Her Sister's Secrets Read online

  “Yeah,” I said. “That’s been the damnedest thing.” That night, after the exhibition, I’d looked at my blog and noticed that traffic was way up and comments were way up, but I hadn’t known what to make of it. I’d been worried that it had been hacked or something, but it turned out that all the traffic was genuine. My ad sales were way up and when I checked my cookbook sales, they were in the stratosphere. I’d been too busy with searching for Violet’s killer to notice that I was having my best month ever as a food blogger. “You know, you said something about telling your friend about my blog.”

  He laughed. “I may have told a few friends. Chatty friends.”

  I shook my head at him. “Well, I don’t know how to thank you. I mean, here I was thinking that you were a murderer—”

  “I didn’t do anything, really. I mentioned your blog, but the strength of your recipes is what sold it to my friends,” he said. “However, if you did want to thank me, I’d still love it if you came to that dinner with me that I’ve been trying to rope you into.”

  My eyes widened. “After everything I said to you, you’d still want that?”

  “Of course,” he said. “But I assumed that what I said to you chased you out of this house, so I didn’t think you’d ever speak to me again.”

  What he’d said had been… well, mostly sad. It reminded me that people were people, whether rich or poor or somewhere in between, and that the tragedies that befell us were always about our human interactions.

  I squared my shoulders. “Okay. I’ll go to dinner with you.”

  “Excellent,” he said, grinning. He gestured to the box I’d been carrying. “You want a hand with that?”

  I grinned back. “Sure thing.”

  And then I stood back at watched the muscles in his arms constrict.

  * * *

  Later, we pulled into the driveway at Violet’s house.

  I got out of my car and Phin got out of his. We’d filled up my trunk and half my backseat with stuff from the beach house, but there was still room in Phin’s car.

  I could have headed right up to the porch and gone in, but I hesitated.

  Phin walked around his car to me, jamming his hands into his pockets. We gazed at each other. I drew in a long, slow breath, and then I looked away. Tears stung my eyes.

  Phin was next to me right away, his hand on my back. His voice was soft. “Hey, look, I’ll take another day off, maybe in a few weeks, and—”

  “No.” I sniffed, rubbing at my eyes and turning back to him. “That’s crazy, and you don’t have any other days to take off, anyway.”

  He rubbed my back for a while, not saying anything. When he did, he just whispered, “You’re not ready.”

  “I’ll never be ready,” I said. “Because she shouldn’t be gone.”

  “You’re right. She shouldn’t.”

  Damn Oliver Patterson. He’d stolen my sister from me. I was glad he was dead, but it didn’t bring her back. It didn’t undo any of the pain.

  “I’ll do whatever you need,” said Phin.

  I hugged him. “You’re the best, you know that? How’d I get so lucky to have a friend like you?”

  He mused over this. “Lucky, huh? You lost your dog, and your mom, and your sister, and you nearly got drowned yourself by your sister’s murderer. So, I’m thinking—”

  “I am lucky, though,” I said. “In a lot of ways, I have more than I could ever ask for.”

  He smiled. “Well, I love you too.”

  I kissed his forehead. “You’re my rock.”

  And then we just smiled at each other for a few minutes, because we really were each other’s family. Always would be, no matter what happened.

  Finally, I squared my shoulders, took a deep breath, and I climbed onto Violet’s porch.

  Stepping into Violet’s house was hard.

  But in some ways, it was easier than it had been before. Maybe because I had found Violet’s murderer, I wasn’t sure. It was good to know how she’d died. It meant I didn’t have to wonder so much.

  Of course, it didn’t make things better. Violet was still gone, and I was never going to get her back.

  However, the time in Violet’s world had helped me get to know my sister better. Even though she’d been gone, I’d been able to find out about her life. I knew the men she’d loved and the people she’d spent time with, and the things that had occupied her time. It wasn’t what I wanted, which was to have Violet back in my life, but it had drawn me closer to her.

  In the end, that was what I had truly wanted. To be close to my sister again.

  I had been terrified of going to her house before, of being around all her things, because I had thought that it would only remind me of what I had lost and that it would drive home my own guilt.

  But instead, as I began to work at gathering Violet’s belongings, I only felt the closeness.

  She had been here, my sister, and she had touched these things.

  Now, I was here, touching them too.

  Nothing would bring her back, but I’d always have a piece of her with me.

  Always.

  * * *

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