“It was you?” Olive asked. “Back at the hotel.”
“Yes,” Riley said.
“But I don’t understand,” Olive said, the disappointment hitting her like a wall, knocking all the air out of her. “Where is Mama?”
The hug got tighter. “Oh, Olive, I think I know. Maybe I’ve known all along but haven’t wanted to believe.”
“She’s dead, isn’t she?”
Riley broke away from the hug but still held Olive’s arms tight. She looked into her eyes. “I think so, Ollie.”
“And Daddy…” She could hardly bring herself to say the words. “He…he killed her?”
Riley nodded slowly.
“But why?”
“I don’t know, Ollie,” she said, studying Olive’s face in the moonlight. “Maybe because he found out she was having an affair?” She paused. “Or maybe she told him she was going to leave him?” Riley said. She brushed the hair away from Olive’s face. “I don’t think we’ll ever know for sure.”
“She found the treasure,” Olive said.
Riley seemed to hold her breath. “She did. And I think he knew it. But she wouldn’t tell him where it was. Maybe that was the last straw.”
Olive said nothing, just tried to imagine the scene as it might have unfolded: Mama and Daddy arguing, him accusing her of being unfaithful, her saying she was leaving, that she could afford to now. And he’d want to know how and maybe she’d told him, told him just to piss him off, to prove that she’d been right all along—the treasure had existed and she’d found it.So where is it?Daddy would have asked.Where is this treasure you’re going to use to start a new life with your new boyfriend?And she wouldn’t tell him. And then…then what? Had he struck her? Shot her? Strangled her? Had it been an accident somehow, a shove that he hadn’t meant to be so rough with? Or had it been cold, premeditated murder?
Olive thought of the fight she’d heard early that morning. How it had ended with a crash. Had she heard her mother’s voice again after that?
Olive looked at her father’s crumpled body on the ground behind them. He looked like a small and ruined thing. Hard to believe he’d been capable of such a horrific act.
“Do you know, Ollie?” Riley asked. “Did your mama tell you where she hid it?”
She put a hand on Olive’s shoulder, squeezing gently at first, but then a little too tight.
“You two were always so close,” Riley said, putting her second hand on Olive’s other shoulder. “She must have said something. Or left you a note? A sign.”
Olive shook her head. “No,” she said, her throat growing dry.
“Have you been getting messages, too?” Riley asked.
“From Mama?” Olive was confused.
“No!From Hattie.Your mother found the treasure because of Hattie. Hattie would send her messages. Sometimes in dreams. You said you’d been dreaming about Hattie. What has she shown you?”
“I don’t know. I—”
“Think!” Riley demanded.
Olive tried to squirm away, but Riley held her tight, pulling her closer, her arms now wrapped around Olive.
“Don’t you get it? How special you are?” Riley said, tightening her grip even more. “Your mother didn’t understand, either. Not at first. But she waschosen.Chosen by Hattie. Hattie gave her powers, gave her the ability to see things beyond what any normal person can see. I didn’t understand at first. I kept asking myself why. Why Lori of all people? She didn’t even want the gifts Hattie gave her. I thought it was so unfair, infuriating. But now I finally understand. It was right there under my nose the whole time, but I never put it together.”
“Put what together?”
“They’re related! Lori was Hattie’s great-granddaughter.”
“What?”
“It’s true. You and your mother have Hattie’s blood running in your veins. Do you understand how special that makes you? That’s why you’ve been dreaming about her—you’re connected by blood. Tell me what you’ve dreamed, Ollie.”
