Enright Family Collection (34 page)

“I always thought you must have missed her so, growing up.”

“I guess in some ways I missed
knowing
her, but I had you.”

“Not quite the same as having your mother, India.”

“I don’t know that I knew the difference,” India said softly.

“Thank you, India. Those may be the most loving words I have ever heard.” August’s eyes unwittingly filled with tears, and she brushed them away with the back of her hand.

“You were always there for Ry and me.” India found her own throat constricting with emotion, and she knew no further words were necessary.

India cleared her throat and sought less poignant ground. “Do they still do all of those dances?”

“Yes, certainly. It’s a
ball
, India.”

“Do the Websters still give lessons?”

“Yes, I believe so. Were you thinking about brushing up on your fancy steps?”

“Yes. Nick said he’d go too, so that we could dance.”

August closed her eyes and saw India swirling around the dance floor in Nick’s arms. The vision was so real to her, so vivid, she could almost hear the orchestra, almost smell the gardenia tucked into India’s hair, right there behind her ear.

“Well, I’m glad to hear that you will attend. It would have been the first time in, oh, I don’t know how many years that there was no young Devlin to lead the grand march.”

“Ry went every year,” India recalled.

“I can’t remember one year that he missed. Even the year that Maris died. He took me as his date.” August’s face softened, remembering. “He was so handsome, my boy. He wore a Victorian-era dinner jacket he found in the attic. Every lady in Devlin’s Light lined up to dance with Ry that night. Oh, they all said it was so that he wouldn’t be without a partner—him being a young widower and all, that was their excuse—but not a one of them fooled me. You could see it in their faces when they danced with him, young and old, they all looked the same way.”

“What way was that, Aunt August?”

“Beautiful,” she said simply. “As if waltzing with a beautiful man made them beautiful too.”

She was lost for a moment, remembering.

“Even me.” She smiled.

“Was that the year he took Darla home?”

“Yes. And they were inseparable from that night on.” August shook her head sadly. “It was Darla he had belonged with all those years. He was never meant to be with anyone else. Destiny
shifts
when you try to change it.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“There are some things that are meant to be, India, in order for things to be right. Pretending that
you know better
, trying to rearrange the natural order of things, throws it all off.” August turned her back and began to fuss with the toast. “It’s important to recognize who you are and where you belong, and with whom.”

“What if you don’t know where you belong?” India asked softly.

“Everyone
knows
, India. Deep inside, it’s there, though some choose to ignore or, worse, think they can outsmart fate. Well, you can’t.” August’s chin squared and she rattled a drawer for a knife and proceeded to butter her toast. “Only thing worse than dodging it when you’re young is wanting it when you’re old, when it’s too late to call it all back.”

August poured her coffee and looked out the back window, and her eyes clouded with what might have been regret, as if seeking a glimpse of those wasted years. India wondered what it was that her aunt had let slip through her fingers so long ago that she sorrowed for now.

India sat on the edge of the dark blue leather chair in the big bright office of the district attorney of the city of Paloma, across the desk from the Man himself, and watched as the first glimmer of understanding crossed his well-worn face.

“It’s out of the question, India.” He leaned back in his chair. “I can’t do without you for three months.”

“Then I’m afraid that you’ll need to begin looking for my replacement,” she said gently.

“Now, hold up there.” He waved a navy blue and gold ballpoint pen loosely in her direction. “What’s this all about, India?”

“I need to be home for a while,” she told him, “home in Devlin’s Light.”

“This has to do with your brother’s unfortunate death, I am assuming.”

“Partly, yes. But there are other considerations.”

He tapped the pen on the desk with beefy, well-manicured hands.

“What guarantee do I have that you’ll be back in three months?”

“None I’m afraid,” she replied.

“Let me see if I understand this.” His head moved slightly from side to side as he appeared to ponder the situation, a habit that fooled neither of them. They both knew he understood perfectly. “I have a choice between letting you take your leave and
maybe
coming back in three
months, or I could know
definitely
, right now, that you will not be back at all.”

“That pretty much sums it up.” India did her best not to blink.

He shook his head. “What’s that saying, ‘What goes around, comes around’?”

“Pardon?”

He stood up and paced to the window. “For five years now, I’ve been bragging about how tough you are. I even encouraged you, went so far as to feed your tenacity to the press to make that reputation stick. But I never thought I’d have that ‘no deals’ attitude turned on me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not, India.” He sighed. “You’re not sorry at all. When did you plan on leaving?”

“I’d like to be in Devlin’s Light by the eighteenth of this month.”

“That gives me roughly three weeks to go through your caseload, figure out what can be postponed, what needs to be reassigned.”

“That’s done.”

“Hmm. And it would be nice to have your input.”

“There will be a summary in every file before I leave.”

“Looks like you’ve thought of everything.” He crossed his arms over his chest, signaling that the conversation was over. She had been dismissed.

“I tried to. Thank you.” She extended her hand and he took it with both of his, holding it for just a second.

“India,” he called to her as she reached the door. “Keep in touch.”

Chapter 20

Packing up her office had been easier, and somewhat less painful, than India had anticipated. With Roxie’s help, she was able to clear her space in a little under two hours.

“Have you lost your mind? India, you’re on the top of the damned heap. The Man almost
likes
you.” Roxie had utterly gaped when India first announced her plans.

“Roxie, there’s a little girl in Devlin’s Light who not only likes me but needs me,” India replied.

“I don’t believe this.” Roxie stood in the doorway to India’s office with her hands on her hips. “There has to be something else to this. You don’t walk away from what you have done here just to play mommy. You don’t leave behind four years worth of work and your whole career for… Wait a minute, India, there’s a man in this equation, isn’t there?”

India just smiled and continued to clean out her bottom desk drawer.

“That’s it. Little girl
plus
man. That’s the combination that did it, isn’t it? Now, who would ever have thought that India Devlin’s head could be turned?”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that I have watched you stare down the devil in open court. I have seen you better the best. But I have never seen you fall in love, India.”

“First time for everything.” India shrugged.

“She admits it.” Roxie grinned. “I’ll be damned, the rumor’s true.”

“What rumor might that be?”

“The one going around the detectives’ lounge. Someone suspected that underneath it all, you might be human. Now Herby, he said he couldn’t see it, but I said I was still on the fence.”

India laughed.

“You want me to follow up with trying to track down the Byers World scam?” Roxie opened a file box and held it open for India to throw in some copies of the transcripts from a case she had tried two years earlier.

“I would really appreciate it, Roxie. We’ve just run into one dead end after another. The attorney who represented Maris at settlement, this Patricia Sweeney, is not a member of the New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland or New York bars. The title company that issued the report and passed clear title on to Byers World doesn’t even exist. Lucien Byers has had a P.I. trying to track down this Shuman for the past couple of weeks and hasn’t been able to get so much as a cold trail. I just don’t get it.”

“Well, we both know that if someone doesn’t want to be found, there are ways to not be found.”

“I guess that’s true. Still, you’d think something would turn up.”

“Something will. Sooner or later, one of these birds will slip up.” Roxie bent to pick up a poorly tossed wad of paper that hit the floor instead of the trash can. “I guess, all kidding aside, you’ll use the time off to track your brother’s killer.”

“If we don’t resolve it now, it’s not likely that it will ever be resolved. I need to know, Roxie.” India pulled up the sleeves of her gray sweater as she prepared to tackle the last desk drawer.

“I understand. In a way, I’m surprised that it took you so long.”

“I really have been torn between going back and just doing what I’m doing.” India pitched a pile of old notebooks toward the trash.

“Hold up there, Indy, are those your notes on the Elliott trial?”

When India nodded, Roxie retrieved them from the trash, saying, “That was one of the best summations I ever heard. Unless you have serious objections, I’d like to keep those. You never know when they’ll come in handy.”

“Help yourself.”

“So, who is he?” Roxie asked.

“He?” India frowned as she poked through a file drawer. Why had she kept so much paper?

“The guy responsible for you finally going home.”

“It’s not just him, Roxie. There’s Corri.”

“India, you could have left here any time since August. There were some people around here who were surprised that you even came back at all after the funeral. Now all of a sudden, you’re hot to trot your buns back to Devlin’s Light. I’m just curious about the man who is special enough to take you away from all this.”

“It wasn’t really ‘all of a sudden.’ I’ve been fighting going back since Ry died. It’s just taken me a while to realize that I should, and can, go back. But I’d be lying if I said that Nick had nothing to do with the decision.”

“Well, it’s good news and bad news as far as I’m concerned. I’ll miss you a lot. You’ve been a good friend, India. And from a professional standpoint, I’d have to go a very long way to meet someone else as good at this game as you are. On the other hand, I’m not sorry to see you go back home. I think we all knew—all but the Man, anyway—that that was where you belonged.”

India smiled, recalling Aunt August’s words.
Know where
you belong, and with whom.

“It’s taken me a while, but I may have come to the same conclusion. I figure I’ll know for sure before the three months are up whether I’ll stay or come back.”

“Oh, there’s a pool on that too,” Roxie told her. “Odds are five to one.”

“On what?”

“On you staying in Devlin’s Light.” Roxie lifted the box that India was taking with her and set it near the door next to the stack of diplomas, personal photographs and Aunt August’s needlepoint that they had removed from the walls.

India looked around the office, now stripped of everything that had made it hers. It looked much the way it had that day, now almost five years ago, that she had first arrived, nervous and unsure of herself. How had that untested lawyer, fresh from passing the bar, developed into what many criminal defense attorneys in Paloma feared as their toughest adversary?

Lizzie
, she told herself. It was love for a lost friend that had brought her here, to do this job. But it was love of another kind that would take her home.

Maybe Nick was right. Maybe the woman had atoned for the sins of the child. Maybe she could finally forgive herself.

Maybe she could go home, and stay home.

Only time would tell.

“India, you’re just in time.” August, having heard India’s car pull into the gravel driveway, had opened the back door and stepped onto the porch to greet her niece. “I was hoping you’d be here earlier, but we still have time.”

“Time for what?” India frowned.

“Time to get you dressed and over to Captain Jon’s.” August held the door open as India passed through to the kitchen with two suitcases full of winter clothing. Having emptied her closets in the townhouse, her car was now full of boxes and bags.

“Why?”

“India, you signed up to hostess for the Christmas tea.” August stepped into the warmth of the house and closed the door. “And it starts at three o’clock.”

“Today?” India dropped her bags.

“Today.”

“Oh, damn, I forgot.” India shed her winter jacket and disappeared briefly into the hallway to hang it up, calling back to ask, “What should I wear?”

“Well, you have a choice of things I brought down from the attic,” August told her. “I left several dresses on your bed. Something of Jerusalem’s, something of Felicity’s, something of Sarah’s.”

The names rolled off August’s tongue as if she spoke of contemporaries rather than ancestors long departed.

“Eat some lunch first, then run up and see what fits best.
We may have time for a rudimentary alteration here and there, if necessary.”

“What are you wearing?” India lifted a lid from a pot that simmered on the stove and sniffed. “Umm. Yankee pot roast.”

“That’s dinner. There’s soup for lunch. I’ll heat some up while you look over the options.” August lifted a large earthenware bowl of chicken Corri chowder from the top shelf of the refrigerator. “And I’m wearing the same afternoon dress of dark green wool that I wear every year. It still fits quite handsomely, if I may say so. I’m not certain who wore this one first; most likely it belonged to my grandmother Kearney, though.”

“And I’m wearing a pretty white dress with hollies on it.” Corri bounced into the kitchen and threw her arms around India’s waist. “And Aunt August said I could help, that I’m big enough.”