All Who Are Lost (Ashmore's Folly Book 1) (38 page)

For a moment, she almost had Julie. Temptation warred behind those eyes, but the girl’s better side won. “I don’t want to go against my father’s wishes.”

This girl was a teenager?

Sweet
, said Lucy.
A sweet, darling girl
. And Lucy, as she’d proved amply the day before, was nobody’s fool.

Hard to believe that anyone could fool Lucy.

So Julie must be very, very good indeed.

“Would you like to go shopping?” Laura zipped up her favorite cotton sundress. “I have fourteen years of Christmases and birthdays to make up for! Is there anything you have your heart set on that you didn’t get for your birthday?” She paused deliberately to bait the trap. “Something you don’t want to ask your father for?”

Julie appeared to consider this; Meg would have had ready and waiting a list as long as her arm. “No, ma’am. But if you’d like to go shopping, I know some neat outlet malls – oh,” she flushed, “I guess you don’t shop at those, probably.”

For a split second, Laura wondered if Richard had warned his daughter against falling prey to her rich aunt’s pocketbook. But why on earth would he object to her spending money on her niece? Did he think she was going to attempt to buy Julie’s trust?

“I shop anywhere,” she said calmly. “What would you like for your birthday?”

Julie said shyly, “I really have everything I need. But thank you.”

The perfect daughter.

She leaned towards the mirror to check her makeup, and let the silence stretch out between them. She knew how to handle silence, how to use it to her advantage, but Julie hadn’t yet the experience to match that. She sensed her niece’s eyes on her, even as Julie stroked Max’s furry back and murmured love words into his adoring ears.

If she hadn’t known better, she would have thought that Julie was trying to scam Richard. And Lucy. And her.

Julie is nowhere near as innocent as everyone thinks.
She hadn’t wondered till this moment why Diana had said such a thing.

Oh, surely not. Julie was a beloved daughter and niece, maybe too sheltered, maybe overly protected, maybe too early separated from a mother with vacant eyes and desperate heart. The product (Laura reminded herself) of a bitterly broken home. And Diana was certainly no expert on her daughter or anyone else.

Still, she trusted her instincts. The girl possessed a superb smoothness, the hallmark of long practice and polished skill. Behind those wide eyes, Laura sensed a first-class mind working away in furious intensity.

Okay, my girl
, Laura thought, following Julie down the stairs.
I’ll play along. Just remember, I’ve got fifteen years on you, and a thousand audiences more.

Julie bore up well under scrutiny throughout the morning. She was the perfect companion, polite, sweet, enthusiastic, even deferential without being too obvious. No stomping on the gas pedal after Laura tempted her again with the car keys. No disappointed face when Laura inserted a classical guitar CD. No flirting with the good-looking young man who pulled up beside them at a stop sign and threw an admiring glance their way.

“I think he recognizes you, Laura.”

Laura turned skeptical shade-framed eyes on her. “I doubt he even saw me.”

“Sure he did.” Julie accelerated smoothly, with all the daring of a little old lady. Maybe she thought better of her absolute denial, because she added, “Oh, I know we look alike. Everyone’s always told me that, and it’s not surprising, is it, since we’re related? Who do we take after, do you know?”

“My great-grandmother.” Giannetta Montini had died decades before, but Laura had seen the unsigned painting
Idol of Perversity
that had shown Giannetta in all her natural splendor in
fin-de-siècle
Paris. “Except none of us got her figure.”

Julie giggled. “Dad says I’ll improve with age. He thinks maybe I’m just a late bloomer. So unfair, don’t you think, Lucy says my mother didn’t have that problem.” Laura intercepted the sidelong glance sent her way and wondered what she was in for now. “You and my mother really do look a lot alike, don’t you? Almost like twins. That’s what my father used to say—”

Great. So even Richard admitted that she reminded him of Diana.

“Except,” finished Julie, “you’re much younger and prettier than she is.”

Laura stopped breathing for a second or two, long enough to absorb the sheer brutality of those words. When she looked at Julie again, she saw the hint of satisfaction playing around the girl’s mouth, the knowledge that she’d struck home magnificently.

Good God, had Julie ever talked to Diana like this?

Well, she didn’t have to tolerate this from someone half her age. She opened her mouth to give Julie a setdown she’d never forget.

Maybe Julie sensed she had gone too far. A certain haste shook her voice as she cut across the words on Laura’s lips. “My mother was beautiful when she was young, though, wasn’t she? Lucy showed me the wedding pictures.” Laura saw the girl bite her lip and steal a sidelong glance. “My father must have been very proud of her.”

Proud? She wouldn’t have used that word to describe the remembered awe on his face, the look of a young man violently in love.

“So,” fished Julie, “I guess they were mad for each other.”

By now, she ought to be getting used to Julie’s hidden agenda. “Yes,” she said to nothing in particular, and waited for the next bombshell.

Silence for a few minutes. The Virginia countryside flew past them, the highway lined with the sentinel trees blending into the lush greenness of summer. Julie accelerated slightly over the speed limit, with another sidelong glance, and Laura dug in her mental heels and refused the admonition that the girl obviously wanted.

All those remarks about Richard and Diana…. She surveyed Julie from the corner of her eye. Maybe the girl really didn’t know anything. As close-mouthed and private as Richard had proved to be, maybe his daughter had no idea why the marriage had broken up. Maybe he had never told her about the springs of their courtship, the night he had brought over her engagement ring, the day he had danced with his bride in his arms.

Meg had often begged for details of her parents’ courtship. Had Julie shown the same curiosity and met Richard’s stonewall?

“Did my mother date much when she was my age?” Julie’s question, when it finally came, cemented Laura’s suspicion. “I mean, besides my father? I’ve heard how they met in grade school and hardly had eyes for anyone else, but – I mean, what if he hadn’t been around? Did other guys ask her out?”

Laura took a minute to sort out her thoughts. She didn’t doubt that an entire history lay behind the question, but what it might contain, she couldn’t hazard a guess. Unless Julie had somehow heard about Diana’s men – but surely that wouldn’t shock the girl. She knew her father dated. Wouldn’t she expect her mother to enjoy the same liberties?

“I don’t remember,” Laura said. “Your mom and dad were always together. I don’t remember her dating anyone else.”

“Are you sure?” Julie sounded intense. “Didn’t anyone else ever ask her out?”

Laura shot her a quick look and registered it all at once: the tension of Julie’s hand on the steering wheel, the quick rise and fall of her young breasts, the rapid blinking of her eyes. Now what was Julie up to?

But wait…. Lucy had said something…. And Richard:
Julie doesn’t have much of a social life… Julie doesn’t date much yet.
Julie, with that incredible face, ought to be beating the boys off with a stick.

Laura took a breath and gambled. “Do you have a boyfriend, Julie?”

Bingo! The girl’s eyes widened, and her hands trembled. Laura leaned over and steadied the wheel, thankful that the roads were free of traffic.

“Pull off on the access road ahead.”

Without a word, the girl obeyed. She regained control of herself quickly; she must have the iron will of the Abbotts. She slowed the car down on the shoulder, staring straight ahead, and if her chin quivered, it was only for a second.

“Cut the motor,” Laura said.

Julie did as she was told.

“Now,” said Laura, “look at me.”

The girl hesitated, grasping for that last one second of independence, but a lifetime of obedience forced her to turn slowly in her seat. Laura stared deep into mirror-green eyes fighting back the threat of tears and reminded herself that, for all that crafty intelligence, behind those eyes lived a daughter sheltered and protected from the adult realities of her world.

Still, she couldn’t allow Julie to run circles around her anymore.

“You don’t date very much, do you?”

“No, ma’am,” Julie whispered, and a stray tear – Laura would swear it was genuine – slipped out of one eye.

“Why?”

She could barely hear her niece. “No one asks me.”

Oh, Lord!
Why
was written all over Julie’s face. No teenage boy was going to risk rejection by asking the most beautiful girl in the class for a date. She felt a spurt of irritation for Richard; he should have dealt with this, not left his daughter to wonder if she was her mother reborn. “Have you talked to your dad about this?”

Julie’s answer surprised her. “Yes. We – he wanted to know how come I didn’t go to the prom a few weeks ago. I guess I must have talked about it some, that I wanted to go. Anyway,” she swallowed, “he asked if I needed money for a dress, and I had to tell him that I wasn’t going. He asked how come.”

Score one for Richard. At least, his daughter felt that she could confide in him. “What did you say?”

“The truth.” Julie’s hand lifted to the tear. “No one asked me. Not even one of the geeks. There’s a guy I like, he’s sort of quiet—” she looked defiantly at her aunt, as though Laura might despise such a choice— “he studies a lot, he’s real smart, and I thought he might ask me because we worked together on a history project and we got along real well. But he didn’t.”

“Of course he didn’t,” Laura said gently. She touched her niece’s hair experimentally, wondering if the girl would accept her comfort. “He’s got an ego as fragile as glass, and he wasn’t about to ask you out and have you turn him down.”

“That’s what Dad said.” Laura gave Richard points. “He said maybe Mike figured I’d already been asked. He said the guys in my class are too young to appreciate me, but in a few years it’ll get better.” Julie wiped her hand across her eyes. “But what am I supposed to do until then? A guy at church asked me out, and he’s in college, and—”

She fell silent. Laura prompted, “And?”

Julie said reluctantly, “And Dad said no, he’s too old for me. He’s twenty.”

Laura rolled her eyes and then hoped that Julie hadn’t seen. Too bad she couldn’t tell Julie the reason for Richard’s fear, that at seventeen he’d been climbing a tree into Diana’s bedroom. “Fathers are like that, Julie. Your dad’s no different. Meg’s dad worried just as much about her. His greatest fear was that she might get pregnant before she got out of school.”

Julie’s eyes widened at that. “No one has to worry about me.”

“I’m sure they don’t.”

A few seconds of silence. Then Julie said unexpectedly, “How about you? Did you date much when you were young?”

Leave it to the truly young to wound with a mere word; she didn’t think Julie even realized what she had said. “No, I didn’t. Not much, anyway. I only had one boyfriend.”

“Why? Were guys scared of you?”

She hadn’t the faintest idea what to answer. “I don’t think so. I was pretty shy. Besides, my father didn’t allow me to date until I was almost seventeen, and I went and got a job in a bookstore after school at the start of my senior year, so I really didn’t have the time.”

“You had a job? Really?” Julie’s interest perked. “I’m going to work for Lucy this summer when I get back from music camp. I want to buy a car. I don’t like driving Grandma’s car.”

“I had a car.” Laura pondered briefly the wisdom of telling the truth. “I needed the money.”

Maybe her tone warned Julie. She saw a curious light come into her niece’s eyes. “You did? Why? Were you saving for college?”

“No. I was saving up to run away.”

Her words hit Julie hard. The girl’s eyes snapped open abruptly; the lock of hair she had twisted around a finger jerked taut. The silence of a few seconds stretched out into a long string, vibrating with Julie’s shock.

“But you were still seventeen when you left.”

Whatever she’d expected, it wasn’t this
non sequitur
. She gave Julie a quick glance and saw the wheels turning in that active mind. “Right. I left in June, right after I graduated—”

“But,” said Julie slowly, “you got a job a – a whole year before then—” She turned and faced Laura. “You planned it,” she whispered. “You
planned
it. You
knew
for a whole year ahead of time that you were going to run away.”

For all the questions her sisters had asked, for that terrible scene ringing with accusations her first evening back, no one had fingered the core of her disappearance. Lucy had asked; Richard had assumed he knew; Diana had only wanted to know about Francie. No one had realized the true architect of the day she and Francie had walked out the door forever.

Until now. Julie, a toddler at the time, whose memories of her must have come from hearing the rest of the family talk – Julie had looked straight into the heart of the past and seen the truth.

It should not come as such a shock that Julie read her so well. Hadn’t she looked at Julie earlier today, in that first moment of meeting, and recognized herself?

She met Julie’s eyes. “You’re right. I planned it.”

“For a
year
,” Julie whispered. “Why?”

“I needed the time. I had to graduate from high school.”

“But I don’t understand.
Why?
What was so terrible that you knew for a
year
—”

She had never told anyone, not Francie, not Cam. Perhaps here, in this car, on this morning, it was time to finally admit what Dominic Abbott had done to her.

She had to go easy. She reminded herself that Julie was a child, and then just as quickly rejected that thought forever. She had been Julie’s age when she had made an adult decision to grab the reins of her life.