'Til Grits Do Us Part Read online

“I think so. Maybe twenty-one.”

  “Besides, Amanda disappeared five years before Mom even moved here.” I swiveled back and forth in my chair. “There’s no correlation. Period.”

  “Does your mom have relatives around here? Cousins? Something?”

  “Don’t even.” I put my hand on my hip. “No relative of mine has ever been south of the Mason-Dixon line. I’m descended from a bunch of drunk French trappers who got permanently stuck in New York.”

  “So your family tree forks.” Meg snickered.

  “In all directions. I’ll never be a Southerner, no matter what Becky says.”

  Meg flipped open the top of the blue folder and thumbed through some pages. “What about Amanda then? Where’s she from?”

  “Deerfield, from what I read.” I glanced uneasily at the folder. “There’s not much else about her, and absolutely nothing in common with my mom. Amanda was a die-hard vegetarian though.” I poked her. “You’re not Amanda, are you?”

  “You never know.” Meg bobbed her eyebrows.

  “She worked at a place in town called The Red Barn when she disappeared.” I flipped a page in the folder. “Ever heard of it?”

  “Nope.”

  Like I said. Nothing in common. Except our birthdays—Amanda’s and mine. Both June twelfth. I tipped her bio sheet toward me, raising my eyebrows.

  “So Amanda grew up in Deerfield,” Meg repeated, tipping her head thoughtfully. “That little place south of…” She bent over my cubicle wall and hunted on the Augusta County map. “It’s around here somewhere. Just a double-wide trailer or two away from Craigsville.”

  I stuck Amanda’s bio sheet back in the folder and pushed it away. “That’s the place.”

  “Do they have enough jacked-up trucks in Deerfield to constitute an actual town?”

  “So says City Hall.” My smirk faded, and I rubbed my arms as if cold. “Anyway, it just feels funny to do a story on a missing woman—who reminds me of another woman who… Well, you get it.”

  “Creepy.” Meg’s voice came out soft and mournful. “But you know, Shiloh, it’s probably our eyes playing tricks on us. Look. Amanda’s got glasses and too much eyeliner. Yikes.” She leaned closer. “Blond hair, too. Maybe the look-alike thing is only our impression.”

  Meg cradled Mom’s picture in her hands, not making a joke or snarky comment. “Ellen Jacobs,” she read off the back. “She’s really pretty, Shiloh. You look like her a little.” She squinted at me. “Not a whole lot, but…something. I can’t figure out what it is. Your hair color?”

  “Not really. My hair’s just plain dark brown, not reddish like hers.” I ran a hand through my sleek just-below-the-shoulder cut, a little longer than I used to wear it back in Japan. “But our eyes look pretty similar.”

  Mine were multicolored hazel like Mom’s, but brighter, with very clear bursts of green and gold. I never knew how to answer “eye color” on forms.

  I looked down at the proof sheet in my lap. “And our eyes are the only thing we had in common. Exactly like in life.”

  “I’m really sorry to hear about her…uh…passing.” Meg’s voice fell surprisingly sober. “How long has it been now?”

  The office congealed like ice, everyone moving in slow motion. A repetitive beep of the department phone. Secretary Chastity’s preppy-sounding, “News Leader?” echoing through the office. The shuffle of the copier.

  “A year.” I dropped my stack of press kits in my outbox as if it didn’t bother me. “To the month.”

  “Wow. Sorry.”

  I cleared my throat, fumbling for words. “I think Stella made my sushi birthday cake for that reason, too. To give me something good to remember instead. Her brother, Jerry, my old restaurant boss, put her up to it.”

  “That’s really sweet.”

  “Yeah.” I gazed at Mom’s slight smile, as if she held a secret. In fact, she did. I’d just stumbled on it a few years late.

  Meg pursed her lips as if unsure whether or not to continue. “Was she…sick?”

  “Nope. Brain aneurysm. Virtually instant.” I could still see myself standing there in my minimalist Tokyo apartment, phone in hand. The shock of unexpected news ringing in my ears.

  My voice must have come out a bit snappish because Meg raised her hands and backed away. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to upset you.”

  “Me? I’m not upset.” My hands shook as I put Mom’s photo back on my cubicle wall. “I mean, I never knew Mom when she was…normal. We didn’t have a good past. We weren’t even speaking when she died.”

  I reached for the mouse and opened up a new page on my computer to write the captions, trying to blot out memories of my seven-year-old self standing in front of the locked apartment door, begging Mom to open. Hoping she hadn’t overdosed on her medication.

  The way I’d stood in front of her casket, knowing it was too late to save her.

  “But there are things I wish I could tell her.” I hesitated, hand still on the mouse. “It would take too long to explain though.”

  Meg stayed quiet. “Karma,” she finally said, playing with my spider ring. “Maybe you can.”

  “Can what?”

  “Have another chance.” She shook the ring for emphasis.

  “As a spider?” I yelped.

  Meg’s mouth gaped in horror. “I didn’t mean that.” She dropped the ring. “I meant reincarnation. To tell her what you wish you could.”

  “Ha.” I shook my head. “I heard enough about reincarnation from Mom’s slew of gurus. And I believe a little differently now.” I glanced up at the Bible verse I’d pegged on my cubicle wall, adorned with a simple cross. “No, a lot differently.”

  “Bible-thumper.” Meg smirked and poked me in the shoulder blades, and it tickled. I laughed.

  “Hippie.” I tried to poke her back with my pen, but she moved faster. “And don’t you dare spill any more of that stuff in your mug. My carpet will reek for months.”

  “I don’t know why I put up with you, Jacobs.” Meg sighed, making a pained face and gazing upward. “You’re all right though, I guess. So long as you don’t go offering me Gideon Bibles.”

  Pretty funny coming from Meg, née Mary Margaret—whose staunch Irish-Catholic parents intended her for the church.

  I pretended to think about her Gideon Bible comment, tapping my chin. “I think I’ve got an extra one in my car.”

  Meg ignored me. “Or those horrible Japanese snacks you stash in your drawer. Jellyfish or something?”

  “You mean my dried squid?” I pulled my drawer open. “I love that stuff! Kyoko just sent me a fresh bag.”

  “Keep that up and I’ll take back all my compliments.”

  “One bite and you’d recant your vegan ways.”

  Meg snorted into her mug. “I doubt it. Offer some to Chastity though.” I shuffled through my stack of press kits, chuckling. “I’d pay to see that.”

  “Chastity.” I rolled my eyes. “That girl gets more flowers than the queen of the Rose Parade.”

  Meg dropped her voice to a smug whisper. “Too bad they’re not from Amanda’s killer. Then Chastity would be next.” She snickered into her hand.

  “Meg.” I smacked her arm. “I don’t like Chastity any more than you do, but I wouldn’t wish her dead. Come on.” I stacked my press kits up in a neat pile. “Or stalked either. Some crazy guy in New York stalked me for months when I was sixteen, convinced I was a Norse queen from his former life.”

  She studied me, sipping in silence. “You sure you’re not?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Anyway, Chastity’s got to be better than that hateful old receptionist. Good riddance.”

  “Lee Ann?” Meg smiled. “Yep. She retired.” She leaned her head close to my ear. “If you ask me, she whacked off Amanda. The old bat. Rumor has it she’s hiding a boatload of secrets that most of us will probably never know.”

  “Right. She and Clarence Toyer, the mail guy,” I whispered, peeking over my shoulder. “They’d make a good couple, woul
dn’t they?”

  Meg smirked. “Maybe you’re right, Jacobs.” She checked her watch and drained the rest of her tea. “Well, anyway, so long as you don’t start getting weird flowers and messages, or spray paint outside your house, I guess you’re safe.”

  I smelled something. Something sweet and inexplicably familiar. I turned around in my chair, trying to follow the scent. The floral fragrance wafted through the newsroom, over the sharp scent of toner from the copier, the faint whiff of coffee, and Clarence’s musty old cologne—so strong I turned my head in its direction.

  I’d just turned back to my keyboard when Chastity nearly bowled me over, whirling around the corner with her arms full of roses. “Shiloh! You got flowers for your birthday. Check these out!”

  “Flowers? For me?” My jaw dropped, speechless.

  “Gorgeous, aren’t they? From Rask.” Chastity preened, fluffing the flowers. Normally I could smell her coming; nobody else at The Leader applied Chanel No. 5 like lipstick, approximately fifteen times a day. But I only caught the heavy perfume from the bouquet.

  “Who’s Rask?” I sucked in my breath in awe as she turned the full bouquet around.

  “The florist.” Chastity gave me a funny look, smoothing a strand of super-bleached-blond hair back into its smooth ponytail. “That downtown place on the corner that’s been around forever. Don’t you know it?”

  “No. Why should I? I don’t have money for flowers and neither does Adam. He must’ve saved up.” A throb of tenderness flickered in my heart as I pictured Adam in his brown UPS uniform, hauling packages and loading trucks so I could pay my back taxes last March and keep Mom’s house. My house, rather, as she’d designated it in her will—and as soon as it sold, the much-needed income would provide Adam and me a place of our own come August.

  The very weight of the vase surprised me as I lifted it toward the desk—heavy not from glass, but cut and polished crystal, clear as a Blue Ridge Mountain stream.

  “Wow.” I stood back, temporarily breathless, to survey the load of intensely perfumed, deep red spirals. Each one perfect. Blooms so thick and full they nearly blotted out the green leaves, allowing a little lacy sprinkle of white baby’s breath to shine through.

  “Adam, what have you done?” I clapped a hand over my mouth. “They’re beautiful!”

  “They sure are.” Chastity’s voice dripped with envy. “And you don’t even like cut flowers.”

  I tipped my head up from her dress-code-defying black stilettos to her cleavage-baring pink suit then quickly averted my eyes. I never knew exactly where to look when speaking to Chastity.

  “Who said I don’t like cut flowers?”

  Chastity, whose outfits tended to cast some doubt on her name, rolled her eyes. She flicked one of my ferns, also from Adam. “You always have plants with…I don’t know…roots and stuff. Why? What’s wrong with cut flowers?”

  “I like potted things, okay? They remind me of Adam’s former business. That’s where I met him, mulching trees and planting shrubs.” I buried my nose in the fragrant roses. “And besides, cut flowers just die. What’s the use in that?”

  Chastity raised a slim eyebrow (which Meg had informed me was permanent makeup) and sniffed in disdain, as if I didn’t deserve such an expensive arrangement. “You’re just weird, Shiloh. I love roses. Lucky you. And there’s a card.”

  I wanted to open it privately, but she just stood there, looming. “Aren’t you going to read it?” she chided, hands on her hips. Even Clarence paused on his mail rounds, cart in hand, and waited.

  I reluctantly opened the envelope. “To my angel,” Adam had typed in a crisp font, with matching red ink. “My love and my joy. I can’t wait to share my life with you only, no matter what.”

  “Hmm.” Chastity flicked an eyebrow. “Not bad, I guess. Even if it is a little canned.”

  “Well, well, well. From Adam?” Meg appeared by the side of my cubicle with her trusty Cannon slung over her shoulder, interrupting the advice I’d like to have given Chastity about what she could do with her “canned” comment.

  “Cool.” Meg bobbed her head in admiration then bent down to see better. “Wait a sec. Is that real crystal?”

  A party at my cubicle. Who’d believe it? Most of the time we avoided each other like a bad virus, hoping our editor, Kevin-the-Stickler Lopez, didn’t catch us yakking and give us more work. But when the proverbial cat’s away at a journalism conference, well…the mice stand around jabbering about who the cops picked up on Greenville Avenue or what Kristen Stewart wore to the Oscars.

  Or flowers. Whatever it takes.

  “I can’t believe Adam sent me roses!” I played with the little ferny chartreuse things that matched my green tea. Crinkly, iridescent red paper. A fat satin ribbon pooled in a flourish of scarlet on my desk.

  “Especially on a budget.” Chastity’s mouth turned up in a slight smile. “Aren’t these a little expensive for Adam? He’s got some kind of blue-collar job, doesn’t he? Lawn mowing…? I forgot.” She wrinkled her nose.

  “No.” I spun around to face her, raising my voice a touch. “Not lawn mowing. And if he hadn’t sold his business for me, he’d still be his own boss.”

  “He gave up a college scholarship, too, didn’t he?” Meg tipped her head as if trying to remember. “For his amputee brother or something?”

  “Well, I only let Jeff give me medium-red roses,” breezed Chastity as if she hadn’t heard us, examining a velvety bloom with perfect fingers. “He owns Furniture Gallery. Did I tell you that? He just bought a boat and a Jet Ski.”

  “Yeah. You’ve mentioned it.” Meg wrinkled her brow in Chastity’s direction and crossed her arms, making the hole in her sweater arm stretch.

  “Oh, have I? Sorry.” Chastity’s lips curved into a sweet pink smile, obviously forgetting that her money talk had little effect on Meg, who’d lived out of a VW Bus for three years. “Well, anyway, I only accept roses that are lipstick red. Long-stemmed, and not too open. But these are cute, too, Shiloh. Enjoy. Even if they are hacked. Doomed. Whatever you call it.”

  Chastity patted me on the head like an ungrateful puppy. “Oh, and I loved the cow picture. Thank your friend Becky for me.”

  She retreated to her desk in a cloud of perfume.

  Oh, please trip. Just once. I shot her a sour look, fiery color shooting up my neck. If I ever got my hands on Becky Donaldson and her dumb camera, so help me, I’d make her eat it for breakfast with her grits.

  Meg watched Chastity go, obviously trying to suppress a smile. “Lipstick red, huh?” She flicked one of my blooms. “Good luck making lipstick out of this color.”

  “My friend Kyoko back in Japan would,” I replied, sitting back down at my desk and trying to calm my temper. “She’s into all this goth and punk-rock stuff. Or no, New Wave. Whatever she calls it. I don’t know what she’s talking about most of the time.”

  “Is she the one that sends you all those shrimp-seaweed rice cracker things?” Meg’s brow peaked in worry. “And those dried… Don’t say it…”

  “Squid?”

  “I told you not to say it.”

  “My offer still stands.” I hovered my hand over the drawer. “Am I tempting you?”

  “Not exactly.” Meg scrunched her nose. “But listen, Shiloh.” She tipped her head closer. “Don’t let Chastity get to you. I think she’s harmless. She’s just…bored.”

  “Who wouldn’t be in a town where kids get excused school absences for hunting?”

  “I rest my case.” Meg laughed. “She’s bored…and, well, an idiot—to spare your newly sainted ears the appropriate word. Anyway. Enjoy your roses. And if the cow photo bothers you, just let me know. I can Photoshop it into a unicorn or something.” She shouldered her camera and started off, raising her stinky mug in “cheers.”

  I liked Meg. In a weird way she even reminded me of Kyoko—but with a lot less angst. On the contrary. Meg was the type who’d fold a thousand (recycled) paper cranes according to the hope-fille
d Japanese tradition, and Kyoko would grind them all through a paper shredder with unnerving satisfaction.

  Adam. I need to call Adam. I dialed his number from the desk phone, holding the receiver under my chin while I turned the vase around, curling the satin ribbon around my finger as he picked up.

  “I got them! You can’t imagine how special this is.”

  “Shiloh?” His familiar voice, touched with the faintest hint of Southern drawl, came across patchy from bad reception. “I can hardly hear you out here. Happy birthday!”

  “Thanks, Adam. They’re so beautiful.” I gave a misty smile, thinking of all the sacrifices Adam had made for me already. Knowing him, he’d probably gone without lunch who-knows-how-many-days just to save up. “I can’t believe you sent me roses.”

  “Sorry?” Static crackled again. “Sent what?”

  “The roses. I love them.”

  More static, and I pressed the phone closer to my ear. “Hello? Adam? Where in the world are you?”

  “Verona. What did you say before that?”

  “The roses. Chastity brought them over to my desk a few minutes ago.” Silence filled the line. “Roses? Sorry, Shiloh. I must not be hearing you right.”

  My fingers froze on the ribbon. “Didn’t you send me roses?”

  “Roses? No! Why, somebody gave you a bouquet?”

  I jerked my hand off the flowers, whose perfume suddenly smelled sickly sweet in my nostrils. Something dreadful welling up in my stomach, squeezing the air out of my lungs.

  “You didn’t write this card?”

  “What card? No. I’m sorry. I’ve got a potted arrangement for you at home. Since you like them better anyway.” He paused. “By the way, Becky sent me some weird photo of you and a cow. Have you seen it?”

  “Huh?” I reeled, scooting my chair back. Adam’s words barely registered.

  “So who’s the bouquet from?”

  I picked up the card again, feeling that sick feeling slither from my stomach to my throat.

  “Shiloh?”

  Chapter 4

  I can’t believe this.” I slumped in my chair—a gray Office Max special that squeaked when I turned to the left—and tipped my head back, not wanting to open my eyes and see the sparkling crystal vase. It gleamed like Carlos’s perfect white teeth when he came from Japan last year, trying to find my house—and a free green card—in his rented Prius. The snake.