CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

I don't know what exactly draws me to the study. It's some instinct that runs deeper than thought. I know that what I need to find, I'll discover in the most private of Johnathan's sanctums.

Some logic attaches itself to the certainty after the fact. I'm still not certain if Cecilia is a murderer, but I am certain that she didn't care for Johnathan at all, and probably wouldn't think to look through his study for something that would incriminate her. The evidence in her room is lost to me, at least for now. The two of them are up there, and there's likely to be no chance of retrieving the death certificate before she can hide it.

A horrible thought stops me with my handle on the door to the library. What if she tells Richard that I suspect her? What if she convinces him that I'm a threat? But then, do I really feel Detective Holloway is involved in Johnathan's murder? True, he doesn't care for the children, and he envies Johnathan's memory. He wants Cecilia all to himself, and the children are the part of Johnathan that Cecilia still loves. But even if he's that selfish, to risk his career killing a billionaire as powerful as Johnathan Ashford? It doesn't make sense.

But if he is involved, then my life could truly be in danger.

I could escape. I could escape now. I could get to the garage, take one of the cars, drive to Buffalo and purchase a plane ticket anywhere in the country. I can make an anonymous phone call to the police and tell them what I suspect. Then I can disappear and find a place with some other family or just rid myself of the silly notion of being a governess and go back to teaching at an actual school. It's not likely that they'd try to find me. Either they will be convicted of the crime, or they will escape justice. Trying to find me would be dangerous for them. They'd just let me leave and congratulate themselves on having chased off their enemy.

But the children deserve justice. They deserve to know who killed their father. And if I manage to discover that Cecilia is innocent, so much the better.

So, I turn the handle and enter the library, then cross the big room to the study beyond.

The room is as I left it. It seems that Theresa only cleans the rooms the family uses. There's probably no laziness in that. She's one woman, and this house requires a staff of at least a half dozen if there's any hope to keep the entire place clean.

It amazes me the thoughts my mind chooses to dwell on in the midst of danger.

I don't know where to look. I stare around the room and realize that there's nowhere else for me to search. I've followed my instincts here, and there's no logic to support those instincts.

But something won't let me leave. Something continues to insist that this is where I will unlock the mystery.

I check the drawers and cabinets of the desk again. Nothing. I've taken the crossword puzzle, and there's nothing else there, clue or otherwise.

I look under the desk but find nothing. The same goes for the display cases in the art room. No sign of anything hidden.

I'm missing something. I know I am. Something obvious. Something that should be clear to me, but damned if I know what.

I look at the large bookshelf that contains perhaps a hundred titles to complement the extra thousand or so in the large library beyond.

That's when it hits me. The books! What better place to hide private notes than within the pages of a book?

I pull the titles off the shelf one at a time and dig through them, flipping through the pages and looking in between the covers and inside the dust jackets. I toss the books to the side when I finish them, and a growing pile soon offers evidence of my madness.

I chuckle to myself as I think of how insane I look. I'm tearing apart a dead man's study to find some clue as to who might have murdered him.

But that instinct continues to drive me, and I continue to look for evidence.

When I'm halfway through the books and no sheets of paper decide to jump out at me and scream, "Here I am! Here's proof of the murder!" it occurs to me that Johnathan could have written something in the margins of the books themselves, and I could already have blithely passe the clue.

That elicits another chuckle from me, though this one is more of desperation than humor. How am I supposed to look through a hundred books to find the one with damning evidence in the margin?

I've already been here for over ten minutes. I don't know that Cecilia's in the mood to have Richard remain here for very long. At any moment, they could come downstairs and find me missing, and then what? If they think to look for me here, I'll have to explain my actions, and I really can't explain any of this right now.

I'll look through the books, and if I don't find anything, I'll put them back on the shelf. That will likely take me another ten minutes, but it's better than trying to skim through each one. I can come back later to—

Except I can't come back later. I've been fired. This is truly my last chance to learn what happened to Johnathan.

And what if I don't find anything? What if I find something that's just another vague clue? What if it's just more of Johnathan's paranoid thoughts that might not have any basis in reality?

For a moment, I wish that I'd never taken an interest in this case. I wish that I'd never concerned myself with Johnathan Ashford and had only focused on helping the children move on.

Why do I take an interest? Why do I care? Why do I want so badly to find the person who killed Johnathan and bring him or her or them to justice?

I can't claim it's to help the children. One could make a compelling argument that the effects of my obsession with their father's death is not helping them at all.

I have helped the children, but not through my relentless pursuit of the murderer. I've helped by being a listening ear, by encouraging them to play together, by gathering them as a family—including their mother—and by pushing for them to be sent back to school. In short, the help I've given has all been around returning them to normal life and showing them that they can still have happiness with the family left them.

But I've allowed Isabella to obsess over her father's death by not addressing the note she gives me properly. I've done more than simply allow Elijah's obsession. I've encouraged it, have, in fact, actively conspired with him to investigate the murder. I've become an accomplice to his doubts and made him an accomplice to my hunt.

I've used the excuse, as recently as a few minutes ago standing outside of this room, that I'm doing this for the children, but that argument falls apart when looked at with even a modicum of objectivity.

So why? What am I doing this for? For myself? If so, then why? What do I hope to gain?

"What do you hope to gain?"

I lower my eyes, and tears come to them as the detective continues to stare at me, through me. "I just want to know. I want to know what happened."

"Sometimes you can't know." Her voice is gentle but final. "It's hard, believe me, I know. I hate it, but by pushing for answers when there are none to be had, we blind ourselves to the truth that actually matters.

"Your sister wouldn't want you spending the rest of your life obsessing over her. She would want you to find joy for yourself. She'd want you to remember her fondly and perhaps even spare a moment or two of sadness every now and then, but she wouldn't want you to lose out on joy because her life ended in tragedy."

"But we don't know that her life ended! We haven't found a body! We haven't found a killer. She could still be alive!"

She looks at me and says nothing. Her eyes communicate everything. I lower my head and weep.

She lets me weep for a few minutes, then says, "I'm closing the case, Mary. I can't prevent you from trying to find answers on your own or through other people, but I hope you won't. If I were you, I would go to the hill overlooking the ocean where you and Annie used to sit, and I would have a private memorial service just for yourself. Say goodbye to her there and promise her that you'll always cherish her memory. Then move on. Give herself the gift of living a full and joyful life."

I hate hearing her say this. I hate hearing that I'll never know what happened to my sister.

But I'm so tired. And nothing I do will bring her back. If I can put this behind me and move on…

I lift my head and smile. "All right. I will."

I collapse to my knees in the study and weep bitterly. The book in my hand falls to the floor and slides around my knees, nestled among dozens of its fellows.

My mother was right. I abandoned my sister. I could have—should have—fought to learn what happened to her. I should have never rested until we had answers. Instead, I let my own exhaustion matter more. I let them close the case and left my sister behind when I should have fought for her.

And she never left me. I never moved on and found happiness. I never led a joyful life. I didn't even cherish her memory. It haunted me. It still haunts me. I don't remember her as my beautiful, vibrant sister with whom I shared a glorious childhood. I remember her as the pale, lifeless ghost hanging on my shoulder as her empty eyes drain all of the vitality from me.

I'm doing this for myself. I'm trying to find the person who killed Johnathan Ashford because I want to believe that I'm not the same person who left my sister to vanish into the mists of the forgotten. I want to believe that I care enough to fight for justice.

I dry my eyes and keep looking. Knowing that I'll fight for justice even if it means destroying those I'm supposed to care for doesn't make me feel good about myself, but at least I'm not hiding anymore. I will see this through to the end. There's no more point in wondering why.

There are only seven books left when I finally find the answer to my questions. The book—appropriately enough—is titled Hidden Things: who people really are when they stop lying to themselves.

The answer is in the form of a photograph. Cecilia's in the photograph. She's much younger in this picture, and the resemblance between her and Isabella is more noticeable and far more striking. She has her head thrown back in laughter, and the youthfulness of her figure in the modest but flattering summer dress she wears is the fantasy of every man who's ever loved women.

There's a man in the picture as well, but it's not Johnathan. This man is handsome, more handsome even than the dashing Johnathan Ashford. He has chiseled features, striking eyes and a devastating smile. It will be some years before age matures his appearance into the rugged beauty he wears today, but there's no mistaking the desire in Richard Holloway's eyes as he looks into Cecilia's own.