First Frost (24 page)

“I was wondering,” Claire said when he finally entered, “when you were asking about me around town, did anyone ever tell you about my grandmother?”

“Your grandmother?” Russell repeated. “No, not in detail.”

“When you knew my mother, did she ever talk about her?” She put on oven mitts and leaned over to pull a baking sheet with two more loaves out of the oven.

He skirted the question by saying, “Now, Claire, Lorelei wasn't your mother.”

Claire took the loaves off the baking sheet and set them on wire racks to cool with the others. “My grandmother Mary once sold a woman a bottle of her snapdragon oil, and the next day the woman found her family's lost emeralds, buried in a bean tin in their backyard,” Claire said, as she slid off her oven mitts. “There are all sorts of stories like that about her. I'm actually surprised you haven't heard them.”

“Smoke and mirrors,” Russell said.

“Maybe in your world, but not mine.”

Russell was confused, and Claire could tell he didn't like it. “Do you have my check or not?”

“Not yet,” Claire said.

“Today. I said today.”

Claire went to the knife block and slowly pulled out a bread knife. “First, you need to satisfy my curiosity about something.” She took one of the cooled loaves of bread on the counter and cut a thick slice of it. “You read about my candy business, but did you ever actually taste the candy?”

“I don't have a sweet tooth,” Russell replied.

“That doesn't surprise me. I'm thinking you could have saved us both a lot of trouble if you had.” She put the slice of bread on a blue plate. She even put a pat of butter beside it. “Here, try this,” she said, sliding the plate in front of him, where he was standing at the end of the kitchen island.

Russell's eyes briefly fell to the plate, then he focused back on Claire. “Thank you, but I'm not hungry,” he said.

“Maybe I didn't make my terms clear. Try this, or we have nothing to discuss.”

He didn't take his eyes off her, but his feelers were twitching. “You do realize that trying to poison me would just draw more attention to what you don't want anyone to know?”

“I'm not trying to poison you,” Claire said with a laugh. “That's fig and pepper bread, made from staples I already had in the cabinets.” She sliced off a piece from the same loaf and took a bite. The crust was hard, but the bread was moist, and the sharp spice of the pepper was a strange complement to the exotic sweetness of the fig. She chewed and swallowed, making a production of how good it was.

But Russell said, “I'm still not eating it.”

Claire smiled. “What do you think this bread will do to you, Mr. Zahler? Change your mind? Make you forget? Make you ashamed? Because I'm capable of making all those things happen. That's how good I am. That's how well my grandmother taught me.” She leaned forward and whispered, “Take a bite. I dare you.” She could feel it tingling under her skin, her gift, her intent. It made her feel powerful and grounded.
Rooted.

Russell shifted his weight, just slightly. “As I said, I'm not hungry.”

Claire leaned back and shook her head. “I have to admit, the DNA test and forged birth certificate were nice touches,” she said. “But I'm calling your bluff.”

Russell stared at her with those silver eyes, waiting her out, but she simply stared back. He seemed to be using the silence to search for another angle. But suddenly, for whatever reason, Russell decided to break eye contact. He lost his bluster, and it was almost a physical transformation, making him a size too small for his suit. “I left you with too much time to think about it.” He put his hands in his pockets and paced a few steps away. He paced back and said, “If I had demanded the money yesterday, you would have given it to me. I could tell. What happened?”

“I talked to my sister,” Claire said simply. “You underestimate the power of family, Mr. Zahler. I almost did, too.”

“But, Claire, as I said, Lorelei wasn't your—”

“Don't insult me again with that, Mr. Zahler.”

Without another word, he turned and walked out. Maybe he decided she wasn't worth it. Maybe he was tired. Maybe he had bigger fish to fry somewhere else. How he ended up here, with the story of Lorelei, she would never know. His departure was so sudden, she thought of going after him. She wanted to ask questions about her mother, what he really knew about her, what relationship they really had. Small things that might make Lorelei more solid to her. But she didn't. In the end, she decided she could live with all she would never know about her mother and grandmother. She could live with not knowing what was in the Karl journal. The one true thing was that these women were a part of her life, a part of who she was.

And who she was, was a Waverley.

*   *   *

Anne Ainsley was washing the dishes from breakfast (her brother said an automatic dishwasher was out of the question for his fine china) when she thought she smelled something burning. She stopped and turned her head, making sure the oven was off. Earlier, she'd cracked the window over the sink to let out some of the hot air from breakfast preparations. She sniffed at the window a few times. It was coming from outside.

She left the dishes in the sink and opened the kitchen door.

Drying her hands on her jeans as she walked out, she looked around and saw smoke coming from her private alcove. Was the heat pump on fire? Oh, great, she thought. She'd lose her one private spot outside.

As she jogged closer, though, she realized that the smoke was coming from the ground, where there were papers burning on the large metal lid from the garbage can. Russell was sitting in one of the chairs in her alcove, tossing papers onto the fire one by one, watching each of them burn.

He didn't acknowledge her as she sat in the chair opposite him.

She watched as he burned the magazine article about Claire Waverley and her candy business. Then copies of Claire's tax records. Anne's knee bounced anxiously, thinking she would have
loved
to have had a closer look at those. Next, he burned copies of death certificates for two people named Barbie Peidpoint and Ingler Whiteman.

Last, he tossed two identical photos onto the pile (but there had been three copies, Anne remembered, from the suitcase). At the last moment, he reached in and snatched one of the photos back. He shook the singed photo quickly, cooling it off. Then he put it in his interior jacket pocket, where thin tendrils of smoke escaped from his buttonholes.

Russell hadn't stayed long at breakfast, like he usually did. For a slender man in his eighties, he sure could put it away. But this morning he'd seemed in a hurry. He'd only taken coffee and a few slices of bacon. Then he'd disappeared. Anne thought at first, since this was checkout day, that he'd left without so much as a farewell. She'd even gone to his room to make sure.

But his suitcase had still been there, and she'd felt unaccountably relieved.

“What was all that?” Anne asked, after the flames had died down.

“A ritual of mine,” Russell said, still staring at the smoldering ash. “I'm tying up loose ends before I go.”

“Was that one of your files?” she asked, because by now he'd surely known she'd snooped. As good as she thought she was, not much escaped Russell's attention.

He didn't respond.

“The file on Lorelei Waverley?”

He finally nodded.

“What are you doing here, Russell?” Anne said, leaning forward. “I can't figure you out, and it's driving me crazy.”

His eyes lifted to meet hers. Instead of answering, he said in his most polite voice, “You have my thanks for the most comfortable stay I've had in a while. Checkout is at eleven, correct?”

She sat back in her seat, disappointed. She'd spent the past few nights staring at the carnival flyer she'd taken from his suitcase, staring at the photo of him from when he was young. He'd been a handsome devil. She'd tried Googling Sir Walter Trott's Traveling Carnival and the Great Banditi, but nothing came up. What a life he must have lived. Her skin itched at the thought of all his secrets. She couldn't imagine the stories he could tell. The burning sausage and pepper stand. Catching the robber. That was just the tip of the iceberg. She couldn't believe he was leaving. Nothing,
nothing
was ever going to be this interesting.

But, then, disappointment was nothing new. She stood. “Take some water from the hose over there and make sure this is out before you leave. Andrew will have a fit if something gets damaged.”

She caught a look of sadness on his face, like her leaving him triggered a sense of loss. He wanted her to be fascinated by him. He wanted her attention. But, stubborn as men were, he wouldn't tell her. She turned and walked away.

“I was here hoping to blackmail Claire Waverley,” Russell suddenly called after her.

She turned back around and gave him a grunt. “I could have told you that wasn't going to end well.”

He held his hands out, palms up. “My options are limited these days.”

She walked back to him. He seemed smaller, frailer, sitting there as she stood over him. “What are you going to do now?”

“I told you. I'm going to Florida.”

“How are you going to get there?” She glanced at his polished shoes with the holes in the soles.

“By bus.”

“I have a car. I could take you,” she said, the words out of her mouth before she realized she'd said them. But once they were out, she thought they sounded
wonderful,
like the first time you hear what will become your favorite song.

Russell shook his head. “I don't have a heart anymore, Anne.”

“And I don't have expectations anymore. What?” she asked with a laugh. “You thought I wanted a love affair? You're old enough to be my father.”

He clutched at his heart dramatically. “I'm wounded.”

She scoffed as she sat back down. “Hardly.”

He considered her for a moment. “If not a love affair, then what?”

“
I want stories,
” she said. “And I don't care if they're lies. I'm tired of picking around in other people's lives, making things up on my own. I want to hear everything you have to say. I've lived here all my life, and all the stories are the same. Every one of my husbands, the same story. But you've been everywhere, haven't you? I want to follow you where you go, and see what you do. I think you've been on your own for a while, haven't you? At some point, you're not going to make it on your own. I could be there for you. I'm a decent cook. I could take early retirement and get a little money in the mail every month. And there's over six thousand in the inn safe that my brother won't miss until he discovers I'm gone.”

He hesitated for just a moment. Then he shook his head dismissively. It was ridiculous, but she was offended, offended that she wasn't deviant enough for him. “Too messy,” he said. “He'd call the police.”

“In case you haven't noticed by now, I'm nosy,” Anne pointed out. “That's how I know my brother has flash drives full of video chats he's recorded, showing him having virtual sex with some woman in Finland who calls herself Karma-licious. He spends hundreds of dollars a month on her. I could take one of the flash drives and then leave one in the safe so he'll know I know. He won't call the police.”

That tempted him. She could tell. Food. Money. Those were his weaknesses. He took a deep breath and exhaled with a long, drawn-out sigh. He stared into the smoldering ash of his failed attempt at cash. “Oh, Anne, it's not as glamorous as you think it is. You have a good life here. I'm going to a charity camp for retired circus workers.”

“Do I look like someone who wants glamour? I think that sounds
fantastic.
” She reached into her jeans pocket and brought out the flyer she'd taken from him. She unfolded it and showed him. “What do you say, Great Banditi?”

He studied the flyer, looking at the old photo as if through a telescope pointed back in time. “You can keep that, if you'd like. But on the condition that you remember me fondly. There are so few people who do.”

“I find that hard to believe. Who could forget you?”

He smiled derisively. “Oh, many people remember me. But not
fondly.
”

Anne pushed the flyer into his hands. “I'm not keeping it. I'm going with you. Meet me in front of the inn at five o'clock, after tea. All the new guests will be checked in by then. My brother won't know I'm gone until the morning.”

She felt her nerves tingling and her stomach jumped with excitement as she walked away, even though Russell called sadly after her, “It's been a pleasure, Anne.”

*   *   *

“Checkout is at eleven, Mr. Zahler,” Andrew Ainsley said, sitting at the front desk like a large, lazy sentinel.

“Thank you. I am aware. I'll be down shortly,” Russell said as he walked up the staircase after making sure the ashes of his Lorelei Waverley file were cool. He reached his room and closed the door behind him. He'd left the curtains open and warm autumnal sunshine was covering the bed, making it glow. He wanted to lie down, to absorb the softness of the mattress one last time.

But he didn't. Instead, he sat on the edge of the bed and waited for sounds of other guests leaving for checkout. He would sneak out behind them and avoid Andrew Ainsley at the front desk.

He took the photo out of his pocket, wondering why he had saved it at the last minute. He certainly didn't like being reminded of his failures.

He was usually good at reading people, and he'd been almost certain Claire Waverley wouldn't tell anyone about his visit to her, that she wouldn't immediately call her family for support. Everything he'd learned about her had pointed to a singular, contained person who liked her mysterious air. She wasn't the kind of person who would risk others thinking there was nothing special about her.