Not Quite Dead (A Lowcountry Mystery)

Chapter Six

"That Mayor Drayton's really something, huh, Gracie-baby?"

I roll my eyes, even though it's exactly what he's expecting. It seems like the right thing to give Gramps what he wants every chance I have. "He's okay. A little overconfident."

"You know, I think he thought you were prettier last night, without your makeup and fancy purple dress. He's no dummy, and you can bet most of the single gals in town have made a pass. Not interested, though. Nope." He slurps a bite of oatmeal doctored with a healthy dose of brown sugar and syrup.

He could be gay. The thought stays where it belongs, in my head, both because Gramps would argue and I don't believe it for a second. The way he looked at me, the not-quite-hidden suggestion of interest in his gold-flecked eyes, betray him. I might not have been able to tell that my fiancé was sleeping with half of his graduate students, but surely I haven't lost the ability to sense when a man is genuinely interested.

"Well, I'm sure it'll be the same with me."

Gramps shakes his head. "You're just like your Grams. Don't see the truth of how pretty you are—look just like her, too."

The comment lifts the corners of my lips and swells my heart in my chest, even though it's far from the first time he's uttered some form of it. The fact that Grams and I bear such a strong resemblance to each other might be part of the reason Gramps has always had a special affection for me, and my Grams was a beautiful woman, even in her eighties. Regal. We do share features, along with a kind of prickly countenance, but she had grace—a quality that, despite my name, continues to elude me.

I get up and rinse out our bowls, helping Gramps take a quick stroll around the front yard, then into his chair. He's situated with remote controls, blankets, his pills, and a drink all within easy reach, not to mention Mrs. Walters saw us outside, so she can't say he's not getting enough air. It's an hour before the library opens when I step out the front door, taking a moment to breathe in the fresh morning air before it turns stagnant and sweaty.

Maybe it's lingering fear of Anne's ghost, or a sudden urge to burn some fat, but my feet find the sidewalk instead of my butt finding the driver's seat of my car. I have an hour, and the walk will take fifteen minutes. I'll regret it later, when the trek home in a hundred muggy degrees drenches me from head to toe, but that's then.

I'm out to prove that I don't give a shit about consequences after all. Fuck adulthood.

Avoiding my car turns out to be a moot point when, less than two blocks from Gramps's house, the scraggly redhead from my backseat joins me on the sidewalk. Her gait matches mine, but her feet don't make any sound on the concrete despite her clunky, knee-high leather boots. Lord if she doesn't smell bad enough to gag a maggot, even outside.

Yesterday, I ran. Today, for some reason, it's as though none of this is happening in real life, and I don't go faster or slower, just keep going, eyes forward, clinging to the hope of waking up. It's like swimming through the air with my blood pumping through me ten times too fast, depositing a chilly sweat on my brow and palms.

She doesn't talk, but based on my sideways glances, the premise that she's Anne Bonny seems legitimate. The smell and her stiff men's shirt, trousers, and boots, combined with the sword and dagger belted at her waist, convince me that she's Anne Bonny or that I'm going nuts. Or both.

The expression on her face wavers between frustration and sorrow, but nothing about it or her posture suggests causing harm is on her agenda. We walk side by side a few more steps, me and my reeking ghost, before my nerve returns out of nowhere.

Dead or not, she's kind of starting to bug me.

"What do you want?" The question would sound more at home in the mouth of the first victim in a horror flick, but it has to be asked.