Girls of Summer Page 6

  Glancing up, she caught sight of his thick arm linked through Georgie’s. The knife-spoon-fork combo slipped from her hand, hitting the table and flopping in a jangle of dissonant tings against the tile floor. With a sigh, she scooted from the bench and knelt to retrieve the flatware. As she reached for the base of the fork, a long-fingered, tan hand grasped the tines.

  Her gaze locked with deep, dark brown. Swallowing hard against the lump in her throat, her lips tightened across her mouth. “I’ve got it. You can let go. No need to rescue the fork.”

  The corner of his mouth lifted softly, revealing a single dimple in his right cheek. “Just trying to help,” he said, with a soft wink.

  They stood simultaneously, their arms brushing lightly. The hairs on the back of Charlotte’s neck stood tall. With a dry swallow, she shuffled around him and plopped onto her seat.

  Sliding onto the bench across from her, Mac was followed by her sister, who snuggled into his side. He draped his arm over Georgie’s shoulders, squeezing her close. “How’re you feeling?” he asked Charlotte. “How are your hands? Your head? Any residual headache from the accident?”

  With a shrug, she dropped her focus to the table and yanked another set of silverware from the basket, and began bundling. “Nothing that could keep me from making sure half of Beaufort County has free hands.”

  She could almost feel the shake of his head.

  “I see your attitude wasn’t wounded.”

  Charlotte dropped her bundle onto the stack and slid off the bench. “I think we have enough silver wrapped.” Heaving the basket with napkins and silverware from the table, she moved toward the doorway. “I think I’ll see if they need help with the flowers. If not, I’m going back to take a nap. Seems you have everything under control here.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Welcome, Taylor. I’m sure these ladies are glad you’re here.”

  11

  Charlie walked through the doorway that connected the kitchen and the main dining room. The natural sway of her hips with the added weight of the basket filled with silverware bundles drew Mac’s attention to her long, lean legs. The twist of his gut in reaction had him shaking his head. She’s technically your boss, Taylor. No unmentionable thoughts. God’s always watching, and He’s probably given a little window for Bent to glance through as well.

  He cranked his neck and kneaded the small space connected to his shoulders. He rarely felt tension in this kitchen. The giant room held the same cozy warmth he’d experienced in his own mother’s kitchen during childhood, but Charlotte had the ability to turn the loveliest of situations into an exercise in angst. The last six weeks had been a lesson in managing chaos in all areas of his life, the most tumultuous having just walked from the room. Prayer had become an even more necessary staple for him. Bent often professed the difference a few minutes on his knees could make when facing an insurmountable obstacle. Hurricane Charlie would more likely generate hours on Mac’s knees, and he wished he could ask his mentor for advice on how best to navigate the storm.

  Mac’s grief was nothing compared to Bent’s “blood family”, but he struggled every day to work without the old man yelling down the hall at him. He expected Bent to pop in for lunch or call after hours with excitement humming through his voice at the discovery of a new pitcher or business opportunity. Mac had not had the space to grieve the loss of his mentor and friend. Not fully.

  Bent had entrusted him with the running of his business and the execution of his will. Mac was trying to fulfill all his best friend’s final requests while maintaining a professional distance, but Bent’s estranged daughter was making his longed-for aloofness nearly impossible.

  She seemed to attract trouble with the consistency of flies finding the honey pot; the exploding car was just one of many events that spelled trouble with a capital “C”.

  Savvy slid onto the bench Charlotte had vacated, and patted his hand. “Just ignore her. She woke up on the wrong side of the bed six weeks ago and couldn’t find the right side if she was Sherlock Holmes.” She glanced over her shoulder toward the empty doorway. “Guess she has more Stasi in her than we ever thought.”

  He shrugged. “She should get at least a partial pass because of the accident. Slamming your body into concrete could not lead to a positive attitude in the best of people.”

  Georgie tensed. Her mass of dark blonde curls seemed to droop with the mention of the explosion. His heart twisted in pain for his adopted kid sister. Mac first met Georgie when she was twelve. Lopsided pigtails topped a heart shaped face as she followed her dad to the practice fields. Her kindness and innocence was as pure today as when she was tiny and coached Mac on his throw to second, claiming his hop “could use a little work”. He wished he could ease Georgie’s pain. She was desperately trying to keep everything in balance—her grief, her career, her relationship with her sister and even her aunt. Mac needed to find a way to help her while dealing with Charlie. The balance was a teeter-totter ride he wasn’t enjoying.

  He tucked Georgie into his side. With a loud smack, he kissed her forehead. “Don’t worry, Slugger. Charlie will be just fine. And Sheriff Camby and the FBI will figure out what happened.”

  Georgie dropped her gaze to the table, her finger tracing an unseen pattern along the smooth surface. A single tear landed just to the left of her hand.

  Lifting his gaze to Savvy, he tilted his head to the side. She nodded, rising from her seat, wordlessly telling him most of the story he already knew.

  “So,” he pulled Georgie tighter to his side. “Why don’t you tell me what the deal is?”

  Her whole body shook against his side with her silent weeping. Stroking her arm, he let her cry and waited. Patience had served him well as a boy sitting up with his prize lamb when she fell ill, as a catcher bouncing around the minor leagues hoping for a shot at “The Show”, and as an attorney across the table from a worthy adversary. He could wait out a few tears.

  Georgie sucked in a shaky breath. Leaning her elbows on the table she rested her chin in her cupped hands tilting her head to meet his gaze. Still damp, the crystal blue depths reflected raw agony. “I don’t know what else to do, Mac,” Her voice broke just above a whisper. “I thought after Thanksgiving, you know, those first few weeks, things would naturally get better. But they haven’t. I think they’ve gotten worse. You were in Ohio, and I didn’t want to whine, but Christmas Eve was awful. She was awful. And now this explosion…this….bomb? Why would someone attack her or anyone at Watershed? Do you think she’s in danger? Is the whole organization? Will we be able to convince her to stay? She has to stay, Mac. It’s Daddy’s last wish. But why would she stay if someone is trying to blow her up?”

  A shudder chased through his body. The sheriff had confirmed today that the explosion was indeed caused by a bomb. He didn’t want to think about the bomb. He couldn’t process the thought that Charlie could have been killed. He blocked the what-if thoughts from his mind and shifted his attention to what he could control. He’d wondered about the Christmas Eve party a week ago. He’d flown home to Ohio before Christmas so he’d missed the annual Savvy Dixon Boudreaux Blow-Out. The party should have been a great way for Charlie to acclimate to the family and the social scene of Beaufort County. Of course, that would’ve been too easy. “Tell me what she did on Christmas Eve,” he prompted. Anything to divert from the talk of bombs.

  She twisted on the bench, pulling a knee to her chest as she faced him. “She was terrible. You could feel how much she hated everyone and everything. And this is her family, Mac. Can you imagine? She looked down her nose at the party like it was a third-rate redneck hoedown rather than the elaborate ordeal Savvy throws every year. I’m not one much for parties, but Savvy knows what she’s doing. I can’t imagine a party planner in New York could do any better.” She nearly spat when she said the name of the city.

  Mac nodded, recognizing the venting he would endure. For over a decade, Georgie had used his shoulder for her tears and her frustration, and she was ju
st beginning to crest the wave.

  With hands twisting and curls bouncing, Georgie proceeded to describe Charlotte’s conduct during Savvy’s much lauded annual Christmas Eve party.

  Mac’s stomach burned, and he felt a sharp pain at the base of his neck as she shared Charlotte’s snub of local politicians, extended family, and her father’s close friends. Mac got an image of lithe Charlotte draped in a skimpy black cocktail dress holding up a wall in the main living room with her lips pursed, forehead scrunched, and focus narrowed as all of the Dixons’ wide range of acquaintances tried to woo her. And she had probably flicked them away with her sharp words as though she was swatting flies at a picnic.

  “The worst was Auntie Darla, you know, Momma’s former sorority sister who lives in Mobile but visits her family every Christmas and still comes to Savvy’s little soirée?”

  A vision of teased, unnaturally red hair the size of Alabama, and rouged cheeks scorched his mind. “I remember.”

  “Well, she came to the party and was trying so hard to be cheerful and upbeat. She felt so bad she missed Daddy’s funeral. She went straight up to Charlie and asked all about New York and her little gallery. She chatted her up like they were at a Sunday social. And Charlie looked at her with that way she has. You know the look I’m talking about?”

  “I know the one.” He’d been on the receiving end of the look more times in the past few weeks than he cared to remember.

  “There’s Auntie Darla chattering away, her hands waving, when Charlie takes a sip from her glass and says, ‘Darla where does one find that particular shade of red your hair is colored? I don’t believe I’ve ever seen such a color outside a crayon box.’ Can you believe?” She tossed her hands wide.

  Although Mac thought Charlotte’s description was fairly accurate, that was the type of thought not meant to be spoken aloud. He guessed Charlie missed the lesson in Sunday school. “Unfortunately, yes I can. But you can’t judge her for what she says or by the morals your parents raised you with, Georgie.”

  Her mouth dropped open, and she laced her arms over her chest. “We had the same father, Mac. She was raised with the same morals I was…or mostly was.”

  He ran his hand lightly over her long curls. “No, she wasn’t.” With a sigh, he dropped his hand to the table and twisted on the bench to face her. “She didn’t have your dad in her life the way you did. And she certainly didn’t have Sav or your Uncle Rayburn or Mellie or your church. She had a mother who, as far as I can tell, used her love as a thing to withhold if Charlie didn’t perform to her expectations. And a distant father, who chose his life over a life with her. She didn’t have what you had…have, Georgie.”

  Her eyes closed. Dropping her forehead to her folded arms, she released a long deep breath.

  Silence lingered between them, cushioned by the clinks and clangs of the catering staff.

  She was processing the frustration of the past few weeks. Her anger toward Charlotte was likely a manifestation of her grief. Anger was one of the steps. There were five, or so he’d been told when his mother died. He was a lawyer not a psychologist. He couldn’t remember them all, but he was certain of anger. Georgie definitely was experiencing anger. And, he imagined Charlotte was experiencing some anger of her own. Women. Why couldn’t they punch it out and be done, like men?

  Lifting her head, she propped her chin on her knee and tilted her head to the side. “It’s not fair.”

  “What’s not fair?”

  “Why are you always right?”

  He felt the corners of his mouth tug. “Taylor curse. I’m the oldest, so I’m always right. My brothers hate it.”

  Her crystal eyes rolled. “OK. What am I supposed to do about my older sister?”

  He wanted to tell her to yell at Charlie and tell her she was being a snobbish idiot. He wanted to tell Georgie to haul off and sock her sister in the jaw—a method that had worked well with his brothers a time or two. But he knew the answer Bent, his own dad, and The Lord wanted him to give. “Love her,” he whispered.

  “She makes it super hard.”

  “Well, love isn’t supposed to be easy. It’s like hitting a hanging curve ball; if it was easy everyone would do it.”

  “Seriously,” she said, with a shove to his shoulder, “is everything baseball with you?”

  He stood and offered a hand to help her stand. “God gave us baseball so we would have an easy way to talk about the hard things in life.”

  Stepping toward him, she wrapped her long arms around his waist and laid her head on his chest. “I’m glad Daddy put you in charge. He chose well. You are a man after his own heart.”

  He patted her back three times and lifted his gaze heavenward. I hope she’s right.

  12

  Sweat pooled on Charlotte’s chest, and beads raced down her back. Her feet pounded the gravel and dirt path connecting the main road to the plantation grounds. Running in December in South Carolina didn’t offer the same fear of frostbite as winter runs in New York.

  First tick in the positive column for South Carolina.

  And, although running with a diagnosed concussion likely wasn’t doctor approved, she clung to the hope her greatest love would grant the calm continuing to evade her. Running had been her outlet since she was first sent to Connecticut for year-round boarding school. On the winding, weed-filled paths around campus, she’d found a sense of calm when her personal life was a mass of twisted emotions and emptiness.

  Through her teen years and into adulthood, running had been her constant companion. When her mother remarried for the fourth time, when Momma D died, when her mother accused her of flirting with one of her step-fathers, when her father ignored her, and when she ignored her father’s dying request, running had never failed her. She could push herself through bruised toes, swollen feet, pulled hamstrings, and sore backs, because by mile four or five she would achieve peace. A clear mind filled with nothing but the pain of her body as a reward. Yet, after several miles along what could only be described as a barren, backwoods country road, she wasn’t any closer to the bliss of an empty mind.

  Her abhorrent behavior over the last few weeks played like a newsreel in her mind, and one little car bomb couldn’t excuse a devastating stack of terrible conduct. Charlotte wanted to blame her behavior on the strained situation, the unspoken fear of what lay outside of her control or even her living conditions, but the reality was she was being a brat. She was being her mother. And she never wanted to be any version of Anastasia ‘Stasi’ Bickford.

  Not ever.

  Rude. Overbearing. Entitled. Her mother was the textbook definition of a person with whom Charlotte didn’t want to associate.

  Technically, her mother worked for her, but the salary was paltry, and she had preferred to play ostrich with Mama’s bookkeeping rather than confront her. Even before she’d asked Remy to intervene with an audit, she’d suspected her mother was skimming money, but Remy’s recent discovery exceeded even Charlotte’s worst expectations of her mother.

  One week before her father’s death, Remy delivered the results of the initial audit. Charlotte’s suspicions were correct. Her mother’s paychecks were more frequent and fuller than they had agreed. But he also found irregular lump sums coming into the gallery—dollars way above the average price of the pieces she sold and often connected to artists her mother “discovered”. The command to come to South Carolina for the funeral and the reading of the will had given Charlotte the reprieve she needed.

  Until the FBI dropped by for a chat.

  And her car exploded.

  And Remy confirmed her worst fears.

  She slowed her run to a lazy jog, the gravel turned to a muddy path as the guest house came into view. The white clapboard, three-bedroom house was almost a mile from the main house, far enough away to feel separation, but close enough for Savvy to drop by for coffee. The driveway was a worn path off of the main gravel road, quilted with mossy grass and dying weeds. Her final steps were muffled as she rou
nded the wraparound porch to the front entrance.

  A scream caught in her throat, her hand rushing to her chest, at the sight of long denim clad legs dangling over the edge of the porch. Her gaze roamed up the legs to the broad chest stretching a taut, well-worn flannel shirt. She locked her gaze with the watchful eyes of Mac Taylor. A lump replaced her scream.

  Why did he have to look as if he stepped out of an outdoor living catalogue? She always went a little melty when she saw a man in a wooly plaid shirt and a days’ growth of beard.

  Extending his hand, he offered her a bottle of water. “You’ve been gone awhile.” He patted the porch floor beside him. “Why don’t you take a load off? Catch your breath.”

  She greedily sucked back half of the water. “Thanks.” The porch was a bit higher than her hip forcing her to hop to sit beside him.

  He nodded. “Thought you were taking a nap?”

  Her breath slowed, and she lifted her shoulders with a shrug, “Wasn’t tired.”

  “So you ran for over an hour instead? Doesn’t seem like good therapy after being released from the hospital less than sixteen hours ago. Can’t imagine running is a good idea after a concussion.”

  The screaming in her brain confirmed he was probably right, but she would never let him know. “Why do you care?”

  He shifted to face her, leaning his back against the weathered column supporting the porch. “Let’s not forget who sat with you during that entire hospital stay.”

  She ignored the warmth spreading through her stomach. “No one asked you to stay.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Thanks, but as you can see”—she spread her arms wide—“I’m doing just fine.”

  His gaze followed the length of her body. “Yeah, your outside looks OK.”

  Wrapping her arms tight over her belly, she scooted against the opposite pillar and crossed her legs at the ankles. “We’ve established I’m fine. You can go. Unless there’s something else you want to discuss.”