Bad Heiress Day

by Allie Pleiter

  I love you. I’ve always loved you. Your mother has always loved you, even when she couldn’t show it anymore. God loves you always. I will love you forever, sweetheart, beyond the 12th of Never.

  Love,

  Dad

  Darcy closed the pages, her face streaming with tears. “Oh, Daddy,” she said quietly, and dissolved into sobs on Kate’s shoulder.

  Chapter 3

  Little Orphan Heiress

  The little red Miata pulled into the driveway just after eleven. The living room lights were off, but Darcy could still see the TV’s flickering colors. She wondered which James Bond movie—Jack’s favorite indulgence from the video store—he had chosen. Live and Let Die, most likely, or maybe even You Only Live Twice, because that one started with James Bond’s own funeral.

  “You have Jack to help you with this. That man’s a dream. And me. I’m dreamy too, aren’t I?” Kate put her arm around Darcy. “Dar, you’re going to be okay. You know that, don’t you?”

  “No.” Darcy let her head fall back against the car seat.

  “Look,” said Kate, “why don’t you let me take the kids tomorrow morning so you and Jack have some time to sort this out. They’ve canceled soccer practice and Thad is going nuts because I won’t let him turn on the TV.” Kate rubbed her eyes, and Darcy thought for the first time how long this day had been for her, too. “I don’t want him seeing all the stuff that’s on right now—some paper showed a photo of someone jumping from the Twin Towers yesterday.” She shook her head. “Everybody needs a distraction—something normal feeling. The kids can get together and play and then I’ll take them out for pizza.”

  The images from the paper had left Darcy feeling cold herself. “The gates of hell” one fireman in New York City had called it. Her father was to have spent his last day at the gates of heaven, not watching the gates of hell open up in New York City and Washington, D.C. It killed her inside to know that such a gruesome day had been Dad’s last hours on earth. Cruel.

  “Dar…?”

  “Yeah. That’s probably a good idea.”

  “I’ll pick them up at nine-thirty. Go get some sleep. It’ll all still be here in the morning. All of it.”

  Darcy picked up the chicken bucket and the bank box from off her lap. She sat still for a moment. “Thanks.”

  Kate just nodded.

  Jack looked up to see Darcy coming through the front door, her hands full of clothes and boxes. She looked better. Exhausted, spent, but some of the tension had eased from her shoulders. He’d have to thank Ed Parrot for his suggestion next time he saw him.

  Darcy tilted the boxes so that the bucket of chicken slid to the coffee table in front of Jack. “Let me guess,” he said, pulling off the lid, “extra crispy, all drumsticks.”

  She smiled, sort of. “There’s even a few left. Dig in.” There was an explosion on the television and she turned to it. “Let me guess, Live and Let Die or You Only Live Twice?”

  Jack grinned. “Both. It’s been that kind of day. Plus, it was two-for-one at the video store.” They knew each other so well. He paused in thought before asking softly, “How are you?”

  Darcy kept staring at the television. “I don’t know. Okay, I suppose. But not really. Tired.”

  An idea struck him. “Go get your pajamas on and come watch. The bad guy is just about to reveal his plan for world domination.” They used to do it all the time. Zap up a bucket of popcorn and watch Bond flicks in their pajamas.

  Darcy returned, clad in soft pink cotton, and sat down beside him. Without a word, he wrapped one arm around her. With his other arm he pulled the throw from off the back of the couch and tugged it over her. She lay her head on his lap and exhaled. He felt her soften against him as he stroked the blond waves of her hair. How long had it been since they’d had time to do this?

  Just as the last drumstick was gone and 007 was getting his girl, Jack looked down at Darcy to notice she’d fallen asleep. Her breathing was soft and peaceful. The knots gone from her shoulders as she lay against him.

  When the movie was over, he hit the VCR remote and watched the blank blue glow of the TV screen fill the room. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and legs and picked her up. Jack held her there for a moment, the sensation taking him back. Back to when they were younger, before kids and middle school and dying parents and flaming office buildings. They would watch Bond movies on the couch and Darcy would always fall asleep. Always just half an hour before the end. The feeling of her asleep against him was warm and familiar. He’d scoop her up on those nights, like he did just now, and carry her to the bedroom.

  There, in the blue glow, that younger woman returned. So much had changed. It’d been months since he’d seen her look like that. She’d been exhausted and beaten down by the endless care of her dad. It was like the life was draining out of both of them at the same time. She’d aged a dozen years in the last two months. Their life had dwindled down to Paul and everything else fell second to him.

  And so much of everything else fell second to him.

  She smelled of chocolate. They’d been to Graeter’s. Mint chocolate chip, if he knew her.

  And he did. There was a small smudge of it at the corner of her mouth.

  He kissed her forehead softly. She made a soft sound that hummed through him. No matter how unfair to Paul, Jack yearned to be the most important man in her life again.

  “Movie’s over,” he said quietly.

  They lay together later in the moonlight, listening to the night sounds waft through the open window. The moon had seemed harsh and cold when she’d been up nights with Paul. Now, the light poured rich and creamy through the window to play across Jack’s shoulders. She laid her hand on his chest and turned to rest her chin on it. Jack put an arm behind his head so he could look into her face. He smiled as he fingered a lock of her hair.

  “Jack?”

  “Hmm?”

  “There’s something I need to tell you.”

  “You’ve been spending your nights with another man.” It was a tasteless joke, but somehow Darcy was glad for the irreverence. Everything had been so very serious for so very long.

  She swatted him softly with her free hand. He caught it in his and held it. “No, seriously. There was something in Dad’s safety deposit box. About the money.”

  That got his attention. “More stuff we didn’t know?”

  “Well, not exactly. It was a letter. From Dad to me. For me to open after he died.”

  “The guy had a flair for drama.”

  Darcy couldn’t suppress a small smile. “This does sound like a bad novel, doesn’t it?” She paused, formulating the right words in her head. She hadn’t even wrapped her own mind around her father’s request, much less figure out how to explain it to Jack. “I’m not sure I even get it myself.”

  Jack cocked an eyebrow, encouraging her to go on.

  “Well, for starters, he told me where the money came from. It was from a settlement on Mom’s accident. She sued the old man who hit her—or at least started to—before she died.” Darcy’s throat tightened a bit at the thought of her mother, so bitter, angry and hopeless.

  “I had a feeling that’s where it came from. Your dad was tight with a buck, but all that couldn’t have come from just clipping coupons. I figured it was from insurance settlements, though, not from lawsuits. Paul doesn’t seem the suing type.”

  “There was a time when he was. Or Mom convinced him to be. He says—said—he tried to stop her.” Darcy still couldn’t get used to talking about her father in the past tense.

  “And…” Jack was trying to help her, but somehow that only seemed to make it harder.

  “They cleaned out the guy who hit her—he had no insurance. Once they got the money, though, Mom was already too far gone. Dad stopped wanting it, I guess. Hated what the lawsuit did to him, how it only ruined another life. Oh, I still don’t really get it. But he ended up promising her he’d never give it away.”

  “So, what? He ju
st hid it?”

  “That’s a good way to put it, I suppose. He hid it. All these years. Never touched it.”

  “Well, at least he had the good sense to find an interest-bearing hiding place.”

  “I suppose. It seems sad, in a way.”

  “It’s amazing when you think of it. All that money, just waiting, sitting. If I ever wanted to teach Mike about the magic of compound interest, I’ve got the ultimate real-life example. I’ve been thinking a lot about this Dar, and we’re going to have to do some serious research on how to manage it. The stock market is already taking a nosedive from the attack, and if we go to war, who knows what will happen? There’s a guy at work who’s really into all that stuff—”

  “Jack,” Darcy stopped him. “There’s more.”

  “Okay.”

  “He asked me to give it away.”

  Jack’s eyes flew wide open. “He what?”

  “The letter asks me not to keep the money, but to give it away. He couldn’t—he’d promised Mom—but I can. At least that’s how he put it.”

  Darcy could feel Jack’s chest tighten under her. Hadn’t she had the same reaction when she read the letter? “Well, that takes a lot of nerve. After all you’ve been through, after keeping it from you—from us—in the first place.”

  “I know, I’m sick to death of bombshells going off around here.”

  “Let me get this straight.” Jack’s hand left hers to rub across his eyes. “Your dad leaves you a small fortune, but you have to give it away? First you play nurse, now you have to play Santa Claus? I tell you, Dar…”

  “I think he had good intentions.”

  “I’ve got a thing or two to say about his methods.”

  “I’m still not sure just why….”

  “I just don’t get it. Was he not in the room when we were talking about struggling to find college money for the kids? It hasn’t exactly been easy street around here since you quit your part-time job at the library so you could spend more time with him. You practically shut down your life—our life—to take care of him. And he pays us back with a stunt like this? Who does this to their own daughter?”

  Darcy slid off Jack and sat up, her own anger growing. It wasn’t fair. This was a lousy thing to do, no matter how many dollar signs or good intentions were involved. “I don’t know, Jack. I don’t get it. I’ve read the letter a dozen times and I still don’t get it. Why on earth did he need to pile this on top of everything else I’ve had to handle?”

  Jack pulled himself up to a sitting position, his elbow jabbed onto one bent knee. “I’ve put up with a lot from your dad over the years, Dar. I’ve put up with his weird mission trips and Bible speeches and all the cancer stuff and who knows what else, but this takes the cake.” He stared right at Darcy. “Since when is it okay to be religious and deceptive at the same time?”

  Darcy could only repeat the phrase that had been echoing in her head all day, “I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.”

  “Darcy, it’s Aunt Jenny.”

  Oh, no. Not Aunt Jenny. This woman had single-handedly started dozens of family arguments.

  “Good morning, Aunt Jenny,” was all Darcy could manage, still holding a box of Pop-Tarts in her other hand. She could already hear the usual hurt edge in the woman’s voice.

  “I just had to call and ask, what were you thinking, child? How could you be so hurtful to the rest of your family? You know we couldn’t get there for the memorial service. They’ve only just now opened up the airports again. Honestly.”

  “Look, Aunt Jenny, I know…” Darcy picked up a Handi Wipes and began mopping up crumbs in an effort to keep from jumping down Aunt Jenny’s throat.

  “You know I would have wanted to be there. We’re all that Paul had left. Would it have killed you to put off the service until the family could come pay their respects?”

  All that Paul had left, huh? “Aunt Jenny…” For a second, she considered that hanging up might be the wisest course of action—she was sure to say something she’d regret if Aunt Jenny kept it up.

  “I just wanted to ask how you could be so inconsiderate. Why, Charles is just livid.” Darcy could imagine just how livid Uncle Chuck could be. The man rarely got off his La-Z-Boy for anything. One of Aunt Jenny’s favorite tactics was to project her self-righteous anger onto Chuck—whom everyone knew to be permanently disinterested—as if he were some sort of emotional ventriloquist’s dummy. Darcy doubted that Chuck had done much more than hoist a beer in her dad’s honor and tell Jenny to go buy a nice card and send flowers.

  And she hadn’t even done that much.

  Darcy wrung out the cloth, trying not to visualize it as Jenny’s neck. “There didn’t seem to be much point in waiting. We didn’t know how long travel would be disrupted. We can always have a nice little family service in the summer.”

  “How very convenient for you. I don’t see the hurry in all this.”

  Darcy whirled around at the harshness of the woman’s words, the phone cord knocking over a glass of juice Paula had left too near the edge of the counter. Her patience shattered with the glass. “I’m sorry you’re upset, Aunt Jenny, but Dad had said his goodbyes. Perhaps you should have paid your respects to him while he was still alive.” She hadn’t intended to be so cruel, but her anger at all the people who stayed away because it was hard to be with Dad came tumbling out. Jenny had never come. Not once in two years. “You never once came to visit him while he was sick, why start now?”

  Jack looked up from the breakfast nook and began to ease himself off the chair. Aunt Jenny’s wounded silence filled the phone. Darcy shut her eyes, fighting for control. Acting like this wouldn’t solve anything. She didn’t fight Jack when he took the phone from her hands.

  “Jenny, perhaps we should leave this conversation for another day. You can understand it has been a hard time.”

  “Jack, I’d have thought you would have been—” came the woman’s shrill voice through the receiver.

  “I’m sorry, Jenny, but Darcy and I have an appointment and we really need to go.”

  Darcy shut her eyes. She heard Jack mutter something less than kind as he thrust the handset back into the cradle.

  “You knew she’d react that way,” he said as he bent over the broken glass, picking shards out of the puddle of orange juice with his fingers.

  Darcy sniffed. “I can hope.”

  “It’s gonna get worse when she finds out about the money.”

  “She’s not going to find out about the money,” Darcy replied. It was hard enough to deal with her own reaction, she wasn’t going to add vicious Aunt Jenny into the mix. “Dar—”

  “I’m not dealing with her. Not now. She’s been invisible for two years, she doesn’t get to show up and play loving sister now.”

  “Yes, I know she’s horrible, but she was horrible before. She’s always been—”

  Darcy cut him off. “Who’s side are you on, anyway?”

  He tossed the shards into the garbage. “Yours. Ours. But we’re all just going to have to try to be reasonable….”

  “Don’t do that!” Darcy snapped. She wasn’t ready to be reasonable. She’d been reasonable and responsible and reliable for months, and she’d been repaid with deception and death. There was nothing reasonable about that. She’d earned the right to act out. To be unreasonable.

  But not to Jack. For God’s sake, he didn’t deserve this. She wasn’t handling this well. Tears tightened her throat.

  “Jack, I’m…”

  “Not handling this well,” he said softly, as he stepped over the juice puddle to take her in his arms. “But it’s only your first week on tour as Little Orphan Heiress.” He’d coined the term late last night after they lay in bed talking. It was so crass, so full of disrespect for the situation at hand, that it made her laugh. Awful but truthful. She should have slapped him on the cheek for the hideous remark, but somehow she loved him for daring to say it. For the absurd honesty of it. “We’ve got a lot to work ou
t here, and that last remnant of your bonkers family isn’t helping.” He kissed her forehead. “But I’m on your side, here, remember?”

  “No, I’m on the side. You’re standing in the middle of the orange juice.”

  Chapter 4

  Comfortably Drastic

  Despite death and national security, Monday came.

  After seeing everyone off to work and school, Darcy sat alone in the quiet of her deserted kitchen, watching the steam make graceful curls out of her teacup. The frenzied desperation of the last week had filtered down to a kind of dead calm. A low tide, still and dry. Darcy remembered the feeling from her childhood home on the Gulf Coast. A flat void of mud and tidal leftovers, baking to a slightly foul smell in the hot summer afternoon.

  Low tide.

  If life had a low tide, she had hit it.

  Her dad was right about one thing: the money meant almost nothing in the face of her life’s tangled messes. It offered no real comfort, just complication. Darcy wondered if the odd sensation of useless abundance had struck her father when the lawsuit had been won. Money, she guessed, was a poor substitute for a living wife. She sure knew it was a poor substitute for a living father.

  The house gaped open and empty around her. She wondered, aimlessly, when the last time was she washed this bathrobe? Or when was the last time she’d bought anything new for the house? Had a haircut? Put on lipstick?

  The idea rose in her chest and surfaced with a small, quiet, pop. Today was Monday. Mike had science club, Paula had dance lessons. And, for once, it was everybody else’s turn to carpool. She cast a hopeful eye at the kitchen calendar, grateful to see a blank square. She had the whole day.