

“But you think it’s worth it,” I press. “To burnish the family name? Maybe for political reasons?” My pulse kicks into a higher gear as I wait to hear what he’ll say. I’d really like to know which of the Wincotts thinks the family has the most to hide, especially where the mansion is concerned.

“Yeah, sometimes it’s useful to remind the people of our fine state that Maine was built on the shipping industry, and that my family did a lot of the building.” He chuckles to himself. “I’m saddled with my shitty family, so I might as well get a few perks of the legacy.”

“Right,” I say slowly. “The mansion is a jewel, and you wouldn’t be the first Wincott to show it off.”

“Did you know that Maine was a dry state when Amos built the house?” he asks. “And did you also notice the big wine cellar in the basement? There’s a reason his parties were popular. The Wincotts have always been hypocrites.”

“Have they?” I ask carefully. “Until Marcus Wincott painted over the wine-swilling gods on the walls. Did you know your uncle well?”

“My great -uncle,” he corrects. “And no, I don’t remember much about him. He was the bachelor uncle at the Thanksgiving table. Liked his scotch. As if I should talk, right?” He laughs.

“It’s funny,” I say, although nothing seems funny. “But your uncle really took the place in a new direction. Most old mansions don’t have a birthing table. And an incubator and forceps and graffiti on the wall, saying, Help me. I want out .”

His head swings in my direction. “Graffiti? Where?”

“It’s in a closet. The conservator found it.”

“Weird.” Hank shrugs but doesn’t say anything more.

If Hank knows what happened at the Magdalene Home, he isn’t going to confide in me.

The driver pulls up in front of my house and kills the engine. “Spruce Street,” he announces.

“Thank you,” I say, popping open the door before anyone can consider helping me out.

It doesn’t work. Hank exits his side of the car at the same time I exit mine.

I really don’t need him to walk me to the door, even if I might have welcomed the gesture a week ago, when I was still imagining a murderer in a ski mask hiding in the shrubberies.

Now I’m wondering whether the murderer owns a Jaguar.

The rain has turned to mist. I head up the walk, fishing out my key. Hank is right on my heels. “Cute house,” he says, stepping up onto the porch. “Did you renovate it yourself?”

“Of course.”

His grin is a little broader than necessary. “Hey—thanks for coming out with me tonight, Rowan. I appreciate it.”

“My pleasure,” I lie.

It’s time for his smile to dim, but it doesn’t. My wariness flares.

He says, “Tell me this—how come we never dated in high school?”

I try to laugh it off. “Because you were cool, and I wasn’t?” And please get off my porch .

I lift my keys, but he’s leaning against the doorframe, blocking my way.

“Rowan,” he says slowly, and my stomach drops. “You are cool. You’re one of the cool kids. Maybe we should see more of each other.”

I don’t answer right away because I’m trying to think of a nice way to say “That’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard in my life.” And the hesitation costs me. He lifts a hand to cup my face. And then he plants a wet kiss on my mouth.

I freeze, even though my mind screams Run!

The porch light flashes on. Blindingly.

Startled, Hank jerks back, lifting a hand to shield his eyes against the glare. “Jesus.”

Inside the house, Lickie lets out a warning woof . And then, after a beat, another one.

I finally find my voice. “Hey! I have to call it a night. I need to get in there. Let the dog out. You know. And your driver is waiting.” I’m babbling, but it works.

“Shit, okay.” He’s still wincing against the light, but he turns toward his Jaguar like he’s forgotten it’s even there. “Another time. You have a good night.”

The moment he moves, I slip the key into the lock and disengage the deadbolt. I’m inside the house faster than you can say worst night ever .

I close the door, lock it behind me, and lean against it. And there’s Harrison, feeding Lickie a piece of...

“Is that cheese ? She’s not supposed to get table food.”

“But she’s such a good girl,” he says maddeningly.

I use my forearm to wipe off my mouth. “Was that you? Did you just flip on the porch light?”

“Sure. Awful dark out.” He shrugs.

I squint at him while my heart does calisthenics in my chest. What did he see? “Is Natalie home?”

“Upstairs. Watching a movie with a friend. Some girl named Tessa who’s sixteen going on thirty-six.”

I’ve had the exact same thought about Tessa many times. But that isn’t what we need to talk about. “Look, I learned something tonight. You know that silver saint medallion? The one that was your mother’s?”

“Sure. Natalie has it now.” He strokes Lickie’s head absently. “She showed it to me. And she told me about the one they found in Kovak’s car.”

“Right. And that was a shock. But there was a woman at this event tonight who also had one. When I asked her about it, she told me it was a gift to babies born at the mansion.”

He frowns. “That’s weird?. But I wasn’t born there. My birth certificate has the name of a hospital on it.”

“Are you sure? Can I see?”

He studies me for a beat with solemn gray eyes. “Sure, Ro. Whatever you need.” He turns around and heads for the den, Lickie on his heels, as if she’s his dog. Traitor.

I take off my coat and follow them both into the room. The first thing I notice is a Shop-Vac—the one I usually keep in the basement. And the second thing I notice is that lots of old paint has been scraped and sanded off the woodwork. “Whoa. What are you doing?”

“Finding my birth certificate.” He’s sorting through an old shoebox that appears to hold his personal documents.

“No, I mean in here.”

He looks up. “You said you were trying to remove the paint and wallpaper in here. If I rent a steamer, I could get the wallpaper off in a day.”

I blink. “You don’t have to do that.”

“Least I can do,” he mutters. “Now where the hell is... ah.” He pulls a manila envelope out of the box and flips it open. “Here we go.” He hands me a birth certificate.

George Harrison Jones. Born June 22, 1982, 10:25 a.m. at Mercy Hospital, Portland, Maine.

I read the details twice. His mother—who obviously loved the Beatles—listed her own name. But on the line for the father, someone has typed UNKNOWN in capital letters. Harsh.

“Satisfied?” he asks.

“Sorry.” I let out a sigh. “Nothing makes sense.”

“Rowan?” he asks quietly. “Are you okay? You seem really stressed.”

“Yeah. That was the longest night of my adult life. And I work for a man who may or may not be covering up a baby-selling scandal.”

He takes the birth certificate out of my hand, puts it away, and sits on the futon. “I think you’d better explain.” He pats the spot beside him.

***

“So...” Harrison pinches the bridge of his nose. “You think it’s possible that Hank Wincott is a killer? Because he wanted to shut Tim up?”

“Hank, or his asshole of a brother. Think about it—Hank runs the same foundation that his great-uncle used to run. And he’s positioning himself to run for Senate. Meanwhile, somewhere in the books and records of his charity are all these adoptions...”

“And some of them were coerced.”

“Right. There could be a dozen more women like Laura. The Wincotts ran that maternity home for, what? Thirty years? More, actually. It opened in the fifties, before closing in the late eighties or early nineties.”

Harrison strokes his beard. He’s always been the kind of person who thinks before he speaks, while I’m sitting here on the sofa in my dress, practically vibrating with anxiety. “It’s not just the bad adoptions that are rotten in this story. Laura said he was cruel to those girls. He liked punishing them. He might have been molesting them. If Hank knows about any of it, then he’s up to his neck in scandal.”

“Okay, I can see it.” He picks up a pair of scissors off the side table. “You want a cup of soup?”

“What?”

“If I snip the thread at the back of your dress, you can put on comfortable clothes and have a cup of tomato soup. Your call.”

“Oh.” Am I stubborn enough to refuse the best soup in the world? Apparently not. “Yes, please.”

His smile is so quick that I almost miss it. “Then turn around.”

His voice is low and steady, and I find myself doing exactly as he asks. I’m too tired to find that irritating.

“Hold still.”

One of his roughened hands lands on my bare shoulder, and I try not to shiver. But he’s so close I can feel the gentle exhale of his breath on my neck as the scissors snip the stitches he made. Goose bumps rise on my skin as he unzips my dress a couple of crucial inches. The sound of the zipper’s teeth and the drag of his fingers against my bare skin make me close my eyes.

“All set,” he whispers, the words vibrating inside my chest.

I pop off the futon without a word. Upstairs, I change into sweatpants and an old T-shirt, and head to the bathroom to wipe off my makeup. From behind Natty’s closed door, I hear the shrieks of two teenage girls laughing.

I return downstairs to find Harrison standing in my kitchen, looking like he belongs in it. Maybe this is his strategy. To ingratiate himself with my daughter and lull me into submission with soup. And also by looking as hot at forty-two as he did at twenty-two.

Men. It’s not fair.

“Here,” he says, putting a bowl of soup onto the table. “We put a dent in the crackers, but I saved you a few.” After I sit, he sets down a saucer with four toasty-looking crackers on it.

I pull the bowl toward me, dip in the spoon, and take a sip. “Wow. Good as ever.”

“Glad you still like it.” He’s smart enough not to look smug, and this solidifies my belief that he’s playing the long game.

“So tell me this—why do you think your mother had that medallion? You said she worked at the mansion when you were little. That’s the early eighties. The maternity home was still open then.”

“What if she just stole it? Maybe there was a stash of them in the office.”

“Maybe,” I concede. “You don’t know what she did there?”

“No idea. But she was only nineteen when I was born. Whatever the job was, it had to be something pretty basic. Cleaning. Food prep. Laundry. Those were the kinds of jobs she always had.”

“Do you remember ever going there with her?”

He shakes his head.

“She was so young,” I say slowly. “What if she was born at the mansion?”

Another shake of his head. “She was born in Canada. Moved here when she was a toddler.”

“Oh right. I wish we knew other people who worked there at the same time. Somebody might remember her.”

“But Ro.” Harrison pins me with a gray-eyed glare. “This isn’t your mystery to solve. If you really think Hank Wincott is violent, and hell-bent on keeping this shit buried, then maybe you should let him. Can’t forget that warning someone sent you.”

“I mean, obviously, this is a job for the police. But I want them to have all the information.” So they leave you and me alone .

He reaches across the table and covers my hand with his. “Just watch yourself. Would Hank have any reason to believe you’re a threat—that you’ve already seen too many of his family skeletons?”

My heart thumps against my chest. Because not an hour ago I asked Hank about Marcus Wincott. “I’ll be careful.”

“Natalie needs you,” he whispers.

“I know,” I whisper back, getting trapped in the tractor beam of his serious gaze.

We’re having a staring contest. And neither of us can figure out who’s going to break first.

He does, as it turns out. He stands up and takes my now-empty soup bowl over to the sink, rinses it, and puts it in the dishwasher.

The cat slides her body between his ankles, and after he dries his hands, he scoops her up into a football hold.

“Thank you for the soup,” I say as he turns to leave the kitchen.

He stops beside me, and I wait for him to say something. Instead, he bends down and kisses me gently on the forehead. It’s a quick press of warmth and whiskers.

He’s left the kitchen by the time I realize I’m holding my breath.