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He stared again at the list. “It all started with Eric’s death. I think he found that egg and contacted Ivan Bury. That’s my gut anyway. Chief Robinson gave me that printout of Eric’s calls, but it got pushed aside while I was dealing with all the other problems. I’m going to go through it and see what I can find out.”
Maybe Carly could help him. She might recognize names.
Twenty-Eight
Isabelle had been true to her word, and so had Carly’s other sisters. They’d all pitched in to help with the babies, and the afternoon sailed by without any real problems. Carly prayed off and on for Kelly, but she refrained from calling to check on her. First off, the hospital was unlikely to tell her anything, and besides, it would take longer than a few hours to see things turn around after such a bad injury.
Gram shooed her onto the back deck while she fixed dinner, and Carly stretched out on a lounger and lifted her face to the late-afternoon sunshine. She was tired from the trauma of the day, but there was no way she could nap. Not with her mind racing. Maybe she could spend a few minutes writing.
Workmen were carrying drywall into Gram’s house next door. Ryan saw her and waved, and she stiffened before waving back. She didn’t know how to feel about what he’d told her.
The door slammed behind her, and Lucas strode toward her holding some papers. His mouth set in a grim line, he gave a short nod. “Mary said I’d find you out here.”
She swung her legs to the deck and sat up. “Is Kelly dead?” Her voice quavered.
He pulled a chair closer to her. “She made it through surgery, but that’s all I’ve heard.”
There was a reserve in his voice she hadn’t heard in a long time, but her tongue tripped over itself when she tried to form the question of what was wrong. Maybe she didn’t want to know. The distance in his eyes felt like he had retreated clear to Alaska.
He held out the papers. “I made a list and realized we need to go back to the beginning. To Eric’s murder and who he contacted after he found that egg. The danger now had to have begun then. I have his call log from his phone in the weeks leading up to his murder, and I’d like you to go over them with me. You’d know better than me if someone was a trusted friend or if a call was someone he might have confided in.”
“Okay,” she said.
His manner was still stiff, but he unbent enough to scoot his chair close enough for her to smell his cologne, a spicy masculine scent that made her want to move nearer. He’d tell her what was wrong when he was ready. Maybe he was tired of the chaos in his house and regretted opening his home to the horde. She wouldn’t blame him if he felt like that.
He’d highlighted the different names on the list and she went down the first page line by line. She stopped at the last ten calls on that page—all to the same person. “I’ve heard him mention this woman, Lucille Godwin, but I can’t think how he knew her.”
Lucas took the paper back and studied it. “Ten calls, about a week before he died. Do you know exactly when he started going through your great-grandmother’s belongings?”
“I’d thought it was that day he died, but the notes on hiscomputer showed he’d begun the process the week before. We’d both been busy and he hadn’t mentioned it.”
“He didn’t mention a lot of things.”
His curt voice made her shrink back on her chair again. What was eating him? If he wanted them to leave, where could they go? A hotel would be the only option, and it wouldn’t be ideal with all of them plus two babies. They’d have to rent a house, and that wouldn’t be easy with Beaufort’s busy tourist season upon them. She needed to make this right somehow. Whateverthiswas.
She marshaled her courage, but before she could question him, he rose and pulled out his phone. She listened to him talk to Vince about Lucille Godwin, and when he hung up, her memory clicked into place.
“I know who she is. Eric mentioned she’s an antique appraiser out of Savannah.”
Lucas dropped back into his chair. “Ah, that explains it. And she might have been someone he confided in. He had to have shown the egg and provenance paper to someone to have figured out its value. We could stop to talk to her when we go to see Elizabeth on Monday.”
“Good idea.” She pursed her lips. “There are some nice furniture pieces, but we’re talking a few thousand dollars per piece, not millions. I think it has to be the egg. But I saw the egg before I took the paint off of it. I don’t think anyone would have known what it was in its gaudy red state.”
“What if he brought the appraiser in to take a look at the furniture and she happened to see it? A trained appraiser might have suspected what it was. You did.”
“I did see white porcelain under the chipped paint. It mademe curious, but I didn’t suspect it was a Fabergé egg. I’ll bet he talked to her about the provenance, and they realized it was a Fabergé egg despite the paint masking its beauty.”
They went through the rest of the call list. Lucas tapped Gage Beaumont’s number. “Chief Robinson had this name marked. It sound familiar to you?”
She studied it a moment, then nodded. “He was someone with a bike to sell—a collectible Harley Eric really wanted. He made an offer on it, but the guy sold it to someone else for more money.”
“So that’s a dead end.” Lucas folded the papers and rose. “Thanks for your help.”
He vanished inside the house before Carly got the courage to ask him what was wrong. Maybe it was for the best since she wasn’t sure if she trusted men in general anymore.
***
Lucas tossed the papers onto his dresser and sank onto the edge of the bed. He wasn’t proud of the way he’d treated Carly just now, and the hurt in her eyes reproached him. What was wrong with him? Was he running scared from his feelings, or was it something more?
