A Spirited Gift

properly.

Gramps didn’t know I’d looked Danny up and had come in contact with him. Having kept him a secret for more than thirty years, he wouldn’t have been too happy about my interest. I didn’t tell Kevin either, even though he’d offered to help me find Danny. I just wasn’t sure he wouldn’t tell Gramps.

And there was something exciting and satisfying about not sharing the treasure I’d found with anyone else. Maybe it only meant something to me, but my mother must have loved this man. I didn’t know what had happened between them that had made her lie to me about him. I might never know. But I wanted to figure it out.

I watched as Cailey and Dwight helped my father out of the van. They placed him on the stretcher and took him to the ambulance. I knew they wouldn’t make him do a field sobriety test to tell if he was impaired. They’d do a blood test on the way to the hospital. I hoped for his sake that what he’d told them was true.

Next in line was getting the van off the road. While traffic was minimal, no one wanted to get a call later that night about another accident involving the vehicle. Kevin and I waited with Luke for the tow truck while Cailey, Barney and Phil went on to the next emergency caused by the storm. It was going to be a long night for everyone.

We sat around in the emergency vehicle, talking about our experiences during the storm. I had the best story—hands down. No one else was actually involved in a possible homicide.

It wasn’t much to brag about, of course. I didn’t have my usual relish for telling what was bound to be a tale that would go down in Duck history. Despite Luke urging me for more details, I was finished quickly, then listened to Luke and Kevin talk about their experiences working with other emergency crews.

The tow-truck driver—all the way from Sanderling—wasn’t in a mood to talk either. He kind of grunted as Kevin and Luke explained that the van needed to go to the Duck Police impound lot. Our usual Duck tow-truck driver wasn’t able to come because part of his house was on his truck. They finally made the Sanderling driver understand the request, and he hitched the van to the back of the tow truck.

While they were talking, I noticed something on the wet street right outside the van door. The floodlight was gone with Cailey, but this glinted in the bright headlights shining across Duck Road from the tow truck and the emergency vehicle.

I walked over and picked it up. It felt cool in my hand. It was a smooth, flat rock that had been made into a necklace. The gold chain that ran through it wasn’t new. As I held it, a flash of emotion went through me.

They were playing around at the beach when they saw the stone. She picked it up and held it for him to touch. The sun was hot on their hands as they held the stone between them. He kissed her and she laughed, splashing water at him before she ran away. He put the stone into his pocket as he followed her.

I took a deep breath and steadied myself with my hand on the side of the emergency vehicle. The man in the image I’d gotten from the stone was a much younger version of Danny. The woman was my mother.

He’d kept this stone for more than thirty years. It went everywhere with him. It was the only thing besides memories that he had of her. Danny Evans had loved my mother—still loved her.

My hands were shaking as I put the necklace into my pocket. What had happened to them? Gramps said Danny had kicked my mother out when he found out she was pregnant. But the emotions from the stone didn’t feel like something that anyone would give up so easily.

It was no use asking Gramps again. He’d told me his side of the tale. There was only one side left besides that of my silent-as-the-grave mother—Danny’s. He was the only one who could tell me why he’d abandoned us.

And though I’d promised myself I would never tell him who I was, I knew I would have to ask him my questions. I needed those answers. Though I’d grown up without ever really thinking about the father my mother and Gramps had told me was dead, he was now an important part of my life. I had to know what had happened between him and my mother.

Chapter 14

“Everything okay, Dae?” Kevin asked after Luke had dropped us off at the Blue Whale.

“Sure. Why do you ask?”

“You’re too quiet. I know you’re thinking about something. Are you still blaming yourself for Sandi’s death?”

It was a convenient excuse, and I snatched it like a hungry turtle with a fish. “I know I shouldn’t,” I lamented falsely. “It’s just been a long day.”

“I think all of this qualifies as more than one day,” he told me, wrapping his arms around me. “We all need some sleep.”

I closed my eyes and silently apologized to him for lying. I hated to do it, but I couldn’t tell him what was really on my mind. “Definitely. When are you going back out again?”

“My shift starts at five A.M.,” he told me. “I hope things are better out there by then.”

But we both knew they wouldn’t be all that much better. There was only so much emergency services could do to clean up in the dark.

“Well, I hope we have power in the morning so I can take a shower,” I said. “If not here, maybe at my house. How is it possible that the power is on in some places but not in others?”

“I think you know the answer to that,” Gramps said as we reached the verandah where he sat in the dark. “You’re the mayor. You know how these things work. I was beginning to get worried about you two.”

I told him about the crashed van—leaving out that the driver was Danny—and how Missing Pieces had suffered no great damage from the storm.

“I’ve been back here a few hours,” he replied. “That bunch in there is going to eat you out of house and home, Kevin. I hope you’ve got something left for breakfast.”

“I hope so too,” Kevin said.

“There’s no way even a big group like that could eat all the food he has stashed away,” I explained to Gramps, glad that we were all on the dark porch so he couldn’t read my face. It was harder to lie to Gramps than to Kevin. Not that Gramps suspected anything from our brief account of the rescue on Duck Road. I had to keep my conscience out of this. By the time I faced him in the daylight, I’d better be ready to handle what I needed to tell him.

We went inside together—the emergency lights not really enough to qualify as lighting up the rooms. About fifty people were staying for the night, according to Marissa. Most of them had gone up to their rooms already. Sandi’s room and Matthew’s room had been sealed off as possible crime scenes.

“There’s still plenty of space,” Marissa told Kevin briskly. “I think we have enough food and water to get by another couple of days if we have to. I’m not sure about toilet paper. I’ve looked everywhere but I can’t find any more. Do you want me to look in the root cellar?”

“No. That’s okay. I’ll check down there in the morning. We’ll have to get by until then. Thank goodness it’s nighttime so everyone should be asleep.”

Gramps sat down in an easy chair. “Not me. I can’t go to sleep without the TV. Ask Dae. It’s like warm milk for me.”

Kevin patted his shoulder. “Sorry, Horace. I thought the freezers were more important than TV. Maybe I was wrong.”

All of the camaraderie—people singing softly at the old piano in the lobby, playing cards on the stairs and drinking in the bar—should have made me feel better about facing the night. It didn’t.

That ghostly presence was still on my mind. It accompanied the thoughts about my mother and father. There were too many questions. My mind was exhausted but full to bursting, like some sandbag dam trying to hold back the flood. I knew I wouldn’t sleep.

I reminded myself again of how often I’d wished to see a ghost. Since I was a child and had heard the supernatural stories of the Outer Banks, I’d imagined what it would be like. I’d thought about it every way possible—except this one.

If the spirit following me was my mother, that would be different. But this presence sounded like some sleazy