Secrets of the Lost Summer (36 page)

Olivia noticed that her mother had gone quiet. Finally she said, “I waited and waited to get up the nerve to make this trip to California. Then I decided to take action, and that’s when the fear and second-guessing eased. I can’t say they went away and I don’t have my bags packed and I’m not on the plane yet, but deciding, acting—they’ve helped.”

“I can’t just wait for Dylan to figure things out, can I?”

Her mother gave a little shrug, and smiled. “I’d never interfere.”

Mark left first, then her parents and grandmother. Jess stayed behind, helping herself to a bottle of chilled chardonnay and bringing two glasses out to the terrace with her. She filled the glasses and handed one to Olivia. “I want to get married here at Carriage Hill.”

“Then you and Mark—”

“No ring yet, no. I’m just saying that I want to get married here. Mark won’t care. He’d get married in a shed if it’s what I wanted. He can be…inert.” Jess grinned and sat down with her own glass of wine. “But I love him.”

“What about Paris?”

“I’m going to Paris. Then I’m coming home.”

Olivia lifted her wineglass and clinked it against Jess’s. “I’d love for you to have your wedding here.” She smiled, trying her wine. “Just not tomorrow, I hope. I have more work to do before I can put on a wedding.”

Jess drank more of her wine, then said, “Do you think Mom will get on that plane to Los Angeles?”

“Yes, I do, Jess. She’s determined.”

“Will you worry?”

Olivia swallowed and set down her glass. “Mom can’t not go because of me, but I’ll be fine.”

“Dad says you probably have some kind of herb here we can chew on if we get nuts.”

“I do, actually.”

Jess grinned, but her humor didn’t last. “This thing with the missing jewels and Grace and the McCaffreys feels unfinished. I think you need to find the jewels. I can help look for them.”

“Thanks, Jess.”

They chatted for a few more minutes, and after Jess left, Olivia patted Buster and got him up for a walk. “I wish you could find the Ashworth jewels.”

An offhand comment Mark had made at Olivia’s house had been bugging Jess. She finally put her finger on it and confronted him when she found him out at the pond by the old sawmill. “You were engaged once?”

“I was twenty-two. It didn’t work out. We’d only known each other for a couple months.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

He shrugged. “I didn’t think it mattered. I’ve known you for as long as I can remember. Hell, Jess, we used to jump in this pond together as kids. Remember?”

“You tried to drown me.”

“You and the drama.” He grinned and drew her into his arms. “Jess, I love you. You’re a romantic at heart. I’m…I can be a rock head.”

“So can I. We’re kindred spirits in that way.”

He laughed, then withdrew a small, navy-blue case from his jacket pocket. He opened it up to a sparkling diamond ring and got down on one knee. “Jessica Frost, I love you, and I want to marry you. I want to be with you for the rest of our lives.” He took her hand. “Jess, will you marry me?”

“Oh, Mark. Yes, yes, yes. I love you so much.”

He slid the ring onto her finger and swept her into his arms as he rose. He had tickets to Paris and hotel reservations, with more adventures to come.

Jess saw that her parents had arrived back at the mill. She and Mark went up and told them the news, and Jess showed them her ring. Her mother laughed and hugged her. “I’m so happy for you, Jess—for both you and Mark.”

Her father sighed. “Finally. I thought I was going to have to get my shotgun.”

He didn’t own a shotgun. Jess rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Dad.” She grinned at him, then was serious. “Are you two really going to California?”

“We’re going,” her mother said.

His daughters needed them. Randy Frost could see that same thought running through Louise’s mind after Jess left. Jess was excited about her wedding and would start making plans. And Olivia…Randy grimaced. His elder daughter had missing British jewels and a rich Californian on her mind, and she didn’t have a steady paycheck.

Louise turned from the map of California tacked to her wall. “Jess and Louise will be fine without us. It’s hard to believe sometimes, but they’re grown now.” Her voice was steady but not loud, as if she were repeating words she wanted to be true rather than she was certain were true.

“It’s not flying and driving that get to you,” Randy said. “It’s not having your chicks in the nest. It’s worrying about them.”

“I remind myself that it’s a big piece of paper.” She shut her eyes a moment, as if imagining those dots of hers, then smiled at him. “There’s enough room for us all to live our lives and still be together.”

Randy slung an arm over his wife’s shoulders. He saw that she’d added a couple more colored pushpins marking the places they’d stop on their trip. “Jess and Olivia live in Knights Bridge because they love it and they want to be here. They have lives here. If that changes, they’ll move on. They’re not here because you’ve held them back.”

“They’re so independent. I never wanted to stifle that.”

“You didn’t and you don’t. Maybe I did a little—maybe we both did a little, but not enough to do any damage.” He paused, cleared his throat. “Maybe I stifled you, just from wanting to protect you.”

“You’re my rock, Randy.”

“Yeah, but not because you’re weak. I’d crush you if you were weak, and you’re not.” He pulled her close to him and groaned. “Damn, Louise. Now I’m sounding like I’ve been seeing a therapist.”

“I’d support you if you did. It’s a good thing, Randy.”

Looking at his wife now, he couldn’t disagree. “Being independent doesn’t mean Liv and Jess have to move a thousand miles from us. It doesn’t mean that they don’t want us in their lives. Too bad if it does, because we’re not going anywhere.” Randy grinned. “Except to freaking California.”

Louise smiled back at him. “I can’t wait.”

“Good, because those rich nuts out there have arranged for a car for us and a suite at the Beverly Hills Hotel for the first two nights. Just until we get over jet lag.”

“Dylan McCaffrey?”

“He and Noah Kendrick.”

Louise’s eyes widened. “You’ve been in touch?”

“Yep.”

Randy liked that he could still surprise her. He thought of the two of them heading off together, then coming home together, and he knew he was the luckiest man in the world.

Twenty-Nine

D
ylan looked out at San Diego from his office windows, aware of Noah Kendrick behind him. “Olivia would love San Diego,” Noah said. “I can see her at your place on Coronado. She’d paint all the walls. She’d liven up that cappuccino-and-white look of yours.”

“She hates to fly.”

“I hate to fly. I do it all the time.”

“Helps to have your own plane.”

“Helps to have a good Scotch handy.”

Dylan knew Noah was kidding. He might dislike flying, but flying was like driving to both of them. Just something they did to get to where they were going. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, Noah.”

“Your father complicated your life by buying that place, but his life was complicated, too. I took your lawyer to dinner. Straightened out what was attorney-client privilege and what I needed to know.”

“As my boss.”

“I’ve never been your boss, Dylan. Hell. You know that. We’re business partners. More than that, we’re friends. I wanted to know as your friend.”

“Don’t tell me Loretta and my father—”

“I’m not telling you anything. Your father couldn’t settle down, even if he wanted to. He had a restless soul. If he found those jewels, what would he have done with them?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yeah, you do. He wasn’t an easy man but he was a decent one.” Noah gazed out the window. He was in an expensive black shirt and jeans today, as if to make a statement. “It’s been an intense few months, Dylan. You’ve been a big help. You always are.”

“If you ever need me, you know I’m there.”

“I know. Same here. I figure it’s time for us to get into venture capital. My role here is changing. Anyway, that’s for the future. This adventure travel thing of yours will only take up so much time. We’ll talk.” He turned to his friend. “Right now, you have a plane to catch. Mine. Go.”

Dylan raised his eyebrows. “Noah, what have you done?”

“I’m meeting Randy and Louise Frost in Beverly Hills. I want to make sure you’re in good hands with these people, plus I have some millwork I need done for my winery.” Noah settled back on his heels, a little hyper but also pleased with himself. “It’s time I had your back, Dylan.”

“You always have. Noah—”

“Just go, will you? Pack, lock the doors and take off.”

Dylan headed out. He found Loretta Wrentham on his front porch. She held up a hand before he could say a word. “I adored your father but I knew the score. I found out he was adopted. He suspected but he didn’t know for sure. His parents never told him—that wasn’t as uncommon then as it is now. He found that newspaper article in his mother’s belongings after she died. I think she meant for him to find it, so that it could be his choice to pursue answers or just let them be.”

“She tore the article out of the newspaper herself?”

“Right. It’s not Grace Webster’s handwriting in the margin. It’s your Grandmother McCaffrey’s handwriting. Maybe she thought Isaiah Webster was the jewel thief, foiled somehow since he never did have money, but, personally, I think she suspected that the jewel thief was her son’s biological father. Your father stuck it in that trunk of his and didn’t think about it again for years. Then two years ago he decided to check out Knights Bridge. He assumed everyone concerned would be dead by then.”

“Grace—his birth mother—wasn’t dead.”

“That’s right. And your father wasn’t going to upset her or do anything that would reveal her secret. Not for anything, Dylan. I see that now. I didn’t know. I’ve tried to put him behind me. I could have spared you a lot of pain.”

“Pain?” He grinned at her. “No pain, Loretta. It’s been a hell of a treasure hunt, exactly what he’d have wanted.”

She looked relieved. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.”

“No. You did what you promised to do. That’s enough. Now if you’ll excuse me—”

“Go, go.” Loretta gave him a quick smile. “The treasure hunt isn’t over.”

He laughed and headed inside to pack for his flight east.

Grace summoned Olivia to Rivendell and asked her to come to the sunroom. She was alone, a shawl wrapped over her thin shoulders as she stood at the windows. “I checked the copies of my book. I’d just had them printed when Duncan McCaffrey visited.” She paused, her eyes pinned on the view of the bird feeders and, in the distance, Quabbin. “One wasn’t in pristine condition. Someone had obviously borrowed it, read it and returned it.”

“Duncan?”

“That rogue. I remember now that I had the books out when he was here. They’d just come back from the printer. I’m not as young as I used to be, Olivia. I never let students put one over on me back in the day. Duncan, though…”

“You’re glad he purloined a copy of your book.”

“He had a chance to read it before he died.” Grace stared out the window, then took a breath and continued without looking at Olivia. “There was a hand-dug well behind my cabin. It might have caved in by now. I used to worry it would get covered up by leaves and someone would fall into it. I mention it in my book, in passing.”

A well. Olivia studied the older woman. “Grace…did you tell Dylan about this well?”

She smiled, a spark of mischief in her eyes. “Thirty minutes ago.”

“He’s here? He’s in Knights Bridge?” Olivia couldn’t hide her surprise. “Has he gone out to Carriage Hill Pond to look for this well?”

Grace sat in her seat and arranged her shawl around her, then lifted her binoculars. “Look, Olivia. A bluebird.”

Olivia found Dylan at the pond, tossing a stick into the quiet water, and she wondered if all those years ago young Grace had responded to her jewel thief the same way, with a breathless gasp and a sense that this man was the only man she would ever want to be with.

He grinned at her. “Think I just stole millions in missing British jewels?”

“You wouldn’t be standing here throwing sticks if you had.” Olivia pushed through ferns to him. “I didn’t know you were back.”

“I rolled into town this morning. I had this unfinished business to settle before I saw you.”

“Looking for Grace’s well. I have a feeling your father got a shot of his wanderlust from her.” Olivia felt a welcome breeze on what had turned into a warm spring day. “I have something I want to tell you.” She pushed back a flutter of anxiety. “Before we go treasure hunting.”

He stepped up onto Grace’s rock. “All right. What’s up?”

Olivia faced the water so she wouldn’t be distracted by her reaction to him. “My sister and I were in a car accident when we were teenagers. I was driving. We were on our way to pick fiddlehead ferns.” She held up a hand before Dylan could ask. “Fiddleheads are like wild asparagus. You eat them. Jess and I were a one-lane road that dead-ended at Quabbin. It’s a lot like our road. Hardly anyone’s ever on it.”

“Except that day,” he said quietly.

Olivia nodded. “A car came straight at us out of nowhere, going way too fast. I swerved and went off the road.”

“The other car?”

“I’m not sure the driver even realized we’d gone off the road. I remember Jess screaming, ‘Car, car,’ and—well, we careened between two trees, down a hill and into a stone wall. We were lucky. We weren’t seriously injured—bumps, and a few scrapes—and we never lost consciousness, but we couldn’t get out.” Olivia paused, focused on the rustling of the trees in the light breeze, the rich smells of the damp ground and greenery around her. Finally she continued, “We were wedged in tight. We couldn’t open our doors. We couldn’t climb into the back and get out that way. We could barely move. I remember…” She took a shallow breath. “I remember thinking we’d die of thirst.”

“How did you get out?” Dylan asked.

“My mother found us. She and my father were in separate cars, driving all over town looking for us. She noticed a tire mark on the road and investigated. When she saw our car, she thought Jess and I were dead. She scrambled down the hill....” Olivia forced herself to take a few breaths before she went on. “I’ve never seen her so pale, but she didn’t cry or scream or anything once she realized we were alive. But she couldn’t get us out, either. She had to wait for my father to get there with the fire department.”

“That had to be tough for all of you.”

“We were fine, though. As I said, we were lucky. My mother was always a worrier, but she had a hard time after the accident. After a while, we thought things were better, but I realize now we all adjusted to doing what we could to keep her from having to worry.”

Dylan toed a stone loose from the mud. “And you don’t like feeling trapped.”

“Like on an airplane,” she said. “It doesn’t do any good to tell myself it could have been so much worse that day. It was what it was, and I didn’t like being stuck in that damn car, with my sister in pain and upset, knowing my parents were crazed with worry. I don’t play that moment back as much as I used to, but the end result is that I don’t like to fly.”

“It was go into the ditch or have a head-on collision?”

Olivia nodded.

“Habits of thinking and reacting can be hard to break. You did good, Olivia. You survived, but you weren’t uninjured.”

“Jess says we suffered a traumatic stress injury. I say we were lucky.”

“Maybe you’re both right. A guy I know took a hard hit in hockey and was permanently disabled. He was ‘lucky’ because he wasn’t paralyzed, but he’ll walk with a limp for the rest of his life and he had to give up his dream of being in the NHL. It was one of those unintentional hits that went wrong. I wasn’t involved, but I watched him get hit. I was sure he’d never walk again. I got stuck in that moment for a while. I held back because of it. I wasn’t all in. I had to rearrange my thinking in order to get back to the game.”

“Did your family attend your games?”

“Some. Not always. They had their own lives. I wasn’t living out their fantasies.”

“But you felt supported?”

Dylan grinned suddenly, sexily. “Yeah, sure.”

Olivia smiled. “We can go treasure hunting now.”

They found the well by an old stone wall in the woods behind the spot where Grace’s cabin had once stood. The opening was covered in wet, rotted leaves, mud, twigs and cobwebs. A beetle scurried past Dylan’s foot, and he saw a fat, brown slug oozing through the muck.

He grinned at Olivia. “I’m not that big on slugs. I’ve lived in a dry climate for a long time.”

“They’re gross but at least they’re harmless.”

He got down on his hands and knees at the edge of the well, then angled a look up at her. “Do you want to dig in first?”

“No way. Whatever’s in this well has nothing to do with me. Grace, Philip Rankin, your father—these are your people, my friend.”

He grabbed a fistful of sodden leaves and tossed it onto the ground next to him. “Right. My people.”