Perfect Family

by Potter, Patricia;

  “I wish that firm had never found me.”

  “No, you don’t, Jessica. You’re too smart not to want to know. You’re too curious. I know it’s all overwhelming. But there’s a lot of good things about the Clements family.”

  “And what side are you on?”

  He raised an eyebrow in question.

  “To sell or not to sell?”

  “I don’t have a side,” Alex replied.

  “You’re just an objective onlooker? Why don’t I believe that?”

  “It’s my job to be objective, to represent the collective will.”

  “And no personal opinion at all?”

  “A good attorney doesn’t have those.”

  “Isn’t that what a good attorney does? Advise?”

  “Only when asked,” he said, his lips quirking up in an attractive smile.

  “Why do I doubt that, too?”

  “Because now you are suspicious of everyone.”

  “Shouldn’t I be?”

  “Ah, Jessica. There are problems and disagreements in every family.”

  “But usually you grow up knowing what they are.”

  “You have good instincts.”

  “That’s why I want to run like hell.”

  Alex raised an eyebrow. “Maybe I misjudged you. I thought you had more gumption than that.”

  Her hackles rose, even though she knew exactly what he was doing.

  “Think about it, Jessica. For Sarah’s sake, if for no other reason.”

  But Sarah had lied to her, too, or at least had withheld some important truths.

  She nodded reluctantly. Just thinking about it held no promises.

  “Now tell me, how do you like Sedona?”

  Alex delivered her back to the casita, then went to his own home.

  After persuading her to at least think about having a role in the family, he’d steered the conversation away, to the history of Sedona, the different peoples who’d lived there. He saw the interest in her eyes, and fanned it. He wanted her fascinated with Sedona. He wanted her in the mix.

  He wanted her trust. Today’s events had made her lose some in Ross. Perhaps even in Sarah.

  He wasn’t sure whether he had built it tonight or destroyed it. But he hadn’t questioned the determination in her eyes when he’d picked her up. She’d been ready to give up everything. Perhaps he’d delayed that decision for a few days. As long, he hoped, as it took to get the DNA tests. And long enough to find out whether she knew anything about the book.

  Alex sure as hell hoped so.

  Jessie packed everything but the clothes she would wear in the morning and the nightshirt she would wear tonight. Then she found herself restless.

  Alex had stirred something in her tonight. He’d surprised her with his knowledge, because it indicated an interest she hadn’t known existed. Oh, he’d previously talked about the recent history of Sedona, about the people who had founded it, but now he talked about the people who’d inhabited the land prior to white settlement.

  She wondered whether he was doing it just to pique her curiosity in Sedona, to deflect any additional questions, or because of any real interest in the subject. Or in her as a person. It was a measure of her newly cultivated skepticism that his motive was the immediate question that came to her mind.

  She’d also been surprised at his defense of Ross.

  Maybe there was more to Alex than she’d first thought. Perhaps he, like the family he served, was adept at hiding behind a facade.

  He’d also expressed more than a little fondness for Sarah. Suddenly, she realized she had not said good-bye to the older woman. She looked at the clock. It was after eleven. And she wanted to leave at sunrise.

  Regret over her thoughtlessness flooded her. But she wasn’t going to change her mind now. She would call Sarah from the airport. She would send a bouquet of flowers as a thank-you.

  Right now, all she wanted was to get home to all that was familiar, all that was safe.

  But still, she couldn’t sleep.

  She put on the slacks and knit shirt she’d planned to wear to the airport and went outside. The rock formations were framed by a hauntingly beautiful full moon. Wispy clouds wandered past it, trailing tiny pieces of lace. The stars were so bright she felt she could reach up and touch them.

  Familiar and safe.

  Exotic and dangerous.

  She needed one. She feared being seduced by the other.

  fifteen

  ATLANTA, GEORGIA

  Jessie unlocked the door to her cottage in Atlanta and went inside. She closed the door, locked it, and leaned against the wall.

  Home.

  But it didn’t feel like home. Not now.

  Everything was quiet. Too quiet. Ben was still with Sol. That would be her next stop. Once he was home, everything would be back to normal. She could retreat back to a safe and tranquil life. Or would she ever feel safe here again? She remembered coming home only a couple of weeks earlier and finding the place in shambles.

  Her gaze traveled over the interior, to the furniture she’d gradually accumulated. Nothing out of place. Her remaining carousel horses still sat atop the mantel. Her plants still looked healthy despite days of neglect. So did the garden outside. She ached to go out and work in it, to bury her hands in the dirt and her thoughts in physical activity.

  A few days. A lifetime.

  Was this how Alice felt when she woke up from her adventure?

  Except she didn’t know how she felt. She wondered whether she would ever sort out the past several days and her instinctive affinity for the Southwest and her ambiguity toward the Clements family. Her compass had gone awry, and the needle was spinning. She had worked hard for a place to belong, and had convinced herself that Atlanta, and the shop, were it. She’d shoved aside those shadows of loneliness and doubt and told herself she was content, and that was all she needed. But the cottage no longer seemed like home. Even the lush green she’d once loved seemed overblown after the stark, dry beauty of northern Arizona.

  Perhaps she would feel … easier when she had Ben.

  She went to the phone and called Sol at the bookstore.

  He answered on the first ring.

  “Sol?”

  “Jessie.” His voice sounded good. Normal. Familiar.

  “I’m home. Is Ben with you?”

  “Of course. He won’t leave my side. Until you arrive, of course.”

  “I’ll be right over. I’ll stay until closing time. You deserve a break.”

  “Me? If anyone does, you do. That was a short vacation.”

  She hesitated, then asked, “Any more trouble?”

  “No. Did you expect more?” His voice was different, concerned.

  “No. Of course not.”

  “We will have tea when you get here. I’ll put it on.”

  Familiar ground again. Sol loved tea. They had a little hot plate just for that reason. He would have made a great Englishman with his wont for tea, his love of books, and even his dress.

  “I’ll look forward to it.”

  Jessie replaced the phone in the cradle. Sol would also be full of questions. He took his role as surrogate uncle seriously.

  She bit her lip. Why did she still feel this restlessness? Why did she feel a loneliness stronger than ever before? She had been lonely in the past. Many, many times, but not like this. Not a piercing, stabbing pain. She’d had a taste of something more, of something she’d always wanted. The need for more petrified her.

  The store, when she reached it, looked reassuringly normal. The scent of some exotic tea greeted her, along with frantic barking and a warm tongue washing over her.

  “He doesn’t say hello to me like that,” Sol observed mournfully.

  Jessie kneeled and buried herself in Ben’s fur coat. A rug with a head on it. That was the apt description that one customer had given the dog.

  But it was such a beloved rug, and such a dear head.

  “I missed you,” she whispered. />
  “What about me?” asked a grumpy voice.

  Reluctantly, she released Ben and stood. She went over to Sol, who was sitting behind his desk. She leaned down and hugged him, too. “You don’t feel as furry,” she observed solemnly.

  “Thank God for that,” Sol said.

  Jessie smiled.

  He looked at her carefully. “Do you want to tell me about it?”

  She sat in the cheap second chair. The store was small and crammed with books. There was no leisurely sitting area like some of the large bookstores. Customers who wanted to scan a book simply took a seat on the staircase, which led up to an equally book-crowded upper room. Since most of the customers were regulars from the university, they felt comfortable doing just that. Jessie weighed what she wanted to tell Sol. “It was … interesting.”

  “Just interesting?”

  “Complicated,” she amended.

  “Is that good? Or bad?”

  “I don’t know. It’s a very complex family. There’s even someone running for the Senate.”

  “I know,” he said. “I’ve been reading about him.”

  She should have known. Sol was a walking encyclopedia. He read everything, and even the mention of a Clements would have sent him to a computer to investigate.

  “What do you think?” she asked.

  “About the congressman?”

  “Yes.”

  “He has a conservative record,” Sol replied in a noncommittal tone.

  In Sol’s world, that was an insult. He was proud to be a liberal. He bore her middle-of-the-road independence with a soul-weary patience, convinced that one day he would lead her onto the path of righteousness.

  “He’s very personable,” she offered.

  “Most politicians are,” he mumbled. “What about the others?”

  “Sarah, who is Harding’s sister, is very nice.”

  “And the attorney who came here?” A gleam was in his eye.

  “Nice, too.”

  “Just nice?”

  Sol had been trying to matchmake since she’d first started working for him. “Are you trying to get rid of me?”

  Something like dismay crossed his face. “Never. I just want you to have a life other than the store. You can’t keep hiding forever,” he said quietly.

  His words were like a hammer hitting her in the chest. “I haven’t been hiding,” she defended herself.

  “I know it when I see it, Jessie,” he said. “I’ve been hiding since my wife died. But at least I had her for twenty years. I had my taste of love. Now I’m content enough, but you’ve never had your chance.”

  Jessie dug her fingers into Ben’s fur and tried to change the subject. “How has business been?”

  Sol sighed. “Good. And no, I’m not going to let you change the subject. Tell me about the Clementses.”

  “I don’t even know that the Clementses are my family,” she argued, as much to herself as to him.

  “You told me on the phone you believed so.”

  “That doesn’t make it so.”

  “When will the DNA tests come back?”

  “This week, I think.”

  He was silent, waiting in his own patient way for her to continue.

  Her hands dug deeper into Ben’s fur. “There’s an inheritance,” she said finally.

  He lifted an eyebrow.

  “It’s a share in the ranch.”

  “You don’t sound happy about it.”

  “I’m not. I’m not even supposed to know about it. Not until it’s proven I am a Clements.”

  He shook his head. “You must be the only person in history who’s unhappy with finding out she’s an heiress.”

  “Most of the family wants to sell the ranch. One doesn’t. If I inherit, I have the deciding vote.”

  He blinked.

  “I don’t want it, Sol. I liked Sarah, but I don’t feel a part of the family. I don’t have the right to make a decision like that.”

  “And so you came back.”

  “Yes. I can’t help thinking that the burglaries must have had something to do with it, but I can’t imagine what.”

  “You said there were mysteries,” he said.

  “And I’m no closer to solving them. I was going to the county seat today but … I wanted to come home.”

  His eyes told her that he knew she had come running home. “Why don’t we close early tonight, and I’ll make you and Ben supper?”

  She knew he would squeeze more information from her. He was a fine listener. She wasn’t sure how much she could tell him, or how much she would hold in her heart. But she didn’t want to be home alone tonight. And Sol was a very good cook. He had a way with spaghetti sauce that would make an Italian matriarch green with envy.

  “I would love that,” she said. “Now tell me about the burglary.”

  “I think I told you everything. You should check your desk and see if anything is missing.”

  The bell on the door tinkled, and a customer entered. She let Sol handle it while she went to her desk in a cluttered corner behind Sol’s. Ben went with her, huddling as close to her legs as he could manage. He whined with contentment.

  She opened the main desk drawer. She’d never locked it for the simple reason that she never put anything there she wanted to keep secret. Now she wished she had, although whoever burglarized the shop probably would have forced it open.

  The interior was a mess. Papers crumpled. Containers of paper clips spilled, business cards torn. She looked in the back of the drawer. She kept a separate set of keys there. It was gone.

  Her heart stopped for a moment. The set included keys to her house, car, shop, and safe-deposit box.

  She waited until he finished with the customer, who left happily with a rare book on the Boxer Rebellion in China. Jessie remembered when he’d ordered it weeks earlier and how difficult it had been to locate.

  She tried to think of anything but what she’d just discovered.

  Sol returned to the back. “What’s wrong?”

  “My keys are missing.” Her voice was strained.

  He frowned, and she realized he probably didn’t even know she had kept a spare set at the office. She’d once misplaced her keys in the shop when a customer came in right after she unlocked it. She’d spent half a day trying to find them, and the next time she’d seen a key duplicating machine, she’d had several copies made.

  “Your house key?” he asked.

  “That among others.”

  “We’ll have those locks changed this afternoon,” he said. “I’ll cook over at your house.”

  She nodded. “There was also a key to the shop.”

  “Whoever took it obviously didn’t need it to get in,” he said wryly. “But I’ll have the locks changed here as well. Anything else?”

  “There was a key to the car, the file cabinets, and a safe-deposit box.”

  “Safe-deposit box?”

  “The old primer,” she said. “The one you advised me to protect.” That was, in fact, how she met Sol. She had brought the book to Sol, and he’d told her that while it held a moderate value now, it could someday be worth a great deal more. It hadn’t mattered to her. She had not planned to sell it in any event, but her father’s words had lingered in her mind. He had told her to protect it. She’d wanted to know why. Sol’s assessment had satisfied her. Maybe her father had not realized that something that old would not be as valuable as he’d thought.

  But she had put it in a safe-deposit box. It had been the last thing she could do for him.

  She saw the question in Sol’s eyes.

  “It’s just an old book,” she said. Then she remembered the odd question from Sarah. Did he leave any personal effects? Photos? Books?

  For some reason, she hadn’t mentioned the primer.

  Her home. Her business. Her hotel room. All invaded.

  “You don’t think anyone could be after the primer?” She finally put voice to the question in both their minds.

  “I
can’t understand why,” he said. “It’s not worth enough to commit a crime over. And you say you might receive an inheritance. They looked for you to give you something, not to take it away.”

  “Did they?” she asked, suddenly in doubt. Had they looked for her father because they wanted a vote on the ranch? Or an old book? She felt chilled.

  “Why don’t we look at the book again?” he asked. “I’ll get a friend who specializes in that field to join us. In the meantime …”

  For the next few minutes, they called locksmiths until they found one willing to come first to the shop, then to her house. Sol reached out and put his hand on hers. “I’ll get some groceries while you wait here. Then we’ll both go with him to your house.”

  Ben barked.

  Sol chuckled, breaking some of the tension. “He approves. I actually think he’s trying to talk to me.”

  And Ben was, Jessie knew. He would sit and make little growling, grumbling sounds as if he were carrying on a perfectly natural conversation. If she didn’t understand, well, that was her loss. He would keep talking anyway. How she’d missed him.

  She also knew that Sol was trying to make her relax. She realized then that her hands were locked together, her fingers intertwined. They were pressing down on the desk.

  “Will you be all right?” he asked.

  “Yes, of course,” she said, unwinding her fingers. She wasn’t entirely sure of that, but she didn’t want him to know it. He’d said she’d been hiding. Perhaps she had. Perhaps it was time to come out of the shadows. “I have Ben,” she said.

  “That’s what worries me,” he said. He went to the door, then turned around to make sure. She nodded.

  He left for the grocery store down the street. She started to straighten the top drawer of the desk. A customer came in, one she hadn’t seen before, and for the first time she felt apprehension. She pushed it aside and went over to him. She wasn’t going to succumb to fear.

  “Can I help you with anything?”

  “A friend told me you had a fine selection of Civil War books,” he said.

  She showed him those shelves, then retreated to her desk. Ben had moved with her, right on her heels. She watched the customer out of the corner of her eye. He somehow looked out of place. He didn’t have the laid-back, casual air of most of their customers from the university. He had the look of a bodybuilder, not the sedentary slouch of a professor, and his blue eyes were a little too sharp, as if they’d been trained to notice everything. She also noticed they didn’t smile when his lips did.