Free Not Quite Right (A Lowcountry Mystery) (Lowcountry Mysteries Book 6) by Lyla Payne

heart. “On all counts. He is damaged. I think that’s what’s drawing him and Millie together.”
    “Hmm.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “Nothing, Gracie, just a hmm. It’s interesting. You never know what’s going to draw people together, that’s all.”
    I think about that as we enter the park, in silent agreement to do the walking-path loop before heading back to the house. Amelia should be going to work, and I plan to shower before digging into Charlotta’s journals again. Maybe Leo will want to stay and help.
    The fact that I really, really want him to digs discomfort under my skin. After what happened with Beau, the idea of depending on another person sets my nerves on alert. But Leo is already here. He’s already part of my life, and somehow, without me noticing, he’s become a piece that would send the rest tumbling down if it went missing.

Chapter Five

    L eo agrees to stay and help me read through some more of the journals, but the smell of him after his shower is distracting. He’s wearing a clean pair of track pants and a thin, long-sleeved Heron Creek High School Baseball shirt that he had in his gym bag. The shirt, at least, looks as though it might have survived since his days walking the halls.  
    His cheeks turn red when I tease him about it. “I’ve been coaching the baseball team. On the side.”
    There’s nothing to do but shake my head. I’ve lost count of Leo’s jobs, but this one seems to suit him. The boys probably think he’s awesome.
    “Um, maybe I’ll run to the hardware store,” he says after taking one look at the mess of the journals on the table.
    “You’re not going to read with me?” I raise my eyebrows.   “Can you read, Leo?”
    He grabs his belly, issuing a fake silent laugh at my teasing. “I can, but…I don’t know. I’m better with my hands.”
    For some reason, the kitchen feels hot all of a sudden. Maybe he doesn’t need to go to the store at all, since the heat seems to be working now. I wave him off and he grabs his coat, checks his pocket for his wallet, then gives me a salute before heading back toward the foyer. It might be paranoia, but while a fresh pot of coffee brews, I follow his steps, making sure to lock the door behind him.
    Mechanisms won’t keep out ghosts, and I have my doubts about voodoo or its practitioners, but being alone, the locks make me feel the slightest bit better anyway.
    I try not to focus on the fact that no one, except maybe Henry’s ghost, is in the house, and I trudge back to the kitchen, pour myself some coffee, and sit back down at the table with Charlotta’s journals. I pull a random one out of the pile, check the date on the first page, and decide to see what’s going on in her teenage life—she and James had gotten romantic around the ages of fourteen, but in a bumbling, childlike way. The history lover in me is fascinated by the ways in which fourteen-year-old children are both more and less worldly than kids today. Not that I have a ton of experience with kids today.
    Teenage Charlotta had been dreamy-eyed but cautious, all too aware that her father would never approve of her feelings for James. They delighted in spending time together, she and James, and touching hands and cheeks. No kissing, and certainly no talk of intimacy beyond that without marriage.
    Of course, we know they did engage in nonmarital intimacy, and the leap beyond what was acceptable makes me want to know her all the more. She was a brave girl, Charlotta Drayton, following her heart instead of custom, and it had cost her—in the terms of the time—a future.  
    Frustration that the journals stop before we know what happens to James runs hot in my veins. Had she ever regretted her choices? Had they ever seen each other again? Did she know what had become of him? Had he known about the baby?
    They are questions that will probably always elude me, and nothing pisses me off more.
    Sighing, I flip forward a few pages to the days after her